The story's already done, and I'm not looking to bother rewriting it, because it's a third rewrite already. What I want is to know what I did wrong, and where, because that sort of info is always useful. Have at it!
quote:
John Farmer was furious because that damned unicorn simply
would not leave his garden."That stupid thing is eating us out of our livelihood!"
He snarled at his daughter Theodora's cat Snooky, kicked the
wall, and, when the pain resulting from that action rendered
him unable to kick anything else, he ran his tongue over his
lips and cast a baleful eye towards his wife, Lara.They had been arguing daily for fourteen years, and
neither cared to put an end to a good thing by divorcing.
Both felt, as they entered the twilight of their years
together, that they were entitled to a little fun."Oh, stop giving me that bloody awful look!" Lara put
down her dishrag....
Edit: that last sentence is fairly long (not quite Jamesian, though) so I had to prune it to make 13 lines.
[This message has been edited by ScottMiller (edited March 03, 2005).]
quote:The second line is great, too.
"That stupid thing is eating us out of our livelihood!"
quote:This was where I started to see a problem. First of all, that sentence is much too long. It starts with him snarling at a cat, and ends with him looking at his wife. This wouldn't be a problem if there wasn't a third action between the other two. You've put a paragraph's worth of action into only one sentence.
He snarled at his daughter Theodora's cat Snooky, kicked the
wall, and, when the pain resulting from that action rendered
him unable to kick anything else, he ran his tongue over his
lips and cast a baleful eye towards his wife, Lara.
Try splitting the statement up into a couple of sentences. I know that all of those commas work for you, because it's the way that it sounds in your head, but to most readers, that many commas kind of, I don't know, makes for a confusing read, because it slows down the narrative and obfuscates the action. It can add an interesting voice sometimes, but I don't feel that this is one of those times. You know what I mean?
Also... on showing versus telling: You're doing a lot of telling. I think it would have been more effective had you showed him rearing up to kick something again, and then changing his mind when he realized how much it hurt the first time.
But I like the general idea, and I'd probably read the whole thing just to get an idea for the world.
[This message has been edited by theokaluza (edited March 03, 2005).]
how long is the whole story? I presume it's fantasy, given the unicorn. Length and genre are always a help in a post, though we all forget from time to time.
The only glaring thing in the intro is the long sentences, as pointed out already.
R
I also like the “voice” you have for the narrator. It is as if he has watched this couple for so long that he describes them with that affectionate dry wit you might use to describe a half-crazy grandparent. I liked it.
But the real problem for me is that I was instantly caught up in the action of the story, and then abruptly jerked out of it by this paragraph:
quote:
They had been arguing daily for fourteen years, and
neither cared to put an end to a good thing by divorcing.
Both felt, as they entered the twilight of their years
together, that they were entitled to a little fun.
I think you could find a better way to work in this info. Just stating it outright was jarring, and it is clearly the narrator's voice intruding, because it says "both felt". A POV character can't really know what any other character feels. Just like I can't say. "I know my brother thinks such and such." I can't really ever know what he really thinks.
Maybe if you started with something like:
He wondered why he even bothered to say anything to her. They had been arguing daily about things like this for fourteen years.
The one sentence, though, is a problem. For one thing, ther eis a grammar error that I'm surprised nobody else poitned out:
"He snarled at his daughter, Theodora's, cat, Snooky, ..."
When you introduce a person or cat in this way you have to separate the explanation or name from the rest of the sentence with a comma. It even works the same backwards, "He snarled at Snooky, his daughter, Theodora's, cat." The trouble is when you throw in a possessive noun, as you have done in this case, I always get confused. In fact, I simply try to avoid combinging to two because I'm not even sure if the grammar is right. (Maybe one of our house experts could pipe in.)
In fact, I would probably not even mention that the cat is his daughter's at this point, nor what her name is. It's TMI for so early in a short story. That, IMO, is one of the biggest tricks to opening a short story...tell only what is necessary to show the scene properly. A little color for characterization is fine, but scrutinize every word to determine how important it is.
He snarled at Snooky, the cat his daughter had taken in three years ago. Theodora was always leaving stray animals for her parents to take care of.
"That !@$# unicorn is the last straw!"
.....or something more relevant to YOUR story....I tend to get carried away sometimes.....
[This message has been edited by Jeraliey (edited March 03, 2005).]
I kinda agree with Christine on her comment too. The lack of punctuation for one (which is an irony considering that same sentence also had too much punctuation) is the main problem. I understand that you're attempting to pretty much introduce the existence of another character (Theodora) through the possession of the cat, which I'm guessing is going to tie in with the unicorn or something at some point soon (the need for me to assume this is what really bugs me about the 13 line restriction), so don't take it out, just re-word it so it's not forcing the reader to have to try re-reading that line about 20 times to figure out what the heck you're saying.
[This message has been edited by TaShaJaRo (edited March 03, 2005).]
theokaluza: I popped open the file and quickly skimmed through it while I read the thread, and, yup, there they are, a whole bunch of run-on sentences. Whenever an entire group zeroes in a problem, I pretty much have to figure that everybody is right.
RFLong: Whoops, I thought I'd put that info in, but I probably forgot about it while I whittled a run-on (yes, another one) to make it 13 lines. It's 4400 words and humorous (or at least supposed to be humorous) fantasy. Sorry.
Christine: I'm not sure what the grammar rule would be in that case, but I don't know most of the rules (in the "proper" sense) because I picked up most of my grammar in French class. But it is TMI. I haven't read this story since I "trunked" it so this is pretty eye-opening (and helpful).
Jeraliey: I like your suggestion for fixing the above problem. In fact, I think once I've gotten the story thoroughly critiqued, I'll rewrite it anyway as an exercise. (Right now I'm worldbuilding for something new, so it would be good practice when I'm not working on maps and notes.)
RavenStarr: Yeah, I was trying to get the daughter's name in there early (trying to follow Chekhov's advice about the gun). On reflection, I think I could have found a better way to do it, lol.
Ursana, TaShaJaRo, Shendülféa: You're all too kind. Thank you
quote:
as they entered the twilight of their years
If it's a second marriage, you can ignore all that, but I think you'd need to say so.
Hoo boy. LOL! Now I definitely think being part of a workshop is a good idea. I have a long ways to go. I'm approaching thirty and I'd certainly be offended if a college kid cheerfully told me I was heading for the "twilight of my years."