Dr. Eric Markosian, genetic engineer at Dyna-Gene, settled into a bench at a park on the Dyna-Gene grounds. Geni, with her peculiar gait, ambled past him and plunked down on the lawn. Exquisetley deformed, she was a fine example of Eric's consummate skill as a genetic engineer.

Eric felt the tang of winter still in the spring air.

"A bit nippy out hey Geni?" He said.

Geni snorted. He took that as affirmative. Sometimes he thought he could interpret her senseless noises, but was never sure. "The problem is," a colleague once told him, "imbeciles are fluent only in babble." He was amused at the recollection of that bit of brilliancy.

Geni sat unaware of the man who stood off to one side and watched her intently.

[This message has been edited by nitewriter (edited January 08, 2007).]

[This message has been edited by nitewriter (edited January 08, 2007).]

[This message has been edited by nitewriter (edited January 08, 2007).]

quote:

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Exquisetley

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Interesting, but if this is a short story, I'd throw in something more immediate and urgent.

My only problem here is POV. You told us what Geni was unaware of, which is not something Erick would know. Then there's this man -- originally I thought it was Eric, then I found Eric was someone else.

You have, indeed, created an intrigiungly dislikeable MC in a very short space of time.

I actually don't mind that Eric is dislikable at this point but I might not be willing to ride with him for long. Did you want him to be dislikable? Keep in mind that his creation of deformed quasi-sentient beings will greatly effect the way people think about him.

I'd like a sense of what Geni is. Is she a deformed humanoid or some other form of life? Describe her to me.

I also thought the "man" watching Geni was Eric.

Is Eric expecting him? Eric is also bio-engineered? Hu?

You set the hook for me in the third line "Exquisitely deformed, she was . . . " so slow down and tell me a story.

NITS -

You don't need the "as a genetic engineer" in the third line since you told me two lines ago that he was one.

I'm not sure you need the "Eric felt the tang of winter still in the spring air" because his next line tells me that the air is cool.

On the positive:

I did like that he interacts with Geni.

You can cut "genetic engineer at Dyna-Gene" completely with no loss of information. You could even cut the later phrase "as a genetic engineer", or replace it with a less clunky or more precise phrase.

On the other hand, when you say that Geni is "exquisitely" deformed, that cries out for explanation of the teleology of the deformation. Since she has been intentionally crafted, and the careful manipulation of her phenotype is considered "exquisite", we know that she has been altered towards a goal. You must tell us what that goal is, because Eric is already thinking about it by virtue of the fact that he considers her deformation exquisite.

The issue of the man who stood off to one side is another example. We need to know what Eric thinks of this, but you neatly avoid telling us up front, instead mentioning that Geni didn't notice him (or appear to notice him) at all and then having Eric size him up clinically. We want to know why Eric is sizing him up. Does he think that the man could be a threat? Is he probably an admirer of Dr. Markosian's work? Is he an imbecile?

More generally, you occasionally ommit needed connective material in the narrative. This can almost be seen by the way you paragraph, with isolated non sequiturs taking up much of your page space.