posted
This is my first time trying this so I appreciate all of your help. These are the 13-ish lines of the start of what I'm working on now. I hope it's good. Thanks!!!
Think of the snow as hands falling through the frozen air, touching. The man was in the back seat of a taxi and his neck was turned to the left. A cylinder of skin on his neck was creased slightly. It was a thin pink in the cold and his nose was a raw red. He stared across the street at a figure leaning on the frosty metal of a streetlamp. The orange light splattered onto the figure’s black coat. The man had seen that person before, standing there. But the taxi quickly veered down another street, even though the red vein of a stoplight was still visible in the black night. The roads were empty, after all, and the driver floored the pedal.
[This message has been edited by jayt (edited December 18, 2007).]
[This message has been edited by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (edited December 18, 2007).]
posted
In all honesty, I'm having trouble following this.
There are a lot of pronouns, but they don't seem connected to anything. On my first read through, I thought that most of the description referred to the cab driver - it took three or four re-readings to realize that you're referring to a passenger in the cab (i think).
Also, your sentences and descriptions are choppy and somewhat confusing. The first sentence seems entirely irrelevant, and I don't understand the bit about 'a cylinder of skin was creased slightly' at all, though I suspect it's connected to 'the man's neck' in some form (is the cylinder his neck?). Also, the bit about the orange light and the coat - 'splattered' is a rather odd verb for light.
posted
I clarified a lot of the pronouns with better descriptions - a main tenet of the story is the lack of a name, at least in the beginning, for the main character. It made it difficult to work around. Your advice was great though and I hope my edits clarified who the pronouns referred to a bit!
Oh yea, the first line is very relevant later (and symbolically).
[This message has been edited by jayt (edited December 18, 2007).]
posted
hey, Jayt, be fair and post your changes, don't just edit the first thirteen, because then we can't tell where you started from! I like this very much. The description is very evocative and sets a great tone for the start of a novel. I'd read more.
Posts: 1304 | Registered: May 2007
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posted
I'm with Kirona on this one. I'm confused by this and if I have to decipher it while I read I can't enjoy it. The first sentence seems extraneous - I don't know why it is there.
"A cylinder of skin on his neck was creased slightly." I can't even begine to visualize this. Creased how? Where? Why? I need more details, more clarity.
"...red vein of a stoplight..." I don't know if by "vein" you are trying to allude to something else or if this is jus a bad (IMO) choice of a word.
The scene, though it has the ingredients of an active, tense scene, feels too passive to me. It must be terse. Cut out the excess words and make the scene more active.
[This message has been edited by nitewriter (edited December 18, 2007).]
[This message has been edited by nitewriter (edited December 18, 2007).]
posted
Minor things: ditto on "cylinder of skin," "orange light splattered onto the figure's black coat," and "red vein of a stoplight." If the coat was black, it would still look black under orange light; it's only the area around that would (or might) look orange, and unless the light just came on, it ought to be pretty steady. And "veins" are long and thin, not round like stoplights.
More important:
quote:the first line is very relevant later (and symbolically)
I would suggest that if it's relevant later, that's where you should put it. It's also offputting because it's a direct instruction from the narrator to the reader, in present tense, whereas the rest is in past tense, and the narrator and reader are both invisible. It's only a short selection, and maybe you have a lot of the narrator addressing the reader, but as it is, it seems an inconsistency in the writing and is liable to throw people out of the story before they're into it.
Why is it important not to give the man a name? Is his identity going to be a surprise later? If that's the case, maybe you could make it so that he thinks of himself by a different name than other people know him by, and you could use that name here. If that's not the reason, I'd be curious what it is. Lack of a name really bothers lots of readers (and it does NOT raise suspense by making them wonder Who It Is).
Finally, point-of-view. So far, you don't seem to have one. Or, rather, it seems cinematic, described by a narrator totally outside of anyone's head. You can do that, and maybe it's intentional, but it means giving up the one huge advantage that the written word has over the movies. I don't recommend it.
posted
Hey guys, thanks for the replies. I made a bunch of corrections already and will post them below this.
I love the first line, but I definitely did need to change the narration style and I did.
Okay, so the reason the man doesn't have a name... pretty much the man undergoes an operation that locks his brain into a loop, creating a consciousness that will live forever but never receive anything new. Because of that, his "self" enters a new world, his consciousness objectified, and in the entrance to the city he forgets everything about himself. Why he does this where it is, all that stuff, is something else...
[Edit: I changed it to I; it fits well and is easily readable, I think.]
The snow seemed like hands falling through the frozen air, touching. I was in the back seat of a taxi and my neck was turned to the left. A line of skin on my collar was creased slightly. It was a thin pink in the cold and my nose was a raw red. The taxi quickly veered down another street, even though the red eye of a stoplight was still visible in the black night. The roads were empty, after all, and the driver floored the pedal. A thin layer of snow had accumulated on the paved city streets. “The hospital by the park, right?” The cab driver asked over his shoulder.
[This message has been edited by jayt (edited December 18, 2007).]
[This message has been edited by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (edited December 18, 2007).]
posted
I liked the second version SO much better. Much more readable. And I felt drawn to the character. He seemed deep and thoughtful, and the setting of a cab ride on a snowy night worked perfectly with that.
My only qualm was with these two lines.
quote:A line of skin on my collar was creased slightly. It was a thin pink in the cold and my nose was a raw red.
The first line is descriptive, but it doesn't really seem to be something someone would notice about themselves. And the second line made me say "Huh?" And that was after I read it three times. Otherwise, great job. I'd keep reading.
posted
To me, that night, the snow in New York seemed like hands falling through the frozen air, touching. I was in the back seat of a taxi and my neck was turned to the left. My nose was a raw red and tingled in the cold. The taxi quickly veered down another street, even though the red eye of a stoplight was still visible in the black night. The roads were empty, after all, and the driver floored the pedal. A thin layer of snow had accumulated on the paved city streets. “The hospital by the park, right?” The cab driver asked over his shoulder. “Yea. That one,” I answered mechanically. I was already a million miles away.
posted
I like this one much better - it's no longer nearly as confusing, and the main character now has a personality, even if it's hard to see here.
One thing though -
quote: A thin layer of snow had accumulated on the paved city streets.
This seems a bit unnecessary since you already mentioned snow in an earlier line. If it's not an important detail that the ground has a thin layer of snow on it, you might want to consider taking it out.
Oh, and one more thing - I don't live in New York, but I'm pretty sure that the streets there are never as empty as you imply. Don't hesitate to correct me if I'm wrong; I'm probably a victim of stereotyping and stylized imagery here, and as I live halfway across the continent, I'm not exactly a good source. Just a thought.
posted
Haha, well it definitely depends where and what time - also, it's snowing so a lot of people would be indoors. At least, that was my thought process!
Posts: 8 | Registered: Dec 2007
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posted
It's always nice to see a new member who not only listens to crits, but actually, in trying to follow it, improves his work.
I still have a problem with:
quote:my neck was turned to the left.
It's better, but it's still not something one would say about oneself. Instead, it's you, the author, trying to look at the scene from OUTSIDE the POV character, rather than the POV character himself. What was he actually doing? Looking out the window, correct? Say so directly: "I was in the back seat of a taxi, looking out the left-hand window."
"My nose was a raw red" is borderline--well at least it's closer to being borderline. It IS possible to see the tip of your nose without looking in a mirror, but people rarely pay any attention to it, and in any case, colors are harder to see at night. So I don't think there's much question that that should go, too. " . . . tingled in the cold" is all we, as the reader, need to know about the character's own reaction to the state of his nose.
The core of POV is: if it's not the character's reaction, leave it out.
PS: read OSC's Characters & Viewpoint. It's even better than his How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy. I think you'd get a lot out of it. Card is a fantastic teacher.
[This message has been edited by rickfisher (edited December 19, 2007).]
posted
Oh, yeah, regarding NYC: Since you don't say where in the city you are, there could be some streets that are nearly empty. But even then you're probably unlikely to turn off one empty street onto another one.
Besides, you probably don't want to be on any of those streets. And if you do, you should know just which streets they are, and use their names, and mention something about the conditions (not a lot, just enough to let the people who know realize that you know what you're doing, and to let the people who don't know understand why this particular street can be empty in such a busy town). But I don't think you'll find any streets by the park that are empty, ever.
Is there a hospital by the park? Is there only one? Make sure you know.
[This message has been edited by rickfisher (edited December 19, 2007).]
I have to say that while the first take was rough, I felt it was much more visceral, and while the new revisions are easier to follow, they’re less foreboding.
Maybe "As I looked left, a thin..." about the neck part.
And maybe, "my nose was red raw", instead of "a raw red"
What happened to the guy under the street lamp? I didn't have any trouble envisioning the part about the orange light, because I've often found the properties of those weird orange streetlamps fascinating; the way they drain everything of color and make it an almost photo negative orange.
I like it, and the more you polish it, the more I want to read it! Rock on!
"The hospital by the park, right?" The cab driver asked..." Not very convincing, as the cab driver would know from the start of the drive exactly where he is going - there would be no second guessing the destination.
First sentence, and I know you need this sentence, but it still seems awkward to me - and don't know at all what it means.
"...neck turned to the left..." Awkward. Do you mean head turned to the left? Neck/head leaning to the left?
This is a description of an active scene, but it does not feel active, feels too slow:
"The taxi quickly veered down another street, even though the red eye of a stoplight was still visible in the black night. The roads were empty after all, and the driver floored the pedal."
Could be:
"Step on it, will ya Mac?" "In a hurry at this hour pal?" He punched the gas. The engine howled and he blew through a red light. We careened down a snow slick empty street. The headlights slashed into the night and like a beacon, swept back and forth over the road.
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