Heh. Susan, I'm a Fragment Nazi. They drive me batshit; it's a quirk. I'll leap on an overuse of those long before I'll check the proper placement of commas.

While I'm a Comma Nazi. I've seen so many contest entries and writing class submissions with commas everywhere they shouldn't be and nowhere they should, and that drives me batshit. Especially breathless run-on sentences that would be just fine with a comma or two properly placed.

I crawled down the stairs. It was night. Dark. Chilly. I crawled. Those damned stairs.

Yeah, I've certainly seen fragments abused as a cheap way to create suspense or speed pacing. But I still like using them in moderation.

I think I'm terrible at all the rules basics of the craft.

No, you're not.

Thanks for letting me vent. For the record, I'm only this much of a perfectionist over things that are being submitted, and I think of contest entries as a sort of dry run for submission, especially since finaling gets you in front of an editor or agent judge. And I get annoyed at having to wade through prose so grammatically flawed that I keep having to read sentences two and three times to have any idea what the writer is driving at. Fortunately, those entries are the exception rather than the rule, or I'd quit judging out of sheer frustration.

I'll use fragments a lot when writing dialogue, since it's how some people speak.

As for punctuation, I may have a bit of an addiction to the em dash.

I've been told(I have barely noticed myself) that I have a parenthesis(dependency)

As for punctuation, I may have a bit of an addiction to the em dash.

Me too. First-round editing involves cutting my em dashes down to one per page. Final round includes seeing if I can weed it to one per scene or even chapter.

This wasn't how it was supposed to feel. Hotter, surely, more active, with her whole body twitching to action. No nerves afire -- cold sliding down every artery and up every vein, coiling around her heart and stiffening her back.

A sudden blush of fire raced across her face, shame and humiliation chased away by resolve.

She tucked the photograph back into his wallet. Contempt filled where anger might have been -- at his stupidity, at the ease of her discovery.

Hefting the knife from left hand to right, she imagined him with his throat slit, a gaping, leaking, twisted smile.

drabble

Weekly phone call to Mother. It's what you do.

"And I lost five pounds, isn't that great?"

Deep breath in Pennsylvania. I wince.

"Well, that's not nearly enough. You really need to lose more weight--"

I slowly put the phone on the couch arm. Go to the bathroom. Get a cookie. Sit next to the phone and eat the cookie. The tiny monologue never pauses.

I finish the cookie, pick up the phone. "Mother, I'm sorry, I have to go."

"And your clothes would--what?"

"Good-bye, Mother."

I hang up, lean back and smile. So that's power.

little long drabble

Sneaking into the closet Santa used was against the rules. But I didn’t care. Much. I made my sister help me. “If you don’t –you get no gifts on Christmas morning.” I boosted her up and had her look at the big one on the tippy top of the shelf. “What’s it say????” “I can’t read!” Jeez, little sisters. I set her back down on the floor and climb.

There it is. Gold and shiny with lots of curling ribbon and a sticky bow right in the middle! The biggest box my 8 year old eyes have seen – save for the new fridge my gram got that one time. There’s a tag! Is it mine, is it mine???

“AIMEE JO MCVAY!”

I fall.

I am fucking dying over these. So very good.

This drabbling is addictive:

The windows of the ancient farmhouse are thrown open to catch the breeze. My cousins and I are piled into two beds. I hear giggling as they listen at the wall separating their bedroom from their parents' room. The house is dark.

My cousin Belinda whispers to me, "come here."

I slide out of bed and at her command put my eye to the hole in the plaster. There’s enough light. I can see two bodies. My uncle's pale ass is pumping back and forth with effort.

I've never seen adults having sex. I'm 10 years old.

Hee, I like both of those Aimee and Cash. I don't remember ever getting a visual of any of the adults in my family, but I don't think my parents realized the heat register under their bed led straight into the living room ceiling where we would stay up late Friday nights to watch movies. It provided an interesting aural soundtrack to the movies.