1921 Ford Roundabout

[Lonesome Cowboy]

1921 Ford Roundabout

The summer of ´26 found Ty McLeod both discharged from the Army and running from the mafia gangs of the East. So, he was given an ultimatum : ride West or die. He read in the "Dearborn Independent" (Henry Ford´s newspaper) that driven by the growth of the automobile industry, total U.S. pipeline mileage grew to over 115,000 miles. Most of it sprawling across the West.

* * *

The Morgan brothers follow the little ´21 Ford pick-up rolling into their gas station.

" Know that guy drivin´ in ? "
" Never seen that pick-up in these neck of the woods Morty"
" Good pick-up tho "
" That´s a drifter´s ride, Morty. I´m a get my shotgun "

Ty McLeod pulls the brake bringing the pick up to a jolting stop. Like a lazy spider crawling out of a tin can he steps out. One long leg at a time. Stretches his skinny frame reaching for the clear blue skies. Looks up, way up, holding his cowboy hat as he takes in the majestic Colorado Mountains. Row after row of gargantuan stone peaks enclosing the Watchatee Valley.
Morty gets up off his rocking chair and slowly walks up to the pick up.
"Hi there stranger, welcome to Smokey River" holds out his hand. Ty looks around and dusts off his jeans. He stares at the gas station sign over the small house.

"You folks the "Morgan Brothers" ?
"In the flesh, this here is my brother Dusty, I´m Morty"

Dusty tips his hat from the porch. A suspicious look on his face.

" I want some gas, which pump old fella" snaps Ty
" If you ask politely..." shouts Dusty from the porch narrowing his eyes.
" Now, now Dusty" says Morty in a shaky voice, calming his older brother down "the young fella ain´t lookin for trouble just wants a lil´ gas".

Morty smiles raising his eyebrows. His "Coolidge 4 President" campaign button fastened to his denim overalls.

"Well if he asks nicely he´ll get it" grumbles Dusty from the porch.

Ty freezes on the spot as if 10 million volts were shooting thru him. He stares at the old man. Cocks his head as if staring at some oddity in a petting zoo.

"I know ya didn´t just say that ol timer" moans Ty as he slowly walks to the porch and up the steps, hands on his hips, defiant.
"I know ya weren´t talkin ta me , were ya ole timer ? ".

Ty cooly tips back his tattered straw hat as he leans on the porch railing.

"Oh, I ain´t been polite enough fer ya ?" he asks mockingly

" Maybe I should change my ways just for a couple of old faggots in the middle of nowhere"

" Why you no good..." Old man Dusty reaches for his shotgun next to his rocking chair.
"Dusty no!!!" screams his brother raising his hand running to stop him.

The gunshot blast echoes through the valley, over the trees, across the river, up into the mountains. Dusty slumps over, falls off his rockin chair. A hole where his tired wrinkled heart use to be. Ty slips his .22 back into his boot and lazily walks over to Morty, shoves him back in his chair

"Morty is it ? Well Mor-Teee" Ty sniffs looking around

"You heard of self-defense right old feller ?" Morty nods his face twisted in sorrow, his lips shaking in anger.

"Well if you haven´t, that was it right there...Heck the ole man´s got his very own finger prints on his shotgun and everythin´" he lets out a chuckle shaking his head in amazement.
"And finger prints are nine tenths of the law, granpaw"
His eyes widen in amusement "Ha! That even rhymes old timer!!! Nine tenths o the law, granpaw!"
Morty looks at his brother´s dead body laying on the porch.

"Get up Dusty" he whispers.

"Look at me when I´m talkin to ya, ya old ****!" Ty yanks the old man violently from his collar.

"Now you´re gonna sit yer *** down on that chair yonder, and watch me fill up with gas and take the money from yer register and then, and then blow yer brains out, got it ?" He lets out a bone chilling howl that echoes through the woods and down the roaring Smokey River.
"Cuz ,ya see, we´re gonna make like old Dusty over there went crazy and tried to shoot me but I had to shoot back in self-defense." Ty raises his eyebrows like he´s thinking.

"But that leaves you, dudn it. Well let´s just say you got yerself caught in the cross-fire, right Morty?". He let´s out another thunderous banshee like yell as he takes his gun out of his boot.

"Man Murders Brother, Kills Self" He says to himself as he cocks his .22. "Love the sound of it already"

A thunderous wave of industry was now rolling West again like a freight train. And Ty Mcleod on it like a bull rider.

[Lonesome Cowboy]

Any thoughts guys ?

[Lonesome Cowboy]

This short story is included in a collection I´m working on called "Helions n Hellcats of the Industrial West : Anarchy of the young, decay of generations and young against old"

[DickZ]

Your opening paragraph is excellent, Lonesome Cowboy. While I didn't check on the accuracy of your 115,000 miles of pipeline in 1926, it seems reasonable. Having read about Henry Ford myself, your newspaper reference sounds good, too. It’s important to continue making sure things like this sound genuine – otherwise, your readers begin to question your credibility. I think you did your homework on this – but only you know for sure.

Your comparison of Ty’s getting out of the pickup with a spider coming out of a can was fantastic – very creative. If you continue to come up with obviously creative ideas like that, your readers will think highly of you, but at first they might be skeptical that you could be copying someone else. In either case, the spider analogy was very good. But once you get caught copying – and I’m not accusing you of that – your credibility would suffer.

But after that, the story starts going downhill fast - in my opinion.

A minor point first, but it’s important. Maybe I’m wrong on this, but I don't think a driver in 1926 would ask the service station attendant "which pump?" Maybe I’m misunderstanding you on this point, but it might be better to have him ask for regular gas. The world was obviously different in 1926 from what it is now, and you as a relatively young writer must be careful not to insert today’s conditions into your stories of yesterday. It’s not easy for you to do that – you aren’t familiar with a world without television, cellphones, or computers. It will take work, so you have to stay at it.

Then we get into the more serious material. I don’t know how credible it is for everybody to be primed for a fight right off the bat - even before the potential combatants meet each other. Maybe I’m wrong here, but it might be better for you to let a little bit of conversing go on before the hostilities start to build. You should build up to the fight a little more gradually – I think.

You have a good beginning here, but keep working at it. As I said in reviewing your Chico Cortez story, you have gotten over the hump of getting started. That’s the hardest part, so now you just have to keep plowing onward.

A subtle suggestion, also. Check out AuntShecky’s stories “Black Friday” and “On the Trail.” I understand the tendency of younger writers to focus on wildly graphic or frightening subjects. And maybe that’s what younger readers demand – I can’t speak for them. But some of us older readers don’t actually require monsters lurking in trees or guts spilling out in the desert to get our interest up for a story. A story well told beats a highly graphic story hands down – at least for some of us.

[Lonesome Cowboy]

Thank you so much DickZ for taking the time to review my short story. You have no idea how important your comments are to me. They will surely lead me down new pathways in my wrtiting. Guaranteed.

[NickAdams]

Sorry about the delay, but this was the week of my finals.

[IMG]
The summer of ´26 found Ty McLeod both discharged from the Army and running from the mafia gangs of the East. So, he was given an ultimatum : ride West or die. He read in the "Dearborn Independent" (Henry Ford´s newspaper) that driven by the growth of the automobile industry, total U.S. pipeline mileage grew to over 115,000 miles. Most of it sprawling across the West.

I like this, but Ty Mcleod's background should be worked into the body of your story. The rest works well, in giving the reader context.


Ty Mcleod read in the "Dearborn Independent" (Henry Ford´s newspaper) that driven by the growth of the automobile industry, total U.S. pipeline mileage grew to over 115,000 miles. Most of it sprawling across the West.

I replaced he with Ty Mcleod, so you can get an idea of what I mean, but I would edit it again.

Dickz makes a valid point. Writing sbout a time period that's not your ow is tricky. I don't know if Ty would have said faggot, or asked the question of pumps (if the Morgan brothers were even able to afford more than one), or if fingerprints were that important in crime detection.

I mentioned Joh Gardner on your other thread and I think it is more relevent now. In Becoming a Novelist he says that a writer has to learn to see. We watch television and read books and when we write, our dialogue and description read like books and shows. It becomes twice removed. It's like the cartoonist who learns anatomy from other artist. We have to go to the source. I like the frame of your dialogue, but I think you have to go to the source. A great excercise is going to any place where there's people and listen. Write some of their dialogue down in a note pad. Get a feel for their speech, their choice of words, and what they talk about ... and how the talk around issues.

True: a story doesn't have to be graphic to be entertaining, but this is Gordon Gecko's America and the violence is expressing the idea.

At the moment this is a sketch and to make it a story, there needs to be a character arch. The intro suggest that Ty is the central character, but he doesn't change and I don't expect him to. But, somebody needs to react to what's going on in a way that changes them. Morty seems like a good canidate. We have Ty and Dusty, two stones. They aren;t going to change. But, Morty. He cautious. He doesn't want trouble. He's no a cynic like his brother. Maybe this event changes him. Maybe he should be left alive, so when Ty drives off, the reader can see the severity of this situation.

All you characters are flat. Morty should be rounded out. Maybe the read should spend more time with Morty and Dusty, before Ty comes in. The potential I see in Morty is guilt. He didn't back his brother's skepticism and allowed Ty to much leg room and as a result he might feel responsible for Dusty's death.

I'm suprised if your symbolism is unintentional, even though it's usual the case.

The theme I get from your work so far is anarchy of the young. The decay of generations. Old agaisnt young. Your introduction, speaks of growth of industry. The spread of modern. Ty is young and reckless he should know he won't live long. When he kills Dusty he denies himself a future. Not only will he be hunted but he will be sent to death. Ty is a modern man who doesn't want to become the old generation. The is echoed when the shot rings out into the distance, the past. The mob is full of older men and tradition and he is running from it.

Morty and Dusty are opposites. Dusty and Ty are similiar. Ty does kill his older self.

There is conflict between Morty and Dusty. Ty and Dusty. Morty and Ty. Explore that.

Figure out who Morty is. What was it like for Morty to grow up with Dusty. You only have to figure out two characters. Morty and Dusty, because when you find Dusty you will have found Ty.

Maybe Dusty was like Ty when he was young, but Morty saved him from that life, but the life still caught up with him.

The frame of the story is great. It just has to be explored. You finished the hardest part. You have all the pieces; it's just a matter of expanding.

The only thing left is how you tag your dialogue. Get rid of the adjectives. The dialogue should set the tone.

I have a character questionnaire. I can pm it to you, if you want it. It's a good way to explore the character.

[Lonesome Cowboy]

Sorry about the delay, but this was the week of my finals.



I like this, but Ty Mcleod's background should be worked into the body of your story. The rest works well, in giving the reader context.


Ty Mcleod read in the "Dearborn Independent" (Henry Ford´s newspaper) that driven by the growth of the automobile industry, total U.S. pipeline mileage grew to over 115,000 miles. Most of it sprawling across the West.

I replaced he with Ty Mcleod, so you can get an idea of what I mean, but I would edit it again.

Dickz makes a valid point. Writing sbout a time period that's not your ow is tricky. I don't know if Ty would have said faggot, or asked the question of pumps (if the Morgan brothers were even able to afford more than one), or if fingerprints were that important in crime detection.

I mentioned Joh Gardner on your other thread and I think it is more relevent now. In Becoming a Novelist he says that a writer has to learn to see. We watch television and read books and when we write, our dialogue and description read like books and shows. It becomes twice removed. It's like the cartoonist who learns anatomy from other artist. We have to go to the source. I like the frame of your dialogue, but I think you have to go to the source. A great excercise is going to any place where there's people and listen. Write some of their dialogue down in a note pad. Get a feel for their speech, their choice of words, and what they talk about ... and how the talk around issues.

True: a story doesn't have to be graphic to be entertaining, but this is Gordon Gecko's America and the violence is expressing the idea.

At the moment this is a sketch and to make it a story, there needs to be a character arch. The intro suggest that Ty is the central character, but he doesn't change and I don't expect him to. But, somebody needs to react to what's going on in a way that changes them. Morty seems like a good canidate. We have Ty and Dusty, two stones. They aren;t going to change. But, Morty. He cautious. He doesn't want trouble. He's no a cynic like his brother. Maybe this event changes him. Maybe he should be left alive, so when Ty drives off, the reader can see the severity of this situation.

All you characters are flat. Morty should be rounded out. Maybe the read should spend more time with Morty and Dusty, before Ty comes in. The potential I see in Morty is guilt. He didn't back his brother's skepticism and allowed Ty to much leg room and as a result he might feel responsible for Dusty's death.

I'm suprised if your symbolism is unintentional, even though it's usual the case.

The theme I get from your work so far is anarchy of the young. The decay of generations. Old agaisnt young. Your introduction, speaks of growth of industry. The spread of modern. Ty is young and reckless he should know he won't live long. When he kills Dusty he denies himself a future. Not only will he be hunted but he will be sent to death. Ty is a modern man who doesn't want to become the old generation. The is echoed when the shot rings out into the distance, the past. The mob is full of older men and tradition and he is running from it.

Morty and Dusty are opposites. Dusty and Ty are similiar. Ty does kill his older self.

There is conflict between Morty and Dusty. Ty and Dusty. Morty and Ty. Explore that.

Figure out who Morty is. What was it like for Morty to grow up with Dusty. You only have to figure out two characters. Morty and Dusty, because when you find Dusty you will have found Ty.

Maybe Dusty was like Ty when he was young, but Morty saved him from that life, but the life still caught up with him.

The frame of the story is great. It just has to be explored. You finished the hardest part. You have all the pieces; it's just a matter of expanding.

The only thing left is how you tag your dialogue. Get rid of the adjectives. The dialogue should set the tone.

I have a character questionnaire. I can pm it to you, if you want it. It's a good way to explore the character.

Nick ? Will you adopt me ? You´re a friggin genius dude.(YES! Please! PM me your character outline now!). The symbolism is unintentional dude, I´m dead serious here, but your comments are friggin opening doors for me man! Opening doors dude! Again , I am appreciative beyond words for your time Nick.

[NickAdams]

Nick ? Will you adopt me ? You´re a friggin genius dude.(YES! Please! PM me your character outline now!). The symbolism is unintentional dude, I´m dead serious here, but your comments are friggin opening doors for me man! Opening doors dude! Again , I am appreciative beyond words for your time Nick.

Your unconcious has a lot to say.

I'm glad I can be of help. I'm still learning the craft myself, they say you never stop though.

You have a great deal of external conflict, but the external is fragmented in the majority of stories. Internal has potential to be constant and can fill the gap of external. Two theories, one from philosophy and the other from psychology, might give you a foundation. I'll pm the theories to you when I get home.

[Lonesome Cowboy]

You have a great deal of external conflict, but the external is fragmented in the majority of stories.

Right on the money Nick (or Dick Gentry?) ! As you can probably tell these stories are just "snippets" of a longer narrative.

[NickAdams]

Right on the money Nick (or Dick Gentry?) ! As you can probably tell these stories are just "snippets" of a longer narrative.

You're holding out.

How many shorts have you completed?

When can we see an entire short story?

[Lonesome Cowboy]

You're holding out.

How many shorts have you completed?

When can we see an entire short story?

Oh gee, I dunno dude. Plagiarism being what it is and all...
Seriously, I can´t decide on which one to post yet.

[NickAdams]

It is less of a cocern on this site, than others. There are more readers than writers here and short stories are posted constantly without any complaints of theft. I never found the lure in it myself. I can't put my name on anhything that I'm not intimate with, but that's me.

Like Eliot said, "mediocre writers borrow, but the great writers steal." It's something like that.

[Lonesome Cowboy]

Like Eliot said, "mediocre writers borrow, but the great writers steal." It's something like that.

Truer words were never spoken...going back to the Greeks ripping off Egyptian art.

[NickAdams]

I didn't know that. Maybe I should be asking you for advice. I'm working on a few stories myself. I'll show you when their completed, so you can tell me what you think.

[Lonesome Cowboy]

I didn't know that. Maybe I should be asking you for advice. I'm working on a few stories myself. I'll show you when their completed, so you can tell me what you think.

Kay dude , but don´t expect professional calibre reviews like yours. I ain´t got the chops for it.