is this a load of rubbish? Or should I continue??

[itsonlyricemichael]

The title speaks for itself really. I am a regular with a name change and I need honesty as I cannor judge whether I am writing self-indulgent bollocks or if I should keep going.

I appreciate any input - thank you.

The Devil kissing a lady

?So are you in to heavy metal then?? she said indicating my black t-shirt, with the wording - 'Gallon Drunk'(a band) and depicting the devil kissing a woman. ?Nooo? I shot back outraged, though eyeing her prim pastel outfit I could hardly expect this woman to be able to discriminate between swamp blues rock bands and iron maiden! I suppose my black jeans, DMs and black tee could be considered metal-ish but no self respecting rock fan would be wearing a saggy holey cardie ? that was the uniform of the dedicated Indie kid.

So I could see that we wouldn?t be bonding over our musical tastes, I swiftly moved conversation onto safer topics, politics, religion (that turned out to be a big mistake), whilst eyeing our other companions. We were seated in the Hexagon bar at the top of the University Union building ? it was harshly lit for a bar (no dark corners) and the décor was chrome and (cheap) light wood but the drinks were cheap and it was over the road from our accommodation so made sense for the first night ?getting to know the strangers you now live with? drinks. Glancing across the bar and out of the large picture windows I remarked in a jolly but sarcastic tone, ?look a church that?ll be handy?, the pastel vision (Mandy) almost clapped her hands in her excitement ?oh yes?, she breathed reverently, ?will you be joining the Christian Union, as well then??

I desperately cast around for an appropriate (not insulting) response as I would be living with this girl for the best part of a year. ?Umm not really my cup of tea, lovely for you though.? My heart sank yet further. Still the northern girl across the table from me with her heavy eye make-up and Levellers t-shirt looked more promising and she was studying Politics as well so we should find some common ground. Surprisingly, I wasn?t feeling as nervous as I had thought I would be, all those miles from home, meeting new people living away from my family for the first time. Still my family was not a sanctuary from the world. Our pokey goldfish bowl of a council maisonette was hardly luxurious and my family already blighted by my mothers depression and parents unhappy marriage, had been devastated by the death of my father only a fortnight ago.

It was surreal I had been dressed in black on the previous Thursday at my fathers funeral and now I sat in a bar hundreds of miles away, starting my university life. Peering over my pint glass I wondered when to make that revelation, I felt oddly embarrassed about my situation as though it would be wrong to burden my new flatmates with the knowledge that I had been so recently bereaved. I dreaded the prospect of their discomfort and any awkward silence it might create.

I went to the bar instead to get the next round in.

I'm not going to give you any lit crit (in fact I haven't even read your story I'm afraid), but of course you should continue, if writing gives you pleasure or satisfaction! Almost no-one makes money from writing, but it'll reward you in so many other ways! :)

i'm not the easiest reader to please (not that it means anything, i know :-) ) but i enjoyed that. I'm not fit to make any proper critique but i would like to know what happens next.

You need to find a writers' forum that suits you and really have a back and forth critique session with other writers. The only small criticism I might give you is to be careful on the adjective front - try and show rather than tell. For example, just use said rather than 'I shot back outraged' - which is too wordy. Be wary of bracketed asides - best not to use them at all.

The story at the heart of it is fine and has a satisfying circularity with the black of the t-shirt - then the funereal black. The tone changes a great deal, which is interesting and engaging.

Hone it down - make it lean to give a more dynamic sense of the prose. Put conversation on separate lines - otherwise it can look quite dense on the eye.

The best advice though is to read read read - especially short story anthologies and maybe prize-winning stories if you can find them online.

Keep on writing though - there is nothing better!

I enjoyed it, but perhaps you could filter the information through more gradually, with some inference rather than specfics - "Our pokey goldfish bowl of a council maisonette was hardly luxurious and my family already blighted by my mothers depression and parents unhappy marriage, had been devastated by the death of my father only a fortnight ago."
That's a lot of important information that could trickle through in stages I thought.

It did make me want to read on.

load of rubbish

That's harsh, you could give a reason why you don't think it's good. Constructive criticism would help more.

well, I answered the question

I liked it although the first bit confused me if its the beginning of the book - who is "she" in the "she said" ?

Actually it's pretty good. I found the ( )'s a bit distracting - occasional use is ok, but too many in a paragraph.

Yes, I don't like brackets when I'm reading.

I really liked the second to last paragraph and would have liked the scene to have started there. The dialogue wasn't set out as it would be in a book.

The thing is that you should write the book, tell the story, then go back and edit and edit and edit until you're blue in the face. Where you thought the story started may not be the place it should start. You have to delete paragraphs, despite the sweat and tears that went into them.

You sound as though you have the start of a good story there. I'd get it down in writing, then worry about the writing style later.