posted
Here's the rewrite of my previous entry. Thanks for the tips. I've mulled this story over for so long and know it so well that the outside input really helps open my eyes to confusion language that I don't see. Hopefully, this version clears up alot of the muck.
Anymore feedback would be amazing. I'm also looking for a couple volunteers to tackle the rest of the prologue.
Prologue
The-One-Who-is-Half stood in his mind. She knew nothing of the man or his backwards time, only of her need.
He would help her destroy the universe.
A sound like bare feet slapping tile penetrated the quiet. The sound rang out again, this time accompanied by a squat silhouette. “I know you. Do I? Something in your skin. Warm. My I. Your I. I know you,” the voice whispered from several directions. The outline vanished.
A child sprang into view a few paces away from her. The pudgy boy held a large, red ball. He bounced the ball. The toy resonated as it rebounded off the blackness at his feet. “Ya wanna play catch?”
The young woman could only stare. This chain of events matched none of her preconceptions for their first meeting. She was the The-One-Who-is-Half and a member of the Profound. She had flung her consciousness across time and space to connect with her counterpart. Now that she had arrived, he wanted to play catch.
quote: posted February 08, 2005 12:26 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Prologue
A child sprang into view a few paces away from her. The pudgy boy held a large, red ball. He bounced the ball. The toy resonated as it rebounded off the blackness at his feet. “Ya wanna play catch?”
The young woman could only stare. This chain of events matched none of her preconceptions for their first meeting. She was the The-One-Who-is-Half and a member of the Profound. She had flung her consciousness across time and space to connect with her counterpart. Now that she had arrived, he wanted to play catch.
This might be more catching if you started with the "A child sprang" paragraph and then worked the info from the first 3 paragraphs in after.
[This message has been edited by HuntGod (edited February 08, 2005).]
A child sprang into view a few paces away from her. The pudgy boy held a large, red ball. He bounced the ball. The toy resonated as it rebounded off the blackness at his feet. “Ya wanna play catch?”
The young woman could only stare. This chain of events matched none of her preconceptions for their first meeting. She was the The-One-Who-is-Half and a member of the Profound. She had flung her consciousness across time and space to enter his mind. They had to destroy the universe before time ran out and he wanted to play catch.
He tossed the ball with an underhanded swing of both arms. She caught it. He ran off to get some distance, his steps silent on the blackness.
posted
I actually preferred your first draft of this. While it was a touch hard to understand, if I were you I'd just clean it up a bit, make it a little more understandable.
Posts: 25 | Registered: Mar 2004
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posted
For now, the biggest thing I would recommend is changing her name to something a little less...prosaic. Of course, that's not a small change.
That first "his" is a major unreferenced pronoun. It also causes some abiguity about the POV, since you start out with an event that happens in "his" mind without any suggestion how this could be the case if he weren't the POV character. With better establishment of the situation early on, the rest of this would go a lot smoother, I think.
posted
I would take Survivor's advice over mine :-)
But yes that is pretty much what I meant. Not sure in hindsight which is better. Though I feel you get to the stoty faster and the payoff line "and he wanted to play catch" faster by using that as your intro paragraph.
posted
Let's have a contest to see who can come up with a catchy replacement for "The-One-Who-is-Half", eh? Or not. The best I would be able to offer would be to try it in Latin or something Posts: 8322 | Registered: Aug 1999
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posted
She could call herself the Complement or the Fullfillment. This story has a nice sound to it; reminds me of Ghost Busters.
Posts: 451 | Registered: Dec 2004
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posted
All right all right...her name is a definate literary debacle. Maybe I'll just be trendy and call her "The-Chosen-One" or just "The-One".(JK) I don't think Keanu would mind.
The whole point of her name was to objectify her as a purpose instead of a human being, and as she grows in the story find a new name, but if the name is such a huge eyesore from the get-go then it just isn't going to work. I thought it might cause a few problems when I wrote and now the audience has confirmed it. So, I'll cook up something else.
p.s.
I agree, Ghostbusters rocks.
[This message has been edited by Ryan Brotman (edited February 10, 2005).]
[This message has been edited by Ryan Brotman (edited February 10, 2005).]
[This message has been edited by Ryan Brotman (edited February 10, 2005).]
posted
Along the lines of killing two birds with one stone, give him a name/title that complements hers so that they both kinda explain each other and so that "he" isn't an unreferenced pronoun like that.
You know, like in that movie where the one chick was all possessed by the, umm "Lockkeeper", and she was waiting for the "Keymaster"? I remember that the actual movie was pretty dumb, but that part worked okay.
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