Early Stories
A long, long time ago, I started to write. I remember three stories specifically that were my three earliest. All of them were pretty cheesy (some more than others), one was written on paper complete with my awful handwriting and spelling, one never made it past 550 words, and the last I'm still working on today. Today, I'll tell you more about all of them (and embarrass myself so badly).
I'm seriously so bummed about that. From what I remember, the story followed Emily and Shelly through various events. It was written from Emily's perspective (but still third person), and it may or may not have had a horse involved. I seriously can't remember.
I wrote it at my grandma's house in Phoenix, Arizona, sometime from 2011 to 2012 (or maybe 2013). I can't remember much else, other than being really proud of it, and spending forever (probably about twenty minutes) working on it.
Emily and Shelly
So! Let's start with the very first story I ever remember writing. It was titled (most imaginatively) Emily and Shelly. Guess what? It was about two girls named Emily and Shelly. Unfortunately, I seem to have lost the paper I wrote this on originally, so I can't remember exactly what I wrote.I'm seriously so bummed about that. From what I remember, the story followed Emily and Shelly through various events. It was written from Emily's perspective (but still third person), and it may or may not have had a horse involved. I seriously can't remember.
I wrote it at my grandma's house in Phoenix, Arizona, sometime from 2011 to 2012 (or maybe 2013). I can't remember much else, other than being really proud of it, and spending forever (probably about twenty minutes) working on it.
The Snowy Winter
This name is a little bit more original. I seriously have barely any memories of writing this, except for opening up the Word document and setting up some "cool" fonts and a title page, etc. Here are some screenshots of the results:
Please notice the title in red (fancy), and my main character's name (Garrett Pascoe) typed over and over again on the background. Also, note that this was going to be a series. Thinking ahead, young Anna!
Again - look at that fancy font. It feels so cool to write in but is not practical for rereading or editing. First hand experience.
And here's an excerpt of the first few paragraphs:
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Garrett gazed out of the window of his small cottage in the England village of Hilda. He stared out at the barren landscape. Similar cottages like his own, the frozen lake, the harbor and the fishing ships that were frozen on the lake were the only things visible for miles around.
“Garrett! I can’t stand idle hands! Get up and set the table. We have to have dinner on the table on time for your father.” Garrett quickly got up and ran over to the table, “Garrett! Don’t run in the house. You know I don’t want you doing that!”
Ever since Garrett’s father had married Valerie Whiter a few months before she had been bossing Garrett around, never though, when his father was there. She was very unkind to Garrett. About ten minutes afterwards Garrett’s father, whom Garrett called Papa, walked in. Valerie immediately put on a smile of mock joy and said,
“Jonathan, I am so glad you are back!”
At a nudge from Valerie Garrett said, “It is nice to see you Papa.”
“You too, son. How did your day go with Mama Valerie?” Papa called his new wife Mama Valerie and Garrett had to when Aggettibvo, the Italian word for horrible and what Garrett called Valerie in his head, was around.
“It was O.K.”
“Only, O.K.?”
Aggettibvo interrupted, “He was very helpful today. Now it’s time to eat.”
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The Great Tale of Joshua Mouse
And it is here that my writing journey truly began. Hehe. Kinda. The Great Tale of Joshua Mouse (shortened to GTOJM - I don't know why I left out the "the") was my very first real story that I actually spent a lot of time working on.
I probably started writing it in 2011 or 2012. The first mention I have of it in my email records (I emailed some cousins about it quite often) is in early 2013 and it was already twenty-nine pages long. That's nearly four or five years, which is crazy.
By 2016 the book had been renamed Daro - because I came to recognize the error of naming it something like "The Great Tale of Joshua Mouse" - and was at fifty-seven pages. Since then, I haven't worked on it hardly at all.
It was in early 2016 that I became completely disinterested with the plot. It was very unoriginal, and all the characters were animals of various types. I like that, but it was hard to imagine how a wolf and a squirrel would interact - even at a level as minor as being drastically different sizes.
So I decided to change the story to where it had men instead of animals. That just highlighted how woefully lacking my plot was. I came up with a new one, renamed my main character (after much debate), and then proceeded to let it sit while a new story emerged in my head involving a girl with magical powers.
By March of 2017, I had decided to combine that changed plot with my magical powers girl plot, creating what I now call Courage and Conquest. So yes, C&C is actually a very morphed (like - you couldn't even figure out the original plot of GTOJM, it really has morphed) version of my very first "serious" story.
To bring a wrap on this long early writings post, here's an excerpt from the end of the first chapter of GTOJM (in its 2013 version).
Two beasts, one an otter dressed in a general’s tunic, the other a reddish-orange fox walked into the room. Gasps filled the room. Foxes were rarely seen. And here was one in the king’s court! This fox had a plain white tunic on. The tunic was patched in quite a few places.
I probably started writing it in 2011 or 2012. The first mention I have of it in my email records (I emailed some cousins about it quite often) is in early 2013 and it was already twenty-nine pages long. That's nearly four or five years, which is crazy.
By 2016 the book had been renamed Daro - because I came to recognize the error of naming it something like "The Great Tale of Joshua Mouse" - and was at fifty-seven pages. Since then, I haven't worked on it hardly at all.
It was in early 2016 that I became completely disinterested with the plot. It was very unoriginal, and all the characters were animals of various types. I like that, but it was hard to imagine how a wolf and a squirrel would interact - even at a level as minor as being drastically different sizes.
So I decided to change the story to where it had men instead of animals. That just highlighted how woefully lacking my plot was. I came up with a new one, renamed my main character (after much debate), and then proceeded to let it sit while a new story emerged in my head involving a girl with magical powers.
By March of 2017, I had decided to combine that changed plot with my magical powers girl plot, creating what I now call Courage and Conquest. So yes, C&C is actually a very morphed (like - you couldn't even figure out the original plot of GTOJM, it really has morphed) version of my very first "serious" story.
To bring a wrap on this long early writings post, here's an excerpt from the end of the first chapter of GTOJM (in its 2013 version).
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Our story begins on a beautiful spring day in the court of King Cenis the Brave.
“Bring before me the offenders, Captain Cornwallis!” Cried the King seated on his thrown.
“Right away Your Highness!” answered the Captain, bowing.
“What do you have to say General Ratner?” asks the king. General Ratner was one of the king’s most trusted otter generals
“Your Highness,” says the General, bowing low, “As I was riding home about a fortnight ago, I saw this fox and an assortment of weasels, ferrets, and rats gathering grain in my field.” the General glares at the rat, “This scoundrel was taking my grain!”
The King motions for silence. Immediately a wave of silence comes over the room. “Fox, what is your name?”
“Tracheas Sire.” bowing low.
“Good, Tracheas, you tell your half of your story now.”
“We, my friends and I, were peacefully walking down the road when we saw the grain field. Now in this grain field there was a rodent, a mouse I think, and a few shrews gathering grain. We, when we saw them went running across the field, trying to chase them off. Now, when the mouse saw us he and his friends threw down the bags of grain they were carrying. Some of my friends got the grain bags while the rest of us tried to chase the scoundrels but they had disappeared. That is when this gentleman showed up.”
“Me and my friends saved his” Tracheas glares at General Ratner, “Grain harvest. And what does he do? Blames me in the royal court!”
The king said, “I will talk with my trusted adviser on the matter. The King left with Genghis, his advisor.
About fifteen minutes later King Cenis and Advisor Genghis came out of the back room. Silence came over the room.
“We have made a decision” the king announced, “Tracheas is in the wrong and for this he will apologize to General Ratner and work for him for three years.”
Tracheas stepped towards General Ratner and said, grouchily, “I’m sorry for taking grain from your field, will you forgive me?”
General Ratner graciously replied, “Yes, I do, Tracheas.”
As Captain Cornwallis escorted both out of the room Adviser Genghis said, “All out of the court room; court is over for the day.”
Tracheas left, glaring at General Ratner and muttering under his breath, “After I’ve served my three years you and your petty king will pay for this outrage!”
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Well. That's it! To this day I'm still rather proud of that last line. Tension, guys - tension. I probably made a complete fool of myself (or at least my younger self) in this post, but hopefully, you enjoyed it, and now you understand my writing "journey" better.
I remember proofreading GTOJM for you! I laughed when I found my copy a few weeks ago. The marks I made didn’t make any sense...
ReplyDeleteThis may seem off topic, but I just realized I never finished the Redwall Series... 😂