Johnny's Writing

I love to write and some have said I don't do too bad a job.  Below are some samples in reverse chronological order.  Many of the later stories contain harsh language and may deal with mature/adult elements.  I make no apologies, just warnings.  These stories were, at one time, online, but I have since decided that the plagiaristic tendencies of students are too great.  If you would like to read one of these stories, e-mail me and I'll send it on to you.

• The Augean Stable (Revision pending)
  (Rated R, language and mature themes) April 2001.
  Henry's day at church.  It's not what you are thinking.  This is my first attempt at true-to-my-life fiction.  It is based on many of my own experiences and I kind of like it.  It does make me nervous about who reads it though and thus the prelude.  Henry's thoughts are how I felt when I wrote it.  I may or may not currently maintain them (oh, the mystery of me). Someone told me this story was "F****** brilliant."  I don't know about that.  There is a major revision in the works and it may become a completely different story.
    

• The Test
  (Rated PG, language, mature themes) April 2001.
  The Turing Test set in a fictional situation.  Not a bad story, but very predictable and the theme is very overdone.  My first attempt at writing good conversation.  Though I've done it before, I think this is the first time I truly grasped the idea that writing expressions is unnecessary to carry a conversation.
    

• ALIVE 9.0
  (Rated PG-13, possibly R, language, adult situation, violence) March 2001
  What is wrong with Kristen, a computer scientist working on an artificial life form.  My first story for JoLynn or rather written for me and submitted for her review.  This is my first true attempt at science fiction.  It failed horribly.  It was written with little or no experience on the main topic.  It was also my first attempt to create a character and let her do what she pleased.  The lack of plotline is more than evident.  This is a very, very poor story, but it inspired better ones (above).
    

• Mr. Adamsworthy's Secret
  (Rated G) May 1998.
  Kindhearted old Mr. Adamsworthy has a secret.  This was written after Seven because the writing class was so offended by it.  I wrote this to sooth their opinion of me and to poke fun at them.  They didn't get that I was being patronizing.  Also, it turned out I liked it more than I thought I would.  I have been interested in the children's book for quite sometime and may revisit it again.  This is a short story that wants to be a novel and so the descriptions are lacking and the timing is erratic.
    

• Seven
  (Rated R, hard language, sexuality, mature themes, drug use) May 1998
  Hard story about a punk raping a woman and robbing a man.  This was so hard that most of the writing class did not read it.  This is my first attempt at "gritty" fiction (i.e. fiction that has a more realistic tone).  The instructor actually did read it and told the class to skip the first few pages so they could find the exciting conclusion without the hard language.  Whatever.  Fiction should be read as a whole.  However, Seven? what a crappy name for a character; what was I thinking; bleh.  I no longer buy the ending to this story.  He took away too much.
    

• Fortunes Told and Sold: Chapter I
  (Rated PG-13, language, adult situations, horror) July 1997
  Fantasy/horror about three strange women coming into a small town.  An attempt at horror and my second attempt at a novel.  I thought it was well written, but very detached from reality.  Some in my writing class fell in love with this story and even drew caricatures for it.
    

• Brother
  (Rated PG) August 1996
  Civil War drama.  My first foray into the novel.  This story is based on a poem I wrote of the same name.  Didn't get beyond the first chapter/short story because I frankly do not have enough experience to write it.
   

• The Prison Incident
  (Rated PG) Original: October 1992 Reworked: August 1996
  A man tries to escape from prison.  I have reworked this story many times over the years.  It was, if I do say so myself, the most gorific tale told for our Halloween writing assignment.  There was another version e-mailed to the writing mailing list at Snow College.  The student's accused me of plagiarism.  That actually made me feel pretty good since this really is my story.
    

• Voyage
  (Rated G) February 1994?
  A family's voyage from France.  I was waxing more than a little melodramatic for this one.  It actually won the schools Reflection's Contest.  However, it didn't go any further.
    

• Sabbath
  (Rated G) March 1993
  A character wanders through a small town.  An instructor told me that you should not introduce a lot of characters in a short story because it would overcomplicate it.  This is my attempt to disprove that statement.  This story also contains an excellent example of audience manipulation.
   

• Ed the Cow and the Attack of the Kamikaze Bee
  (Rated G) March 1993
  Just as the name says.  This is a 12 sentence story (ask your writing teachers).   The idea is to write two sentences for each of the following: exposition, conflict, rising action, climax, falling action, dénouement for a total of 12.  The instructor said the assignment was to teach us that the rising action requires much more time than the rest of the story.  I, of course, had to try to prove her wrong.  I think I was somewhat successful.
   

• Countdown
  (Rated PG) February 1993
  Astronauts prepare to take off.  May have been inspired by memories of the Challenger explosion, but by no means based on it.  Reflection Contest entry.
    

• Fire Engine
  (Rated G) September 1991.
  Just what the name says.  One of my first stories.  The first one to be read in front of class.  I have edited it a little from the original version, but it is essentially the same.