posted
Here's the current opening of my manuscript. In spite of tearing the storylines apart, it's still weighing in at 177k words. My main question is whether the hook is hooking, and how much line I can play out here.
<takes deep breath>
Fire at will.
-------------------
Given the choice, Dom would not have picked a throw-fishing net for catching a shark. But sometimes the choice isn't given. An hour's walk from the village, he stood beneath the mangrove trees, balanced on one leg in the cool, thigh-deep water of high tide. One foot was buried in the silt, while the other was frozen in mid-step, just below the surface of the water. Air drifted across his bare arms and chest; birds off in the trees kept up a steady, chaotic music; a school of silvery herring in the stream swept forward and back, side to side. Sunlight filtered down among the mangrove leaves, turning the fish brilliant when they angled one way, but leaving them almost invisible when they cut back again. When they veered close to his leg, he could also see his own reflection in the slow-moving water. His tawny hair....
Posts: 114 | Registered: Jun 2015
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posted
I like it. The prose is pretty enough, without crossing into purple territory, that I would keep reading on that basis alone.
And fishing (sharking?) for a shark without the appropriate gear is a scenario I'm interested in reading about. Some danger right off the bat to pull me in.
So, I suspect I haven't really found out anything about what this story is about, but that's cool. I'm happy to wait. I'm along for the ride because the writing is pleasant to read.
Posts: 1528 | Registered: Dec 2003
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But it looks like you're about to step into the trap of having the protagonist describe himself by looking at his reflection. Better to avoid that, if you can.
Posts: 4633 | Registered: Dec 2008
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posted
A hand-thrown fishing net is a cast net and they come in numerous sizes, the smaller sizes for catching maybe a small dogfish (or sand shark), maybe of a pound size. All sharks shred nets worse than most any sea creature and many easily get away. In other words, the term "throw-fishing net" and stalking a shark with a cast net don't work for me, throw me so far out of the story from the falseness of the term and the incredible method as to be unnatural for even a young fisher person of some small skill, that those parts read like the observations of a person who's never been near marsh brine or saltwater sea.
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posted
I agree with extrinsic in that the devil is in the detail; get it wrong at the outset and you've lost knowledgeable readers. The up-side is, most people probably won't know that particular detail. Still, a writer's pride should demand accuracy at all times when possible.
Next: The sentence that begins with: "Air drifted across his bare arms and chest; birds . . ." if find evocative; the next sentence smacks of overkill.
Finally: Meredith is right in suggesting you not fall into the trap of your MC describing his own reflection; it IS cliche. However, I have used the image of a MC NOT looking at his reflection as an oblique way of describing him.
It's that second flowery sentence that would stop me reading.
With revisions: ----------- If he had planned on catching a shark, Dom would not have gone fishing with a cast net. But sometimes things don't go as planned. An hour's walk from the village, he stood beneath the mangrove trees, balanced on one leg in the cool, thigh-deep water of high tide. One foot was buried in the silt, while the other was frozen in mid-step, just below the surface. Air drifted across his bare arms and chest; birds off in the trees kept up a steady, chaotic music; a school of silvery herring in the stream swept forward and back, side to side. When they veered close to his leg, he could also see his own reflection in the slow-moving water. His tawny hair and tanned skin were darker than when he was a boy, but he still didn't look anything like his adopted family or his friends. He was still an outsider.
Posts: 114 | Registered: Jun 2015
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posted
Ok so far. Except I dont know why he is standing on one leg. That has to get old.
I am not exactly hooked yet, but I like the imagery, and I do wonder sbout his outsiderness. I wd definitely keep reading.
Posts: 35 | Registered: May 2015
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posted
Your revision of the first sentence works much better for me. I can't claim any expertise like those above, but I buy the predicament Dom's in--he's brought a knife to a gun fight, and he knows it.
The others are right about the reflection cliche, but apart from its hackneyed status, the question to ask yourself is, is it relevant? What about Dom's skin color or outsider status is immediately pertinent to shark-catching? The better place for this detail might be once he returns to his village and catches the familiar odd looks he gets from the natives. Maybe they give him a wide berth or call him some derogatory nickname. Whatever it is, let the situation remind him of his distinctiveness. It will feel much more natural.
Posts: 21 | Registered: May 2015
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posted
Mangrove marshes' turbidity varies considerably. Silty-bottomed marshes are highly turbid most of the time. Even silver fish and minnows are difficult to see -- why small-fry enjoy estuary marshes' sanctuary most. I raise these points because of their potential for symbolic relevance to the whole and their skewed though "telling detail" potentials for intangibly expressing foreshadowing motifs and what the narrative is actually about related to a moral human condition: what about an opening that really "hooks," line, and sinker readers.
Small-fry, for example, symbolizes a young fisher person's social status as a child's standing to adults. Turbid waters symbolizes an uncertain perception of current and future events. An estuary marsh, like a mangrove marsh, itself symbolizes youth's creche nursery, a domain of youth.
If further symbolism for outsider status is warranted, then a similar motif may serve and one congruent to Dom's physical appearance. For example, tawny hair and suntanned, sand-colored and bronzed, respectively, could be symbolized by shore tidal zone exposed sand. Gradations of higher and lower iron oxide content shore sands appear to be shades of vanilla cream -- tawny -- and ruddy-red bronze -- suntanned -- in reflected sunlight. A thin exposed sand bar or sandy shoreline outside the water, for a time, could symbolize a child's temporary state of youth.
By the way, an optimal tidal condition for fishing an estuary is half tide rising before full flood high tide. Slack tides, full low and full high, are poorest, falling tides secondmost poor, and low tide rising nextmost optimum.
Ebb tides expel excreted wastes; flood tides carry in fresh nutrients for feed; low tides limit movement, generally a time for small-fry rest and shelter; high tides let in large predators, likewise, a time for small-fry rest and shelter. This is why half-tide rising is optimal for fishing: small and large prey is most actively feeding and least sheltered.
Standing on one leg imitates feeding birds, herons in particular. The symbolism potential there could be of outsider status: Dom a water bird-like individual and the village people otherwise, say, a turf motif, trees maybe or feline- or canine-like, panther or wolf, respectively. If villagers rely on large sea game, then they could be instead symbolized by a pelagic (open ocean), adult game species: tuna, marlin, swordfish, etc.
The state of the tide and unintentional cast-net fishing for sharks, likewise, hold symbolism potentials.
posted
Thanks a bunch for the recent comments. I've been feeling slack-off-ish, but your feedback was encouraging.
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