Scratch

calebxy wrote:

Suddenly, the person jumped down from the platform and landed next to William. They both swivelled round and pointed their LPE guns at each other. William was going to shoot, but then he realized who it was. It was Jacob, who was on the same team as William; the blue team.

Just correcting a small spelling error. The first chapter is great! I haven't read any further yet. But I think the characters should have some more emotion.

The training is like the ultimate game of laser tag.    I love it!

soupoftomato wrote:

Nomolos wrote:

The training is like the ultimate game of laser tag.    I love it!

You should try Ender's Game if you like that. In it they have freeze lasers and obstacles and zero gravity.

I am not allowed to read Ender's game. Too much swearing and violence.

Nomolos wrote:

soupoftomato wrote:

Nomolos wrote:

The training is like the ultimate game of laser tag.    I love it!

You should try Ender's Game if you like that. In it they have freeze lasers and obstacles and zero gravity.

I am not allowed to read Ender's game. Too much swearing and violence.

Well, when you are allowed to, read it immediately!   

I really don't see what's so bad about it anyway. I read it in fifth grade, and then I showed it to my dad, who also enjoyed it.

bananaman114 wrote:

secondly you need to SHOW, DON'T TELL
I feel like whenever I read your writing
I feel like I'm reading writing
not like i'm 'watching' what you wrote you know?
like if you're reading something you can pretty much make a mental image of it
but i can't do that with you! not to be rude but your writing
you just say things
in sometimes a very blunt manner like
'getting the hint'
I'm SURE there is a million and a half better ways to say that
but you seem to have picked one of the most blunt ones

I'd appreciate it if you could give me examples of what you think I should say, to make it more showy and less telly. And the same when you talk about emotion. Please could you actually give me examples as to how I could do that.

Also, I would greatly appreciate it if you and soupoftomato could tell me what you like about the story, as well as what you don't. 

BirdByte wrote:

Woah, that's epic, I like chapter 3.

Like bananaman said, try to describe things a bit more.

Thank you very much.    So did you read the whole thing?

Yeah, I know, description has never been my strong point, but I like to leave a lot of it up to the reader's imagination, letting them decide what it looks like.

Nomolos wrote:

Read the whole thing! Great job!

Thank you. 

soupoftomato wrote:

calebxy wrote:

bananaman114 wrote:

secondly you need to SHOW, DON'T TELL
I feel like whenever I read your writing
I feel like I'm reading writing
not like i'm 'watching' what you wrote you know?
like if you're reading something you can pretty much make a mental image of it
but i can't do that with you! not to be rude but your writing
you just say things
in sometimes a very blunt manner like
'getting the hint'
I'm SURE there is a million and a half better ways to say that
but you seem to have picked one of the most blunt ones

Also, I would greatly appreciate it if you and soupoftomato could tell me what you like about the story, as well as what you don't. 

The concept is really nice and you clearly have good grammar/syntax.

As for "leaving it to the reader's imagination" there's a fine line between having detailed prose and purple prose (which I think is what you are trying to avoid). There's a difference between letting the reader imagine some stuff during an action and having them imagine every single character with no description for the first paragraph.

Yes, I know, I need to work on it. But I'm just saying what I'm aiming to do.

And thank you. 

Last edited by calebxy (2012-09-17 17:30:20)

bananaman114 wrote:

Okay I can actually give a possible example of something i would improve.
i need a bit of context for a lazy reader tho..
" William was going to shoot, but then he realized who it was. It was Jacob, who was on the same team as William; the blue team."
before this sentence, have you established Jacob as a character?
have you established that William is on the blue team?

No, this is me establishing both.

Last edited by calebxy (2012-09-18 03:56:15)

banana500 wrote:

calebxy wrote:

bananaman114 wrote:

Okay I can actually give a possible example of something i would improve.
i need a bit of context for a lazy reader tho..
" William was going to shoot, but then he realized who it was. It was Jacob, who was on the same team as William; the blue team."
before this sentence, have you established Jacob as a character?
have you established that William is on the blue team?

No, this is me establishing both.

Some advice for you is that you should let your story flow nicely. Keep it at a better pace. Don't be all like "It was Jacob, who was on the same team as William; the blue team", be like

"William swerved around and fixed his gun on his assailant, but lowered it, seeing who it was. William noticed Jacob's blue uniform insignia, telling him that he was an ally."

That way you can allow yourself to establish new characters in a better way. Also, add a few more descriptions to really allow readers to conjure images of the action in their minds. Assuming that the reader is going to be picturing this in their head while you're writing will lessen the quality of it.

EDIT: I'm reading more of the story now (I'm halfway through Chapter 2), and your vocabulary seems okay, but I still think that you should use a little wider word choice. Also, the characters are a little uninteresting. The dialogues are bland, and I have no idea of their appearance or personality, which really doesn't help when I'm trying to picture this in my mind. Perhaps you should spend some time writing about William's physical appearance and personality. Also, talk a bit more about the settings in the story. I don't know much about the laser tag battle room thingamabob, so perhaps you should add in a few sentences pertaining to the battle room and what it looks like.

Well that's not exactly what I was trying to say, because that makes it seem like William didn't already know that he was on his team, which isn't what I meant. However, I agree that the sentence doesn't flow very well, so I'll edit that, thanks.   

(moving on to your final paragraph) When you say bland, do you just mean it's uninteresting, or do you mean all the characters sound the same? Because you see, other people have told me that I'm very good with dialogue, in that I'm very good at giving my characters distinct personalities. And I genuinely agree, though of course I wouldn't be the best judge at saying that because I'm taking about my own writing.

Last edited by calebxy (2012-09-19 03:56:19)

banana500 wrote:

calebxy wrote:

banana500 wrote:

Some advice for you is that you should let your story flow nicely. Keep it at a better pace. Don't be all like "It was Jacob, who was on the same team as William; the blue team", be like

"William swerved around and fixed his gun on his assailant, but lowered it, seeing who it was. William noticed Jacob's blue uniform insignia, telling him that he was an ally."

That way you can allow yourself to establish new characters in a better way. Also, add a few more descriptions to really allow readers to conjure images of the action in their minds. Assuming that the reader is going to be picturing this in their head while you're writing will lessen the quality of it.

EDIT: I'm reading more of the story now (I'm halfway through Chapter 2), and your vocabulary seems okay, but I still think that you should use a little wider word choice. Also, the characters are a little uninteresting. The dialogues are bland, and I have no idea of their appearance or personality, which really doesn't help when I'm trying to picture this in my mind. Perhaps you should spend some time writing about William's physical appearance and personality. Also, talk a bit more about the settings in the story. I don't know much about the laser tag battle room thingamabob, so perhaps you should add in a few sentences pertaining to the battle room and what it looks like.

Well that's not exactly what I was trying to say, because that makes it seem like William didn't already know that he was on his team, which isn't what I meant. However, I agree that the sentence doesn't flow very well, so I'll edit that, thanks.   

(moving on to your final paragraph) When you say bland, do you just mean it's uninteresting, or do you mean all the characters sound the same? Because you see, other people have told me that I'm very good with dialogue, in that I'm very good at giving my characters distinct personalities. And I genuinely agree, though of course I wouldn't be the best judge at saying that because I'm taking about my own writing.

Well, what I meant really was the characters' physical appearance. It seems that their personalities are being divided through their dialogue, but I think it needs a bit more explanation. Why not use adverbs like "Jacob said sarcastically" or something like that? But you should focus some time on the characters' appearances. That way it can put a better image in the reader's head.

But keep up the good work on the story!  I look forward to seeing these changes. 

Ah, ok. Well, I'll finish the story first, (because I'm getting quite near the end) and then go through it and use your suggestions, like adding more detail and describing the characters more and so forth. So thank you. 

How much of the story have you read so far?

Last edited by calebxy (2012-09-19 10:46:53)

I already gave a review on 3 sites. 

calebxy wrote:

mythbusteranimator wrote:

I already gave a review on 3 sites. 

3? I only remember 2. 

I didn't comment on SN? Oh. Well, two should be good.