Critique #55 — Chris Howard
Kevin Andrew Murphy August 16th, 2006
    It was just too easy. I flipped on the spots, gave the trucker a few chirps and he pulled his rig over, slow and smooth, hitting the hazards when he had the forty-eight-foot flatbed nice and perpendicular to the asphalt.
    Abe glanced over while he keyed in annotations to the truck’s datacast. “Nice landing. What was with the lane hopping?”
    I shrugged, scanning the plate run and public feedbacks from the flatbed and rig. “They’re clean, local Arizona regs. Have the driver put on the trailer lights. Take a look at the load. I’ll get an ID and manifest.”
    I pulled on my armor, checked into the deepening fog along I-10 for a clear road, and moved between the squadcar and the end of the flatbed. A thick green lumber tarp covered the load, and I tapped the hold-downs as I made my way to the passenger side of the cab. The trailer lights came to life, swiveling to follow Abe back down the flatbed’s traffic side. I heard him clunking around with the crowbar, unlatching the straps at the flatbed’s rear driver corner.
The most interesting part of this was when he pulled on his armor, otherwise, I’m not sure why I would read it. I was confused by the use of “and” in places where simultaneous action didn’t actually occur. “flipped, gave and pulled” s/b something like “flipped, gave, then pulled”. And look at “pulled, checked and moved”. I’d suggest better words than “gave” and “came”, something more descriptive, and/or active. Otherwise, it’s written well but I’ve nothing that interests me in the first 13 lines
I find this opening very intriguing. All except the first line–because I don’t know what “it” refers to–and by the end I still don’t know. The pull-over? The truck driver’s driving? The data-scan?
i think if you begin just a graf forward–we see what it is the narrator saw which made him want to pull the truck over–we’d be better oriented. (And incidentally have a better clue to what “it” is so we can better appreciate the irony when something goes sour, which the lines certainly implies.)
Sherwood’s put her finger on what’s troubling me here. It’s not that there isn’t intriguing stuff or foreshadowing about things going horribly wrong, but I’m not really certain what’s going on at first. With her recommendations, it will be a lot more intriguing as opposed to just confusing.
Thanks!
Alley, I read my first few lines after your comments, and you’re right, it’s awkward because it is a sequence of actions. The “gave” and “came” are understated. I’ll work on these. I need to focus on the points of suspense. Anytime someone puts armor on, you just know something’s going to happen.
Sherwood, “it” refers to the trucker pulling over without a protest when he’s hauling contraband that will guarantee something bad happens to him. Even that sounds much better than “It was just too easy.” I know there was more to the first line when I originally wrote it.
Kevin, I swear I have read and reworked the first two lines thirty times, and really thought they were tight and had a lot going for them. I think all the substance seems to have leaked out of the first line with a few editing passes.
Thank you for taking the time to look at my work.
“And” is word that expresses “the general relation of connection or addition, especially accompaniment, participation, combination, contiguity, continuance, simultaneity, [or] sequence.” (”and.” Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged. Merriam-Webster, 2002. http://unabridged.merriam-webster.com (16 Aug. 2006)
It takes on its meaning in context, and in this context, I think it’s clear that there’s a sequence, not simultaneity.
To be sure, “then” may sound better. But that doesn’t make “and” wrong.
IMHO
No one has mentioned it, but I’m bothered by the word “perpendicular”, which made me see the truck at right angles to the asphalt, crosswise to the road. Do you mean “parallel”?
Good tension though; I know something BAD is about to happen.
I have no excuse for that one, melospiza. Parallel is the obvious one. I can’t believe I didn’t see that. Thanks!
A further note on the “perpendicular to the asphalt” line: Refererce to the asphalt makes me think of the surface of the road, rather than the line the road follows. So, I took this to mean that the truck had somehow parked vertically (parked perpendicular to the surface). I had convinced myself that this was some sort of flying vehicle that could perform such a maneuver, until I read the link about the tarp covering the load.