posted
Hello. This is my first post ever on this forum. Here are the first 13 lines to a short story I'm working on. If you find it interesting or are feeling charitable, your help as a reader would be nice. *******************************************
The State
As soon as Alica smashed through the wooden door, she raised her pistol and pulled the trigger three times. For several seconds afterwards, she remained motionless, frozen in that instant after the last deafening shot. Her gun was still aimed at the would-be assassin’s chest, her eyes still focused on the cold, steel barrel.
When they unfocused, she saw his face. No longer a blur against her weapon’s crosshair, the dead man’s expression looked much too alive. The sun had darkened his skin to an almost copper shade. His jaw was covered with a thick, grimy black beard and his red lips were slightly parted and relaxed. His head rested against the dusty wall and his smiling eyes were looking slightly down and to his right, lost in a good memory from long ago. His left hand still clutched the barrel of his sniper rifle.
Alica could not stand looking at him any longer. She aimed once again and shot him in the face. She holstered the pistol and walked toward the apartment’s only window.
From there, she could see the panicked voices of the crowd that had gathered at the City Square one block away. Ten thousand had come on that day to see their Vuren speak.
[This message has been edited by N. Machiavelli (edited May 21, 2005).]
posted
Well, first of all I have to state up front that I am not your audience. I don't read crime stuff because I don't like the violence.
But even if I did, I think I'd have a problem with it. You start with a sudden violent act, but you hadn't yet developed a character that I cared about. I wouldn't go past the first 13 lines...
posted
The concern I had with this was that you just jumped into the action - Alica crashing through the door, and there's something about an assassin - but we don't really have enough context to understand what's going on. Is Alica some kind of bodyguard? How did she know the assassin was there? It might be stronger if you started it 5 minutes earlier in the story - something like Alica becomes aware of a threat and THEN hops into action.
There's a whole lot of action here but as Elan says, nothing to care about, and without more of an understanding of the situation, I'm not sure what I'm supposed to think. I'm not even positive I'm supposed to be rooting for Alica.
I was also thrown by the description of the happy corpse; that didn't seem right.
posted
Some plausibility nits will come from your audience. A pistol with a "crosshair", for instance. Don't get me wrong, these do exist, but...it didn't come off well in the passage. There were a lot of lesser things, like firing three shots rather than a double tap. Firing in groups of two shots is pretty well accepted, but trying for three just doesn't work, it makes all three shots nearly certain to miss entirely.
Blasting away at the face of a dead man...just not professional, nor is bursting through the door and then standing motionless while focusing on only one target. You generally can't see the barrel of your own pistol if you're sighted in properly, even if you could you wouldn't focus your eyes there during a CQB situation.
Facial expressions of relaxation and reminisence don't tend to survive three bullets in the chest (assuming she shot him where she was aiming). Chest wounds can incapacitate very quickly, but they don't kill instantly or anything like that. And if the guy is going to die from bleeding out or whatever, allowing him to regain his smiling eyes and whatnot, well, that takes time that you don't indicate here.
The identification of the "City Square" being "one block away" sounds a little fuzzy to me. Also, ten thousand doesn't seem like a really big crowd, not big enough for a guy important enough to have bodyguards or whatever running around killing his assassin (apparently after the fact, anyway).
There are also the problems with poor presentation already mentioned.
posted
this is off topic, but now I am really curious about why 3 shots would tend to make them all miss, but 2 wouldn't. That doesn't make sense to me.
Posts: 1750 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
It just does. I'm not sure why either, it might have to do with the fact that trying for three means you tense up your grip too much or something. Double tap works, triple tapping doesn't.
That doesn't mean that you can't take a third shot after your first two (bang bang...bang), by the way. But that third shot will usually be a distinctly aimed shot from the first two, usually a "coup de grace" shot to the head of an already disabled target. That's a no-no if you're trying to avoid leaving a "signature" on your MO, by the way. Double tap followed by a single kill shot indicates a very skilled individual. That's probably not the problem here. It's just that everything is a bit like that "crosshair" reference. There are pistols sufficiently accurate and powerful that it isn't totally stupid to have a scope attachment. But something like that would definitly be addressed and justified, and it isn't.
posted
Well, I agree in part that I really don't yet care about the character in the story. However I think that the way you did write the action was pretty interesting. I like your tone I guess. It flows well.
Posts: 62 | Registered: Jun 2005
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posted
By the end of this segment, I dislike Alicia, doubt I would want to read more about her. I was OK with her until:
"Alica could not stand looking at him any longer. She aimed once again and shot him in the face."
I also agree with Survivor about the strangeness of her focusing on only one target. Shouldn't she scan the room to see if there are anymore bad guys (although she seems more like the bad guy) around the room.
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