Gone Away ~ The journal of Clive Allen in America

And Boogie Too!
06/07/2005

My sons, Mad and the Pootle, recently forced their way into this blog through their escapades (both are doing fine, by the way) and it seems only fair that my daughter, Boogie, should have her moment in the sun too. This morning we were discussing things and I had occasion to ask her if she would show me some of her writing.

Boogie is very shy and self-effacing, especially as regards her short stories, so I was particularly pleased when she agreed to let me see a fairy tale she had written some time ago. Having read the story now, I felt that it was of high quality for her age (she is 16) and asked if I might post just the first part of it to my blog. She has given the nod and so I have a guest blogger! Here is the excerpt, a description of a forgotten city:

Burnt Sienna

The Edge of the World

There is a little known place that had once done much. Dry broken roots hung off crumbling buildings and pathways; this was a city that had fallen into slumber. In the air hung the magic of the past, a thick atmosphere of invisible dust, coating everything in city. Settling and swirling in hidey holes, in the fine linings of the smallest mouse's ear, and resting on the most delicate branches of spindly saplings. It was this dust that made the occupants drowsy and the character of the city seem eerie and uncaring. To outsiders who stumbled upon this place it felt strangely isolated and the inhabitants made them feel uneasy. Very few stayed for long if they could help it. Visitors did not understand the city, they did not understand how the past had made the present. They had not been raised with the dust sifting through the backdrop.

Maybe the inhabitants did not understand either. They failed to notice the symbols scratched onto statues and building's walls by ghosts. It could have been because no one had told them, but the dust was part of them, collecting in their lungs, resting on their sleeping faces, part of the very fibre of their beings, an invisible education.

Outside the city, tree roots twisted tightly together, sealing in the enchanted metropolis; inside, shadows grew and unknown things drifted through the nights. The outside forgot about their deeds, the inside forgot who had built the buildings and statues, who the ghosts were; essentially they forgot what had made them. This was the forgotten city.

Boogie

Clive

keeefer
Post the rest, post the rest!
Date Added: 06/07/2005

Gary
She has a very nice touch for 16. Quite a good imagination, too.
Date Added: 06/07/2005

Gone Away
I'll ask her, Keef. She so shy, she may not want me to...
Date Added: 06/07/2005

Gone Away
Thanks, Gary, I thought so too. ;)
Date Added: 06/07/2005

keeefer
Just get Pootle to blog it, after all what are little brothers for if not to annoy their big sisters and leave them crying in their rooms?
Date Added: 06/07/2005

John (SYNTAGMA)
Mad, Pootle and Boogie ~ an interesting choice of names, if I may say so. Worthy of Tolkien himself. One of mine used to be called Pye, after Mr Pye in the Mervyn Peake novel. He was the one who had angel's wings one week, then horns the next, and behaved accordingly. Yes, nice bit of writing. The inky-fingered art clearly runs in your family, Clive.
Date Added: 06/07/2005

Gone Away
That would be taking sides, Keef... Of course, I understand where you're coming from, as a little brother yourself. :D
Date Added: 06/07/2005

Gone Away
Admittedly they are nicknames, John, although Boogie is always known as that now and Mad almost always.
Date Added: 06/07/2005

Phil Dillon
Clive She has a wonderful way with words. We need to see more!
Date Added: 06/07/2005

Gone Away
I'll ask her, Phil. :)
Date Added: 06/07/2005

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