Parker Owens Posted December 4, 2015 Author Share Posted December 4, 2015 This is just a note to anyone looking in: there are going to be some longer chapters coming up. Readers may need to pace themselves! Just saying... 3 Link to comment
Timothy M. Posted December 4, 2015 Share Posted December 4, 2015 This is just a note to anyone looking in: there are going to be some longer chapters coming up. Readers may need to pace themselves! Just saying... Bring them on. 1 Link to comment
skinnydragon Posted December 4, 2015 Share Posted December 4, 2015 Oh dear, I usually glaze over after 146 words Link to comment
Parker Owens Posted December 4, 2015 Author Share Posted December 4, 2015 Oh dear, I usually glaze over after 146 words Is that a maple glaze, or a sweet mustard glaze? Link to comment
skinnydragon Posted December 4, 2015 Share Posted December 4, 2015 I was actually thinking about the doughnut in front of me Link to comment
skinnydragon Posted December 4, 2015 Share Posted December 4, 2015 speaking of words, I just noticed Twoey crossed 100,000 with today's chapter. No wonder my fingers ache!! Link to comment
Parker Owens Posted December 4, 2015 Author Share Posted December 4, 2015 Ohhhhhh. Congratulations, my friend! No wonder the doughnut on your fingers feels good. So I asked this question earlier, but I'll try again for fun - casting A to Z as a movie, I wondered who might be cast as supporting character actors (these are the people I love most in movies)... Eustace Whitley (Chris Cooper was the consensus, but are there other suggestions?) Ambrose Whitley (Matt Damon?) Gunnar Ericsson ..... Toby Harris .... Marjorie McDowell ... Mrs. Gersheimer ... Mr. Karpus.... Not ready to even think about main characters yet! 1 Link to comment
Parker Owens Posted December 11, 2015 Author Share Posted December 11, 2015 Ohhhhhh. Congratulations, my friend! No wonder the doughnut on your fingers feels good. So I asked this question earlier, but I'll try again for fun - casting A to Z as a movie, I wondered who might be cast as supporting character actors (these are the people I love most in movies)... Eustace Whitley (Chris Cooper was the consensus, but are there other suggestions?) Ambrose Whitley (Matt Damon?) Gunnar Ericsson ..... Toby Harris .... Marjorie McDowell ... Mrs. Gersheimer ... Mr. Karpus.... Not ready to even think about main characters yet! Maybe Vincent D'Nofrio for Gunnar Ericsson? Link to comment
skinnydragon Posted December 11, 2015 Share Posted December 11, 2015 Maybe Vincent D'Nofrio for Gunnar Ericsson? Only in his MIB body Link to comment
Parker Owens Posted December 12, 2015 Author Share Posted December 12, 2015 Nominating Kathy Bates to play Mrs. Marjorie... Link to comment
Rigel Posted December 13, 2015 Share Posted December 13, 2015 (edited) For me, setting and geography have always been important. I've tried to describe things generically enough that a reader can imagine things as it suits. How have you imagined Blackburn? Or Eustace's farm, for that matter? Just curious how people see things. You given me enough info to think of Blackburn as being a small town in a south-central Pennsylvania valley. It's a place where there are parallel ridges that run North-South and Amish farmers in the valleys, and in chapter 23, you slip in a reference to the Pirates as the nearby sports team. I'm loving the story--at first the "Perils of Pauline" series of misadventures to Stefan/Eric/Andy was offputting, but I came in late enough that I could read my way to a point where he had met Eustace Whitley, and there was hope for a story that would develop the main character with at least a semi-stable supporting cast. As I write this, you've just posted the Christmas Eve chapters, and I'm hopeful that Andy's lies will get found out, in a good kind of way. I should probably post my next thoughts in the reviews section to avoid giving away any spoilers, but before I do, I need to know--have you written the story all the way through, or are posts liable to switch the future plot? If the latter, I might need to be careful with plot development speculations. Is it correct that you try to post each Tuesday and Friday, or am I making that up in my own addled brain. --Rigel Edited December 13, 2015 by Rigel Link to comment
spike382 Posted December 14, 2015 Share Posted December 14, 2015 Rigel I can totally answer that last question for Parker, he now updates every three days. He was posting every other day previously but now that chapters are longer he's waiting an extra day between. Link to comment
skinnydragon Posted December 14, 2015 Share Posted December 14, 2015 Nominating Kathy Bates to play Mrs. Marjorie... Nuh-uh Wrong type. I envision a Maggie Smith, sans accent although not sans enunciation peculiarities. 2 Link to comment
Parker Owens Posted December 14, 2015 Author Share Posted December 14, 2015 Nuh-uh Wrong type. I envision a Maggie Smith, sans accent although not sans enunciation peculiarities. Maggie might be a little fine-boned for the role...wonder how she drives a Volvo? Oh, and posting: twice a week, pretty much Tuesday and Friday, though with variations for the holidays and so forth. Link to comment
Former Member Posted December 19, 2015 Share Posted December 19, 2015 I've been enjoying this story since I first started reading it. (I save pdfs and copy them to my iPad to read in the Kindle app because it's formatted better for reading.) Yes, it was very frustrating that every encounter was bad and he ran away, but it seemed appropriate to the character. I was homeless for two years, but as an adult and I stayed in shelters almost the whole time. Somehow I managed to survive the experience and am on Social Security Disability for Depression and Anxiety (which I was suffering with long before I lost a job and was evicted from an apartment, but the Depression was one cause for those things occurring). I met lots of homeless guys who have all sorts of reasons for not liking shelters though. If guys know you are Gay, they will often proposition you even though they identify as straight. It didn't happen to me very often, but it did to younger guys. There are very, very few shelters specifically for LGBT youth. Most shelters are very unsafe especially for Transpeople. Quite often people are segregated by their birth gender, so TransWomen are housed with men who verbally torment them, physically attack them, and/or generally make life difficult. Straight men convince themselves that having sex with a TransWoman isn't the same as having sex with another man even if the TransWoman hasn't had bottom surgery (with the proof of her birth gender dangling between her legs). One thing I like about Andy is that he's even more oblivious than I am! I have Cognitive Dissonance — I often don't see what other people see in me. People always tell me that I smile all the time, but it never feels like I'm smiling much at all. People tell me I'm a nice guy, but I don't feel like I am — all the nice things I do are things that we're all supposed to do so I don't get any KarmaPoints™, but I keep losing KarmaPoints™ every time I do something wrong. (My therapist asks me to come up with examples of what I'm doing wrong, but I can't really think of any. That doesn't change the fact that I feel like a bad person, but I am getting better at realizing that my perceptions are often wrong.) Link to comment
Puppilull Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 That's a very interesting question. I have fortunately not suffered abuse, so perhaps I shouldn't speculate. I think Andy's anger will come later. Right now, he's in survival mode. He's just getting away from his flight instinct and starting to perhaps not trust, but at least enjoy other people. He doesn't let them in, but tolerate company and can participate. When or if he finally gets to a trusting phase, I think anger and a lot of other suppressed emotions will surface. Then he'll need help. Professional or by a friend. Link to comment
impunity Posted December 23, 2015 Share Posted December 23, 2015 On the other hand, this is fiction; therefore, the presence or absence of Andy's anger is entirely dependent on the author. Link to comment
spike382 Posted December 23, 2015 Share Posted December 23, 2015 I'm no expert by any means, but at this stage in Andy's life, he has been so abused in every form that he has such a low opinion of himself and truly believes that he actually deserved everything that happened to him. I think once he actually realized what he's capable of and figures out that his father was so freaking wrong for torturing him like that for so many years, all his suppressed emotions are going to bubble to the surface like crazy. Once he finally learns a better way and encounters people that actually love him and he realizes he is in fact worth it, he'll probably be just as angry as anyone would be. Link to comment
purrbaby Posted December 25, 2015 Share Posted December 25, 2015 About the anger issue, or lack there of. My impression is that he has been so isolated from "life" that he really doesn't understand what has been taken away from / denied him. No tv, movies, etc. (basically everything that we would consider to be a normal life ). He will need to develop that understanding of what he has missed/deserved, before the anger will develop, I think. Link to comment
Former Member Posted December 27, 2015 Share Posted December 27, 2015 I agree that Andy's anger will erupt when he feels more secure and comfortable. It's kind of unfair that the people he loves and trusts the most will have to deal with his pent-up emotions. Hopefully they will understand why this is happening and be able to realize they aren't the real target of his anger. And I hope A to Z will continue, maybe as a sequel, to explore Andy's future as he begins to trust his friends. Otherwise it feels like the story might be coming, slowly, to a conclusion. I don't think Andy has the energy to run away again (and if he does, I think there'll be some upset readers). We've invested so much in Andy's current situation and you seem to have recently provided Andy with most of the tools he needs to get out of his legal issues, real or imagined. I can imagine a future married Andy and Zander visiting Eustace's farm and maybe helping with the chores! (A harvest festival special?) Link to comment
Parker Owens Posted December 27, 2015 Author Share Posted December 27, 2015 Andy has a world of problems to sort through. He also has a lifetime - a real one, it seems, with Zander and his family - in which to do hyena sorting. This thought kept me going for a long time. I am interested in your reactions to Andy's life; there are som many directions it could take at this point. Link to comment
Puppilull Posted December 27, 2015 Share Posted December 27, 2015 In the mean time, I just went 'D'oh' at the title. Like now. I'm so slow sometimes... LOL Great chapter today! Link to comment
spike382 Posted December 29, 2015 Share Posted December 29, 2015 In the mean time, I just went 'D'oh' at the title. Like now. I'm so slow sometimes... LOL Great chapter today! I literally just did the same thing. The title had been bugging me and I couldn't figure it out and then it just hit me. I feel a little slow myself... 1 Link to comment
Timothy M. Posted December 30, 2015 Share Posted December 30, 2015 Well, here is one thing bugging me Mr Stevenson says to the judge: There may be living relatives, but that would take further investigation. and later the judge asks Andy: are there any resources or family you didn’t tell me about? What about Uncle Ray? Is he simply dismissed as family due to him molesting Andy? Link to comment
Puppilull Posted December 30, 2015 Share Posted December 30, 2015 I thought about that, but based on the diary I think the judge just edited him out of the picture. I do fear he'll make an appearance, if nothing else to claim guardianship to get to the inheritance, meager as it may be. Link to comment
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