RuneScape Forum Archive | Well Told Tales

Cutie Tia

Posts: 6,232 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Please please please give me feedback, especially on the connotations of the words and the feeling of that short passage. I need to improve my writing and all comments will be greatly appreciated!

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04-Sep-2010 05:32:22 - Last edited on 04-Sep-2010 05:33:25 by Cutie Tia

Dec

2023

Logan Shafts

Posts: 3,211 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

== [Announcement!] ==
I am here, finally, to announce the results of the ‘On the Sea* contest from early June.
I once again would like to formally apologize for the delay. My life has been hectic and I’ve had quite a few life-changing emergencies in the last few months.
Even so, I must confess that I could have finished this sooner, but often indulged myself in other things instead.
I am infinitely thankful for all of you, and for your incredible patience with me over the last few months.
As such, I am also going to be announcing the beginning of another contest, and the placing of administrator and editor positions on this thread (for when I’m not around, which is sadly quite often now).
In light of my inability to grade quickly, the next contest will be of a very abrupt nature, but we’ll get to that.
For now, I’m sure you’re all craving the results of the previous contest, so here it goes.

09-Sep-2010 01:46:11

Dec

2023

Logan Shafts

Posts: 3,211 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

ITIalevolent:
Here is your score:
Plot: 19/20
I found your entire story quite amusing and enjoyable to read. Excluding the grammatical errors, the beginning was quite enthralling, and lead smoothly to a surprising and ironic middle which acted as a gateway for a well-built up conclusion.
Not only was your story fantastical, but it was also one big elaborate joke. I enjoyed it a lot, good work.
Adherence to theme: 10/10
This was covered quite well.
While the theme is “on the sea*, I didn't actually mean “above the sea” but rather “regarding the sea* or “involving the sea* in which case you hit the nail on the head.
Grammar: 5/10
It is bad to start a story with a near-instant error.
You wrote: "his toes curling at the sight terrible sight before him."
This should be at the very least "sight, terrible sight, before him."
But I think it really should have just been "terrible sight before him."
Later in the story, near the end, you wrote: “Another lobster screeched as an anchor sunk into the soft sand, only inches from his head.” - This should be “an anchor sank”.
It simply struck me as an incorrect verb form. Either way, having errors at both the beginning and the end of a story isn't good for your score.
I also noticed a few mix ups of homophones.
In example: “But it was no use, Jasper was floating further away by the second.”
The word “Further” actually means “to a greater extent”. Meanwhile “Farther” means “A greater distance”.
Another example of this is here: “Floating down past the suspended lights, he landed softly on the strange-looking path,” - the word “past” means “preceding”, the word “passed* means “went by”.

09-Sep-2010 01:48:23

Dec

2023

Logan Shafts

Posts: 3,211 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

There were also a few instances of redundant word use in the story, in example: “Rampaging around a large chunk of coral, which protruded out from the otherwise flat seabed,”
The word “Protruded” mean “stuck out”, so “protruded out” is saying “stuck out out”. The word “out” should be removed.
These are things that take a while to become accustomed to scanning for, so not many points were deducted due to them, but I hope that you examine such things closer in following stories. =]
A few notable things:
Some of the words you used were not counted as misspellings due to their stylistic nature.
In example: “Jump ya’ coward.” - In a formal sense, “ya'” is not correct. However, with the characters being pirates, I believe that it is more than acceptable.
The same is true about your crustacean friends at the bottom of the ocean, and their adorable lisp.
Description: 9/10
Personally, I loved the old-timer tone that you managed to keep throughout the story (excluding certain instances where he is talking to his hands, etc.), it gave the story a “pirates tale” feel to it and greatly enhanced the description throughout the story.
For instance, “Rampaging around a large chunk of coral, which protruded out from the otherwise flat seabed, were the most unsightly beasts” - Aside from some grammatical issues, this is a brilliant choice of words. And it is only one instance out of the story.
The only thing which I believe may have restricted your descriptive powers in this story was the series of grammatical mistakes – as those greatly reduce readability in a story.
Total score: 43/50
An excellent score to be sure.
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09-Sep-2010 01:49:06 - Last edited on 09-Sep-2010 01:49:46 by Logan Shafts

Dec

2023

Logan Shafts

Posts: 3,211 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Azigarath:
Here is your score:
Plot: 10/20
While your story certainly began on an interesting note (namely the world being all red), I didnt really see much of a plot beyond that.
A bunch of sailors in a red world get attacked by man-eating snakes. It doesn't really go very far.
As it is it was simply too easy-going to stand as a horror story and too simple in dialogue and plot to be an adventure story. Thus I would classify it as a survival story.
As far as survival stories go though (which isn't very far to be honest), you did okay, except that I think you could have made the ending more climactic, and also it is always necessary to build up characters in any kind of survival story, because the reader doesn't really care if your character dies or not if they don't even know anything about the character.
Advice for next time: Decide on the plot before writing the story, and find some method to either envelope the reader in a predictable but still interesting plot-line, or surprise them outright.
Adherence to theme: 10/10
This is by far your best category. You stuck to the theme perfectly, though this is not a particularly hard theme to stick to, kudos nevertheless.
Grammar: 6/10
Here are some of the grammatical errors I noticed in your story which effected your score.
“This hot, moist wind provided a waking sensation for the seemingly dead sailors, whom were sleeping here and there on the boat.*
Technically this should be “who were sleeping here and there”.
A few more instances of the same issue were found throughout the story.
You wrote: “'The only way to find out is if one of us goes down there and checks.' The sailor whom spoke first said.” and “Out of the thirty men whom were asleep, twenty woke up and were moving around.”
This should be “who spoke first.”, and “Who were asleep,”. Try to remember to use the nominative pronoun case with verbs.

09-Sep-2010 01:52:32

[#H0IM9TXOA]

Posts: 1,027 Mithril Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

I've written a story called Azzanadra. But, I'm having trouble getting people to read it. A few of my clanmates have said its pretty good, so please read.
49-50-721-61632233
oops didnt know you were still posting

09-Sep-2010 01:53:36 - Last edited on 09-Sep-2010 01:55:26 by [#H0IM9TXOA]

Dec

2023

Logan Shafts

Posts: 3,211 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

To continue, you wrote: "It was partially filled with water at its lowest level, for it took heavy damages."
"Partially" means "to a certain degree." "Partly" refers to part of a whole.
You wrote: “but unable to actually see the trunks of the trees”.
This is a split infinitive. A split infinitive is when you put an 'enhancing' word inside a verb.
In this case the verb would be “to see*, and you split it by putting “actually” in-between.
While this can be considered acceptable for stylistic reasons, I strongly advise against it because it can quickly become confusing.
A few minor things:
Throughout the story you use the word “seafloor.”.
The words “Sea* and “floor” should technically be separated by a space, or at least a hyphen.
There were a few small tense changes such as this: “a rugged galleon called 'Ozymandias.' It was partially filled with water at its lowest level, for it took heavy damages.” - You begin this sentence with “It was”, this is past tense. “took” later in the sentence is present tense.
Also, “damages” is awkward. It should be “had taken heavy damage.”
Also there were a few issues in this sentence: “Realising that he was falling with the mast, Jonah quickly sheathed his sabre and jumped off the mast right before it went into a freefall”
The word “Realising” is incorrectly spelled, it should be “realizing”. Also “Freefall” should be two words, “free fall.” (with the exception of space-faring stories).
Description: 5/10
At best I would describe your description in this story as abrupt.
It is a style which is completely acceptable, but also not entirely admired in a story so weak in plot.
In example, you wrote: “Some of them woke up, only to remember that their pleasant dreams were killed at the thought of living through another red day in a vast ocean of red water. Even the sky was red, as was the sun, and even the clouds.” - You use the word “red” repeatedly here.

09-Sep-2010 01:54:18

Dec

2023

Logan Shafts

Posts: 3,211 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Not only is “red” not very descriptive, but it is also such a regular word that it doesn't catch the readers mind at all.
Mixing it up with something like “Crimson” would be a good idea in future stories.
Even so, writing with little-to-no description is as I said completely acceptable, so long as you make the story-line interesting enough to make up for the lack in immersion.
This story was weak in plot, and so the weakness in description didn't help at all.
In the future, if you intend to write in this style, I suggest putting more attention into your plot.
Also, it might help to speed things up, fast paced stories should be a lot easier to read, and thus having a more to-the-point writing style helps a lot for them.
Total score: 31/50

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09-Sep-2010 01:55:17

Dec

2023

Logan Shafts

Posts: 3,211 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Baron Ogre:
Here is your score:
Plot: 16/20
While I love a good adventure story, what I love even more are exploration stories. You managed to mix them both together in a wonderful way.
You begin the story by introducing your character, and you quickly give a bit of background on him. Then you continue to build him up throughout the story, without interrupting the flow too much.
This gets the reader to the point of caring about the character, and keeps them interested in reading the rest of the story to find out what happens to him. You do all this, meanwhile taking one of the few mysteries left in our world (namely the bottom of the ocean) and putting him right in the middle of it.
Your beginning was good, your middle was good, and your ending was excellent. While sometimes it is a big mistake to leave the reader hanging, you did this is just the right way – which is especially admirable in a story which is so short.
The only thing which I marked you off for on this story was its natural cliches. Giant sea monster? Man in underwater peril? Meh, there wasn't very much originality in the story at all.
However, it is not altogether a bad thing to tell a tale which is cliched, so long as you tell it well, and you did. Good work.
Adherence to theme: 5/10
You're naturally going to wonder why you have a 5 in this. Well, you managed to stick to the theme just fine, but your story exceeded the maximum length (which was 5 posts, not 2,000 words).
After having written this entire review, I decided not to disqualify you but rather to remove these points, as I had discussed with other people whose stories also exceeded the limit.
Grammar: 8/10
You did a fairly good job at keeping the grammar in this story clean and straightforward.
I did find a few errors however, as is to be expected in any story of this length really.

09-Sep-2010 01:56:40

Dec

2023

Logan Shafts

Posts: 3,211 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

I saw a few cases of mixed up homophones.
Here is an example of one such thing: “It steadily became darker and darker, and he began having trouble identifying the types of fish that swam past him and all around.” - The word “past” means “before”. The word “passed* means “to go by*, this should be “passed”.
Another easy mistake is to split infinitives, such as this: “These lights were bigger and stronger though. A faint glimmer from what appeared to be a reflective surface caused Anthony to curiously switch his lights back on.” - “To curiously switch” is a split infinitive.
An infinitive is any phrase which contains “to” and a verb. “To switch” in this instance. You split it by placing an adjective between “to” and the verb. This is incorrect and should be avoided.
There were also a few minor typos and misspellings in your story, as follows:
You wrote: “but now he was considered a researcher in boundry pushing science” - This should be “Boundary”.
And, you wrote: “he asked, but then some new lights appaered.” - This should be “appeared”.
Other than these few things, you actually did a remarkable job on your grammar.
Description: 7/10
This was decent. You have a fairly large vocabulary, and you use it well.
The only thing I would improve is your description regarding the fish. In example, describing them as “odd and alien like” is not really describing them, except to mention that describing them would be hard due to their strangeness. =p
I understand that heavy description is out the window in a story with size limits, but I think you could have focused a bit more on the shape and look of the fish and beasts which your main character comes across, rather than just on the murkiness of the water, etc.
Total score: 36/50
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09-Sep-2010 01:58:12 - Last edited on 09-Sep-2010 01:58:24 by Logan Shafts

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