posted
Heh, I made a joke about my dating plight to a friend of mine, who suggested I write a story about it. So here's a few lines...
“Curse you Donella!!!” I screamed as I swung my sledgehammer into the marble pillars of the temple. The great goddess of courtship had not been kind to me, and I wanted revenge. You’d like to think that a kind and loving deity would reward the efforts of a noble youth such as myself. The religious texts said that an offering of gold to the goddess Donella at the moment the moon began to shed its light again would grant the one who offered sacrifice the blessings of success in courtship and love. For me, this was not the case. Oh, I offered my sacrifice every time the first sliver of light appeared on the face of the moon. I would stand at the offering bowl and stare at the dark moon each time it was supposed to change. The wait was terrible, especially when holding a large chunk of heavy gold, waiting for just the moment when the moon’s face would begin its change. Hundreds of fools crowded around the bowl every month to make the same offering, thinking such sacrifice would bring them love and happiness.
[This message has been edited by Boris (edited January 19, 2005).]
posted
It's interesting. Sacrificing gold to obtain love.
I'm having trouble with the line:
"The religious texts said that an offering of gold to the goddess Donella at the moment the moon began to shed its light again would grant the one who offered sacrifice the blessings of success in courtship and love."
It is an extremely long sentence, and a few well place commas may alleviate the problem. Or rewriting it into two separate sentences.
There is a word placement problem or missing word -
"...grant the one who offered sacrifice the blessings of success in courtship and love."
Perhaps it should read "...grant the one who offered the sacrifice the blessings..."
Mav.
[This message has been edited by maverick (edited January 20, 2005).]
posted
Thanks. I've only finished the first draft, and am probably going to re-write from the third person just to see what I get. Mostly the story is about the guy who DOESN'T get love from his sacrifice, and what he does about it. So yeah. Still a work in progress.
Posts: 11 | Registered: Jan 2005
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posted
I believe that the opening paragraph is the most important in any work. It sets the style, tone, voice and mood. So I'll focus on that.
I know the opening bit of dialog is emphatic, but one exclamation point is sufficient. If you check most published work, they rarely use exclamations. Only in the greatest heat of rage or passion do they succumb. And in that case, it's a single exclamation point.
Since you opened with dialog, my spidey-senses tell me they want a bit more dialog before you reveal why he's angry.
I also find (personal style thing) the concurrent dialog-tag-with-action construction less effective than separating them. I screamed as I swung...
The word 'wanted' seems passive.
Taking all those into account, I would try the first paragraph like this:
quote:"Curse you Donella!" I screamed. Shards of marble sprayed the altar as my sledgehammer bit into the unsympathetic pillar. "I want my gold back you faithless hussy!" I swung again. The great goddess of courtship had not been kind to me, and I was here for vengeance.
Most of this is fairly subjective. But another thing I like is that the second bit of dialog removes a bit of the exposition you have to do in paragraph 2. Hope you find some of this useful.
Jefficus
*Edited to fix typos.
[This message has been edited by Jefficus (edited January 21, 2005).]
[This message has been edited by Jefficus (edited January 21, 2005).]
posted
Yeah, that does help. My stupid multiple exclamation habit (Lousy internet). I think I fixed that part already. I decided not to have this guy break things quite yet, so I may need to go back in time a little. Thanks for the input Posts: 11 | Registered: Jan 2005
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posted
Oh yeah...Here's a good question for anyone. I somehow wound up inventing a few different rituals while I was writing the first draft. Is first person a good POV to explain these from, or would thrid person make more sense? More importantly, should I even bother explaining the rituals? They add a little color to the story, and generally help to explain the feel of the culture this person lives in, and how important this goddess is, but other than that they don't do much.
Posts: 11 | Registered: Jan 2005
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posted
I think a story about a guy and his relationship with worshipping one of his gods MUST convey at least some of the rituals involved.
As to what POV, I think any of them can be used effectively, depending upon the dictates of the story. Rather than explain them expositionally, I would expect them to be witnessed, as they occur.
The usual problem with a 'strange land' story is that they work much better if you drop in a 'stranger' character for whom things need to be explained. A guy going about his daily life rarely stops to contemplate or explain what he's doing and why. But as soon as you add the visiting cousin from Hicksville, you have an excuse to start explaining things.
Since your prot. is young (I'm assuming) you could create a bit of a familiar-stranger out of him by making these courtship rituals a rite of passage. Children in this culture aren't told anything about how the Donella god is worshipped. Now that he is of age, he is trying to learn the ropes. So he can be viewed as a stranger to that aspect of his own culture and thereby create an excuse to explain things.
Going off on a tangent, I could conceive of this temple as being run by priestesses, one of whom is assigned to your prot. to show him the ropes, making for a great exposition character. That could even set you up for a possible 'she was in front of me all along' kind of story, if that's of any interest. Or you could just make them priests and his 'mentor' becomes a sort of avuncular figure. Maybe even comic relief.
posted
Also, since he's going against the rituals, he's cognizant of them in an interesting manner.
Structurally, you have a bit of a weakness in starting with two lines in the story's "present" before wandering off into a mixed expositional flashback for the rest of your opening. And while I don't discount first person out of hand, a first person running narrative always tells me that a writer probably doesn't have a firm grasp of POV (lots of things tell me that, though). "Proper" first person is told from the perspective of a character at a point in time after all the events of the story. There are acceptable and even interesting deviations from this model, but a running narrative (particularly one with lots of exposition) isn't really one of them.
posted
Ah, thanks I was having some issues with the First person POV myself, but I couldn't quite firgure out why. I've read REALLY bad stories in the past where the writer used First person *present* POV, or some other wierd POV that is like the narrator is talking to the reader like something is happening while you're reading. I swear I almost threw up it was so bad. At any rate, all of the stories I've written so far have been in first person for some reason. I think it helps me to get into the main character's head and explain the story more easilly.
As for the begining, would it make sense to start out with a scene in the temple while this guy's got a sledgehammer and a grudge, then go back and explain how he got to that point? Or would it be better to just start him off as a young kid looking forward to all these rituals?
posted
Well, you don't really need to go anywhere. He's smashing up the temple for a reason, after all. You can have him think of his reasons even as he smashes. It works particularly well since a lot of the experiences that are reasons for him to smash things happened in the very place he's smashing things.
"This ornate bowl, how many times had I offered a lump of heavy gold, jostled by a crowd of other fools like myself? This time I would offer it a lump of iron, by all the gods!"
posted
I personally find the "explaining during a rage" thing a bit awkward. I know that when I am teaching my ex-favorite lawn chair a lesson in manners with a chainsaw, I am usually pre-verbal. (Which includes internal-verbal as well as external.) The most articulate thing I would be capable in such times is "Oh Yeah? Well how do you like THIS hinge-my-ass!" Very cathartic, but not much on the expositional front.
Boris, I would enjoy seeing a well-meaning but impotent temple functionary, like maybe the caretaker or the lady who arranges the flowers, flustered and trying to placate him.
quote:"You don't want to be upsetting the love bowl, guv'ner. Donella won't be able to remember whose sheep ain't breeding...."
"Sheep? Sheep! We're _all_ sheep!" Crunch.
"Oh my. Those poor, frustrated sheep."
This could provide for a wonderful exposition device about the various rituals. Or at least, about the breakable objects relating to the rituals. It also provides a way to draw him out of his rage and into the meat of the story.
Of course, you could use the mentor character I mentioned in the previous posting instead if you want to go for a more serious (and less comic relief) interaction.
Jefficus
[This message has been edited by Jefficus (edited January 23, 2005).]
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Other one got screwed up somehow...
