RuneScape Forum Archive | Feel the Silence

Chuk

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Woah, woah, woah. Too much, too few posts. Bottom of page 56 and top of page 57 in the conversation between Lucas and Sorokin. Soro gets way too heated. Also, how would he know what Gray was thinking?
Maybe I'm forgetting some earlier scene/conversation, but this seemed out of place. :\
*sigh* Another moral dilemma for poor Lucas. Month or so ago, you were asking about the story being too long; I'd say the bit about requisitioning supplies isn't really necessary, unless you were going to take more time to explore it than those two posts. And if you did choose to do that, don't have Lucas wondering about all the consequences of the army having too much power. He'd likely be too overcome with the shock of what he was doing to think about or analyze it much. Maybe that evening or something, but not while in the middle of the act.
I'd say it makes sense for him to be wondering if it's right/wrong, but not worrying about destroying whole cities with such activity. I know he's a scribe/historian, but that's too philosophical for the heat of the moment, IMO.
Bottom of page 58: "He imagined that by the end of the first week, he’d be Instead, he found himself flying through the brush of the forest..."
- Wha...?
The scenes between Justine/James/King around page 59/60 were much stronger than the preceding ones following Lucas and Sorokin. You get James's righteous anger just right, and his confusion over Justine's behavior. Likewise, Justine's been written as a near perfect emotional wreck. (Oh the irony of that...)
Justine's scenes all feel more natural, whereas the recent Lucas ones seem more forced. I'm not sure what it is, exactly, but I definitely enjoy reading Justine more. (Though the running bit with Lucas's dead exhaustion was also done well.)

18-Jul-2011 11:17:51 - Last edited on 18-Jul-2011 11:40:28 by Chuk

Chuk

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page 70: "Oh, right. That happened. "
Dear goodness that's sarcastic/cynical sounding. Way too sarcastic for the situation, and for Lucas. Jonah, maybe, when he wakes up sober, but if Lucas changed that much, it was way too fast. O_o

Page 72: During Lucas's fight with Gavin: dirt floor on a boat? O_o

And for the first time in... a year? More? I'm caught up. I thought your writing got back to it's normal impressiveness around your late May, early June adds. Seems like the stresses of school and the long breaks do make you a bit rusty. Still thoroughly enjoyable, but there was a marked difference. Anyway, lotsa new stuff coming out. You said you're a third done, if I remember right? I'd have thought a quarter at most, maybe a fifth, with all the new stuff coming out. Seems to be the starts of new plotlines, rather than continuations of old ones.
Anywho, eagerly awaiting more adds. Now that I'm actually caught up, you'll have to get more prolific, don't ya know.

18-Jul-2011 12:05:44 - Last edited on 18-Jul-2011 12:25:06 by Chuk

Crystal Smee

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Thanks for the comments. Those are really helpful. This is the problem I always have with my writing...not explaining things well enough/justifying emotion because it's all justified in MY head...I just tend to forget other people don't know it. When I haven't written in awhile and I'm trying to get something out quick, I get sloppy and forget to try to clean that up. Something I seriously need to work on.
To be honest, those adds were so long ago that I don't really remember what exactly I was thinking. I know that I imagine Sorokin as a sort of no-nonsense, no bull**** kind of guy who speaks his mind. He's supposed to be the guy that knocks sense into your head, the guy who is quick to defend his friends. The idea is that he was supposed to just get annoyed with Lucas for being so pathetic. There was no hidden subtext there, it wasn't personal for him and it wasn't supposed to be that he literally KNEW what Gray was thinking...he was just inferring that Lucas had been duped. I think I wanted him to be pointing out the things that Lucas didn't want to see himself. It was just a bad blunder in my writing, that I overdid that scene a little too much.
As for Lucas' cynicism in that moment...another overdone emotional change, one I didn't plot out as clearly as I did in my head.
The dirt floor thing, plain careless. My bad.
I appreciate the criticisms, and I'll definitely try to work on these things in the future. So, this week was crazy hectic (I went to two concerts early in the week) and I'm leaving for France on Saturday, so I have a ton to do before that. I'll try to bang out something short to leave you with when I'm gone...and I'll be back the following Sunday and will write then

21-Jul-2011 15:46:00 - Last edited on 21-Jul-2011 15:50:24 by Crystal Smee

Chuk

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Yeah, I definitely saw that side of Sorokin. I think it did just come on a little too strongly. Maybe a little more dismissive and irritated rather than straight-up anger?
And that problem with coming back rusty happens to everyone. No worries there. Just figure it's better to have the comments to help in the future, even if it's too hard to go back and change the previous writing.

21-Jul-2011 15:49:11

Crystal Smee

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Yeah, definitely. It's a bad problem to have with this story, since the story depends on the emotional progressions of all the characters. I need to tighten that up a little

21-Jul-2011 15:51:15

Chuk

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It's still much better than anything else here, by far.
And if you're looking to get something this long ready for publishing, hopefully you'll have a bit more time to work on it each week, so the continuity is a bit stronger, and that should fix a lot of the issues. You won't get so rusty with the writing and the characters.

21-Jul-2011 15:54:13

Crystal Smee

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Yeah, a big part of the problem is the huge time gaps between adding. I need to take better notes as I write...but I'm bad at that.
Right now for publishing efforts I"m mostly doing short stories, trying to send them to literary magazines (which I did last summer and was successful ^_^

) so I've got about four stories I'm working on right now (hopefully more by the end of the summer) that I could send out.
I'd love to publish a novel, but I don't think I have the time or work ethic to put out a legitimately good one. :\ I need to improve all the things I'm failing at in this story before I can tackle that.
How about you? Have you tried to publish anything? (or succeeded?)

21-Jul-2011 18:44:03

Chuk

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Tried once a couple years ago with one story, nothing else since. Brevity isn't my strong point, so I have a hard time coming up with decent ideas that I can contain to the short story lengths that most magazines want.
And I haven't gotten close enough to finishing anything longer.

21-Jul-2011 21:48:57 - Last edited on 21-Jul-2011 21:49:37 by Chuk

Crystal Smee

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Ah, sorry to hear it. For me its the opposite - I find it easier to come up with short story ideas, they seem more simple and straightforward to me. Are you working on any long-term stuff you might pursue publishing, or just focusing on other things right now?

I have adds. They're not very good and they're pretty short - I was planning to write more but my family is having some serious issues today and unfortunately I need to go deal with that...so this is all you get. I'll have more when I come back from my trip.

22-Jul-2011 21:16:18

Crystal Smee

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Lucas stood on the deck with the other men, his pack slung over his back, sword at his hip. Ahead of him was the island of Karamja, a large green blot on the horizon. The ship floated a ways offshore, and he could see the rainbow colors of the reef that ran along the coastline. He turned at a call from one of the men, and went to help unload one of the rowboats from the deck. They carefully lowered it into the water, hauling on the ropes until it smacked the surface of the waves. Jonah stood on the upper deck, running his hands over the steering wheel, and as Lucas watched him, he had a flash of the storm, of the same craggy figure surrounded by lightning and pouring rain. Then he was awash in sunlight again as he barked orders for the first round of men to climb into the boat and head for shore. Lucas followed the others down the ladder and into the dinghy, to his place at an oar. They pushed off and began to row.
As they slogged through the water, Lucas peered over the edge. The water was a vibrant blue-green color on the surface, and yet when he looked down, he could see clear to the bottom. Colorful fish flitted this way and that around the coral. The water looked shallow, the sand a bright white color. The boat rocked on gentle waves, splashing spray across his face. He raked his damp hair away from his face and watched the ship grow smaller and smaller. Suddenly someone yelled out that they had arrived. They piled out, dropping into the knee-deep water, and hauled the ship to shore. As Lucas finally climbed the sandy beach, dropping the wood of the boat from his hands, he looked up and got his first look at the jungle.
A narrow strip of sand, abruptly cut off by a row of towering trees. It rose up like a wall around a city, a looming barrier. Where he stood, the sun blazed hot against his skin, but in there, it looked dark and ominous. The only sunlight appeared through narrow gaps in the canopy.

22-Jul-2011 21:16:45

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