Either way, there IS an issue afoot!
I was rooting around, deep into my d'archives, and found this picture I think I saved almost 10 years ago. It was a small set, from dressed to undressed, and it was pleasant enough but hadn't really struck me with anything until today, when I was giving it a bit more of a look. I had never noticed that the schoolbooks she had were for a GED, aka General Educational Development, is what you get if you don't get a high school diploma due to dropping out, or other issues. That gave me an angle, and honestly, the whole punch line came to be right there.
It took me about 3-5 minutes to actually write a story around that punchline, and I hope I made it come around to a complete circle. Kaitlyn is a sweet person, and in my head, he would pick on someone with a learning disability (perhaps she blew her evaluator to give her that prognosis?) so I got to wipe out that possible sin on his part AND trap him in her body/persona at the same time! Seems like a win-win to me .. don't you think so?
I left it open as to who changed him. Could've been the girl's mom or dad, or perhaps the principal or school board. I don't think it really mattered overall. It also could've been magic or technology, depending on how you'd like to view it. I actually don't think I've asked this before, but, do you like it better when the caption is more vague about the details, or do you want everything to be pinned down for you? I wonder this because when writing this one, I wasn't really concerned about the who and how .. and as such I didn't really have an intention either way on those details.
Let me know what you think. Comments are welcome, and I'm still looking for more suggestions as to recent music I might like but have missed somehow!
Lovely caption, and being a drop out myself, this struck a chord.
ReplyDeleteI'm in the category: other issues, one of them eventually led me here.
Whether or not the details of the transformation should be in the cap depends on the story. When I look at the caps I made so far, some of them are detailed with the way and the motives of the transformation, because that's what the story is about. Others are as vague as possible, simply because these details are irrelevant.
I guess it's up to you if you put the details in, but I haven't read one of your caps where I missed the details.
I did read some stories over the years where the details felt forced into the story, and those probably would benefit from less details, while I read longer stories, very detailed, and they simply flowed naturally.
So if you have some stories, you believe would benefit from the details, please do add the details.
If not, I like your "less is more" style caps anyway.
It feels weird, me, a novice writer, giving advice;)
Not really new music, but I always liked Big Country. Their song "the teacher" is actually one of my favourites. I saw them play before Stuart Adamson past away. Mike Peters from the Alarm did the vocals for Big Country until November last year.
The Alarm have another of my favourites. "Rain in the summertime." I saw them live as well on an open air festival. During summer, and it wasn't raining, it was pouring. We stood to our ankles in the water.
If you don't mind something in French, "Papaoutai" and "Formidable" from Belgium singer Stromae are great. Usually hip hop, house and techno not my taste in music, but he has a very intense way of singing. While it is a totally different genre, his intensity reminds me of another Belgium singer, the late Jacques Brel.
I have to be honest, I´m not following new music these days. And a part of music that was new to me, was either direct from you, or from the suggestions You Tube gave at the end of the video´s.
I think the whole 'too much detail, too little detail' in a story comes down to the type of story. In broad terms there are small personal 'in the moment' stories that you truly excel at and the longer narrative stories. I think the shorter 'in the moment' stories are more personal because all the details do fit in... they just get fit in by the reader. I can find myself drawn into your caps a lot easier than most simply because when **I** read them, they are about **me**. When Helena or some other reads them, they are about them.
ReplyDeleteLonger more narrative stories aren't about the reader. They are about the reader experiencing and enjoying someone else's story. I think in either situation, it doesn't take much to pull the reader out of that happy zone. For instance with this cap (which I did enjoy by the way), I couldn't fully get into it as it's about a profession that I don't share. I can't get t he details to fully shroud me as I'm not a teacher. I can't even get into the other side of the story as I didn't have any academic problems at school.
Longer more narrative stories have the same problem of details derailing a readers enjoyment, but it comes more from character development and motivations. I can be reading a well written story that fits all of my personal joys... a guy gets deceived, is more or less blackmailed into changing, has to hold up the charade, struggles with various aspects of his new situation... but when something doesn't fit my particular mold (say he starts to accept and embrace his change too early), it can pull me out of the enjoyment zone and make me stop reading.
So as to your direct question; "do you like it better when the caption is more vague about the details", my answer is both yes and no.