extract for critique

Wantobe

Hi all, long time reader, have been doing a creative writing class lately but it finished a few weeks back and am missing other people's input. So here is an extract from a short I am writing and would love to hear feedback.


Untitled.


Maura parked outside the pawnshop. Her hands were clenched around the steering wheel and she could feel the strain pulling right up through her shoulders into the back of her neck. A headache coming on. One of many over the past months, maybe even years. Lorna, her yoga teacher, had advised looking at each muscle in turn willing each one to relax. Maura thought that the times when it had worked had been owing more to the gin and tonic she had beforehand than the yoga but despite that she gazed at her hands. They were still slightly tanned from her early spring gardening. She had slim hands and wrists. On her ring finger she wore her grandmothers wedding ring- a tiny gold band- lost next to the engagement ring and wedding band Hugh had given her. On her wrist the gold watch that was his wedding present and the charm bracelet he'd given her for her 30th birthday. Now it was laden with charms, one for each birthday since. Even looking at her burdened hand made her feel heavy.
Before the engagement she never wore jewellery, well not much anyway. The odd top shop bangle or cheap costume ring. The first weekend she and Hugh had spent together she'd bought a topaz and silver bangle from a market stall and on the way to the hotel Hugh had caught her wrist in the car on the pretext of examining it. He'd rubbed his thumb over the inside of her wrist and she'd felt desire pooling inside her. They'd made love roughly, their first time, barely inside the hotel door. God that seemed a long time ago.
Feeling her eyes well, she willed the memory away, enough mawkishness she told herself.
The pawnshop was dark inside, cluttered with shelves of every concievable household good. Washing Machines, microwaves, televisions, even irons everywhere. They were all covered in a layer of dust but here and there fingerprints or hand prints showed some activity recently. Despite the banal normality of the stock the air in the shop was somehow malevolent. At the opposite side of the shop to the door was a full plate glass wall, and right in the middle a counter. Inside a bored looking middle aged woman stared at Maura as she approached. Behind her a television screen showed an image of Maura taken from the camera inside the door so that, faintly bizarrly, as Maura got nearer she could see herself from behind.
Despite the strain outside, now that she was here Maura felt rather matter of fact. She slid off the engagement ring, watch and charm bracelet and slid them through the aperture to the woman waiting behind. Apparantly no words were needed as the woman took them silently, took out a magnifying eye glass and examined them.
'Three thousand five hundred.' Her voice was surprisingly soft.
'Here, take this too.' Maura had to pull slightly to remove the thick wedding band.
'Ten euro'. The woman hadn't even looked at it.
'Done.' But the sense of relief she expected never came.

i-digress

I'd leave out the 'topshop' reference. You also don't mention her getting from the car to the pawn shop. It doesn't really need mentioning I suppose, but as she nearly cried a simple 'steeling herself she stepped out of the car and slammed the door behind her' type line could work well. It's incredibly well written though. I liked the lines about her jewellery weighing her down.

Wantobe

Thanks i-digress. In my creative writing class our teacher allowed only positive criticism and I've seen some of the comments here so I felt a little naked out there...Pleased to get some positive reinforcement. I know what you mean about the skip between car and shop, I really did think of it myself ( honest!) but thought I could do without. It does seem a bit clumsy though.
Every time I re-read something I've written I want to change something. One of the best pieces of advice our teacher gave us was just to write it first, just write. Don't agonise over the first sentence, don't rewrite each sentence as you go along or you will never get there. That's what I had been doing before the class- and the first line was never good enough so I was getting nowhere. So this piece of a story was written in one go, no editing. I will try to finish the story before I edit it for the same reason.Usually I write in a humourous tone, but this one is coming out like this.
Writing is really tough though, isn't it? I mean it's really the only thing I want to do, but somehow when it comes to the crunch I will find a hundred and one things to do before I start writing. Check my usual websites, check the laundry, do the washup....delay delay delay. Is everyone else the same? And does every one else have like a tape of an idea playing and replaying inside their head like I do? Can't get rid of it, like an annoying pop song with a catchy beat!

dublinario

I think this is extremely well written.

paulusdu

I've had that tape playing for years in my head, the same idea, looked at from a hundred different angles, started, and restarted too often to keep count.
i keep promising myself a full 2 weeks of zero distractions to get it out of my head and down on paper, more for my own sanity than for any need of critique or praise :-)
I know how you feel though.

As for the extract, i like it, very well written and flows nicely.

kmick

I think its well written. If I had one criticism it would be that it would be hard to keep up that kind of pace. To me it seems rushed.

Wantobe

kmick wrote: »

I think its well written. If I had one criticism it would be that it would be hard to keep up that kind of pace. To me it seems rushed.

Thanks kmick. You could be right in that I tend to be rushed in real life so that might be translating into my writing. I don't get a lot of time to write so maybe I should be more considered. I will take that on board.

Thanks too to dublinario and paulusdu for taking the time to reply- I really appreciate it. Paulusdu- when are you going to get two weeks to write?! That would be great! I went away for Easter with my family and was determined to claw back some 'me-time' and taking an hour each night after my girls were in bed to write. Needless to say it didnt happen at all!