Strange Inspiration... Possible Novel

Amicus Dei of [FoG]

Amicus Dei of [FoG]

New Member
Blackened Heart - novel inspired by 1907 photo

In my history class, my teacher likes to put up pictures on the side and back walls pertaining to the era or topic we're learning about... Recently, she has had pictures from the Napoleonic era for European history, but today she had swapped those for pictures about our topic... essentially the late 1800's/early 1900's economy and working conditions...
On the wall behind me, she had put pictures of child labor, which was sad... The feeling of sadness increased especially when I came across this specific picture of a young coal mining boy:
CoalMinerLewisHine.jpg

I found it devastatingly depressing... :(
Shortly after seeing it, I was inspired (oddly enough) to possibly write a tragedy novel on the experiences based around such a horrible experience...
Comment please... :eek:
 
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My historical fiction novel begins!

Blackened Heart

Warning: Spoiler contains Preface to Blackened Heart, which includes descriptions of somewhat historically accurate working conditions and child labor. [By the way, I'm not showing you anything from chapter one because it will be by far the most important chapter for the dramatic, tragic effect of the novel... and if you read any part of that chapter (and maybe a little beyond it, though I haven't made it that far yet), the effect will be utterly ruined]
Preface

“Back to work, you lazy boy!” shouted the angry, obese overseer, glaring at the snoozing boy who lay awkwardly along the ground at the foot of a massive pile of coal. The boy, as young as ten years, seemed the opposite of young itself. His youth was concealed behind a mask of pitiful health, his face shrouded by a filthy collection of coal powder which had become a paste upon contact with his sweat. The hair beneath his soiled work cap had a peppery mesh of black and his natural auburn color. His cap, with a heavy light adorning its front pressed down onto his face, further obscuring his already contorted eyelid and brow. His bent limbs, also slightly misshapen, had been sprawled in unusual angles until he had begun to rise.
Exhausted from his many long hours and long days of dreaded work, he had nodded off again. His eyes half opened as the annoying man griped at him from across the room. Ignoring the threats being thrown at him, he urged his unwilling body to crawl up from its deep slumber, simply for the sake of keeping the job though he hated it so. Finally coming to a rough standing position after a long, lethargic rise, he turned away from the overseer to tend to his job. His torn and disgustingly dirty clothing was darkened with heavy exposure to the atmosphere of the deep coal mine, and his gloves were smothered with the black substance.
Slowly, he reached to the ground and retrieved his shovel, which was also ashen with the black rock, and lazily pushed it into the pile of coal next to him. He scooped out as much coal as was possible for him to carry, and clumsily dumped in into a mine cart which was set off the tracks next to him.
After what seemed like hours, but had lasted only a few minutes, a young man approached, pulling an empty mine cart. This boy was seven years older than the one displacing the coal pile, and was clearly much more muscular. However, he still appeared just as drained by the hard work. He approached the younger boy and placed the fresh cart next to the one being used, which was nearing its fill of coal. Without any exchange of words, the two boys performed their jobs as prescribed by the overseer. The younger shoveled a final scoop into the used cart, and the older placed in on the tracks. The younger then continued to shovel the coal, using the empty cart, and the older proceeded to exit from the hall through which he had entered, pulling his new payload.
Breathing in heavy amounts of wet, grotesquely scented, ashy clouds of black, the boy grew tired again very quickly. The temperature down in the depths of the mine was extremely high, contributing to his fatigue, and many of the men had stripped down to all but their caps in order to keep the heat out of their bodies. The young boy had not been used to bareness around other people, and could never quite get himself accustomed to working around naked men.
His brother, who had been the one to exchange the carts, was making his way out of sight into the cloudy darkness, wearing no more than his cap and undergarments. The young one had intentionally kept his eyes away from his older brother while they worked together. He knew that as his brother neared the surface, he would put on some more clothing. Meanwhile, the heat trapped beneath the young one’s clothing, the long hours of work, and the horrible atmosphere were bringing a wave of total exhaustion over him.
Weary beyond wit’s end, he found himself once more lying down on the ground, submitting himself to rest.
Questions? Comments? Corrections? (etc. etc.)
 
Sqweak!

Go figure I just saw a PBS program on Appalachia (lots of coal mining and exportation of workers there). Having quickly perused your writing I'll offer my opinion. Your descriptions are clear as to what is occurring and you've reportedly created a background for the characters in chapter one, thus empathy. So you've succeeded there :). However, in general I'd use more varied wording for the same thing. Example: mine < fetid pit, festering hellhole, oppressive cave, Faustian nightmare, black abyss, or perhaps "The mine is an open grave in which men discard their clothes, dignity, health and eventually lives in the forlorn chase of a few pennies" (could not resist a line sorry :p). If you can do this consistently without losing understanding of what is going on, which you have already, it will be par excelant. Read Dickens he writes in an analogous manner and many of his works have themes against child labor and poverty in general. Giving the boy a name would help as well (perhaps you omitted it for secrecy or will do so later). Anyway it is just my opinion and I'm just a shmoe so what do I know :p . Overall keep up the good work :)

My grammar and punctuation are horrid so I cannot help you there.
 
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Thumbs up with your descriptions. I look forward to reading more. Since you're going for a dramatic novel, make sure you really let the reader dig into the character. I want to know what "little Timmy" is thinking, feeling, and what he'd do in any situation.
 
Thanks guys :3
I feel more encouraged than before (usually when I talk to my friends at school about novels they look at me like I'm pursuing some stupid hobby that interests them not at all and respond subtley) :3
 
I'm finding it extremely difficult to look forward to writing chapter one because it's a totally separate story that the prelude that i intend to deal with in the later chapters of the book x_x

However, I think the transitions between the Prelude and the first chapter, then the first to second chapters, will be very nice to set up the remainder of the story :3

I think I'll truncate the first chapter just a bit...(since when I thought of the book, I hadn't invisioned myself writing this separate story that will later tie in on the first... However, those who skip the Prelude [as I usually do in school reading assignments] will have no trouble following the story)
Or maybe, as for separate stories that tie in to the first, I'll continue to expand on Ch.1, and make a couple of others similar to it... I'm thinking of a Les Mis effect, where there are many different main characters that all have separate story lines to follow, but they're all in fact intertwined and the storylines meet at the same time and place to make a great climax to the novel :3 (i <3'ed Les Mis)


By the way, did anybody happen to notice anything unusual about the picture in my first post?
Hint: It's more than meets the EYES (or maybe the whole face)
If you cover the left side of his face (on your right), the boy looks young and happy, and appears to have just scarfed down a delicious chocolate candy bar (that would be the powdery coal I think), yet if you cover his right (left for you!), he looks about in his mid-thirties, very worried or depressed, and poorly shaven (coal again... I doubt a 10-12 year old would need a shave ;)).
Did you see it?
I doubt you did without looking at my spoiler ;)... but I think that specific actual paradigm shift is intriguing :3
 
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