A New Take on a Classic Reflection

(image courtesy of Bing Copilot)

One of my favorite pieces that I have written in my portfolio is the piece labeled A New Take on A Classic, which is in desperate need of a new name. I wrote this as a part of my Intro to Creative Writing class and it's the thing that made me realize how much I love this genre of writing. The original assignment was to write a short story that was based on some sort of old myth or legend. I chose to take a myth from the Red Rocks area of Colorado and transform it into a "kids on bikes" story akin to Stranger Things.

The story follows Alphonse, and his three buddies as they have a spooky encounter with a headless woman who is said to haunt Red Rocks. One by one, the ghost picks them off until they are all gone. This leads to an open ending that I have yet to decide what it means, and I kind of like it this way.

This story took me nearly 10 weeks to complete and despite it being from the first half of my time at DU I am extremely proud of the story that I have produced. Upon reading it again for this blog post, there are some technical things that I would like to change should I choose to return to this piece. The two biggest things that stood out to me in this regard is some stylistic elements and of course some grammar and spelling.

In terms of stylistic things that I am no longer so wild about, one would be repeated phrases. This is something that I picked up on from some of Steven King's work, but my implementation of it feels childish and clunky. I think some more elegant phrases, as well as a greater variety of said phrases, would help the writing feel more sophisticated and less cobbled together.

Based on the feedback that I've gotten from friends and classmates who have read this story, it has the intended uncomfortable horror vibe that I am trying to convey. When I submitted this for a class workshop, my classmates praised how uncomfortable and how "on the edge" my writing in this piece made them feel.