Xenzues watched his daughter’s soft leather boots, the delicate way she balanced on the balls of her feet, how she slightly shifted her weight. It was hardly noticeable, but efficient enough to help her gain the momentum needed to swing her sword into her opponent. Celestia maintained perfect balance as her weight transferred again, allowing her foot to come up and smash into another man’s chest, causing him to double over. Today, for training, she fought two members of the royal guard.

To format is courier new size 12, 1 inch margins.

* You're showing us a sporting match. What happens in a sporting match doesn't make good fiction. Even sports movies spend little time in the game itself. You can certainly get by with some, especially the grudge match sort of thing, or "I must prove myself!" but Xeunzes has no conflict or struggle here, so there's nothing to hook me. Maybe start somewhere else?

* Let us know what's happening as soon as it happens. "King Xenzues watched his daughter fight a sword match with two members of the royal guard. He saw her soft leather boots, the delicate way..."

The problem I see with this frag, though, is that nothing is really happening - it doesn't hook me once you get past the initial "dance" part at the beginning. What you may want to ask yourself is, why should the reader care about any of this? Do they know these characters well enough to get involved and interested in that lovely dance movement? Is the girl delicate and lovely, but with a warrior's steely resolve that only shows when necessary? We don't know anything about her, so it's hard to judge how her "soft leather boots" and dance-like movements compare or contribute to her warrior-like qualities (if she has any - or is she just practicing because that's what royals "do" rather than for real practical use??)

I think the second paragraph being so descriptive slows the momentum of the narrative. Could you spread that narrative through the chapter? That might make it more effective.

Perhaps the chapter would be more active if you started with "There's nothing more I can teach her," Pallos told her father. (If he says he's the teacher, we don't need to know he's the sword master here, do we?) Then show them watching her together. That might make a more "active" opening. Just an idea.

I hope my rambling comments are of some use to you.

Lynda

King Xenzues watched his daughter spar in a sword match with her trainers. He was pushing his daugther to become the best sword fighter, but feared that she will never be good enough. The X was about to happen to his daughter, and he had not told her, and he felt ___.

If the King is your POV or your are omni (either 3PL or full), let me into his head. If I know what he's concerned about then it is likely to hook me. The fact that he's done everything to hide the truth from his daughter is compelling.

After all, why withhold that information when he's preparing her for whatever X is? I'd read to find out why he hasn't told her.

Doesn't she need to know (as an example) to avoid spindles from a sewing wheel to avoid the bad event? I'm a big fan for the idea if you told Sleeping Beauty why you were trying to protect her, she'd be able to help protect herself.

You don't have to lay out everything but if he knows there is a trouble coming give me a hint in a general way about what it is, why he doesn't think she'll be a good enough swordsman and why she needs to be one. Then you can decribe his watching her fencing and the reader can decide if the King's fears are rational.

Xenzues is watching the sparring match, his attention is therefore drawn to different things than would be the case if he were a contestant. He might know that footwork is important (okay, he does know it), but he only watches her footwork when there is nothing more interesting to watch, such as when she is manuvering for position. When she's executing an attack, the entire business of footwork is subsumed into her overall form, it has no importance of itself. The entire point of the exercise is, erm, the point

If the King is trying to prepare her for X isn't it better if the people, who I assume must be involved with X, don't know that she's a good swordfighter? Wouldn't the King want this training done secretly? Is it normal in this world for women to train to be swordsmen? If women don't normally train this way, it seems an even greater reasdn for there to be secrecy.

I think the concept of hiring a number of the best trainers in different forms seems more credible than letting her train with the guard especially since it's likely that she started training MUCH earlier than the average person would. Just something to think about.

Also, have you done any research on fighting two opponents? I found a fairly wonderful book which is comprised of illustrations of medieval fighting techniques from a renouned trainer. I bought it because I have a three person fight scene which didn't seem plausible to me. As it turns out, it wasn't. I
rewrote most of my fight scenes as a result.

Not withstanding Hollywood and the rather laughable three person fight scene in Pirates II, it is incredibly difficult to win when the odds are 2 to 1. The only real chance of sucess is if she can disable one of the attackers fairly quickly. While the kick is a good idea, its not very practical because it will take too long for her to recover from (i.e. engage the other opponent) and it exposes her to attack from the other swordsman. There were no illustrations suggesting kicking as a viable defense. I suspect this is because if the other opponent attacks the foot that stays on the ground, he's likely to trip the person and have the advantage in the resulting grapple.

Holding the sword at the midpoint with one hand and thrusting the pommel into his jaw was a suggested attack in the book. She can then flip the blade, turn and attack the other opponent. Positioning is also key.

Contrary to what I thought, a lot of time was spent teaching the knights how to disarm an opponent and win the grapple. In fact, more than 1/2 the illustrations deal with these techniques. It was definately an eye opening reading experience.

Celestia, however, fights with magic. Both her father and her sword trainer are wizards, which the reader doesn't learn about until later, and they are using her sword fighting as a way to channel her magic. That is why she is able to fight multiple opponents at once, she uses magic. She is aware of her magic, but keeps it a secret from her father. He is aware of it but is keeping it a secret from her. I don’t know how detailed I should get, it really is a rather complicated story, but basically her sword fighting abilities are what develop her magic.

quote:

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Then she shouldn't be sparring with them. Let not thy right hand know....

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As for the father and daughter using magic in fighting, that sounds like something we ought to know very early, especially since we are in the father's POV. If he's thinking about fighting and talking about fighting and we only learn later that there was a magic element the whole time that we didn't know about, we'll feel jipped. (Of course, perhaps you already intended to tell us, and it just hadn't come up yet. )

As for sparring with the royal guard? It seems entirely appropriate to me. How do you suppose a person gets their training? I think in terms of Paul Atreides in Dune... he sparred often with the Duke's master at arms as part of his training. Getting "better than" is a process. Arriving at the point in the story when the student surpasses the master could be part of the plot?

As to the specifics about THIS 13... I'm choking on Xenzues's name. I cannot imagine how it is pronounced, so it makes me stumble right from the begining. And I agree that, if he's a king, give us his title right up front.

You should always have your royal guard operating under the assumption that the persons they guard are basically helpless. Yes, this can cause unnecessary complications, but it's a lot better than the alternatives. Anything that dramatically undermines this basic presumption, like having the princess regularly beat up the guards, is extremely counterproductive. You never want royal guards to even be capable of thinking "the princess probably doesn't need our help." You're asking these people to lay down their own lives in your defense, if you demonstrate that such a sacrifice is unnecessary they'll either become demoralized or disillusioned.

It is tough to get kicked in the chest and then to double over. Most people would not react this way. If the blow is hard enough in the upper body they fall over because of balance issues. I suppose it is possible for someone to double over after getting kicked very hard in the chest, but it is probably going to be a delayed reaction and possibly voluntary after dealing with the pain for a moment. I also suppose if you lost your breath you might do it.

If you get kicked in the stomach you double over. If you get kicked in the ribs or in the side you grab your side and raise up on tiptoes because of pain (or maybe double over). The groin... well you get the point.

I suppose it sounds more impressive to kick someone in the chest but it struck me as kind of strange when the guard reacted by doubling over. If she is kicking him that hard he probably would have just fallen down.

Also, even a top notch martial artist would need some pretty serious momentum to kick someone hard enough in the chest to cause such a reaction, especially if the guy is wearing armor, which I am not sure about.

This description seems to be real casual, like 'oh, she leaned one way and whacked a guy in the chest with a sword, and then leaned ever-so-slightly the other way and kicked the royal guard in the chest and he doubled over.'

It is difficult for me to picture someone described with the word delicate having the power to do such a thing.

After all of this rambling I want you to know that I like the intro and I like your description of what is about to happen even more.

I think I would be more impressed if she was just fighting and struggling with one accomplished fighter and he was giving as good as he got. It would make it more realistic to me than having her kick the snot out of a couple of two dimensional fall guys.

There would also be tension, which is good for holding reader interest. This excerpt has no tension and no doubt about the outcome.

It would also be more impressive if she beats him for the first time or something at this moment, walking away with her bloody lip. I don't know, just my perspective.

This character is kind of like River from the movie "Sernity". I want her to kick ass, but she still has a kind of fairy tale like, princess quality about her. (Her mother was, by birth, a fairy, which is a very delicate creature, her father is a master wizard) So I want to reflect both qualities in her.

Maybe there are other members of the royal household who need protection, not just this one princess. Maybe she is well loved and they will protect her out of regard. Maybe they know she would die to protect any one of them (or perhaps she already has). Maybe she's great when she's prepared, but they ensure no one sneaks in to kill her in her sleep. Maybe in aking's universe, it is the responsibility of the guards to train the royal offspring, and if the latter fail to learn well, it falls on the heads of the guards that didn't teach well enough. Maybe it is a huge honor to be chosen to spar against the princess - a sign of your dedication and loyalty to serving on the guard. Etc etc etc.

As for River, they made very sure to establish that she has psychic powers before they showed her doing that. It made it believable that she could.

But that's not the issue. The issue is that I found it immensely implausible that a king smart enough to raise a daughter skilled enough to beat up his royal guard would ever let her do any such thing just for practice. How implausible is it? So implausible that it is far easier to believe that the daughter is undergoing a sort of "self-esteem" exercise with the cooperation of the guards. And that is exactly opposite the kind of image that aking is trying to create here.

It sounds like you solved your own problem then. Substitute one or two of these people who travel from afar for the royal guardsmen. This could even be presented in a way that would make it so that the reader is unaware it is training until it is over.

First, start with her magical abilities. I know you said that's in the prologue, but you didn't post your prologue as your opening, which means you've written it as a "prologue" because the exposition, despite being critical, is also boring and you expect people to skip it.

Secondly, if she's used to using magic in her swordfighting, then she isn't getting much in the way of serious training from fighting anyone who doesn't have similar abilities. I know you wanted her to think her father doesn't know about that, though you tell us that he knows anyway. Maybe it could be a secret between herself and her instructor.

As for bringing in random strangers to fight the princess, I think Iviron was kidding about that. It kinda defeats the notion of having royal guards at all if they regularly let swordy guys in to have at the princess.

You aren't going to gain points with your readers by screwing with them. "It was all a game/dream/story" is one of the cardinal sins of bad narrative. I'm guessing Iviron was kidding about that too. Maybe you're kidding as well, but I don't want to take that risk.

After all, this is your story aking - and if you want to take it down a certain path I was trying to help you come up with a way to do it.

Let me tell you how I feel, though, because I agree with Survivor. Ask me to suspend disbelief and believe that a character can do magic -- Alright. I will do it. Ask me to believe that someone who comes off during the initial description as a bit of a dainty porcelain doll can beat up a couple of guys that are called Royal Guards (read Elite soldier) -- harder, but alright I will try.

Ask me to believe that a father would let his daughter or son spar with Royal Guards or anyone that comes along, including Miyamoto Musashi (who killed several men and his biggest rival with wooden swords), I can't do it. It just goes beyond what I am willing to accept. Maybe other people are different and can do it.

I just reread your post above about wanting everyone to know how tough the Princess is right from the start.

I would not try to beat the reader up with how tough your character is. This has been done over and over again to the point of provoking reader anger. Show us as the story goes. It would be more believable to me to just read about her working out with her sword and maybe throwing in a few spells or something while getting to know and like or dislike her. Then when I read about her actually fighting someone in a later scene I will be able to believe it.

so yours becomes:

She/Celeste balanced delicately on the balls of her feet, slightly shifting her weight. This allowed her the momentum she needed to swing her sword into her opponent. Still poised, she did the same again, kicking the other guard's chest...

Her father watched with satisfaction... (or whatever, your story after all)