Chapter 4 of my 'distasteful', 'offensive' and 'insulting' novella. I enjoyed writing this one, knowing that the ink in my 'ugly pen' will never run dry.

I've uploaded only the first part of this chapter, as it is a tad too long and I'd like some focused comments. It's been a long week, what with supposed horror writers complaining about sexual violence towards women (yeah, go figure that one out), but what the Hell, we're all still here and we're all still hopefully writing.

I'd love comments from anywhere BUT - if you do happen to find this work so offensive, then please don't bother to read it. I don't see the point in a critique based solely on a body's own personal moral views, to be honest, as that is clearly not the point of an objective review, it is nothing less than an outright cry for censorship, and censorship, my friends, is the death of art.

To everyone whose made such great comments so far - especially LisaC, Optimist and Casey - thanks. It's been terrifically helpful to have a female perspective, on this story particularly, and it'll all help loads in the edit.

http://www.writewords.org.uk/archive/15996.asp

Cheers guys, for your support.

JB

I think my offerings for Chapter 2 were, as you say: 'distasteful and offensive'... I don't remember adding 'insulting' or 'ugly pen'. Come to think of it though, I do think all pens are a bit ugly. Especially biros. Those little Argos pens are vile.

LisaC you are my new favourite quick wit.

Nitwit, more like. I'm trying to continue with Novel 2 but I'm getting distracted with visions of little blue pens that are wholly incongruous with 1880s Cornwall.

I loathe the pens with fur and feathers coming out of the top.

JB

I loathe pens with self-regarding claptrap coming out of them

Pete

I'm getting distracted with visions of little blue pens that are wholly incongruous with 1880s Cornwall.

Do they have sheep in them? If so, surely this would be okay? Or perhaps the pens should be a natural wood colour? Of course if you don't wish to have sheep in your novel then it could be a problem. Pigs, perhaps?

Did you know that Shakespeare's autograph is worth £1 million - if you can find one written in Biro it is worth double.

Beadle

Some danger with a pig pen of pouring out buckets of swill. Dogs maybe?

Beadle, there are sheep and pigs. And you are correct, they do have pens. But they do not have ink in them, and they are sadly not blue.

I plan to visit Argos today and I am dreading the feel of the slippery, stubby plastic pen in my hand. I might have given myself a phobia. I shall take my own pencil.

(I hate Argos but I have to buy black-out blinds. Not for air raids. To stop me squinting whilst writing. Desk under window).

Regarding Endangerment Dolls, all should read it. There is nothing like controversy to drum up publicity. This long introduction thread might draw extra attention to it.

Is it not done all electronically as Argos these days? You punch in your order number at the desk, next to all the 14 year olds looking for PlayStation games, and then it tells you whether the Eternal Bow matching tea caddy and guzunder are in stock...or not. Then its beamed using a megatron anti-matter device to Elsie at the cash desk who takes your Sainsbury's bag full of pennies in payment and processes your purchase, which results in a bloke on a computer terminal in the warehouse prodding Brian with a big stick and telling him to 'get that big brown box by the bogs' which is delivered to you 40 minutes later smelling of wee and fags.

God I love England. Huzzah!

Thanks Lisa. I have really valued your comments on this story. It needs work, but so does everything, and I'm captivated by the theme.

JB