The Underchair Letters
Dear Rachel,
I'm glad to hear that school is going well for you. I can't believe I survived freshman year of college, but here I am!
You already know it costs too much to fly home, so for now I'm renting this little house in this little neighborhood. And by 'little' I mean absolutely teeny. It was actually built in between two other houses because there was a little extra space. It's adorable. But it really only fits one person.
But that's not exactly why I'm writing. I'm writing because of the people who love across the street. Their names are Myrdie and Earl. They are next-door neighbors and both of them must be at least two hundred years old. The only reason I know both their names is because every Saturday they both come out onto their porches and yell at each other. For hours. I'd like to say I'm kidding, but it's seriously one of the funniest things I've ever seen. It's so fantastic I've put a pad of paper under the cruddy little chair on my little porch so I can write you what happens right as it's happening, because you're my best friend and you wouldn't want to miss this for the world.
Myrdie's house is blue and it's on the left of Earl's house, which is white. They do have a fence between their yards but it doesn't do much because it's only about a foot and a half tall and only extends to the street, not around either of their yards. It looks like Myrdie has painted her side of this fence yellow, and Earl has painted his side light brown, and right now they're arguing over whose fence it is, per usual. Earl just said something about the war and Myrdie laughed and said her late husband Albert Jr. built that there fence in the summer of '85.
It's almost impossible not to notice something about Myrdie's yard. Aside from the creative array of weird little statues there are probably at least eight live cats lounging about all over.
I've always heard people talk about the mythical "cat lady," but holy cow. This ancient woman has SO MANY CATS. She must have like sixty in her house because aside from the seven in her yard and the two on her lap, here are usually two in every lacy window that I can see. It's crazy.
And like Myrdie has cats Earl has grandchildren. They're all pretty little, which is surprising because he's so old, and usually two or three come and visit each weekend and they're all different. I've never actually seen the same one more than once. They always sit and play in the garden and he yells at them to stay out of the petunias and they laugh and he goes off muttering about "those young people and their video tube and their Internet web..."
Anyway, I'll keep writing if you want. But I have to leave for a party in a few, so I'll wrap this up.
Wait. Is that a box of puppies? Oh, Earl, what are you doing? This should get interesting.
Morgan
I feel like you're writing about my neighbors...
This is so funny! You put a smile on my face once I began reading about Myrdie (love her name) and Earl. I feel like everyone has two neighbors like these crazy characters. I would agree that this started off slightly slower, but not to the painfully slow. It didn't turn me off from the story.
Good luck!
I like this. You rock at character descriptions, but for this one, I found that it started off a little slow. And the info about the house's colors is interesting and all, but it's a bit tedious to read.
I don't think Myrdie's cliche; I think it's too early in the story to label anyone cliche, but I agree though that I want to know more about Morgan and her friend.
I loved this every minute! Made me laugh when you mentioned about the cat lady. Also I love the idea of writing a letter about two old people who always argue. This first part definitely makes me want to hear more. You are going to make more right?! You better because I want to hear more about Myrdie and Earl. Also I don't really have anything to fix because this is a funny writing piece and not something serious like a novel. Also there are no grammar mistakes that I know of so good job so far. Again great job and I can't wait to hear more letters from Morgan!
Happy Writing,
Cgirl
Haha! Hello, here goes the review!
I absolutely love this! I love how you made this so real and yet interesting, but also very funny. The ending was my favorite. However, I do think you should turn the whole letter into Italic. Most letters are italic when it comes to stories and stuff. Also, I think you should add some commas whenever you use the word "like." Aside from this, I think the story/letter was amazing and brilliant! Good job! Keep working and writing!
GrapeNerd
Hi there!
This chapter is so funny. Not in an lol kind of funny, but a funny where I can sit and kinda chuckle to myself as I read. I mean, who knew that everyday life could so funny?
I'm gonna start off talking about the characters of the neighbors first. I think they might be a bit cliche. The cat lady definitely is. Like Morgan said in this,there's always that cat lady people talk about. I'd normally tell you to consider creating a different character attribution for her, but now that I think about it, the cliche characters actually work. First of all, they compliment each other. It's like, here's one person's crazy and, oh gosh, the neighbor is just as bad. You know what I mean? And it sure adds to the humor and Morgan's annoyance of this town (which I'm sure she has).
Next I'm gonna focus on Morgan herself. We don't know much about her at all so I hope you intend on making this a prologue. In the prologue you can get away with some lack of description because you're just enticing the reader, making them want to keep going and read more. But if this is supposed to be the first chapter, you'll want to introduce what Morgan looks like. Now this is tricky in first person, but especially so here because who would describe themselves in a letter to their best friend? Of course their friend already knows what they look like. I did some thinking about it and here could be a few ways to describe your character, either in this chapter or a later one:
~have Morgan stand outside for one of the arguments between her neighbors. They are obviously oblivious about her because they're fighting. But then you can throw something in there about how they wouldn't have noticed her anyway cause of her plain look. 'You know, Rach. My hair is so frizzy it makes Myrdie's cat's fur look calm after she runs into the invisible dog fence across the street. That cat is the stupidest...' You could end up writing something like that and just slip a quick description in.
~have Morgan just change her hair color. This is my favorite really, especially in first person POV. Say Morgan always wanted blond hair. Maybe on a whim she went to the hair salon and dyed it. She'd be so excited she might say something like, 'Oh my God, Rach, I finally dyed my hair. My mom is gonna flip! But it's fine really because MY HAIR IS BLOND! Goodbye boring, old, brown, frizzy moptop and hello sleek, straight, sophisticated blond hair! You know, I was worried about how my eyes would look with this hair color, but it actually makes the brown pop.' Something like that not only shows what your character looks like, but it also shows personality.
Now onto some writing corrections, just a few thing you might want to correct or look at:
*here I think you should use the word tiny or maybe absolutely miniscule. You're 17 so you're writing characters around your age. Do you say words like teeny? Okay, well maybe you do, but I feel like that's more a word that is used by little kids. It's always important to keep dialogue realistic to both the time frame and the age range. I think you did a great job with that overall. Just find another word house here and you'll be good.
*first of all, you should really get rid of the 'but' at the beginning of this sentence because the previous sentence started with that word as well. I always try to switch up what words I use to begin sentences often. Because a reader might get confused when reading if too many sentences begin with say 'she' or 'I'. Or it might just plain out annoy them. Either way, try to minimize repeating the beginning of sentences like this.
*secondly, love should be live here. Just a little nitpick
*now, if I was writing this (which I'm not obviously, but feel free to take my advice) I would insert something here to kind of play with the comedy some more. You say that they come out every Saturday, but do they come out at the same time? Maybe you could say they come out at 10 every Saturday morning, Myrdie carrying a cat and Earl dragging a grandchild behind him. I thought that would be funny
Alright so overall I really like this piece. It's got great potential and I can't wait to see where you take this. I really want to see you focus o developing Morgan in the next chapter. This party could be a perfect opportunity too. Remember, conflict and struggle reveal personality very well. Just a helpful hint.
I really enjoyed reading this. I'll give it a 4/5.
Keep writing!
**Noelle**
P.S. I apologize for any stupid auto corrected words in this review. I'm writing this on my tablet and the auto correct is really annoying at times.
Hi, DannieInkBlotHanson ^-^
Firstly, I loved the opening! It really inspired me to think outside the box when opening my open stories c:
Anyhoo, this piece is not forced. It flows naturally and easily, and it's easy to follow. The only downside to it is that the reader doesn't know the characters, and therefore they don't "care" about them. Meaning they aren't particularly interested in what they have to say. An opening is the most important part of a story--it's what draws, hooks a reader in. If the beginning words, the starting paragraph, isn't worthwhile, it can cause the impatient reader to close the book. Believe me, readers are hard to please. The average reader can't be patient, they have to get hooked early on and stay that way lol To do this, I suggest making interesting characters that people will care about. They'll care about what they think, say and do. Without that, no matter how good or witty your plot, dialogue, setting or description is, the whole of the story will fall flat.
Anyhoo, you've done an excellent job. Your style is wonderful, unique, personal--and I loved it. Excellent opening, keep writing! I'll be looking out for your work from now on ^-^
Nice work, again <3
Catnip~