This is a supernatural drama involving a teenage girl who gets caught up in the dangerous psychological snares of her Uncle. It's Approx 4000 words and finished if anyone wants to read it in full and perhaps give a critique.
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'Prophet? Ha!' Oxana thought to herself. 'More like cheap fortune-teller,' she continued as she grated a fat stick of purple chalk against the cement walkway that led to her uncle's house. "And not a very good one at that," she added aloud. The chalk wasn't hers, just something she picked up at the bottom of the stairs that went to the front door. It probably belonged to her younger cousin. She sat on the bottom step, hunched over and staring at her indistinguishable scribble, wondering if it was done yet. 'I don't care if he's right half the time. He's wrong half the time, too!' she thought as she tossed the chalk off to the side.
Joe's eyes followed the purple stick as it flew through the air and landed in the lush green grass in front of him.
[This message has been edited by headolence (edited November 10, 2005).]
Sorry, this still wasn't 13 lines in manuscript format (courier 12-point font), so I had to cut it.
[This message has been edited by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (edited November 11, 2005).]
Would refer to read the opening 13, rather than snippets from elsewhere.
Your first excerpt reads like a 'teaser trailer' for that part of the story, instead of being proper narrative.
Some nice descriptive touches in the second excerpts.
I take it the Oxana/Odexa name choices are deliberate, but they're just too close and the reader will inevitably muddle them up, which will just annoy the reader no end.
posted
I am assuming the name is intended to be Oxana, as I'm not finding any examples of the other name mentioned. For my part, the name Oxana immediately made me think of Luoxana Troi on Star Trek (not sure I spelled it right, but the point is the only difference in pronounciation is the "L"... yeah, yeah, yeah, there was probably a "w" in there, but who really enunciated her name that clearly?
As for Oxana's thoughts: you only need to anchor us once per paragraph as to who the speaker is. Adding in redundant dialog tags breaks up your flow.
Here's an example of how to get rid of at least one dialog tag, and turn the other into a tool to move the action forward.
'Prophet? Ha!' Oxana thought to herself. 'More like cheap fortune-teller.' She grated a fat stick of purple chalk against the cement walkway that led to her uncle's house. "And not a very good one at that," she added aloud, glancing around to see if anyone was listening.
I liked the start with the chalk, but was somewhat disappointed that it went no where. If you are starting out with chalk pictures, make them part of the story. Otherwise, they took up far too much space in your very valuable first 13 lines.
[This message has been edited by Elan (edited November 10, 2005).]
posted
This looks pretty good and I will read it if you wish. Please can tell me just how much grammatical and style critique you are looking for? Also, please recall I am sometimes a slow reader.
I was a bit confused about why such a bulky phrase described where the chalk was found.
I think that italics work better than single apostrophes used as quotes for characters' thoughts or subvocalizations. I generally reserve them them for quotes inside quotes.
Joe said, "I talked to John and he said, 'You are Jakes brother,' and I nodded agreement."
[This message has been edited by keldon02 (edited November 11, 2005).]
posted
I liked the anger-at-the-prophet thing, and would probably keep reading. The down side is the other stuff not being clear. I got distracted by the chalk: why's she doing that thing with the chalk? I later figured it was just something to do with her hands, but I wondered for a paragraph.
Then Joe appeared, and I didn't know how long he'd been there, and I wondered what else of significance was in the environment the author hadn't told yet.
And I don't know why she's angry with the prophet, which is of course the focal point, rather than the chalk.
One important suggestion from OSC: don't tell us the emotions until you've told us what they're about, because until we know, we can't relate. After you tell us, then we can be angry along with her.
posted
I thought I'd add here that I read the story and think that it has some excellent parts, but some other parts which remain unfinished. In a way it reminds me of Kafka's "In the Penal Colony" where the reader has to struggle with layers of abstraction, some by implication and some by exposition.
I think the main question I would wonder about at this point is how can a writer read their own story for the "first time" so they can experiance the unfolding process and see what are the weak and strong points? I think this is a major need in writing a story with so many hidden meanings.
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