The "Do You Turn The Page" Game

Inspired by Uncle Jim's thread in the Novels forum, I thought we could have some fun with this here as well mainly because I don't have enough to do or enough time to read everything some of you might have.

The rules (Mods, feel free to chime in here),

You can post the first page (ie the first half-page, double-spaced, or 100 words - from any published work or your own published/unpublished work of horror or cross-genre horror fiction (per Haggis' instructions below).

You can respond by saying "Yes" or "No" and by stating, in a polite manner, why (again, as per Haggis' instructions below). You may not insult the personal integrity or style of the author in any fashion although you may be frank about why you would not turn the page.

No Stephanie Meyers stuff! Period. End of story.

If you are the author of the piece you may respond, in a polite fashion, and invite discussion (here or elsewhere) on how the first page might be improved.

Don't tell us right away where the piece is from or who it's by. You must, however, let us know later.

I'll post a piece of mine tomorrow as I don't have the right file with me right now, but let's play.

Or you can just tell me to go soak my head...

Okay, rather than starting off with something of mine, here's the first page of a published novel,

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"The dead scrabbled for an entrance to his grave. His wife was among them, as ravenous for Jim in death as she'd been in life. Their faint, soulless cries drifted down through ten feet of soil and rock.

The kerosene lamp cast flickering shadows on the cinder block walls, and the air in the shelter was stale and earthy. His grip on the Ruger tightened. Above him, Carrie shrieked and clawed at the earth.

She'd been dead for a week.

Jim sighed, breathing in the dank air. He lifted the metal coffeepot from where it sat on the heater and poured himself a cup."
-----
104 words

Do you turn the page?

rsmccoy, I believe this constitutes what might be called "fair use" in that it is clearly stated that it is not for intention of copyright violation, it's an extremely small section (a couple of hundred words), and it's in the nature of a game or blurb for "review" purposes. In addition, we will give attribution once people have commented, stating whose work the piece is from.

Haggis, DL Hegel, what say the Mods?

Thanks, Haggis. If it's not to exceed 50 words, we'll stick to that until you get back to us.

Callalilly, The book is "The Rising" by Brian Keene.

Haggis, Fair enough. Can we go over slightly to complete the sentence (as in the 104 above)?

All Hail our Evil Jackbooted Thug Overlord!

Okay, here's another one. I'll tell you up-front that this one was translated into a decent horror movie, but it's most famous for being SF.

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"The place stank. A queer, mingled stench that only the ice-buried cabins of an Antarctic camp know, compounded of reeking human sweat, and the heavy, fish-oil stench of melted seal blubber. An overtone of liniment combated the musty smell of sweat-and-snow-drenched furs. The acrid odor of burnt cooking fat, and the animal, not-unpleasant smell of dogs, diluted by time, hung in the air.

Lingering odors of machine oil contrasted sharply with the taint of harness dressing and leather. Yet somehow, through all that reek of human beings and their associates - dogs, machines and cooking - came another taint."
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Do you turn the page?

Yup, it's the opening for John W. Campbell's novella "Who Goes There" which was made into the movie "The Thing From Another World" in the 1950s and, of course, John Carpenter's classic horror version "The Thing" in 1982.

I think Carpenter's version more faithfiully follows the story, but there is a lot in this opening that sets the entire scene and tone for the story, just as Carpenter strove to do in his opening scenes.

Notice how much Campbell relies on smells to set his scene. Smell is one of the most emotionally powerful senses in humans, but I think it's often overlooked in our writing.