An experiment

I read an article today about a workshop at a writing conference at which an actress chose manuscripts and read the first 250 words aloud to a panel of publishers and agents. At the point at which a panelist would have stopped reading the manuscript and stamped it "reject," they would raise a hand. Three hands before 250 words and the actress would stop. Then the panel would discuss what went wrong. If she got to 250 words without hands, they'd discuss what went right. Kind of like The Gong Show for authors.

So this has me intrigued. I've been playing around with the idea of sharing just a snippet of something I'm working on, but didn't know how to approach it. To follow are the first 250 words of one of my current projects (okay - you got me - it's 254 - I cheat). It is a young adult novel.

Read and see where you get bored, disinterested, disgusted or just generally want to beg for mercy. Then, let me know. It's your turn to play judge on The Gong Show. Which hatefully means that I'm the lunatic doing a hula dance with my terribly trained terrier while balancing a spinning plate on my nose. Gonnnggg!

I’ve never ruined anyone’s life before this. I mean, sure, my cousin proclaimed loudly in that dog whistle kind of whiny voice she gets that I’d ruined her life last month when I called her a poster board (metaphor – thank you Ms. Finch) in front of some guy at the store. But I don’t think her life is really ruined. She was back to annoying me the very next day. Not ruined. And sometimes my mom gets this blighted look when I need her to do something for me, and I think it is because she’s imagining a life where she’s not beholden to children’s needs. But that’s not my fault because I could have told her condoms are not failsafe and quite frankly, the idea of her as a sexual being is a big bunch of nasty. Plus, I’m a freaking genius. What mom wouldn’t be proud of that? My point is her life - not ruined. And my friends, they may complain that my obsessive studying is ruining their lives, but really, it just means we don’t start playing video games on Friday night until nine instead of seven. Definitely not ruined, just slightly delayed. So, while I’m often told that I ruin lives, I don’t think any of that counts. As Ms. Finch would say, they are just speaking figuratively.

But, in this case, in the particular case of that same Ms. Finch, I think it would be more than fair to say that I did. I ruined her life.