May 4, 1970. Her life changed.
Shilo lost her unarmed brother and her sweet room mate [roommate] Johanna. Now decades later, sick of swallowing the bile[,] she woke up angry in 2018, pissed to her limit and decided that will do. Time to find the shooters. Just enough. The two people she loved the most, ripped from life so young. For what?
As a mother, grandmother, soon to be great grand mother [grandmother,] Shiloh woke up very angry that anniversary day. She’d find the shooters and make them pay. After vomiting at dawn she rinsed her mouth and looked at her old sad face in the mirror.
“You sons of bitches. You are so done. You’ll know what it means to… die.”
Her chin lifted, she wiped her tears. Justice would be served. Her life was coming to a close. She had nothing to lose. But those bastards sure did.
“Just watch me,” she promised the two people who meant the world, the whole world to her. “I’m going to make it right.” Because no else has…or will.
She showered, went down stairs [downstairs] and had a great full fry breakfast – pork belly pea meal rolled bacon, eggs, fried green tomatoes and how she relished the sour taste of those ‘matoes.
“I’m coming for you. You had no right. If no one has or [else] will make it right, I’m gonna.”
Shilo sat on her computer for hours. Days. [Then decided it would be more productive to sit in front of it.] When she got the name of the man who authorized the shooting she got in her car, loaded for bear.
Payback is a bitch – and its [it's] named Shilo. With stage four whatever, she had one more thing to do before she died. And bloody hell, she was going to [do] it. She grinned as she hit the road.
This was going to feel real good.
Without taking her eyes off the road, she flipped open the picnic basket riding in the passenger seat and groped around for the ziplock full'a those 'matoes.
Gotta keep the bile pumping.
Opening: Wilkins MacQueen.....Continuation: JCWrites
Notes
If Shilo were going to die alone in a few months, it might be plausible that she wants to go out with this kind of bang, but she's a mother, grandmother, soon to be great grandmother. I find it hard to believe she wouldn't rather spend her remaining time with some of her family than trying to kill some guy who's probably pushing eighty by now.
Neither of the women killed at Kent State was named Johanna. So you've either created a third (fictional) female victim or changed the name of a victim. Not that this isn't done. Saving Private Ryan was loosely based on a real person who wasn't named Ryan. Not sure why this feels different to me.
Shilo originally sets out to find the shooters. At least 29 guardsmen shot their weapons, so is she going after all 29, or does she somehow know which two shot the bullets that killed her brother and Johanna?
Later Shilo is just going after the man who authorized the massacre, which makes more sense, although killing a guy who has maybe one more decade to live isn't much payback for the six decades taken from the victims, plus how does she know that anyone authorized it?
If you're sending a few pages or chapters to an agent or editor, a bunch of minor errors on page 1 is likely to doom you.
I recommend writing a novel in which a team of people with stage 4 whatever parachute into some danger zone on a mission to kill the head of a terrorist group or the American president. It would be like The Dirty Dozen, but instead of convicted killers it's terminal patients.
3 comments:
I see quite a few people in stage four and they do not appear to be the sort to parachute anywhere. So if the author goes that way, it is necessary to show how and why they are more athletic than the average healthy person.
I think it was Governor Rhodes who authorize the National Guard to have loaded weapons. He died a long time ago. There is no evidence that the soldiers were ordered to fire their weapons. Most of them were likely college-aged non-students who joined to avoid the draft.
So, finding somebody who was even irresponsible would be a challenge.
The name Shilo is throwing me off a bit. Probably because most college age kids in America back then were named things like Frank, Steven and Susan.
"You’ll know what it means to… die.” Most reasonable people would realize that everyone will, eventually.
"Her life was coming to a close. She had nothing to lose. But those bastards sure did." They are older than a great grandmother, and men typically don't live as long as women. How many are still alive?
No one authorized the shootings. It was a decision the guardsmen made themselves. If you've made up a name, it's not likely to fly even in a fictional story, because five minutes of Googling will tell you they decided among themselves to do this. There was authorization for the Nat'l Guard to be there in the first place, but that seems beside the point.
I'd suggest making a fake Kent State-like shooting story with similar, but not exact details, making up the names, and placing your character on campus at the time of the shooting. That way, you can be as descriptive as you like and the details are yours to do with as you please.
Thanks you two for you considered comments. Appreciated.And EE for the grammar fixes.
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