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Flesh and Gossip - Chapter 1

by olirichards 

Posted: 16 August 2009
Word Count: 1650
Summary: This is the part of the first chapter of my novel.


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It was an alluring outfit for a young man: red knee-high boots, a flowery dress floating above swan-white skin and an obsidian helmet of hair beginning just above insolent, unfocused eyes. Accessories draped off her like a Christmas tree weighed down by family heirlooms.
The man allured was Tom: scruffy jeans and blue t-shirt. Acceptably tall and, while not muscular, there was nothing overflowing where it shouldn’t be. Short brown hair, ironic smile and unpolished brown shoes.
‘Nice outfit,’ he commented as the door opened.
‘Thanks,’ she curtseyed. Behind her stretched a cavernous kitchen, cathedral-like with its hanging air and neat, rectangular tiles of light draped across the floor from the tall windows. All cupboards and appliances were neatly lined up against one wall and a few stuffed bookshelves sprawled out from a corner. A wide corridor led off into shadows and there was a small door in the far corner.
A wooden table, the altar, was covered in the washed up detritus of a long gone party. She walked over to it, flicked open a slightly crumpled fag packet and, seeing a lone cigarette that had so far escaped its destiny, drew it out and stuck it in her lips. She swung round, ‘Tom, right? Carrie’s brother.’
‘Right, and you’re Alice?’
Alice shrugged agreement as she lit the fag.
‘This place is huge,’ Tom leant against the doorframe and slowly surveyed the panorama.
‘It used to be a warehouse.’
‘What type?’
Alice took a long drag before replying, ‘the type that stored things.’
Tom laughed, ‘no shit. Is my sister around?’
‘She’s out.’
‘Out? She could at least have been here to welcome her favourite and only brother.’
‘Why? We’re hooking up later,’ Alice leisurely looked Tom up and down, ‘are you coming in or what?’
Tom blushed at how bashful he must have looked hovering by the door. He entered, flicked the door shut without looking back, and strode over to the table. Sitting down in a chair, he lounged back and rubbed his face with his hands. ‘Man it’s been a hell of a day. You haven’t got a spare one of those have you? Mine are in the car.’
Alice picked up a fag packet and rattled it. Hearing muffled shuffling from inside she tossed the packet at Tom, ‘help yourself.’
He took out a cigarette and lit it from one of the discarded lighters on the table. Alice sat down opposite him. She crossed her legs, bobbing her dangling boot gently up and down.
Tom’s gaze drifted to it.
She stopped and looked Tom directly in the eye.
He glanced up and caught her gaze, averting his eyes for a moment before recovering, looking straight back at her.
‘So?’
‘So indeed.’
There were a hundred questions about the flat he could ask, about her, about flatmates. Yet it seemed, all of a sudden, that to say anything obvious would be boring, an admission of dullness, defeat even. He needed something random yet relevant and cool. He desperately rummaged through his memory for an acceptable opening. Was she thinking the same?
‘You own a car?’ Alice asked.
‘Mum’s. I have to return it. Do you?’
‘Can’t drive. I’d be terrible anyway, mow down school children by the class.’ Tom laughed while Alice flicked her ash into a mug, ‘besides you can’t drink, so where’s the fun in that?’
‘Right.’
Another pause. Tom forced himself to relax, inter-locking his hands behind his head and purposefully looking casually around the room, taking his time. He looked at the shelves in the corner but couldn’t make out anything worth commenting on. A set of music decks stood in another corner, attached to hefty speakers. He looked at the cupboards, which had words and pictures scrawled across them. One had a photo of a schoolgirl in uniform, another ‘Suggs’ with a scrawled ‘l’ between the ‘S’ and the ‘u’. Tom suddenly realised he was craning his neck round unnaturally and turned back to Alice, his hands dropping from behind his head. He stubbed out his fag.
‘So what do you…,’ he began, but was thankfully cut off before the sterility of the question revealed itself.
‘…do you want to see your room?’
‘Sure.’ Of course. Why hadn’t he asked that?
Alice got up, leading the way out of the kitchen and down the long, windowless corridor. The walls were adorned with paintings, odd sculptures and what seemed like bits of rubbish that had been pulled from the tip. They passed a couple of doors.
‘Nice art,’ he commented.
‘That one’s mine.’ She pointed to a rag doll dressed up like a dominatrix that was holding up a whip, then flicked a switch on the wall and the whip lit up.
‘A lamp, cool.’
‘I know. Suggs did the electrics, we’ve got a few more around.’
She walked through an open door and turned on the light, ‘here it is.’
It was big, far larger than his university hovels. A few empty cardboard boxes lay strewn on the floor and the walls were covered in streaks of blue tack with the occasional nail piercing out. The only furniture was the bed, raised up above their heads on tall stilts but still far below the dizzying ceiling, a ladder leaning against it for access. A limp rag of cloth hung across the tall window. The sordid loneliness of an abandoned room, thought Tom.
‘It’s gigantic.’
‘Yes it is.’
Tom took a leisurely turn about the room, looking around it slowly as though through examination it would reveal itself to be more than the large box with a bed that it seemed at first glance. He even took hold of one of the bed stilts and pushed it, testing its firmness like a builder weighing up a job. It creaked in pain. At the window he stopped and pulled back the cloth. The view was an endless tessellation of dirty yellow brick rectangles - another warehouse built just far enough away to allow Victorian cart to run between them rather than for any considerations about the view. Looking up he could see past the roof to the fading blue sky beyond. To endless freedom, he thought, then wondered if the reality of that was as good as it sounded.
Snapping himself out of his thoughts, he turned around and pointed at the boxes, ‘whose are those?’
Alice shrugged, ‘rubbish I guess. I’ll show you the toilet.’
They began walking back down the corridor.
‘So how long have you been here?’
‘Dunno, about a year or something.’
Alice skipped into a spin which ended with her back draped against the wall, arms above her head and cigarette hanging at a jaunty angle out of her mouth.
‘Do you like the photo?’ she asked, her fag bobbing up and down as she spoke.
Tom examined the massive black and white photograph she was leaning against that extended up half the wall, no mean feat, and spread expansively on either side. He realised it was an extreme close up of part of a neck, a shoulder and an extended arm.
‘Is it you?’
‘In exactly this pose.’
‘Great.’
‘Tanya did it.’
Alice continued back to the kitchen and Tom followed behind. From this view he only now realised how short she was. ‘Stocky’ came to mind, cruel as the word was, though he didn’t mean it cruelly. In fact he had been attracted to her the moment he had laid eyes on her. That sultry, half-friendly, half-cold manner had weaved its web to perfection, leaving him completely unsure as to what she thought of him. He shouldn’t start messing around with housemates anyway, he told himself, he had been alive long enough to know that many a happy household had been dashed on the rocks for the sake of getting a few rocks off.
He suddenly became conscious that he was walking behind her, as though a subordinate or a slave. Why was he doing so? He thought it was because some part of him felt he was being tested on how cool he was and he was failing. That he was being exposed as a novice and his original pretence at being able to play the game was being smitherened. He had fallen behind out of shame, his body accepting defeat even as his mind was still racing to try and pretend to be cool.
But that was only one part of him, one that had momentarily gained the upper hand. Another part thought it was all ridiculous and just his mind playing games. That he was being stupid and should act like an adult. This part banished the other back to the dungeons where he tried to keep it and he jogged a few steps to catch up with Alice as they walked into the kitchen. Where were the dungeons of his mind, he thought? The Cerebellum? The Spinal Column? Anywhere as long as there were enough cells on guard around the perpetrator?
They walked through to the small door in the corner which led to a pokey bathroom draped in damp towels, half full plastic bottles and empty toilet rolls. Pubes ranged far and wide like bacteria under a microscope.
‘It’s a pigsty. Nothing to do with me.’
Alice retreated to the kitchen and Tom followed soon after. He watched her go over to a cupboard scrawled with a huge ‘A’, and take out a bottle. She rinsed out a couple of glasses and poured small measures into them.
‘Down in one,’ came the order along with the glass.
‘Down in one,’ came the confident reply as Tom took the glass and, without pausing, knocked its contents back. Vodka. Tom hated vodka. He hated neat vodka even more.
‘Just what I needed,’ he winced, and slammed the glass down on the side.
‘Another?’
‘Sure. Then I should grab my stuff from the car.’






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Comments by other Members



NMott at 18:44 on 17 August 2009  Report this post
A confident start and it definitely has potential.

The characterisations were very good, but I wasn't sure where the story was going. The main plot thread should start on the opening page - preferably the opening paragraph - but I just couldn't get a handle on it; the extract felt as though it belonged further into the novel and I wondered if this was the opening of chapter 1? At the very least it felt as though there was a paragraph or so missing from the opening, and I was a little wrong footed with the opening line: "It was an alluring outfit for a young man:", and couldn't get the image of Tom wearing that outfit out for my mind.


- NaomiM

THS at 21:10 on 17 August 2009  Report this post
Hi there!

I can't comment on the general layout of it being the opening chapter or the depths of the grammar (I leave to the experts on the site), but I did agree with regards to the opening line... I did for one minute think it was the guy dressed up in the boots! he he.
Perhaps suggest:
It was an alluring outfit good enough to seduce any young man... or something to that effect.

Overall, I liked the introduction of the two characters - which I presume will be the MC's to the story? They both come across well and I too wonder how far into the story this part is from?

unfocused eyes
- this being a description of her but I wasn't sure if this came across more that she was either very tired or drugged/drunk?

Look forward to hearing more about the story,

Tani



Mand245 at 06:47 on 18 August 2009  Report this post
Hi Oli

I thought this was a great start. For me it very much conjured up a picture of communal 60s living - I could almost hear The Velvet Underground playing in the background and imagine the Pop Art on the walls.

I imagine this extract comes from the middle of the first chapter rather than right atthe beginning - I'd be interested to know.

I've found a few things to point out, including some punctuation, and as you've specified "Go on, I can take it!", I hope you don't mind me pointing some of these out!

It was an alluring outfit for a young man:

I do agree with the others that this sounds as of Tom is wearing the boots etc. You could substitute the word "for" with "to"

obsidian helmet of hair

It may just be me but I didn't really understand this reference - it didn't let me picture a particular hairstyle

The man allured was Tom:

I may be wrong but I'm not sure it's grammatically correct to say the "man allured". I think you could say: "The man who found ... so alluring", or maybe, "the man so captivated by"

and neat, rectangular tiles of light draped across the floor from the tall windows.

I liked this image very much

‘It used to be a warehouse.’
‘What type?’
Alice took a long drag before replying, ‘the type that stored things.’

That made me laugh

Tom laughed, ‘no shit.

I'd put a full stop after "laughed" and then a capital letter for "No"

Tom forced himself to relax, inter-locking his hands behind his head

Hard to do whilst holding a cigarette!

She walked through an open door and turned on the light, ‘here it is.’

I would put a full stop after "light" and then a capital letter for "here"

The sordid loneliness of an abandoned room, thought Tom.

As you've been specific as to the words he thinks, I wonder if this character thinks himself a poet, particularly as he thinks "endless freedon" a little further on!

far enough away to allow Victorian cart

missing word "a Victorian cart"

pointed at the boxes, ‘whose are those?’

full stop after "boxes" and then a capital for "Whose"

Alice shrugged, ‘rubbish I guess.

again, full stop after "shrugged" and then a capital for "Rubbish"

‘Do you like the photo?’ she asked, her fag

This is just personal but I'm not over keen on the continous use of the word "fag" instead of cigarette in the narrative. It's fine in the characture's dialogue but I find it a little tedious after a while, although others may disagree

He shouldn’t start messing around with housemates anyway, he told himself, he had been alive long enough to know that many a happy household had been dashed on the rocks for the sake of getting a few rocks off.

I'd use a semi colon rather than a comma after "himself"

and he was failing. That he was being exposed as a novice

I think this should all be one sentence so I'l use a comma rather than a full stop after "failing"

game was being smitherened.

I didn't understand "smitherened". Should it be smothered?

mind playing games. That he was being stupid and should act like an adult.

I think this should be one sentence: "...playing games, that he was..."

I hope some of these comments help. Overall I thought this was really good and I love the characters. As I say, it feels very 60's (although the presence of Blue tack suggests that it's not!). I do hope you become a full member then we can see more of this story.

Mand

SJ Williamson at 18:56 on 18 August 2009  Report this post
Hi Oli,

I'll be back ... will read this in the morning when the old brain is fresh!

SJxx

olirichards at 08:42 on 19 August 2009  Report this post
Thanks for all your comments - especially Mand - really useful. So the first sentence definitely needs changing! will do that.

This extract is from the very beginning on the novel. I guess what i'm hearing is it isn't fast paced enough for an opening.

in answer to a question - yup, Tom seems himself as a bit of a poet

ta,
Oli

Mand245 at 10:55 on 19 August 2009  Report this post
Hi Oli

For me, it's not a matter of the opening not being of a fast enough pace. It's about context. Right from the opening line you want to grab your reader's attention and ensure that they keep reading! At the moment you describe Tom's arrival but don't give the reader a reason to follow his story. I think you need to engage your reader with such questions as, why is he there? What is he expecting etc, so that your reader wants to turn the page to discover the answers. I hope that makes sense and helps a bit.

Mand

NMott at 11:35 on 19 August 2009  Report this post
Hi Oli,

Just to add to Mand's comments, it would help to hint at the characters' motivations. Motives are what drive a plot, what makes the characters do what they do. What they do might be fast paced or a slow burn, but motives give the piece body. Hope that's not too obtuse. It's one of those etherial things which is difficult to explain. Sometimes it helps to read the opening chapter of a few novels and ask yourself, 'what is keeping me reading this?' and then try to work that into your own work.



- NaomiM

<Added>

give the piece body, ...err...that would probably have made more sense if I'd said 'gives it depth'.

SJ Williamson at 15:01 on 19 August 2009  Report this post
Hi Oli,

An enjoyable start. You've created some entertaining characters in Tom and Alice and I hope to learn more about them. Alice especially feels really flamboyant and dramatic. Tom's self consciousness about being dull was excellent. This is exactly how "interesting" people can make me feel. I’m convinced that I need to say or do something cool when in their presence, and usually make an arse out of myself!

The imagery was nice, I could picture the place and the people (revoltingly so with regards to the bathroom)!

I agree with the other's comments regarding the structure of the piece. I think there is great promise here and I'm sure that with a few additions of why, what, where and when, you'll be able to intrigue your readers enough to make them turn to the next chapter.

That sultry, half-friendly, half-cold manner had weaved its web to perfection, leaving him completely unsure as to what she thought of him.


- I really loved this.

I'd very much like to read on.

SJxx

StephB at 15:19 on 19 August 2009  Report this post
Hi Oli,

Welcome to the group! Sorry to be late coming into this.

This is a great start; I enjoyed reading it and getting to know the characters. I think you've been very clever creating Alice; as the reader, I can feel what Tom feels about her; slightly awed, she seems very 'cool' and intriguing.

I agree with the others that it would be nice to have some hook; some idea of what we can expect when we read on. But I certainly am intrigued enough to read on.

Steph x

freynolds at 08:15 on 20 August 2009  Report this post
Hi Oli,

Like the others, I found the characters really interesting and well described. I also concur that a few lines to introduce some background to the reasons why Tom is there, or how he got there would add some attention-grabbing element to the chapter. Perhaps you could start with Tom arriving by car, perhaps wondering about the place from the outside, does he like it? Why did he come. I'm sure you'll find the right angle. This is a very promising chapter with some great descriptions and thoughts. To me it had the potential of a David Lynch story.

A couple of words I tripped on, such as 'smitherened' and 'tessellation'.

I do hope you join a full member and get all the benefits of taking part in this writing adventure that is the Beginners Group.

Fabienne

fbtoast at 23:30 on 21 August 2009  Report this post
Hi Oli

Welcome belatedly to the group.

You set the atmosphere up well in this, I get a real sense of the scuzzy studenty sort of warehouse.

I think there's a bit too much of the inconsequential dialogue, he doesn't need to keep on saying how big it is.

The obsession with cool also seems terribly young. I mean, I suppose Tom is terribly young, but perhaps some ironic distance between him and the narratorial voice needs to be introduced?

Also in the first 2000 words you probably need to have seeded something to keep the reader hooked.

In a bit more detail:

People have already remarked about the first sentence.
Alice does not seem like the kind of person who curtseys, even ironically.
I like the sentence about the cavernous kitchen
I'd leave out the sentence beginning "the sordid loneliness". It's too self-conscious.
I like "endless tessellation"
"many a happy household" etc - too many "rocks" in this sentence!
Why is the pigsty bathroom nothing to do with Alice? Doesn't she live there in the apartment? Or is this supposed to show how she is the kind of person who doesn't take responsibility for things?

Overall, I think the atmosphere wins it for me, but it needs trimming down. I look forward to finding out what's going on with this story!

Nicole

Demonqueen at 17:15 on 27 August 2009  Report this post
Hi Oli,

Generally I really liked your writing style, I thought the character of Alice came alive on the page and the whole description of the flat took me back to my younger days in similar places in London the morning after the night before, so well done for that.
As others have mentioned, the whole piece didn't really clue us into where it was going or provide any juicy morsels of intrigue, character motivation, etc. I was left wondering who the story was to be about- Tom or Alice.
Here are some more specific comments where I felt need alteration.

It was an alluring outfit for a young man: red knee-high boots,
Agree with everyone about this.

obsidian
Doesn't conjure an image in my mind

helmet of hair
Sorry to say this but it makes me think of that funny little robot in, was it Buck Rogers? You know the gold robot in the form of a boy- or was it Battlestar Galactica?

beginning just above insolent, unfocused eyes.
I understood this was a reference to her being a drinker.

The man allured was Tom:

This didn't sit right with me. Perhaps you could try something like, 'The allured in question was Tom.'
hanging air
this confused me.
and a few stuffed bookshelves sprawled out from a corner
. Sorry, did the bookshelves sprawl or was it the books? [;]

A wooden table, the altar, was covered in the washed up detritus of a long gone party.
I wonder if this might be embellished- perhaps a few telling items that look like they are being revered?

‘This place is huge,’ Tom leant against the doorframe and slowly surveyed the panorama.
Maybe I missed something but what panorama? I know the hall is wide but I thought the view led to shadows and a small door. It's just that panorama suggests there's a huge view before him and a hall suggests there are walls which block any kind of view.

‘It used to be a warehouse.’
‘What type?’
Alice took a long drag before replying, ‘the type that stored things.’
Brilliant- that's exactly the kind of thing a cool person would say and exactly the kind of thing that would make someone who's not feel about the size of, well, a single-celled being. Love it.


Alice picked up a fag packet and rattled it. Hearing muffled shuffling from inside she tossed the packet at Tom, ‘help yourself.’
He took out a cigarette and lit it from one of the discarded lighters on the table. Alice sat down opposite him. She crossed her legs, bobbing her dangling boot gently up and down.
Tom’s gaze drifted to it.
She stopped and looked Tom directly in the eye.
He glanced up and caught her gaze, averting his eyes for a moment before recovering, looking straight back at her.

Starting to feel a little like every single action is being relayed to me, overly so. Do we need to know he took a ciggy and lit up? Of course you may be trying to tell us that he is uncomfortably aware of every thing he does under her scrutiny but for me it doesn't hit that note. I loved her bobbing boot, brought me back into the room - more so than the fag.
Watch out- how can she stop and look him directly in the eye when he is looking down at her boot? Same goes for smoking while clasping hands behind heads- mind you, if she's had as many parties as implied she won't notice another fag burn on the carpet![]
flicked her ash into a mug,
Loved that bit too. Not sure why -maybe I think it makes a really good statement about the character's attitude

The sordid loneliness of an abandoned room, thought Tom.
Okay, I'm no expert so you may wish to verify this with more experienced writers but I do believe here that you may have switched POV. I did this in a piece on another site and got picked up on it. You're writing in the third person and your narrator doesn't have its own character or voice (like, perhaps, in a Dickens book- I think this is called the omniscient narrator), so how does it know what he's thinking? Do you get what I mean? Unfortunately I understood it when it was explained to me but I don't think I can explain it as well! I think you need to use quotation marks when referring to his direct thoughts, like you would with speech, but as I said I;m not an expert so you're best to take it up with others.

tessellation
A lovely unusual word!
‘Tanya did it.’
Um... who's Tanya?
He shouldn’t start messing around with housemates anyway, he told himself,
Again, I think you've changed POV.
He suddenly became conscious that he was walking behind her, as though a subordinate or a slave.
I know this is probably important to the social balance between them but if it's your first time in someone's flat who you've never met before, it would be natural to follow them rather than lead the way, I think anyway.

That's about it. You do a lovely job of putting us in the room and I think Alice is going to be a very interesting and outrageous character.

I Hope this post reads okay, for some reason the preview wouldn't work so not sure if the quote's are correct!

DQ


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