I couldn't just forget this one!
Aug. 17th, 2022 06:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
garoteSo, this morning, for about 25 minutes as I was waking up but still had my eyes closed, I began to narrate to myself the opening pages of a Douglas Adams inspired scifi story.
I have no idea why this happened. I think it started because I was pondering the importance in novels of opening the story with a good hook - something that doesn't require a lot of explaining but is immediately interesting - so the reader feels compelled to keep reading while the larger narrative is established.
It was effortless at first. The words flowed easily. As the minutes went by it began to develop pauses as my mind struggled for the right phrase, or the next idea.
It's been way too long since this morning and there's no way I could reproduce the exact words, which is a shame, because it was delightful. Terry Pratchett really was right: The best time to work on the outline of a new novel is when you just wake up in the morning. "I think my mind is on time-share to a better author overnight," is how he put it.
Here is a recreation of what I came up with for the hook at the beginning of a story, and no doubt it's going to come out far more stilted than what I had this morning, but I feel like I have to try anyway.
-;-;-
The giant nose had been there for at least 20 years. There was no one left in management who could remember why it was created, and there was no one left in the science wing who could remember how. The only paperwork that remained was a terse instruction manual in a three-ring binder: "Swap fresh blood every 30 days, and replace the air filter every six months," it said, with a few more pages of diagrams and part numbers.
The maintenance was not difficult, but it was tedious, so naturally it fell to a grad student. Jacob inherited it from the student he was replacing. "Oh, hey, there's something else you need to take care of," she'd said vaguely, as she entered the elevator that would bring her up to the lobby for the last time, and when she turned around her expression was a bit too neutral. "... The nose. It's yours now. There's a manual and a key on your desk."
The doors slid shut just before Jacob could form the first question.
It was about as tall the average lab employee. It reclined slightly on its wheeled platform. The back side was a flat plane of gray rubber, as though it had been sliced off the head of a demigod with one confident swing. Half a dozen tubes and some wires came out of the gray rubber and ran to a cabinet bolted to a corner of the platform, which in turn was plugged into an electrical socket and a water pipe on the wall of the cramped storage room where it had been stashed, like some ugly but necessary kitchen appliance. Lacking any other sensory apparatus, the nose did not seem to mind being stored in the dark, and the non-disclosure agreements that each grad student signed made it difficult to explain the origin of their trauma to counselors afterwards, once they unlocked the door for the first time and flicked on the lights. Occasionally the lab had to scramble to replace a curious janitor.
Jacob had mastered the initial shock, and this was his third time replacing the blood supply. His mind was already starting to drift elsewhere as he closed the cabinet door and rolled up the old bag in his gloved hands. He had some robots running samples in the main lab and the data was looking interesting. Sandra was a good boss, but she was laser-focused on her project and when Jacob came to her with a head full of questions about the nose on his second day, she didn't even look up from her spreadsheet and shook her head irritably. "Don't think about it too hard. It's there, it's weird, and all we need to do is keep it alive."
He was standing in the doorway, left arm out to shut off the lights, when he heard the platform shudder behind him. He turned around.
The thing had never made any sound before except for the gentle whirring of a few pumps. Had the noise come from the cabinet? After so many years, was some part failing inside the mechanism? He considered just shutting the door anyway, but then imagined coming back in a month to find the machine stopped, and a terrible smell, and some gross puddle forming under the platform. Sandra would be furious, and he would be known forever as "the grad student who killed the nose."
He walked back into the room and stood looking at it. If it were an ordinary size, it would have been handsome. Dark-skinned, symmetrical, not too hairy. As it was, the hairs dangling out from the nostrils looked strangely thin and long. Biological things don't always scale up smoothly. What else had to be different, biologically speaking, inside a nose that was a hundred times bigger than usual? How would he even begin to diagnose some problem in this thing? The manual was useless. He didn't even know who was authorized to talk about it.
He leaned back on the wall, and sighed. He wanted to fold his arms but he was still wearing the gloves. "What are you even here for?" he said out loud.
Muscles flexed on either side of the nose, and its massive nostrils suddenly flared outward, then relaxed again. The platform shuddered with the movement. Jacob flung his hands out involuntarily to grab the wall. He was suddenly very aware that the organ was between him and the door. Wanting to stay as far away as possible, he began to slide along the wall around the room. A few seconds later his heart almost flew up out of his mouth when the cabinet emitted one loud beep, like a vintage laundry machine signaling the end of a run.
I have no idea why this happened. I think it started because I was pondering the importance in novels of opening the story with a good hook - something that doesn't require a lot of explaining but is immediately interesting - so the reader feels compelled to keep reading while the larger narrative is established.It was effortless at first. The words flowed easily. As the minutes went by it began to develop pauses as my mind struggled for the right phrase, or the next idea.
It's been way too long since this morning and there's no way I could reproduce the exact words, which is a shame, because it was delightful. Terry Pratchett really was right: The best time to work on the outline of a new novel is when you just wake up in the morning. "I think my mind is on time-share to a better author overnight," is how he put it.
Here is a recreation of what I came up with for the hook at the beginning of a story, and no doubt it's going to come out far more stilted than what I had this morning, but I feel like I have to try anyway.
-;-;-
The giant nose had been there for at least 20 years. There was no one left in management who could remember why it was created, and there was no one left in the science wing who could remember how. The only paperwork that remained was a terse instruction manual in a three-ring binder: "Swap fresh blood every 30 days, and replace the air filter every six months," it said, with a few more pages of diagrams and part numbers.
The maintenance was not difficult, but it was tedious, so naturally it fell to a grad student. Jacob inherited it from the student he was replacing. "Oh, hey, there's something else you need to take care of," she'd said vaguely, as she entered the elevator that would bring her up to the lobby for the last time, and when she turned around her expression was a bit too neutral. "... The nose. It's yours now. There's a manual and a key on your desk."
The doors slid shut just before Jacob could form the first question.
It was about as tall the average lab employee. It reclined slightly on its wheeled platform. The back side was a flat plane of gray rubber, as though it had been sliced off the head of a demigod with one confident swing. Half a dozen tubes and some wires came out of the gray rubber and ran to a cabinet bolted to a corner of the platform, which in turn was plugged into an electrical socket and a water pipe on the wall of the cramped storage room where it had been stashed, like some ugly but necessary kitchen appliance. Lacking any other sensory apparatus, the nose did not seem to mind being stored in the dark, and the non-disclosure agreements that each grad student signed made it difficult to explain the origin of their trauma to counselors afterwards, once they unlocked the door for the first time and flicked on the lights. Occasionally the lab had to scramble to replace a curious janitor.
Jacob had mastered the initial shock, and this was his third time replacing the blood supply. His mind was already starting to drift elsewhere as he closed the cabinet door and rolled up the old bag in his gloved hands. He had some robots running samples in the main lab and the data was looking interesting. Sandra was a good boss, but she was laser-focused on her project and when Jacob came to her with a head full of questions about the nose on his second day, she didn't even look up from her spreadsheet and shook her head irritably. "Don't think about it too hard. It's there, it's weird, and all we need to do is keep it alive."
He was standing in the doorway, left arm out to shut off the lights, when he heard the platform shudder behind him. He turned around.
The thing had never made any sound before except for the gentle whirring of a few pumps. Had the noise come from the cabinet? After so many years, was some part failing inside the mechanism? He considered just shutting the door anyway, but then imagined coming back in a month to find the machine stopped, and a terrible smell, and some gross puddle forming under the platform. Sandra would be furious, and he would be known forever as "the grad student who killed the nose."
He walked back into the room and stood looking at it. If it were an ordinary size, it would have been handsome. Dark-skinned, symmetrical, not too hairy. As it was, the hairs dangling out from the nostrils looked strangely thin and long. Biological things don't always scale up smoothly. What else had to be different, biologically speaking, inside a nose that was a hundred times bigger than usual? How would he even begin to diagnose some problem in this thing? The manual was useless. He didn't even know who was authorized to talk about it.
He leaned back on the wall, and sighed. He wanted to fold his arms but he was still wearing the gloves. "What are you even here for?" he said out loud.
Muscles flexed on either side of the nose, and its massive nostrils suddenly flared outward, then relaxed again. The platform shuddered with the movement. Jacob flung his hands out involuntarily to grab the wall. He was suddenly very aware that the organ was between him and the door. Wanting to stay as far away as possible, he began to slide along the wall around the room. A few seconds later his heart almost flew up out of his mouth when the cabinet emitted one loud beep, like a vintage laundry machine signaling the end of a run.
no subject
Date: 2022-08-18 11:28 am (UTC)OMG. Will it be continued? (And did you read Gogol's "Nose"?)
no subject
Date: 2022-08-20 06:05 am (UTC)Why the one loud beep ??!? To be continued?
no subject
Date: 2022-10-27 12:02 am (UTC)It feels like the idea belongs to my subconscious, and if I let my conscious self finish it, it would be sort of ... improper??
How would you continue it? :D