September 30th, 2025

Twenty years ago, minus a day, I began writing a story. Skinny Legs and All, A Russian Debutante's Handbook, and A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius had inspired me to write something. Something wordy and stylistic and crazy, if possible.

I spent a year (10 months?) writing the first draft. A local writers' workshop eviscerated the first five pages.

"When does the story begin?"
"If I grabbed this off a bookshelf then flipped through it, I would put it right back."
"No one talks like this."
Et cetera.

After the group dispersed, a woman (safely away from any lingering hate) said she liked my writing. I believed her confession was genuine, but now as I type this, wonder if the public flogging had spawned an amount of pity.

In 2010, I posted the story to a now-defunct website where other people shared fiction. I got one review.

I removed the story after a few months then abandoned fiction writing (and the enterprise of audience-attracting) indefinitely. Thirteen years later, on a random day, an inclination possessed me, and I challenged myself to read my old story again. Naturally, impulsively--inexorably--a rewrite followed, and this blog contains the result of that exercise.

P.S.
I adore that review.

Circa 2005, Chapter One