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From: Leowulf
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: Thu, 24 Oct 2002 02:40:16 -0000
"Desdmona" <[email protected]> wrote in
news:[email protected]:
This is a story from a planned series but stands alone as a complete story. It is 1,526 words. What kind of mischief can someone get into inside a phone booth? FishTank guidelines apply:
1) 2 positive comments
2) 2 suggestions for improvement
3) Try not to repeat!
Questions? Suggestions? Submissions? Send to [email protected] or [email protected].
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******************************************* Wrong Number A Phone Booth story
By theGreatxIam
Brilliant!
Well constructed - sets the stage quickly and makes it believable with the addition of colorful peripherals. We see only as much of the minimal stage as needed, and can concentrate on the mostly-verbal action.
LOVED THE ENDING! The entire story builds to the last word. When it arrives, it is revealed to be inevitible even as it surprises the reader.
Only can think of one improvement - I'd have liked a hint dropped in the middle of the story. As it is, it is a well-told joke, but the revealed secret is too dependent on the last paragraphs. Just one hint in the middle of the action would make the story a little stronger, a little better.
Thanks for a great, very sexy joke! <g>
Leowulf
From: john
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: 23 Oct 2002 21:49:53 -0700
An interesting puzzle. Too clever to be an accident. Too careless to be a final draft. Too tight to be disliked. Too implausible to be believed.
I applaud the restraint. The interesting moral question of what constitutes incest, the literary pattern of irony vrs romance, the definitions of fidelity and sex are all side-stepped. Cleverly, a write-your-own ending has been provided without calling it that. Those who are titillated by the prospect of sex with a parent and those abhorred by it can both enjoy this work. That's an accomplishment!
The large bulk of dialogue is speakable, and balanced with description in a workmanlike manner. It builds like one of those graphs in a writing class, gracefully toward the climax. It's obviously written by a writer. It's readable. Enjoyable for that.
The places that it's not are few but jarring. Too many repetitions too close together of the time/time, slit/slit ilk. Some unnecessary adjectives: pay phones are "black"; cradles are "silver". And occasionally awkward as in the four conjunctions wrecking: " Sultry but soothing, but sounding calculated, like an actress in a seductive role and trying too hard." I'd delete them all; it flows without them. Overall, it only lacks revision.
Implausible. How could a wife talk dirty to an office phone for six paragraphs without being certain she has the right person on the line? How could a son or mother not recognize each other's voice. Zara might playfully, seductively. calculatingly put on some French or Russian accent. But why would Saul? You'd need a terrible connection or serious hearing loss to make it work for me.
Even so I liked the "Lady or the Tiger" ending? You write very well.
John
From: Jeff Zephyr
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: Thu, 24 Oct 2002 12:27:37 -0600
On Mon, 21 Oct 2002 08:41:03 -0400, "Desdmona" <[email protected]> wrote:
First thing is a repeat. But the story doesn't "work" if you don't let the situation go - the joke can't work out without ignoring this particular issue.
The odds that mom and son won't recognize each other's voices seem really bad. Unless maybe they've never talked on the phone, or don't see each other very often, or something else to get in the way of the natural ability to recognize your child/parent by voice alone?
The solution to me is to leave the story as is, ignore this entirely. I don't see a magic way to keep the joke, which is funny, and fix this issue. A bad enough phone connection to make recognition hard would make the conversation itself very difficult. Saul has no reason to disguise his voice, and most people are sort of aware of the "play voices" other people they know use, so even if one or both were doing that, it would only draw attention to the unlikeliness of failing to recognize. Though she is playing with her voice for the role, I still think that the son would figure it out well before the end.
Explaining this isn't necessary. The end is all that matters, and trying to convince the reader that it would really happen like this would mess up the ending.
On the same order of improbability is for the wrong number call to reach this particular phone booth, no other. Again, if you worry about the implausibility, it breaks down.
As a positive, the sudden shocking discovery revealed only at the end works. An earlier revelation, or more clues, would reduce the effectiveness.
Saul's age isn't revealed early on, not early enough I think. There are tiny hints, but nothing which really gives the impression that he is underage. We know more about Saul than "Zara" throughout the story, so it seems odd not to know his age, and possibly his lack of experience with sex.
I know that kind of conflicts with the embarrassing revelation of age at the end, but to me it makes it harder to identify with Saul without knowing just a bit more about his situation.
The phone sex conversation is nicely done. Exciting in its presentation, and it seemed to fit what a couple might really talk about, playing that game with words.
The ending begs the question about what happens next. To me, with the cat of the bag so to speak, there isn't much point in being embarrassed about it all. Saul and Mom obviously are both old enough to know what sex is, right? And Saul can no longer doubt that Mom and Dad are really into sex, not just for having babies when he's not looking.
Jeff
Web site at http://www.asstr.org/~jeffzephyr/ For FTP, ftp://ftp.asstr.org/pub/Authors/jeffzephyr/
There is nothing more important than petting the cat.
From: Bramble
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: Fri, 25 Oct 2002 13:42:00 +1000
Jeff Zephyr wrote:
The odds that mom and son won't recognize each other's voices seem really bad. Unless maybe they've never talked on the phone, or don't see each other very often, or something else to get in the way of the natural ability to recognize your child/parent by voice alone?
A bad phone connection - or a family cold just bad enough to hoarsen the voice - might work here.
Bramble
From: Jeff Zephyr
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: Fri, 25 Oct 2002 15:42:06 -0600
On Fri, 25 Oct 2002 13:42:00 +1000, Bramble <[email protected]> wrote:
Jeff Zephyr wrote:
The odds that mom and son won't recognize each other's voices seem really bad. Unless maybe they've never talked on the phone, or don't see each other very often, or something else to get in the way of the natural ability to recognize your child/parent by voice alone?
A bad phone connection - or a family cold just bad enough to hoarsen the voice - might work here.
Both did whisper for various reasons, so it is possible. Just still not easily believable. Parents and children tend to have chances to converse in whispers, over bad phone connections, when illness affects the voice, etc. To me, this requires a handwave, ignoring the whole issue, rather than some lame attempt to clear up why neither one recognized the other.
Since there are no leading hints about it prior to the end, that works OK for me.
Jeff
Web site at http://www.asstr.org/~jeffzephyr/ For FTP, ftp://ftp.asstr.org/pub/Authors/jeffzephyr/
There is nothing more important than petting the cat.
From: Conjugate
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: Sat, 26 Oct 2002 02:06:25 -0600
"Bramble" <[email protected]> wrote in message news:[email protected] ...
Jeff Zephyr wrote:
The odds that mom and son won't recognize each other's voices seem really bad. Unless maybe they've never talked on the phone, or don't see each other very often, or something else to get in the way of the natural ability to recognize your child/parent by voice alone?
A bad phone connection - or a family cold just bad enough to hoarsen the voice - might work here.
Bramble
Or a cold bad enough to make it hard to hear clearly; congestion can occur like that.
Conjugate
From: Mat Twassel
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: 24 Oct 2002 18:27:50 GMT
So far all the comments seem pretty right to me - smoothly written but in the end incredible and more like a joke than a story. If this is primarily intended as a stroke piece, then there's nothing wrong with that. Hey, half the readers might never get to the punch line, not with all their faculties intact.
I do have suggestion, though it's a slightly different story - but perhaps not in the essentials.
Scrap the phone booth (although I liked the phone booth - I was wondering why a lot of phone booths don't take incoming calls anymore. This must be the reason). Somehow the boy and his dad have picked up each other's cellphone on the way out of the house that morning. (Alternatively the mom has just hit the wrong speed dial number.)
Early on the boy probably recognizes it's his mom, but he doesn't let on. There's the narrative trick - don't lie but don't make it obvious. He can't help it - he goes along.
At the end the mom comes to the realization that it's her son.
From here the quick end can go two ways. He covers up. Or he doesn't. Lot of
variations either way. "David? David is that you?" "No, Mom, it's not me, it's Dad."
- Mat Twassel
Mat's Erotic Calendar at http://calendar.atEros.com
From: Conjugate
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: Thu, 24 Oct 2002 19:46:22 -0600
Just FYI ...
"mat twassel" <[email protected]> wrote in message news:[email protected] ...
Scrap the phone booth (although I liked the phone booth - I was wondering why a lot of phone booths don't take incoming calls anymore. This must be the reason).
Oddly enough, that's not quite the reason, but it's close. A number of drug dealers were making deals on their "business phone," a pay phone where they would loiter and wait for an incoming call. So, phone traces never gave away their home phone or any other incriminating evidence. As part of The War on Drugs, and because lots of people were tired of seeing drug dealers loitering next to pay phones in the neighborhood, many (not quite all) pay phones lost the ability to take incoming calls. I assume the forthcoming disposable phones will give drug dealers back their ability to take incoming calls without having to compromise their identities.
Conjugate
From: Jeff Zephyr
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: Thu, 24 Oct 2002 22:39:53 -0600
On Thu, 24 Oct 2002 19:46:22 -0600, "Conjugate" <[email protected]> wrote:
Just FYI ...
"mat twassel" <[email protected]> wrote in message news:[email protected] ...
Scrap the phone booth (although I liked the phone booth - I was wondering why a lot of phone booths don't take incoming calls anymore. This must be the reason).
Oddly enough, that's not quite the reason, but it's close. A number of drug dealers were making deals on their "business phone," a pay phone where they would loiter and wait for an incoming call. So, phone traces never gave away their home phone or any other incriminating evidence. As part of The War on Drugs, and because lots of people were tired of seeing drug dealers loitering next to pay phones in the neighborhood, many (not quite all) pay phones lost the ability to take incoming calls. I assume the forthcoming disposable phones will give drug dealers back their ability to take incoming calls without having to compromise their identities.
Quite a few still take incoming calls, but the new pay phones don't. The advent of cheap, and now disposable cell phones pretty much eliminated the issue, and easy traces on cell phones can be hard to pull off (Caller ID blocking is easy enough.
There remain enough public phones of some sort or another to make simple call tracing and tapping hard to pull off. But it really is the loitering issue which caused pay phones to lose the incoming call ability, I believe.
Jeff
Web site at http://www.asstr.org/~jeffzephyr/ For FTP, ftp://ftp.asstr.org/pub/Authors/jeffzephyr/
There is nothing more important than petting the cat.
From: Altan
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: Sat, 26 Oct 2002 02:40:46 GMT
On Mon, 21 Oct 2002 08:41:03 -0400, "Desdmona" <[email protected]> wrote:
This is a story from a planned series but stands alone as a complete story. It is 1,526 words. What kind of mischief can someone get into inside a phone booth? FishTank guidelines apply:
1) 2 positive comments
2) 2 suggestions for improvement
3) Try not to repeat!
Saying this is a great story is a repetition, so it doesn't count. It should be easy to come up with positive comments, but that would just elaborate on the previous.
On re-reading, I noticed two little things.
1. In the initial exchange, Saul mentions he is at a pay phone, Then, at the end, Zara says "A booth? You're in a booth?" I read that as surprise of him being at a pay phone, not a particular type of pay phone.
2. Third-to-last sentence:
"Yeah, so, I was on my home and my dad was supposed to pick me up, but he's working late, so I was calling my - "
I guess that should be " ... on my way home ..."
By the way, I don't think the not recognizing is so much of a problem. I mean, they both start out with very different voices than their regular ones, and by the time they start to talk "normally" they are mentally on a track completely away from eachother. Even though Saul says he thinks the voice sounds familiar, I'm sure the thought of his mother making such a call just doesn't even "begin contemplating the possibility of crossing his mind" (Douglas Adams).
The chance of hitting that exact number are probably better than 1 in 10,000 (assuming that the payphone and the office of the father are in the same exchange, there are no more than 10,000 numbers within an exchange). That works as the story seems to be set in the US; other countries don't always have the concept of an "exchange" tied to a geographical location.
So no, I didn't think it was too unbelievable. Unlikely, but not impossible.
Thanks!
A.
http://www.asstr.org/~altan/
From: Sagittaria
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: Sat, 26 Oct 2002 05:12:54 -0000
Altan <[email protected]> wrote in
news:[email protected]:
The chance of hitting that exact number are probably better than 1 in 10,000 (assuming that the payphone and the office of the father are in the same exchange, there are no more than 10,000 numbers within an exchange). That works as the story seems to be set in the US; other countries don't always have the concept of an "exchange" tied to a geographical location.
But any local calling area is likely to have several exchanges. :)
- - >Sagittaria< - -
I've got cat class, and I've got cat style.
From: Altan
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: Sat, 26 Oct 2002 20:18:32 GMT
On Sat, 26 Oct 2002 05:12:54 -0000, Sagittaria <[email protected]> wrote:
Altan <[email protected]> wrote in
news:[email protected]:
The chance of hitting that exact number are probably better than 1 in 10,000 (assuming that the payphone and the office of the father are in the same exchange, there are no more than 10,000 numbers within an exchange). That works as the story seems to be set in the US; other countries don't always have the concept of an "exchange" tied to a geographical location.
But any local calling area is likely to have several exchanges. :)
Of course - up to a thousand of them (three digits).
The point was that, if she made an error in one of the last four digits, she would end up in the same geographical area (the same exchange). If school, office and payphone are located in the same general area, the chances of connecting to that payphone aren't too bad. That could maybe help with the believability.
Of course, that wouldn't always work elsewhere than in the U.S.
A.
http://www.asstr.org/~altan/
From: PleaseCain
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: 26 Oct 2002 14:11:28 GMT
Good writing, good strong verbs. Your depiction of chance, anonymous phone play is hot. However, upping the ante to include the coincidence of mother and son didn't work for me: you may have to set that up better (unless I missed something - I did read twice). To heighten the comic effect, you might have him choose for his phone lover his mother's name (or is Zara her name?) and two other (the "rule of three") intimate Oedipal aspects, after which you spring realization upon them.
Thank you for sharing another story with us!
Cain
From: Souvie
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: Mon, 28 Oct 2002 01:24:19 GMT
On Mon, 21 Oct 2002 08:41:03 -0400, "Desdmona" <[email protected]> wrote:
This is a story from a planned series but stands alone as a complete story. It is 1,526 words. What kind of mischief can someone get into inside a phone booth? FishTank guidelines apply:
1) 2 positive comments
2) 2 suggestions for improvement
3) Try not to repeat!
I can't guarantee that I won't repeat since I'm getting this in at the last minute, but ...
Positive: I like the overall tone of the piece. Not funny, not serious, but somewhere in between.
Positive: The ending. I laughed at the ending, even though I figured out it was his mother before I got that far.
Improvement: I kind of wondered how he put two and two together there at the end since he wasn't the one who dialed the number, his mother did.
Nicely done!
- Souvie
From: theGreatxIam
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: 28 Oct 2002 17:11:50 -0800
"Desdmona" <[email protected]> wrote in message news:<[email protected]> ...
This is a story from a planned series but stands alone as a complete story. It is 1,526 words. What kind of mischief can someone get into inside a phone booth? FishTank guidelines apply:
First, of course, thanks to all who took the time to comment. This is one of a group of stories for which I set myself some rules - all must involve that phone booth at North and Fourth, all should be significantly shorter than my usual stories, and as much as possible they should involve alternative forms of storytelling. I wanted to test myself.
To the general observations:
Recognizing the voices: As Jeff said, this is an extended joke, the sexual equivalent of "a giraffe walks into a bar ..." Mat Twassel offered a way to make it less unbelieveable, but in the end, there has to be some suspension of disbelief.
Getting the right number: OK, it's improbable. Extremely unlikely. Which is why, say 999,999 times out of a million, the mom's call goes to some other number. But that would be another story.
Bradley Stoke - I'm with you on the iaaaghs. They're a cliche. But they do serve to extend the crucial moment, which is the key thing. Alternatives to the iaagh, however, would be quite welcome.
Leowulf - I hesitated to put in clues midway through the story, since the premise - as others commented - is pretty thin to begin with. But I'll see if I can't sneak in one or two things that, while they hopefully won't give away the punch line, may give readers an aha moment at the end when they realize the double meanings.
johndear - Very sharp stuff, and i think repetitious language is one of the things I need to work on most.
Jeff - i think I can find ways to clarify Saul's age earlier.
Mat - I like your cell phone idea; were I not committed to the phone booth scenario that would be a perfect switch.
Altan - Good catches.
PleaseCain - as noted, I didn't want to give too much away, but I like your suggestion of having the kid pick a name and using the similarity to mom's name to lay a little groundwork.
Souvie - "He knew that sigh" was my way of saying the penny finally dropped for the kid. Actually, it was also a way to acknowledge that mom and son couldn't be forever fooled by each other's voices. My presumption is that if you picked up a pay phone and heard what Saul did, you wouldn't expect it to be your mom, so you wouldn't pick up on that - but just a little nudge, such as "I was calling my mother," would be enough to make him suddenly notice the familiarity, confirmed by a sigh from Mom, who was beginning to get suspicious herself.
To all - This was a help. It's an interesting exercise to start out with some constraining rules and try to make stories work; your comments make me sure the exercise is worthwhile.
theGreatxIam
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From: Conjugate
Re: Wrong Number - A Phone Booth Story, by theGreatxIam
Date: Mon, 21 Oct 2002 21:35:27 -0600
Funny, short. Not much to add. Thanks for sharing it.
Conjugate
"Desdmona" <[email protected]> wrote in message news:[email protected] ...