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Author Topic: The Last Vinallort
Rosalie005
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Hello everyone,
It's been a while since I posted anything. I'm currently writing a Fantasy book for teens and the excerpt is from chapter 2. Any feedback would be appreciated. Thanks


The town of Enilno was a trading community, established by merchants and mercenaries as a place to sell their goods and services. Only the stupidest of creatures would try cheating or stealing from one of the peddlers.
“Stop thief.” A loud voice shouted.
“Get out of my way. Move it.” Sirhc yelled running through the crowded bazaar. As people moved into his path he reached out and effortless pushed them to the side sending them, food and boxes scattering in all directions.
“Someone stop him.”
As a stack of crates fell Sirhc jumped as high as he could trying to vault over them but his foot caught on the last crate and he found himself tumbling to the ground. Scrambling to his

[This message has been edited by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (edited August 29, 2008).]


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C L Lynn
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The action had nice flow. Only a couple of issues jumped out at me. (1)punctuation - I'd put an exclamation mark after "Stop thief" and "Get out of my way" to emphasize panic, urgency, whatever. A comma after "Move it" as is only proper. (2)The opening paragraph - the phrase "established by merchants...services" seems redundant. Why else would traders build a community? Also, to the last sentence of the first paragraph, I asked myself "why?" I assume the answer is forthcoming and that you're trying to establish Sirhc as one of these "stupid creatures" but could you not give a hint of the reason here, so we understand the stakes involved in stealing? This would certainly help us sympathize with Sirhc as he's trying to escape.
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Rosalie005
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Hi Lynn,
Thanks for the feedback. I agree my punctuation is horrible, I'll work on that, as for why it would be stupid to steal I actually cover that in the rest of the chapter, basically if you are caught the cost of the item that was stolen is beaten out of you. Also the item he steals he pawns off on a passerby who is the other main character in the book. Once again I appreciate the feedback.


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Esso
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Hi Rosalie -

I don't feel the urge to continue reading this story, and I think it's because I don't have a real feel for the place and culture yet. The exclamations of people in the bazaar seem isolated, with no surrounding detail, and I don't have a picture of the bazaar either. I think if you added just a little information about the place and the non-characters involved in this chase scene, you would grab my attention for what is happening to the main guy.


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skadder
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The town of Enilno was a trading community, established by merchants and mercenaries as a place to sell their goods and services. Only the stupidest of creatures would try cheating or stealing from one of the peddlers.
“Stop thief.” A loud voice shouted.
“Get out of my way. Move it.” Sirhc yelled running through the crowded bazaar. As people moved into his path he reached out and effortless pushed them to the side sending them, food and boxes scattering in all directions.
“Someone stop him.”
As a stack of crates fell Sirhc jumped as high as he could trying to vault over them but his foot caught on the last crate and he found himself tumbling to the ground. Scrambling to his


>The town of Enilno was a trading community, established by merchants and mercenaries as a place to sell their goods and services.

or

The trading town of Enilno was established by merchants...

If you can say it fewer words, you should.

>“Stop thief.” A loud voice shouted.

You could tell us who shouted. If you can be specific you gain a clarity that helps the story image in the readers head. Also it is a speech tag and so is part of the same sentence. The way you start makes it seem omniscient

Try:

“Stop thief,” a bearded silver-smith shouted.

>“Get out of my way--(dash works better)move it, (commma)” Sirhc yelled running through the crowded bazaar. As people moved into his path, he reached out and effortless(ly) pushed them to the side, sending them, piles of fruit (be specific), and boxes scattering in all directions.

>“Someone stop him.”

Is this a child speaking, or a woman or a man? At the moment it is non-specific voice, and you are missing the opportunity of painting colours in your scene.

>As a stack of crates fell(comma) Sirhc jumped as high as he could(comma) trying to vault over them(comma) but his foot caught on the last crate and he found himself tumbling to the ground. Scrambling to his

This sentence feels to me that it could be improved by creating a more immediate picture. It is also too long.

Example:

A stack of crates crashed (use stronger verbs not run of the mill ones if you can) in front of Sirhc. As he leapt over them, his foot caught and he tumbled to the cobbles. Scrambling to his

How did the stack of crates crash in front of him? It's unlikely they did it on their own.

I appreciate this is a teen fantasy, and so will only mention that this feels like a generic intro of a hero who starts as thief--see Aladdin. You do mention that this is chapter two of a book (and so should really be in the novel section of hatrack)
and so I wonder if this is your hero or not. Quite late to introduce the hero if it is.


[This message has been edited by skadder (edited September 16, 2008).]

[This message has been edited by skadder (edited September 17, 2008).]


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Rosalie005
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thank for the feedback. I appreciate the grammatical correction. The entire story is about 35,000 words. I wasn't sure where it should go. I'll take your suggestions and rework them into my story. Thanks
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Brant Danay
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"The town of Enilno was a trading community, established by merchants and mercenaries as a place to sell their goods and services."

Not sure I particularly care for the name Enilno, but that might just be me.

I would leave the mercenaries part, as mercenaries are far more interesting than merchants, in my opinion, but I agree with the others that "as a place to sell their goods and services" is redundant and should be dropped, or perhaps replaced with something more interesting.

"Only the stupidest of creatures would try cheating or stealing from one of the peddlers."

I noticed you mentioned that the consequences of stealing would be mentioned later. I think, if they're severe or unique enough, that moving their description into the first 13 might make for a good hook.

"As people moved into his path he reached out and effortless pushed them to the side sending them, food and boxes scattering in all directions."

Effortless should be effortlessly.

Just a couple thoughts. Maybe they can help you out.


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