He sat on my lap. “I’m writing a story!” he said. “I’m typing!”
And then he wrote:
Nhdjyrttythjkj,./N
Qw23343dfgfghrtfghjbghnmhyjkrtyjg hmm,zAMNAMNB RTFGHBNKND FXGH JHGNMAZZVFGA
G t aqthywqhg ab bv b
zTdxcdvxccv dcvcvvvcTQ nnz asm mz A
z tyj ybnhqdf3g3cvbv
And I assume he meant to finish with:
THEN THEY WERE ALL EATEN BY ZOMBIE CROCODILES
THE END.
Thought I’d preserve the boy’s first foray into fiction writing here on the blog. Now to spend the next 16 years convincing him that being a writer is a really, really horrible idea.
Bonnee Crawford says:
This is so cute 🙂
January 16, 2014 — 6:21 AM
Alex Edwards says:
The youngling is testing you, to see if he can take over the role of alpha. In response, it would be best to urinate on your laptop and books to mark them as yours.
January 16, 2014 — 6:52 AM
Courtney Cantrell says:
Bahahahaha!
January 16, 2014 — 8:58 AM
Blue Cole says:
Cool beans. I encourage my 5 & 11 year old to write, and the 11 yo is pretty good at it. When they were younger, I’d tell then stories of “Princess Ansley & King Daddy” made up off the cuff. I wish I’d written some of them down. I do have a folded piece of paper on my bookshelf that is the product of my 5 yo’s imagination; It’s sitting between “A storm of Swords” and “Lonesome Dove”.
January 16, 2014 — 7:02 AM
mckkenzie says:
Genius! Where is he thinking of submitting it? 😉
January 16, 2014 — 8:09 AM
Amber J Gardner says:
Too long! Direct self publish now!
January 20, 2014 — 9:29 AM
change it up editing says:
Amazing! And perfectly executed, requiring no editing whatsoever!
January 16, 2014 — 8:42 AM
Pat says:
CONGRATS!! Easy on the discouragement…look at Joe Hill. Love your work. You continue to inspire.
January 16, 2014 — 8:54 AM
Teddy Fuhringer says:
What an adorable first story! Can’t wait for the sequel 🙂
January 16, 2014 — 8:58 AM
Courtney Cantrell says:
He really nailed the “hook” — after line one, I couldnt stop reading. And his character development is pretty strong throughout. But the plot structure seems a little iffy. I’ll have to read it a few more times and see if he’s just being too subtle for me.
Great work, B-Dub. Keep it up!
January 16, 2014 — 9:03 AM
Wulfie says:
This made me smile. When my son this age I gave him paper and pencil and showed him how to draw. I still have his first pictures. Toady he’s an artist.
January 16, 2014 — 9:10 AM
Jeremy Podolski says:
Smart move – making sure his first published work doesn’t receive any scathing criticism b/c he’s too cute. Chuck, you diabolical…
January 16, 2014 — 10:00 AM
jovancerda says:
He could be writing something in Polish.
January 16, 2014 — 10:11 AM
Maggie Carroll says:
You’re a good dad, Chuck.
January 16, 2014 — 10:12 AM
terribleminds says:
Last night he might have disagreed with you, when I was trying to get him to eat his — wait for it, wait for it —
PIZZA.
Jesus, the kid wouldn’t eat one of his favorite foods?!
Man. Toddlers are cuckoopants.
January 16, 2014 — 10:15 AM
Ellie Di says:
First he won’t eat cake, now pizza?! Clearly, this is a changeling child. You need to take him back to the store.
January 16, 2014 — 10:17 AM
terribleminds says:
Night before last he wouldn’t eat sloppy joes. A CHILDHOOD FAVORITE. He ate the broccoli on the side and picked out the red peppers from the sloppy joes — not to discard but to eat. He left the meat behind.
And this kid loves meat.
He’s going through a thing.
Toddlers always are going through a thing.
January 16, 2014 — 10:26 AM
Ash says:
I know how you feel about processed foods and all that, but please let the tyke enjoy some Spaghetti-O’s!
January 16, 2014 — 7:05 PM
punkeroo2 says:
Food jags and refusals are normal. I have learned, after 4 kids, that the less you fight about it, the quicker it goes away.
January 17, 2014 — 7:45 PM
Maggie Carroll says:
Tommy refuses to eat anything with tomato sauce. No pizza, no spaghetti, no ravioli (and we all know Chef Boyardee puts crack in those, it’s why they’re so tasty). I feel you on the pizza thing.
January 16, 2014 — 10:28 AM
Wendy Christopher says:
Yeah, that sounds familiar… one of my laddie’s favourite battle cries is “I DO like {insert innocuous food item here} – but not AT HOME…” Even if it’s the EXACT SAME BRAND, served up in the exact same way…
I’m liking B-Dub’s experimental prose though. Looks like he’s leaning towards fantasy-realism. And being impossibly cute at the same time 🙂
January 16, 2014 — 11:34 AM
Susan Saxx says:
AWWWWWW.
*goes off to study B-Dub’s prose – I think sometimes, when I’ve been overtired, I might already have dabbled in his unique style, but didn’t realize its value…*
🙂
January 16, 2014 — 11:05 AM
Katherine Hetzel says:
Brilliant! Reminds me of when my daughter took a spanner to the wheel nuts on the car, aged two-and-a-half, because that’s what she’d seen Daddy doing…
January 16, 2014 — 11:23 AM
Betsy says:
I still have stories that my kids wrote when they were little. My younger daughter wrote some pretty good screen plays for Sponge Bob and The Suite Life of Zack and Cody when she was in elementary school. One of her best Sponge Bob episodes involved a body swap and was called The Switch Gitch. Some time after she wrote it, a body swap episode aired and she was mad that someone stole her idea. Welcome to the world of Hollywood script writing… 🙂
January 16, 2014 — 11:35 AM
Rebecca Douglass says:
My oldest son started writing stories about that age. He’s now 16, still writing, and I’m starting to worry me might want to be a writer. Though at least I’m modeling the important part (marry someone with a good job).
January 16, 2014 — 12:26 PM
J.F. Constantine says:
This is absolutely precious, Chuck. Your boy is adorable. Let the child be a writer if he wants. He might become a blockbuster best seller and support Mommie and Daddy with his royalties. 😉
Either way if he does what he loves, he’ll be happier. My mother drove me toward other things (a “good” job – translated, one that made money) and I was miserable. Now I’m fighting to get out of a job I hate and into something I like better so I can write more.
My niece wants to write and I tell her to find a day job she really likes and that will give her time to write, too. The only thing I want for her is not to be stuck with a job she hates just for the money.
If your boy admires his Dad and wants to do what Daddy does, why not? 🙂
January 16, 2014 — 1:20 PM
A. E. Lowan says:
Writer’s kids are awesome, if I do say so, myself!
In August our 9 year-old nephew came to stay with us for a week. I was in the middle of drafting our WIP, and, inspired by our little dog, he wanted in on the action, too. So he got my partner (and writing partner) to help him write his first story. My post on our Facebook author page that day was this –
“Once upon a time my writer mother would have me tell her stories while she typed them out for posterity. I’m sure that she still has a copy of “Ghosty Ghost” around somewhere. Right now behind me Jennifer is transcribing an epic sci fi tale of mutant world destroying Japanese Chins as dictated by our 9 year-old nephew. The world turns full circle.”
The story was amazing and imaginative, and neither Texas nor China will ever be the same.
January 16, 2014 — 2:08 PM
Ross Pullen says:
As rumored to have been said by Scrooge on finding that it is Christmas day and he has not missed it,”What an intelligent boy! A remarkable boy!”
January 16, 2014 — 3:03 PM
wiltedjasmine says:
adorable!
January 16, 2014 — 3:12 PM
Edward Forrest Frank says:
He just missed the open submissions for Fantasy and Science Fiction which ended yesterday.
January 16, 2014 — 4:52 PM
Wendy says:
What a delight!
January 16, 2014 — 5:11 PM
decayingorbits says:
Obviously, he has yet to master the concept of editing. But I’ve always been a fan of the unidraft, so who am I to criticize?
January 16, 2014 — 7:10 PM
Nick Nafpliotis says:
The use of a period and back slash at the beginning through me a bit. After a while, however, it felt like he really settled in and began relying more on content than the caps key to get the reader’s attention.
Excellent first effort.
January 16, 2014 — 8:25 PM
The Liz says:
You know the more you tell him NOT to be an author, the more likely he will try to be one. At first, to piss you off… Then later he’ll actually be trying to emulate his awesome Dad.
But I’m sure he’ll be great at whatever he chooses. 🙂
My 6yo likes to “write” stories with me. By this I mean she draws a picture, then ferociously dictates to Mommy, her word slave, what text should be written on the page in crayon. Then she draws another picture, dictates, and repeat until its “The End”.
She then told me that I need to make 10 copies with my copier so she can sell them.
The kid knows what she wants. I imagine she’ll be self-pubbing by age 12.
January 17, 2014 — 4:29 AM
springinkerl says:
Adorable. And in ten years, he will find this blog post and write a novel about a boy whose path through life was determined by social media and the way his daddy used them. It will be called “The Doom of Sloppy Joe” and will sell millions. At least.
January 17, 2014 — 5:20 AM
M T McGuire says:
Wow he’s very young to be so fluent in Klingon! A fine effort there.
McMini likes to make up stories too. 😉
January 17, 2014 — 8:53 AM
kurt bali says:
I’ve tried telling my daughter the same thing. Writers…they just don’t listen.
January 17, 2014 — 4:57 PM
punkeroo2 says:
I used to have my kids submit to Writers’ Digest for their kids writing prompt contest. It was part of home schooling. One of my daughter’s submissions was actually published in the magazine. They had fun and my daughter teases me that she is published and I’m not.
January 17, 2014 — 7:42 PM
feralbulb says:
B-DUB
BUD-B
RUBDUBDUB
O
BE-DUB
BUDA-BE
RUBADUBDUBE
O
BEE-DUB
BUDA-BEE
RUBADUBADUBEE
B-DUMB
O
A small poem to help hello-cushion and pronounchia-chion and poetism. Just for him. Just for B-DUB.
January 18, 2014 — 12:07 PM
Daniel says:
This kid, man! Watch him! 🙂
January 28, 2014 — 6:53 AM