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Young Writers Society


The Parallel Of Existence



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Gender: Male
Points: 1040
Reviews: 32
Wed Apr 16, 2008 12:25 am
WriterAddict12356 says...



Prologue: The Past of Earth


The past of Earth is a very important one, indeed.
After the thirty-first century on Earth, people began to wonder “Will life continue for us, space dwellers?” and they received their answer only by their actions.
First, they tried to receive an expedited answer from their own “space god” but he had to do some major thinking to do about it. It was a tough decision, it was.
“Either keep on with all modern civilization or scrap it up, suck it all into a black hole in the deep, dark crevices of space, throw the time and life switches in reverse and see where this new universe takes us,’ the choices were.
The final choice was pre-evident to most of the people in the universe, plus it was so obvious that even a person of the lowest Cro-Magnonian intelligentsia could even figure it out and weigh the options themselves even with the lowest amount of brain power, thought and wit.
They weighed their mental scales and thought of a mental film projector and two reels of film informant of their options. On 1 reel was just plain nothingness. Zip. Nada. Zilch.
The other hypothetical film reel contained a 30 minute film on how life would be changed forever but they really did not have much enough of a centralized attention span for his species on the planet of Earth and all around it and beyond.
They and their human communion convened and had a vote which ended up resulting as in the polls… 59% to… 41%!... in favor of… reversing all life or what was “life” to them whatsoever.
The “space god” then asked “ What is the decision of you all and then they all said in unison “Reversal of all life, time and and everything due to life being boring and all that jazz”
So, The “space god” sucked up all life, music, intelligence, work, etc… etc… etc and there was a long silence and instantly, almost, in a flash even… the entire human race was in Africa in biped homosapien form.
This is their story of a sort of “resurvival”, if you will. Now on to their story…

















Chapter 1: The Beginning and Caveman Days
So, as soon as the newly biped homosapiens devoid of all human possessions, intelligence and well, overall know-how and intelligence about the world around them were spit out of the emptiness that once was the past of their own solar system with Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune, Uranus and all other dwarf planets and with Alpha Centauri and all the asteroid belts and galaxies and such, they waited around for their newly biped caveman brethren and sisteren to grunt something significant, but all there was was pure, deafening, eerie, silence until one of the females grunted something that would sound in normal, intelligible, vocalized, Standard Edited American English like “Oh my god, we have to fend for ourselves with no prior intelligence of anything or any current memories of technology!” “In short, we are all doomed to die a horrible demise and it is only our 1st second 1st day as cavemen!”
They all ran around like imbeciles until one male caveman blew the goat horn as a calling device and grunted something like “Hold on, we can all make it through this if we work together as a team”, he grunted. They all grunted something like “Yeah, right”, sarcastically.
“No seriously, it does,” he shouted.
So they all worked together in unison to try and make fire, but due to their newly expelled intelligence from their new brain, they had forgotten all processes of human life, even forgetting how to answer nature’s call, which was dangerous for them and their bodies to even THINK about forgetting.
One cave person grunted something that sounded like “Don’t know how to release rocks from self” The next day he died. All of the race then grunted something like “we no know how to honor frozen like rock friend” They then threw him out to the ocean where his body lay motionless flowing forever floating through the seas of Pangaea.
Cro-Magnonians then started to weep. This became what would later be the modern day re-tradition that once was and still is today known as a funeral. Soon after that, there came what was known and still is known today as a period of mourning where a moment of silence came into the world for the first second time.
This gave the new cavepeople a break from learning and gave them time for reflection or time to “stop and smell the roses”. This gave them a serious wake up call as a species of New Pangaea. They had to consider some ways to keep themselves healthy, otherwise the species would die out, into extinction. Luckily they survived through it the first time, but now due to the reversal of the universe, it all hit the metaphorical fan.
The cavemen and women then ran around like morons once it hit them. They screamed and hollered so loud that even with the low frequencies that elephants could hear, it was so loud and low, that, the elephants mistook it for one of their own’s help calls.
The elephant who first heard the yell alerted other’s and quickly started a stampede like lightning, faster than a cheetah, stomp, stomp stomp. One of the cavemen or women put their ear to the ground, and grunted almost like a scream, “Run like hell, run for the hills, run for the heavens, we have started an elephant stampede”!
They all screamed at such a low frequency that even the animals under the sea could hear them. They ran faster than the elephants, neglecting to realize that they would cause themselves a concussion bumping into things, and if they hit themselves at the right time in the right place they would cause mortal internal bleeding and hemorrhaging.
Nearly all of the cavemen knocked themselves on the noggins from a tree like George of the Jungle. All of them grunted angrily something like “Ow!”. All the cave women, on the other hand, ran towards their men, grunting something like “Are you okay?” They all grunted “Yes”. They soon walked on, forgetting about the incident.
The next day, when all the men woke up with what seemed to be migraines, they immediately rubbed their temples angrily, faster and harder, hoping that the pain would cease. They seriously would soon regret it with the pain coming harder and faster than before. They were grunting in pain. They, after a few hours, would feel better. They walked out. Brought home dinners. That was it for the entire period.

Any Critiques?
Reviews?
  





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Gender: Female
Points: 2999
Reviews: 438
Sat Apr 26, 2008 7:15 pm
JFW1415 says...



You asked me to critique everything in your portfolio, so here goes! ;P

The numbers next to the highlighted areas correspond with the 'highlighted comments' below.

Prologue

Image

Highlighted Comments

1. A little interesting, but not enough. Can you think up any ways to hook the reader?
2. Not everyone wondered the exact same thing. Suggestion: ‘…wonder if life would continue for them. They received answer only though their actions.’
3. Apostrophes.
4. You’re not Yoda – don’t talk like it.
5. Very odd wording. Maybe: ‘There were only three choices. They could keep on with all modern civilization, or scrap it up, suck it all into a black hole in the deep, dark crevices of space, through the time and life switches in reverse, and see where the new universe took them.’ Also, the second choice made nearly no sense…
6. Final implies that there were a lot.
7. This needs to be rewording a lot. Watch the ellipses, and no exclamation points in the middle of a sentence.
8. Apostrophes.
9. Suggestion: ‘they replied.’
10. Everyone spoke like this? Unlikely.
11. Don’t start a paragraph like this!
12. Apostrophes.
13. Don’t use this. Maybe ‘and all other advances of life?’ Something…I’m no good with sci-fi. *Shrug*
14. And, and, and, ellipses…not very good. Split it up!
15. Word doesn’t like this spelling, but I’m pretty sure it’s correct…just check it over.
16. You really shouldn’t say ‘this is the story…’ in a story, just as you shouldn’t say ‘in this essay, I will…’ in an essay.
17. I’d scrap this.

Overall Comments

Honestly, this was not a very good prologue. I’ve now read two of your prologues, and your not the best at them. My suggestion? Read them. Millions of them. Go to the library and find at least ten books with prologues. Read them all!

This did not pull me in. You were just telling me everything. I think you could scrap this, and slip in the information later on. Prologues are needed information, and it’s easy to put this in the rest of the story.

On to chapter one!

Chapter One

I'm not going to do a nit-pick of this. In fact, I'm not going to read it.

Your first sentence was 132 words. It was a very rambly, run on sentence, and it sounded like you were talking to a friend. I overlooked this and continued, but you kept doing this.

This is not how a story is written. You don't use a thousand ellipses, you don't run-on. You have plot, structure, character development.

I can only suggest that you read. Read the critiques - the real, in-depth critiques - here on YWS. Read real stories of all genres. Read how-to-write books.

This writing, I'm sorry to say, if something that would never be published, but a teacher would give an A to. (Teachers give kids the wrong impression of their writing. :? )

Everything I've read of your is the same way. Look over my advice, and try not to take it too personally. Challenge me - become published one day! Just read a ton, and you should improve.

You asked me to critique everything in your portfolio, but I'll just say this every time, and I know that it's hard enough to hear once. Keep trying, write constantly, and read 24/7. PM me when you think you've improved, or if you need help. I'm nearly always here, and can help you perfect your writing.

Sorry about this, and good luck!

~JFW1415
  





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Gender: Female
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Reviews: 150
Sat Apr 26, 2008 7:46 pm
ChernobyllyInclined says...



Hmmm. This is definitely an interesting idea, you just didn't present it in an interesting way.

When writing this kind of Sci-Fi it is very important to hook peoples attention; make them want to read more. In the prologue you threw out a bunch of information but did not bother writing the information in a compelling way. Some of the questions you asked were intriguing, even exciting, but then you go on to dump for information where the reader would prefer more description.

What you need to do is scrap this. Keep the idea, but present it in an entirely different way. Shorten the prologue part. Make it more like this: "After a billion years of thoughtless, pointless living, people began to wonder. Would it always be like this? Would the cycle of homicide and self-destruction ever end? They decided to begin again; worn down, sick of the never-changing idiocy that ruled their planet. It was the "space god" that reversed it for them. (You might want to think of a new name for this deity). He turned time backwards and sent humanity spiraling backwards for a new beginning. Here is their story..." Of course you can write it your own way, this is only an example of a more compelling way of presenting it.

The first chapter cannot be left the way it is. This is a story, not a history book. You must begin with a scene, characters, a plot. Do these people remember the 31st century? Or are they truly just what we humans used to be, with absolutely no knowledge of anything? That didn't seem clear. Anyway, you must create characters, description, and a plot. Make it interesting, suspenseful, exciting. This is your story, and so I will not assume as to what kind of characters you think would best fit into this scenario, but try to avoid much of what you've seen before. Make it unpredictable, and the dialogue fresh and unique. If you like to write you will continue working on this until it is as good as it can be.

Good luck and I hope this helps.
"Men invent new ideals because they dare not attempt old ideals. They look forward with enthusiasm, because they are afraid to look back."
  








The important thing is never to stop questioning.
— Albert Einstein