posted
I am new, and have written part one of a novel. If anyone wishes to read the rest of part one I would be very appreciative. Here are the first 13 lines.
“With all respect, Chief, I cannot understand how we are supposed to trust them.” “They won the auc–” “I know what you did, and I know why you did it. And I am not about to sit back and let you communists try to weasel your way through our system again.” “Communism failed in 20th century.” “You know what I mean.” “I’m afraid I don’t, Admiral Buckingham.” “The Rules of Auction state that every party in attendance is allowed a chance to place a bid. Not just the ones whose interest matches the Chief of Legislation.”
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posted
An interesting suppostion, that nations can be bid for... I personally like some setting details laid out before dialogue begins, especially in the very first chapter. Although your dialogue intrigues me, I am left 13 lines without a place or face to help me visualize what is taking place. Consider a sentence describing tension in the room or two people standing nose to nose or something... anything....
[This message has been edited by Rocklover (edited January 30, 2005).]
posted
Are you pulling an OSC-esque opening? If you are, then it's been done so be prepared to do it better (than he has, not better than you have.. if that makes sense). If you aren't, then I absolutely must have that dialogue broken up a bit.
posted
Considering that you've got some military personnel in the dialogue and probably throughout your story, then you might want to check out this topic we had going about Naval / Military Etiquette. There might be something useful there.
Anyway, the line where the Chief says "[...]Admiral Buckingham" sounds forced. A Chief might say "Admiral", yet it's more likely he'd probably just say "sir". But what a Chief isn't likely to do at all is say "Admiral Buckingham" to his face, unless he's trying to get his attention from across a room or he's speaking to someone else about the Admiral. Admiral or sir will suffice.
There are exceptions, though... perhaps their fraternizing or something... but from the gist of the conversation with "you communists", I doubt it.
My one penny (I'm only allowed one these days).
EDIT: Rereading this, I wonder if the Chief is even military... ? If not, scratch what I said. Tho, I hope the link may still prove useful.
[This message has been edited by HSO (edited January 30, 2005).]
posted
Rocklover: The setting is described around line 20. When I read through it I thought this part was more interesting for the beginning, so I stuck with it.
Rahl22: Point taken. Althought it isn't that kind of intro, it seems like it. I will break it up some.
HSO: The Chief is not military. He is the Chief of Legislation in InterCongress. (That means nothing really, but he is of higher status) He says "...Admeral Buckingham." As to call the attention to his superiority - sort of like a mother would to his son. I'm not sure if this worked, since you had a question about it. Do you still think it should just be Admeral?
posted
In that case, I was mistaken and it's probably acceptable. I saw Chief and Admiral without context and immediately applied a known context to it.
Posts: 1520 | Registered: Jun 2004
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Bidding for ownership of a nation is an interesting idea, and so far you’ve piqued my interest. I would defiantly read on. The few things that bother me in this passage are minor in comparison.
For example, I agree with the previous post in that when I see “Admiral” and “Chief” in the same paragraph, my first assumption is that you mean a chief petty officer.
“They won the auc–” Why not just say “auction”? An unrecognizable fragment right at the start of a story is a bit jarring.
Also, the last sentence doesn’t seem to flow with the previous ones. Prior to the last sentence, they’re discussing something to do with communism. But the last sentence seems to change the subject to whether the Chief is abusing his office, which would have more to do with plain old corruption than communism, per se. All of this may well be explained in the rest of the story, so please take my comments with a grain of salt.
posted
Good hook. I'd rather have it at the beginning of the dialog. I also want to know time and place, just a few hints.
OSC speaks in one of his books about the value of complex motivations. You can have a standard argument on nuclear power, say, or you can have somebody saying, "You already said it was a dangerous design. How can you do this?" and getting the answer "I have no choice" -- so we also get the issues of lying to the public, being compelled, etc., and maybe a little whining, and a sense of betrayal ... way cooler than a simple debate, IMHO.
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