Crazy writer moment
So all of my comrades on this site know, but I decided my novel needed conclusion, and I turned it into a short story at c. 11,000 words. I wrote a terrible ending which will be posted at some point so all may share in its awfulness.
This weekend, though, I was driving through fair Baltimore and passed the intersection where something tragic happens in my novel. And it was weird, because the first thing I thought was, "This was where
x died. And there's where
y's car was."
All of a sudden, my novel became far more realistic to me. I had a genuine connection to my characters, and they had an identity and a reality that was my more concrete than before. It's almost a pity that I ended the story so soon, now that my characters have become real people, almost friends and enemies, to me.
I will be trying my hand at fiction again, oh, yes indeed.
Two endings and some thank yous
Tapeworm ending I: Somewhere in the middle of the novel, a tapeworm came. The tapeworm infested everyone in this novel. It infested Clinton Westwood, Mark, Molly, Bart, Tobias, Phil, Joe, Elf, Jilla, the elephant named Mervin, the turtle name Marcus, and anyone else that may have played role here. The tapeworm was of a hybrid species that had never ever been seen before, or experienced before. But reader, everyone experienced it because in Spring Grove, the water was contaminated from the disintegrating factory. Each and every soul that lived in the ghetto of the futuristic Spring Grove died a terrible, terrible, terrible, painful, agonizing, trauitizing death. The tapeworm ate the stomach from the inside of every last soul. The town became even more deserted than it had been at the start of this novel. It became a ghost town. It was very depressing.
Matt Carvin owes me a bouzouoki lesson.
End novel.
Tapeworm ending II: Molly, Mark, and Bart were eating a cheap and delicious spaghetti dinner together on fateful night. Just as Bart was about to sprinkle some parmesan cheese on top of his steaming plate of tomato sauce-ridden pasta, he felt something terribly wrong in his stomach. He froze, his small beady eyes widening in confusion. He dropped the parmesan cheese and the can rolled off the table. Molly and Mark looked at Bart in confusion, until they felt the same extreme discomfort in their stomachs as well.
What they felt, reader, was tapeworm. But it was no ordinary tapeworm; it was a hybrid tapeworm, practically a new species, that infected and lived in the stomach and intestinal areas of humans—and then ate them from the inside out. It was largely believed by future generations that the water of the Surodoc River had been infected by the paper mill to a point of extreme pollution in which many new creatures were mutated and formed. This tapeworm was one such creature.
Mark, Molly, and Bart all fell over dead within the next five minutes of Bart dropping the can of parmesan. Joe of Joe’s Splendid Pizza fell over in mid pizza-pie toss. Clinton Westwood had been driving his pickup truck, singing along to “It’s a Great day for Being Alive” by Travis Tritt when all of a sudden, he felt an extreme discomfort in his lower abdomen. He ran his truck off the road, hitting a small turtle named Marcus in the meantime. Subsequently, Marcus’s children all died because he never came home to feed them.
Jilla and Elf were having dinner together in Australia. They didn’t have any little elf-fairy children yet, thank goodness, for they both fell down dead over their cherry pie dessert. It was a mess, reader.
Phil and Tobias died quietly in Phil’s home in the diseased woods. No one really missed them and Phil’s motorcycle rusted up outside in the rain and became a complete sad waste.
The tapeworms destroyed everyone in Spring Grove within a week. Spring Grove fell into ruins and became the saddest ghost town that there ever was. Many companies went out of business because they didn’t have any paper.
John returned from Peru to find his beloved Molly (and everyone else) dead. If only he had come sooner and whisked her off into the sunset, he might have saved her before she became infected with the mutated hybrid tapeworm.
And so you see, reader . . . everyone died. And if you think about it, you will realize that we are all dying even as we live, for each day brings us closer to death. And so this story has been written to show you this. The author hopes, deeply, that you have learned something valuable after reading this well-crafted novel.
Thank you:
To Anna Luther and Richard Rabil, the “Racounteurs” who stood by me during the writing of this ridiculous novel.
To my parents, for making me dinner and doing my dishes and my laundry, and for offering moral support.
To everyone else who asked me how it was going.
To Matt Carvin, who suggested the tapeworm ending that I cannot begin to do justice to.
To Seth Ilgenfritz for being my fairy consultant even during his times of sever stress.
To Sparky and Clarks, Borders, Panera, and Richard’s roommates for their hospitality and internet connections that provided ample distractions
To coffee, my faithful friend. May you flow abundantly in my life.
To the author of that book that I can’t remember the name of, and for Anna Luther for buying the book randomly one fateful night at Borders and letting me borrow it.
Novel: finished
After working nine hours yesterday doing coffee things for Olivia's House without any kind of formal break and on only three hours of sleep, I finished my novel at Sparky and Clarks just before 10:00 p.m.
I was accompannied by the lovely Anna Luther, and we were both entertained by some really interesting music that included songs from "Phantom of the Opera".
The final work count was 50,020, but after that I added a lot of thank-yous and whatnot.
I realized maybe thirty seconds ago that I forgot to give it a title. I have one in mind that has nothing at all to do with the story, and that may have to serve as a temporary placeholder.
I did indeed add an alternate ending that involves tapeworms, but I feel that I did not do it justice, so there may actually be some editing already today.
In any case, there are pictures, except I forget how to post them here. And I went to bed last night at 11 something and slept until 9. Feeling gooood.
I am going to get my hair done as a present to myself, plus it needs a good trim anyway. So yeah!
