“Captain Lotus; bridge,” the bulkhead panel repeated.
Captain Hansson Lotus clenched his jaws in irritation at the interruption, “Excuse me gentlemen,” he said to the six captains assembled in his state room. It had taken him four months to coordinate this meeting; he had given orders not to be disturbed.
“Bridge; this is the captain,” a displacement hatch opened in the bulkhead giving the captain instant access to the main bridge.
“Sir we are tracking an event horizon. It is on an intercept vector and will arrive in less than four minutes,”
“Another ship?” He knew the odds were against it being another ship this far below the galactic plane.

You have a good opener on your hands. I’m hooked!

Hmm... Rereading there's one more thing... You introduce the chosen but the reader not precisely sure how to feel about them. (but maybe that's good) My vague impression is that they're bad news. Perhaps you could punch it up a bit by making the captain react a bit. Or maybe you can use a sprinkle of foreshadowing.

The flow isn’t perfect, though I’m not sure I would have noticed if you didn’t say so yourself. Immediately I saw one line that could be cut. Also, you start off with dialogue but it's not clear who's speaking.

quote:

---

“Bridge to Captain Lotus!” the bulkhead panel repeated. Captain Hansson Lotus clenched his jaws in irritation at the interruption. “Excuse me gentlemen,” he said to the six captains assembled in his state room. It had taken him four months to coordinate this meeting; he had given strict orders not to be disturbed. Unless of course it was an Emergency, 'with a capitol E.'

“Captain speaking.”

“Sir we are tracking an event horizon. It is on an intercept vector and will arrive in less than four minutes.”

“Another ship?” Unlikely. Not this far below the galactic plane. Still, he hoped.

“No sir too small, too fast.” Every man in the small state room knew that meant one thing; it was a Chosen.

---

Hope this helps.

Best!
-Donelle

in the movies, books and TV they would say "Bridge to Captain Lotus" but in the real Navy they say they intended reciever first, then the sender... "Captain Lotus - bridge" or "engine room - bridge" it doesn't flow as well on paper. what are your thoughts.

"the six captains assembled in his state room"
"It had taken him four months to coordinate this meeting"
It just isn't credible enough. I'd drop it and have the captain playing chess or something. However if you were to keep sentence one, you might want to change it to "six colleagues".

I'd also drop the "Captain Lotus; bridge," / "Bridge; this is the captain," dialog. I see immediate flashbacks of the four Star Trek episodes I once suffered watching. This should be a simple fix.

Last but not least, I would drop "it was a chosen." I know you're trying to hook us, but it doesn't have to be so specific.

Chosen isn't a hook it is leading directly into the action of the first scene; a confrontation with this Chosen One. SO you might suggest leaving that line off and going straight to the next scene, that being Capt. reaction to her arriving.

I know "real writers" hate Star Trek but just because something sounds like it... I mean help me, how else can a person in his stateroom nearly 7 miles and 38 decks below the bridge be notified when something happens. I am open to suggestions.

The hook for me though was the event horizon and the Chosen. I don't care that "every man in the state room knew . ." I care what Hansson knows.

I'd say whether you start with the meeting depends on 2 things: what seems most hook-y, and what matters to the story.

But if you do start with the meeting, tell us what it's for, and make us care (by telling us why the Captain cares). I think we'll care more if the Captain isn't angry with his crew for doing their jobs, but frightened about being caught.

BTW in current understanding "tracking an event horizon" is nonsense. Maybe you have a new meaning for it, though; I'd stick around to find out!

tracking an event horizon is silly but so is FTL travel right now. The picture I have in my head is a moving black hole; that would have a moving event horizon would it not. Gotta love SF <grin>

I believe I'll hold off on the meeting; it naturally comes after the events with the Chosen. thanks everyone as usual I try to cram too much into the opening.

The puntcuration is a killer for me, never had those classes (I'm a math guy) I have read one book it did help, short of taking classes at the local college do you have any suggestions? its hass gatten betterer tho.

Thanks Wbriggs, I'm always eager to hear what you have to say on any ones post.

You're opening line isn't so good.

quote:

---

“Captain Lotus; bridge.”
“Captain Lotus; bridge,” the bulkhead panel repeated.

---

No, your text doesn't actually list it twice, but that is the effect of saying that it was repeated. It would be better if we already knew that Lotus had given orders to be left undisturbed. It would also be nice if we could have some idea of how far this meeting has gone, before it ends up being deferred indefinitely. For both those reasons I'd rather you started by giving us the situation and then having it interrupted...which helps us sympathize with Lotus a bit.

As far as the question of having them use modern navel conventions...I would vote nay. Yes, it will help you seem a little less "Trekkie", but I don't think it's very realistic. Using a formalized version of natural language is easier to understand, even for navel officers. I'd think that by the future they'd have figured that much out. Of course, you'd also think they'd have a more discrete (in both senses) communications system.

The bit about the displacement hatch seems a bit odd. Why would he open the hatch just to answer a call? Even if it was a normal door, doesn't that seem odd to you? Besides, you're already hitting us with a lot of stuff already, FTL drives, deep-space, secret meeting of starship captains, super-uber-transhumans, I think that you could wait a second on the nifty displacement hatches until someone is actually going to use them.

My second thought was if you keep the squawk box, you've got classic 1960s Trek. If the guys are playing chess at opening, you've got Star Trek Next Generation. Is this meant to be a Trek or Star Wars book? If you have a contract to write one of these or are writing toward that end, then maybe ok.

Otherwise, I felt the entire opening was cliched, Trek style. Thet they're on a starship, there's officers, captain is called to the bridge, he's irritated. Are you sure this is new stuff?

I thought I read that the first 13 would fill the comment box, I guess I don't understand what is the first 13 then.

When you start a topic in Fragments and Feedback, and put your 13 lines in the message box, you know you're at exactly 13 lines if you can see all of your 13-line text without scrolling. (If you have blank lines between paragraphs, of course, you'll have to scroll that many more lines to see everything, but only in that case.)

This is also the case if you post any rewritten 13 lines in your topic.

KDW this is what you posted in the READ ME FIRST section. help me understand why you have edited my post back to well less then that. I just copied what you left of my post into this box to see and it is now three or four lines short. I am confused. is there an easier way, say number of characters and or spaces, we could look at?

No big deal, just curious and would like to get it right for the future. Plus it sounds like the first 13 are important to catching a buyers attention so I'd like to get that right too.

thanks

KBD never mind

[This message has been edited by BruceWayne1 (edited January 10, 2007).]