Tight write gone wrong...

[Nik]

Um, you may have noticed from the terse stuff I've posted in the critique section that I've a habit of trying to say too much in too few words...

Well, this time I over-did it.

I've spent the weekend re-re-re-writing a long paragraph. I must have started a-fresh a dozen times. It was just wrapping up a sub-plot, toppling several small preset dominos, nothing much, nothing too serious. But, it would not come right.

Write, re-write, swear, edit, start again, repeat until obvious dawned: I didn't have one paragraph with a news flash, a laugh and a few comments, I had the makings of a dozen pages spread over a day and a half...

D'uh...

Now I've got to find my protagonists something interesting to do while the consequences grind onwards...

Let's see...
M&J have done the ThriftMart and claimed their free drinks. The TLAs have asked them not to leave town. They must stick around until Friday night. They can catch up on their sleep in six hours. There's a limit to how much even these enthusiastic honeymooners can do 'loud & long'...

So, what else can my 'Loose Cannon firing Silver Bullets' find to do in fictional Harrison, 'The Town Where Nothing Happens' ??

Time to get creative...

 

[RcGrant]

I'm not sure if I know what you're saying. Are you asking for ideas? 'The Town Where Nothing Happens' is surely an oxymoron, in fictional terms? Something has to happen, otherwise...why is it there?

Let your characters do some talking and see what they think; if you have breathed enough life into them then they will know what to do.

 

[The Judge]

Do they need to do anything? Or at least, do we need to know what they are doing? If you've got all this other stuff to come out, why can't you just write that and leave the two of them in their hotel room for the 36 hours? (Or however many there are in 1.5 days in this world.)

And if you want to break up the explanatory stuff, why do they have to do something interesting? Why can't you have the two of them being bored witless? Or they can go for a walk, watch TV, play cards, play charades... Or, if you want to be really different, why can't you have them talk to each other? Not the cheap rat-a-tat witticisms, but discussions of belief or art or science or philosophy or poetry or music... or just what names they are going to give to their brats when they are born. It's controversial stuff, I know, but I'm pretty sure that married couples do actually talk to each other sometimes.

J

 

[Nik]

Sorted...

By curious coincidence, it's 'Founders Day' at Old Harrison, the former mining camp up in the hills. Tourists come over the pass from the Interstate, so rarely get to visit 'New' Harrison itself. At least Harrison County gets some revenue...

Acting-Mayor Hanlon gets to speechify, a bunch of amateurish but enthusiastic local re-enactors plus any-one willing to dress 'Old Western' parade past the Last Chance Saloon, and every-one has a fun afternoon...

At least until...

 

[TheEndIsNigh]

High Noon springs to mind.

Our hero visits every establishment looking for that never to be kindled sense of community. He goes into the saloon buys nobody a drink and then announces he will deputise every man and boy to help in his fight against the Boring Paragraph Gang who are due in on the noon train with their origami patterns and hairdressing magazines.

The town takes umbridge at our heros attempt to spoil the only exitement the've had in years and tell him to get out of town or face the Paragraph Gang like a man - in pink tights and blue hair ribbons.