Carnival: Preview
Carnival: Preview
From chapter one. This is the Call to Adventure. If you like what you read, go to the book’s profile below.
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Lakewood, Colorado. In an apartment unit, a dim lamp lit the upper right corner of the front room. Brain, Caleb, Jackie, José, and James sat on a grey couch right of that lamp. On the carpet floor lay Chaz, too sad to notice his friends. They glanced at him, then at each other, unsure how to comfort him.
“Why?” Chaz whispered to himself, “why, why, why, why, why?” A moment later, he said, “no use crying now.” He sat up, wiped the tears off his face, stood, and noticed his friends. They stared at him.
“Why are you staring, and how long have you—”
James stood, “you killed her, didn’t you?” Chaz blinked, “what?”
“You heard me.” He smirked.
“Phoenix is dead,” José whispered. He stood, but Brian pulled at his t-shirt. So, he sat back down.
“What makes you think I killed her!?” Chaz said. James shrugged, “I don’t know. Maybe because you don’t trust anyone—”
“I trusted Rebecca- “Chaz pointed at him- “and you know it!”
“Yeah, right. So, you decided to—”
“No, I didn’t.” He clenched his fists. “They said there was a leak in her car’s gas tank! I was here when it happened, and I didn’t know until Brian told me!”
“You probably poked a hole in it,” James said.
“I didn’t touch Rebecca’s car when she left!”
He pointed at Chaz, “you did something to her car to make it explode—”
“No, I didn’t! Why the fuck are you accusing me in the first place!?”
“You—”
“I DID NOT! WHY WOULD I WANT TO KILL HER!? I LOVED HER!” The room fell silent.
Chaz felt shaky, so he lay on the floor again. He cried again. James sat on the couch and lowered his eyes.
"Happy now?" Jackie whispered to him.
Brian stood and walked towards Chaz.
“Don’t touch me.” He found a box of tissues and placed it next to his friend instead, respecting his vulnerability.
Ten awkward minutes later, Chaz took a deep breath, sat up, used a tissue, stood, and turned to face Brian.
He said, “you said the police won’t investigate because as far as anyone knows, the explosion was caused by a gas leak from a bad fuel tank.” Brian nodded (as if it weren’t said earlier.)
“But they didn’t see any body!” Jackie kicked José's leg.
“Let’s go to Lakeside and find Rebecca ourselves.”
More Posts from Mx-field and Others
SL: Another thing about Terrance's second person perspective. He perceives his thoughts as commentary, so it's like The Murder After has a chorus. He doesn't have a name for it, but we call it Also Terrance.
Terrance is a plurallet. That's a singlet who is still plural (more than one) in some way. We think it's a midcontinuum experience. (That's the state of not being singular but also not multiple.)
SL: If anyone asks, Terrance thinks straight edge and ruler are interchangeable. I definitely did not screw up.
Update (11/10): I decided to fix the error. The beauty of having a book no one has bought yet is I can change something, and no one will ever know. (Terrance didn't want to go with my plan, anyway.)
SL: Hey, why don't I publish The Development Before as a book instead after I finish Terrance's story? It'll be in order, and people might buy it. I didn't think about that. People love looking behind the scenes!
Reanna: I wonder if Le Prince and Disney will be our first novel. So far, our stories have been shorter.
Carnival is a novella, and so was Nightingale. (I pulled that one from publication.) The Murder After is a chapbook, and The Year After seems to be going in a similar direction. (At least people read romance novellas.)
Now, for Le Prince and Disney, we have the dark ride's sections planned: Three Precursors and the First Film, Animals, Animation, Trick Films, and Phantom Rides. That's five chapters. And they have a few films in them. There will also be five chapters that Terrance categorized as being outside the ride. So, that's ten chapters in all.
After the story, we'll list the films used. That might take a few pages. What if all these pages come together and make a novel?
SL: Wouldn't it be funny if The Year After were 88 pages, double the first volume's page count? I'm already making it fourteen chapters, double the first volume's chapter count.
SL: I added Terrance's notes to The Murder After, and now, it's 52 pages. I also changed the price to $5.95 because it sounds better. This is the last change I'll make, I promise. Now, it's ready to buy! I'm happy with myself.
Reanna: Sometimes, plural writer culture is being the headmate everyone takes traits from for their characters.
Reanna: We should make an academic discipline analyzing the plurality of media and plurality in media. We should call it Plural Theory.
Buying but not Reading
You don't have to read our books to buy them. There are other things you can do with our books.
You can give them as a gift.
You can donate them to a library.
You can donate them to a book drive.
You can use them in a Book Exchange.
Link to the profile of Carnival Link to the profile of The Murder After
SL: Does anyone else have preemptive rants for works you haven't shared yet? I keep doing that for The Murder After, which is going to be published on 8 October. From the very beginning, I would get really mad over the idea of readers wondering why the ending isn't considered a good one.
