The general questions apply - does it have a hook? Would anyone be willing to read the whole thing (2200 words) for me?

Also, is the title as awkward as I'm worried it is? (it comes from that poem "For the want of a nail, the horseshoe was lost..." etc, which plays a prominent role in the story)

Thanks, all!
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After the first twenty or so stones, it didn’t really hurt anymore. The sting of each new rock was trivial compared to the pain she already felt. Another stone struck her temple, and she curled up tighter, hands over her head. She had prevented herself from screaming, but she can’t stop the tears. So this was what came from telling the truth. This is what came from trying to do the right thing. How easily good intentions were tainted.
“Well now,” said a voice. The shouts, the taunts, the stones, they all stopped. Isabelle lifted her head to find the source of the deep rich voice. The crowd parted to reveal a knight and his squad. The knight dismounted gracefully from his horse and sauntered toward where Isabelle lay huddled.

(edited to incorporate some of ML's suggestions)

This needs a severe re-write for editing of tenses and structure of information.

You're breaking tense between the first and second sentences. Present tense 'it didn't really hurt anymore' does not work well with 'was' is a past tense verb.

Then in the third you jump to present tense action but in the same sentence you use a past tense reaction by your MC.
Same in the fourth sentence has and prevented are opposing tense and prevented also clashes with "can't stop"

Starting with "So this was" you have MC internal monologue attached to narration. Re-structure this whole first paragraph.

I'd move the "deep rich" description closer(attached even) to the dialog tag.

"Sliding" is never graceful. "Dismounting" is graceful.

Nonchalantly is not needed sauntered is enough of a tell to indicate cock-sure attitude.

"lay huddled" again I believe violates tense and verb usage.

The story has some promise but the current format is far too muddled to even attempt to want to read more.

Present tense 'it didn't really hurt anymore' does not work well with 'was' is a past tense verb.

"It didn't really hurt anymore" is past tense. Did is past tense of the verb do. Was is past tense of verb is. Both did and was are past tense. There is no tense irregularity in that sentence. The verbs struck and curled in the third sentence are also past tense. Your sentence tenses are not inconsistent, and you have no problem with that. They are all past tense.

I made a few changes already, but if anyone could help me fix the grammer, I would greatly appreciate it. (I'm no English major, but can't "did not/didn't" be considered past tense?)

The switch to Isabelle's POV is in italics in the whole story, but I'm afraid I'm a bit of an HTML dummy so my many tries to make it italicized failed.

(Edit: thanks, JeanneT; it seems we posted simultaneously)

Someone needs to do some reading up on grammar.

Edit: We did post simultaneously. Not only can did be considered past tense, it is always past tense. I'll be happy to help you with grammar issues although I don't consider myself a grammarian by a long shot. But I do know verb tenses. lol

I'd like to take a look at your lines an comment on them first though.

On the html thing this uses ubb code which basically means you use a bracket instead of the < > like in html. Hope that helps.
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This is my OPINION. I do not have the right to give you more than that because whatever I state as a critter is opinion, pure and simple. I do not have the right to tell you that your writing is useless. I do not have the write to tell you that my opinion counts more than yours. I hope my OPINION may be helpful to you, though.

After the first twenty or so stones, it didn’t really hurt anymore. I like this hook, but I'm not sure you wouldn't be seriously hurt after 20 stones. Maybe no though. The sting of each new rock was trivial compared to the pain she already felt. Another stone struck her temple, and she curled up tighter, hands over her head. She had prevented herself from screaming, but she can’t stop the tears. So this was what came from telling the truth. This is what came from trying to do the right thing. How easily good intentions were tainted. I had a little problem with this internal dialogue. I'm not sure I'd be quite that calm while being stoned to death.
“Well now,” said a voice. The shouts, the taunts, the stones, they all stopped. Isabelle lifted her head to find the source of the deep rich voice. I don't think she'd be admiring his deep, rich voice at this time. The crowd parted to reveal a knight and his squad. The knight dismounted gracefully from his horse and sauntered toward where Isabelle lay huddled Something seems off in the description of his gracefully dismouting and sauntering to me. I can't tell you exactly what, except that it doesn't sound "right." However there is nothing wrong with the useage in "lay huddled." Those are perfectly good past tense verbs.

However, I'd recommend in the future to save your updates for a new post or until more people have commented. As JeanneT noted I'm not perfect in my grammar.

I feel that "another stone struck and she curled" is awkward because the action is new to the reader yet past tense in description. This makes the opening passive in pace.

"She had prevented" but "she can't stop the tears" strikes me as awkward as well. Maybe its a POV violation, or a tense violation or just an unusual way of phrasing this.

also I feel that there POV shift starting at "So this was?" If so you need to break it off the from the first paragraph.

If not this is a rather stark change in the tone and pacing of the narration.

having "They all" after the listing is redundant. Especially since the list is the first time the reader is explicitly aware of the noise from the crowd.

Also I don't believe that after twenty relatively well thrown and probably rather large stones she'd be able to do anything.

This is a stoning after all and any culture with stoning is not completely "spontaneous" about it. If they came to stone her or even if it was a random mob they would not be throwing rocks smaller than a golf ball and likely would be recycling the larger rocks (its not like they disappear after one throw). Thus even with just a few rocks to the head that even the most hardy person (man or woman) would be able to lift their head to look around.

no need to be snide.

Edit: However, let me add that whenever I see a statement like The story has some promise but the current format is far too muddled to even attempt to want to read more. made as a fact rather than opinon, you may find me getting a bit snide about it. You find it so. That doesn't necessarily mean that everyone in the world would.

The stoning begs the question why? Also of her identity and that of the knight. These are not things to be put in the first 13 necessarily, but to be covered very soon after to keep the reader from guessing. As it is, I'm guessing that she and the knight introduce themselves to each other in a few paragraphs.

I haven't done a technical sweep in this forum before, but there's always a first time. If I do the codes right, the bold is used to set off my inserted comments.

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After the first twenty or so stones, it didn’t really hurt anymore. The sting of each new rock was trivial compared to the pain she already felt. Another stone struck her temple(had others hit her temple?), and she curled up tighter, hands (or arms?) over her head. She had prevented herself from screaming, but she can’t (I don't think of this as past tense and the other verbs around it are past tense) stop the tears. So this was what came from telling the truth. This is (you use 'was' in the previous sentence) what came from trying to do the right thing. How easily good intentions were tainted.
"Well now," said a voice. The shouts, the taunts, the stones, they (redundant they) all stopped. Isabelle lifted her head to find the source of the deep rich voice. The crowd parted to reveal a knight and his squad. The knight dismounted gracefully from his horse and sauntered toward where Isabelle lay huddled (toward Isabelle).

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I can see some constructions that work well in present tense that are more awkward in past tense. "This is what comes from ..." is often used to express consequences and conclusions. Works great in present. "was what came" is more awkward.

Does it have a hook? The poor girl getting stoned is sort of a hook. I think it would be more compelling if we knew why. In this sense, it would be more valuable to reveal her transgression in the first 13 than to identify any of the people.

I'd enjoy seeing this re-written. Unfortunately, I'm so swamped with crits at the moment, not to mention a story I'm committed to collaborate with another author, I couldn't promise to get to reading the entire thing for about a week. If the delay wouldn't be a problem, I'd be happy to read it. But I understand if you don't want to wait that long.

Edit: That still leaves a novel I need to work on and two short stories I'm trying to complete. Ack!

Back to the issue of the 13 lines, I don't find it a problem that we don't know yet why she is being stoned. The fact that she is would be enough of a hook to keep me reading for at least a couple of paragraphs. However, I think you'd need to get in some background about why soon.

quote:

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Bored, no, your tenses are not switching. Someone on this forum has become extremely confused about verb tenses. I see people all over this forum being told that past tense verbs are present tense.

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I must have misunderstood this.

quote:

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After the first twenty or so stones, it didn’t really hurt anymore.[<--I can't really imagine this. If she's still conscious, and her spine hasn't been severed, I would think that she still felt the pain. That is the idea of stoning someone to death: it is one of the most painful and brutal ways of killing someone.] The sting of each new rock was trivial compared to the pain she already felt. Another stone struck her temple, and she curled up [tighter<--Than what? You could probably get away with "tight".], hands over her head. [She had prevented herself from screaming<--I can't imagine this, either. You should maybe do some research on stoning. The practice is still around, in some countries.], but she [couldn't] stop the tears. So this was what came from telling the truth[About what?]. This is what came from trying to do the right thing[What "right" thing?]. How easily good intentions were tainted[By what? How were they tainted? What were the good intentions?].
“Well now,” said a voice[Male?Female?]. The shouts, [Deleted]taunts, the stones[Deleted] all stopped. Isabelle lifted her head to find the source of the deep[,] rich voice. The crowd parted to reveal a knight and his [squad<--Out of place with a knight.]. The knight dismounted [gracefully<--unneeded] from his horse and sauntered toward where Isabelle [lay<--Choose one-->huddled].

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1) You are intentionally withholding information that the PoV would know. If the PoV knows it, we must.

2) I don't have any direction in which the story is headed, or promise of a conflict. Therefore, this doesn't hook me.

Yes. Yes, I would read the next line of this.

I think the tone of the knight's arrival is rather cavalier for the situation, but hey! He's arrived. I think this hooks, for sure, though the stoning/reaction did seem a little discrepant.

Can you give me more of a hint where this is going? At least in audience, whether it's more humorous or straight, etc.? I'd like to have a better idea before I volunteer to read it. Sorry. Am wuss.

Good point, Matt, I'll be sure to do any re-writes in a seperate topic.

Arachne: Har, meant to mention in the first post that this is dark fantasy.

Jeff: Thanks for the offer to read! I'll send it off after I fix it up a bit.

Jeanne: I don't mind waiting a week. Besides, many improvements will hopefully have been made by then.

Good Luck with this.

Jeanne

Edit: I don't think anyone considers bold to be rude.

I would have been a lot less upset with you, IB, if I hadn't thought you were yelling at me. But I don't hold grudges, so I am very willing to let bygones be bygones if you are.

The title does seem a little awkward to me, but I don't know the poem that you mentioned either, so you probably shouldn't go by just my opinion.

"After the first twenty or so stones,"

Twenty stones is an awful lot to get hit by and still be alive. Unless whoever's doing the stoning isn't really trying to kill her, I would suggest lowering the number a bit.

"it didn’t really hurt anymore. The sting of each new rock was trivial compared to the pain she already felt."

Actually, it makes perfect sense that she would experience a lack of feeling similar to this. It's perfectly natural and extremely common to have this kind of sensation when experiencing extreme trauma. I can give you thousands of examples; people having their faces ripped off by bears, or trampled half to death by moose (I used to live where this happened a lot) and they often reported that they experienced very little pain during the incident. It’s just a chemical reaction that the brain has during a traumatic experience like this one. I strongly recommend that you do not change this part. When I first read it, I was immediately hooked, because I can personally relate to that feeling of numbness to injury, and know where the character is coming from.

"Another stone struck her temple"

I’m not so sure it would be a good idea to have her get struck in the temple, being such a soft and unprotected part of the cranium. But, I suppose rather it’s a good idea or not would depend on what’s going to happen next in the story.

If you like, you can send your work to me and I’ll have a look at it.

How's that?
I researched stoning this time, and it is not unusual for the crowd to start out with small stones. Sometimes they bury the individual up to their waist, but not always, so for the purposes of my story I left that out.
There's also a hint now of why she's being stoned, though you leaarn the exact details of it a few paragraphs down.
Still looking for more readers...

(man... totally missed that 'stuck' thing... lol)

I can see that you have looked into stoning a bit, just from mentioning the sizes of the stones.

There is a little question of time-period:

quote:

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Let this be a lesson to those who would spread lies and dissent among us...fetal position

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Whether or not "dissent" or the description "fetal position" were available, is a question that may take some readers out of the story.

As for me, I'll give it a go.

[i["Let this be a lesson to those who would spread lies and dissent among us,” the headman intoned, spreading his arms wide. “In this village, we do not tolerate witchcraft.”[/i]

It first seems to imply that she was stoned for lies and dissent and then changes to witchcraft. But I still like this version better.

For me just staring at her doesn't prove that Isabelle is looking back and since you're using an OMNI POV for the introduction of the aura I personally need to be sure this is something only the "witch" can see.

After all competing schools of magic would call the other bad names just as much as a mundane would call a magic user bad names.

And yes, Deb's right, change stuck to struck, at first glance, I just whizzed on by that. It was probably because I have read the entire tale.

Right now there is simply summary narration that it exists not direct narration that Isabelle is seeing it.

"in her sight his aura grew sickly scarlet."

or something equally implicit.