The AGS chain story, detective theme, finished now for your reading pleasure!

[Stupot]

Wow.
That was actually one of the best short stories I've read for a long time.
Some people didn't appreciate the twists as much as others, but I ask you, what kind of story would it have been without them?  A boring one is my answer.  They added a great deal of depth and helped to create a world for the story and a background to the characters.

All the time I was reading it, it was playing out in my mind's eye almost cinematically.  I think it would make a great short film.  The first person narrative would work brilliantly for this.

I'm looking forward to the next challenge.  As this was a team effort with no 'winner' who decides the theme etc... Andail you wanna set another one?

I'm not a fan of this 'splitting the story up' idea... There seems to be just the right number of us to write a story of a decent length.  This last effort wasn't without its teething problems but I think we should stick to the system we have for a few rounds before playing about with the format.

[Candall]

 I'd be up for that, Andail.  


Wow, this was... quite the read.  Boggles the mind, it does!

I still don't know whether Vince was joking or not, but I think it would be awesome for a bunch of us to contribute assets for an adventure game.  With everybody throwing art, dialogue and scripting into the mix we'd get something as bizarre and cobbled as the story itself!

[Venus]

Hehe, that was a nice read.

I'd be up for a second round, no matter what it's gonna look like. I have to second what Stupot said though. Maybe we should first test what we have a little bit more before we start experimenting...

[Jack Sheehan]

Reading it as a whole it ALMOST makes sense, and lo rez did a nice job cleaning up the mess of the end. I'd definitely so this again. Perhaps we should begin suggesting a new topic. My suggestion: Russia.

[Emerald]

I think it would make a nice official competition. Andail could pick his favourite paragraph, and the writer chooses the next topic, and the next winner, and so on...

It would encourage people to think harder about what they're going to write (since they want to win), and it also ensures that Andail doesn't start to run dry on ideas...

Anyway, I'll try to read it now before I go see Macbeth in the Helix (bleh).


Edit1: Wow, missed a whole page of this thread. I like the idea of teams - it might keep things more coherent, especially if the team-members are communicative.

Edit2: Ugh. That was quite excruciating. Although, maybe I shouldn't be reading it the same way I'd read a normal piece of writing (more like you need to read it a little dissociatively in order to get it to come out sounding normal).

I think next time the characters, settings and general plot should be set out definitively, so the focus is more about writing than twisting/untwisting...

[Jack Sheehan]

I think it would make a nice official competition. Andail could pick his favourite paragraph, and the writer chooses the next topic, and the next winner, and so on...

It would encourage people to think harder about what they're going to write (since they want to win), and it also ensures that Andail doesn't start to run dry on ideas...

Anyway, I'll try to read it now before I go see Macbeth in the Helix (bleh).


Edit1: Wow, missed a whole page of this thread. I like the idea of teams - it might keep things more coherent, especially if the team-members are communicative.

Tell me if Macbeth is good will you? I have to go to it for my LC course.

[Emerald]

Got some bad reviews I think.

Anyway, we should probably PM this.

[Stupot]

I think next time the characters, settings and general plot should be set out definitively, so the focus is more about writing than twisting/untwisting...

That would be boring.  The charm of this exercise was in not knowing where the hell it was going.  If we all knew the plot before we began then it wouldn't have been half as fun.

What would be the point in writing 200 words if it was just padding.  I added the newspaper clipping in my 200 words and it became an important part of the story.   If I'd have just written a few words linking the previous 200 to the next 200 then it would have been most unsatisfactory.

[Jon]

Well, that was...different!
Apart from the bizarre aspects such as literally eating someone's heart out, the story made relative sense.
I would also like to recommend that the word count be lowered as it took a while for me to read and became a novel rather than a short story.

[TheJBurger]

So, hm...should we start pointing out apparent contradictions now?
Perhaps some people feel obliged to explain what they meant with their passages?

The most confusing thing to me was how Detective Lane went from:
- An honest, hard working detective, to
- A heart stealing, accomplice with a shadowy figure, to
- A borderline hallucinatory madman, to
- He actually was trying to kill the first person?

I am sorry, but I really didn't like it. I guess what turned me off was eating the heart, and then the spider man and then the confusion and then...*runs away screaming*

Call me a sicko, but I actually loved the heart-eating part. I think it may be my favorite part out of the whole story. 

If we do another chain writing activity, I would throw out the suggestion that we have two teams of ten people instead of one giant team and start them both off with the same theme or even the same 200 word intro.  Then, the turnaround would be shorter and we could see how different the two stories turned out.

Yes, I vouch for this. It sounds like it will be great fun.

[Emerald]

I don't mean set out exactly what's going to happen, I mean set out a very vague outline. People can still do twists, but not something along the lines of "suddenly, aliens arrive and start blowing shit up"

So, you'd say...

Plot: A man kills his superior for personal gain
Setting: Seventeenth century England
Protagonist: Melancholy and tragically ambitious

That leaves plenty of room for a good story, but is still limiting enough to give everyone a sense of purpose, and keep things within the realms of what could fathomably occur (if that's a word).

In other words, with something definitive to refer back to, there's less to be lost in translation between each writer. (i.e. the characters stay relatively consistent, and the events can have a more coherent pacing)

[Antonio]

Perhaps some people feel obliged to explain what they meant with their passages?

I switched to Carmine's POV as I wasn't feeling anything for the Lane character. I hope it didn't interrupt the flow too much.
Overall I think the piece has too many narrative and point of view changes but it still has the semblence of a good story.
This was my first foray into writing anything that would be read by strangers and I loved it. Can't wait for the next round, whichever format we decide on...

[Tuomas]

I just made the guy wash his face and hands from all the blood thinking that wouldn't be too subtle for making it seem like the killer and the other guys were the same person, because that's what I thought of him when I read the beginning of the story. 

[Eggie]

I like to think I'm the one who broke James's mind.
Honestly, it seemed like the only way to explain how the world kept shifting around him... plus, we already knew he was insane, really. Sane people don't eat hearts.

I also imagined the event at the beginning of the story and the subsequent heart eating to be the 'organ killing' that happened 15 years ago, but in the characters perception both the murders only happened a couple of nights apart.

Mr. Bear is made of spiders becauses spiders are icky. As is murder.
It is deep.

Anyway, a thought: Introducing sudden twists isn't usually a great tactic early on in the story but when it happens i think it's probably best to roll with them rather than to try and 'twist back'.

EDIT: Also, I was dissapointed when the main character turned out to a male. I don't know why but I got the impression it was a she from the first paragraph and a yarn about socially inept female detective genius sounded like fun.

[Candall]

I was dissapointed when the main character turned out to a male.

Heh, that was my fault.  Carmine said "no, sir" to him.  So actually, it was Carmine's fault.  Blame her.

[lo_res_man]

If we do another chain writing activity, I would throw out the suggestion that we have two teams of ten people instead of one giant team and start them both off with the same theme or even the same 200 word intro.  Then, the turnaround would be shorter and we could see how different the two stories turned out.

I like the idea of starting with the same original paragraph a firm idea and theme and two teams seperating off.It will take longer, but hopefully it will weed out a bit of the, "joyrider" element.  It will probably still be crap, but hopefully it will not make my head implode this time.

[PixelPerfect]

Kudos to everybody! It certainly is a challenging piece to the reader. 
For the next one the two teams idea is good, but maybe we should try this one more time before changing it? Maybe we can do it with a less of confusion this time around?

[auriond]

Yes, let's stick with the same format for one more round first. I think we need to iron out how it will work before we try with two teams.

My suggestion is that we establish at least the main character. The rest of the story can go haywire, but I think the reason why this story broke, or became genius, was how the protagonist himself was hopelessly incoherent. So I suggest that we decide on a main character before we start on the next one. Just my two cents

[Emerald]

I suggest that we decide on a main character before we start on the next one. Just my two cents

I agree. Even though that was practically copied from my previous post...

[auriond]

Well, maybe I didn't make myself clear - you suggested a rough plot, protagonist and so on... I think just a character will do