Daily writing prompts from June 9th, 2008 to December 31st, 2022
Monday June 24th, 2019
The exercise: Now that I've finally added to last month's post, let us revisit Empires. With a whole week to spare before the end of the month. Sigh. Apologies, I'm trying to get things back on track around here.
Well done on getting to this so early in the week! Well, looking back over Empires it feels like we had got a lot better at writing at pace and handling each other's ideas as they were introduced. Certainly compared with the first year we tried it, there's a huge difference. This time round we even managed a kind of epilogue in December, which means our pacing was much more on point. What this suffers from though is occasional lapses of continuity, which I think are much less obvious when we're just writing one month at a time. When I re-read it all I can see that Stacey has never been inside the hospital until the story starts, but two-thirds of the way through the year she has memories of things only Ben has seen. The morgue doors go from being heavy rubber one month to thick metal two months later (needed to explain the loss of connection, but still an error on our (collective) part. And the fact that we don't know up front what we're writing towards shows up most apparently here, with the goal changing from "what is the Mayor up to?" to "what is the secret in the hospital?" to "the Mayor wants to build an army of super-soldiers" to "the baby machine must be protected even though we don't know what it is or does". Given all that, it's a bit surprising how satisfying the ending turns out to be! So overall I'm saying that this is a B, while the Dream Kingdom was a B+, but I think we've every opportunity to reach an A doing this :)
Empires, Epilogue "This is a paddling pool!" "It's a birthing pool, Stacey." Ana's voice was calm where Stacey's was panicked. The two women, one pregnant and the other athletic, were standing on the gently sloped terrace behind their house. Indoors, Ben and David were pretending not to hear the shouting match that the women were pretending was a discussion. "I'm not giving birth in that!" "It's not like you have a lot of choice. If we call an ambulance when your waters break it'll probably be here in time to christen the baby. We're a three-hour drive to the nearest supermarket, and three and a half to the hospital." "I can go and check in the week before I'm due. We can afford it." "And where will you hide the egg?" There was a moment's silence. "I was going to tell you." "We share most of our thoughts, Stacey." "I didn't share when I was with the egg." "Your dreams told me. I might have ignored them as just one of those twin things, except I woke up from one of your dreams and found myself kneeling next to the egg and stroking it. That was when I knew the dreams were based on memories." "Oh. I'm sorry." "I'm not. I think this was inevitable. But, Stacey?" "What?" "What do think you're going to give birth to?" "...I don't know, Ana."
"Do you think he's still looking for us?" Stacey asked, wanting to change the subject from thing near to things distant.
"I've seen no signs that anything might be amiss back in the Falls," Ana replied. She'd risked a few carefully worded internet searches in various coffee shops, telling herself all the while that the sweat on her brow was due to ineffective air conditioning. "No cancelled Council meetings, no staff turnover in the mayor's office..."
"... and no press conferences about missing fugitives," Stacey pointed out. "If he's hunting us he's doing it quietly. We're not going to see him coming."
"Stacey, we see everyone coming." Ana looked at the long, clear stretch of road running from their beach house up the coast. "Besides, he has no idea we're here - we were exceptionally careful."
"But what if.." Stacey stopped, unable to voice a fear that had been growing within her apace with the child in her womb.
"What is it?"
"What if.." Stacey swallowed hard, then forced herself to continue. "What if the egg tells him where to find it?"
2 comments:
Well done on getting to this so early in the week! Well, looking back over Empires it feels like we had got a lot better at writing at pace and handling each other's ideas as they were introduced. Certainly compared with the first year we tried it, there's a huge difference. This time round we even managed a kind of epilogue in December, which means our pacing was much more on point.
What this suffers from though is occasional lapses of continuity, which I think are much less obvious when we're just writing one month at a time. When I re-read it all I can see that Stacey has never been inside the hospital until the story starts, but two-thirds of the way through the year she has memories of things only Ben has seen. The morgue doors go from being heavy rubber one month to thick metal two months later (needed to explain the loss of connection, but still an error on our (collective) part. And the fact that we don't know up front what we're writing towards shows up most apparently here, with the goal changing from "what is the Mayor up to?" to "what is the secret in the hospital?" to "the Mayor wants to build an army of super-soldiers" to "the baby machine must be protected even though we don't know what it is or does". Given all that, it's a bit surprising how satisfying the ending turns out to be!
So overall I'm saying that this is a B, while the Dream Kingdom was a B+, but I think we've every opportunity to reach an A doing this :)
Empires, Epilogue
"This is a paddling pool!"
"It's a birthing pool, Stacey." Ana's voice was calm where Stacey's was panicked. The two women, one pregnant and the other athletic, were standing on the gently sloped terrace behind their house. Indoors, Ben and David were pretending not to hear the shouting match that the women were pretending was a discussion.
"I'm not giving birth in that!"
"It's not like you have a lot of choice. If we call an ambulance when your waters break it'll probably be here in time to christen the baby. We're a three-hour drive to the nearest supermarket, and three and a half to the hospital."
"I can go and check in the week before I'm due. We can afford it."
"And where will you hide the egg?"
There was a moment's silence.
"I was going to tell you."
"We share most of our thoughts, Stacey."
"I didn't share when I was with the egg."
"Your dreams told me. I might have ignored them as just one of those twin things, except I woke up from one of your dreams and found myself kneeling next to the egg and stroking it. That was when I knew the dreams were based on memories."
"Oh. I'm sorry."
"I'm not. I think this was inevitable. But, Stacey?"
"What?"
"What do think you're going to give birth to?"
"...I don't know, Ana."
"Do you think he's still looking for us?" Stacey asked, wanting to change the subject from thing near to things distant.
"I've seen no signs that anything might be amiss back in the Falls," Ana replied. She'd risked a few carefully worded internet searches in various coffee shops, telling herself all the while that the sweat on her brow was due to ineffective air conditioning. "No cancelled Council meetings, no staff turnover in the mayor's office..."
"... and no press conferences about missing fugitives," Stacey pointed out. "If he's hunting us he's doing it quietly. We're not going to see him coming."
"Stacey, we see everyone coming." Ana looked at the long, clear stretch of road running from their beach house up the coast. "Besides, he has no idea we're here - we were exceptionally careful."
"But what if.." Stacey stopped, unable to voice a fear that had been growing within her apace with the child in her womb.
"What is it?"
"What if.." Stacey swallowed hard, then forced herself to continue. "What if the egg tells him where to find it?"
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