Mental Cellar Publications

Hi folks. I missed the post yesterday, so take a seat “Moment of Candor…” Time for Word Works.

This time, on Word Works I am going to post a few hundred words from an early rough draft I made a couple months ago. In this case, they are from the very start of the book. See what you make of this, and I’ll be back on the other side to comment on what I reread.

*

Two men, both young, dark-skinned and built like trucks who just decided to act like humans sat in the dingy recesses of a bar as lunch wound down. Gabe, out hero, poked at the sauce-laden foil basket where his chicken wings once lay with his fork. He sighed.
“Thanks for making it over, bro.”
Jax shook his head.
“Sucks it’s so far.”
“How long it take you?”
“More than an hour.”
“Heaven forbid you drive two.”
“Might have been two. I was rocking. Don’t remember when I left.”
“Sure you don’t.” Gabe smirked. He picked up a glass, more water than whiskey now.
“Still sucks and you know it,” Jax said.
“Better than you.” Gabe took a long sip of his water-whiskey.
“Such ingratitude.”
“I said thanks.”
“My ears musta been ringing. I missed it.”
“Thanks, Jax.”
“There you go. I heard that one.”
Gabe swished his glass. All water left. At least it tasted that way.
“You done?” he asked.
Jax shrugged.
“If you are, we can roll.”
“Where else you wanna go?”
“Eh, where else is there? Want another drink?”
“Only if you’re buying.”
“Right, you gotta save. How’s your leg?”
“Feeling fine. Doc says not to strain it though. Could re-injure the tendon or whatever.”
“How much longer.”
“Jax.”
“Gabe, you ain’t seriously out.”
“No. I’m serious. No more football, not for a long-ass time.”
“Now that sucks.”
“Royally.” Gabe took another sip. He spat water into the cup, wishing it tasted more bitter, less sweet.
“How’re you gonna get by? Pay for next term?”
“I’m saving. You know it.”
“As a mechanic? How much can you—”
“I’m doin’ more than shop work.”
“What kinda more?”
“Stuff they need big guys for.”
“Construction?”
“Brother, you never heard of power lifters have ya?”
“Not construction, okay, okay. Then what?”
Gabe’s massive shoulders rose and fell. At six foot eight inches, not many tight ends had been bigger.
Had been.
In the past.
“Don’t worry about it,” Gabe said. “My dad’s old buddy lets me work on his team.”
“Team?”
“Usually its just two of us.”
“You got a partnership with some old dude?”
“He’s not that old.”

*

And that’s the clip. Lots of dialog, I know. I think most readers will notice the staccato of conversation right away. At the very beginning the narrator’s voice intrudes a bit, but mostly this is just two characters talking with very little description.

I don’t normally write this way for a stretch this long, especially at the beginning of the book. A problem I see here is this opening doesn’t do much to say the genre of the book. Yeah… It has a ways to go.

Anyway, let me know what you think of the excerpt, of this post, or anything else that interests you related to my work or posts.

Thanks for reading. I’ll be back tomorrow with a Moment of Candor.

To support this blog, check out my books. Ice War is out now, and that’s book three of the Pillar Universe series, so it’s a great time to jump into book one, Storm Fleet. Check it out. And good luck to you, reader.