-6. Beyond the Pale
The Seven Fantastic Heresies of Heshman Shew Mote
2021, 28,305 words, graphic in hand
Reader/Editor: the Graphomaniac
Publisher: Lynn Lockhart
No work of mine has taken longer to finish then Beyond the Pale, which took a full decade to write. This tale is a combination of my most empathetic character development and most disappointing plot trajectory, with two of the three readers experiencing actual distress over the terminus of the story arc.
Page 15: removed an extra ‘a’
Page 16: corrected ‘Christendom’
Page 19: kneeled to knelt
Page 22: I have retained the long, florid sentence structure, as fitting to the subject. Insert ‘of’ between both and them,
Page 23: or worship to of worship
Page 24: never to ‘knew in his…’
Page 25: make paragraph break
Page 31: capitalized Time, arm to arms,
Page 32: her ad to he had, idetic to eidetic, insert come between Savior and before
Page 35: joyess to joyless
Page 38: best complex scene thus far
Lost correction record for 39-45.
The story of Pig Weed and the servants at the tollhouse was some of my better work I think.
Page 48: replace comma with colon at page top,
From page 50 of 114: I quite like this passage.
“Look, Madam Dear, up into the dome of the sphere. It is not real—it is for the meaty ones to fear. I will transfer the actual heavenly dance to you so that what you know is not what appears above in this heretic sky that is to us, in our Love, a lie.”
Removed a redundant “her.”
The artifice has drifted into technological Time, but the narrative has maintained a mythic chime. At page 50 I have attained agreement with this story, which I had utterly forgotten writing.
“In his mind's bell tower a fanatic voice of girlish brass sang, David, I so love the heretic sky!”
Page 51: removed redundant “the,” “boned” to “bones,” “the” to “that,” removed redundant “white,” space inserted between kinds and a
Page 52: confirmed to conformed
Page 53: and to an before unshakable, declaration of changed to declaration to, nation to notion of sainthood,
Page 54: insert a between is and spark, who to whose, kind to mind,
Page 55: insert ‘a’ between ever and creature, replace em with me twice, replace the with to before the
Page 56: italicized They will be taken, Florantine to Florentine, his for is, italicized Thank you, Ignatius, italicize They will, Ignatius. You should prepare.
Page 57: correct Reliquary,
Page 60: italicize last paragraph
Page 61: or oars to of oars
page 62: wood to would
Page 64: italicize What is a Tartar boy doing on this crusade to save the Christ from his own heathen kind?
Page 65: puzzles to puzzled
Page 66: replace flow with floor
Page 67: reduce space between a and start,
Page 71: David to David’s,
Page 73: glending to lending, a unique typo at least,
Page 74: reduced redundant a, capitalize Madam Three, remove his from before sword
Page 76: to field changed to the field,
Page 77: italicized Heshman—
Page 78: whack mole to whack-a-mole
Page 81: coldrons to cauldrons, waifers to wafers,
Page 83: a to am before among friends
Page 85: separated a from cousin, I had linked this story line to a science fiction series I did, having decided during the final draft that Beyond the Pale should be an internal, rather than an external fantasy.
Page 87: Bowie to scuba knife, this might be my most realistic knife fight, not to no,
Page 91: suprise to surprise, remove redundant and,
Page 95: no to now
The novel ends on page 95. It feels like a good story, perhaps too oblique in exposition for many readers. In many ways it is the most horrific horror story I have written, a dark fantasy, dreamed by an inmate of a grim dystopian realm, lived by its occupants with brutality, savagery, calculative malice, and, for one among their number an old Grace that this writer hopes never entirely abandons us in this scrap-made place.
This record of self-editing shall be placed on page 97 of Beyond the Pale, before the brief appendices of some articles written while the novel was composed, articles I will but briefly proof.
