An E-Prime Character Intro

Homework for my Writing Class had us writing a page in E-Prime and also beginning to jot down ideas for a Character we'd like to write about.

E-Prime, as explained in the link, has a great deal of potential as a tool to free up the English language from the constraints of too much reliance on the verb to be and with the pleasant side effect of improving readability for a broad range of individuals with difficulties reading contemporary writing.  The example given being persons with English as a Second Language (ESL) who have a difficult time following what is meant by our many subtle uses of the verb.

That sounds good, but writing in that mode takes a great deal of attention as I discovered when I combined the two objectives and wrote a story opening with a heavy focus on the main character and entirely in E-Prime.

The result follows, hit the break to see it and my thoughts on the exercise.

Intro to Fiction Class 1 - It Starts.

You may recall my fiction blurbs from last year, well they are about to resume.  Last week in Intro to Fiction we were given 10 or so minutes to jot down something in 1st Person narrative that would hopefully be intimate to the character.  This is what I threw up on the page:

I stepped out into the dim memory of a beautiful summer afternoon, diminished now to the half-light of coming night.  It was cooler and not least of all for the absence of the glowering sun overhead.

I love this time of the day, it always reminds me of the evenings I spent with my childhood friends many years ago.  How long has it been now since I last stayed out at kevin's place debating which comic book villain was best under an observant graveyard of stars?  Too long.  And yet, who thinks much of comics these days?

With a long breath I exhaled old thoughts and stretched my back, releasing old knots.  Where is that cat?

Furball is usually croaking his tired voice at me before I'm even halfway down memory lane to Kevin's old home.  I keep meaning to let him in before he can annoy the neighbours with his nighttime challenges up and down the neighbourhood and it looks like tonight I'm too early... only, I'm not.

I didn't edit this much, just a few typos and carriage returns, although a whole bunch of it is singing at me right now, not least of which is a little ditty about adverbs and useless words.  That said, it was fun to flex the creative muscle again, even if this one is highly unoriginal.  I also started reading a book on Characterization & Viewpoint by Orson Scott Card which is very insightful.  I'll post whatever I write each week.  Our current assignment is to create a character of some sort so I'll post that soon.

Classes are on Wednesdays so stay tuned!

Route Eighty-Ate

"Hot town, summer in the city..." crooned out of the radio as Lenny bounced along a snowy route 88.  The little Volkswagon was buzzing through the shallow snow drifts up the valley at a pretty good clip but Lenny was worried that if he did stop he wasn't going to get started again.  Visibility in the failing sunlight was low, but it was still better than the blinding glare that he had expected before the snow began to fall in the late afternoon, obscuring the sky.

This job better be worth it, he thought to himself.  It didn't pay a lot and it was way over in Tankerville, a backwater upitty little place through the Deepfoot Valley along Route 88, but heck if it wasn't better than anything he'd found in Thornton.

A pair of dim headlights peaked out of the canvas of falling snow in the oncoming lane and Lenny tightened his grip on the wheel; you never quite expected the full force on the wheel from passing another vehicle in snow this deep.  He idly hoped this one wasn't bigger than an SUV but Lenny wasn't overly worried; he'd driven in bad weather before and he always made it where he was going because of his one simple rule: never, ever stop moving.

Coopertown, Population: Done.

Gary wished he hadn't wasted all that money on life insurance.  Grotesquely, this was the only thing he could think about as he ran across Central Ave in the dead of night carrying a shovel in both hands.  As he passed under the diffused spotlight of a street lamp he caught sight of the blood and brain matter on the blade of the spade.

I bet they had life insurance, thought Gary, fat lot of good it did them.

Just then he noticed he was running straight towards Coopertown Co-operators where their slogan was bannered across the window, "Insure now, for piece of mind!"  Man, had that guy made the most fitting and timely typo in what was proving to be the short history of human civilization.

Depths of Despair

Bubbles streamed behind the submarine as it floated along the sea floor.

"Here it comes everyone," said Dr. Smythe, "New Atlantis!"

As the sub burst over the shelf ledge a glorous blue structure rose over the horizon like a galaxy of lights being born in front of them.

"It's beautiful," said Kelly under her breath.

"Amazing," said Sam, "You built this?"

"Seatech, along with 3 countries and a couple billion dollars, yes."

"How did you overcome the pressure?  What about prolonged exposure to..." began Benjamin.

"Can it guys," said Kelly, "I swear you'd talk during the Sermon on the Mount.".

New Atlantis stretched its tube-like fingers across the viewing window as it grew even larger, bubbles occasionally billowing up the glass from the sub's motion.

"Hang on," said Dr. Smythe quietly, "this should be fun."

The sub rocked gently at first but it quickly grew to a violent shudder as it drastically picked up speed, rushing forward and away from the ledge.

"Don't worry everyone, we just hit a feeder current slip-streaming over the ledge."

"A feeder for what?" asked Benjamin.

"This!"

The sub suddenly plummeted straight down into the trench beyond the ledge.  The pilot brought the nose down to match their trajectory, stopping the lurching; the city scape disappered as the pitch black maw of the trench devoured their view.

To Ear is Human...

The warp core thrummed on its lazy cycle as Geordie LaForge layed under the console beside it performing a diagnostic.  He had been under almost every console in Engineering trying to track down this problem.  it had started about 2 days ago when the Enterprise had finished running some short range scans on a previously unknown type of ringed gas giant.  After they had warped away he had started to notice the differences in the power readouts; just a few points at first, then a few percents, and now getting worse.  As Chief Engineer he was silently seething over it he had no idea what was causing it.

That was when Lt. Barclay entered Engineering whistling an almost familiar tune.

"Good Morning Chief!", exclaimed Barclay, "Fine day to run diagnostics isn't it?"

"Whatever you say Reggie," said Geordie, slightly distracted, something had his mind buzzing but he couldn't put his finger on it.

Childhood Twilight (The Twilight of Childhood?)

"Oh what a save!", Desmond shouted as he rolled over onto the ball, his legs extended into the air.  He had thrown the leg pads up in a desperate attempt to repel Tim's rebound and had succeeded in muting the shot.

"Nice one Des, I thought I had you," said Tim receiving the old tennis ball as Desmond scrabbled up in his 'crease'.  Crease being a fairly accurate description on the canvas covered driveway.  Most of that same driveway was cast in shadows now and the boys could feel the truly good hours of hockey ending and the truly good hours of bonding approach.

Bitter Sweet Treat

His teeth pressed through the firm consistency of the jelly bean as his mouth exploded in saliva.  A moment later, as if it almost had been present before his mouth watered, the sweetly sharp tang of fresh peaches bit into his tongue.  The taste washed over him as he began to chew it into a gummy pulp.  Swallowing, the pulp raced down his throat, chased by a tangy aftertaste.  His mouth grew chalky and robbed of moisture as the poison absorbed into his bloodstream.

"Peach, nice touch," croaked Robert as his throat closed up and he slumped over dead.

The Technologist!

"Bang! Bang!", rang Maxwell's Silver Hammer as it came down upon her head, in two swift blows.

The teller dropped to the ground as the bank erupted in a shower of shrieks and moans.  As the body fell away a sinister smile spread across Maxwell Edison's lips revealing a row of perfect white teeth.

"Anyone else want to reach for any little hidey buttons, cellphones, beepers, guns, or tazers?" His voice rose in pitch as he spoke, sounding feverishly excited as he hit the crescendo, "JUST TRY IT!"

The bank lobby fell to quiet moans and weeping as a pool of blood spread out from Missy, the late teller's, lifeless heap.

"Now Mr. Borrowitz that is a fine idea, yes," he said wryly as he lilted around on the bank manager that had been slying towards the vault room, "Let's get to that money shall we."

-

"The madman Maxwell Edison has seized control of the Utopolis Central Bank building," creaked the ear buds hanging around Tim's neck as he talked on the desk phone in his cube.

"This install will only take about fifteen minutes Mrs. Shaw, I'd just ask that you avoid using the old software until it completes upgrading."

"12 people are visible inside the..." the ear buds continued.

"Not a problem Tim, thanks for calling me back so quickly on a Friday," Mrs. Shaw oozed into the phone.

Tim reflected how pleasant people were when things were going their way.  He knew full well how different they could be when they weren't.

"It's my pleasure, give it about 20 minutes and check for a new icon, if you don't see it, give me a call back."

"Great."

"Have a great weekend Mrs. Shaw."

"You as well!"

This is when the nagging feeling in Tim's mind, present since he had reflected on Mrs. Shaw's reaction, hooked his attention on the ear buds.

"That sounds bad," he mumbled, slipping in the ear buds.

"...presently housing one-hundred million in gold bullion, police expect Maxwell Edison is looking to score big but sources close to the police report they are completely baffled how he plans to escape with it."

"Shit," said Tim, he had started to rise at the name Maxwell.

"...What was that?  Oh my god, we just saw two flashes of light from inside the bank.  That is normally a sign of Maxwell's Silver Hammer and could mean another hostage was just executed!"

"Jesus," said Tim grabbing his coat and running past Soren's cube.

"Hey Soren, check on that install I just started in a half-hour, for PDF Reader.  I gotta grab a coffee!"

"Ya, no problem, what is it life and death coffee?!", yelled Soren down the hall.

"It might be," said Tim to himself as he hit the stairwell running.

Heart Race

The world moved, and his mind was still.  He found this therapeutic and looked forward to it more and more these days.  Troubles seemed to cloud his thoughts of late and the detachment of his newly favourite past time helped to sort it all out.

Something streaked by on his left and he knew it was time to "thread the needle" as he had heard it called.  This part he just liked for the sheer thrill of it.

Quickly he careened to the right a few degrees and counted the heartbeats to the turn.

Eight, nine, now!


He dug his toes in and dragged himself into the turn with his front limbs, only to immediately twist to the left and kick his back half around into a 90° turn.

Oh yeah!  Now to give it some speed!

Windmilling like an Olympic rowing team his sleek body quickly regained his speed just in time for the second dogleg, but not before he buzzed by Tim's seat in a blur.

"For Pete's sake Smokie, lay off!  It's late!" Tim cried out in surprise, clutching the arm of his big comfortable computer chair.

"Sorry guys, my cat is being a nutbar again," Tim said into his headset, resuming his game.

But Smokie didn't hear, or wasn't listening, as he deftly completed the second bend.

Left, Right, 6 more heartbeats...

Sally and Me

The littlest tree in the forest belonged to me.  I called her Sally and years later I would name my own dear daughter after her.  She was poking up through the grass at the base of an old Oak Grandfather when I found her as I was exploring the hills and woods near our home.  I was 12 years and 42 days old; I know exactly because I had been determined to count each day to my next birthday for I was convinced that would be the year I finally got a pony.

Finding Sally was so accidental I nearly crushed her in doing so.  I had been climbing absently up the gnarled trunk of the Oak with my eyes more on a delightfully fuzzy caterpita' (as I called them for far too long) than on the tree, and I slipped, sliding all the way to the bottom and onto my side.  Before I could consider hurting or crying, I spotted the little branches sticking magically up through the shady grass in front of me.

Oh and what magic!  Before my eyes was a wonderous world in which I was the size of the sun itself and a lone tree spread its lopsided roof of leaves out over the overgrown hillside.  The old oak's leaves rustled as a breeze whiffed by and a sliver of sun crossed my cheek and bathed my little kingdom in gold.

"Why hello," I said in a voice just as golden, "I think we are to be wonderful friends."

Yellow Soul

Everything was cast in the warm hues of yellow common to buttercups and sunsets.

Well that's not quite right, thought Jordan, it's about 30 times that strong.

It had been getting steadily more and more yellow since last Friday when everyone, even the vehement naysayers, had to finally admit the scientists were right.  That was the first day the comet appeared in the sky beside the sun.

Nearly a week later and what had started as a large day-star was now Sol's little brother, trotting along at a leisurely pace across the sky.

Really you'd expect more to have changed in a week than just the peculiar colouring, Jordan mused to himself.  I mean sure the U.N. had scrambled to assemble a battery of scientists, and most recently nukes, just in case, but people were still heading to work and banks were still foreclosing properties and those poor African tribes were still being forced into squalor by their own leaders.  But hey, at least they probably didn't know or care that the world would likely end within the month...

Last weekend was "sick"!

Many words weasel themselves out of straightforward meanings via the appropriation of newly minted memes and social contexts and idioms.  That is not how I meant the usage of sick in the title, in this case it is a poor pun of sorts.

Man, when did I start sounding like a complete geek when writing??  Well because I was down with a cold all weekend and the better part of today, I am going to put up some short story 'beginnings' from my Thursday writing class.  Keep in mind these are all written in one go and not edited or filtered as I went and started on a dime, so to speak.

Each will have it's own post and title, comments are appreciated and vote for one if you want me to try to finish it!