Hatrack River Writers Workshop: Shadows [Very Creepy, Very Good]

This is topic Shadows [Very Creepy, Very Good] in forum Fragments and Feedback for Short Works at Hatrack River Writers Workshop.

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Posted by zetars (Member # 2956) on :

Slowly, he lifted his head and looked around, lying on his stomach. The space vessel was empty and he was alone. Horrible things happened when he was alone. He looked to the console, only fifteen or so feet in front of him.
He tried to get up, but swiftly discovered that his legs were strapped to the floor. Quickly reacting, he tried to lift his hands, but discovered his hands were also strapped down.
Suddenly, alarms flashed and he looked through the front window of the ship to see that they were entering orbit of an unknown planet. Slowly, shadows emerged from the walls, encroaching upon.
He began to yelp and scream but no one came. No one ever came…

Posted by Brecca's Sister (Member # 2925) on :

Stephen King: "Consider the sentence He closed the door firmly. It's by no means a terrible sentence (at least it's got an active verb going for it), but ask yourself if firmly really has to be there. You can argue that it expresses a degree of difference between He closed the door and He slammed the door, and you'll get no argument from me... [sic] but what about context? What about all the enlightening (not to say emotionally moving) prose that came before He closed the door firmly? Shouldn't this tell us how he closed the door? And if the foregoing prose does tell us, isn't firmly an extra word? Isn't it redundant?"

page 124-125 from On Writing, a memoir of the craft.

of course, this is from the guy who says that adverbs pave the way to hell....
EDIT: just fixing tyops ^.^;

[This message has been edited by Brecca's Sister (edited November 15, 2005).]

Posted by zetars (Member # 2956) on :

fxg

[This message has been edited by zetars (edited November 16, 2005).]

Posted by tchernabyelo (Member # 2651) on :

Perhaps you should re-read your piece and look at how many adverbs are there, and what they are bringing to the narrative compared with what they are taking away from it?

Perhaps you should also refrain from telling us that something is "very good", because that's a subjective judgement. By all means tell us that you think it's the best thing you've written, but don't tell me it's good, because I reserve the right to disagree. For example:
1). We have unattributed pronouns, no name, no chance to identify meaningfully with a character, so we are less likely to care when something terrible happens to him.
2). If he is lying on his stomach and wants to get up, he's more likely to use his hands first, not his legs.
3). "Slowly shadows emerged from the walls, encroaching upon." Emcroaching upon what? The sentence just stops.
4). There's nothing vivid here. He's in a "space vessel". There's a console. There's an "unknown planet", which he sees through the front window, not on any sort of sensor display. It's flat. It's dull. And it isn't good.
But that's just my opinion, and it's no more or less valid than anyone else's.

Posted by zetars (Member # 2956) on :

Well, that's all there was supposed to be. Supposed to envoke mystery, make you wonder... I just thought it was good...

Posted by sojoyful (Member # 2997) on :

zetars, don't let the feedback discourage you. You have a good idea going; we'll help you to fine-tune it. Or, you can ignore us completely, because each of these posts is only one person's opinion!

I had the same thought as tchernabyelo - he would try using his hands first.

I have to agree on the adverbs thing. I think you're holding back - not trusting yourself to do a good job describing the action, and therefore relying on adverbs to do it for you. Swallow your self-consciousness and have faith in yourself! See if you can rephrase things so that we get a sense of what's happening by the actions themselves. If your first few tries at this sound overdone, that's ok. I'd rather have a life raft that's over-inflated than one without enough air in it.

I get the sense that he's been captured, wakes up and doesn't exactly know where he is or what's going on. If that's the case, how does he know the entire vessel is empty? Is it a one-room vessel? He can't see 360 degrees around him because he's restrained, so he doesn't even know for sure that the room he's in is empty.

How does an alarm flash?

If he's lying on his stomach, arms and legs tied down, can he really crane his neck up enough to see the console and the window?

Who is 'he' anyway? I would feel more engaged in his personal struggle if I knew his name.

Like I said, don't be discouraged. This is what we writers do: we act as skeptics of our own work, asking questions, then more questions, then more. Why this, and why that? I do this ALL DAY LONG (argh!!) with my own work. Cooking dinner, mailing a letter, walking back to my office from lunch...always asking, "But why is doing that? How did that get there? How come they don't know this?" All these questions you've generated from us are GOOD because that's how you get at the meat of the work.

Take heart. We're all in the same boat.

Posted by Elan (Member # 2442) on :

zetars, the fastest way to alienate everyone on this board is to get snippy when folks are trying to help you. The advice to read Stephen King's book "On Writing" was a gem. I recently bought it and read it in just two days. It taught me a lot about how to make my writing more powerful. If you felt you were already 100% at the top of your game you wouldn't be posting here and asking a bunch of strangers to critique your work. So don't get huffy when someone passes on good advice.

The proper way to respond to a critique is to say "Thank you." And leave it at that.