[Fung Koo]

I couldn't post this internally in the "Stories" section as it returned an error. So, I've posted it via Google Docs. I'll put it in the "Stories" section once it's working and change the link.



Whatever feedback is welcome.

[TheScribblery]

(Baugh, it took me about a dozen tries over three days to be able to post anything up on this site, so I share your pain. x_x I've got no clue why it's so buggy.)

Anyway: the writing style in your story is very vivid and descriptive. You've got a great handle on imagery, and it comes through clearly through your writing.

However, when I was reading through the piece, a lot of what was written struck me as unnecessary and drawn out, crafted with such a close eye to detail that the larger picture was lost. Was it necessary for the story to spend an entire paragraph describing the way that the light reflected off of the blade? I understand that it's a key detail of the scene, but with all the time spent on these small details, the reader is likely to lose focus, miss the important bits of the scene, or even turn away altogether.

There was a decent amount of repetition in the descriptions, which I think are also attributable to the detail-oriented perspective this seems to have been written in. An example is how the story was describing the valley twice in the first paragraph, even using the same word "valley" to identify the subject; another is talking about the blade as having "awoken hungry" and following it up by telling us "I am hungry, it says". Later, with the huntress - "Her brain screams for escape, yet finds itself paralyzed"; shortly thereafter, she has a "paralyzing, crushing" fear, and then "in her head, she begins screaming". There are a lot more of these examples, but I think the point is made. There are some places where repetition can be used effectively, and you demonstrated this in a number of places in your writing (though I'd be careful of that as well; too much use of an emphasizing tool can dull its effect).

I unfortunately wound up not being able to follow much of the story, because these details really were too overwhelming for me to dig into, so I can't give too much critique on the plot details. I hope what suggestions I could offer were of some help, though!

[kmtolan]

I looked through your writing and was immediately struck by both an overuse of adjectives and imagery as well as a mostly narrative style. This is not an uncommon thing for new writers - especially those who do have a knack for description. They tend to go overboard. (grin).

First, I would suggest backing off on the prose. You are writing a story, not a poem. Second, start sniffing through the "Show vs Tell" thread here and see why sitting a reader on a stool and narrating the story to them is not a great way for the reader to become part of the story.

When properly balanced with dialog and exposition, I think your ability to describe things will serve you well once you've worked through the basics. For those basics, I would suggest a book called "Elements Of Style". Another good one is "Techniques of the Selling Writer."

Kerry

[Hereford Eye]

You may be an acquired taste, Flung Poo. Cause I liked it! Sure, me being me, I have some nits for you to ignore but, overall, there is a great deal happening here that intrigues me. Here's how I saw as I read it:

Ah, FK, you do have a way with words. And sentences, And paragraphs though, at time, your fragments could be merged to present compound sentences that would retain the mood. It’s like McCarthy in The Road: sometimes the need for fragmentation made no sense as the none of the characters spoke in fragments, only the narrator.

All that work in a prologue, the book must be epic.

For me, the first Hunter exposition in the prologue is like reading Donaldson. I appreciate the vocabulary but if I cannot determine probable definitions from context - coticule, esker, lanceolate -then irritation begins to grow and soon I stop trying. I refuse to keep a dictionary at hand just to read a story. I can tolerate a few instances but if the language is beyond me on too many pages, I’m gone.

Post-apocalyptic world with undetermined memories of its past. Prologue reads as if no knowledge has been lost - the relentless lull of gravity..;; A synthesis with the tectonic bending of plates and grinding erosion of ice that produced the walls of this valley…; in text too ancient for the bearer to know…; tectonic plates, world-washing floods; physics for light called home from across the cosmos; mathematics for fractals… - but that thought is immediately and forcefully contrasted with a man surviving by hunting with a knife. No bow and arrow? No spear? No atlatl?

The tension between knife and hunter seemed unclear. At one point, early, I believe the knife can directly control the hunter’s actions and then I think that it can merely insinuate itself into the hunter’s actions and then I think it can only sample the hunter’s emotions. If intentional, okay, but realize the confusion may be enough to put the reader off. Hunter’s been carrying the blade for 17 years, eh? Then, the paths of communication must not be susceptible to improvement over time. And the hunter must be at least in his early to mid-20s.

Must be a fairly small valley if the honing of the blade is able to reverberate around it.

“…implanted with a force once lost to the earth, the knowledge submerged in a great flood that cleansed the surface of the world…” presents a conundrum: the original world flood before continents arose, the biblical world flood, or a later apocalyptic flood? Would hope the story eventually clears this up.

The Huntress:

Nicely drawn scene. Two nits bother me:
(1) In the potholes, there are skeletons of rats and birds, once burned. Seventeen years ago in the apocalypse? Long time for skeletons to lie in murky puddles. Since then? Maybe so, since she lights the town afire as goes.
(2) She can’t recall how long she’s been there? Something wrong with that especially since she is imbued with “the unsteady confidence of late-teenage awkwardness”
I think I see the foreshadowing of her talents. Even so, my nits remain.

A train? Even more reason the to wonder at the Hunter and his knife.

Later segments:

“kolk” – you did it again!
“For the first time her mind wanders to thoughts of home.” She’s thinking of the town she just left, right?

All this for the birth of the plant? So, he can go hunt down the damned train?:D

***
But, oh, my, what a prologue! So much hinted at, so much promised, and so little explained. When do we get more?

[Fung Koo]

Thanks for the comments thus far.

Kerry -- could you expand on the "Show v. Tell" issues you see, perhaps with an excerpt for specific analysis? (preferably not from the opening sequence, but from one of the later scenes.)

I'm deliberately relying heavily on the 3rd person omniscient voice, which necessitates a lot of the apparent "Tell" faux pas. I've tried to craft the "Tell" elements into experiential, sensory descriptions, thereby grafting "Show" aspects onto the "Tell" elements -- this may or may not be working on a case-by-case basis. Some specific examination would really help me grind down to the specific mechanics where this works or fails.

Aside -- I've been following the Show v. Tell thread, and frankly it's more of a boogeyman thread than a place for constructive advice. "Show v. Tell" is largely an imaginary divide, and one frequently employed as the basis for subjective objections masquerading as objective, critical analysis. It's called "story telling" after all. ;)

While there is definitely some merit to the Show v. Tell discussion, I'm hoping for a more direct application to the specific text I've posted for critique.

Dialogue wise, I'd be remiss if I didn't point out that throughout the entire sequence, the two characters with speaking voices only come into contact with one another when one of them is already dead after being pummeled by a rock slide and being controlled by the non-verbal knife. And the other is mostly unconscious during their brief exchange, and then stabbed to death in the vajayjay. Not sure what conversation they would have! heheheh :D

[Hoodwink]

It's never a chore to give you feedback FK, but it is an effort; I have to screw in a more critical eye than I'd normally read with simply because otherwise I'm too easily enamoured by the subtle poetry and obvious quality of your writing. Anyway, I'll give it a try. First up, the hunter section, and I'll get to the huntress section in a follow up post.

I stumble over the minutiae of the first paragraphs, predominantly the way it moves from the micro to the macro: we're watching the slivers of metal from the blade. Now we're considering the valley and the waterfall. Then we're back to a thumb against edge. Minute flakes, dust reflections, light shooting off to the sky. It's a more elegant and interesting opening than describing some character's clothes or how they get out of bed and take a sh*t, and it cleverly hints at the balance of setting between fantasy and sci-fi, but I feel there's too much of it and you risk making your reader demand "yes, yes, but what happens?"

Next, five short sentences in a row begin with "it" and take the form "it does something" or "it is something". I think this'd benefit from breaking them up a bit. Repetition is a powerful tool for conveying rhythm, but it can also feel like someone is beating you over the head.

I like that you don't rush to name or even personalise your hunter, even if it binds you to refering to him as 'the bearer'. I'm not a fan of chapters that begin with a name drop, and I appreciate that you're deliberately showing the reader that the bearer is less important (at least at this point) than The Knife (which is a character by itself).

The reference to glacial flow and "esker" made me think of Stephen Erikson. Seems you Canadians share a necessary obsession with glacial mechanics and geological effects, not to mention obscure and specific vocabulary :) This is no bad thing. So long as the plot doesn't require that I spend too much time acquiring the knowledge I need to understand what's going on. Pleasingly, yours doesn't.

I also enjoy the concept symbiosis, as it's something that features in a project I'm working on. There is something in the way you're using it that echos faintly of Iain M Banks. Again, this is no bad thing.

A couple of really pedantic nitpicks:
"Floating, rolling, and tumbling softly through the damp air of the valley clearing to settle in a bed of beaded-wet and greenest grass"
Seems overcrafted to me. Do you need all three of floating, rolling and tumbling? Also, on first scan I wondered what a beaded wet might be.

"as finely tuned as the needle locked in spiral rotation on vinyl." Depending on where you stand regarding the issue of a narrators viewpoint, this simile may not work. Does the imagery of a stylus on a vinyl record really belong in this universe? Given the next section it seems that it does, but at first this stuck out for me.

"Its small quantum heart" - doesn't quantum already mean small?

Huntress section coming up next :)

[Hoodwink]

I had fewer niggles with this section. Are we allowed to say "niggles" in these sensitive times? :)

So straight away, the timespan of seventeen years is made significant, and makes me go back and consider the the previous section's assertion that it's been seventeen years since The Knife's awakening. Nicely done. If it took an apocalypse to awaken The Knife, does it predate the civilisation that collapsed with the apocalypse?

"The steady, metronomic rush and wash of waves takes over the briefly intervening and transitory silence". A very pretty sentence once one has digested the adverbs and adjectives.

Now several paragraphs beginning with "she" followed by verbs. She trudges, she leaves, she walks, and I realise you prefer to avoid the present continuous, which is interesting because I've found myself using it just to break up the patten of present simple on the occasions when I've felt brave enough to write in the present tense. Not a criticism, just an observation and conversation piece.

"With a thought, she sets the lonely beautiful nest of flowers to sending arcs of liquid flame across the ground. It licks the sledge to boiling, melts the skeletons of buildings and animals. Rain hisses and spits." She made the flowers spit napalm? Does she need a level of indirection to use her pyrokinetic ability? Or am I missing something?



Later sections: (yeah I'm speeding up. I was giving feedback chronologically and realised at this rate, Brandon Sanderson was likely going to have to step in to finish it for me)

Plastic water bottles that poisoned a generation now helping post-apocalyptic survivors survive? Genius, FK :)

You reveal a memory of the hunter's youth, and his aching knees and in my mind he goes from Mowgli to Mad Max. With scarcity of detail, I'm having trouble settling on an age and frame of reference for the Knife-bearer, but I like how his mobility brings him more in to focus as he is driven to depart the refuge of the valley.

Speaking of focus, at "focus, focus, he mutters" you reveal that the hunter was indeed Stephen Erikson before the apocalypse judging by the previous paragraph. You can ignore this gripe - I'm being pissy at Erikson and taking it out on you.

The Huntress is afraid of the dark hole, but happily slept in holes full of animal skeletons when she was back in the village?

From the section that starts with "In ashen shock" until the end, your writing is masterful and if I try and pull it apart it would feel churlish, so I'll save my efforts for hopefully later opportunities and murdering your futile efforts in the flash fiction contest instead ;)

[kmtolan]

Thanks for the comments thus far.

Kerry -- could you expand on the "Show v. Tell" issues you see, perhaps with an excerpt for specific analysis? (preferably not from the opening sequence, but from one of the later scenes.)

I'm deliberately relying heavily on the 3rd person omniscient voice, which necessitates a lot of the apparent "Tell" faux pas. I've tried to craft the "Tell" elements into experiential, sensory descriptions, thereby grafting "Show" aspects onto the "Tell" elements -- this may or may not be working on a case-by-case basis. Some specific examination would really help me grind down to the specific mechanics where this works or fails.

Aside -- I've been following the Show v. Tell thread, and frankly it's more of a boogeyman thread than a place for constructive advice. "Show v. Tell" is largely an imaginary divide, and one frequently employed as the basis for subjective objections masquerading as objective, critical analysis. It's called "story telling" after all. ;)

While there is definitely some merit to the Show v. Tell discussion, I'm hoping for a more direct application to the specific text I've posted for critique.

Dialogue wise, I'd be remiss if I didn't point out that throughout the entire sequence, the two characters with speaking voices only come into contact with one another when one of them is already dead after being pummeled by a rock slide and being controlled by the non-verbal knife. And the other is mostly unconscious during their brief exchange, and then stabbed to death in the vajayjay. Not sure what conversation they would have! heheheh :D

Happy to provide an example:
For the first time her mind wanders to thoughts of home. Its simple offerings of shelter and security. Its familiarity and open skies. And before her, this hole. This black, black hole.

vs something like this:
She closed her eyes for a moment. I'd give anything to be back home right now. A warm bath and hot food. Anything but this damn hole.

Now, note that for this to work, your POV has to change to something other than its current POV. You probably know that from the start - and can give a good argument that what you are doing is as close to showing vs telling as it gets for Third Person Omniscient. I would agree with you in most respects.

Now, if this was just for fun or the sheer joy of writing, you can safely ignore my advice. In fact, don't read further because it absolutely doesn't apply.

If you are contemplating selling your work, then here's your wake up call. Publishers don't give a damn about what a writer thinks when it comes to writing style. They will only accept what they know sells. Your job is to learn the style that they prefer - and that probably isn't going to be anything written in Third Person Omniscient these days.

Personally, I think that if you tear out 80% of the prose and sling this into Third Person, Limited, you might have something. Hell, you're not short in the imagination and description department by any means.

Kerry

[Fung Koo]

Cheers, Kerry. :)

This is just for fun right now. Maybe one day after years and years of toiling over my masterwork I'll consider trying to get it published. And hey, who knows, maybe by then the rule will be "Tell, don't Show"?! :eek:

[Fung Koo]

Thanks also Scribble, HE, and Hoodwink. Seems like the basic plot elements are getting across between the verbosities. I shall clip for clarity, reduce for redundancy, manipulate for megatron...

Whoa, got off track there! :D

But thanks -- your impressions are very helpful.

I shall provide the next portion as soon as my agonizing over it is complete. :)