“I don’t believe it,” Stephen said when, shortly after they’d finished their sandwiches of bacon and stale bread softened over a coffee can fire, Michael reached into his jacket and pulled out a thin soft cover novel with a much-repaired cover and began to read by the flickering light.
“What?” Michael asked without looking up.
“You got time to read, living on the street?” Stephen asked.
“Some days, I’ve got nothing but time,” Michael said.
“Aren’t we supposed to be standing guard?” Stephen asked.
“Standing watch, more like,” Michael said. “We’re out of the line of fire. Anyway, nothing will happen tonight.”
“How do you know?”
“I just do,” Michael said.
“If you ‘just know’ nothing will happen, why are we standing watch?”
“In case I’m wrong,” Michael said.
“Shouldn’t we keep an eye out, then?”
“Probably.”
“Is that your only book?” Stephen asked.
Michael patted the front of his denim jacket.
“Got six… seven in here right now,” he said. “I’ve got a blowtorch and a grappling hook, too.”
“Smartass,” Stephen retorted. “Can… uh… can I borrow one?”
“On one condition,” Michael said.
“Don’t worry, I’ll give it back,” Stephen said.
“That’s not the condition,” Michael said. “Pass it on. When you finish, give it to somebody else. Any book worth reading is worth sharing.”
“What were you, a librarian?” Stephen asked.
“I am a teacher,” Michael said.
“I thought you were between jobs,” Stephen said.
“I’m between paychecks,” Michael said. “But I’m still a teacher. It’s like the difference between the sell-by date and spoiled food.”
“Who the hell do you teach, out here?” Stephen asked.
Michael gave him a significant look.
“At the moment?” he asked.
“Point taken,” Stephen said. “Can I please have a book?”
“Sure,” Michael said. “What do you fancy?”
“Practically anything,” Stephen said.
“Well,” Michael said, fishing in his spacious inner pockets, “got any experience with Asimov?”
“I saw that robot movie,” Stephen said.
“That’d be a no,” Michael said, and tossed him the book. “Enjoy.”
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“That’d be a no,” Michael said, and tossed him the book. “Enjoy.”
That’s somehow awesome. I’ve loved this story so far. Thank you for the joy.
This seems somehow ominous. Foreboding may be more apt. I fear Michael is going to be wrong…
Hopefully, Stephen will learn from that mistake.
Yay!
“got any experience with Asimov?”
“I saw that robot movie,” Stephen said.
“That’d be a no,” Michael said, and tossed him the book. “Enjoy.”
so true, most movies “based” on books have so little to do with the book they are purportedly based on anymore…Asimov would have had a huge fit over what they did to his book. that movie wasn’t I. Robot .
I remember reading his whole series. It was forever ago, but I have yet to see a robot movie that even resembles anything at all similar to what I’ve read.
I didn’t mind that the movie had nothing to do with the book. No, the part that disgusted me was walking into a bookstore and seeing Asimov’s I, Robot with Will Smith’s face on it.
Now now, not all of them are bad. Stardust stayed relatively true to the book, as did Lion, Witch and the Wardrobe and (as well as possible) the Lord of the Rings series. It is a very mixed bag though; The Seeker for instance was outright *horrible*, and a perfect example of how Hollywood can totally destroy a movie by trying to “Americanize” a story that is distinctly non-American.
Anyone have any opinions on The Golden Compass? I’m thinking of seeing that one later today.
The I, Robot movie was an unrelated script called “Haywire”. They bought the rights to use the title, the names of Asimov and some characters when somebody at the studio noticed it was similar enough in concept that if anybody else owned the rights they could have sued them.
This is also how a script called “Bug Wars” became Starship Troopers.
On the subject of “The Seeker”, though, let’s be reasonable. The original book was about an eleven year old British boy learning he’s inherited a magical heritage he must now learn to use. Audiences would never go see a movie like that…
No, seriously, I was so excited when I heard they were making that movie, and then the initial reports on the accuracy and attention to detail: real trained rooks instead of CGI puppets (every time I hear somebody say “The CGI looks so cool!”, it just underscores the central point that with the state of the art being what it is, CGI usually looks more like CGI than it does the real thing), professional historical re-enactors called in as consultants, etc., and it’s like, “Oh, they’re taking this seriously! Good!”… then I see the trailer and it’s like Sky High and Harry Potter had a baby.
Worst adaptation since the Sci-Fi channel looked at the Earthsea series and said, “Oooh, yeah, confronting the darkness within is a powerful theme, but hard for audiences to grasp. Let’s stick in a megalomaniacal supervillain stroking a monkey.”
” The original book was about an eleven year old British boy learning he’s inherited a magical heritage he must now learn to use. Audiences would never go see a movie like that…”
Your alter ego is showing.
*pounce*
Look at the Postman.
Hell, at least Brin did something worthy with the money he got from that butchery.
And hell, if the movie can start a revolution in Georgia, i guess it can’t be totally shit, can it?
Yeah. when I read Earthsea I though that It’d make a great movie. The whole darkness within is a theme is under used in American moives, so I was very disapointed when I saw the series.
I’m late and repetitious with this comment, but your line , “That’d be a no”, hit home. I loved Asimov’s I Robot and even named my first dog Robbie. The movie was entertaining, but I would have enjoyed it a lot more if I hadn’t had to react to the fact that it was called I Robot.
Whoever said using “said” as a dialogue tag blends and no one will notice, lied. When used after every piece of dialogue, it becomes glaringly obvious and repetitive. Not to mention the redundant tags such as “retorted” and “asked” when it’s already obvious from the dialogue itself that it’s a question or a retort.
When reading this story and seeing so many unnecessary dialogue tags, I can’t help but thinking you’re reaching for the word could and, in my eyes, it’s reading forced. I know you’re a better writer than this and can reach your target word count using something other than filler words, describing body language, for instance. I started really noticing this in the second arc but didn’t say anything until now. In my opinion, you’re wasting precious few words on pointless ones.
You do what you will, obviously. This is just my opinion, but it’s the one flaw I’m really noticing in this piece.
Just to add, the dialogue is set up between which two people in the first two paragraphs. Taking out all of the tags thereafter (since he said/he said is pointless in an already set up two person conversation), you’d have an extra 48 words to play with, 14% of your word count. That’s a lot of missed opportunities when working with so few words.