Untitled-sudden fiction

This is a sudden fiction piece. It has seen only 1 editing and revision round.

Please address the switches between internal dialogue and the current happenings. I’m a bit unsure whether or not this story is easy for the reader to follow. I am also looking for a good title…any suggestions?

Water Things Kind of Freak Me Out (06.11.07)

Please Press this piece.  (any critical feedback as it is nearing completion)

 

The Glass Castle

With the conclusion of my reading of Jeanette Walls’ The Glass Castle, I have felt so inspired to continue writing. I am so impressed with her ability to stay removed from her story. Walls does not sway the reader with any negative opinion of her parents or their life style choices. She allows the reader to interpret and learn the lives of both her parents and herself through beautifully written narratives and stories that seem nearly fictional.

I recently located an interesting link to a conversation with Walls. This conversation was able to answer many questions I had and brought to our book study group. I thought the most interesting comment she made was,

I thought about writing it for close to 20 years. I tried to write it fictionalized, but I couldn’t even make fake names of people. Periodically, I’d write about 200 pages in a weekend and throw it all away without even reading it. What happened is, the opening scene in the book pushed me into thinking, “I should really write this.”

As I have been attempting to get my own story into words after many years of contemplating it, I was very comforted to know that it took her so long to write her story. Although I am so deliberate with my writing, I can’t imagine writing 200 pages in a weekend and throwing them away.

I have had a difficult time writing my memoir in a way that is as withdrawn and emotionless as Walls. My writing is so full of my feeling that I am worried that the story is being skewed for the reader by it. I really want to be able to purify my work to allow the reader to discover the truth of my family life without the baggage that I bring to it. Walls notes:

One of the reasons I could write it now is because I am happy with where I am. 10 or 15 years ago, I was very confused about my feelings toward my mother and my father, and myself, where did I belong in this whole spectrum of things…There was no doubt in my mind when I wrote this book, that I would lose everything by writing it, whatever status I had, my friends. I had to get to a place where I didn’t mind losing it. Of course it was foolish of me to think that because that hasn’t happened. It’s been an incredible lesson to me that I thought I would lose it all.

http://gothamist.com/2005/05/27/jeannette_walls_author_the_glass_castle_gossip_columnist_msnbccom.php