December 2009
14 posts
1 tag
Round Three, Week Two Wrapup
HO HO HO / DREIDEL DREIDEL DREIDEL TO YOU GOOD TUMBLR PEOPLE
The holiday season is upon us, and we here at Too Many Cooks have been given two weeks off with full pay to enjoy ourselves! J/K we’re all broke.
Here is a summary of where we find ourselves at the end of week two of our series, looking forward to the next installments after the break beginning on January 4, 2010.
A very Happy...
Chapter 2: Paul's Wounds
Previously
Paul felt himself drift in and out of consciousness in the ambulance. Even on the backboard, he felt every bump they hit on the road. He kept trying to speak but just opening his mouth was exhausting. The young woman who seemed to be in charge of taking care of him looked down at him, seemingly making soothing sounds. He could barely decipher them in his state.
“Just...
2 tags
Knowing--Chapter 2
Previously
Patty explains everything to Mike’s mom when she gets home. Ms. Brook is unnerved and begs her to stay—and while she entertains the idea for a minute, Patty realizes she can’t. Nobody is home to take care of her dogs. And while Ms. Brook offers to drive her home to take care of them and then drive her back here, Patty declines. Even if it wasn’t for the dogs,...
2 tags
The Girl At The Bus Stop - Chapter 2
Previously.
The day passes in a blur of stale air and pointless shuffling of papers, feet, and blame. He is just another fleck of dust trapped in a corporate wormhole. He finishes his day after dark, and rides the bus home, not paying much heed to the view out the bus windows because what he wants to see isn’t there in the evening. That is why he didn’t see her look up at his face in the well-lit...
3 tags
Gasoline: Chapter 2
Previously.
Detective Andrew James stared blankly at the mass of paperwork scattered over his desk as he rubbed his temples in the vain hope of fending off yet another headache. Ten days of working on this high-profile case had meant very little sleep and zero social life. Not that he’d had a social life in the first place. His usual well-groomed appearance had been replaced with crumpled...
2 tags
Here At the End of All Things - Chapter 2
Previously
“These mortals do concern me, dying as they are.”
—The Iliad, Book 20, line 26
The vast desert floor glittered green and blue in the early morning hours. Surrounding mountains cast somber shadows that continued to give cool relief to the slumbering creatures lying in dark crevices and under rocks during these final twilight moments. The horizon swirled gray and red,...
1 tag
Round Three, Week One Wrapup
And here we are again, with a new round of first chapters!
“Here At the End Of All Things”—This Zelazny-inspired story is my take on the apocalypse, and what would happen if the future of humanity was left in the trust of a cold, unfeeling machine. What happens next will be up to the other writers, starting with Marley. Can’t wait to see what plots they dangle in my...
2 tags
Knowing - Chapter 1
She doesn’t know what woke her up. Befuddled and sleepy she lies there, rubbing her eyes and trying to figure out what day it is. It is still dark, and as far as she knows, she could have been asleep for minutes or days.
Patty struggles out of bed. She is all tangled in the covers as always, and the dog sleeping up against her back isn’t inclined to move. Finally she sits up, looks at the clock...
3 tags
The Girl at the Bus Stop - Chapter 1
He feels the usual fluttering in his chest. Part anxiety. Part excitement. It always starts as the bus approaches the roundabout near the hospital. Her stop is just after that - the one opposite the hospital’s main entrance. Will she be there today? He knows she should be. It’s term time.
He remembers when he first saw her a few months ago. He’d glanced up idly from his...
5 tags
Gasoline: Chapter 1
Mason Pope opened his eyes and was unsurprised by how bright his bedroom seemed to be. He always forgot to close his curtains when he came home from a drunken night out at some dive with his friends. His routine typically involved attempting to take his pants off and only getting them halfway off and falling asleep on his stomach, due to Mason being half lazy and half paranoid that he would choke...
2 tags
Paul's Wounds - Chapter 1
The violence done to his body in the last few seconds would not register in his conscious mind, and the blood spilling from just below his collarbone down the dress-shirt he had worn to the office that day was, to Paul, an unknown oily substance that baffled him. His hands shook violently unbeknownst to him while in the empty landscape of his mind he thoughtfully palpated the sticky substance and...
2 tags
Here At the End Of All Things--Chapter One
(For Roger Zelazny) Chapter One
From far, from eve and morning And yon twelve-winded sky, The stuff of life to knit me Blew hither: here am I. Now— for a breath I tarry Nor yet disperse apart— Take my hand quick and tell me, What have you in your heart. Speak now, and I will answer; How shall I help you, say; Ere to the wind’s twelve quarters I take my endless way.
—A. E....
Heads Up Folks!
“Too Many Cooks” Round Three starts Monday! We have a new writer joining us and an original TMC participant returnning to the fold, so I hope you’ll all check out the new round of stories coming up!
Staring at a blank page – Paulos G's thoughts on...
Going for a cigar - brb.
***
Ahhh. That’s better. I do a lot of my thinking about what I’m going to write while having a puff in our back garden. That’s where the idea for Saints Above! came to me and wouldn’t let go. I had fun writing this and it was a joy to see what my fellow Cooks did with it.
One of the challenging (and enjoyable) things about TMC is that you...
