Just Keep Swimming! (The sharks are vegans.)

What I'm Listening To: Emilie Autumn - Swallow

What I'm Doing: Writing!

Jess (first, may I call you that? XD Never even thought about it until now) posted excerpts from her novels and WIPs, and also mentioned that she'd never read anything I've written (except the 'first lines' I posted a few days ago) and it decided me to post excerpts of my own. (In one case, there's an entire first chapter; the first original story that I posted anywhere, based off of RP-born characters, dating from 2oo2. IT'S BAD. REALLY, REALLY BAD. I'm posting it here to show that YES, PRACTICE MAKES IT BETTER.)

Sorrow of Memory, from my high school days. (It was either late sophomore year or early junior year. Probably sophomore.)

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Perfect excerpt:
The first time Allison Scotts turned on her television and saw herself on the news, she’d just come home after leaving the scene of a murder.
The silence of her spacious condo pressed in on her, broken only by the rain thumping against the windows, and she turned the t.v. on for noise. Gradually, the reporter’s voice cut through the wall of apathy in her mind, and as she realised they were talking about her – indirectly of course, because no one could possibly connect a well-to-do heiress to such horrific crimes – she laughed.
”The police are calling it the work of a deranged mind, and are investigating the motives behind such a brutal killing. The name of the victim has not yet been released, and we are all confident that the killer will be caught.”
Ally tugged the scrunchie out of her hair and peeled her wet clothes off as she made her way towards the luxurious bathroom at the back of the suite, the details of the crime she’d just committed pushing their way out of her mind in favour of recalling the details of the murder still being reported by the bleached-blonde twit on the news. She poured herself a drink, and set the tub to filling itself, adding some bubbles as an afterthought.
At twenty seven, Ally was the poster-child for the Rich Bitch stereotype. She’d never worked a day in her life, and had attended parties that made Paris Hilton’s exploits look tame by comparison.

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Eversong excerpt:
She was dreaming. It was a familiar dream, one she’d had several times over the course of the last month, and it was always the same – the dark haired man, the tall forests, and a massive city rising above the trees. She was reaching towards him, and just before their hands met, he crumpled to the ground, and she woke up.
Blinking the sleep from her eyes, she flinched away from the sunlight streaming through the open blinds in her bedroom window, and for a moment couldn’t think of where she was. Seconds later, memory reasserted itself, and she recalled that she’d finished college a month ago – as hard to believe as that was – and had moved temporarily back in with her parents while she found a full-time job, and got back on her feet from spending the last four years in a dorm. Her alarm began blaring out it’s message, set to her favourite song in the world, Unchained Melody. Her room-mates had always made fun of her for waking up to such a soft, pleasant song, but she’d always told them that it beat waking up to something harsh and demanding.
“Vicky! You awake yet?” It was her father, the only man, as she’d said since she was five years old, that she’d ever need in her life. “Vick?”
“Coming daddy,” she hollered back down at him, and slid out of the comforting warmth of her bed, shaking off the remnants of the strange dream. In the notebook she kept beside her bed, she jotted down a single line: had that dream again...

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Mischief and Murder excerpt:
My name is Riley, and I’m a rat. A really old rat, or so my grandkids say, but I’ve also got a really old memory. Not that it doesn’t work – oh no, my memories are as clear as the day they were made. None of us who lived through that hellish time were ever the same again, not really, but none of us ever forgot. It was the beginning of my sixteenth summer when the bottom fell out of my life, and my world was changed forever. This is where my story starts.

*

“Riley! Front and center!”
The young rat heard his father’s call, and dropped the flower he had been admiring, scurrying back towards the house. It was never a good idea to ignore Balthasar in one of his militaristic moods, something Riley had learned early and never forgotten. As one of the eldest members of Riley’s mischief, his family group, Balthasar had always had special treatment, had always demanded special treatment, especially from members of his immediate family. Riley’s mother Garnet had learned to deal with his various peculiarities quietly, but Riley himself had always resented Balthasar’s special place.
It’s not like he’s a military rat any more, he thought spitefully. Why should we have to suffer because he grew up in a cage? They were a familiar refrain, one he repeated to himself every time Balthasar had some new demand to make of them. Briefly, he wished he was made of sterner stuff, that he was brave like Corin, or strong like Bowen, and could safely break away from the mischief with a few friends, and start his own mischief somewhere else.

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The thing I'd like everyone to keep in mind about the last three (the first thing I linked to can be forgotten utterly, and I'd prefer if you did) is that they're just first drafts.

The final drafts, upon completion, will be better. Not perfect, because I'm of the opinion that once you create something 'perfect' you're finished as an artist or author. But better. Definitely.

And there you have it, me at my worst.