Chapter 3 of my novel is probably rougher than the others, mainly because it involves some plot details that I'm not satisfied with. I HAVE to do more research into baseball to involve that element, since it's so far out of my league. *heh* I don't follow the sport all that much, but I feel that Mark being a baseball player who fits more the old mold of player before the public became (rightfully) cynical is right for the story. But any details on his profession are more or less placeholders since I have to look more into it. Aside from the baseball references, I want to improve Lenara and Mark's first conversation, and I want to see how the plot develops through the rest of the book; then I want to come back and rework this chapter a bit.
E4 Chapter 3 excerpt Any den of ineptitude, any dive, Lenara Quesal was at home. Now, she wasn’t insulting her own character by admitting that. She was royal blood; there was no room for low self-image. Rather, she prided herself on being a chameleon. She could stride into a meeting place that appealed to commoners or even those of a haughty high station and converse with any chosen individual, even steal the party if she sought to. If they were exposed to only one side of her personality, even be it a side that left her with some form of personal disdain, she could live with it. As long as her job got done. There was usually money or other wealth involved in her work and tonight was no different. Of course, if the job she was there to do tonight was profitable, why was she feeling a prickly pang of guilt?Lenara folded away her inner queries into the Sometime Quite Later File and pulled her face into a delightfully seductive stare. The one that came naturally to her when she let it. Cheshire smile, auburn hair teased over the edges of her tan cheeks and both her green eye and her blue eye aglow.
This was Mekong’s before her, a little bar on the fringe edge of a rural-ish town called Tempest, New Jersey. A dive. The walls were cracked stucco and illuminated beer signs beckoned from the cloudy windows. The wooden door muffled throbbing rock music. Quaint. Lenara straightened her white jacket, white like the rest of her outfit, and pushed open the door.
The smoke hit her like a brick. And though hazy, the situation inside became obvious. All men. All looking at her, gawking at her lithe assets. All but one. He was leaning on the bar, the tip of his forehead touching the bottle he hunched in his hands, as if willing the liquid directly into his brain. He was mid-20s, maybe a little younger than her although that admission would stay in her mouth. He had a farmer’s tan, the lighter sections of his football-like biceps visible under his rolled-up sleeves. His hair was black and spiked like a little porcupine. Lenara caught a giggle in her throat. His face was angular and severe but his expression was soft, something damaged. Cute, she assessed. Maybe the kind of guy who would lap up her advanced like a porcupine lapping up milk. Hmmm, she thought, do porcupines drink milk?
Lenara strutted past the other guys, most of them already starting their wicked glances and preparing their opening lines. She blatantly ignored them and took a barstool next to the guy not paying any attention to her.
His eyes were closed. She drew her hips across the stool and propped her forearms on the bar so she was in his sight. His personal space punctured, he sensed her and glanced up at her somewhat irritably but his expression switched to shock, his brown eyes blaring as if flicked on by a light switch. It was quick and he drew a hand across his face.
“Um, hello?” he greeted her.
Lenara looked him up and down and nodded. “Hey,” she said, seductively soft, “I give you a fright?”
He looked down at the drink cupped in his hands. “No. Just startled me. You reminded me of someone. For a second, anyway. Like there was something similar in spirit.”
“So,” Lenara said, changing the subject, “What’s your name?”
“Mark,” he offered, saluting her with his drink. He had gone from frustration with her presence to a sort of cautious fascination.
“Lenara,” she said. “Tempest here is kind of out of the way. You live here?”
“Yeah. No, not anymore,” he said. “I’ve been living in North Carolina. Came back to help a friend.”
“Help him move to a new house?”
Mark looked at the bar with nebulous guilt. “Not exactly.”
Lenara leaned into him and pressed his arm. “You’re built well. What do you do?” Mark didn’t respond to her touch but he didn’t move away, either. He clutched his drink tighter and shot her a pointed stare.
“What do you do?” he asked.
Lenara smiled and flipped a lock of hair that was hanging over her face. “Well…I’m in exports,” she said. “It’s not very exciting.” She looked up at him bashfully and they both chuckled.
“I’m a ballplayer,” Mark gently offered.
“Ahh,” she said impishly. “I was gonna guess that.”
“Oh, yeah?” Mark said.
“Really,” she said. “It’s the shirt.”
“My shirt?”
“Yeah,” she said, lightly tugging on his sleeve. “The kind with the white center and the blue sleeves. Don’t basesball players wear those?”
“Baseball, you mean?”
“Exactly,” she said.
“Yeah,” he said, smiling. “I guess we do.”
“Do you like it?” she asked. “Not the shirt, the game.”
Mark halted and looked into his drink, his mouth stalling on an answer. He finally said, “Well, I’m good at it. I might get some time in the majors in a season or two.”
Lenara leaned back on the bar and looked at him with concern. “You don’t look happy about it. What you do for a living should make you happy,” she stated with an exaggerated nod.
Mark sheepishly grinned. “I play ball. Not to much to complain about when you’re talking to a guy who works in a factory, y’know?”
Lenara tapped her fingers on the bar and paused to make him a proposition. “Would you like a different job, Mark?”
Mark looked quizzically up at her. “What do you mean?”
“A new profession,” she said in a clipped, hushed voice and catching his eyes with an enticing stare. “Maybe something you’re more sure you’ll like. All I can tell you at this point, and, I quote my employer, is, ‘It’s a chance to make a difference.’”
Mark ran his knuckles over the bar’s smooth but cloudy wooden surface. “It would depend. I’m not even sure why you’re asking me this.”
It seemed, Lenara observed, that the matter of fulfillment had piqued his interest.
Lenara exhaled and stared absently at the far wall. “Who did I remind you of, Mark?”
Mark’s head sunk and Lenara thought that he had closed her out. Drat, she should have kept being sensitive. But then he talked.
“Her name was Sam,” he quietly explained, looking into the fluid before him. “A few years ago, she was murdered.”
Lenara looked over and saw that he was mentally somewhere else.
“I remember when we found out,” he continued. “My friend Jeff and I, we were at this bar, sitting right where the two of us are sitting now. Jeff was dating her at the time. When the television gave the news, he fell to the ground, crushed.” Mark took a long sip of his drink, then ran a hand along his face. “I just remember going numb, feeling all youth and passion bleed away.”
“Then what?” Lenara asked.
“Then, eventually,” Mark said, “I moved. Left everyone.” He went quiet and looked away.
“You would welcome an opportunity to alleviate past regrets?” she asked matter-of-factly.
Mark regarded her and she could see he was confused and suspicious. “What are you aiming at?” he said. “You didn’t hit a few bars before here, did you?”
“It’s tied into my offer,” she said sternly. “I will tell you more. But for right now, I need to know if you’re open to some adventure.”
“Mark rolled it around in his head for a few seconds and then shrugged, exasperated. “I have no idea what you’re talking about but why the hell not?”
“Very good,” Lenara commended, rubbing his arm. She stood up from her barstool and dropped money on the counter to pay for his drink. “I’ll be in touch, dear.” She saw he was perplexed. “Don’t look so down,” she said, “I think you’re going to like this. I do.”
Mark rubbed a hand along the back of his neck. “Well…ah…I’ll be at the motel on Davenport.”
“Are you headed there now?” she inquired. “Or perhaps you’ll see some of the old sites of town first?” The way she asked it was more of a strong suggestion.
Mark squinted at her, then shrugged. “I’ll take a drive by the site of the old Tempest Fair. It’s been awhile, though. Maybe once I’m okay to drive.”
Lenara raised an eyebrow and leaned over to get a better look at his drink. “Aren’t you drinking mineral water?” she asked.
Mark issued a dry laugh. “I’m not much of a drinker. I just need some time.”
“As you wish,” she said. Lenara touched his chin, feeling his short stubble. His look was questioning, curious. Perfect. He was intrigued but not too spooked. “I’ll be in touch,” she repeated, giving him a glimmering smile. The she turned and strode away, once again avoiding the come-ons of the other bar patrons. Well, half of them, anyway. The others were staring jealously at Mark.
Mark watched Lenara exit the bar and turned slowly back to his water. “This town gets weirder every day,” he mumbled. Mark didn’t know what kind of job she was offering but she knew how to press the right buttons, like she knew him and he had forgotten her. The notion of job fulfillment, though, was not going to whitewash the furor of the past that emanated from Tempest and that he carried everywhere with him inside his skull.
2 comments:
If I had to sum up soo far what you have written here verse what you have written previously then I would have to state I am intrigued. That said though, and if I may sling some things your way, some parts are better than others. Now, in truth, I am not reading everything that is going on in the chapters and things may flesh out better in the long term so I am not, or I don't think I am, going to comment on the greater story but on how the passages make me feel as a reader.
Going back to chapter 1 I find myself, honestly, disinterested. The text, that is the conversation, plays out to sophmoric(sp). What I mean to say is that I don't find it very believable(?) or tangible (i know it is a psuedo dream sequence) The precieved age of the characters (that mark is a minor league player) doesn't fit into, at least my precieved, notion of his age. The dialogue plays out more like highschool kids chatting. While they are not exactly talking about who does who and Mrs Pearsons third period bio class, the dialogue itself seems of the smae intelligence level. may I suggest the female to be more distant; more phatasmgorical(sp) even if she is a positive in the dreamscape; maybe more of a version of Mark trying to get info from her or even sex from her (since its "his" dream) but she having no part of it; have this done more in her actions than her dialogue, I would keep that sparse. have mark struggle more with the experiance than just travel from point A to point B. While I don't know where this sits in your first chapter I didn't feel engaged to continue reading, the plight of Mark's friend didn't concern me because I didn't feel a sense of urgency from the dialogue and actions. Also I am not so convinced minor league baseball player fits in the story thus far, by your own admission you don't know much about it. While that is not to say it doesn't and can never work, I would recommend not solitifying it as gold until you see how it adapts. As you said on the front page there is a certain scorn for baseball right now, it is not the american pasttime like it was and no longer are the players they golden boy heros. Baseball has become maybe too tarnished with its money, celebrity, and drugs. Baseball players no longer seem mythical but are more in relation of movie stars and pop singers. Not to mention the potential of a major league player and the money they stand to make remove characters from the idea of the "everyman" theme. now I claim no ownership... sorry had to take a phone call now where was I... oh yeah the everyman thing. What if Mark had already been chosen to play for a major league team but once going to summer camp he feels disillusioned (much like american society with baseball) and now is looking for a new life, be it back to the minor leagues or something completely different. This could play well into chapter three and might also remove you from having to gain too much history about baseball because mark would no longer be directly related to it, it would be more of a past event scenerio. This also allows him time away from the games while he is adventuring, if not you need to factor in him missing ball games to have adventures which in the end could make him loose his career. In the end the story itself, at least the adventure mark is about to parttake in is more important than his day job. This isn't a baseball story this is (insert your story theme here) story. The baseball should take a passive stance to the overall story, not something that could be seen as laborous that you would be forced to tie up at the end well after your story has been told just for the sake of having a completed story.
Anyway, I had ill feelings about the first part but then in turn had a reverse of feelings when I had read chapter 2. Your work with detective Fork has paid off in the sense that you write a captivating and stylistic version of noir even within the realm of a scifi novel. At first I wanted you to scrap mark and the lot and work on the adventure of the characters of the second chapter a james bond meets maltese falcon story but admittingly how you get the two to connect could be very interesting so I am not so much wishing you scrap mark but make his appearance in the first chapter as exilerating has chapter 2's sample. Chapter 2 makes for something I want to read until the end. I had thought of even recommending that you start with it has chapter one and leave mark for the second chapter but then again you would not want to slump the great stride you would have set for the first chapter with a duller and trodding second.
This brings us to chapter three. Mark feels more of the everyman character in this chapter. While the dialogue seems to travel quickly with both characters divulging more than might be believable (esp without the use of alcohol) I found the set up wonderful. So wonderful in fact that I want to say more chapter 3 to chapter one to set up a mystery and a tension. leave chapter 2 where it is, and scrap chapter 1 and add it as bits and pieces into chapter 3/1. Make it an unruly memory, more of a phantom that plagues him. A siren calling him to do soemthing the thing with Jeff but let that come naturally to the reader through flash back instead of setting up so much of that in the beginning and just playing it out in ta straight linear fashion. My boy fuck with time, it adds suspence and keeps a reader reading to see how the puzzle pieces fit. Keep the flow of the story a scifi noir and I think you have something very important on your hands.
just opinions mind you since I am not reading everything but just smatterings of chapters.
Tim, your comments are more helpful than you can imagine. Something didn't strike me as right about the first chapter. And you're right, the conversation is too much teen angst (the characters are meant to be early 20s) and the vision of Sam should be more dream-like. I mean, if I'm inside Mark's mind, why not take advantage of the dream world? There is a later chapter that does this slightly better, I think. My intent is to have the "dream" version of her be a more idolized (to Mark) version of the real person, who is seen later. I agree with you in that this chapter could be reworked into a later chapter, and I think I'll do that. I'm not sure about starting the book with Lenara, though, although it is a more exciting beginning. I might likely do that, though. However, it's mainly Mark's story. Now, I know he didn't impress you in the first chapter, but I think he comes into his own soon in later chapters. I just need to make him consistent and interesting throughout.
A big problem for me is actually the reason Mark comes home. I think the idea of his friend Jeff needing his help is too tacked on, especially because circumstances sidetrack Mark a bit and his motivations seem off. I think I need to either downplay that and make his coming home be more about what it's truly about - he can only avoid going home to his problems, which he's been avoiding, for so long. He's also restless and can't really move forward in his life into he settles the past. Yet, he does show glimpses of doing this. I don't want to write Jeff out because he does play an important role in the book, but I think I need something that's less pressing but compelling. I've had some more radical ideas, like Mark having disappeared for years and then showing up again without anyone - or himself - knowing where he's been, but that's a whole other can of worms. I'll still working on it, lol.
I'm glad that you liked the second and third chapters, especially as I was unsure about the third. Yeah, the first conversation between Mark and Lenara does need work. Or at least I need to better present Lenara's ability to get people to talk.
Once the book gets to a certain point (a few chapters in), I have it very intricately plotted and set up in a way that hopefully builds tension and plays well with the idea of time travel. The intro has been giving me a hard time, obviously.
What your comments have made me realize, however, is that it won't be possible for anyone to give a full opinion of my work if I don't present it all. So, I'm going to say what the hell and post my chapters in full. They need a lot of work, but might as well put it all out there to dissect instead of just bits and pieces. I think it greatly helps me as a writer, and I hope you have the time to continue with your comments, even though I know you're soon to have your hands full with fatherhood. :) So, I'm going to post the chapters in full, even the ones I've posted excerpts from already. I'm a little hesitant to post Chapter 1 again, lol, but I think I should post the chapters of the current draft I have, then go back and rework them, then continue on. Thanks! I greatly appreciate anyone's constructive criticism.
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