Silence can be awed, peaceful, stunned, strained, awkward or terrified.
Trouble is, they all sound the same.
At Writing Society this week I plucked up the kahunas to put the prologue of TM up on the big projector screen to 'workshop', i.e. have the member with the most impressive voice read it out and then everyone gives feedback on the writing.
Except, they didn't. At least, for a good fifteen seconds. The first reply asked if he could scroll back up because she'd popped to the loo and missed the beginning.
Fifteen seconds doesn't sound very long, but it's a hell of a long time when your heart's thumping like crazy in your chest and your honed words start swimming into childish crayon marks on the screen.
After a while, though, I did get soime very valuable feedback about what was clear and what was not, how a phonetic attempt at Lancastrian was read as Jamaican (...), and a helpful interjection as to which way someone has to slit their wrists to die (upwards, not across - who'da thunk?).
I redeemed the situation somewhat by tentaively volunteering further details of the book... which was met with wide eyes and a chorus of 'ohh!'s. This made sense, as the chapter I was workshopping was in fact the prologue, a piece by its very nature mysterious and foreshadowing. If someone had been under a rock for twenty-five years, emerged one day and decided to read Michael Crichton's prologue to Jurassic Park (which follows workers we never meet again, most of whom die, on an island somewhere at night, poking something in a cage that has claws) would he guess that the rest of the book told of rampaging dinosaurs, world-weary archaeologists and a plucky lawyer?
I hope not...
For now I'm going to keep chugging on with TM (when schoolwork and the Rose Prince are over) and try and write as best I can what the story's telling me (God that sounds so pretentious) to write. Because, as the lady who popped to the loo pointed out, she'd have to read a lot more and hope the story grounds itself - Saxons who move forward in time isn't exactly going to win a Pulitzer (my words, not hers).
I told my friend about the silence, and she said that sometimes the sound of silence after a reading is actually envy-seething. While I doubt her lovely sentiment, which I'm hugely grateful for, there's nothing to do but plough on regardless.
