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tuyop posted:
Hi and welcome back to fiction writing! Here's what I got out of your piece: Overall story = Guy whose work clues him in to the problems waste is having on nature and the lives of animals. He begins noticing more and more how wasteful the world is until one day he follows the waste. At the end of the path he discovers a horror-bird that elicits a terrible price from people to atone for their wrongs against nature.? I like the overall premise of the story and I like how the path of the protagonist is compared to the client he is researching on behalf of. They also are interested in helping the planet, but their interest is superficial whereas the protagonist is willing to give up so much more. I like the unreality of dumping a wheelbarrow full of rice and pouring out perfectly brewed coffee, but I think these things should be done in escalation. From noticing litter, to finding whole fields of buried toys and then finally to throwing away what isn't even trash. The biggest problem I had with reading it is just how laden this is with details. The protagonist seems to notice everything until the very end when I feel more confused than the protagonist probably. I think some focus on details that really matter to the protagonist or that matter to the story being told will help tighten this up. There's a lot of focus on the weather and the natural setting and while I can understand that it relates to the narrative by the time I get to the end, since this is a first person POV story, the protagonist's interest in taking note of these things seems out of place and unexplained. This surplus of details at the beginning would be a good contrast with the end if there were fewer details to show just how dazed and confused the protagonist is such that they gloss over their surroundings and only get vague impressions of bad/dead/detritus, etc. Since I think the story could benefit from some rearranging and cutting of details I didn't want to comment on too many specific things but these two lines made me cringe: "It happened one day in November while I was waiting for a bus on Windmill Road." - This is the opening line and needs to grab people or at least propel them onto your second sentence. And unfortunately the "it" that happened doesn't actually define this piece. In fact, I wonder how much anyone is going to remember wheelbarrow full of rice. "This was an afront and could not stand." - Delete Not bad if this is your first attempt in 17 years. Congratulations on finishing a story! And I would definitely recommend the Thunderdome thread if you want to do some more short story practice.
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Jan 19, 2021 20:46
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Popeston posted:I’m looking from some feedback on my fantasy novel. In the writing thread, Leng suggested this would be a good place so here it goes. Love the premise. I'm already imagining the movie Sneakers in fantasy novel form. Immediately, I'm lost. While beginning with an unattributed quote with such impossibilities as being dead and yet speaking raises all kinds of questions that make me curious, there's no scene setting. The King and Misen are floating in nebulous wheres and whens. The first place we're given is a bedchamber, but we don't know whose or if that's the present moment or prior, though we can assume not. And then there's backstory about how Misen got to this point, again without a scene setting. The first indication I get as a reader as to the setup is when Misen pulls the report from her satchel. A quick fix. The prose flows nicely. The humor is self-evident from the situation in the throne room. But I'd like a bit of the context of the world earlier too. Because saying that a king has no locking doors, no dungeons, four guards but a whole host of royal attendants doesn't jive with what expectations I have of a fantasy kingdom. While the concept of having just tons of minor kingdoms, some only inches big, is amusing and can lead to a lot of other amusing circumstances, without putting that up front, a reader is left confused rather than entertained. Because if that really was his plan all along and he knew what he was doing, why wouldn't he just hire her to make that statement in the first place? It does make some logical sense. But his surprise at the fact that she was able to "theoretically" kill him is in that case unbelievable. If this king is stupid, he needs to be stupid in just the right way. Finishing Abren's section, there's also an issue with telegraphing the motivations of these characters. I don't need to know what they're seeking on a book level at this point, but if Misen had already been paid and even got a potted plant for her troubles, without having to actually kill anybody or help people through her report, what's the problem? Why is she in this game? To get out of having to kill people? Done. To earn money/make a living? Done. To actually make a difference in the world? Not done. But why does she want this specific thing? I don't think that's it. But I don't know what the answer is, even on the most basic level. As for Abren, I don't even know whether he'd rather be alive or dead. And when that's already muddled, things like, why he's waiting for Misen, why he's preaching the word of prophets on the streets of Jakusta, or why people are propositioning him on the street are all confusing but not the first questions on my mind. I think these characters on their surfaces are great concepts. Assassin turned security agent. Himbo sidekick obsessed with purity of a religion. These have a lot of potential. But their introductions are missing some small details to keep me in the story while wanting more. Things get much better when we get to the bar. We get a sense of place. We start to tease out the deeper desires of Misen. We're introduced to a thoroughly slimy guild master. But even after all of the reasons why joining a guild would make Misen's life easier, we still don't learn why she doesn't want to be an assassin. She just gets increasingly drunk. Yet Abren still doesn't abandon her and I don't know why. Is he some sort of servant? Her butler? Her landlord? Why do they cohabitate? You have a good sense for the snarky detail that is of a piece with Pratchett. I am excited for the call to action being a job with a friend protecting a King from assassination. I hope they don't leave Abren behind. But I think this chapter dances around what happened at Sullenbridge too much to really make me understand what this means for Misen or Broukas. Give the reader more! Not necessarily all of it, but I'm assuming that's why you put this out here for fresh eyes. And as fresh eyes, I need a tad more explanation behind who people are, why they do what they do, and how that informs their interactions with other people. Not a ton. Not whole paragraphs, just enough to keep me interested in them and care about them to get to the snark and the rest of the ridiculous plot. Definitely keep going.
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Jan 10, 2023 21:09
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Leng posted:The rest of the points, I'll disagree on, in the sense that yes, you can add all that in line edits but structurally, this is solid. When I'm reading something that's snarky and absurd, I'm not really hanging out for these details; as long as you keep the jokes coming (and boy, you sure did, this was hilarious), I'm down for the ride. Agreed with this. If the story keeps moving and the absurdity is the main focus, you can absolutely gloss over a lot of the details I pointed out. And I don't think even the details I want would take more than half a sentence to hand wave an answer at to satisfy me or even just a reordering of information that you've already included. This is clearly not some glorious internally consistent worldbuilding epic. And no one going into it will expect it to be. So as long as you do what Leng said, you won't get too many people really digging into the particulars.
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Jan 13, 2023 19:49
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