My Writer’s Speaks:

        Honestly, this piece was challenging for me to write. I've wanted to write a story about dinosaurs for so long, but I was always scared because I've offended people with this material before. That's not this story's intention at all. It's just a sci-fi adventure piece with a twist.

        All the research I had to do made this story hard. It delayed it, so I got a late start, which proved very difficult with the time crunch and page limit for my class (twenty-five). I wanted to give up multiple times, but I always pushed myself to keep going. My goal was to toss everything I've learned about writing since 4th grade into it, so I went to extreme lengths to pull Messummer off.

        Dan is my favorite character, partly because I based him on my dad, whose name is also "Dan". That doesn't mean I don't love Messummer, too. These two characters came naturally to me because I knew what I wanted their story arc to be from the beginning.

        That said, the plot wasn't that difficult—not as difficult as Evangeline's Flame (the other story I had to write for my class). To help with it, I watched a documentary on the K-T Mass Extinction. I was severely disturbed by it. I felt so bad for the dinosaurs, but I thought the extinction would be an exciting concept you don't usually see in dinosaur stories. I tried to keep the disaster scenes at a minimum in case people were uncomfortable reading about animals trying to survive.

        I threw some things in from my personal life, too. Dan's mother's death mimics my brother's, as does Dan's lesson about moving on and accepting where he belongs. I wanted Messummer to be his mother's spirit, but I had a bit of trouble pulling it off. If you guys could give me suggestions on how to make this paranormal subplot work better, please do not hesitate.

        Before I move on, I want to say something really quick. I know this story's time-traveling rules are bent, but that's what I wanted. It was the only way to make Dan and Messummer's relationship work. Sometimes, you have to bend the rules. I always do that when I write, but I still get called out for it.

        Other than that, I hope you enjoyed Messummer.

Questions for Improvement:

1. Dan and Messummer are both important characters, so I considered writing the story from both their points of view. But with the time crunch, the page requirement, and the late start of this story (due to all the research I had to do for it), I ended up writing from Messummer's perspective. What do you guys think? Should I write the story from Dan's and Messummer's points of view?

2. How can I improve the paranormal subplot, with Messummer being the spirit of Dan's mom? I tried to include subtle details, but do you think I can add a few more? I want to make it less obvious than Axis's secret in Evangeline.

3. I'm still new to sci-fi, so I'm wondering what's working and what I can do to improve in this genre?