The Farm 2013. Flash Fiction and Snippets Critique Hub (<1000 Words)

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Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

I'm not a critmaster like any of the Thunderdome old guard, but let's give this a whirl.

quote:

The obelisk stood before Shara, eldritch try not to use 'eldritch' unless you are H. P. Lovecraft or writing a roleplaying sourcebook runes glowing red on its obsidian surface, pulsing with the rhythm of a great beast�s breaths. The chamber was silent, the sole illumination being the deep crimson of the stone pillar. I get that this is flowery and purple for a joke, but it doesn't work for me. Most of your work is from Shara's point of view, so it doesn't make sense that she'd wax poetic briefly then go back to modern sarcasm. The juxtaposition of weird technology with mundane attitudes is fine, but the execution doesn't really work.

Shara kicked it.

�Great, there goes everyone�s bonus,� the elf Again, I get that you're trying to establish this, but on my first read, I though maybe there was some other elf. said, running her hand through her hair. Not that she didn�t see this coming, though- the engine was a bit on the old side, after all. It was just that being on the arse-end of Hegemony space meant that engine replacements were going to be a bitch to find. On the one hand, these two sentences were more conversational, which fits with the tone you're going for, but you're stuffing them with equivocating language that weakens what you're saying. For instance, "She'd seen this coming, though--the engine was old." The more you qualify your descriptions, the less vivid they get. She walked back to the room�s entrance and reactivated the lights, Why did she have the lights off when she came in? Was it just to set up the beginning scene? before turning back to the engine. Far as she could tell, the engine was good for one, maybe two more jumps, then-

Something dripped in front of her. Dark brown droplets stained the floor, and Shara looked up, her eyes widening when she saw the creature above- a man-sized centipede stretching forth from the ceiling, This sentence should be split here. Everything after it is a weird awkward phrase. two pairs of grotesque, armlike claws located just behind an insectoid head that ended in wicked mandibles bordered on the outside by delicate manipulator tendrils. This is a good physical inventory, but I still don't have a very good idea of how he looks. If you're going for a weird-is-normal vibe, and if you're doing it from Shara's point of view, then don't dump all of the description at once. She sees him, and he's on the ceiling, so that's normal but WOW a bottle of WINE!!! _{(which happens to be in his lobster claws)}

But that was not what made Shara jump- it was what the beast held. �Is that...?� she asked, not wanting to believe it.

The centipede nodded, handing Shara the bottle it held. �A bottle of Blackbird, yes,� it said. �Been saving it for a special occasion.� Aw dude you did this same exact joke like three paragraphs ago! This is a slightly better execution of the joke, but it's irrelevant because we already had this joke happen.

�You�re an angel, Torch Dialogue Tip: People usually only say someone's name if they're a third party to the conversation, or if they're trying to get their attention or really, REALLY underscore what they're saying. Imagine your mother calling you by your full name. If your mother wouldn't call you by your full name in that situation, don't use it.,� Shara said, taking a swig Unless Shara has a Zaphod Beeblebrox thing going on she probably can't say something and drink at the same time. Also, when did the bottle get into her hands? Torch was on the ceiling and she was on the ground. Even if you're showing things that are sort of simultaneous (he crawls down, she takes the bottle, and takes a swig) the reader is going to understand things in the order you present them. as Torch crawled down from the ceiling beside her. �What? It�s true!� Not necessary, you can get the idea that he disagrees/is blushing (actually, I'm not sure which.) from the way she qualifies. she said when Torch�s carapace rippled blue. �The ugliest angel, let�s be fair, but an angel nonetheless.� Nonetheless is a big word for someone who's been fairly casual so far. My five-second rewrite would be something like "Okay, you're an ugly angel, but you're still an angel."

�Doubt it,� Torch replied. �If I were, I�d have brought you a new engine.�

�Hm, good point. What the hells oh I get it, because space, fantasy, elf, more than one hell are you doing aboard my ship then, you useless roach?� I think you're overshooting friendly banter a bit here. I'd say roach as an insult is clear enough, and adding 'useless' makes it seem more mean-spirited than it needs to be. This would be a good place to do some of that juxtaposition you were doing earlier, e.g., "So if you don't have an engine for me, what are you doing on my ship, you roach?" She held out the bottle, but Torch was eyeing the engine, so she took another sip.

�Mooching,� Torch said, crawling towards the engine. �Eating your hair while you sleep.�

�And anyone who actually means it when they call you �roach�?�This is awkward, because it doesn't mesh well with what she was talking about.

�I call it morale-building.� It took me two reads to get what he meant by this, and a third to get the idea that it's improving other peoples' morale.

�Certainly makes me feel better.� Okay, so you're trying to get across the idea that Torch doesn't mind when people insult him, and that Shara teases him about it. You need to make the conversation flow more naturally, though--as it is, it feels like five lines that don't quite match up together. Shara goes from talking about why he's on the ship to other people insulting him to joking about how she insults him. Torch goes from talking about his actions to what he calls other people's actions. Here's my five-second rewrite: "Mooching," Torch said, crawling towards the engine. "Eating your hair while you sleep." / "Again? Is it because I called you a roach?" / "From you, that doesn't mean anything. From others...well, they're building their morale." "Hey, it makes me feel better too." The hard part of writing a conversation like this is getting the topic to flow naturally based on what people are saying. In my rewrite, you can sort of see the lines of thought behind what they're saying. Shara reacts to 'eating your hair', and segues from that into her teasing. Torch moves from her teasing to other people's, but she brings it back to herself, because she's not interested in discussing how other people treat Torch at the moment. When you've got a conversation like this, you need to think about how these two characters are thinking and reacting to each other, and that'll help you make your conversations flow better. Shara took another swig, and sighed as she looked at the engine again. �You think it�d sell for anything?� May just be me, but I'd phrase this as "you think I could sell it?" Distancing herself from the doing the selling (it'd sell versus i could sell it) makes it sounds like someone else is going to sell it. Also, it flows better with the next line. It's okay to have similar phrases in conversations because people often build off what each other say.

�How much you want to sell it for?� So for instance, this would be building off of "You think I could sell it?", where Torch just reflects what she says and adds in the question 'for how much?'. Torch asked as he came back. If he didn't do anything important over by the engine why did he go there in the first place?

Shara shrugged. �Enough?� Enough for what? I don't know what she's referring to. Enough to buy a new engine?

�Then nope.� He took the drink out of Shara�s hands and had himself a short sip. �So... how bad are things?� he asked, handing the bottle back.

Shara sighed. �We�d be running on fumes and dreams for a while,� Is this with or without replacing the engine? And what's gone wrong that they're low on cash? she said, �but I�ve got enough saved up to at least pay the crew their salaries. No bonuses though, and if this What is 'this'? I only know that things are bad and this has been going on but I don't know what things or this actually are. goes on another six months, it�d be just you and me again.�

�And no lower,� Torch clicked. This time, his carapace grew even redder. �No lower,� he said, trying to reassure himself. You established that Torch speaks relatively casually, so this seems out of place, kind of formal (thinking of a friendship in a numerican sort of way). "At least there's the two of us," would seem a bit more natural, but there's other ways to phrase it. If you want to keep up the teasing, he could say something like "You couldn't get rid of me even if you went broke," but it's not a good idea to lay on the sarcasm with every line.

�I�ll drink to that,� Shara groaned, leaning her head back. �Gods I'd forgotten this was a spaceship with an elf, thanks., can you imagine how smug Father Is Shara kind of upper class? Are elves kind of upper class? 'My dad' is more natural unless she's grown up referring to him as 'father'. would be if I moved back in?�

�You can move back in with me,� Torch said. �My hive would love to have you.�

�Like that would stop Father,� Uhh, stop him from what? Shara said. �He�d set up a covered chair in front of the house every morning, and just smug Please don't do this at me as soon as I stepped out of your place.� She stood up. �Nothing for it- we�re shelling out for a new engine at Elphes,� she said. �Something dwarven, maybe.� "Nothing for it" sounds weird to me, but maybe it's from a different dialect? If you've never heard anyone else say it though, leave that out. If you want to keep the idea that she changes the subject abruptly back to the engine, you could just have her stand up and say "Anyway, we're buying a new engine at Elphes."

Torch let out a high-pitched chitter. �I thought you wanted to save money?�

�Doesn�t have to be top of the line,� Shara said. �As long as it lasts longer than this lump,� she said, looking up at the stone obelisk This aside is unnecessary because we already know it's the engine., �it�s fine by me.�

�Well, you�re the captain,� she heard Torch say as he came up from behind her.

�And the chief engineer,� Shara reminded him. �And the head negotiator,� she said, waggling her finger as they walked off. What does being the negotiator have to do with things, and what is she waggling her finger at? In fact, why is she waggling her finger?

�Yes, yes,� Torch said, placing two arms around the elf. �You�re indispensable. My duties twiddling the navigation controls are surely numbered.� TOO MUCH SARCASM. It just gets smarmy by this point.

�And don�t you forget it,� Shara said, placing her own arm around Torch. This is another section where I don't think the flow of the conversation works. It starts off with Shara saying they'll spend money if they have to (As long as it lasts longer than this lump), and Torch essentially agrees with her, and then I'm not sure what she's doing listing off the other roles she has, then Torch makes some joke and apparently he's the pilot, maybe? Also, the phrase is that one's 'days are numbered', not one's duties. Five-second rewrite: "As long as it lasts longer than this lump, I'm fine with paying." \ "Well, you're the captain." \ "And the engineer and the negotiator, and all three of us vote for a new engine." \ "I'm glad you haven't decided to be the pilot, too." \ "Don't think I wouldn't."

Your prose isn't too bad, and it's certainly better than some stuff I've seen in Thunderdome. Where you could use some work is in imagery, dialogue, and pacing your descriptions.

If you're trying to do the weird-but-it's-normal tone, that's done best through the eyes of the person to whom it's normal. This means you have to trust your readers a bit, sure, but it means you can do more interesting things, like having a character blithely notice that another character is on the ceiling, and oh, he's climbing down along the wall and he's got booze in his clawhand. That slow drip of information, gradually filling out with more odd details, is more interesting than knowing all at one that he's a centipede. Doing this would also probably help you to show more of your description, as you'd be showing it as it becomes relevant instead of telling it to the reader all at once.

When it comes to the dialogue, I can see how you're weak there. Part of learning to write dialogue is just learning from hearing--ideally, hearing other real people talk. But part of it is also dramatizing how real people talk, and I think the advice I gave you for how to structure multi-line conversations can help. Each sentence should make sense as a response to the previous one. Even if in your mind you're working toward something specific that they're saying, remember that each line needs to make sense in context.

# ¿ Mar 19, 2014 01:07

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 13:21

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

Whenever you see that construction in your writing, break it up. It's incredibly easy to fix.

Before:
"Butts butts butts," Djeser said, taking a bite of his sandwich.

After:
"Butts butts butts," Djeser said. He took a bite of his sandwich.

Then if that sentence looks awkward, later on in revising you can rephrase.

# ¿ Mar 25, 2014 18:02

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

rizuhbull posted:

"Having just moved to the area from New England, I figured it'd be a good idea to get a feel for the town. With comfortable sneakers and a sunny sky, I picked a direction and started walking.

'With comfortable sneakers and a sunny sky' doesn't read quite right to me, because the shoes are something your character has, while the sun is something that's just in the environment. 'Picked a direction and started walking' is somewhat of a common phrase, so I'd replace it. Stock phrases tend to make people gloss over and forget what you were saying in the first place.

quote:

Growing up in valleys and around mountains, The first thing I noticed was the flat landscape and picturesque suburban setting. Almost as if I had been dropped into a fictional world created by a non-American who was asked to describe this country.

I can empathize with the protagonist noticing the lack of hills. I'm not sure about the choice of simile though. I get that you're trying to combine the idea of flatness and the suburban nature, but I'm not buying into that imagery, mostly because you didn't put any imagery there. Since I also grew up around hills and then went to flat places, here's my five-second rewrite of how that felt:

I grew up around mountains. To me, the horizon was always filled with peaks, always a tree-lined border around the sky. But the sky here was huge and bold, dominating my view all the way down to the color-matched roofs of the homes around me.

quote:

Single-story single family homes with decorative fences, pools or trampolines in the backyards and a single straight driveway leading to either a carport or garage. Complete with stay at home mothers watching their young children, men and husbands either working or tending to their lawns of always lush green grass. Not three blocks into this walk and I had come upon a public park called "Ridgeland".

You have one complete sentence and two sentence fragments in this paragraph. I also don't know what point of view you're coming from. It seems like this is all things your protagonist sees, so I can get the houses, the yards, the mothers and young kids, and the husbands tending their lawns, but if they're working, wouldn't they be, you know, at work and not at home? "Men and husbands" is also weird as a phrase. How does your character know the name? You don't tell us that he sees a plaque until a paragraph break later. A reader is going to be understanding your story in the order you tell it. My five-second rewrite of that and the next line or two:

Three blocks down away from my home, I found an empty park. A tall wooden plaque at the entrance read 'Ridgeland Park', with a list of rules printed in large type beneath.

quote:

As this was a Friday, I remember thinking it odd how deserted it was. I first came upon a large wooden plaque designating the park's name and a list of rules. The basics all applied; no littering, no skateboards, no overnight camping, etc. Walking down the park's length, I was surprised by it's massive size and amenities. Almost every outdoor activity imaginable was doable here. benches, outdoor grills, restrooms, basket and tennis courts, a playground and even a sizeable bike park. Why skateboards were prohibited for use on the bike park doesn't make sense to me, but I do neither."

The first sentence is at least twice as long as it needs to be and you don't even need it. "I remember thinking it odd" is redundant because with the first-person past-tense narration, we already assume that what we're reading is his telling of the story. But more importantly, you/your protagonist is telling us that it's odd. That's something you should be able to convey through details--a largely-printed list of rules posted up in multiple places, maybe, or a library-like quiet, or a jungle gym with immaculately even mulch, like no one's ever played on it. Whatever works for the story you're telling, but if your protagonist thinks it's odd, at least have him say "It was odd how deserted it was," or better yet, have him tell us how deserted it was, and we the readers will go, "oh, that's odd" for you.

You use it's incorrectly, where it should be its. You also forgot to capitalize your sentence fragment. Maybe you meant that to be a colon instead of a period? "Almost every outdoor activity was doable here" is an awkward sentence, because 'every outdoor activity' is an unnatural phrase (it sounds like what you'd see on a brochure) and 'was doable here' is passive tense. Plus, skating is an outdoor activity and skating isn't doable. My advice would be to drop that sentence and stick "there were" in front of the sentence fragment where you list what there was.

Your last line has tense and comprehension issues. You use both past and present tense ('skateboarding was prohibited'/'doesn't make sense to me'), but more importantly, your sentence wanders from where you start. The parts of that sentence are: [Why skateboards are prohibited] [doesn't make sense] [to me], [but I do neither]. The first two parts don't match up perfectly to me ('The rule against skateboards didn't make sense', I'd say, or something like that). But the real issue is that last part. As you're reading it, it comes off like 'it doesn't make sense, but I do,' before you get to the last word. And 'neither' doesn't work, because you haven't mentioned two actions, you only mentioned skateboarding in the bike park. So my five-second rewrite would be:

They had a bike park, so the rule against skateboards made even less sense, but I don't bike or skateboard anyway.

Overall what I'd say you should be working on is clarity and vividness. You've got a few very visual moments, but you don't do a whole lot with them, and I got tripped up on strange things or awkward words that took me out of the flow. One thing you can do to help with the clarity issues is just to read out what you've written to yourself. Try to read it as naturally as possible. If there's a part you get to where it doesn't flow naturally, change it to make it more smooth and natural. As for the vividness, all I can suggest is to try to get inside the head of your character, and imagine the details that he sees. A small detail can anchor a broad idea clearly--like if you wanted to stress the regular nature of the suburban houses, maybe your protagonist notices that they always alternate between a carport and a garage. A small, well chosen detail like that does two jobs: first, it creates an image in someone's head, and second, because you picked that detail to underscore a larger idea, now that idea is now going to stick around in that person's head.

Also, what is a bike park? Is it like a skate park, but you're not allowed to bring skateboards? If so, why would he think of it as a 'bike park'? Or maybe that's just me, but I've always heard of those sorts of areas referred to as specifically "skate parks".

# ¿ Mar 30, 2014 02:00

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

Pata Pata Pata Pon posted:

Nolichucky

"Get the drat water, boy, and be quick about it!" Maybe I'm just thick but it took me until I read back to the beginning to figure out that he's fetching water for the blacksmith. I'm not sure about starting on dialogue--it seems like maybe you shouldn't, but I don't feel like I can make that distinction yet.

Christopher's sooty hand flew up just in time to catch the faded wooden pail before it whacked him in the face. The tricky part of showing instead of telling is that detail on its own doesn't turn it into showing. This feels more like telling to me, because even with the detail, you're still telling me he's got a sooty hand and a faded wooden pail. (Note that writing an entire story by showing without telling would be hard--telling gets information across succinctly, while showing creatively elaborates on details. He turned without a word and dashed through the door, blinking as the sunlight slammed into his eyes. Grammar tip: Watch your -ing phrases. They're very easy to slap onto sentences, but they make your sentences longer and sometimes don't make lexical sense. Here, having 'blinking' be an -ing phrase makes it sound like he's doing it the whole time he's turning and dashing. The dust beneath his bare feet rose gently Words such as gently, softly, slightly, seemed--cut them. into the air as he slowed down to a skip, sucking in the warm spring air. This sentence could be shorter; you've got three ideas (the dust rose, he slowed, he sucked). Break it down to two or one per sentence. To everyone else, it was an uncommonly hot day for this time of year. Christopher, who spent every day of the year next to a blazing hot forge, found even stagnent I don't know what you typed this in but consider a spelling pass. summer air refreshing.

The ground squished and slid This isn't bad in terms of showing (maybe I just like how squish and slid read like the sort of sounds mud makes) but I think 'ground' confuses things a little. Maybe 'shore' or 'mud'? beneath his toes as he neared the creek. Christopher trotted behind the big tree that blocked the view of the river from the blacksmith's shop and happily leapt leaped into the air, his feet splattering mud everywhere with a satisfying splat as he slid down the bank towards the sparkling blue river. Woah that is a big sentence. Christopher trotted and leaped, hsi feet splattering as he slid down the bank--there's about four things there, not counting the phrase where you mentioned the tree. Split it up. A squirrel chattered, its tiny jaw moving in quick little bursts of anger I think you were trying to show here, but you got caught up in squirrel jaws. When you show, you want to engage the senses. Make it seem like I'm really hearing a squirrel cry. as it skittered up a tree out of Christopher's path. The sky seemed see above note on words to cut impossibly bright as Christopher looked up through the waving branches, the tip of the squirrel's fluffy tail vanishing just out of his sight.

"Ow!" The sky vanished as Christopher flung forward, pain shooting through his toes as his body smashed into the ground, mud filling his mouth. I get that he's falling but last thing I knew he was sliding down a slope so what's happening now? He barely saw the gray of a large rock sticking up in the middle of the path before suddenly there was sky again, rock, sky, rock, sky. For better ~*showing*~ I might try to describe the pain of getting bowled over, the feeling of mud in his mouth, or the vertigo you get when you're falling and can't control yourself. His hands flew out, grasping for the bucket handle, but only splashed into cool water, and then his whole body was splashing as the spinning world came to a halt and the taste of mud was replaced with earthy water.

The sound of laughter floated over the river and Christopher cowered, expecting the laughter to be drowned out in a moment by the whistle of a lash about to slash across his back. He trembled.

"Oh, Eliza, he's really hurt." A girl's voice, not the voice of his master. Sentence fragment

"He'd not be hurt if he were proper, he's just Mister John's 'prentice." But whose voice is this?

"Don't being a 'prentice mean one day he'll be a smith just like Mister John?"

"If he can't get water wi'out drowning, Mister John ain't going to be training him much longer." Dialogue is kind of awkward. I know that you're going for a period/regional thing with the phrasing, but since I don't know what Christopher even did (some kind of leaping slide fall tumble into a river but there was a rock involved) I don't know what "if he were proper" is trying to say. I don't quite feel the flow from the second line to the third or the third to the fourth. Conversation in real life has a bit of a back and forth, and I got that from the "He's really hurt," "He wouldn't be hurt if he was proper" lines. Maybe it goes back to me not being sure what 'proper' means.

A few splashes grew closer.Wording here is weird. Christopher pushed his dripping hair out of his eyes as rustling pink fabric filled his vision.

"Yer bucket's okay, it didn't break." The bucket thrust towards him. What did the bucket thrust toward him?

Christopher glanced up, blinking the last bit of water from his eyes. A girl gazed at him with eyes the color of the river, and when he met her eyes, her round cheeks grew plumper as she grinned. Number one, I don't actually know what color the river is. Rivers can be a lot of colors. Number two, you're stacking ideas on top of ideas here. Split them up and it won't seem like such a weird cluster of actions, and your pacing will get better. A second girl on the opposite river bank stomped her foot, wait were they yelling across a river at each other? Rivers are pretty big. pulling her blue skirts up to keep them from dragging in the mud.

"Catherine, hurry up, or I'm goin' back wit'out you and you can have Ma's switching."

Catherine stood up, brown braids swinging across her face as she turned to glare. "Eliza, yer oldest so Ma will switch you too for not being responsblah."

"It's responsablah, and I'll switch you for makin' us late wi' the water." I'm ambivalent on the regional dialect. On one hand, it can come off awkward in prose. On the other hand, I once wrote a story B'rer Rabbit-style, so I'm as guilty as you.

The biggest stumbling blocks I saw to comprehension were your kudzu sentences and the whole whatever was happening to Christopher. Regarding the sentences, it's something I think a lot of writers have to work hard at. It's definitely something I have to do when I do revisions on my stuff. I end up tossing on those extra phrases when they would sound and read better as their own separate sentences. Don't be afraid to have short sentences if it makes things clearer.

# ¿ Apr 24, 2014 00:57

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

Rollofthedice posted:

It was a particular day in February, a decade ago. "It was [month], [year]" is not a captivating opening It was bright out, very bright, even as the sun set. Snow blanketed the earth, occasionally ~~inter~~mixing with falling petals and leaves and blossoms. Why are there flowers out in February? Flowers come out in spring, not winter There was an aesthetic appeal, i.e. "it looked good" as if tiny paint splotches had fallen on a clean canvas. If the sun is setting why is the snow white instead of the rusty orange of a fading day or whatever wordy way you'd try to say it? It was cold. I was waiting. I am too, when is the story going to start?

It took hours before I sighted I think you mean you 'saw' unless your friend is in the crosshairs of your sniper rifle my friend on the northern road. He was a speck on a lane of dirt and ice that stretched past my known world. duuuude He'd traveled its length and returned on his morning jog but seriously this is pretty cheesy, and I knew before even seeing his face that the distance had changed him, hurt him. Even his speck looked morose. Show me how a speck looks morose and I'll believe you, tell me it does and I'll call bullshit.

Another half-hour before he stood in front of me. not a sentence The moon had risen, and was full. Orange replaced silver Where do you live where sunsets are white?, and fog crept in. I could see my friend staring past me, at a large patch of white mixed with ashes. I don't know what this is. A burned house? Did you burn his house down and now you're going to snipe him? He knew what I knew, and as I told him the news all he did was nod, and stare.

Halfway done with your vignette and nothing's happened besides a conversation.

He asked to see the graves. While I walked with him to the cemetery, silent, I took the time to study his changes. Weird phrasing He was in his military getup if you're going for drab bleakness, getup is too goofy a word and military is vague, which twinkled with a half-dozen badges and pins of honorable service. He walked upright, stiff, and would've seemed proud if his eyes hadn't been so dull. I wondered at how many people he had killed "wow dude you killed SO MANY people" or did you mean he wondered instead of wondered at?, and whether he was used to death.

We arrived at the cemetery. I led my friend to two sixth-month old plots near the center of the quiet place, Place is like a dumb placeholder word here and left him to any grief he had. I'd say he probably has a nonzero amount of grief but I still don't know what happened so maybe you're just showing him some graves. Check out these hot plots dude. Best graves. As I neared the exit � passing the tombstones, old and new, the rows of markers above countless bodies dead of uncounted causes this mouthfeels dumb � I heard a gunshot. It cracked through the air, unsettling the ground. ~~For a split second, I felt as if~~ You are narrating this which means you get the special skill of being able to express how you felt without saying "this is how I felt". We know it's how you felt. You're the one who's saying it. the quiet, funerary sanctuary had been defiled, and split sentences here imagined skeletons shifting shifted in their sleep. Then, I ran.

My friend's blood stained the tombstones of his wife and child. Oh okay now I know what's happening now that the story is over. I thought I know it's your thoughts, you're narrating. I could feel its warmth as I stood over him, and as I called 911 I saw the thousands of red droplets that had stained the snow. You mashed four sentences together for this. [i could feel]as[i stood]and [i saw]as[i called] Paint, creating a painting.

The blood cooled quickly. It was cold out, and I was waiting.

Plot: My friend came home from "military" and killed himself because his wife and child died in [unexplained].
Conflict: Grief?
Message: My friend's death was beautiful like a painting of inexplicable flower petals in February.

Apart from a few minor clarity issues, your writing is understandable and you've got some idea of sentence pacing. You lost me on some of the imagery, like your winter flowers and white sunsets. But more than that, I don't know what I'm supposed to feel about this or why I'm supposed to care. First person characters can let you get inside the head of someone who's going through a conflict, but your first person character doesn't have a conflict beyond not wanting his friend to die. I don't know what's happened until two lines from the end, and the ending makes his death seem kind of beautiful which is a bit weird because that's not the tone the story takes. There's something good in there about the dramatic irony of the soldier living while his family back home dies, but I never got to care about any of it.

Anyway I should nut up or shut up so have fun with some 2011 vintage words.

Recursive Zero II
650 words
In the times indefinite of King Ur Who Counted The World, there were two who came for the naming of their son. In the old tradition they listened and heard, as within ringing-speaking the forms of his name became clear. Stone words shone in sound, speaking over the name: [Urzchtek], Ur's Death.

Even within and around these times naming was known to aspire to Truth. His parents swore upon the brow of Reason that they would keep him where he could do no harm to their king. Within walls of heath and bars of grass they bound him, to not leave their home. (But remember in these days that their homes were of lesser flesh and bone teetering atop the ground.)

Ur's Death grew up within these walls. He enjoyed counting immensely, as Ur had. But while Ur had counted the world and made it whole within his mind, Ur's Death had little to count but his family's garden. So once he had counted all that lay within it, he turned his numbers upon their sides, and counted perpendicularly. He counted the garden eight times over, each time taking a new direction.

His parents watched, tears stabbing their breasts at their child's madness. (For remember, in these days numbers stretched only like lines toward the horizon.) Ur's Death planned to turn aside the hedge and escape the garden, but soon his mother found him, and told him that they would go into the wild to hunt.

As she wept tears of fire, he set out before her. She had to end her shame, and so she drew her bow and let fly her loving arrow straight at the back of Ur's Death.

Ur's Death turned around and quickly counted the distance between the arrow and himself, then took off running.

"Your arrow flies faster than I run, mother! But by the time it's got to where I was, I've gone further already. And when it's where I am-was I'll be where I will-be-am."

The arrow heard the words that Ur's Death spoke and felt its logic to be true; so the further Ur's Death ran, the nearer it crept, yet still he eluded its flight. Before long, however, he reached a steep cliff, surrounded on all sides with the arrow coming behind him.

He couldn't stop, so he spoke to the stone, counting it upwards, then backwards, then rightwards, then timewards, and again the four times in orthagic sequence. Bent in the Eight Ways of Building, the stone gave way, by the power of Ur's Death compelled to follow the numbers that he spoke.

Halls sprang from his throat, breath becoming column and balustrade, his heartbeat pounding into alcoves. Deeper into the stone Ur's Death and his death ran. With finesse that had been turned inward, stone became finest brass under his lips.

Ur's Death saw what he had created and was delighted, pausing to bask in his first creation. And as where he was became coterminous with where he would-be, the arrow robbed him of all Logic and Reason, and he fell silent.

The mother of Ur's Death was distraught to find the curled and angled stone, and came back only when accompanied by Ur Who Speaks and the World Listens. (For remember, in these days such beauty was unknown.) In awe, Ur reached out, feeling the ways in which the count had become angles and angles become form. Of the Eight Ways only Four were felt, and so half of Geometry was lost; we seek now still to learn what Ur's Death spoke.

Ur Tongue of Pure Premise saw his integral within Ur's Death, and proclaimed him to be a hero; he was the death of Ur, for now the Angles superceded the Count. With Architecture and Geometry began our cities, and with brass we built our name. Recurring and infinite thanks be to Urzchtek, Thamzurak and the Zero Angle.

# ¿ Apr 30, 2014 14:01

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

Sithsaber posted:

Brother Pride hated many things, most of all his brother. His brother was stupid, his brother was crass, and his brother revelled in all things petty. For years Brother Pride had tolerated him, for YEARS Brother Pride had turned a blind eye as Brother Vanity grew more and more cruel. He had tried compassion and understanding. He had tried sternness and strength; nothing seemed make a difference. The boy remained the same. This has a lot of ideas, but no substance. You cannot tell a reader about undescribed cruelties/revelries/stupidities/toleration/hatred/whatever. Well, you can, but they won't be interested, and they won't believe you. What did he do that was stupid? What was crass? What revelry? Why was it petty? How did he tolerate him? I don't know the answer to any of this. If these things are something you care about enough to tell us, then show us why they're worth telling us about. Don't just say 'it was really bad and he was a dumb guy'.

No, the boy grew worse. He grew worse and the people loved him for it. They loved the little prince far more than they had ever loved his elder. They loved that Vanity defiled the temples as Pride stood in prayer before gods who rewarded those who paid no more than lip service to their binding creeds. This is a meandering sentence. Cut out some of those clauses at the end into their own sentences. They loved that (Vanity defiled as (Pride stood before (gods who (paid no more than (lip service.))))) Note that this will fix the sentence grammatically but it's still kind of bland like the rest of this. You're not showing me anything about these temples or this prayer or these gods or these people or that lip service. ^{see note 1} The people delighted in how Vanity cursed the seas as it gave them her bounty while Pride sweated and toiled to feed them every night.More awkwardly long sentence, more unexplained telling. They even smiled while their young were deflowered WOAH this totes bears more explanation and their old dishonored by the boy's scheming tricks. They knew that Pride's little brother used them, and still they adored him as he fed on their attention and became more and more of a parasite. They loved him because he was one of them.This doesn't land for me at all. I don't even know who 'they' are beyond 'the people', and I'm not sure whose people they are, either. All you've told me are vaguely paradoxical things about why they like him. I don't buy this as public opinion. I'm going to keep reading, but see my second note.

And Pride was not. Pride hated them and all like them. He hated them yet did all he could to treat them as he would like to be treated; incorrect semicolon: do not use with conjunctions but they knew that. They saw the disgust in Pride�s eyes as he showered them with every courtesy, and they returned it in kind. Everyone knew that they hated him and that he hated them. Only decorum, necessity and fear kept them from ever coming to blows with their provider. Unfortunately, Pride's brother had none of these qualities. I DON'T KNOW WHAT IS HAPPENING. What courtesy? What decorum? What fear? What is he providing them with? What disgust? Showing this briefly would do far more than whatever this paragraph was. I'm starting to feel like you don't even know where this story is happening. Don't go 'oh so you want a whole paragraph of worldbuilding', I mean I literally haven't seen a hint of your story's setting. This is something I teach fourth graders. Where a story takes place is called a setting. I have zero clue where your story takes place.

Pride wasn't jealous of his brother; he just hated that someone like him was allowed to exist. The boy lacked restraint - a trait that was both a blessing and a curse depending on the circumstances. This means nothing, but it's on par with the rest of this meaning nothing. Vanity took what he wanted without even a thought of how his actions would affect those around him. God forbid you ever give an actual example. Pride's brother didn't know how to stop, and would continue a conflict until his adversary had to either let himself lose to maintain sanity or face mutual annihilation. This is another awkwardly long sentence. Chop it in half at the conjunction and reword the second sentence to be less SAT Prep.

Vanity was smart. He strutted when there was an audience and withdrew when the two siblings were alone. At times they had even successfully coexisted, tending and defending what they had made theirs. What did they make theirs? But the brother did not have self-control, and little by little Pride sensed being supplanted. How did he sense it? The little Prince wanted to be a King, and the Pride The pride? ??? ???????? wouldn't stand that. Pride tolerated many things, but there was one thing he could not allow: disrespect. Pride tolerated disrespecting the temples and stuff so why is this different?

When Pride asked his brother for help in the field, If they're princes why are they working in the field? it took the usual period of supplication and bribery before Vanity acquiesced. Pride inwardly fumed at having to beg for help in harvesting what they would both eat, They are farmers and also princes? but he felt that he could tolerate the brat's haughtiness for a little while. As they strolled the older brother's emotions began to cool. He remembered what it was like when they were young; When is a conjunction here, so incorrect semicolon when innocence blinded them from the darker things of the world. He remembered those times and smiled. I don't remember those times, because they didn't exist, even in the world of the story, because the story is about two anthropomorphic words spewing words at each other and at a giant crowd of anthropomorphic words standing outside their giant farm-palace which is just the word FARM-PALACE wrapped into the shape of a farm that's also a palace.

Then his brother spoke. Pride didn't remember what his brother said, nor when he started smashing a stone into his brother�s forehead until his brains were bashed This is the first action in the entire story and you cut away for it, so thanks for saving me from Things Happening and the ground was soaked with blood. Pride struck and struck until the rock chipped and his knuckles broke, and only then did he realize his mistake. Don't know why he did this, because there's no lead up. Is it like, gently caress you for being so poo poo when you were a cool dude as a kid? It comes out of nowhere because despite your mounds of words, I haven't learned anything really meaningful about this guy beyond that he's upset with his brother, the people like his brother, and they were happy when they were kids.

His brother was dead. His brother was dead and the hate remained, hate now turned within as it had previously been turned without. He instantly regretted what he had done, but not because of any sense of grief. Pride could never return home; You used a semicolon right this time! the others would hunt him for as long as they could to avenge the loss of their beloved.

But perhaps there was still hope. The Man Don't do this please grew frantic; he shook the corpse, entreating it with rage and tears to get up and put this trivial What part of it was trivial, the 'you're a huge douche' part or the 'bashed your head in' part? conflict behind them. He grew more desperate: he kicked the body until its ribs broke, than wrong then/than. Than is comparateive, then says what happens next. the balls until they popped. just eww man Eventually he had to why? stop beating the corpse in desperation. He prayed to the forgotten gods weren't the gods the ones who were cool with people making GBS threads up the temples? or are these different, special gods? and begged for a response; Nope, these are two separate sentences he begged for any way out of what he had just condemned himself to. He begged until he could beg no longer, and then he sat in the dust and waited for a response.

For hours he waited, until his eyes became vacant and his mind unaware. Pride had been dishonored and a boy lay dead. After a while the body stirred: I think you meant to put a semicolon here because this is neither a list or an example following the colon. A semicolon would still be wrong, though, because the following phrase doesn't modify or explain the phrase before it. Pride's despondency turned to impossible hope, and his hope to incomprehensible terror as his �brother� how about tell me how he knows it's not his brother instead of just using scare quotes rose up and stood over his would forgot your hyphen be killer. Pride was enraged wait he was just terrified, now he's back to angry? and petrified at the same time. Although most of his features had become unrecognizable, Vanity retained the feature Pride hated the most: his intolerable smile. I'd be grossed out if you went for imagery here, but I'm still upset that you keep on telling instead of showing. One word faded out one of the few times you use figurative language and it doesn't work for me. drat from Vanity�s mangled mouth before madness took them both; this semicolon is okay but I still don't like it personally. a subtle echo that would ring for the rest of the brothers� hellish eternity. bluhhhh noooo He whispered �finally�. I see the /quote tag at the bottom of my screen, so I'm whispering finally myself. Except when I do it, I say it like this: Djeser whispered, "Finally." Because that's how you do dialogue.

The flood gates broke: ehhh this is kind of an example so I'll let it slide, this time Pride�s screech of terror became a scream of hate and Vanity returned it in kind. They collided like a tidal wave upon a mountain, they tore like beings possessed and before long both were reduced to strips of flesh stitched together by the essence of all that could be despised. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0uQor_juqE First gave way sight, than sound and sensation, until all that was left was living destruction set free.

War had been unleashed: period instead of colon there would be no turning back.

This story is nothing but telling me about things that vaguely happened in an indefinite setting. Let's talk about the three things a basic story needs: character, setting and plot. A character is someone who the reader can identify with. This doesn't mean they have to be the same demographic as the reader, but it means their experience should relate to the reader's life in some way. The reader thinks, "oh, I've got a greedy friend, he's kind of like this character," or "I can empathize with the empty motions of a robot whose masters are long dead", or anything in between.

A setting is where a story takes place. All stories have a setting, even if it's not explicit. Sometimes, a story focused on characters can make no direct reference to its setting, but it will be evident from the writing and the interactions approximately where and when it happens. Even if it isn't explicitly told, the writer should have the setting in mind, because a well-realized setting adds to the real-ness of a story.

Finally, plot is the series of events that occur as a character tries to reach a goal or solve a problem. A good story introduces and establishes the conflict the character faces, shows that character working toward that conflict, and in the end, the character solves their conflict (or not) and has changed as a person (or not) from their experience. In this story, most of the plot came in the last few paragraphs. Most of the piece is establishing the conflict, and there's little that gets shown of the character trying to solve his problem.

Purely grammar-wise, there's nothing wrong with your writing that isn't just beginning writers' overzealousness. You can put together a sentence fine, when you're not overwriting. The really damning part of your writing for me is how hollow everything is and how little you seem to have invested into the story beyond some damp symbolism.

Note 1: Do you need to describe every last thing? No, that's silly. But you do need to describe enough that the reader can fill in the gaps themselves. Good writing (especially in short stories) is like a great sketch. You see just a few quick lines, but suddenly there's an image there. You don't have to draw in every detail, but you're not playing Pictionary. Just like in writing, you don't need to describe every detail, but you have to give the reader enough that the world feels real to them. Here, it barely feels like you're even trying to make this world real.

Note 2: When you're writing something for other people to read, there's a certain amount of trust the reader puts in you. To put it shortly, they trust you to have a meaningful story. If you start doing this hollow stuff where it doesn't even feel like you put any time and effort into the story, if you make these narrative shortcuts that undermine the weight of the story, then they won't trust you. People will start disbelieving the story you're telling them if they get the idea that you're bullshitting them.

Djeser fucked around with this message at 06:01 on Jul 13, 2014

# ¿ Jul 13, 2014 04:12

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

I found that as I was starting out, I tried to wrap my stories in narrative gimmicks because I thought that would be more interesting, but I found out pretty quickly that it's tough to write a good story simultaneously while sticking with your gimmick.

I wrote a story as a textbook chapter when I was just starting to write for serious, and it came out...as good as you'd expect that to.

Narrative gimmicks can work. I remember one book I liked as a kid that told the story of a...water fountain, I think? It was all told through correspondence and clippings, everything was presented as a document. But the trick with narrative gimmicks is that you have to be able to write a good, solid story before you can write with gimmicks. Gimmicks on a good story can be interesting and creative, but on a bad story, they just become annoying. The best thing to do is just focus on telling simple, solid stories, then work your way up to the level of skill where you can pull off a story like that.

# ¿ Jul 19, 2014 06:41

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

CommissarMega posted:

PROLOGUE

The bells within the Black Temples rang out, singly at first, 'Singly' stopped me and I had to figure out what you meant. then in ever more cacophonic choruses. Better than singly, but still tough to grab at first. The city of Pandaemonium shuddered underneath the weight of both the bells' clamorous din, as well as Almost every time someone uses 'as well as', they can just as well have used 'and' the thunderous revelation that marched forth through the city's streets and brought more dread than all the legions of that terrible place. This sentence is pretty garden pathy, and it makes it harder to parse. It What? was a truth that pierced its way through the lies of Pandaemonium's citizens, bleeding the ears of all who heard it. Bleeding the ears is a weird turn of phrase.

"Gone! Gone! Woops, typo.

The truth blew past the gates of Pandaemonium on the wings, the cloven hooves, the clawed limbs Weird phrase. of those privileged enough to be allowed to leave its bone-white walls. It carried itself on the winds of Hell, drowning the quiet sobs of fields where cut stalks leaked blood and the grains wept. It became pricless merchandise on the endless caravans of the inferno, the sole piece of merchandise that the merchants would give away willingly and otherwise. And otherwise? They're both willing and unwilling? And it's the only thing they're both willing and unwilling to give away? It was carried on the rhythm of clashing weapons, The following clause connects poorly to the preceding clause, because you refer to the rhythm, then the armies. Connecting the rhythm to the drills (that the armies are doing) as opposed to the army (that's doing drills) would probably make it clearer. daemonic armies drilling for what they knew would come.

"Empty! Empty!"

Upon a gilded throne, itself placed atop an infinitely tall pillar buried to the hilt in gold and jewels, a four-armed toad smacked its lips hungrily. Its tongue lashed out into its wealth, untold riches sticking to its surface even as Be careful about using 'as' for actions that don't need it. 'As' puts a pretty specific time structure into things, so if you're not using it to strictly convey order of events, just split the sentence into two or find another conjunction. And don't use 'even as'. Just don't. its arms reached out and clutched their own handfuls of wealth. The creature held these treasures, each a fortune that would beggar every mortal ruler who had ever and will ever live, and dreamt of the single treasure that would put its own wealth to shame. Don't know why this is important. Seems like you just jumped somewhere else.

A silken bordello that once rustled with the promise and betrayal of desires both exquisitely bestial and vice versa, now echoed softly with the the ecstatic sigh of the desire's embers rekindled. This sentence is just a mess. The 'vice versa' part doesn't work super well with exquisitely bestial (bestially exquisite? idgi), and I don't know what specific desire you're referring to. You mentioned two kinds of desires It was achingly beautiful, its features changing with every blink, yet always heart-rendingly perfect. Its body What's body? What was achingly beautiful? You only mentioned desires., slender yet curvy, AKA every sexy female character description in an online game ever? arose from a perfumed couch and walked languidly to an open window where the wind caressed its body. What might have been a tail, or a trailing piece of diaphanous gown, fluttered slightly as its owner sighed happily. The adverbs aren't helping here.

Brackish green-yellow blood dripped from broken, rusted blood vessels that shook with a burst of sudden activity. The body of the being that they had been torn from, This is a weird way to start the scene, by saying there's some blood vessels, then there's the body they came from. the being that formed the foundation of the city that lay upon it, groaned The body groaned? I get that you mean some kind of structural sound, but groaning is a thing people can do too, so that's the first thing I expected a body to do. And that conflicts with 'taking a breath'. as Oh, and there's that 'as' again. the creature took a breath centuries ahead of schedule. Those few inhabitants both fortunate and unfortunate enough to still be active gazed up at the beast's head, where an eye opened for the first time in sleepy attention as it turned towards Pandemonium. But I thought Pandaemonium (which is the way you spelled it earlier, by the way) was the city, so if it's the foundation of the city, how is it looking up at the city?

The ever-roiling waters of the Styx boiled even more violently than before, and choked gurgles soon became throaty war cries as snarling legions clawed their way to the river's shores. I know you're trying to be elaborate, but there's sentences like these where you're jamming so many clauses together that it gets hard to follow what elaborate adjectives go with what. Some wielded pitted Doesn't quite work as an adjective here. bronze blades, some banged Again, doesn't quite give me the war/time-ravaged equipment vibe. rusted iron and steel weapons on their shields, while others fired off rounds from rifles and pistols with powder that remained dry even in the depths of the Styx. At their head was the priestess betrayed, The priestess was betrayed? And you didn't tell me about this? You rear end in a top hat. (Seriously, it comes off like I'm supposed to know who she is.) her fanged, apelike face topped by a hive of serpents, her entire upper body crusted in the scales that also covered the snakelike form which comprised her lower half. The snake body feels almost like an aftersight the way you describe it here. I can't pinpoint what makes it awkward, but it is.

For the first time in its life, the three wormlike mouths Of the snake lady's snake hair? ('head' being too noble and descriptive a term) Parentheses feel a bit too oral, like you'd put an aside in parentheses, while this should really be surrounded by commas instead. looked upwards from its feast of wayward souls. For the first time in its life, searching jaws You mean its searching jaws? Because you said its life and, well... did not partake of the feast of suicides hanging from trees of bone. For the first time in its life, the fleshy, wrinkled limbs and distended torso of the beast raised itself The limbs and torso are not an it, they are a they. Maybe you want to say "the beast raised its fleshy, wrinkled limbs and distended torso" from its eternal hunch to lift itself upward. Three jaws salivated and snapped; the feast was becoming too much to anticipate, yet such anticipation was itself to be savoured, What? an appetizer to the endless repast that it would soon enjoy.

The giant serpent Is this the priestess or the hydra worm or a third snakey sorta thing? coiled itself through the endless halls of its never-finished grand palace, its thousand heads Oh okay. snarling and snapping at the damned souls that were doomed to toil endlessly in its halls- or it would have, PSYCHE. Seriously though, not a good construction to say this thing happened, but actually it didn't. had it not fallen silent this day. Its thousand upon thousand You said it was just a thousand before! heads gazzed Oop, typo again. into the distance, green eyes flashing. Its ophidian See this might be a cool thing to drop in if we didn't already know it was a snake. The snake had snakey jaws? You don't say. jaws, normally filled with spiteful invective, now hissed in laughter. I know it's a snake but "hissed in laughter" is still a weird phrase. At last, at last, at last! Okay, I get it. At last, OKAY! it would be the greatest of all Hell's pontifices, and all would know its might as it once hated theirs! What? All would know its might as it once hated theirs? So it once hated them a whole lot, so everyone's going to know its might a whole lot? It doesn't feel like the two things are comparable enough for that construction.

Thousands of daemons and damned souls stood motionlessly before the sculpture gleaming in the darkness. Without the cold that held them, naught could seperate the ice that made the web from diamond. I don't get what you're trying to say here. Also, until I reread this, I didn't get the idea that the sculpture was the web. Are you trying to say that the web couldn't be physically separated from diamond unless it was warmer, or that the cold is the only indicator that the web is ice and not diamond? She Who? Which of the thousands of motionless demons and or damned souls is she? Because you haven't referred to anyone else in this paragraph yet. was a spider with the head of a woman, her mouth distended obscenely by a pair of massive fangs. Okay, at least here you got to the meat of the description immediately. In days past, Why are we reminiscing here? What's important about this? she would continue weaving her icy web though Hell's depths, to attract her captive audiences, to show that there were none better. Yet, something always gnawed within her, and now she knew what it was- here in the depths, her only audience was that which she could catch. The transitions and tenses don't feel great here. Yet isn't necessary, and now feels ehhh, but I see why the nowness of her realization is important. The 'but now' coming up also doesn't feel great. Maybe you need to make better use of tenses: "Yet something had always gnawed...and now she knew... [...] Now she would have the chance..." But now, she had the chance to show her beauty to all of Hell, that all would know that there were none better than she.

And upon a high mountan, his skin urned Ouch, two typos this close together. and charred under the rays of an eternal sun, an angel stood up with a soft smile. The unbreakable chains which once held him down now shattered easily as he stood and spread his withered wings. How could he not, when he heard the news?

"The throne of Hell is empty! Lucifer is gone!"

Okay, so on a second read, it was more clear what you were going for, and I think I have some structural tips to make it clearer. First off, I didn't get the idea that each paragraph was a new scene. You either need to establish that more clearly, or spend more time establishing each new scene. The idea that came to me, if you want to make this sound a little theatrical, would be to get a little bit of dramatis personae in there, since that's what you're essentially doing here. Like:

quote:

The truth blew past the gates of Pandaemonium on the wings, the cloven hooves, the clawed limbs of those privileged enough to be allowed to leave its bone-white walls. It carried itself on the winds of Hell, drowning the quiet sobs of fields where cut stalks leaked blood and the grains wept. It became pricless merchandise on the endless caravans of the inferno, the sole piece of merchandise that the merchants would give away willingly and otherwise. It was carried on the rhythm of clashing weapons, daemonic armies drilling for what they knew would come.

"Empty! Empty!"

[center]Andromalius - Great Count of Hell, Punisher of Thieves[/center]

Upon a gilded throne, itself placed atop an infinitely tall pillar buried to the hilt in gold and jewels, a four-armed toad smacked its lips hungrily. Its tongue lashed out into its wealth, untold riches sticking to its surface even as its arms reached out and clutched their own handfuls of wealth. The creature held these treasures, each a fortune that would beggar every mortal ruler who had ever and will ever live, and dreamt of the single treasure that would put its own wealth to shame.

Just an example name I pulled out, but it'd serve the purpose of being theatrical and it'd clear up the confusion about the inter-paragraph structure. If that's a little artificial for you, you could instead be sure to start each paragraph with that particular contender's name, to make it clear that we're seeing each of the candidates.

And speaking of the struggle for the throne, this is something I think should come sooner. Holding off on revealing information can be tough, because while you want to give your reader a reason to keep going, you don't want them to get lost with no idea what's going on. I'd bump up the 'throne is empty' idea, put that before introducing the characters. That way, it makes even more sense that you're going through one by one to introduce them all, because now the question isn't what are they all getting up for, but which of these is going to get the throne? If you wanted a reveal at the end, you could keep the 'lucifer is missing' idea until the end. That way, you can still have the reward at the end that gives more context to what's happening, but the motivation of the characters you're introducing is clear: they want the throne. It's just not clear that it's literally Lucifer's throne until the end of the prologue.

Though with all that said, I do want to also say that I'm not saying 'this is how it needs to be done', just that this is how I'd do it if it was me writing this story. If you come up with some other way to fix the clarity issues (which is the one major area that needs work) then that's great too. I think one way you might be able to catch some of this yourself is to read it out loud once or twice at least. If there's parts that feel difficult or that you stumble over in reading to yourself, imagine how someone who didn't write those words themselves is going to feel when they get to that part.

# ¿ Feb 6, 2015 05:31

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

Elpato posted:

Goons, I need your help. My creative writing class is a giant hug box, and I can't get more than a sentence of critique on anything i post. It's getting to be pretty frustrating.
The assignment in this case was a 250 to 300 word short story.

Something Old

Jacob shook out his slicker and boots in the house�s entryway while Tropical Storm Abraham continued its deluge outside. His new wife, Ann, posing with her friends and family warmly welcomed him home from within the frames of a lifetime of photos.
As he entered the kitchen he stopped short. poo poo. A man in a dark coat and still-dripping brimmed hat sat at the kitchen table holding a steaming cup of coffee.
�There you are!� Ann called from next to the coffee pot. �Jake, your dad is hilarious. I�ve gotten two wildly embarrassing stories out of him so far. Who�s Becka?�
Jacob sized up the situation. �He�s my foster father, Ann. My dad passed.�
�Still... He�s got stories.� She smiled behind her coffee mug.
�Can you give us a minute?� No questions, Baby. Please.
�Sure,� she said, raising an eyebrow. She turned to Dad�s ghost. �You and I have more to talk about, sir. Pleasure to finally meet you.�
�Likewise, ma�am,� his familiar southern drawl and gravelly voice were exactly as Jacob remembered.
With Ann safely upstairs, Jacob poured another cup from the pot, keeping Dad within sight. �Freshen that up for you?� Jacob slipped a boning knife into his sleeve.
�No thanks. How did I die, by the way?�
�Hunting accident.� Figuratively true.
Dad chuckled. �What was I hunting?�
�Big game.�
�Does Annie know you�re hiding?�
�And she never asks why.�
Rain drummed on the windows as they sipped their coffee.
�Guess you�re wondering how I�m here.�
The wind changed.
�I know the basics...a Beckoning, right?�
Dad nodded gravely and leaned forward. �Give me what They want so I can rest again.�
Jacob massaged his temples. �And if I refuse I�ll have to put you to rest.�
�That, my boy, is the long and short of it.�

Writing a story within 300 words is tough, since you don't have a lot of space to get through the entire plot arc. That said, I don't think this works well on its own. What's different at the end from the beginning? At the end, Jacob knows his dad's ghost is there, and there's something undefined he has to do. But throughout this, he hasn't really taken any action of his own, not even really to make a choice. He just has his choices laid out for him, and then it's over. There's a lot of vague things that are introduced but then not closed: mysterious circumstances around the dad's death, the fact that he's hiding, what a Beckoning is, who They are, and Jacob slipping the knife into his sleeve.. These things don't need to be laid out in detail, but by the end of it, I don't know who They are beyond the assumption that they're the ones who did the Beckoning, and I don't know what a Beckoning is beyond the fact that it makes ghosts appear. There's a lot of words spent introducing things, and none spent on resolving any of the things.

I do appreciate the setting detail that ghosts are just a normal thing, and I like the way you introduce that not by telling it to us but by showing her reaction to it. There's some issues with clarity right then though, because I get the flow of conversation is 'Who's Becka', 'he's my foster father, my dad [the man with us now] is dead', but a careless read could get you 'Your dad is hilarious, [section Jacob ignores because he takes offense to calling his foster father his dad]', 'he's [the man with us now] my foster father, my dad [who is elsewhere] is dead'. Later on, it gets cleared up, but that section could be clearer. Other than that, there's only a few things that stick out for me. The beginning line, especially the second sentence, reads oddly to me. It gave me the impression that Ann wasn't home. I know this is a work where you had to conserve words, but without tags, sometimes it's hard to tell who's saying what, particularly when there's three people in the room.

# ¿ Apr 16, 2015 19:53

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

If anyone wants to read over my old gamerdome entry, that'd be great. I'm trying to get the hang of sincere-yet-pulpy action stuff.

# ¿ May 17, 2015 09:37

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

There's some good stuff in here and there's some stuff in here that didn't land for me. It's fine if you feel like this was more of a writing exercise than a finished piece, but I'm going to dig into some more granular details as well as the broader stuff. (Also, I put line breaks between your paragraphs, because it's easier to read that way.)

mr meowzers posted:

It's another night in. Just me, a movie, and Mary. Work was tedium and I don't feel up to playing video games. Tedium is a difficult thing to make interesting, and at this point, I am feeling kind of bored. Besides, Mary's in a more amiable mood, it took me a moment to realize 'more amiable' was in comparison to his mood, or is it in comparison to her normal mood? unclear either way so I should try to keep her happy. She sits lightly not sure of this adverb use, especially when it comes to adverbs that 'weaken' the verb on the other end of the couch while I cycle through options on the streaming video service. That's an awkward phrase where you could have just said Netflix. It's hard to see her clearly, but I still try to register her reactions whenever I linger on a video. Her wavy black hair is hanging over a lot of her face. Anybody who didn't know her like I do would assume she's had a bad day, or they'd just pretend she wasn't there. That last part is a bit confusing. I get the idea is that her presence is one that people prefer to overlook, but consider the context. Anyone who didn't know her that well would pretend she wasn't there...while picking out a movie to watch together? There is the time she scared the poo poo out of the landlord, but he just swore she was somebody who used to live here. I'm not sure what you're trying to say here. Her whole Ring thing scared him, but...she looks like someone who used to live there? I don't see how this is relevant to building their character dynamic, it's like saying one time she surprised someone by opening the door just as they were about to turn the doorknob from the other side.

Her strained eyes weird phrasing twitch up also weird phrasing at the screen when I stop on a documentary about cats in Rome. Cats in Rome it is. She doesn't like when I look directly at her, but I more than just glance. More awkward wording. The sentence feels like it's structured to move from something weaker to something stronger ("she doesn't like anything more than a glance, but i do much more than glance") but you have it moving from something strong [looking directly at her] to something weak [more than just glance]. I'm trying to think of a construction that would work with the inversion, maybe like "even though she doesn't like when i look directly at her, i more than just glance". Structure aside, it seems extremely antisocial to not even like being looked at. So she's perfectly happy to have other people "pretend she wasn't there"? If he's a special category of people she's more comfortable with, it doesn't come off like that, it comes off like he's got a weird un-reciprocated crush on her. Outside of the strongly negative aura she puts off, Mary is pretty much in the average range. I think this is the goony line Sebmojo was talking about, "strongly negative aura" is vague and weird and "pretty much in the average range" just makes it weirder and more like he's trying to rate her. In fact, she's easier to define by the things that she isn't than the things that she is, but I try. This is a nice line. She's pale. Her hair is black and wavy. She's a bit unkempt, but to be fair, the past few years have been unkind to her. I was kind of hoping you'd describe her in terms of what she isn't here, then have him struggle to describe what she is. Maybe it'd even be better to have him actually do that, instead of have him tell us about that. Very unkind. The next part is difficult to keep in positive terms. She's quiet. She speaks sometimes, but it's usually confused. When she overflows, she tends to blow up in hysterical sobbing or howling rage. If I had more self-respect or will to stand up and be my own person, I'd have left already. Most people do. This is the interesting part so far: she's a shy goonette who's not fun to be around, he's boring and schlubby himself, but there's some kind of connection between them. What hidden experiences and wants bring these two nerds together? Then again, what else am I doing with my life?

She glances at me briefly, but looks down, then back at the screen. I made her self-conscious again. Well, I suppose I should eat tonight. If this is meant to underscore the dispassionate attitude he has toward life, believe me, I've already gotten that point. The walk to the kitchen is brief enough, this line doesn't add anything at all and I grab the two styrofoam boxes, one with General Tso's chicken, the other with beef broccoli. The beef broccoli goes in front of her, the lid flipped open. I stab a pair of chopsticks into the rice and leave it there, because that's how she prefers that I offer it. This is another nice character moment, where we see (without telling!) that he knows her preferences and he's trying to make her happy in these little mundane ways. I start eating my culturally disingenuous dish this is one of those non-joke things that are really tempting to put in writing but you really shouldn't, because they're just witty enough not to blend into the prose, but not witty enough to actually be funny/a joke and watch more facts about cats. Cats in Rome. Apparently they enjoy the Colosseum.

Our first meeting was very confusing Okay, so tell me about it.. She just seemed so lost, and I know I was lost. I'd make a joke about show don't tell, but you didn't really tell me anything about their first meeting. I don't know why it was confusing. Mary can be off-putting to most people, but I accept her as she is. Already got this more elegantly from some of those character beats up above. I just sometimes wish I knew how to help her. Like usual, she isn't touching her food. Why not? He did the chopsticks thing. Does she just not eat at all? I suppose it can't be helped. I used to try talking to her more, but she isn't much for discussions. She isn't much for anything, really, but her presence is strangely comforting. Another time adverb use weakens the prose--strangely how? Is she comforting like a cat, mysterious and distant but vaguely friendly? Some part of myself wishes more of her. More how? This is an interesting feeling, but if it's only in vague terms, I can't get a good grasp on it. We have a relationship, but I really don't know what it is. I know that we aren't more than friends, but is she really a friend? She basically sits in my apartment while I try to take care of her. This is a weird situation to introduce without much backstory. "Taking care of her" how? How was she getting along before him? Sometimes I think I'd do anything to see her smile, but maybe I'm just being overly dramatic.

We're a half hour into the documentary and she scoots closer. Before I can get any kind of hope/disappointment cycle awkward but at least it's compact into my head, she leans over and lays her head on my shoulder. This isn't the first time, but it's always strange. Why? I can feel pressure but no weight. It's like she's not there. It's like she's there. It's not like anything. I like this part. Last time I tried to put an arm around her, but that didn't work out so well so I'll let her rest as she pleases. Why didn't it work out so well? What happened? Besides, I'm done eating. Don't care. I can't say I give a poo poo about cats in Rome, I know other people in CC have stronger opinions about cursing than me but here it doesn't really fit the tone, it makes it suddenly rather aggressive but I typically don't let people get within a certain radius of me anyways. Why is it okay if she does it? I'm divided on whether I like this detail, but I think it would be better served earlier on. It doesn't seem to match up super well with some other things, though--if he doesn't like people getting close to him, and he's not sure why it's okay when she gets close, why did he try to get even closer by putting his arm around her?

Well, she was here first. What? It isn't her apartment anymore. What? I did read her diary, though. I understand why she did it what did she do? and I wish I knew how to help her, but I secretly don't mind the company. Am I keeping her here? An interesting thought line to follow, but it feels a bit plopped in here. Then again, I don't have a clear read on any of this paragraph. I like the self-awareness of "maybe we're both so antisocial we're enabling each other" but she's so passive I don't know what she'd be doing if she wasn't there. so far, it doesn't feel like she has a place to be that's not here.

I glance at her face over my shoulder. Well, I don't have much purpose other than this anyways. My degree in Anthropology doesn't amount to jack or poo poo. Again, the cursing works against your tone. I work in a call center. I don't have anybody else in my life. I can't claim to be good at anything. All I have is the head on my shoulder, cool, I like that line and she doesn't have anything but unfinished business that she won't talk about. not as big on this one How much do the lips have to curve to constitute a smile? Ends a bit limply, like he's trying to compromise on the one bit of conflict he's got.

So, if I wasn't reading this to crit it, would I consider it worth my time to read? Not really, but as a writing exercise, getting some stretches in, seeing what you can do, I'd say it was fine. You said it was a character sketch, though I felt like it was more of a sketch trying to work out the relationship between these two characters. I can't really say what makes Mary tick, and though I've got a clearer idea of protag guy's character, most of what I know of him is in relation to Mary, and what I can read of his personality from that. But the good thing there is that since it's about a relationship, it's not quite as boring as a single character might be. Like Seb said, there's hints of motivation and conflict and change, so I could see a good story spinning out of this somehow, but it would depend on your ability to set them in an interesting situation. In terms of relatability, there's not a whole lot I can hang my hat on for protag guy, because he's a bit of a sad sack wet noodle, but what warmed me toward him the most was the chopsticks in the rice, which gave me the strongest 'good person' vibes. Mary's deliberately written as a mystery so there's not a ton I can read off of her.

As a concluding thought, even though I dug out a lot of things that didn't work for me, overall it wasn't bad and even if it was kind of boring and vague in parts, there's parts in there that show you know your way around words. I'd love to see you do more writing, cause if you polished up a bit I bet it'd sound pretty slick.

# ¿ Sep 16, 2015 11:18

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

I would not have picked that up in the slightest, because as it stands, it just sounds like a weird girl and a sad guy living together.

To turn it into a story, you'd need some central conflict, which could be internal to the relationship, dealing in some way with the difficulty of a ghost and a human becoming friends, or it could be something external to the relationship. Either way, someone would have to want something, have trouble getting it, and take steps toward achieving that goal..

However long it ends up, I would say absolutely do not try to hide the fact that she's a ghost. That is some interesting poo poo right there. Stories trade on interesting poo poo, that's what they're built on. You wouldn't be reading a story if it wasn't interesting, and hiding what's interesting in a story until late in the game just makes most of your story boring (and it increases your chances of having a twist ending, which is a terrible thing to have, because a twist invalidates the tone and tension you've built up throughout the story). You could get away with hints for a little while if they're interesting hints, like what the heck is up with this girl, why is she acting weird, then drop, hey, she's a ghost, and then move onto the conflict.

The trick with an interesting concept like that is that while it's interesting, your conflict has to be something more than just "a thing, interesting". And the conflict is going to be the meat of your story. By all means, hang that conflict on the fact that she's a ghost and he's a guy so inured to horror and so bland and desperate for female attention that he'll hang out with her. Let what's interesting inform your conflict, but make sure you get to that conflict nice and quick and don't focus on drawing out some sweet reveal. Deliberately hiding information from the audience that the character would know doesn't make for an interesting story, it makes for a frustrating exercise in poor communication, and it makes me, the reader, distrust you, the author.

What I'd do if I was writing a story out of that sketch would be to snag some of those good lines, maybe toss them all into the first paragraph with some evocative hook at the beginning, and then on the next line go "oh yeah, all that stuff i just said, it's cause she's a ghost," and then bam, you have the rest of the story to show us the interesting consequences of the interesting thing and how the interesting thing leads to an interesting conflict. (That's assuming a short-story-length piece, if you were going longer you'd have more of a grace period but I'd still expect things to get interesting pretty soon, and you'd still want to introduce the fact that she's a ghost early on.)

# ¿ Sep 16, 2015 12:16

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

mr meowzers posted:

Hm. Kinda wondering if I could get away with putting the reveal of her being a ghost at the end, or is that still trying too hard to be clever? I know that under 1000 words means being more direct and more telling rather than showing, but I feel like saying she's a ghost at the beginning is like explaining a joke before you tell it.

Don't put it at the end. Not because it's too clever, but because it's a bad ending. Dropping in the fact that she's a ghost makes so much more of the nonsense in that piece make sense, and it makes the fact that he's formed this relationship with her more meaningful. It doesn't add any of the conflict/resolution you need to make a complete story, but actually saying that she's a ghost leads to much more fertile ground for conflict.

Speaking of bad twist endings, I just made an effortpost over in the Fiction Advice thread about why twist endings suck, which I will quote here. (This isn't specifically in response to you, more in response to all the CC stories I've read with twist endings that sucked.)

Djeser posted:

Twist Endings Suck

1. Twist endings suck because they undermine the rest of the story. An ending that changes the entire context of everything you've just read wrenches away all the emotional capital, all the dramatic tension, all the excitement and interest. Suddenly, nothing is what it meant before, so why did the author waste my time like that? However much the author made me care about the story I was reading, a twist ending means, woah, hey, suddenly I'm reading a different story, one that�s not the one I cared about. Twist endings make the rest of the story feel less real and resonant and more like a setup to a punchline.

2. Twist endings suck because they rely on withholding information from the reader. This is especially egregious in works written from the perspective of a character who should know this information. Now, I'm not saying you need to put all your cards on the table, but if you're withholding information that is obvious and relevant to the characters, all you're doing is making me feel stupid for the fact that you didn't tell me something. I remember some advice I heard about writing mystery stories, along the lines of "never let your character know something that the reader couldn't". Imagine a mystery story where in the end, the detective solves the mystery based on a bunch of clues the reader never saw. Or imagine the detective solving the mystery like, "Ah, well, we know that alien wasps require two power crystals per hour to maintain their cloaking, so that white powder on the late Mr. Prendergast's chest told me we were dealing with alien wasps," when up until the end, it's been standard Victorian mystery-solving.

3. Twist endings suck because they're not an ending. At best, they're meta-endings, getting their legitimacy from the fact that the story is over now. But twist endings don't resolve your story--see point number 1. They unresolve your story. Now, it's suddenly a different story, but it's also over. It doesn't conclude the narrative arc in any meaningful way, it just ends abruptly. There's no sense of closure apart from the fact that there's no more words on the page.

4. Twist endings suck because they screw up a good story's structure. In a story, the early parts are where you introduce the information and the rules your story operates under. The later parts are where you move those pieces around, see how they react together, and bring it to an end. I'm not saying you can't have a hinted-at reveal near the end (oh no, your brother was the killer all along!), but you definitely can't have something that changes the rules at the end (oh no, werewolves exist and your brother, who is the killer, was a werewolf all along!). I expect a story's background to be fairly consistent once I pass the midway point. By then, I should know what kind of story I'm dealing with, and a twist ending puts off a crucial piece of the story until the end.

5. Twist endings suck because they�re designed to make the reader feel dumb. Here's a riddle: What's worth more, a new hundred-dollar-bill, or a five-year-old one? Here's the answer: A new hundred-dollar-bill is worth more than a five-year-old one-dollar-bill. Yeah, that riddle sucks. I hate riddles that rely on communicating poorly, because all they're there to do is to make the riddler feel smart and the riddlee feel dumb. Twist endings are like that. They make you feel like a clever author and make me feel like a dumb reader. Why do I want to read your story if it's set up to make me feel like a big loser at the end for not 'getting' the fact that you were being deliberately obtuse? Some people like feeling smart by figuring out twists, but it�s still an ending that�s designed to make some people feel smart.

6. Twist endings suck because they violate the trust between reader and author. When I go to read someone's story, I'm putting trust in them. I'm trusting that this story's going to make sense. I'm trusting that it's not going to waste my time. I know that what I'm reading is fiction, but I'm trusting the author to have created a consistent reality within that fiction. And I'm trusting that the author is going to tell me what I need to know to understand what's going on. If the author's trying to lead me on, planning to do a bait-and-switch with a twist ending, when I hit that twist, I'm going to lose all the trust I had in the author.

7. Twist endings suck because they turn your story into the setup for a punchline. No matter how much work goes into the beginning, a twist ending reduces the rest of the story into the preface for the twist. Sometimes, this can work in your favor, if you intend the whole piece to be a setup to a punchline, but if you want the beginning of your story to have resonance of its own and be meaningful, don�t use a twist ending.

8. Twist endings suck because they�re easy to use wrong. I have actually seen good stories make use of a twist ending. To bring back the mystery story example, I�ve read a story online that ended with basically, �all that stuff you were unable to figure out, mister detective, was because I�m actually a werewolf and my partner is a ghost,� and they still managed to fashion that into some sort of satisfying ending by focusing on the character�s reaction to that reveal and the choices he made because of it. It�s possible for a twist ending to not suck. That doesn�t mean you should write them, though. They're tough and tricky and require creatively breaking a lot of rules of good writing, and you shouldn't break rules until you understand fully why those rules are there in the first place.

# ¿ Sep 16, 2015 23:12

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

I read through it and while I don't have the energy for a full line crit, here's a few things I noticed:

There's a lot of staccato sentence fragments and they make it more choppy than it should be. A lot of them are closer to punctuation errors, too. Your first line feels like it should be "There is only one thing worse than suicide: surviving a suicide." (As a note, I'd change the phrasing to say "worse than surviving a suicide" so the parallel construction works better.) Other places, it's just used for repetition in a way that could be cut without losing anything.

There's a lot of unfocused musing too, especially in the first paragraph. "What an odd behavior that is," and stuff like that, that's all just vague conjecture. There's other places where you use too many words to say something that's more effective in a shorter form. "So killing yourself is not as easy of a task as it may initially seem." -> "Killing yourself isn't as easy as it seems." This goes for a lot of sentences, there's plenty of word cruft to cut.

"Only darkness prevailed. And calm. That too." Cut out "that too," entirely redundant. Things are at least getting a bit more grounded in character and action here.

The thing about an emotional smile I felt was good, it felt real and experiential while also being pretty novel.

Mammoth versus dino fight is a little monkeycheese for something that's supposed to be a very emotional sort of scene, it undercuts a lot of the mood that's been set up.

It ends on an interesting idea, the fact that someone who's killed themselves and been buried alive would want to just stay there is a decent inversion of the 'waking up in a coffin' stock plot. Unfortunately, it does also mean that your character's chosen to do nothing by the end, which is kind of boring. Overall, there's some good ideas in there, but it really needs you to go in with a weed whacker and cut back a lot of that overgrown prose that's bogging down the point. It's fine to let characters take time to think, but thinking should be balanced out with doing to make the thinking relevant, and your character here doesn't do a whole lot, so I'm hoping there's more doing coming up after this point.

# ¿ Sep 17, 2015 23:21

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

You mentioned working on narrative voice, so I'm going to do a line critique and let you know where the tone works or doesn't.

The Witness posted:

Griselda climbed a steep slope up the mountainside and into a small cavern. She removed her heavy coat and sat down. The winter winds howled outside, but she ignored it. She used her coat as a pillow and rested.

So far, this is pretty utilitarian, but it's okay. Not good, but okay. In terms of changes, the first line doesn't capture me at all, and your sentences are all structured similarly. Also, there's not much sensory detail--I know that detail takes longer to convey than simple facts, but even just one bit of detail can color the whole scene for me, the reader. For instance, you could dwell on how cold she feels without her coat, and then that gets me thinking about how how tired she must be. Or if you dwelled a bit on the starkness of the mountain, it would make me think about how determined she is. Or you could focus on the inhospitable interior of the cave, or the softness of her coat, or whatever you wanted.

The other big thing that's hit me so far is that there's a lot of distance between the narrator and Griselda, since I have no access to her thoughts, feelings, or sensory experiences. You can write a detached story and make it work, but I don't think this means to be detached like that. The advice I offered above, wrapping some sensory information in there, would help bring me closer to what Griselda is experiencing and make me sympathize with her. As an alternate way to think about it, you could present this series of events as told through Griselda's voice--not necessarily in first person, but in the style in which she might tell this story to someone, including her thoughts and feelings. "Even though the winds were howling outside, I was too tired to care. I pulled off my coat and bundled it up under my head, and then I was asleep."

The closer you let me, the reader, get to your viewpoint character (Griselda), the more I'll identify with her. A list of actions doesn't get me very close to her mental state, but if I know why she's doing things (she was too tired to care) or what she's feeling (the cold bit her bare skin) or even just what she's thinking (she let out a sigh of relief; she was finally here) then I'll be more engaged with the character and interested in reading.

Inside the cave, a hole You use 'hole' four times in five sentences. Not only is that repetition going to grate on the reader, but I get the feeling that this is meant to be a deeper passage into the cave. The word 'hole' makes it sound like a round hole in the ground you could drop through. descended deeper into the darkness. Griselda stared at the hole. A wave of warmth emitted from the hole, followed by a bright orange light and a scream. This is meant to be fire, but tonally, it sounds more like someone flashed an orange strobe light and let hot air waft out of the hole. 'A wave of warmth' sounds gentle, and 'a bright orange light' sounds pretty static and plain for fire, which tends to range in color and intensity and is both mobile (flickering) and directional (casts strong shadows). Fire would more likely cast bits of flickering light on the edges of rocks (since it's coming from deeper in.) Afterwards, a munching sound 'Munching' is too comedic if you're going for a serious tone. It's more akin to 'nom nom' than grisly chewing. echoed throughout the cavern.

Griselda rose, approached the hole, and descended into a large chamber. She focused on the sleeping creature in front of her. Bones of cattle littered the floor, and Griselda stepped over some ashes. The gray beast resembled a snake curled into itself to sleep. Its wings Then it doesn't really resemble a snake, does it? I have a strong feeling this is a dragon at this point, but you've only said that this is a 'creature' and a 'beast that resembled a snake', so I am imagining a large gray snake. If it's a dragon, just say it. There's absolutely no need to be coy, especially if your viewpoint character, Griselda, knows what a dragon is. covered the beast as it napped.

�Ganeshka, wake up!� Griselda yelled.

A blue eye opened up and stared at her. �Who are you?� it asked.

�Griselda. I want to talk to you.� This sounds like she's addressing herself, as in "Griselda, I want to talk to you.". I know she isn't, so if you stick a dialogue tag in the middle ("Griselda," she said. "I want to talk to you") that conveys the fact that it's two separate ideas. Or put an action beat in there, or something.

The second eyelid opened. �What do you want?�

�I want you to stop attacking my town.�

Griselda heard a rumble in Ganeshka�s throat. �I never attacked the town�s citizens. I only fed on its livestock.�

�Is that your excuse?� Griselda crossed her arms. �I come from a family of farmers, and last winter we nearly starved thanks to you.�

Ganeska raised his head. �I need to eat, and you farmers provide a nice source of meats. You need a stronger reason to convince me.� Griselda and the dragon kind of sound the same, which is to say they both sound kind of bland. I know Griselda is upset and the dragon is kind of uncaring, but I can't tell if Griselda is eloquent or uneducated, if she's exasperated or desperate or what. Likewise, there's a lot of ways the dragon could be taking its lines--it could be sarcastic, could be pompous, could just be disinterested, but the problem is I can't tell.

Note that I am not not NOT saying that you should tell me these things. But if you have a voice in mind for Griselda and the dragon, I should be able to pick it up from the dialogue itself. For example, look at the dragon's last line. Here's a couple variants, trying to bring out character through the way he phrases things.

"You need a stronger reason to convince me." - original, kind of bored and logical
"You'll need to be more convincing than that." - more taunting
"You expect that to convince me?" - more sarcastic
"You'll need a far better reason to convince me." - more pompous

Likewise, for a snippet of Griselda's dialogue.

"I come from a family of farmers," - original
"My whole family is farmers," - exasperated, emotional
"We're farmers, we depend on livestock," - invested, reasoning

When you're writing dialogue, you should always think about how the character and how they're going to communicate their point. Often, it depends on their opinion of the person--you'd describe how your day went differently depending on whether you were saying it to a person on the bus, or your friend, or your boss, or your mom. If the dragon doesn't care, he'll be more disaffected or sarcastic; if he's actively looking down on humans, he might be more conceited. If Griselda's desperate, she might be trying to make an emotional appeal to the dragon's mercy, but if she's clever and trying to help the dragon, she might be more likely to reason with it.

Griselda glanced at the exit. �I didn�t come alone.�

�What do you mean?�

�A war party is on its way to kill you. I scouted ahead to determine your location. This sounds really technical for a farmer girl from town. Instead of 'determine your location' she's probably going to say something like 'find out where your cave was'. 'Scouted ahead' is a pretty tactical term for her to be pulling out too. If you don�t stop attacking the town, they will kill you unless you flee.� Here's what's confusing a little bit, plotwise. Is she telling the dragon to stop attacking, or to run? Or both? It seems like if people are actually marching toward her right now, it's too late to promise not to attack.

�Why should I flee?�

�I can�t imagine you�re strong enough to fight them all off.� She stood firm. If she didn't literally stand firm right then, this should be replaced with something else. Don't have someone say something, and then have the dialogue tag say the same thing.

�What makes you think they can kill me?�

�Um�� Griselda back pedaled. Again, if she's not literally backpedaling, you don't need to tell me, because I can see from the dialogue. �They have swords and war bows capable of piercing your skin. They have archers and skilled warriors climbing the mountainside as we speak. There are a hundred men, mercenaries and townsfolk, who are approaching your cavern right now.� Again, very military/technical for a farmgirl.

The beast stomped one of his legs. Without further context I don't know what emotion this signifies. �Who is their leader?�

�Uh, Jack Blueburn. His party will destroy you unless you leave my town alone. 'Um' or 'Uh' next to this hypercompetent, unflinching description of physical force is really tonally jarring. This goes for a lot of this dialogue, but think how someone with Griselda's background would say this. 'His party will destroy you unless you leave my town alone' or 'his men are going to kill you if you don't leave my town alone' or even 'you've got to leave my town alone, or else he'll kill you,' depending on whether she's focusing on 'leave my town alone' (next to last sentence) or 'or else he'll kill you' (last sentence).

�What human names their kid Blueburn?� This has been very dramatic up to this point, and a pause for a 'weird name' gag seems out of place, plus if it's a last name it's not like his parents had a lot of choice in the matter.

Griselda shrugged her shoulders. �I don�t know. Regardless, he sent me here to negotiate with you if possible.� This is weird, because up until this point, I was kind of assuming that she was trying to save the dragon in spite of the army marching to kill it. This is where having a better sense of her feelings and motivations would help.

The behemoth Dude, it's a dragon. You can say it. lifted the rest of his body. �So you�re telling me Jack sent you ahead as a negotiator, alone, without any support?�

�Yes. I am negotiating with you to leave my town alone.�

�You said earlier you were scouting ahead to find my lair. Now you tell me you�re a diplomat.� All right, so that was on purpose, but the problem here was that because I'm not privy to her thoughts on any level, I had no sense of whether she was lying then, or lying now, or if she's been lying both times. Or if she's telling the truth.

The color drained out of Griselda�s face. �I-�

�- think you�re lying to me.�

�But��

The dragon bared its fangs at Griselda. �You aren�t very clever, Griselda. You should know better trying to trick a creature like me.�

The creature engulfed the whole chamber in flames. And then it just ends, but the problem is that now I have absolutely zero idea what her motivations were at all. Why was she lying to the dragon? What was the truth? Because I don't know why she was doing this, I can't really feel bad. The distance that your prose kept from Griselda's thoughts and feelings meant that I couldn't identify with her as a character, and it makes the whole 'I see through your lies' thing harder for me, the reader, because now I literally don't know what's true about her. All I know for sure is that a girl died to a dragon. I mean, if she's some kind of rogue trying to steal the dragon's treasure, which is never mentioned so wouldn't make sense but ANYWAY. If she's trying to trick the dragon, then you'd need at the very least a scene at the beginning that establishes what the truth is (in the rogue example, she stashes all her roguin' gear and puts on some peasant clothes, so we know she's putting on an act), or to reveal that she's trying to trick it through internal monologue, or something.

This feels like a rough concept of a story, and I like the reasoning with the beast trope in fantasy, but there's so little actual character or motivation here that it doesn't feel like it's got a plot, it's just an open space you could squeeze a couple different plots into.

# ¿ Jan 3, 2016 23:00

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

But in Berserk, that scene barely even makes sense because Guts is so traumatized by his childhood that it takes a serious relationship before he's okay with people even touching him. Sure, it sets the mood, but it actually makes no sense with the characterization.

# ¿ Mar 27, 2016 10:58

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

MrSlam posted:

His hand was wet. He knew what it was. It hurt more pulling out than it did going in, but that little mattered at this point. Trying very hard not to make a sex joke. Gerhold gripped half the shortspear in his massive hands and ripped it from his gullet. Continuing to try not to make a sex joke. The pain thundered and cackled through him but it was already a world away; another place, another person, like a waking dream. Not a bad opening, a guy pulling a spear out of his throat. I want to know more about this man, such as his motivations.

�Alone!� he tossed the spear back That dialogue should be a separate sentence. at the hunter, clumsily enough to topple it end over end, but forceful enough to embed it deep in the forest soil. �Let me alone!�

The hunter was frantically loading another shortspear to his streiker I don't know what this is. After a moment's thought, I figured probably a giant crossbow, but it's not good if a reader has to pause to figure out what you're talking about. but there wouldn�t be enough time. In four thumping strides Gerhold was already upon the man when pinpricks shot up and down his right side. 'When' is not the word you should be using to connect those clauses. That should be at least two sentences. Five arrows Are these shortspears or something different? were now As opposed to when, exactly? If you say 'now' in past tense, you're implying that it happened since the last action, and the last action was the man getting pinpricks. sticking out at odd angles, oozing a foul murky blood. It shocked more than it hurt, but a pathetic whimper He tore a spear out of his throat, why is he whimpering pathetically about getting shot with arrows that might be spears? escaped him before he realized the hunter was already away running through the trees. Oh wait, did the hunter shoot Gerhold? Because that's not what you said. When you use a pronoun, people are going to slot in the closest applicable noun. If you say 'Gerhold was upon the man when pinpricks hit his side,' the word 'his' is closest to 'the man', not 'Gerhold'.

�I�ve done you no harm!� Instinctively he grasped at a thick stone, whipped around, and let it crash How generous of him to let it crash. into a tree where two hidden archers tumbled to the earth. Split this into two sentences at 'where'. It's so long that it loses all momentum and the subjects get confused. 'The boulder crashed into a tree where two hidden archers tumbled into the earth' pales in comparison to 'The boulder crashed into a tree. Two hidden archers tumbled out of its branches.' �Let me live and die as I will!� Six mighty strides across the forest floor brought him to the dazed young man in the brown hood. You know, the dazed young man? Actually, I don't know, because as far as I know no one in this story is young or wearing a brown hood and I don't know why either of those facts are important. Fingers thick as branches gripped his tunic and drew it tight. Gerhold brought him up to eye level and held him against the tree. The archer was handsome. Trying very hard right now to not make the sex jokes. He had a strong chin, dark eyes, long hair, and the kind of face that would win him the love of anyone he put his mind to. Okay, thanks for the list of characteristics. The last bit about his face was more interesting than what kind of hair he has, at least. I wouldn't say it's showing instead of telling, because it's still telling, but you're telling me something interesting about his handsomeness. Cut the part where you already said he was handsome and that one half-sentence about his face would be acceptable. Gerhold hated him for what he was, as much as any man had hated him. Pronoun confusion again. Does Gerhold hate the archer as much as any man hated the archer (because he's jealous of his handsomeness) or does Gerhold hate the archer as much as any man hated Gerhold (because of reciprocal hatred)? �You want to die?� he screamed through greasy tears. Ew why are they greasy? �You want your graves�� his voice broke. The archer was so afraid of him. Like he�d seen a monster. I think he's afraid of you because you threw a boulder at him and could rip him apart, guy.

KTHUNK! Okay, pulp onamatopoeia in a serious action story, a bold and probably stupid choice.

The tip of the shortspear was barely to the left of the first spear. Which one, the one he pulled out of his throat? I don't know which is first. Gerhold vomited mud-stained blood down his front like a babe. Why is his blood muddy? Thunder flashed in that other place That one throwaway line in the beginning about him being in another place? Okay, bring that metaphor back. I figured it was about shock, but apparently it's about escapism or something. as the reality of the wound struck him harder than the shortspear itself. �RAAAGH!� Capitals and bold means I'm mad! You wouldn't be able to tell otherwise. He pulled the archer back and slammed him against the tree. He did it again�and again. One! Two! Three! Four! Five! Ellipses and exclamation marks are punctuation that dictate how something should be spoken. They're fine in dialogue, but they don't make a lot of sense in your narrative prose unless you've got a conversational tone for the viewpoint character. (As in, the story reads like someone recounting the story to you in their own words.) He heaved, and as his chest shuddered up and down blood black spittle Blood-black spittle? Black blood and spittle? I don't know! seeped from his mouth.

He�d left them. He left them behind in the Ubelwald. What? But he�d left them before in the Volklands hadn�t he? Who and what? There would always be men like this; This should be a colon since you're giving an example. this handsome young hero, lifeless and shattered in his stony grip. She�d lied to him. Who? A warm, soft, beautiful lie, but now it was far behind him in the south. Who and what? There were no lies in the dark forests of the Firlands. What and where?

The dead archer spun into the underbrush where he threw him. A third shortspear was no doubt being loaded in a clever blindspot. I have no idea of where this is taking place, other than that there are boulders and trees. A nod to physical blocking like this just underscores the fact that I have no concrete location to pin them to. There was no running. If he couldn�t find peace in the green hell of Firland, What and where? then maybe there�d be peace in the other world. What?

He saw it coming this time, a silvery flash in the muted Comma. scattered sunlight. He dodged as well a thing of his size Which is? could, but it caught him in a ring finger. There was no pain Comma. only grey green meat. Why is his finger meat grey and green? The silhouette of the hunter slung his streiker Is it a silhouette of a striker? and began to run. �WIRR�NGHHEHAarrr�� I can slap my keyboard too. ieowa;jfrewao;iiiiiiiiitereaoq he struggled to shout at them, taunt them to kill him, but whatever injuries the spears had wrought robbed him of speech. The thunder he�d hidden in that other place struck him fully now, Wow that's a very bad phrase. I understand it, but even metaphorically 'hiding thunder' doesn't make sense, you could muffle or mute it or something but you can't hide thunder, and 'that other place' is a really juvenile way of putting it. and it suddenly got hard to breathe. His boulder Hyphenate. sized knee sunk to the forest floor. It wouldn�t move. He shouted at it, God drat it, knee. cursed it with all the dark words he knew. But we know he already can't talk.

The right side of his face was scratchy and cold. Did he forget to shave? He felt around him Himself? with a ruined hand. There was a wall of soil there. 'My face feels scratchy' is a phrase that refers not to what your face is feeling, but how your face itself feels. When I have stubble, my face feels scratchy. When I am lying on the ground, my face feels scratched. He hadn�t realized he�d fallen to the earth. How long had he been lying there? Seconds? Hours? Shadows moved in front of his eyes. He couldn�t see what they were, only that they were up close.

�It�s breathing,� came a voice stern and arrogant. �Hand it to me.� A glinting silver shadow If it's silver it's not a shadow. passed into view.

�You�d need an axe, I think.� The other voice was soft and scared. The blade Comma. slow and strong Comma. A statement where you're making an aside like that needs commas around it. made its way through Gerhold�s back. There was no strength to scream.

�Burning hells,� came the first voice. �What is this thing?� The blade moved back and forth as whatever put it there in the first place Unnecessarily vague, I know one of the voices did it. attempted to retrieve it.

A humming silence followed and Gerhold thought back to the Volklands. A golden land, of happy people. A land of generic platitudes. It brought him comfort. She was so kind to him. Who? A mother�s lie. What? Was she his mother? It was hard to remember so he believed it was so. There were people like him, and places for people like him, but there was only one Gerhold Comma. she said. That much was true.

The blade moved into him again. In its own horrific way, the Ubelwald was a comforting place too. It was cold and harsh, but freer than any life he�d known. Brothers and sisters, creatures cursed by life and haunted by death. It was family.

It was peace.

He hadn�t even felt the blade retreat. It was dark now and he couldn�t breathe. He hadn�t breathed in quite a long time, and yet his eyes were open.

Another shadow walked before him.

�Loyal subject, noble son,� the voice slithered into his mind. �Take up your burden�and walk.� Gerhold�s heart beat inside him for the first time in hours. �I command you.� Oh sweet an ending that makes no sense with anything that came before it.

In the line crit I gave a lot of specific feedback so here's some general feedback: Firstly, there's so much that goes unexplained in this: place-names, people and devices, and it's hard in an excerpt this short to get any sense of it. With what little German roots I know, I can figure that Volklands are where people live and the Ubelwald is an evil forest. And I guess the Firlands have fur trees. I could get the gist of it, but I don't want to have to get the gist of a story, I want to understand a story. There's too much worldbuilding in this small area, and it's not introduced in a way that's really all that relevant to what's happening.

Second and more importantly, by the end I'd figured out his motivations, that he was just trying to survive in a place that treats him as dangerous, due to his unspecified but large size. But the problem is that within the text, he's actually pretty violent. Yes, it's in self-defense, but it's just a fight scene while he wishes he didn't have to fight. I don't get to see him struggling with anything other than not dying, then getting mad and killing someone, then feeling bad for it. There was some vague character movement at the end, with him accepting that there's a beauty to being free and being united in mortality, but then the ending comes and he's brought back to life. I don't understand why he's brought back to life or what that has to do with his motivations. It has nothing to do with him being accepted or not.

# ¿ Apr 1, 2016 02:13

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

Gave it a quick read, so here's my general impressions.

If I wasn't reading it to give feedback, I would have gotten lost in the first section, as it's all very highly political stuff about laws and customs I'm not familiar with. The second section, while it wasn't very remarkable, did more to draw me in. I had a hard time figuring out where the characters were, physically. If you're aiming for a pulpy feeling, I think a good sense of location and environment is important. To me, one of the draws of pulp stuff are interesting settings, and while you do some work building that in the second section, I was left feeling like I couldn't really visualize where he was a lot of the time.

The solution doesn't need to be a paragraph of introduction each time, but I'd at least like to get a sense of each place through Zeeb's eyes. (Also, you chose a hell of a name to write out every time.) Let him say in his own voice what he thinks about the place. That way, you get to build character and establish setting at the same time. For instance, he could look at a marble floor and mahogany furniture and think 'pff, bunch of posh posturing' and then the reader both has an idea of what the place looks like, and they know that he's more practical. Or if he's very proper, maybe he looks at the same thing and notes how different it looks all clean and tidy in here compared to the messy bustle outside. The part where he watches some kids play around and break a robot is good, and more of that in the other parts would have helped ground the setting.

You could have placed your characters more clearly, too. For instance, you started off in the middle of dialogue, so I didn't know that he was kneeling with his face to the floor until he was no longer kneeling. Since you hadn't mentioned it, I assumed they were standing up or sitting around a table having that conversation, so it was jarring when he suddenly stood up from kneeling. Personally, I would have mentioned that in the second sentence, because a) it's something that Zeeb would notice immediately and b) it gives context, and might even hint at conflict, if he's in this clearly uncomfortable position.

Motivation and conflict was the last thing I noticed, because I had trouble figuring it out. First, I had to suss out what all the political jargon up top meant, and once I had that figured out, I had to piece through who was who, and what he wanted to do. I'm not entirely sure what his job is even now, other than inspecting...things? And I think the political stuff in the beginning is like 'you signaled you're officially stopping here early, so since it'll be some time before your duties are ready, here's [quest hook]', boiled down. I get the sense that he's got some other motivations, maybe, from the final bit, but it took me too much thinking to figure out what he's trying to do and I'm still not sure I know exactly what he wants. I know that in a serial, there's going to be a slow drip of information, but I think ideally in something episodic, there should clearly be some motion into the next episode. Like, I should be able to predict what he's going to try to do next. Whether he does it, or not, or something comes up, or whatever is all up to you, the author, but I didn't have a clear enough idea of what his goals are to get super invested in what comes next. If I was going to read more, it would be mainly in the hopes that things would start making more sense.

Now that I've written like five paragraphs about what I didn't like, I do want to just add that I think overall it shows promise, and I like pulpy stuff in general, and I wanted to read more of the parts that I liked. This just feels like a bit of a messy start as you're trying to establish everything and get your story's feet underneath it.

# ¿ Apr 9, 2016 04:28

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 13:21

Djeser: Mar 22, 2013; it's crow time again

Mr Gentleman posted:

Cheers, thanks, all good points to keep in mind. It's a new area for me so I'm eager to play around with what works and doesn't. The joke of that his face was pressed against the floor the entire time clearly fell flat

It would be a good comedic moment if I hadn't by that point assumed he was standing, because a) I had so little physical information to go on and b) what information I had suggested he could see the other guy. As it was I was like :confused:

oh okay I guess he's been kneeling.

There's two ways I could see structuring that joke to make it work. Number one, reveal it immediately, but don't have Zeeb address it. Like if your first line was like this:

quote:

"Yes indeed," said the colonial whatsernator, "we're most very indeed impressed to have such a man of personhood."

Zeeb was as flattered as someone could be with their forehead pressed against the ground. "Well, with modesty like mine, personhood is a valor of quality."

Number two, instead of saying it outright, hint heavily enough that someone can guess what's going on before he gets up. Like if Zeeb was musing heavily on the marble floor after each line of his--the first time it happens, it seems just like description, but he keeps going back to talking about the look of the marble, then maybe its feel and temperature, all while he's having this normal conversation. Then, when he stops bowing, it's still a reveal (ah, that's why he was talking about the floor) without being a non-sequitur.

Djeser fucked around with this message at 21:37 on Apr 9, 2016

# ¿ Apr 9, 2016 21:34

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Creative Convention > The Farm 2013. Flash Fiction and Snippets Critique Hub (<1000 Words)