woodpryan's Written Works

[Sickrose]

Re: Drive

You're welcome. I thought the description of Clint's character and his despression was particulary good. I also liked the King and Dylan reference.

[woodpryan]

Re: Drive

You're welcome. I thought the description of Clint's character and his despression was particulary good. I also liked the King and Dylan reference.

I really tried to make clint 1. believable and 2. likable, even though he's an alcoholic. I think we can sort of feel for him in a way. His wife is dead and he's depressed. That's why he drinks so much. And then, oh shit, he killed a girl. But somehow, I was trying to get the reader to still feel for him and understand him. I spent a lot of the story building his character. I think it's about half of the story. Even him giving the money to the homeless guy is character building.

[Sickrose]

Re: Drive

I think you succeeded I did feel sympathy and thought giving the change to the homeless guy was a nice touch and it wasnt corny either.I thought it was beleivable.

[woodpryan]

Re: Drive

I'll be submitting this to Fantasy and Science Fiction Magazine in a couple of days. Anyone else have any advise before I do so? I've had a pretty positive response from my first readers so far.

[woodpryan]

Re: Drive

This gets sent off today. Fantasy and Science Fiction Magazine. Wish me luck. The Shadowman was rejected so hopefully this one is good enough to be published.

[Brice]

Re: Drive

Good luck!

[Sickrose]

Re: Drive

Hey good luck !! I like the addition to the ending. nice touch

[woodpryan]

Re: Drive

Hey good luck !! I like the addition to the ending. nice touch

thanks man. I appreciate it.

[Sickrose]

Re: Drive

You're welcome. I look forward to hearing how you get on.

There is a website called spinetinglers who have a monthy quiz as well. Maybe it's worthwhile sending it on. Just thought I would mention, i have submitted a couple of my own (unsucesful) stories there.

[Jack Torrance]

Re: Drive

Best of luck!

[woodpryan]

Re: Drive

thanks guys. i hope it gets accepted. of course, they buy first american publishing rights, so hopefully they don't consider it being posted on an internet forum having been "previously published".

[Jean]

Re: Drive

[woodpryan]

Re: Drive

The story was sent back to me with not enough postage so I had to re-send it. I sent it back to them on Tuesday with express shipping so they should have received it on Wednesday. Hopefully they will publish it. I would be so delighted to be able to say I got my first professional publication under my belt.

[woodpryan]

Re: Drive

oh, and thanks for the good luck teddy bear jean.

[woodpryan]

This is the second draft of my latest short story
*edited July 9th for logic




Erroneous Perception
By Ryan Wood



The interstate was almost completely devoid of traffic at this late hour on a Tuesday evening. It was a few days after the Fourth of July and firecrackers could still be heard every now and then between the droning monotonous music of the crickets. It was a clear night with few clouds and the moon was full. Her weekly Literature Meeting ended late tonight and Margaret Evans was driving home at almost midnight.
The meeting had been held at Janice Williams' house tonight and she lived in Huntsville, which was a twenty minute drive from Margaret's own home in Dennison. In attendance tonight had been Margaret and Janice along with Amanda Baranowski and Kathleen Walton. Sharron Danville had been sick tonight and had to miss the discussion of The Haunting of Hill House, which Margaret found quite disappointing as she was sure that Sharron would have had some excellent points to make on this short novel. The Literature club to which Margaret Evans belonged often took on a single author for a full month and the author they were discussing this month was Shirley Jackson. Each month a different member of the group would pick an author and it had been Kathleen Walton's turn. Kathleen always seemed to pick strange authors of which Margaret was not particularly fond. Next week they would be talking about the short story The Lottery and although this short story is very short indeed, Margaret thought there would be much to talk about next week.
A semi truck passed her on the left and she looked down at her speedometer. Fifty five. She sped up to sixty and held it there as Trisha Yearwood sang softly from the speakers of her hot pink 1992 Cadillac, which had been given to her for outstanding Mary Kay sales years ago.
Margaret was a little put off by the fact that she was the only person in the group who seemed to make any sense tonight. Amanda Baranowski was under the impression that everything had been in Eleanor's mind; that there had been no paranormal activity in Hill House at all. Margaret had pointed out the fact that when the banging was ringing through the halls in the upstairs corridor, Eleanor had not been the only one to hear it and that Dr. Montague's atrocious wife and the pompous moron who had escorted her to the house had made communication with something in the house. Well, Kathleen Walton and Janice Williams had not come to Margaret's rescue, saying they had no opinion on the believability of Eleanor's claims. They wanted to talk about other aspects of the novel, such as the fact that the women seemed more receptive to the phenomena of the house. Sharron would have agreed with Margaret, she was sure. There was nothing in the novel that led Margaret Evans to reject Eleanor's account. The woman had obviously seen it with her own two eyes.
There was a loud pop on the front passenger's side of the car and the car jerked violently to the right. Margaret pulled it back to the left, barely managing to keep it on the road. Now there was a loud buzzing on that side of the car, as if there were a giant hive of bees infesting her front passenger wheel. She did not slam on the brakes but eased the pedal down and slowed, not putting on her emergency lights because it would take her a minute to find them and she wanted her full attention on safely pulling over. She was now riding on the rim of her right front wheel and it was screeching loudly on the road. It was difficult to keep the car from veering off the road and she held the wheel with all the strength she had in her forty seven year old arms. Finally, she slowed enough to ease the car onto the shoulder and stopped.
She breathed a sigh of relief, turned the engine and the radio off, then found the emergency lights, which were on the right side of the steering column. She pushed the large button into the column and began to wonder what to do.
Margaret did not taken get any cell phone service out here and she had no way of contacting anyone for help. Margaret opened her purse and removed a pack of Salem Lights. She opened the pack, pulled her bic lighter out of it and stuck a cigarette in her mouth. Getting out of the car, Margaret silently wondered if this might be punishment for talking to the homosexual at the bookstore last week and even momentarily sympathizing with his inability to marry. She should have prayed for him this Sunday but she had forgotten and now she may be paying a price.
The night was slightly cool but, because of the humidity, it felt somewhat hot and sticky anyway, giving her an instantaneous dirty feeling. She stood by her car smoking, hoping someone would pull over to help her. She had a spare tire in the trunk, but did not know how to put it on. The stretch of interstate on which she had become stranded was long and straight. Anyone who saw her would have plenty of time to stop behind her. A cricket serenaded her while she smoked and the bug was beginning to get on her nerves. Headlights appeared around the last bend before her stretch of interstate and she began to wave her arms above her head, hoping beyond hope. As the BMW passed her she cursed, finished her cigarette and dropped it on the ground, crushing it angrily. She already wanted another one, but she was trying to cut back and decided to wait.
Her Lady's Rolex told her that it was now twelve thirty in the morning. Her husband would begin to worry about her soon. Margaret took the watch off her wrist and put it in the car on the passenger side, not wanting someone to steel it if they saw her and pulled over.
Another pair of headlights was coming now and she waved her hands over her head frantically, trying to get the attention of the driver. The Mercedes honked once as it flew past her. She waited a full ten minutes before the next pair of headlights showed up and this time the vehicle began to slow down as it neared her. Oh, thank you God, she thought.
It was an old rusted truck, she realized and with a sense of dread she noticed that some death metal band was blaring from the open windows. When the truck stopped, it backfired once before the driver killed the engine. Then the guy (she assumed it was a guy as no woman would drive such a thing) just sat there for a minute before getting out. The man was silhouetted for a moment against the headlights of his atrocious truck, his hair falling past his bare shoulders. She began to fear this man, wishing that he had continued driving. Why couldn't the BMW have stopped? As the man approached her, she saw that his hair was black and very dirty. It might have been washed last week, but she couldn't be sure. It might also have been a month ago. His bare chest was covered in tattoos and so were his arms. She wanted to cross herself, but thought it might set him off. The Bible clearly says not to mark the body and she would pray for him tonight. Here on his breast was a six point star. On his shoulder was some sort of demonic looking design she didn't understand and had never seen before. The man was wearing a pair of jeans that were very old and riddled with holes.
“What seems to be the trouble ma'am?” The voice was thick with country twang.
At first, she wasn't sure what to say. How many times had she seen a face like his on the news or in one of those horror movies her kids watched when they were teenagers? Did this guy really want to help? It was almost one o' clock in the morning now, she was on an almost deserted road, and she was only one woman who looked fairly attractive for her age. This man would have no trouble clocking her over the head and taking her to his house (or trailer more likely) and raping her until he killed her.
“Oh, don't worry about it, I've got someone on the way to help.” The words escaped her before she could stop them or think about what she was saying.
“Really? Why were you waving your arms in the air then?”
“I... umm... I forgot for a moment... that I had already... umm... called my son to come pick me up. He should be here any minute.”
“Name's William. You can just call me Billy.” Billy stuck out his grimy hand and Margaret merely looked at it, not wanting to touch it. He ran it through his hair as if this was what he intended to do in the first place. Margaret noticed how strong Billy was and realized that he could bring that hand down from his head and strike her hard enough to knock her out if he wanted. Instead, he dipped it into his jeans pocket and removed a pack of Marlboro and a Zippo lighter. “Why don't you just give your son a call and let him know that I'm already here and I'll get you all fixed up,” he said, popping a cigarette in his mouth, flipping open the lighter, and lighting up.
“Well... I...” She thought for a moment. The man had caught her in a lie and he knew it. She wondered briefly if he was angry yet. She could open her phone and pretend to make a call but she would rather keep pretending her son was on his way. “It ran out of batteries after I made the call.”
“Well what's the problem?” He strode past her and then saw for himself that the wheel had been torn to shreds on the front passenger side. He whistled loudly and asked her if she had a replacement.
“Yes, it's in the trunk. I have the tools to fix it too. I just don't know how.”
Billy took a step toward her and she backed up one step. She didn't know what he intended to do when he took that step forward but he stopped after that, looking at her in irritation. “Pop the trunk,” he said in a dry voice.
She went to do it immediately, not wanting to make this man angry, hoping that he wouldn't hurt her. After she popped the trunk, he removed the jack and tire iron, then pulled out her spare tire and set it on the ground as Margaret got back out of the car. He picked up the rod used to pump the car jack while she fumbled with her lighter, trying to achieve a flame in the light breeze. Margaret's hands were shaking and she could hardly get the stupid thing to spark at all.
Billy was walking toward her with the rod in one hand held out in front of him, pulling it back, ready to swing it at her head.
Margaret prepared herself for the blow, squinting her eyes shut and when the blow didn't come, she opened them again and saw that he was standing in front of her, digging in his right pocket. He had moved the rod from one hand to the other and it was now slung over his shoulder. He removed something metallic from his pocket. Oh god, she thought. He's going to stab me to death right here. Panic surged through her heart before she saw a flame in his hand. For a moment she didn't realize what had happened. Then she realized that he was lighting the cigarette still clamped tightly in her teeth. Margaret inhaled deeply as Billy walked around the car and dropped the rod on the ground next to her car on the passenger's side. Then he went back to get the base of the jack and the tire. While he worked, Margaret was relieved since she could stand at the rear of the car and keep some distance from the man. He made small talk while he worked but they had no common interests and he eventually stopped.
She continued to look down the interstate at regular intervals, wishing traffic would pick up a little. She felt sure that if there was more traffic, he would be less likely to try anything. But no more cars passed by at all while he worked and she realized that no one would be able to place this man at this scene tomorrow. No one would know if he stuffed her into his truck unconscious and took her home to do God knows what to her. She became increasingly nervous as he got closer to finishing and smoked continuously while he changed the tire. Finally, he finished and put the old tire in the trunk, followed by the jack. He came around the car last with the tire iron. She imagined it swinging at her head, connecting with her skull, and knocking her out. Margaret backed away from him when he brought this to the trunk and she almost ran into Billy's truck.
Then he was coming at her, striding over to her with his big muscles and she knew it was time. He reached up a hand in front of her face in a threatening gesture. Knowing he was going to strangle her, she squeezed her eyes shut again, wishing she had a can of pepper spray in her purse. She felt his hand close over her shoulder.
“I think that'll do it,” he said and squeezed. He removed his hand and began to walk around the front of his truck to the driver's door. “Have a good night.”
Margaret Evans was stunned. She had been so sure the man was going to kill her. Her mind was flooded with relief then and she began to cry a little. She watched by her car as William (but you can call me Billy) pulled back onto the interstate.
Margaret sat in her car for twenty minutes crying. She couldn't stop. She didn't know why she was doing it but the tears would not stop flowing. Maybe she didn't need to pray for the man she met at the bookstore last week and maybe she didn't need to pray for the man who had changed her tire. He had stopped to help her when no one else would. She realized now that she hadn't even thanked him.
Maybe she needed to pray for herself.

July 7, 2010

[woodpryan]

Re: Drive

Got a rejection slip from Fantasy and Science Fiction Magazine for this one today.

[Sickrose]

Re: Drive

I am really sorry to hear that man I hope it,s not discouraged you from submitting it elsewhere. You should still be proud of yourself for having the balls to do it.

If it's any consolation a lot of people on this site have said how much they like Drive - me included - which just goes to show what that they dont know what they are talking about.

[woodpryan]

Re: Drive

No, it hasn't discouraged me. I'm going to submit it to a few more places. I got a rejection from FandSF for "The Shadowman" too and I still submitted drive only a couple weeks later. I'm just going back over it now, trying to figure out why it was rejected to that I can improve. I don't know though. Hopefully I'll figure it out eventually. Thanks for that support Sickrose.

[Sickrose]

Re: Drive

No probs have you posted The Shadowman on here?

[woodpryan]

Re: Drive

yes, I have. You find it here: http://www.thedarktower.org/palaver/...ad.php?t=10623
I hope you enjoy it.

[woodpryan]

Re: Drive

Sickrose,
After the rejection of this story from Fantasy and Science Fiction Magazine, I have deleted and/or re-written about half this story (approximately 2,500 words of it). It now stands at 4,000 words, so about 500 words of it have been deleted. Some major changes were made to the story. I will not post it here as magazine editors actually do consider that to be in violation of the "previous publication" requirement, but if you'd like me to e mail you a copy of it, PM me. I figured you would be interested.

[woodpryan]

Re: The Shadowman

I read "The Boogeyman" yesterday and there were a few similarities. It wasn't too similar though. I don't feel like I've ripped him off. It's a pretty "stock" idea anyway. It's probably been written by tons of horror authors.

[woodpryan]

This is the first 1/4 of my latest short story titled, "House of Ash". I have decided not to post full stories anymore because magazine believe that to be "first publication" and they want those rights. So, what I will post here from now on will be first drafts of introductions. Please let me know what you guys think of this and if you want to read the rest of the story, PM me and I'll send it to your e mail.

It wasn't until his step-mother said not to go near the house next door that Matthew began to wonder. An unobservant child by nature, he hadn't given it much thought since they moved to Dennison, Alabama, but now he came to the sudden realization that the house was abandoned and had been for some time. He never saw kids playing in the front yard or some guy mowing the lawn, which had, in fact, taken on a life of its own with weeds overtaking the dead grass. There had at one time been a garden with a white bird bath, which was now faded to a light gray and grown over with weeds, which snaked around the bath and, in some areas, up the side of the house as though attempting to conquer everything in its path. The stairs leading up to the concrete front porch were flanked by a white railing, which was no longer white either. The railing was black in some places, faded to a dull gray in others, and in some areas the white paint still showed through like small islands surrounded by dark waters.
His mother's telling them not to go near it had sparked a mild curiosity about the house next door and Matthew had done what any ten year old kid would have done. He asked his best friend if he knew anything. They were sitting on Jimmy's front porch up the block on the opposite side of the street from Matthew's house. Jimmy smirked with an air of one who knows everything about it.
The interior of the house had been burnt to a crisp, according to Jimmy. His father, who was a firefighter, had helped to stop that fire from completely consuming the house. His father had been asleep when they got the call at two thirty in the morning, he said, and they had suited up and gotten to the scene within ten minutes.
Now Jimmy lowered his voice from the normal children's conversational tone to the conspiratorial whisper, of which only children are truly capable. His face became grave and he leaned forward on the porch to look Matthew straight in the eyes.
“Now, my dad didn't tell me this part. Kurt told me this part and he only knows about it because he overhead mom and dad talking.”
“What?” Matthew whispered, excitement rising in his throat.
“The fire wasn't an accident. It was set. The guy who lived there set it on fire, but he got trapped in there somehow. He couldn't get out and when my dad got there, the guy was laying on the floor, burning up. He was already dead.”
Matthew stared back at his friend dumbstruck. Who would set their house on fire? he wondered. Why?
“I heard my dad that night in my parent's room. The sound carries through the vents and I heard my dad...”
“What,” Matthew said, “What?”
“I've never seen my dad cry in my life, Matt. I'm telling you the truth. My Dad has seen a lot of messed up stuff an he's a pretty tough guy, but something terrible must have happened in there. If I tell you this, you better not laugh because my Dad is made of iron.”
Matthew nodded his head in agreement. He would never laugh at Jimmy. Two years old than himself, Matthew was lucky to have a friend like him.
“For the first time in my life,” he said, pointing a finger at him, as though threatening him if in case he were to laugh at his dad. “I heard my father crying that night. I heard him sobbing and crying and I never want to hear anything like that again, man. Your Mom said to stay out of there. I think... Maybe she's probably right.”

#

The next day, Matthew and his older sister stood in the back yard of the burnt house, looking at the windows and the back door. Matthew could see that some of the windows on the left side of the house had been blown out and that they had all been damaged by smoke. The frames were blackened as though a constant shadow were falling over them and the panes were covered in a thick brown dust. All those that were not shattered outward were opened. Glass littered the ground bellow those that were shattered. The house appeared to brood over the rear lawn as if it were angry at the job having been left unfinished. The back door was closed and untouched by the fire. Matthew wondered if it was locked. If it was, they had plenty of windows they could go through.
“Do you think what Jimmy said was true?” Matthew asked.
“Who knows?” Samantha shrugged, noncommittally. “The only way to find out is to go in. Or are you chicken?” Samantha looked at him in a teasing manner, her lips stretching into a smirk. She had long red hair flowing half way down her back. She was thin and, at four years older than Matthew, she was almost six inches taller. Today, she wore shorts and a red T-shirt. It was hot on this mid summer day in 1994, but Matthew still wore a pair of jeans, hating the way he looked in shorts. The house stood looming before them, casting its long shadow over them. A cicada was playing a maddening tune in a nearby tree. Behind them, there were no houses, only fields where cotton was grown. No one was home yet at their house. Their father and step-mother usually didn't come home until seven or eight o' clock and it was only five now. Matthew wasn't worried about getting caught going into the house. He was worried about what they might find inside.
“I'm not chicken. He just seemed kind of upset. He said that his Dad must have seen horrible stuff in there.” Matthew said, gesturing at the house.
“Well, lets go in and see then.” Samantha turned from him and walked to the back of the house while Matthew followed. Samantha put her hand on the doorknob and Matthew's breath caught in his chest, wanting to change his mind and at the same time, needing to know. The knob turned easily and Samantha swung the door inward.
What greeted them was a large sitting room in which the family could look out the windows into the backyard and the fields beyond. The room was mostly spared by the fire itself, but had sustained serious smoke damage. The walls were white at one time, but had been discolored to a light soot gray. A chair sat by the window with a light black dust covering the entirety of its surface. Book shelves had once lined the walls, but a few of them had fallen over, one of them blocking the exit from the room into the living room. Books littered the floor, some of them burned in places, some fat from water damage, and a few that were not so bad at all. Matthew picked one of these up as Samantha stepped on top of and then over the fallen bookcase, leaving the room to explore deeper in the house. The book was thin and the spine said The Dark Tower I: The Gunslinger. Matthew liked to read and he wondered if this had been a good book. He could imagine the owner of the house sitting in a chair by the window, reading and listening to music. Indeed, a stereo was in one corner of the room, the tape deck hanging out like a tongue hanging from someone's mouth.
The smell in the house was oppressive, somehow a wet and dry smell at the same time. It reminded Matthew of walking down this street on a cold January night when he could smell in the air that someone had their fireplace working. But this was much stronger. Although it reminded him of those January nights, it was really like nothing else he had ever encountered and can not be fully described here.
“Hey.”
Matthew jumped, startled out of his thoughts by the sound of his sister's voice. She grinned at the show of fright but said nothing. “What?” Matthew whispered.
“The kitchen is clean. The fire didn't get in there. That would confirm that it didn't start because someone doesn't know how to cook. But there's more. Come on.” She waved a hand for Matthew to follow her.
After leaving the sitting room, they were greeted by the living room, which was charred to a thick black. To the right of the living room was the kitchen, but Matthew wasn't interested in it. What interested him was the hole in the living room floor. The hole was rounded, approximately six feet in diameter and Matthew could see nothing below it from his angle just outside the sitting area. The curtains had burned off the metal rails which held them. The windows, like those of the sitting room, stood open. Now Matthew understood why. If police or investigators wanted to come into this house, these windows needed to be open in order to illuminate the interior. The windows that were whole were covered in dust thick enough to allow little light to come through. With the hole being in the middle of the living room, neither Matthew nor Samantha wanted to explore the room. The floor might be weak enough for one of them to fall straight through.
“Look at that,” Samantha said, pointing at the front door.
Matthew squinted, letting his eyes adjust to the extra gloom that this room contained. In the entrance was a decorative piece of wood, shaped in an oval with letters carved into it. Across the top of the board was THE WYATT FAMILY. Bellow this was GREG SHEILA KAREN FRANKENSTEIN. “Frankenstein. Who would name their kid Frankenstein?”
“You idiot, they probably had a dog or something and they named it Frankenstein.” Samantha rolled her eyes at him. “And look there. The guy must have been a drunk.”
A recliner stood in a corner of the room, most of it's fabric burned away, springs popping out through what was left of the seat like an array of Jack-In-The-Boxes missing the clownish heads. Beside the chair were bottles of beer, some still standing upright and others laying on their sides. Matthew counted eight of them. What remained of a couch had been flipped over. Video taps, CDs, cassette tapes, a TV, and other electronic equipment was strewn across the room and Matthew wondered how much of it had happened before the fire was started.

[woodpryan]

Re: House of Ash

This thing is now finished. If anyone wants a copy of the first draft, let me know and I'll send it to whatever e mail address you give me. Thanks guys.

Ryan

[woodpryan]

Re: House of Ash

The finished version of this story gets sent off to Fantasy and Science Fiction Magazine tomorrow. Wish me luck guys.