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GS Chapter 12 edited ‘Live through Death’

Hola people of ‘teh’ world, me again here to spout a mini blog type thing that I do over the chapters of my insane meandering in the world of fiction.

Gonna keep it mercifully short today because reasons, just usual shit. I’m gearing up for nano, wrapping up Ladies Close Your Eyes, I’m pretty happy with it, and the reception on that nepotisitic fart box known as ‘inkitt’ is fairly good. But who gives a shit? I’m enjoying writing it, it was a nice change to do focus on something smaller and different. I’ll try and find a place for it some magazine or contest when it’s done, maybe I’ll get it edited, but judging by the amount of time it’s taking for GS to come back I’d be lucky to get it out before the next ice age. Oh also currently in talks with an artist acquantance of mine for the cover, which should be fun, his art is really… arty. I look forward to spend too much money on that haha.

I’m excited about nano (Almost said about the next ice age), my personal life is in ruins, got no career to speak of but hey I can write some decent shit and that’s a reason not to off myself which is wearing thin haha.

This chapter is the more feelsy one, grab those tissues lads and laddettes, its about to get real up in here.

As usual head on over to those good smarmy twats over at inkitt to get your peepers all over it for free by following this here link. And if anyone wants to send me more pictures of green haired chicks, feel free haha.

Live through Death

~

Candlelight flickered on the counter top in TJ’s kitchen, a weary flame tossed back and forth by a careless breath or a sigh. TJ, his mother and Sunday huddled around the small kitchen table and ate in silence.  A restrained rattling of cutlery hid polite coughs and awkward glances across the table. No one dared utter a word.

TJ’s mom smiled at whomever cast an eye her way, but her smile was a little cracked on one side.

They finished a humble meal of frozen pork chops and a garden salad from a re-sealable pack, which TJ’s mother put back in the crisper at the bottom of the fridge. She cleared their plates.

“Mom, let me help you.”

“It’s fine. You two wash up and get to bed. I set you two up on the couch until we can get your room tidied up.” She sighed. “It’s such a mess; you said an animal got in?”

“Yeah,” TJ said as his hands slipped from the plates. He turned his head away and felt a cold steel ringing in the emptiness that was growing inside him.

His mom smiled as she took the plates to the dishwasher and loaded them in.

“It’s OK. I didn’t like any of those posters anyway; we can get it cleaned up in no time.” A weak laugh tried to escape her diaphragm, but it didn’t quite make it and instead came out as a pained hiccup.

TJ sat back down and looked at Sunday anxiously. She sat with her feet up on her seat, poking at a very dry piece of lettuce, trying not to be noticed.

“I’m done,” she said as she pushed the table away and hopped off the seat. She swam through the tension in the little kitchen and escaped to the cosy solitude of the living room.

TJ bit his bottom lip and swallowed a dry lump, his chest feeling tight and hot.

“Good night,” he said as he got up from the table and walked away. His footsteps, light, barely made contact with the floor. The image of his mother at the kitchen sink got smaller and smaller as he left the room. That image of her burned into his memory.

~

“It’s almost time,” Evergreen sighed. He felt a strange elation washing over him. He kept it to himself. “What do we have in stock?” he said through gritted teeth. A closeted eagerness leaked out in his voice as he leant against a high back chair in the operations van.

“Err, a couple of chimeras, one of those big bastards and that new one,” the tech said as he handed Evergreen a small tablet computer over his shoulder.

The tech seemed to be getting high off of Evergreen’s steely excitement. He sat in his chair, craning his neck to watch. Evergreen smiled, flipping through the pictures on the tablet as it lit up his dark, shark-like face. The mobile command centre was dark, lit only by a series of monitors. They covered the inside of something that looked like a large tanker truck from the outside.

Noticing the attention he was getting from this eager little whelp, Evergreen cast a disparaging eye towards the tech. He was a young guy, maybe late twenties, early thirties, with shaggy blond hair. A set of boxy glasses perched on his sharp nose. His name tag said his name was ‘Murray’. Tossing the tablet into his lap, he said, “Fuck it, ‘Murray’, use ’em all.”

Murray, feeling a little exposed, tilted his eyes down, cleared his throat, adjusted his glasses and got back to work. “Yes, sir. T minus two hours to full release of specimens.”

~

In the dimly lit living room, Sunday had commandeered the roomy sofa and had spread herself across it like Cleopatra. She wore another one of TJ’s zombie-themed shirts with no bottoms. ‘Evil Dead’, this time, with a picture of Ash lifting his chainsaw, ready for root canal work.

“Got a big day tomorrow,” she said as she rolled onto her side, away from TJ, revealing a set of pink panties with a picture of a little cartoon, a smiling green ice cream cone, on the back.

He turned away, trying not to look and burst a blood vessel; a sudden rush of sadness hit him. “Tell me…” He pulled a blanket off the coffee table. His mother had set out a bunch of folded bedding for them both. He began to lay it down flat on the wooden floor. “…Are we gonna make it?”

“What are you doing?” She turned to watch him laying the blanket on the floor. “There’s enough room for both of us on here.” She rolled back over onto her side.

“Err.” A cold sweat began plummeting down to TJ’s ass crack, like cold corpse fingers running down his back “What?” His breath came out in short bursts now.

“You need to get your rest for tomorrow.” She paused and took a deep breath. “You can’t sleep on the floor; I won’t let you.”

TJ swallowed hard, harder than he’d ever swallowed, and began to shake his head up and down like a dog.

“O-K.”

TJ edged his way closer to the couch. Each step felt like jumping on a slippery rock in a fast flowing stream. The image of Sunday’s warm back jostled in his field of vision as he tried to get closer. He reached the edge of the couch. He stopped dead, trying not to make a sound.

She rolled sleepily onto her back.

Without opening her eyes, she yawned and said, “TJ, get on the fucking couch.” She then rolled back onto her side, showing him her lovely back again, with that signature green quaff of hair sticking up from where she had just lain on it.

“Yeah, I’m just…”

He turned away and edged his roomy behind onto the tip of the couch, praying to himself in his head, Please don’t fart. Please don’t fart. Please don’t fart. When all his weight was equally distributed, he let out a little sigh, followed by a small yet squeaky fart that he hoped only dogs could hear. He froze, swallowing hard as he waited for her to say something. Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit! he said to himself. She stirred. His heart pounded in his chest. His throat became drier than a cough sweet sitting at the bottom of an old lady’s purse.

After a moment of nervous pause, he deduced that she was asleep and hadn’t heard, so he began to gradually lower himself into position on the couch. Pulling the cover up over himself and Sunday, he ever so delicately slid his large body in next to hers. His belly pressed against her warm back and, as he put his head down to rest next to hers, he could smell her hair. It smelled a little musty but not bad musty. Like the stump of a tree with fresh moss growing on it, fresh and rich and intoxicating. Her smell made his hair stand up on his pudgy arms. He tried to position his arms behind her back without touching her butt or making too much noise.

Don’t get a boner, don’t get a boner, don’t get a boner, don’t get a boner, he said to himself, under his breath, as he slithered his arm around her waist, angling for a more comfortable position while holding his breath. It was not unlike someone trying to defuse a bomb in an eighties action movie.

Sighing and releasing the tension in his arm, he grinned like a monkey and took a large inhalation of her hair as he settled into his dream position: the big spoon of a girl he couldn’t have imagined would say more than three words to him if the world wasn’t ending.

His heart leapt in his chest as if it wanted to climb out of his throat and give him a high five. For a minute he forgot what he was even doing on the couch. Oh, yeah, sleep.

He settled and forced his eyes closed. And he glided off to sleep on rainbows and bullshit.

~

Live through Death

Hide & Seek By Jakayla Toney – A review

Usually what you’ll find on inkitt is people will only read the first chapter of a story and review that, for brevity but also because the first and last chapters are arguably the most important.
The first chapter if you’re going to send this to an editor/publisher/literary agent will in nine out of ten cases be the only chapter they need to read to ascertain whether they want to use your work. So essentially paired with a good synopsis/blurg, the first chapter has to be almost a summation of whats to follow in the entirity of the story.
I understand people like to slow boil their horror which is fine if you’re out their making a name for yourself with that and accumulate fans who like that sort of horror. But have you ever noticed that at the beginning of a horror movie there’s always a sort of prologue where someone else is suffering from the problem the protagonists are working their way towards. Not always but on average you’ll see it as a literal forshadowing. Even in the shining you’re told what happened to the previous caretaker as an effort of foreshadowing, the first conversation they have in the car on the way to the hotel is about the Donner party. People trapped in the winter being forced to eat eachother.
After reading the first chapter and the blurb I have literally no idea what the story is remotely about or have a good feel for any of the characters. You started the story at a point where literally nothing happens except a game of hide and seek. A game of hide and seek which neither serves the story or really develops the characters in any way other than the main protagonist is an excellent hide and seek player.
Other than that, I seem really critical but the writing style is effective, there were a few grammatical errors, even in the first paragraph. But the writing is solid, the first chapter is just too short and nothing happens, You need a hook in the first chapter to force people to read the next chapter, you can’t just end the chapter with “Oh wouldn’t it be cool to play hide and seek in the forest alone” that’s not a hook. It needs more.
Again sorry if this seems harsh, the style isn’t all that bad I’m just telling you how I see it, It’s not bad, I’ve read a lot worse, it’s just not great.

If you wanna check out this story for yourself and a lot of others, head on over to inkitt for the grand total of zero monopoly money.

Hide and Seek

Ensanguined by Patrick Zac – A review

This first chapter is great. It’s punchy, it get’s right to the point, it delivers but doesn’t all together rush it either.
One thing I’m really critical of is long middling slow boil first chapters. Sometimes they work but most of the time they don’t. I think the story should start at the most interesting part of a person’s life, I don’t care if they’re great at cross stitch or they got a b minus in history, If that’s not the what the story is about and it’s not interesting I don’t care. I want meat and this story has meat, buckets of fresh bloody meat.
The story is great, not a lot happens at the start, by that I mean you don’t learn a hell of a lot about the main character but it was quite a short first chapter. That being said her voice is very strong, acerbic and a little self-depricating which is why I likened it to Dexter.
Although the Dexter analogy is a double edged sword, because although I loved those books and the show and I love the first person style. I like being inside a serial killer’s mind. It’s been done before and it’s been done incredibly well. Trying to compete with Jeff Lindsay is like trying to wrestle with a miami aligator, it’s not gonna go your way. And although I love the style it seems a little hackneyed a little by the standards of a Dexter Devotee like myself.
That’s my only real criticism. I loved the jump from the date to the murder, just no time wasted, cut straight through the bullshit like a hot knife through butter. It functions perfectly as a first chapter, just gets right into it and delivers a succint synopsis of what’s to come. A really great hook, which is what a first chapter should be. So you nailed in that respect I think.
The description of the murder is very nice too, gory but not over the top, it’s tasteful but still sates the blood lust of the reader.
Another criticism I have is I think readers when they write women they tend to mistake bitchiness for confidence or character. I see this slipping into that. So in some regards I think you should make her a little more self-depricating like Dexter. One great thing about Dexter is his ability to laugh at himself, which allows him to be the monster but still allows him to be likeable.

Final thoughts, I actually think this is something I could write, the style is a mirror of mine in some respects and I’ve dreamed of writing Dexter fanfiction this might be the inspiration or the push I need to do that. The last book just left a hole that needs to be filled by something.
I loved it, keep it up!

If you wanna check it out for yourself, head on over to inkitt to read Ensanguined and Patrick’s other stories for free.

Draco’s Demon a fanfiction by Laz. R. Gray – A review

Sorry I couldn’t resist.

I’m just too big a fan of Constantine not to read and review some fanfic. Not that into Potter but it’s decent. I know you wanted a review on your earthquake story but as the title says, I couldn’t resist.
I was actually really impressed with the overall plot right off the bat. A lot of the negative comments I have for stories I read on inkitt are that nothing tends to happen in the first chapter. Like they’re just kicking their legs waiting for the story to get going, they don’t get that the story has to get going from the start or it won’t garner enough interest for people to read the second.
But this swept me up from the start. I’m a big fan of Constantine, Hellblazer is one of my favourite if not my favourite comic of all time. I absolutely love Constantine and if anyone asks my favourite DC character, they say Batman I say John Constantine haha (tips pretentious twat cap).
So the start was great, it felt almost like a neo-noir Harry Potter. Lots of fun fan service and the cheeky scouse magic con-man being his typical caddish self.
The writing style is very competent and confident, it’s very functional, it feels practiced and wasn’t overly verbose or cringeworthy.
Technical writings skills were spot on, it was very easy to read and I didn’t see any typos or grammatical errors. There’s a bit where the dialogue of the demon rhymes with the description of his voice but I’m pretty sure that was intentional. The urge to rhyme is addictive.
Ok no some of the negative points. I have to say although there was a lot going on it seemed pretty safe and by the numbers. It felt a little fanfictiony and it didn’t feel like it took any risks or did anything different. I mean I know the HP world is strictly pg-13 or whatever but that’s not Constantine’s world. So when I see John Constantine going to Hogwarts I want Hermione naked on an alter covered in pig’s blood haha.
I just felt it was a little weak, not as edgy as a Constantine fan like me would like, gotta channel some edgelordiness from the man himself Alan Moore haha.
Also I found Constantine was a little too smug, I mean I know he is pretty happy with himself most of the time but it was a little over the top although I loved the hint at him shagging Harry’s mum, that was nice haha.
Overall it was a lot of fun, maybe my expectations were just a little too high.

If you wanna check out the whole story for yourself head on over to inkitt to read it for free.

Draco’s Demon

A poetic lamenation of the fps genre.

Ok so that was just a title that popped into my head, nothing about this ramble is going to be remotely poetic. Or even a limerick, maybe I’ll do haiku at the end.

I thought I should just do a ramble to break up all the literary shade I’ve been throwing you folks over the past however long and I really can’t be bothered to do another knife review or even buy another knife. Shit I just spent like a hundred quid on a new blender, what the fuck am I doing with my life?

Right so topic, topic. Ok I recently bought the game Doom, and I thought I could complain/praise that and maybe spin it into a blog here and abouts a ponies worth of words (500, at least I think, need to take another course on cockney rhyming slang).

Ok (gotta stop starting new paragraphs with ok, I was talking to someone on xbox live ((i.e. the only human contact I get)) and I kept starting every sentence with ‘basically’ or ‘essentially’ which are basically essentially the same word and I wanted to strangle myself with a kitty print draft excluder). I really actually enjoyed this game, I haven’t completed it yet but I had some minor gripes about this game and shooters today in general.
Because to be perfectly honest with you I preferred Doom 3 to this and let me tell you why before you rectally examine me with a verbal steel toe cap. It had atmosphere, yeah the game is dated now and it was pretty shitty even then, like lame haunted house half-life knock off. But I really enjoyed it, it rang so hard of event horizon I couldn’t help but love it. And if Doom 3 had the awesome gameplay of the new Doom it would win hands down.

Opening a dimensional portal on mars to hell is super cool so how did Bethesda make it shit and boring?
Well in Doom 3 the hell research was sort of hush-hush, it built up gradually and you didn’t really know what was going on and you read audio logs that documented the slow descent into hell and madness. It was a mining operation that was experimenting with teleportation and accidentally opened a gateway to hell in an ancient Martian ruin.
In Doom they’re actually purposefully trying to get to hell to frack some demon gas, I’m not even kidding. There are like holograms saying how it’s all super cool and safe and awesome to open a portal to hell to nick their idemon chargers.

I mean seriously is this game for real? How would that ever make sense? It’s just ridiculous, no janitor working for no three-fiddy an hour would mop the floors of a mars base where they’re openly telling everyone they’re opening a gateway into hell to steal their unobtainium. I mean how could it go wrong?

So the first strike for me is Doom 3 took it in stride and played it closer to the chest and had better atmosphere and actually tried to be scary. The new Doom doesn’t give a shit, it’s just a balls out shooter. Which I like, but it really missed an opportunity to be more than a shooter and surpass Doom 3.
I feel a twinge of disappointment whenever I start a new shooter and literally two seconds in you’re mashing a zombie or I’m sorry a ‘Possessed”s head into mushy peas. Whatever happened to the half life style of games where there’s actual build up and the action seems to flow organically? You’re not just given a gun and a slap on the bum. It’s insulting. I want set up, I want atmosphere and I want tension.

I think the day I noticed the real immersive shooter experience was dead was Farcry 3. The trailers were this intense looking fps that looked like a game of the movie The Beach. A group of holiday goers having fun get snatched by guerillas and have to fight and adapt to survive. But as soon as you start the game you’ve already been captured, no build up, no character development, you’re just kicked onto an open stage with your pants down. And then the cheek of the game reaches peak when you’re told to save your friends in the game that hasn’t introduced you to them yet. How can you want to save someone if you don’t even get to know them at all? You’re actually in the cage with your brother and he dies right in front of you and the game expects you to care, I like met him two minutes ago and he was only really there as a tutorial.
Then I started to realise they don’t really care, and ubisoft in general is pretty lazy, willing to literally copy and paste their games into shiny new sky boxes selling them at full price with a hackneyed plot ripped right out of Michael Moore’s asshole. Yeah when we say ‘Sequel’ we mean an actual sequel not the same game where everyone is wearing different hats.

I’m really enjoying the game, it just makes me sad to think shooters used to be so much more than this and they’ll never be like that again. It’s fun, the guns are great, the monsters are great, the action is heart pounding. But I used to play games I felt that people really cared about when they made them. Now I’m not so sure.

Doom is a fun game
Lots of mindless gore and shit
Seven out of ten.

Peace!

 

First review for Green Sunday chapter one

In a bit of a shameless quid pro quo back scratching, Florian has done a lovely review in thanks for the review I did of his story Wayward Salvation. So you know it’s completely unbiased and subjective haha.
It’s a nice review, I think he did a great job and captured it nicely but take it with a grain of salt because he’s a friend.

Thanks again Flo, don’t forget to check out his story Wayward Salvation and of course Green Sunday.

Katanas and Cheese Graters

Green Sunday chapter one reviewed by Florian Maier
Let's be honest, whether we like it or not, the Zombie Apocalypse has been done to death. From films like the legendary 'RomeroTrilogy' and TV-shows like 'The Walking Dead' to books like 'World War Z' and video games franchises like 'Dead Rising', there have been so many incarnations, they could fill the coffers of any zombiephile to last them several lifetimes.

Let me take you aside for a second, and let's look at the bigger picture: a fresh take is needed.

Yes, we've had self aware zombie comedies in forms of our 'Shaun of the Deads' and 'Zombielands', and not to forget a hammy teeny love-story/comedy called 'Warm Bodies', but none have been particularly daring, at least for modern standards, when it comes to the setting or story department. 

The gist always is: 'Zombies happen (for whatever reason), modern society as we know it crumbles and someone (or many) must step up to do stuff, or just survive, or keep their humanity intact, or all things at once..' 

Sound familiar? No? Well, then you've probably never seen 'Dawn of the Dead', or the remake.

'Green Sunday' is not only a fresh take on the whole Zombie Apocalypse shebang, it also  dares to abandon the gritty seriousness of more recent incarnations for a return to Romero-style satire and humour.

Now I know you probably think this is going to be about the Zombie Apocalypse, but to be precise, the Apocalypse has happened, and passed. Turns out our shambling friends were no match for the Military  leaving a lot of disappointed teenagers and zombie themed web-shows in the wake of the disaster. 

TJ, our protagonist, is one of those disappointed teens, a tubby neckbeard with an affinity for cutting up plastic water bottles  in his Mom's backyard with a mall katana. 
His loud mouthed neighbour, Zed, runs one of the aforementioned web-shows and brings his audience (and us as the readers) up to speed on how things are now, of course hinting (or rather hoping) the Apocalypse will return so he can finally show off his automated killer cheese graters some more (yes, you read correctly, cheese graters) instead of having them tested on toothless zombie 'stumps' in his backyard. 

TJ, meanwhile seems content swinging about his swords and imagining himself as a samurai in feudal Japan. So, why is he our main character again? Well, who doesn't like a lovable loser and underdog? I sure do. 

Right from the title of the chapter you will notice that 'Green Sunday' relies on its humour, and it's far from toothless packing a real bite (obvious pun intended). I must honestly confess however that the humour may not be for everyone, since it does not shirk away from being vulgar and upfront. Don't get me wrong, it's funny, and I Iaughed and smiled all the way through. 

Besides its off-beat humour, its writing is visual, the opening being a prime example for this. I'm a huge fan of visual and descriptive writing and found it to be one of the things that lifted it up from seeming like your run-of-the-mill piece of fiction published on the web. There was one point when the tense seemed to change abruptly but that is easily forgiven since the story flows off the page like a zombie oozes pus.

Overall, I found it to be an entertaining and not to forget refreshing read. To some TJ may seem a bit passive as a main character, but we're so spoiled nowadays by our quirky hyperactive and not to mention whiny emotional main characters that we have expected these to be the norm making it no surprise whatsoever when the protagonist does something badass or brave. 

Needless to say, the story shows off its potential right off the bat and the author definitely knows what he is doing and how to tinge his universe in satirical comedy. To quote John Hurt here:

"We can expect great things from you."

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