posted
Per recommendation, I've reordered the first chapter of Agents of the Balance to work more of the driving force into the first page. This is the first 13 plus what remained of the last sentence, to prevent fragmenting.
What you see in the original post is still in there because it is an important setting, but this new first 13 better sets the scene for what's to come. ----- Agents of the Balance -----
Jonos lifted his eyes from the woodpile as a wagon cart jolted the ruts of the main road toward the village green. Halos, the blacksmith, urged his mule forward as he strode alongside the beast, a carriage of tiny trinkets and metal puzzles jingling and bouncing behind.
Over the sweat-dampened lines of his mustaches, the blacksmith turned his eyes to Jonos. His silent appraisal was neutral, feeling, but where there had begun to grow warm sentiment between them, as Jonos had more than once helped the man carry loads of sheeted metal and helped his quarry team scout for mineral deposits, a sense of alarm rode in the man's eyes. Jonos saw in them something of the old times, a measuring gaze that worked to understand the nature of a threat before him.
Edited for length. First by Ms. Woodbury, and then by me. ^^ [This message has been edited by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (edited October 29, 2006).]
[This message has been edited by David (edited October 30, 2006).]
posted
I'll post here, since you made the new thread, but my comments are mostly about issues already raised...
quote:I had considered the cutting stump and the pile at his feet sufficient to indicate he's chopping wood. Would it be better served if I indicated a chopping block instead? That's traditionally indicative of an execution in my mind, but I suppose it lends the same purpose.
As for Jonos' mood, the fireworks made him smile despite himself. Is that not a sharp enough clue to his opinion? What more do you think could be done with the first paragraph, without throwing subtlety under the axe?
My point is: throw subtlety under the axe! Readers aren't the least bit bothered (at least, this one isn't) to read "Jonos was chopping woods" or "Jonos felt _______."
...and no, telling me the fireworks made Jonos smile despite himself doesn't tell me what he's feeling, except that whatever it is, it isn't intense, and is tinged with either humor, happiness, or irony.
--
Now, on your latest bit: you're summarizing. This is no crime, of course. (This time I know he's at a woodpile, but not what he's doing there, btw.) But I'm not interested in the summary. Essentially nothing's happening: the blacksmith's driving by. Why would we care?
What's the story going to be about? Start there, maybe.
posted
I think your previous effort worked better. Here it seems to me that you've added nothing that helps me understand what's happening, but you've fragmented your POV.
[*] "Jonos lifted" as first phrase in first sentence sets you in his POV, "Halos...urged" as first phrase in second sentence _wants_ to put you in his POV, but it turns out you're still in Jonos's POV [*] The first sentence of the second paragraph ("over the sweat...to Jonos") seems like it's in Halos's POV still, and mention of "his silent appraisal" also hovers there.
My recommendations: solidify the story as being in Jonos's POV (or make it obviously omni), and tell us something more about why there's tension around Jonos.
Regards, Oliver
[This message has been edited by oliverhouse (edited October 31, 2006).]
I've read both versions of this and both versions of your dragon story and I have to admit that I had the same questions reading all four openings...to take a note from OSC's wise reader critique: Huh? and So what?
Let's take those one at a time. I believe my confusion stemmed fromthe unrelenting series of complex sentences. I remember when I was in 8th grade and the English teacher had us doing this series of exercises for about a month -- take 4 or 5 simple sentences and combine them together to make 1 complex sentence. It was good practice, but at the time I made the mistaken leap that ALL sentences should be this way. In fiction, it is my opinion that sentence lengths need to vary to move the story along. A short sentence works as an implied exclamation mark! A long sentence in the midst of many short sentences draws attention and importance. In fact, if I had to pick only one thing to bring to your attention it would be the complex, unvaried sentence structure. I humbly suggest that you study the writing of some of your favorite authors. You may notice that during action scenes all the sentences get short and choppy, like a stacato moving the action along.
Next, I'll tackle the "So what?" reaction. It is possible that this still stems from the difficult work of parsing the sentences, but I don't think so. Even after I get to the heart of what's happening in any of your openings, I'm not getting a real sense of conflict. Conflict (not action...obviously, in the dragon piece a guy falling off a dragon's back is pretty action packed) is the core of most openings. It is conflict that will usually draw in a reader and convince them to rea more. (It can be a few other things, too, but usually it's conflict.)
What's going on here? From my reader's perception, it's a guy looking at his blacksmith mentor. The *words* are attempting to lay something heavier on me, but the words are getting in the way of the story. Words aren't the story. People and events are the story. People, in particular, are what *I* care about. The conflict is in the why and in the showing of details. Let's take a look at these two examples:
"I was so mad at my mom."
"My mom got drunk with her boyfriend last night instead of taking me out for my birthday."
It's the same with men falling off of dragons, really. If I don't know what he was doing on the dragon in the first place, if I don't understand what conflict unseatd him, then his spiral to the ground isn't entirely meaningful for me.
Edit: Don't mistake my meaning. I'm not telling you that you need to tell me exactly what the story is about right away or that you need to explain the entire background. But I come into this story knowing certain things -- use that. In my example above, I don't need to know anything else about a person to know that it would really hack me off if my mom got drunk with her boyfriend instead of taking me out for my birthday. It's something to build on. In fantasy, this can be more difficult, but it can be done. The beginning doesn't tell the story, it just plants a seed and lays out an implicit promise of what we can expect going forward. And on that note, I'll probably start a post in open discussion about implicit promises and the MICE quotient.
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I hope you find some of this useful. I didn't have time to resopnd to each opening individually and I noticed so many fo the same reactions from each one that I thought it might help to lump them all together. Your writing has a lot of promise. I don't know if that means much coming from some random person over the internet, but I've critiqued a lot of stories in the past few years and this is clearly written by someone who has the required skillset but who is maybe trying a little too hard. Practice makes perfect, so get your but tin a chair (BIC) and keep writing.
[This message has been edited by Christine (edited October 31, 2006).]
posted
Your style is lyrical, but I think you need to focus more on your main character and his POV. I also feel a need for the "voice" to be more active. This story, so far, feels passive to me, as if I'm watching a movie at such a distance that I can't hear the dialogue.
I'm going to be a more technical in my crit than some other folks, and about a different aspect than the others, because of my particular area of expertise: blacksmiths and things horse-related.
quote:Jonos lifted his eyes from the woodpile as a wagon cart jolted the ruts of the main road toward the village green. Halos, the blacksmith, urged his mule forward as he strode alongside the beast, a carriage of tiny trinkets and metal puzzles jingling and bouncing behind.
Blacksmiths make things out of heavy metals with hammer, tongs, forge and anvil. In historic times, they also shod horses. In modern times, we have farriers who shoe horses and don't do the work of a blacksmith (making substantial things out of metal or repairing metal things). More on this in a minute.
The first thing that jumped out at me was that "wagon cart" probably should be either "wagon" or "cart," not both. "Cart" indicates a two-wheeled vehicle, and here he might very well be walking beside his mule. A "wagon" is a more substantial 4 wheeled vehicle where he'd be in the driver's seat, most likely, not walking by the mule, and it might take a team - two or four mules - to pull a wagon, depending on its size. And if a wagon, he wouldn't be walking next to the mule unless he'd been riding in the wagon a long time and needed a break. Just FYI.
Blacksmiths don't normally make trinkets and puzzles nor do they take carts places to market their wares - even historically, people came to the blacksmith shop instead of the smith going on the road with his wares. Modern forges are small and transportable, thanks to using gas for the fire and heavy insulation on the fire box, but historic forges were huge and stayed in the shop. If the blacksmith makes a lot of hinges, latches, candlesticks, etc. on his own rather than "to order," he might have a store attached to his blacksmith shop, where his wife or an employee would sell the wares. But to the best of my knowledge, historically, most blacksmiths made stuff to order.
Making "trinkets" is the job of a tinsmith or other craftsman. A blacksmith makes horse shoes, the metal rims for wagon wheels, other metal parts for wagons and farm implements, as well as swords, weapons, tools -- anything heavy, metal and useful. If they make "trinkets" at all (and I'm talking about "historical" blacksmiths as well as modern-day ones), they might make puzzles, but they don't (and didn't) make much that wasn't "useful." They made (and continue to make) candlesticks, chandeliers, door knockers, door hinges and latches, wrought iron railings, all that kind of thing - heavy metal stuff, nothing "tiny" or "trinket-y" - that's a tinsmith's job, as I said. You don't make "tiny" things with a forge, tongs, hammer and anvil.
I don't get the impression of what a real blacksmith makes from what you describe in his cart or wagon, whichever it is, so I'm already thrown out of the story because it's unrealistic (and even fantasy should be as realistic as possible, IMO). Good writing doesn't allow the reader to stop reading and go "huh?" because such details catch their eye. Good writing leads the reader on a story that flows from scene to scene without any "bumps" that make them stop and scratch their heads. Any trade or profession that's "recognizable" (something the average person has some familiarity with) in stories should be researched enough that it's portrayed accurately, IMO.
quote: Over the sweat-dampened lines of his mustaches, the blacksmith turned his eyes to Jonos. His silent appraisal was neutral, feeling, but where there had begun to grow warm sentiment between them, as Jonos had more than once helped the man carry loads of sheeted metal and helped his quarry team scout for mineral deposits, a sense of alarm rode in the man's eyes.
This sentence is so long and complex, I'm completely lost. What do you mean, "his silent appraisal was neutral, feeling,"? It was neutral, it wouldn't be angry or happy or whatever, just "blah." "Feeling" what? Why? Keep your writing simple - its elegance will shine through (and you are an elegant writer) and the story will be more accessible to the reader, IMO.
If this guy's a blacksmith, what's he doing looking for quarry deposits? Usually a blacksmith has so much work to do (because he's making "useful" things people cannot do without), he's busy from dawn to dusk, without a lot of time for other pursuits. Is the story about the blacksmith or Jonos? The POV here is confusing, and as you can see, the blacksmith is already more interesting to me than Jonos. If he isn't the POV character, then you need to work on making Jonos more sympathetic, more "real" somehow. You've given us some details about the blacksmith, and very few about Jonos - that's partly why he's more interesting, because we know more about him at this point.
quote: Jonos saw in them something of the old times, a measuring gaze that worked to understand the nature of a threat before him.
Again, I'm confused. Whose eyes are you looking through? If Jonos's, then he won't see the other man "working to understand the nature. . .".
Books that capture my interest usually introduce a character enough to make me like him or care about him in some way, and then the threat emerges once I care. So far, I see no reason to care about these guys. I don't know anything about their personalities, just a tiny bit about their jobs. Show me Jonos's reaction to something, or how he thinks about something, so I can get to know him at least a little. If he's a sweet, kind-natured man, you could (perhaps) show him helping a child get up after she falls, or picking up the child's doll and handing it to her (if he's near the village green where there are people about). If he's in the woods, then perhaps you could show his good nature by having him hold out the remains of his lunch to a squirrel. (And these examples are based on the characters of my own novel, "Star Sons" -- they're nice guys, and these are things they might do -- I have no idea if Jonos is a "nice guy" like this or not, I'm just making up examples here.)
Keep working on this! I'd like to know what the conflict is, what the problem is, why we should care about Jonos. If you can find a way to show us that in the first thirteen lines, or at least hint at it, you'll be off to a great start, I suspect!
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