ROW80, Flogometer, Vocabulary Quiz and Other Wordiness
heck in number one.No editing on Out of the Water yet. I hope to visit all other ROW80ers sometime between now and Sunday, though!
Both projects have been derailed by the festival cum explosion cum drafting fest cum everybodydancenow that is the writers' houseparty at the Mall at the End of Time.
Here's a wee snip, featuring Rosa and Baha. Rosa's never seen a swing before, and they've just discovered one in the middle of the gardens on one side of the Mall:
"What should I be afraid of?"
He gave her a squeeze then pushed her off his lap. "Take a seat, Peri, and I'll swing you."
Glancing warily at him and then at the seat dangling from cold metal chains, she sat, tucking her skirts up underneath her. The cross bar the swing hung from was very high above her head.
"Extend your legs as you fly out, and tuck them under as you fall back," he told her, moving around behind her and placing his hands at her waist. "Ready?"
"Ye - no!"
He'd started running, pushing her as far as the chains extended, and then he skipped to the side and she was falling, falling back, rising up the other side, and as she came down he caught her again and heaved and she rose even higher, her toes nearly touching the overhanging branches of a willow outside the circle of sand.
Her stomach dropped as she dropped and the air rushed past her cheeks, and his hands caught her on each upswing and she thought, it doesn't matter where I am. As long as he's there, it'll always feel like this.
Submit an opening scene to the Flogometer! Fellow Forumite Dee-Ann has just had her exciting and mysterious opening critiqued.
Test your vocabulary! I got 37,900 words, which means I'm better than Shakespeare, but not up to Inky Fool standards. Think I'll reread a Diana Gabaldon novel - perhaps the just-released 20th anniversary edition of Outlander!
Have you ordered your copy yet?
Comments
You're still better than Shakespeare Sarah :-)
I got 38,300 words, but it might not be a fair test since I taught Latin. That does give me an edge.
I also love that excerpt you posted, especially that last sentence and all that it means.
I gave you a blog award! Drop by whenever it suits you to pick it up! :)
i loved Outlander... fascinated with diana gabaldon in general. she seems like quite a woman. would make an interesting friend. so says me and about fifty thousand other women, eh...
<3 Gina Blechman
Off to check the link.
Good luck with ROW80!
Thanks Madeline, Nas and Glynis, I'm glad you liked it!
And yet it's almost over, ZanMarie, isn't it sad? I got about that many words in too. Hopefully some of them will find their way into the wip.
Oh, Liz, you read Outlander when it first came out? How on earth did you stand the wait between each book? I discovered them when A Breath of Snow and Ashes came out and it was a long time to wait for An Echo in the Bone. I'm glad you liked the excerpt!
Thanks for the award, Su!
I think all my writer friends have been hitting above 30,000, Pamela, which is above average apparently! Glad you liked my snip :-)
Don't worry Gina and Theresa - you guys still have a greater vocabulary than Shakespear [g]
A post about Jamie, Jennifer? I shall have to see!
Loved this snip. There was another one, also to do with swings, a little after this that I also liked -- but I'm half-asleep and in no mental shape to go look it up right now. [g] Point is, I thought it was lovely!