New Project, still untitled

[Serzen]

Okay, so here's a look at a new project I'm tackling. I think I'm just going to shove BROKEN MIRROR in the drawer and have done with it. People don't actually want challenging literature any more. They're way too busy to make decisions for themselves or think about the world critically. We wouldn't want Ryan Seacrest or Kim Kardashian to be out of work, after all.

It's still in rough draft form, but have a look:

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Janice was a plucky heroine. The world needed more plucky heroines, and she was proud to do her part. She decided this as she swept through her apartment, collecting her keys from the counter and her cell phone from the other counter. She clicked off the TV just as Horatio Caine slipped on his sunglasses and delivered his opening pun.

Janice donned her sunglasses in the hall, locked the door and headed down the steps. The Who did not accompany her, but she preferred the Ramones. If someone wanted to make a movie about her life some day, she really hoped they would use the Ramones. She just hoped that the theme song wouldn't be "I Just Want to Have Something to Do."

She drove past great trees and sprawling vineyards on her way to work. It was an old part of the country, and felt like it. The sun always seemed brighter here, as though it had been shining for longer and had burned through the cruft in the air surrounding some of the newer cities. It was quiet, peaceful and, for all its beauty, utterly dull. Janice longed for something to happen. She didn't want the idyllic scene ruined, she just wanted, well, something to do.

Her job was actually a good one, and she only had to drive for 30 minutes--through gorgeous scenery, no less--to get to it. The workload was light, all things considered, and she had her own office. The hours were flexible, the benefits were good, she took long lunches. They even let her keep a bottle of gin in her desk drawer. Sure, she had to review a lot of papers and talk to people she wasn't really fond of, and sometimes the papers were written in really bad handwriting, but it was better than selling shoes.

Ugh. She hated toes, they were ugly things. No one ever took good care of their toes, and the people who did take care of their feet were far too stuck up about it and never wanted her help finding a pair of shoes that would fit right. On her last day at work, Janice told some preppy bottle-blonde that she hoped the women's toes got all cramped up and twisted, and that her ugly pedicure would give her an infection. It was a freeing feeling.

From that day forward, Janice tried to live her life in a way that would set her firmly on the road to proper plucky heroineism. She just needed someone to save or a situation to diffuse.

Janice pulled into her assigned parking place, thinking about her destiny, never considering that her destiny might find her.
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So, there you have it, the opening salvo in my new project.

~Serzen

[Mary-Catharine]

You're humor was the main thing that kept me reading (espeically about the toes). I'm wondering where this is going and what you mean by destiny. I think you could give a little more of an inside scoop of what your book is about without giving too much away. Just enough to give someone motivation to want to read forward.
I hope this helps
Best of luck to you!

[kenpochick]

I don't know enough about the story to judge it. Nothing really happens in what you've posted.

This may be coming from reading your intro and maybe I would feel differently if I hadn't read that part but whereas it could be read as cute and funny, I read it as making fun of mainstream books with an edge of hostility.

[Serzen]

The story isn't actually going anywhere. It was a quickly thrown together post for April Fool's Day. If I'd have thought of it sooner, I could have polished out the hostility without losing the riff on mainstream.

Don't get me wrong, I don't hate mainstream books. BOB knows I've read my share, and I own dozens of them that I even re-read. But just because I don't hate them doesn't mean that I embrace them. I'll be the fist to admit that I watch CSI at 2am when I can't sleep, but it doesn't mean I approve of it. Anything that keeps people reading is a Good Thing™, as long as people know that reading MAINSTREAM NOVEL: THE SEQUEL is a lot like watching CSI: MIAMI--they both provide you with some entertainment and escapism, but neither one is going to make you think deeply about the material in question.

If I want to imagine what life in space might be like, I'll turn on STAR TREK; if I want to learn about the composition of the Horsehead Nebula, I'll turn on National Geographic Channel. Likewise, if I want a fun adventure story I might pick up one of Modesitt's RECLUSE books, but if I want to consider what it means to evolve as a person I might pick up A CLOCKWORK ORANGE.

Next time I'll play up the spoof angle better.

~Serzen