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Young Writers Society


16+ Language Mature Content

Ecliptic: Episode One - Streetlight [WIP]

by ToriChanceAlton


Warning: This work has been rated 16+ for language and mature content.

Mars, "Tharsis"

Kumbha, Sol 1/27

2300 Hours, MTC

Tori Chance Alton

"$825 an ounce," I tell myself. Logically I should sell in bulk. I run a hand through my hair, trying to think of the easiest solution. I need only a week and $9,000 to pay off my eviction.

I have a little sister, Malia, I just don't see her too much. She sleeps in the greenhouse out back of the shop. I usually prop up a cot next to her and stare at the stars through the clear ceiling. That’s almost our only bonding period.

I'm an herbalist, and as an herbalist does: I sell herbs for medicinal purposes. I use this shop for more than just herbs though. I always keep a few ounces of high purity rerock cocaine under the counter.

I only need to make about eight single-ounce sales to get me where I need, keep in mind, the regular store income I earn. Then I can get the remainder to Mizzie, the source of my coke.

"I have plenty," I whisper. "Release, release, release," says my mentality in a deep growl. I roll up a Note and put the powder in a line with a card. I stuff the Note in my nose and inhale, as it shoots through my nose. I pull my head back up instantaneously, my beanie falls to the ground - what a rush. I've sold cocaine, but I've never tried it. 

I shyly bend down to pick up my beanie and look in the mirror in the corner of the greenhouse. I'm wearing a light and elastic hoodie, grey sweats, running shoes, and a scarf made of discarded rags. I have long brunette hair with blonde highlights, masked by my beanie and glasses, amplifying my dilated blue eyes. Not too shabby per my money situation.

Pump. Pump. Pump. I feel like my heartbeat is racing, trying to keep up with itself, meanwhile my nose burns. Oh, it burns so good. The numbing sensation arises in my throat, euphoria courses through my veins. I use my scarf to wipe off some of the powder from my nose, tiny flakes fall to the ground. I need another bump. I need to feel like that again, just one more time.

I crumple up the eviction note in front of me. I throw it to the side. It slowly rolls out of the greenhouse, swept by the wind with the big "$9000" printed at the front.

I put up a mountain of powder and inhale. I snap my head up. I feel guilty, and as if I just lost a part of myself. I know I shouldn't have done that, but it felt so damn good - still does.

Mars, "Tharsis"

Kumbha, Sol 1/27

2330 Hours, MTC

Malia Ann Alton

The neon sign on the shop appears in the distance. The wind breezes past my back, I stare at the vast beauty of our Martian moons in the sky, Deimos obscuring Phobos.

Then there is the other part of town. Bottles corrode the streets next to roadkill, men sleep on sidewalks, sometimes without the clothes on their backs.

Next to the pier sits a man on a cooler, ice fishing. I flash him a quick smile, he glares at me with anguish. He's roughly in his late 40's with a few grey hairs poking out of his fur coat. He looks so cold, the air he breathes almost freezes right in front of him.

Here on Tharsis, you pay the blood price to even twitch a muscle. When it's as cold as -30 °C your cheeks will freeze. Every smile will crack your cheeks, as your blood vessels explode within them.

I meet Tori in the greenhouse, passed out with her back to a tree, the air rushes inside, ivy scales the walls of our desolate home. I look into the mirror on Serenity's side of the greenhouse. I'm about 5"4', flushed cheeks, a large fur coat with a hood, and sweats. I've been given more than most people. I'm very grateful for that.

I prop a cot out next to Tori and stare at the night sky.

Mars, "Tharsis"

Kumbha, Sol 2/27

0600 Hours, MTC

Tori Chance Alton

It's the crack of dawn, sunlight peers in through the roof. I've got places to be, and I've got moves to make.


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8 Reviews


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Wed Jun 06, 2018 4:44 am
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Jezebel wrote a review...



Hallå!

This is certainly an intriguing premise you've got here. A cocaine dealer from outer space—now I've heard of everything.

The piece itself is a bit rough around the edges, but it's also sharp and weird (in a good way), and I get the sense you have a really good understanding of your characters—which is, of course, extremely important. There's some strong imagery. The chapter (or episode, I guess?) progresses at a nice clip. Of course there is room for improvement, but the story has good bones and I think you can do something cool with it.

But back to that "room for improvement" bit. One of my main issues with this is that you tell the reader a lot of information, in a short span of time, and you don't really "show" that much. This is very exposition-heavy, which is okay, but it would've been nice if you'd maybe taken the time to subtly layer in all these details rather than presenting them in such a blunt and overtly explanatory way.

I don't know how familiar you are with the concept of exposition—it's one of those words that's a bit nebulous, and I know some youngish writers aren't terribly familiar with what it means, or how to do it the "right" way. Assuming you're not super knowledgable about it (and, if you are, feel free to ignore this), there's basically two main ways to do exposition. The first would be colloquially referred to as an info dump, wherein a character basically just explains a bunch of key things about themselves in a rapid-fire manner. Here's an example of what that would look like:

Spoiler! :
Hi, my name is Mary and I live in Las Vegas. I work for my mother at her pet store. I love working at the pet store. My favorite thing to do there is to feed the fish we sell.

Pretty clunky, right?

And then there's good exposition: nuanced, carefully-sprinkled information about a character and a story that is as covert as possible. Here's what that would look like:

Spoiler! :
"Mary, can you give me a hand?" my mom calls. I walk over to the front door and help her bring a heavy bag of pet food into our store.
Once we're safely out of the sweltering Nevada heat, she thanks me, but I wave her away. "Always happy to help!"
She smiles, then says, "Want to feed the fish? I know it's your favorite."

So, in this example, we have all of the same basic information from the previous example—main character named Mary, from Nevada, loves working at her mom's pet store, favorite thing to do is feed the fish—and it's all quickly established, but it's done so in a way that feels natural. Mary isn't shouting information at the reader, she's just taking you through her day and letting you see it.

In your case, I'd say the exposition of this piece falls somewhere in between the two examples. It's not quite as annoying as the first example, nor as stealthy as the second. It's layered in a bit, but it's also not presented as a natural part of the proceedings—rather, the main characters just sort of say it. Sometimes it's okay for the main characters to reveal key pieces of info in their narration, but don't overdo it. Trust the reader to keep up with the story. You don't have to explain everything right away—let it happen naturally. Let them have questions.

It also goes back to what ChristianL said before me, about threading in the physical description of your characters organically rather than having them look in the mirror and describe their selves. ChristianL's alternative suggestion of how to sneak in character descriptions is a much better option, and the same can be said for a lot of the info revealed in this chapter: from the coke dealing to the coke-doing to the sisters' relationship with each other... basically all of it. You can establish those details through dialogue and subtle interactions between characters, not just through plainly narrating it or having a character say it aloud to their self for no clear reason.

Another big problem with this chapter is your issue with run-on sentences. You have to watch out for that. Don't be afraid to break up your sentences when they start to sound ramble-y. And don't abuse commas—they're great and everything, but they are not meant as replacements for periods, dashes, colons and semicolons. Keep that in mind.

Anyway, onto some more specific issues:

"Logically I should sell in bulk."

Do you ever say this sort of thing aloud to yourself? I don't.

I run a hand through my hair, trying to think of the easiest solution, and running the numbers.

"Run" is repetitive.

"I don't get any more cocaine until I can sell three ounces of high purity rerock."

This is what I'm talking about, right here. Obvious exposition is obvious. I am 95% certain that no actual cocaine dealer would ever randomly say this sort of thing aloud to their self. There has to be a more subtle, realistic way for you to establish this information.

I've had a great education: I graduated high school two years early with some college credits, to which I went to college for four years and became an herbalist.

Well, isn't that special? Seriously though, it really isn't necessary to be so wordy and detailed. Maybe try, "I've had a great education: I graduated high school early, got my bachelor's degree and became an herbalist right out of college." Or don't say anything at all and wait for an opportunity to organically mention that—like during a later conversation between some characters about their education.

I have a little sister, "Malia",

The sister's name doesn't need to be in quotes, unless the narrator is being sarcastic or using a code name or something.

She sleeps in the greenhouse out back of the shop, I usually prop up a cot next to her and stare at the stars through the clear ceiling, that’s almost our only bonding period.

Run-on sentence. Break this up a bit.

"Croatian" sign in front of my shop is a signal that we have cocaine, a simple one at that.

That "a simple one at that" line sounds clunky.

Rather than I find my customers, they find me

This is worded really badly. Maybe try: "I don't have to scour for customers: they find me."

I say as I roll up a dollar bill and put the powder in a line with a card and shoot it through my nose.

This is another pretty long sentence. I'm not going to quote all the excessively lengthy sentences in this piece—frankly, if I did, we'd be here all day—but there's a lot. Thankfully, they're easy to fix. Just need a good edit, that's all.

Okay, so, overall, I like where you're going with this and I think the premise is really neat. It needs a bit of work, but almost every story does, so don't sweat it. If you work on those run-on sentences and trying to be a bit more stealthy with your exposition, you'll have a pretty awesome story on your hands. Nice work!

Write on~
Jezebel



Random avatar


Thank you so much for the nitpicks, they go a long way. I'll be sure to tweak upon that. My issue as you stated was mainly keeping a sentence going for too long, and compacting too much info. I feel as if I'm doing that right now actually. (lol...?) It's a horrible habit I need to break.

Thanks so much really, I love feedback that is constructive etc.

Have a wonderful day <3



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Wed Jun 06, 2018 4:23 am
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FantasyWriter76 wrote a review...



I see that this is a W.I.P., so I don't know if I can review it, but I will.

I'm FantasyWriter76, or Fantasy76. I'm a reviewer of many stories, but here is my first review on a more restrictive story (from what I can remember at least, so many reviews.) on the site. I'll try to be more serious in this review, so yeah.

The Positives
Your story is very polished and it is setting the story instead of exposition that go nowhere in other stories. The characters seem interesting, and their character arcs can be built upon. I focus my story "Fist of Fates" on the characters' arcs, so that's one relatable thing I can say. I'd like to say I look forward to seeing your story more but...

The Negatives (Remember: ART IS SUBJECTIVE!)
The problem isn't your story, it's your activity. It seems you haven't done ANYTHING on the site, especially reviews.

You see, the way that YWS works is that: when you review something, you are given points for the number of characters used. More characters, more points. 200 points are needed to publish stories. So, I encourage you to try and review something. Maybe look at my stories, or my friend, Prachi's stories.

Also, you seem to want to say exactly what the characters appear like all at once. Like ChristianL said, threading is a better way of getting the character's appearance out in a subtle way.

I would usually insert nitpicks here, but I have none, so good job.

I'm FantasyWrtiter76 and the arbitrary rate-o-meter gives you 4.5 roadkills out of 5 (4.5/5)!
I hope you review some stories and post around like on the Welcome Mat, and I wish you a FANTASTICAL day!
-FantasyWriter76/Fantasy76



Random avatar


I was actually going to read the "Conics Unfortunately" series on here and review it when I was finished. That'll be a while, but it seems like a hell of a series.

I LOVE character arcs! I have more planned out for this that I haven't written yet, but we see Tori start as a small-time coke dealer, into a 4th dimension traversing... hero? I don't know if I could call her that, she's more based on working with anomalies in the fabric of space.

Sounds complicated, I hope I can write it simply.

Thank you so much <3



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Mon Jun 04, 2018 9:20 pm
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ChristianL wrote a review...



so I see this is a WIP. Not sure if that means I shouldn't review it but its cool

I've never reviewed someone else piece of writing before, so take what I say with a grain of salt. I'm going to be doing this by number.


1: I really like it! (Don't take this one with a grain of salt). I liked how you provided the planet, time, date, and person talking. I also think the concept of martian drug dealers is also radical, through the story you display good world building techniques. My favorite moment where you did that was here:

Then there is the other part of town. Bottles corrode the streets next to roadkill, men sleep on sidewalks, sometimes with very little clothes on their backs.

Overall, well done! as someone who really likes science fiction, I think you did a good job making me interested in the world you built

2: I have no idea what its like to be on cocaine, but I feel like in the passage where the main character decides to try it for the first time, it would help to go crazy with the description

"I have plenty," I whisper. "Just a little wouldn't hurt," I say as I roll up a dollar bill and put the powder in a line with a card and shoot it through my nose. I pull my head back up instantaneously - what a rush. I've always been selling cocaine, but I've never tried it, I feel euphoric and replenished.

I can certainly tell what the character is feeling, but more because you said exactly what they were feeling: euphoric and replenished. In the future, try and show the character being euphoric and replenished through their actions. Good news, you do that in the following two paragraphs! just do it more. even if you didn't tell me, the reader, that the character was feeling euphoric and replenished, I would have been able to tell through the later paragraphs. Examples, where you SHOWED the character acting euphoric and replenished, are:

"Pump. Pump. Pump. I feel like my heartbeat is racing, trying to keep up with itself, meanwhile my nose burns. It burns so well."

That right there is good, I like that sentence. More of sentences like that.

3: on the subject of how you describe your the character. Try and "Thread" what the character looks like into the story. This paragraph here:

"I look in the mirror in the corner of the greenhouse, I'm wearing a light hoodie, grey sweats, running shoes, and a scarf made of discarded rags. I have long brunette hair with blonde highlights, masked by my beanie and glasses, amplifying my dilated eyes. Not too shabby per my money situation."

try and avoid doing this in the future. I get it, it's nice to just have your character looking at a mirror and describing themselves, I've done this before as well. Trust me on this one, your story flow will improve if you thread character descriptions in. What I mean by that is this:

In the first sentence, you mention that the main character runs their hand through their hair. By doing this, as a reader, I now know that the character has hair. You could "Thread" more description into that first sentence by saying " I run a hand through my LONG BRUNETTE hair. (I put the additions in caps to show what I added.)

basically what I'm trying to say is to avoid having your character stand in front of a mirror and describe themselves. Instead, put snippets of their appearance/what they are wearing, throughout the story.

I focused more on the first characters part of the story because I really have nothing to say about the other characters side of the story other than good things. Well written, nice descriptions of their home and the world. Solid job.

FINAL CONCLUSION: I love it. I'm going to follow you so I can see what you write in the future. You captured my interest quickly and gave a glimpse into an interesting world that I would love to know more about.



Random avatar


Wow. Thank you so much, this was exactly the kind of feedback I wanted. I love the concept of threading, I've never really thought about it. You have really helped more than you think because I now know what I did well, and what I didn't do so well.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you.




I didn't know beards could do that ;)
— ShadowVyper