By William Smith
Keelan Savoie — a 12-year-old Aldo Leopold student — yearns for a career in marine biology.
But he’s also a remarkably talented writer. That’s how Savoie ended up winning the youth category of the statewide Waspie Writing Contest.
A cursory glance at the story he submitted reveals an extremely high level of grammar for a 12-year-old. While Savoie admitted that he gets high marks in English class, he said his writing has dramatically improved since he wrote his first story a few years ago.
He also reads a lot — the secret of any good writer. He even knows how to kill a writing project that veers off course.
“I made up this other story that had to do with like time machines and stuff, but it didn’t go that well,” he said.
“Point Nemo Extended” is a classic seafaring horror featuring a giant sea beast not believed to exist. Savoie ensured that his fantastical tale was grounded in reality. Point Nemo is a real location, commonly referred to as the most remote place on Earth.
Located in the South Pacific Ocean, Point Nemo is 1,670 miles from the nearest landmass — a perfect spot for a horror story.
Savoie turned in a rougher version of his ocean horror story for a class contest and just barely missed out on winning. He needed something more and got a new narrative idea from the kid who did win first place.
“The kid who got first place used journal entries. So I thought it was a really good idea, and I decided to add some of that to my second version,” he said.
The story is told entirely through the main character’s journal entries, giving the tale a found-footage feel, similar to “The Blair Witch Project.”
By the time he put pencil to paper, most of the story — and its style — was already in Savoie’s head. It took him about two weeks to write during study periods at school.
“I mostly knew what I wanted to write,” he said.
To keep the tension high, Savoie starts “Point Nemo Extended” in “medias res” — the French term for a narrative technique that begins a story in the middle of the plot. The story begins:
“5 months later … ‘Hello, this is the Point Nemo research division log entry #34. After the apparent events from 5 months ago, coming from Point Nemo, we have been trying to figure out what could’ve happened.’ ”
Point Nemo is a brief little pot-boiler, coming in at about 1,700 words. Savoie’s next story, which he is currently writing, will be much longer. He has already written roughly 6,000 words.
“I never got to finish it before the school year ended, but I’m planning to work on it at the beginning of next year,” he said.
Savoie is going sci-fi with his next narrative jaunt — something akin to the popular book and subsequent film starring Matt Damon, “The Martian.”
The story doesn’t have a title yet, but the premise is simple.
A man wants to travel to outer space and visits a business that specializes in space travel. That’s when things start to go horribly wrong.
“He gets trapped in one of the shuttles, and he gets sent off without really any warning and no proper preparation,” he said.
Not one to repeat himself, Savoie said the story would not use the journal entry format of “Point Nemo Extended.”
“It’s going to be more traditional. You can read the character’s thoughts and stuff,” he said.
Despite his talent for it, Savoie doesn’t plan on making a career out of his writing. His heart is in marine biology.
However, he will continue to enter writing contests, using them as an outlet and amplifier for his other interests, such as astronomy.
“I just like writing about concepts that I like,” he said.
After completing his next story, Savoie plans to double the length of the one after it and aims to write approximately 15,000 words.
If you know Keelan, just don’t be surprised to see some familiar names in there.
Savoie said his biggest weakness is coming up with character names that don’t sound false. That’s why so many of his classmates appear in his adventures.
“I’m bad at making up names,” he said with a grin.