Tag: High School Writing

Samples, Writing

A Good Read: An Essay

Chrys Buckley

519546I have tried many times to explain who I am, at all different points in my life. I have used up pages and pages trying to convey all the different and conflicting attributes of my personality. I have used my interests, my reactions to situations, the way I think, what I believe in, some significant experiences, my aspirations, my fears, and my deepest innermost emotions to try to define what makes me who I am and separates me from the rest of the world. I have tried to find what makes me an individual, unique in my own way. Each time I have tried I always have come away feeling that I am too complex to explain, or maybe that I am no different from anyone else.

Then, over the course of eighth and ninth grade I read the six-part series by Christopher Pike called The Last Vampire series. They sound like books that are just simple thrillers for young readers, and for someone at a younger age, that is really all they are. However, I read the series earlier this year at a much deeper level and was amazed at what I found. There is really significant material within the lines of the books.

After the first reading, I finished the last book feeling different, but I could not easily put my finger on the reason why. I felt a sense of tranquility that I was unaccustomed to.

Continue reading “A Good Read: An Essay” →

Samples, Writing

Josie – Sunshower Chapter Two

Chrys Buckley

alienworld-800“Josie, I’m so sorry.  Seth told me what happened,” Ray Ann said as soon as she saw me the next day, during our break between our first two sessions with the InfoMaster.  We were in the Psych-Lab Wing, the most central spot when the cafeteria wasn’t open.  White, windowless walls surrounded us on all sides.  Above were large fluorescent lights that left not a spot of darkness, much to my dismay.  There were large heavy doors on each side of the boxlike room.  The one to the cafeteria had a green metallic number pad next to it-students needed to punch in their ID numbers to enter-that read “CLOSED” in electric blue letters across the display.

“Oh, so you’re speaking to me now?  I feel honored,” I replied with a twinge of bitterness.  Lately it seemed she was a friend when it was convenient for her, or when she felt it was her duty.

“Of course.  I’m sorry about that dumb fight.  It was all my fault.”

Continue reading “Josie – Sunshower Chapter Two” →

Samples, Writing

Computer Junkie: A Complete Short Story

Chrys Buckley

comp junkie imagesI love my computer. Since I’m what some people would call a “loser,” I don’t have much of a social life. But when I get on the computer, a whole different side of me comes out. I am no longer shy and dorky, but the queen of the chat rooms. I run three mailing lists and manage two newsgroups. My real hobby, though, is creating webpages. I am an expert when it comes to HTML, and many people do not know it, so the business is pretty good.

Life is always shoving it down my throat that I am never going to be a success, or anyone important, however. My older brother, Brian, is a professional webpage designer and a computer programmer. He gets paid a ton of money for doing the same thing I do, and all I get is lunch money out of it. Sometimes I envy him so much; Brian is everyone’s favorite guy. He was always the prize child. Now he is the richest guy in the family. I will never be anything compared to him.

At the same time, though, I can’t dislike him. He’s nicer to me than anyone else is. He makes time to call me at least once a week and listens to my teenage angst even though he’s been out of college for three years already. He is always doing special things for me like buying me little presents or sending me funny e-mails just to make me laugh. Even though I’m jealous of him, he’s really a great guy. And he can always help when the stupid computer won’t listen to me.

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~~~

Okay, this has to be the most embarrassing story I could post, but since I allude to it in my introductory post, it seems only fair to put it up. This is the one with characters named after members of Alice in Chains, one of whom speaks in song lyrics. I wrote this in 1997, back when my parents very first got the internet and I had no knowledge whatsoever of how the internet works so there is a bunch of made up stuff, and a lot of it is really dated. Entertainment purposes!

Don’t forget, you can always check out the Samples section, including Older Works and Published.

~Chrys

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Metaphysics, Samples, Writing

Dear Friends: A Complete Short Story

Chrys Buckley

Seance_candles_____mom_by_bloodrosealchemist    I walked slowly to my backyard with candles and matches under my arm.  The wind howled and whistled in the trees.  The dead leaves crackled under my feet.  It was as dark as night.  That’s probably because it was night.  Halloween night to be exact.

We were planning to have a seance.  It was rather strange, the way it came about.  All of us, excluding Curt, had dreamt about it.  I was first, last Monday.  Since then, one by one, we each had the seance dream.  We pretended to take this lightly, as a joke to see if our dreams were psychic or something, but we all knew how serious we were about it.  We tried to keep it light so that we couldn’t admit to ourselves how spooky and terrifying it was.  If only we’d truly known how terrible it would really be.

Even though Curt hadn’t had the dream, he was included.  We couldn’t not inc≥lude him.  He was there last Halloween when the whole thing began, along with Daniel, Alexa, Edna and I.  It did bother me though, that he had no dream about it.

Continue reading “Dear Friends: A Complete Short Story” →

Metaphysics, Samples, Writing

Night of Evils: A Complete Short Story

Chrys Buckley

Aurora_Borealis_NOIt was to be a night of evils. I knew that the moment the sun set. As soon as the blues, violets, reds, greens, oranges and yellows drained from the sky it was clear. The evil vibes were almost tangible. Mystery hung in the air and fear was everywhere. I could taste the sadness and smell the sorrows. Horror and hatred weighed heavily in the clouds. It didn’t need to be spoken aloud, the fact was evident: Death was ready to strike. I knew all this and yet I went to the lake anyway.

I could get to the lake by taking a path through the woods that were in my backyard. It was so familiar and routine that I could easily get there blindfolded. Tonight, though, everything was different. I had trouble staying on the path, which had never happened before and really worried me. The wind blew fiercely, chilling the night air and making whistling and howling noises in the trees. I had to pull on a sweater to avoid the cold.

When I arrived at the lake, it was spooky as well. The full moon cast eerie shadows all over its surface. The stars didn’t seem to twinkle as they should. The sky had a strange reddish tint. No light from nearby homes shone through the trees, as it usually did at this time of night. The whole place had a somewhat grayish fog around it that reminded me of a dream scene in a TV show.

Continue Reading –>

~~~

I’m going back to delving into early work for some writing samples.

I thought of this story in particular because it was right about this time of year that I wrote this story. The year was 1997. I was a junior in high school and for a creative writing class, the assignment was to write our first full-length story. This started for me with trying to evoke the atmosphere. I can actually remember typing this up on my parents’ computer and doing some really funky stuff with the background and font colors to help match the atmosphere I was trying to portray, which I never felt I fully did. Some things in our minds, especially the very ethereal, just can’t be fully captured in words. So instead, I made a story out of it.

As always, you can check out other Friday Writing Samples that cover lots of different styles, genres and media, as well as other Older Works and Published.

~Chrys

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Samples, Writing

Josie – Sunshower Chapter One

Chrys Buckley

Josie 1images “Josie, I’m sorry,” he said for the thousandth time. “Things just aren’t working out.”

My heart was being broken and I was reading a book. While he rattled off all the reasons why we couldn’t be together, I sat there with one ear on the phone, and my eyes on the pages of a book I had found in the basement of my house.

It was actually more like a diary than a novel. It was written by Janet Andrioli, who had apparently lived in my house almost two hundred years before I was born, way back near the turn of the 21st century. I was reading about her teenage years. Things were so different back then. Humanity had not traveled past the moon. Computers had required laborious typing to function; that seems so mediocre compared to the ones we have today, where you can give them voice commands. And people couldn’t interact with their televisions; I couldn’t live like that!

Continue reading “Josie – Sunshower Chapter One” →

Samples, Writing

A Star is Born: A Complete Short Story

Chrys Buckley
A Star is Born
A Star is Born

Sryall had once been a beautiful land, adorned with blooming trees offering many leaves. Serene waters were plenty. The sky above was a tranquil blue by day and a quiet navy blanket by night. Birds sang and animals frolicked in the grass. Humans lived, loved and laughed, generally enjoying the beauties and pleasures that life offered. The Sun rose high, not each day, but frequently, giving many great joy. The moon and stars gave comfort at night. Death was a sad event, for which were shed many tears, but it was often at the time of birth, to carry on the Eternal Cycle.

Life was simple then. People were free to express themselves how they wished. It was a period of great creativity. Much art, music, dance and writing were accomplished throughout the land. Imagination was encouraged. Dreams were seen as the gateway to unlocking the mysteries of the soul, something they truly believed to exist.

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~~~

Decided to do something a little different here.

I can’t post too much current material (a lot of times, writing posted on a blog is considered “previously published,” which disqualifies it for lots of places I might want to submit my writing pieces to) that I’m sending out (sporadically) and trying to get published. But I want to keep giving a writing sample every Friday.

So, what I’m doing is pulling up some of my early work and posting it here. Even though it’s mostly terrible and makes me cringe (like in a whole body shuddering, totally embarrassed cringe sort of way) to read it. I wrote a LOT while in high school, sometimes without deadlines or prompts. They were prolific years and there’s lots to mine. I feel like (hope?) my writing is really different now. A lot of the old stuff is sorta sci-fi-ish and not at all the kind of stuff I write now, but in the interest of posting something on a consistent basis, I’m going to embarrass myself publicly.

I wrote this one during my senior year of high school,  and it won first place in my school’s short story contest that year. Fun fact: Winning the short story contest, as well as an essay contest, was how I paid for some prom-related expenses.

Check out other (incl. some more current) Samples, as well as Published and Older Works for more writing samples.

~Chrys

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