Revision 1:
Stallholders were packing away in the cool, blue dawn-light as Catalique's night market drew its last few, ragged breaths. I shovelled spicy tiger-noodles into my mouth and watched a vendor collapse his origami-like stall with a few deft touches, then heave it into the back of a waiting skimmer.
A panicked squeal made me snap my head round; a street-butcher in the next stall withdrew a long blade from the neck of a hanging pig, and blood fountained into a tin bucket below. I looked away, mildly nauseated.
"Mr. Vigelund?"
A white-haired man stood behind me, surrounded by five bulky men.
"Who's asking?" I laid down my box of noodles on the snack bar's counter, then cursed as I realised I'd left my plasma pistol in
[This message has been edited by skadder (edited October 26, 2009).]
I like your setting. You establish what feels like a very down-to-earth background, with minimal intrusion of futuristic tech (skimmer and plasma pistol) - the tech isn't the important part (at least, so far), which I like.
I would drop some of your descriptives to make it smoother (cut everything in < >:
quote:
Stallholders were <already> packing up in the cool, blue dawn-light as Catalique's night market drew its last <few,> ragged breaths.
I shovelled <more> tiger-noodles into my mouth and watched a nearby <market> vendor collapse his origami-like stall with a few deft touches, then heave it into the back of a waiting skimmer.
A <nearby,> panicked<,> squeal made me snap my head round; a street-butcher in the next stall withdrew a blade from the neck of a <pink,> hanging pig, and blood fountained into a tin bucket below it.
I looked away, <mildly> nauseated.
"Mr. Vigleund?"
A white-haired man stood behind me, surrounded by five bulky men.
"Who's asking?" I laid down my box of noodles on the snack bar's counter, then cursed (? - out loud? under his breath? in his mind?)as I realised I'd left my plasma pistol
[This message has been edited by NoTimeToThink (edited October 26, 2009).]
In the "watched a nearby market vendor..." I suggest cutting even further. It's clear the MC is in the market, you can just say "watched a vendor collapse his..." (he couldn't see the vendor unless he was nearby, or you'd have said he was using magna-vision specs or something.)
My only other comment is on the paragraph breaks - was that just an artifact of pasting here, or were you really expecting to have a carriage return after each sentence? That interrupted the flow for me. I would expect one after skimmer, another after nauseated, then the dialogue dictates the rest of the paragraph returns for this segment.
Good luck with this!
Regarding the cursing to himself comment. I wrote it specifically the way I did as he curses as he realises he'd left his plasma pistol (wherever). I felt it implied it was also part of the same mental process. Maybe it doesn't work.
Stallholders were packing away in the cool, blue dawn-light as Catalique's night market drew its last few, ragged breaths.I'd cut this sentence for the weak "were packing" construction, and because the second sentence is better (and references the "packing away" thats going on. You could sprinkle in the "last breath" metaphor later on.
I shovelled spicy tiger-noodles into my mouth and watched a vendor collapse his origami-like stall with a few deft touches, then heave it into the back of a waiting skimmer. Really like this as an opening sentence. Gives setting, POV, and lets us know we're in a different world.
A panicked squeal made me snap my head round; a street-butcher in the next stall withdrew a long blade from the neck of a hanging pig, and blood fountained into a tin bucket below. I looked away, mildly nauseated. Cool, and hopefully foreshadows violence to come.
"Mr. Vigelund?"
A white-haired man stood behind me, surrounded by five bulky men.
"Who's asking?" I laid down my box of noodles on the snack bar's counter, then cursed as I realised I'd left my plasma pistol in I agree that this comes off as an audible curse.
1: Stallholders. It took me a few passes before I got who/what "Stallholders" are. Could you use a term like vendors? Maybe more people are famalier with the term Stallholders, I dunno.
2: Packing up in the cool dawn light. Now, once I got that Stallholders were vendors in a market (I still could be wrong) this second line threw me just a tad. I used to work as a vendor in a street market and we were never packing up in the we hours of the morning, rather we were unpacking our stuff for the coming day. But your market may not be the same as the one I grew up in (the market I grew up in was food, trinkets, odd things).
Stall holders is probably a UK term; market vendor works for me, too.
[This message has been edited by skadder (edited October 26, 2009).]
A white-haired man stood behind me, to me implied eyes in the back of his head - assuming his limited pov, can he instead turn to find the white-haired man?
If the ambiguity of the curse (can the white-haired man hear it?) causes readers to scratch their heads, could the anxiety be shown as some other action - a pause, a heart flutter?
quote:
A white-haired man stood behind me, to me implied eyes in the back of his head - assuming his limited pov, can he instead turn to find the white-haired man?
I thought the implication would be that he turned--I haven't suggested he isn't human. Still, it's obviously not clear.
"Tekiya were packing away their wares in the cool..."
"Roten vendors" might sound more familiar
"Bania" has an ethnic sound though Indian in root.
"Catalique's night market drew its last few, ragged breaths." I like this line.
quote:
A white-haired man stood behind me, surrounded by five bulky men.
Eh, not great but just tossing something out.
I think the revision looks good, seems to address several of the points raised.
For reference, I had no issues with the stallholder term. I don't know if it's because i do a lot of farmers' market types of shopping or spent time in asia growing up. I think it gives a certain flavor...I get the sense this isn't set in downtown NYC.
Couple other small things: I think you can do away with the commas in first sentence. Cool blue dawn-light works fine. last few ragged breaths also fine. They're all descriptors that modify the words - light and breaths. I think it would read more smoothly without the commas, but check it out. I have commaitis, I'm hardly the one to judge.
Then another purely style point - you could make the "blood fountained" phrase into it's own sentence. That, to me, would make that passage read more smoothly as well. Total style point, though, do what works best for your style.
I would be up for a full read if you need reviewers (so long as it's not terribly long...), just have to give me a couple days as I have one in my inbox waiting for my response tonight.
I don't publish my email addy here, so let me know if you're interested and I'll send you a note that you can reply to. Good luck!
I 'll think aboout the burly men. I just chucked them, I may replace them with some tech anyway.
Thanks for reading and taking the time to comment.
@Kayti
I have comma-indecisionitis. Shall I or shan't I? I'll remove them, I think.
I agree I could split the blood fountained sentence away. I usually make decisions like that based on cadence--so it would depend on the final edit.
Thanks for the offer of a read. I think it is 1K long at present and will probably be about 5k. If you send me an email now so I have your email, I'll send you an email when its finished (a week or two)--see if you still want to crit it.
Thanks for your comments.
[This message has been edited by skadder (edited October 27, 2009).]
"cool, blue dawn-light" and "last few, ragged breaths" in the same (opening) sentence is laying it on a bit thick, imo. The second sentence continues with lots of adjectival work (spicy, origami-like, deft). A touch more careful choice on the verb and noun front may see you able to lighten up a touch on the adjective/adverb front. Interestingly, you give agreat deal of care to the image of the location, but are much sparser once the "action" starts (one white-haired man, five bulky men; that's all we get, and no hint of the narrator's emotions about them).
The things we don't know - who the narrator is, who these men are, what they want - are more important than the things we do know. That seems to be the wrong way round, to me.
Firstly the first / original form I liked better. More on that in a second.
The only negative was the first two lines. They open very neutrally toned like a narrator. Then I discover it's first person. Hmmm I would have personally made it a little more personal / perspectivised. Ie his thoughts not a neutral parties thoughts. Does this make sense?
And that's it. Look plenny of feedback here on the minor technicals but the positives are it paced well, held my attention thoroughly and made me 'there'.
I think that's what I liked about your first version of he 13. It didn't seem like a first 13 it was balanced like I needed to turn the page. And his is what we want publishers to do. Turn the page!
Genuinely wanted more... Well done.
Simon