Friday Five First Sentences Challenge– 10/27/06

Here we go again.

1. There was no way in hell she was going to the opera.
2. Three hundred years had passed since the banishment of the War God and now the cracks in the world were truly starting to show.
3. Shaina had made up her mind; she was definitely, probably going with decaf this morning.
4. Bill was going to kill his brother.
5. Taylor watched in horror as the crack slowly crawled across her windshield, forking in the middle and branching out like two great arms in some desperate plea.

Now it’s your turn…

Tags: Friday Five 1rst sentences, writing, fiction, meme, bloghopping

Friday Five First Sentences

It’s that time again.

1. She had waited so long her fingers fingers were numb.
2. The drip-drip-dripping in the otherwise peaceful afternoon was slowly driving Dale mad.
3. It had been terribly long since Shelly had been tired of rain, but now after 30 days, 13 hours and 22 minutes, she was tired of rain again.
4. The secret was out and Tess loved a good secret.
5. Spider had picked up knitting in prison, or so he had said.

Now it’s your turn.

Tags: Friday Five 1rst Sentences, writing, fiction

Friday Five First Sentences — Back By Popular Demand

So, I used to try to do “this thing” every Friday way back when (before I knew what memes were) as a writing exercise.

What’s “this thing“, you ask?

Is it some weird cult thing? (That’s a fair question from the few people who know I grew up in New Orleans and went to a few Voodoo rituals.)

Naw, it’s fairly safe, though mentally challenging. It’s good for the writer’s soul.

A long time ago, in a city far far away, I had a writing circle where I encouraged the group to write five sentences that could be the first sentences of a story or novel. The intent is to draw readers in, to make them want to know more. The first sentence of short stories and novels and articles should grab the reader and make him or her unable to close the book and toss it away.

So, the object of this exercise or meme is to write five sentences that could be the first sentences of different stories each Friday and share them by posting them either here in the comments or on your own blog and post a link in the comments that you did so.

More

Tags: Friday Five 1rst Sentences, meme, bloghopping, writing, fiction, NaNoWriMo

Writing: Alone in the Black

This is Izzy’s introductory post in the PBeM I joined.

Who: Izzy
Where: cockpit of the Tianlong

She’d crashed once. During the war.

That had been an unpleasant experience to say the least. Her fighter had taken an unlucky hit that had knocked out part of her propulsion system and she’d been sent spinning toward the unwelcoming view of a mountainside.

This was worse.

Cold fingers touched her forehead and came away with a sticky, wet substance. Green eyes tried to focus but it occurred to her that there was nothing to focus on. Not when her eyes were closed. Slowly, painfully, she opened her eyes. It didn’t help. The cockpit was dark. Not a single light.

“Gos se,” she whispered, though the sound of her own voice seemed faint. [Chinese translation: Crap.]

Flashes now. Reavers by her guess. She’d heard tell of them — men gone crazy on the edge of space. Wild tales told in unsavory drinking establishments along the Rim. Something had given her a chill the moment she saw the ship, but the captain of the Tianlong had insisted they contact the junk heap of a ship. He was all about making friends on the Rim — a sure sign he’d just arrived from the Core.

It occurred to her that she was floating well off of the floor of the ship. That meant the gravity was out as well as the power. She took a slow cold breath as it occurred to her that the air was probably shot as well. She tried to turn but with nothing really to push off of, she was like a fish out of water. Finally she rotated around enough that she could see out of the window.The only light she had was that of distant stars. The view before her had kept her warm at night during her time in prison — just the dream or hope of one more moment in the Black, free — but now…panic.

Around her she could see the floating wreckage of…the Tianlong. More panic set in as she noticed the body of the cook floating next to what appeared to be part of the engine.

That’s when she realized she was alone in the Black. Dead in space like the Tianlong. Well, worse. The question then would be if she bleed to death first or just ran out of air. Perhaps she’d be lucky and freeze to death.

Then again. This was probably better than the Reavers.

Tags: writing, fiction, Firefly, Serenity, Fan Fiction

Writing Sample: Firefly PBeM Audition

I wrote the following to be a writing sample for an audition for a Firefly PBeM game. It’s been a long, long time since I’ve had to audition for a game. Usually I go on reputation because I usually know someone. Izzy is an original character, an ex-ace fighter pilot with a history with both the Alliance and the Independents which left her liking neither.

Izzy pulled her Stetson down low over her brow as she settled into the back corner of the hole in the wall bar. The bottle of whiskey sat on the unfinished table between her and the the off-duty fed squad who’d just joined the usual rabble. The weight of her six-shooter in the hip-holster was heavy against her leg.

She was between jobs and the gorram feds where going to make it harder to find work — honest or not. Not to mention, they’d likely tear this dump apart as the beer flowed. Glancing around, it occurred to her that there weren’t nearly enough doxies in the place to keep the men distracted. Yet she didn’t move except to pour another shot and kick it back. She almost dared any of them to approach her. She hadn’t been in a satisfying fistfight in awhile and it’d be mighty satisfying to beat the crap out of some drunken feds.

The right corner of her lips curled upward as she settled in.

Oh, and I got in. Wish me luck.

Tags: writing, Firefly, Serenity, Fan Fiction, fiction

Farewell To Summer

For some reason the air near the lake always has a different feel to it than then chemical-tainted air at the crowded community pool — cleaner, crisper, more alive, and there is always something special about that first splash into the still, wet mirror of blue sky on a hot Summer day.

Of course, it is always more fun to call it a “swimmin’ hole” and swing on a rope as far out as you can toward the middle of the stillness and pretend you are Tom or Huck in the good ole days after a hot day of pretending to white wash the fence.

No, there is nothing quite like it at all. That moment when your hands let go of the rope and you breathlessly hang mid-air for one weightless moment before falling ever so quickly with your heart in your throat. No changing your mind now. Just downward into the cold, wet, crashing through the stillness and plunging into darkness.

Then as if reason suddenly returns to you and panic sets in, you begin to flail your limbs, pushing and pulling and willing yourself back into the light, bursting upward into the warm Summer air and blinding light, gasping for air to fill your starving lungs.

And for some reason after that first cold splash all heck breaks loose in almost every tree within a hundred yards as if in disturbing the calm of the catfish-infested lake, you have set off some wake-up alarm to rouse every squirrel, bird, and bug within 100 yards.

And slowly as the wildlife goes quiet again, your heart returns to a more familiar beat and you float casually in the water. And you think to yourself, “Could it possibly be better the second time around?”

Nothing else to do but try.

Tags: writing, fiction, Short Story, Summer