. Orientalizing Mid/Far Eastern culture
. Opening with a huge chunk of worldbuilding
. Overlooking melee mechanics (this has helped me with that: https://www.amazon.com/Writing-Fight-Scenes-Professional-Techniques-ebook/dp/B005MJFVS0 )
. Understanding horse mechanics. They only go faster than walking if you press them. Keep forcing and the horse will die. Usually they're used by travelers to hold supplies and for long term relief.
. Ancient evils
Just a few off the top of my head. Hope this helps.
It’s a bit eccentric, but Wonderbook by Jeff Vandermeer is a fun read and has a ton of great writing advice geared towards fantasy and speculative fiction.
Hi, I only glanced over your sample, but I wanted to share something with you that I only just learned yesterday. Filter words. This is a fairly simple concept that will significantly improve your writing. As I went through your sample I saw that you have at least a few instances of filter words, which means you probably have a lot more. The good news is, they're easy to fix! The bad news is, it might be fairly time consuming depending on how many you use.
Another tip: Hire beta readers. Maybe I'm cynical but in my experience people will often offer to beta read for you, but they don't follow through. I don't blame them; it's time-consuming to read a 100k manuscript, much less a 200k one. But if you hire a beta reader on fiverr, they better follow through (and in timely fashion) or their side gig is toast. For this reason I will only utilize hired beta readers.
Hey, this is me! I self-published my first novel on Amazon just about a month ago.
It's called The Greencloak Wanderer. It's a cozy epic fantasy written in a heightened style, inspired by works such as Redwall and The Books of Earthsea. It would be awesome if you could give it a look!
I liked it. I thought the opening for the first paragraph was a little heavy-handed, the ideas behind the first half of of it could be compressed (as well as removing one or two uses of "mock"), but perhaps that was the intent. If so, carry on. I would also suggest breaking these paragraphs apart, but that is more of a style/readability issue to me. Also, I would advise running your story through ProWritingAid and Grammarly because I saw a few grammar things that could be cleaned up.
Overall, I think it was an atmospheric story that kept me reading. Good job.
I'm kind of surprised no one has mentioned Shadowrun. It is a cyberpunk setting in which magic has begun to reappear. Great setting and RPG.
It's hard to go wrong recommending Sun Tsu's The Art of War. It's a basic strategy handbook for pre-industrial combat. The particulars for your work are going to depend a lot on mundane and magical technology.
FYI: The Art of War was originally written in Chinese around 2,500 years ago, and not all translations are created equal.
With that in mind, I recommend Ralph D. Sawyer's version to (fantasy) writers who want it for world-building and learning about military strategy. One of the biggest strengths of Sawyer's work is that it's not just a translation; it's well-researched and heavily annotated with footnotes, Sawyer's remarks at the end of each chapter, and a long introduction that help to provide historical context about who Sun Tzu was and the landscape of the world he lived in. It's a great version for people who are interested in learning about Sun Tzu and not just reading the words of Sun Tzu.
By all means write short stories! Write! I really can't stress that enough. If you're a writer just write... anything.
And yes, I would go as far as to say most writers in the world today write mostly short stories. And many of the best, and most popular writers today wrote ONLY short stories for YEARS before they started their first novel (Stephen King for example).
In fact, Ray Bradbury even said, "Don't start out writing novels."
While some authors start off writing short stories and then carry on to writing novels later, many authors continue to write just short stories. (They release a collection of short stories instead of novels).
Overall, just write. You should write for yourself, and if you enjoy writing short stories rather than novels, then I urge you, please continue to write short stories. If by happenstance a novel starts to happen... go with it.
He says, "I don’t want to dick around with fonts, spacing, indentation, etc." as if that got in the way of composition, and then recommends learning a complex programming setup and urges us to learn LaTeX?
I think I'll stick with PageFour and Google Docs, thanks.
I skim read most of this, as I found it hard to sink into. For my critique I want to focus on a single point: showing vs telling. Before I start, rest assured, it is difficult to get it right. Really difficult. I mess it up regularly. I'm always on the hunt for more advice myself :)
If you read Stephen King's On Writing (and you should) you will learn that a story has three core elements: narrative (action), description, and dialogue. "Showing vs telling" is all about descriptions.
Descriptions can be colourful and engaging. They can also be flat and boring. When someone says "show, don't tell" they are essentially saying "enliven your descriptions, I'm bored". IMO.
There are two ways (at least) to enliven your desciptions. Use active language. And use dramatic language. You can research these two points online. Rest assured you can go too far and wander into the wonderful world of purple prose. What to do? Practice writing, read, and maybe highlight favourite passages.
Your prose starts like this:- "He was bleeding. He was sweaty. His muscles felt like lead. His heart was pumping furiously."
"He was bleeding." Passive. "He bled." Active, but flat. "His leather jerkin was sliced, and new blood welled up." Active with a dot of the dramatic.
Your passage, using active language and dots of dramatic imagery: "His blood smeared his skin, and he blinked away the sweat. His muscles were ready to betray him, and his heart was a blacksmith's hammer, pounding relentlessly."
Use active, dramatic description throughout your writing.
Good luck!
One of my best friends works 12-hour days, probably 6 days a week, and writes more in a day than I do in a week.
We've almost all got day jobs and find the time to do it. I'm not berating you, I'm just saying, it's possible to have your cake and eat it too. You have to make time, you can't just find it.
I read the first four or five pages of the first chapter, and found it difficult to keep going.
For me, the omniscient narrator that feels like he's addressing me is odd. Not good-odd or bad-odd; I'm still trying to figure out how to qualify it. As something I'm not used to, the style frequently took me out of the story. I may not be the type of audience you're going for, so this may not matter.
The use of parenthesis and single quotes also felt odd as a style choice, but could easily be something that's outside of my norm but within the norm for others. You occasionally switched to double quotes, and I'd recommend sticking with one or the other for consistency.
The first chapter started off with what felt like a history lesson. There are a lot of facts told of things, but I don't feel any connection to character or story that anchors such facts in my mind. Partly due to the info dumping, and partly due to the long paragraph length, I found myself regularly starting to skim and had to keep going back.
Several pages in, I don't have an idea for what the plot is, and nothing in particular hooked my curiosity to read more.
Here's a website I recommend: http://www.hemingwayapp.com/. Don't take everything it says as gospel, but it provides an interesting perspective on the complexity of writing. I put several of your paragraphs into that site and it agreed with a feeling of complexity that may have been part of my difficulty in focusing on your writing.
Don't necessarily edit your work to make that site happy. In putting my own writing there, I found things that I disagreed with and kept as is. It's just an interesting perspective to consider.
https://www.amazon.com/Primal-Gambit-First-Ghostlands-Ghostland/dp/1530667658
Primal Gambit, first published back in 2017. Dystopian fiction focusing on human zoos and the fall of humanity. Totally regret it now; don't buy it. But I'm happy to share my faults.
(quick flair your post so that the mods don't remove it!)
Your question seems really broad: I think that there are certain tropes that readers look for but not all readers will look for the same thing and there are certainly readers out there for practically anything, especially sword and sorcery and coming of age stories.
What kinds of advice are you looking for? There's loads out there already, here's a link to an old post of mine with loads of writing resources with lots aimed at fantasy writers
Really the best, basic advise is write often, write lots, and read often and read lots.
Maybe another good place to start would be Season 10 of Writing Excuses? A podcast with Brandon Sanderson, Marie Robinette Kowal, Dan Wells, and Howard Taylor and their 'season 10' is aimed at being a masterclass in writing a novel: http://www.writingexcuses.com/category/season/season-10/
(made some minor edits)
Stephen King in On Writing suggests that for every successful writer like James Mitchner who creates elaborate worlds with history and backstory, there are 100 who try and fail. Why? The backstory detracts from the narrative, the plot, the action...
I personally love world-building as an escape, but I am starting to see that too much world building isn't good for my writing.
Asimov, I feel, did a great job in the Foundation Series with "galactic encyclopedia" entries to explain the world building. Larry Nivan in Ringworld used a geographic adventure story to hint at the mysterious builders of the his universe.
You can always have an appendix (thus at the end of your novel) with entries on the geography, the ecology, the magic of whatever world you are creating.
The March 1957 issue of Amazing Stories featured the novelette The Savage Swarm by Harlan Ellison that was written for this incredibly-pulpy-yet-amazingly-awesome cover art. Source, page 7.
This is one of three of his stories in that issue, by the way. The others were published under the pseudonyms “Ellis Hart” (S.R.O.) and “Lee Archer” (Escape Route) to make it look like the magazine had more contributors than it actually had… This was a common practice in those days, and the authors generally didn’t mind because it fetched multiple (albeit small) paychecks. Sometimes whole issues were comprised of only one author writing under assumed names for each story!
Thank you for permitting guilt-free promotion on this thread ! I just discovered this sub-reddit, and will strive to meet its rules of etiquette. This week I self-published my first (9k) fantasy short Flotsam .
I am fascinated with mixing fantasy with hard science. Flotsam is set in a secondary world that resembles medieval South Asia. The protagonist, a scholar named Sibi, is hired by a damsel-in-distress to help rescue her husband. The rescue takes them to prehistoric ruins, that sits within a magical Time Stream flowing ever faster into the future. And when they finally face the monster that lurks there, Sibi must exploit the Time Stream along with a bit of physics to get out alive !
The story is free, and available on a few channels including Nook, Kobo, iBooks, etc. This the first story within a planned anthology and I look forward to joining this community of kindred spirits.
It depends. But, a general rule is: new speaker, new line. Indented.
And like any rule, you can break it stylistically, once you've learned it. And do this sparingly. If you've seen examples outside of these rules, they may have just been making an artistic choice.
So, content aside, it's not exactly readable in its current state due to the formatting. Consider referencing dialogue rules and basic paragraph structuring, as well as punctuation.
https://prowritingaid.com/art/369/How-to-Write-Dialogue-in-a-Narrative-Paragraph.aspx
Hello!
I did a bunch of commenting on the document, so I'll just touch on my general feeling here.
First and foremost, I think this has good potential. Your writing is pretty solid as a whole and you do quite well with jumping straight into the scene while avoiding info dumps. The prose flowed pretty well. I didn't have the urge to stop at any point, so I suppose that says quite a bit.
That said, there are a couple things you could improve on - always the case, isn't it?
You use way too many adverbs... I think I counted almost 35 in less than 2000 words. While I don't find adverbs to be the complete devil like some do, I still think that's excessive. Any time you use an adverb, look at what you just wrote. Was it necessary? Was there absolutely no better way to say it with a stronger verb? Sometimes there isn't (and I marked an example on the doc), but usually you can replace it with something better.
You have a bit of passive voice, but not so much that it's a problem. Again, this has its place when used sparingly, but I like to cut down on it as much as possible. If you have trouble seeing it, this website is a great tool for finding all the occurrences for you.
Lastly, watch out for those dialogue markers. It wasn't bad, but enough that I noticed. Nine times out of ten you should probably be using 'said'.
Anyway, as I said, I think you have some good potential here. There's nothing glaring wrong in your writing that can't be easily fixed, so keep at it and you'll be writing great stuff before you know it.
Why did I make one of my characters a blacksmith? Not only is it a giant cliché, but now, because I want him to do some forging, I have to do proper research. I hate it. On the other hand the world of blacksmithing is pretty neat and I can sort of get away with inconsistenties by waving my hands and shouting "MAGIC".
This technique works for practically all plotholes. It's great.
The first issue of my comic ended up on Amazon. I'm excited about it, so I made it free for a few days.
I hope you guys enjoy it. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MEBSY6I
My airship adventure book is free through Friday on Amazon.
Here's the latest blurb we throw at people:
> The life of an airshipman is violent and short.
> Vasili Mikhailovich never knew his legendary father. The swashbuckling airship captain died mysteriously when the boy was five, leaving only tall tales and long shadows. Vasili yearns to leave his tiny frontier village and become a skysailing legend in his own right.
> When a charismatic traveler arrives in Vasili’s hometown, he not only brings answers, but offers Vasili the chance of a lifetime: to join the crew of Vasili’s father’s old ship, the fabled Apotheosis Break.
> But Vasili soon learns the world and its skies are nothing like in his books. The serendipitous airship is filled with beguiling shard hunters, resource thieves, now at the end of their rope. They have already lost good men and women looking for Vasili. They may still lose everything on one last job.
> The farther from home Vasili travels, the more he begins to question the nature of his father’s legacy. If half of what the crew says is true, his father’s story was one of loss, madness, and betrayal. In order for Vasili to survive in the skies he will have to be as lucky as his father and twice as clever. Otherwise another Mikhailovich may be lost forever to the skies.
If you're looking just for fiction to read, I'd recommend something by Brandon Sanderson. If you're most interested in YA fantasy, you'd probably like his Reckoners series. If you're looking for a more epic affair, then I'd recommend anywhere from Mistborn to the Way of Kings. The latter is probably my favorite from him.
On the topic of epic fantasy, there's also Patrick Rothfuss with The Name of The Wind, or for something really dark brutal, there's Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin (though I wouldn't necessarily recommend that if you're coming straight out of Ranger's Apprentice).
For more on actual instruction about writing, there's always Stephen King's On Writing, or you have Write About Dragons on YouTube. For more fundamentals, many people recommend Strunk and White.
Just some ideas to put you in the right direction.
>Stephen King’s On Writing, How to Write a Damn Good Novel 1/2, The Elements of Style, The Write Good Fiction Series, Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy
OP, may I ask you which of those books would you recommend and how did each of them help you? I'm interested in reading those kind of books at the moment.
I'm going to be honest--the prose seems a little awkward. It's in the present tense, but I feel very removed from the action as if I'm being told what's happening rather than experiencing it as it happens. I'd also recommend reading 'The Elements of Style' by Strunk and White. It will help your prose stand up on its own and help with some of the clunkiness of the writing. It is a book on usage and grammar, but it lays out sentence structure very well and helped me immensely when I first started out. I wrote very similarly to the way you do and the book was recommended to me.
Certainly don't stop. I'd just spend a little bit of time working on your structure and cleaning up your usage and sentence structure. The story will be told no matter how you write it, and editing and drafting is secondary to the story you want to tell. So, tell your story, but work on the craft as well.
Orson Scott Card's How to Write SF&F and Stephen King's On Writing are the two big genre fiction manuals. It might be no harm to get How Not To Write A Novel for the comedy/entertainment value if it's on special offer.
Ah, we are kindred spirits then. My motivations are much the same, and I also have a degree in poetry (and one in fiction and one in rhetoric). You will ultimately need to develop your own process, but research shows it will have a lot in common with other people's processes. Just today I came across an interesting thing that I think presents a good model. Like any model, it is an abstraction, but this one has the advantage of being process-oriented. I'd recommend it, just adding that you should be sure to take it as guideline rather than rule and to freely adapt it for your purposes. Here is a link. I also always recommend Stephen King's On Writing because it is so accessible and provides a decent foundation (though I quibble with his section on grammar) and Orson Scott Card's How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy for some genre-specific insight.
Much better week for me. Really starting to get into the swing of the new year. 16k words this past week on the manuscript for Black Ocean, Mission 3.
After an attempt to use Kobo to get Tech, Lies, and Wizardry to go perma-free on Amazon (Kobo let's you just choose free; what a concept!), I decided to use Smashwords to make it free on B&N. If anyone would be interested in lending a hand, go to the Amazon page for it (previous link) and click the "Tell us about a lower price" option. They'll ask for a link to where it's free: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/tech-lies-and-wizardry-js-morin/1120866443
Much appreciated. :)
>I thought it could be interesting to see someone abuse empathy to not feel and deal with her pain.
This is a nice touch.
>In sum, is it a problem that my only two POV female characters are empaths?
No.
Not for me at least.
>Is it too “women are good with emotions?
There may well be some readers out there who might make this objection.
But there will almost certainly be just as many who are fully on board with it.
Deanna Troi in Star Trek was an empath and to my knowledge this didn't upset many people.
Admittedly, that show was from the 80s or 90s, but there are plenty of modern equivalents.
In fact, I think I'm right in saying that there are plenty of people who argue that there should be more women CEOs and politicians etc. precisely because they bring this kind of empathetic touch to the roles while maintaining high professional standards in other aspects of the job.
New Zealand Prime Minister's biography <em>Jacinda Ardern: Leading with Empathy</em> might be a case in point.
In terms of the writing, I've produced sweet fuck all. Stoopid day job >:-(
HOWEVER, a small, and super-secret project has just come to fruition and I now have a couple of excellent covers for The Werechicken :-) I was assisted by a pair of fabulous Redditors who produced amazing work. I couldn't decide between them, so I'm using both :-)
u/crowqueen's cover on Amazon The Werechicken
and u/artemis_aquarius's cover on Smashwords The Werechicken
Needless to say I'm chuffed to bits with both of them :-)
Let me get this straight . . .
You purposely took on tunnel vision for six months and you thought your writing would improve?
That's like Michael Jordan practising basketball in the dark and expecting to be number one.
Dumb choice man.
You want to improve? Put your stuff out there and keep getting rejected until you hit home. Read 'Stephen King, On Writing' for the 101.
In regards to potential, go read some of Brandon Sanderson's early stuff. It is the corniest sack of shit writing I've ever seen in my life. You choose your own path and sink or swim, there's no such thing as 'no potential'.
If this is for you, keep your head up and in the game!
Comments as I read:-
1/ "3" should be "three" - https://www.grammarly.com/handbook/mechanics/numbers/2/spell-out-numbers-of-one-or-two-words-or-those-tha/
2/ I'll recommend a more advanced English writing book: The Sense of Style by Steven Pinker. This covers punctuation/grammar and the underlying rules.
3/ You need to give Gokk a brief introductory line before you tell us his thoughts on the brothers.
4/ Your dialogue does not follow the usual conventions of fiction writing.
5/ You have a natural ability to write combat scenes. Your blocking (placement of characters) and action (step-by-step but without excessive detail) look good.
Summary: Alzamag is going to make a terrific villian! Your natural instincts for story-telling are spot-on as far as I can tell, but obviously you have a lot of work to do to improve. In addition to the book I mention above, I'd also recommend another favourite of mine: On Writing by Stephen King.
Comments:-
1/ "Feint" should be "faint". Who could the faint knocking be heard by? Perhaps you mean "There was a faint knock on the door."
2/ Your first paragraph is a series of stubby little sentences some of which disobey basic grammar. I have a couple of favourite grammar books; can you say the same? Your intuitive sense of how to write is way off the mark, so you must address this without delay.
3/ Your dialogue has basic puncutation errors. There are attribution problems.
Summary: Please do what I've done, and what all aspiring writers do. Get yourself a book on grammar and study it carefully. Also get yourself a book on how to write fiction; I will recommend "On Writing" by Stephen King as it is entertaining and informative. Good luck!
It's been a while since I read On Writing and The Elements of Style (and I haven't read these other ones... yet), but I found On Writing to be more about workflow and the overall process of writing and The Elements of Style to be more about writing prose well.
For example, Stephen King wrote more about how he moved into writing as a career, and what is important to him when writing and editing books, and how to maintain a habit and the motivation to push through to the end. The Elements of Style was more technical.
I also second the suggestion to absorb all of Branderson's writing advice. Particularly the new Youtube series, 318R at BYU, is so good.
edit: if it isn't obvious, Branderson = Brandon + Sanderson
So the main takeaways of The Art of War, as I understand it: (1) war sucks so avoid it, (2) if you really must go to war, minimize its costs by winning quickly and decisively, (3) prioritize intelligence and deception so that you know what's happening but your enemy does not. All of that is common sense and good advice, with or without magic.
But you can definitely add a magical sky-world gloss on it. To deceive, airships might fly false flags. To gather intelligence, you would need spies on enemy ships. Let the enemy think you're a breeze when you're a tempest. Be as unpredictable as the wind. Use what passes for "terrain" in the sky to your advantage--clouds, sky-cities, the light of the sun. Don't abandon a defensive position unless you have the advantage.
And you need to keep track of logistical data. How many skybiscuits are on each ship, yours and the enemies? How many sailors? How long can they remain aloft? How many cannons? Cannonballs? How many tons of powder? When will they need to be resupplied? Just spitballing, hope that helps!
A word of caution: while /u/ProbableWalrus has succeeded in making your first few paragraphs more interesting, his version is still error-ridden. You'll need a solid understanding of grammar and punctuation if you want to get published.
I think Martha Kolln's <em>Rhetorical Grammar</em> would help you tremendously. It provides a thorough-but-accessible overview of modern phrase-structure grammar, favoring critical, rhetorical decision-making over rote memorization. If you're interested in something more advanced, Steven Pinker's <em>The Sense of Style</em> is also wonderful. Pinker is on the cutting edge of modern linguistics.
Try to avoid lazy verbs. "Callen was hunched." = Callen hunched, his back cramping in the small room. Something like that. Overall I just saw grammatical errors like that, lazy verbs, ("The man sat in front of Callen had his legs crossed" = "The man that sat across from Callen had his legs crossed" gives a bit of a clearer picture.) See the difference? Stephen King touches on this a lot in his On Writing (seriously the Bible of writing for me.) Otherwise, story-wise I was interested, just need to watch your grammar.
As I mentioned earlier:
Zen in the Art of Writing--Ray Bradbury
On Writing--Stephen King
Booklife--Jeff VanderMeer
The Art of Ficton--John Gardner (this is my favorite.)
If you like Campbell, you should try his Masks of God sequence--Primitive Mythology, Oriental Mythology, Occidental Mythology, and Creative Mythology. It's his magnum opus, and while I have qualms with Campbell, I think it's important for people who want to write epics to understand it, even if they ultimately disagree.
A few months back I actually led a talk on Campbell at an art exhibit which was devoted to The Hero's Journey, and wrote the placards that explain what each of the steps represents.
You requested my presence?
Yes. Come in and be seated. I doubt you need telling of what topic needs to be addressed.
I presume you mean the Jykk incident.
Incident. Incident! An encounter with a cutpurse in the street is an incident. Accidentally slighting a lower lord is an incident. What we have here, no, what you have created for us is more than a god’s damned incident. It is a black handed catastrophe.
I gave you what you asked for.
I asked for a tool. You were to shape and mould him to the purpose I saw fit. But you couldn’t give me what i asked for, no, you had to try for so much more. I asked for a scalpel and you gave me a rabid bear on a frayed leash.
The rest: A nice chat
Hopefully this doesn't break any rules. I don't think anything in it really should, but I didn't realize we had any rules except length and no powers (just read the original post, not the thread).
Like I said, I don't feel it does, but if anyone thinks my submission violates the rules, I understand.
The principles of computer programming are thankfully easy to learn at low cost thanks to things like Code Academy. And 'computer science and engineering' is usually the official name of a degree where you'd learn about both code and hardware. I can't think of an easy way that someone would be able to learn computer engineering beyond taking something apart or, say, building a PC. (The latter has more in common with IT. It's the difference between an auto mechanic and a mechanical engineer.) Computer engineering takes a lot of physics and calculus- one of my professors, who works at NASA as an electrical engineer, even called calculus and calculus-based physics 'something you survive, not ace'. He's not wrong.
I don't know quite what you are looking for. But I put 'magic' and 'Thesaurus' into google and thesaurus.com seemed quite useful. Note there are three pages...
Maybe these are not obscure/arcance enoug for what you are looking for?
This is based off an obscure fairytale called Bearskin by the Brother's Grimm. I'd never heard of it until I did some research for this challenge. It's just under the 2500 mark and I had to scale it down by 1700 words! I hope it reads well.
I just finished chapter 9 of my novel...and it's already 50 pages typed. I dread to think of how long this thing is going to be. For your reading pleasure, here's chapters 1-4.
If you only have time for one chapter, I'd recommend reading chapter 4. It's my personal favorite. =)
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwqIAc2EJEiCTHBQdEQ5MGlzV0E/edit?usp=sharing
I loved having Scrivener, but I lost it when I had to swap operating systems. I've been using Word by itself since, but I've not been nearly as organized. When I can get a job and have some cash to spare, I'll probably buy it again.
For Christmas, though, my mom paid for the $20 download of Write Or Die ( http://writeordie.com )and I've been using it every day. It really helps get the words out when the program threatens you with loud noises and munched letters if you stop writing for too long. You can use it for free online, but I'm moving to a house with limited internet, so it'll be well worth the investment.
It certainly has helped me to improve, and I hope that it does the same for you my friend! I recently found some advice from Ray Bradbury, who I’ll admit is one of my favorites, where he offers advice on writing. I thought his points were excellent, and one of them was to not start out writing novels and instead create “a hell of a lot of short stories.”
Looking at my growth and experiences over the last year, his advice is really resonating with me. I jumped pell mell into serious writing focused on writing novels with a tunnel vision. I see now that was a mistake. It’s like waking up one morning and saying “I’m going to run a marathon today!” without doing any training or conditioning beforehand; of course you fail.
Then I started working on my short fiction, keeping up with the challenges and switching between them and my other writing projects. That is training and practice, and I can see how my writing has improved because of it. Better yet, I have some stories I love to actually show people what I’ve written, rather than just tell them about my worldbuilding and ideas!
Sloz,
For grammar checks, you can try this site: https://prowritingaid.com/ It performs a free analysis of the text you put in and gives you feedbacks on the mechanics of the writing.
For story feedback, it's far more useful to have that grammar stuff out of the way first. You'll get better feedback if your critiquers aren't having to work grammatical weaknesses to try and judge your character development and plot.
In the future, I'd always recommend addressing grammar before asking for a critique. ;) You just get more bang for your buck that way.
This may well end up not being the first paragraph, and I will have to think about it this weekend myself because I'm working part of next week and want to keep the updates to the story coming, but I am currently on the second part of <em>Snowmaiden</em> and this is the first paragraph of that chapter.
>“The hair will have to come off. If it remains in that state she might suffer from an infestation.” Gordon Falls clipped off the matted locks with a shake of his head. “She shouldn’t have survived buried like that in a snowdrift.”
ETA: Revision, thanks to Artemis' input and confusion over Falls' position in the story.
>“Her hair will have to come off - if it remains in that state she might suffer from an infestation.” Doctor Gordon Falls clipped off the matted locks with a shake of his head. “She shouldn’t have survived, buried like that in a snowdrift.”
Finished a rather gruelling once-over of Brother Wolf where I mapped out the POV in Scrivener and decided which scenes to merge or cut. There's a glitch I got some way towards a coherent ending after I took out a pointless subplot which had a 2K word capstone scene on it - but a little bit of tweaking to other scenes at the climax of the novel made that part of the story meaty enough to replace the capstone scene without having to write extra new material in the denouement. Now fussing over the cover and the blurb, but have a few scenes to write (there's a few loose threads) and a bit of editing yet. I'm not expecting to publish until March, however, so plenty of time.
I actually kept up with putting out a six-part story, The Orderly, on Wattpad over New Year (since it has a climactic event on New Year's Eve). I'm a newbie to that site and posted each part as a separate story, but the first part is here.
Don't know what I've got planned for this week as I go in for induction for a new job on Monday but have no idea when I'll be starting or what hours I'll be doing. At that point I'll probably sit down and work something out in time for next week's Check In.
Totally! If any of y'all are looking to get into the classics, Librivox has tons of free audiobooks of old works. I listen to them when I'm doing any hands-on, brain-off tasks around the house.
I really admire some of the "girly" classics for how they deal with characterization. I think it's because when you have a tiny canvas where, say, you never go anywhere more inherently dramatic than the neighbor's drawing room, you need to work with skill and delicacy to create interesting characters and conflicts. Compared to the magic-wielding, planet-destroying Big Bads we often get in fantasy, Austen's Mansfield Park, for example, is positively dull-- but the "Aunt Norris" character makes my blood boil in a way that no sf/f villain ever has. The protagonist's rebellion in L.M. Montgomery's The Blue Castle is more satisfying than some literal slave revolts. Amy March burning her sister's manuscript in Little Women still ranks up there as one of the worst betrayals in fiction I've ever read-- all because it was built slowly, as the reader gains an understanding of the family dynamic and what's important to each person.
I'm not against blowing up planets, of course. I just think that blowing up planets + nuanced and subtle characterization is way more fun.
"Master Shoowick licked his right index finger, before he stuck it out of the carriage window. He hesitated for a moment, squinted his eyes, and then licked his finger again. Tasted disgusting."
Note: Roughly translated with the help of DeepL Translator
You can try Azgaar's, it's not that easy to use but it looks great and has a lot a layers. Or you could look into Wonderdraft , great tool for world maps but it isn't free. I think it's about $20.
A custom illustration is going to cost more. Way more. But that's not my concern - if you plan on reaching out to an illustrator for a custom cover, you're stepping on the toes of your team. You should be reaching out to them to ask about cover options and your preferences, not to artists. They have your book now, and you signed with them, which means they are now your point of contact.
But to answer the question, I don't care. I tend to prefer "designed" covers, the ones with abstract art on the cover like Shadow and Bone and The Hazel Wood. These types of things are drawn by artists ultimately, but I've seen fantastic work from designers including stuff like this, which I know is stock because the author's talked about it.
I published my first novel last year. It's about a servant who realizes he's been lied to about the nature of his existence and seeks to free everyone like him from the incarnate of a dead goddess and her lover, the immortal emperor of his homeland. It's the first book in a broader series with a ton of magic, fictional races, gods and demons, etc. Some of that shows up in the first book, and I'm writing the second one right now. Here's the link for that: https://www.amazon.com/The-Black-Rain-Chronicles/dp/B08BZCVRT2
And I'm releasing another book in about 3 weeks that isn't related. It's New Weird/Urban Fantasy. The premise is people have the innate ability to obtain superpowers but in order to do so, they have to "abandon themselves", basically feed everything they've got into either their superego or id. They either become members of communities and form codes that dictate when and under what circumstances they can use their powers, or they engage in a life of hedonistic (and at times animalistic) self-indulgence without care for the consequences of their actions in order to obtain what's called Boundlessness, or limitless power. Both orders are extremely dangerous and pose problems for the world at large, so a college professor takes it upon himself to educate his class (which includes his grandson) about what these people are, how they operate, and (potentially) how to eliminate them. Given the nature of the subject matter, I think this one will be a bit controversial, but I felt a need to publish it anyway, so it's coming shortly.
I have a new SF&F book coming out September 7th. I wrote a prequel novella to it that's available on ebook platforms: https://www.amazon.com/Undone-Life-Jak-Dreadth-ebook/dp/B09237LBR7/ref=sr\_1\_2?dchild=1&keywords=jak+dreadth&qid=1622834519&sr=8-2
Shadow Souls is just .99 on Amazon for Kindle.
"Her eyes adjusted to the light as she peered at the letters. Her breath caught in her throat. It was her name. Keezie."
Smart and successful, Keezie Stockman's life is perfect until her grandfather dies and leaves her a mysterious trail of cryptic messages that lead to a discovery which throws that perfect life into a dark and dangerous tailspin.
A life sentence in prison is literal hell if you aren't prone to dying. Ask Eli Seven Crow. Forty years at The Farm have taken a toll on his strength and will, but for a man like Eli there is only so long that he can avoid his calling. Only so long before his long list of enemies come knocking and thrust him back into the maelstrom of violence and dark power that has ruled his life for over 200 years.
When events pull the two into each other's orbit they begin to wonder if they were meant to save or destroy one another.
It's super crunch time at work so I've been getting almost no writing done, though it's been scratching at me that I need to get back to it.
In other news, yesterday was the 5th anniversary of my first and only adventure in publishing, a short story collection I wrote called Across The Battlefield. It's historical short fiction stories and one speculative story as well. You could probably read it on a single coffee break. It's up for free on amazon.
I'm hoping to get some writing done next week once things at work cool down a little, so fingers crossed.
I like that type of book enough that I wrote one. Amazon link and Goodreads link.
Their world has something terrible happen to it, but the main characters are determined, noble, and loyal to the bitter end.
I didn’t say they were the same, I said there were slave owners. I read a memoir written by a slave where he talks about black slave owners stealing him and his sister from their home, separating them, and selling them to Spain. I’m aware of the differences, it doesn’t make African slave owners any better though. They were all in the cash for flesh business.
Edit: link for source The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano: Or Gustavus Vassa, The African, Written By Himself https://www.amazon.com/dp/1517442370/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_x4JDFbVXFY6G4
Comments as I read through:-
1/ Your first sentence has a non-sequitur. Being able to read the cover, and the fact that the book is locked are unrelated.
2/ Your second sentence can be deleted. Curiosity is implied already.
3/ You're not selling it as extraordinary very well. It's a book in the grass that still looks new. Try to play it up. "The book was wrapped in weeds, yet the gilt-edges shone and the cover was smooth. Somehow the tome had escaped the decaying touch of the elements."
4/ If the book still looks like it came off a printing press (these exist in your fantasy world I take it) then why is your hero picking it up so gingerly.
5/ Now the book is a "mere book" when previously it was extraordinary.
6/ "Like these" is repeated.
7/ He didn't go back to the wagon "that he had left"; he went back to the wagon.
8/ You have used first-person POV (book-finder dude). Now we are suddenly in the head of a passenger, and know that he or she is "anxious".
9/ "Loud children" is telling, not showing, and it distracts.
10/ The dialogue hangs and does nothing. What was he doing; what took him so long? If relevant then explain via more dialogue. If irrelevant then delete.
11/ You are attempting to explain a prior paragraph's dialogue "words uttered with an annoyed tone". Delete. Emotion in dialogue needs to be contained within that dialogue and accompanying action. '"What took you so long?" said a passenger' - this is enough.
12/ Smelled and smelled. Repetition.
13/ You go back to the "inconsiderate passenger". Delete. Stay on smell. "Anyone with a decent sense..."
Summary: this short piece is so full of basic errors it would be wrong to give false praise. It wasn't really ready for a critique and if it had been much longer I'd have stopped at paragraph 1. Please get yourself a copy of "On Writing" by Stephen King, plus a good book on grammar and learn the nuts and bolts of the craft.
There's a dark comic-book feel to your writing. The following passages are stupendously ridiculous and made me laugh:-
Always in demand he bragged to himself. He slammed the papers down on the table, the woman behind the counter head shot up. Calm yourself if I wanted you dead, you’d be dead already.
Leadmouth approached the guard and pointed at his pike, “May I?” he asked. The guard reluctantly handed it over. Leadmouth drove it through the assassin’s head with a grunt. He handed it back with a, “Thank you.”
Improving descriptive writing is something that takes practice and a lot of reading. Be very particular about where your "camera" is. Your first paragraph is jarring and hard to read. IMO the focus jerks about far too much: tongue, mouth, interior of inn, outside (midnight), bartender, contracts, bartender, contracts, breeches. Here's what was relevant: dude with leaden teeth sits in a bar at midnight, finishes his wine and heads for the exit. Action ensues.
To improve your writing further I'd recommend you read Stephen King's On Writing. It's fun and very helpful.
Comments:
1/ Your piece is riddled with grammatical errors. You must equip yourself with a book on grammar and learn the subject if you wish to engage readers.
2/ The narrator is giving us information. It is a classic example of telling, not showing. There is no immediacy, no tension. There are no characters. Nothing is on the line. Imagine how you'd feel if those opening words of Star Wars rolled on, page after page, for 30 minutes. You should get yourself a copy of Stephen King's book 'On Writing'; it is a fun read and will help you.
This seems to be improving on your previous submissions, so good work!
I'm not gonna do a blow by blow critique since I don't have much time right now, but as for not knowing where you want to go after this, try this. Sit down with a pen and paper and start scribbling out something that your MC really wants or a goal that they are trying to attain. For example, Rokkar wants to be a glorious leader (which I'm assuming based on what I've just read) so he does something reckless to further his exploits (we've just seen this). What's the cause and effect? He ends up being cursed by this orc shaman. Start creating a cause and effect chain that starts to get your plot rolling. Rokkar wants (really, needs) to be cured so they head to the grand elves - they heal him but he's stuck with this curse. Now he's stuck with this curse but he thinks he can only be a great leader if he has his full power. So what does he do? Well, that's up to you.
I know a lot of writing books are pretty subjective but I just finished reading one called Story Genius that has really helped me in the way I brainstorm and begin to plot a story. It's not perfect (none of them usually are) but I'd recommend it. And hopefully I'm not breaking any rules by suggesting it!
Good luck, though, I can tell you're determined and that's great.
Edit; forgot a word
I read Stephen King's "On Writing" which I thought was great. He said that a good thing to do as a writer was to "be honest". Write what comes to you and what you think your characters will do. Don't pull punches essentially.
You know you might want to read a very short bit of writing by Frederick Douglass (about 100 or so pages if you skip the editor notes and go straight to Chapter 1) "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass" it is available online for free on Project Gutenberg in it he details his life as a slave, how he secretly learned to read, developed a thirst for freedom - which he couldn't even imagine as a concept until he learned to read- how he managed to earn a little money and eventually escape (though he doesn't spell out specifics because he was worried the people who helped might get in trouble). A lot of little details that might help you if you can work your way through it.
As for how she could travel it will also depend on her background. If she was rough she might have some knowledge of wild plants, If she was kidnapped from a fishing village she might remember how to make a line and catch fish. You probably need to know about her frame of mind - is she scared, is she brave, what she knows how to do and so on.
Good luck.
I've read a little bit about publishing and marketing from Write, Publish, Repeat by Sean Platt and Johnny B. Truant. They say that your goal starting out is to get "~~100~~ 1,000 true fans," regardless of writing format.
An easy way to do that in my opinion would be going through a magazine. Possibly Science & Fantasy or Black Treacle. This could even be more profitable, or at least safer, since you are guaranteed to get paid if they accept your work. Not to mention you will get a cult following and eventually you'll have enough fans to look for your work.
Just my thoughts. If anyone else has some input regarding publishing in this manner I'm all ears as well.
My take on a similar concept (to escape WOTC coyright) is an 'elf' (I use a different name) country who's major resource is my equivalent to mythril: verrum. Since Verrum is underground and the ruling class knows they are running out of ore, an elaborate slave-caste was created and they are kept exclusively underground. Feeding costs are kept down by the (decidedly disgusting) practice of feeding all the poop to pigs also kept underground (Yes, this is a real thing. ). Dead slaves are also thrown to the pigs. Said pigs are then butchered and fed back to the slaves in the most morbid, disease-ridden recycling program to grace the face/bowels of the planet. This makes the ore cheap to harvest so the nobles can live a life of relative luxury as their society slowly runs out of resources and will (eventually) implode in a civil/necromantic war.
Circling back to your spider bent, you could do something similar just with spiders as the livestock. Dead are thrown into the webs of giant spiders, then spiders are killed an eaten in holy rituals. As for the sewage, well, that could feed other animals (pigs?) that are then also fed to the spiders. It creates this ongoing murderous/nurturing cycle between your elves and the spiders.
What the hey. Here's mine.
This is a secondary character in my current novel. Probably the one I've ended up liking the most since he's managed to survive every draft thus far with the fewest changes.
Hey. I wasn't able to finish my entry but here is what i have so far. This is the first time i have written anything so constructive criticism is appreciated.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1DV6yRd-asK_SkA3HVG9Hc_c_swsnibIUf-xmTI4C020/edit
When Marcus and his crew fail to return from a routine pantry raid it's up to Gregory and Russell to discover what's become of them. Russell suspects betrayal, but Gregory is not so sure.
Finally getting the chance to work on Tavern. It's slow progress but I've been enjoying it. It's nice to write true swords and magic type fantasy after finishing my post apoc fantasy.
On other news, I managed to upload all of Dusk Territories: Always Burning on my Deviant Art and started my Patreon. DA has been really nice on giving me some feedback and confidence in the rest of the series.
I've promoted my work here before, but my cover artist finally came through, so I'm self-promoting again!
Magical Girls. A novel about gender, sexuality, and teenagers fighting monsters. You can get it from the Kindle Store for $2.99.
The world is lousy with stories about teenagers saving the world. But what if the bad guys knew the stories, too? What if they could use the stories against you?
Five teenagers just graduated high school. Now a man wearing a mask and a tuxedo wants them to fight the forces of evil and save the world.
Asuka Taylor is a white girl with a Japanese name. If you don't move quickly enough, she will tell you all about Homestuck, whether you like it or not.
Joan Nielsen is a good little Mormon girl, hiding a terrible secret that threatens to tear her family apart.
Rosalind Williams is an ex-basketball star, taking care of her deadbeat dad.
Duncan Oaks can read minds. But only women's minds. And yes, he knows all about the Mel Gibson movie, thank you very much.
Faye Morgan was raised by white-collar criminals to be cold, calculating, and ruthless.
Five evil generals? Mysterious, shapeshifting shadow monsters? Magic wands and spontaneous wardrobe transformations? As these girls (and Duncan) will find out, if it reads too much like fiction, maybe that's because someone is lying to you...
Described as a cross between Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Sailor Moon, MAGICAL GIRLS is an epic work of suburban fantasy that pits five unlikely teenagers against magical marauders from another world.
I would love to hear reviews and critiques from the community here. I'm proud to be a part of it, and I value your input. Thank you in advance for your time.
Dandelion is a minstrel or jongleur or troubador. I don't think you need any other word - it's pretty much a given that if said jongleur is handsome, he will be expected to "entertain" the ladies in many ways.
I suppose you could describe him with a word like - urbane, sophisticated, worldly, cosmopolitan, suave, debonair, dashing, dapper, gallant, flamboyant, glamourous...the thesaurus is my friend :) http://www.thesaurus.com/browse/flamboyant?s=t
> I want the person to understand the main character's motivations, his attitude and personality, as well as the people who's changed him before he himself makes a big change, so that nobody becomes confused at what's going on in the story. I feel as if it should take a certain portion up in the story.
Yes definitely.
> Do you have any more names I could base it off?
This is my method when I am stuck: http://www.thesaurus.com/browse/seeker
Check out words the are synonyms of the word you kind of want, and see if anything you like comes up.
Another option is: GoogleTranslate
Depending if latin words would makes sense in your story.
These are called epigraphs.
Yes, word count does matter in traditional publishing and epigraphs do drive that up, which means bigger costs in ink and paper. Will it make or break your book, though? Probably not, as long as you are not wildly out of parameters.
As for readership, be aware there's a large subset of the reading population that ignores epigraphs as "extras" unless they very clearly contribute to the plot... which is astoundingly rare. Think of them more like sauce or spices to add flavor to your work; if the underlying meat of your book is good, this will enhance it, but it won't make bad work taste good.
I keep a folder in the cloud for pictures of good character inspiration, as well as one for environments. (It might show as empty at the moment because my onedrive's being funky and decided to reupload everything)
I think it can be great, in fact, my submission "Dave vs. The Void" for the January challenge was themed on an incompetent wizard! I got positive reactions to it. I think it just should be one of two styles (though no necessarily only these two, just the 2 i think are most direct): Incompetent characters always make for good comic relief, wizard or not, OR you can have the incompetent wizard BECOME competent through the story.
Alright then.
My friend released several short stories. My personal favorites are Sofia and Warning: http://www.amazon.com/Sander-F./e/B008C0WRLA/
And I have a novella and novelette of my own, with a 3rd book about to be completed by March. This series will have 5-6 books in all: https://payhip.com/kalsdavian (the first book is even free) :)
I have made some significant progress in editing book 4 in my science fantasy series, Nihilian Effect. Draft 2 is 3/4ths done and coming along swimmingly. You can view a very rough preview of part 1 here.
I do not have a proper synopsis yet, but it portrays events on the first moon base during a time when the world was on the brink of the first major war between the gods. Betrayal, death, magic, explosions. This should be fun :D
In other news, since I edited book 3 and jumped right into editing book 4, I can honestly say I cannot wait to get back to actually writing lol. I dislike editing. It is nowhere near as fun.
My first book, Branding of a Heretic, is always free all over the internet! For other formats and all links to my books, see the sidebar of /r/kalez238
I literally just started. I'm planning on updating weekly, and I do an ongoing story, a mix of mystery/thriller and paranormal/horror.
http://www.wattpad.com/user/JoshuaJohnston4
What do you write?
Wrote another short story, The Interview. It was bouncing off the monthly challenge prompt, but I no longer enter them so you can enjoy it two weeks early. I have another short vignette written up from a chapter from one of my draft books, following the same theme of mundane characters encountering magic, but The Interview is truer to the prompt, since it features the eventual villain in the process of securing the employment that allows him to be a villain in the first place...
As for the longer works, not much progress at all since Christmas. I have some days off next week, however, so I might take the opportunity to explore them a bit more and get myself back into the groove of longer writing after a couple of months of mostly writing short stories. I also have another short story anthology planned, so in the mean time I'm looking for prompts and ideas which fit the setting. I think I'd like to mine this subreddit's old challenge list, from the two years before I joined, and maybe write a series of stories based on those older prompts. They tend to be much easier to work with than other prompting sites.
I've hit ~25k words on my ongoing fantasy story Swords of Solana.
I'm also working on a short story set within the world / events of SoS. That is going to be my submission for the Blackguard anthology open submissions. Very excited to work more on it and expand my sandbox a bit.
Written my competition entry for this month. No peeking!
Otherwise been editing another book rather than writing and giving my imagination a chance to refresh itself. I uploaded a collection of my /r/worldbuilding short pieces to Wattpad, but I'm holding back some which relate to the armed forces for an anthology I hope to release to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the World War One Christmas Truce (I missed the 100th anniversary of the beginning of the war :P...).
Have you tried Wonderdraft?
https://www.wonderdraft.net/?m=1
Or else, there's several free art programs out there. You'd just have to scale things to fit on an appropriate sized digital document. Maybe have to make a few layers based on how much detail you want at given zoom levels.
I usually listen to rock, EDM, and metal when writing because I somehow can convert the lyrics to gibberish, or it's a song that emotionally matches the scene I'm writing.
That said, I enjoy listening to the Portal 2 soundtrack for instrumental stuff. I usually write sci-fi, urban fantasy, or some in between genre, and it works well for that sort of feel.
Nice work! very descriptive i had a clear vision of what was happening throughout! i want to see more of this leviathan!
Also OP, so random, but look at the art for this song i was listening to when i read this, seriously its weird..
https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=2yczNZz-xP4&list=OLAK5uy_lGKihHpQfhsdcH882vVKq82btTLh4nP4g
I feel where you want to go with this. Something you might necessarily be asking to have critical information about, however there are bones here and I see what you want to make of it.
Others have broken down your wordage and offered much advice be it direct example or personal thoughts.
I feel your over reaching points. In a blocking sense man intercedes when monster attempts to eat kids. Awesome!!
So something that helps me, am I telling or am I showing? Pro tip read aloud. In the coffee shop,at the public library, on the pot when the thinking is prime.
Don't fret the Edit. Everything will be cheese clothed more and more as you get brain pencil to the paper. ( typing writing jotting all of those)
You don't need to reinvest and redefine the genre. Tolkien didn't set out to make the stand as it stands for his work. Just keep writing and redefining.
I watched a video of Alan Moore (v for vendetta, watchmen, league of extraordinary gentlemen) and he was standing in some bookstore told everyone listening you don't have to be published to be a writer. That if you take the time to create something, you are the master of it's creation. In this moment a dark fantasy writer! Now that is achieved you and we must all aid ourselves to be Better dark fantasy editors.
https://www.powerthesaurus.org/ This is an amazing help to flex the literary muscle without a brain aneurysm.
IANAL, but, I do know that names, even titles do not always have protected status.
You CAN entitle your steamy pirate romance "A Song of Ice and Fire" and get away with it unless there is a trademark on that title.
That's an example of why copyright research and lawyers are important.
As an example, you may be able to use "The Others" as a name for your creatures. Check for prior artwork (other published works) and make sure no one reading your description of The Others would confuse them with GRRMs.
And of course, when in doubt consult a real lawyer.
Edit: prior artwork
VIsual aids are very beneficial. Ordinary maps are good. Political and territorial maps as well. The fantasy map generator by /u/Azgarr is very nice. In addition timelines mapped out with plot elements penciled in save a lot of time. If you have an idea about how your characters appear, use the information to look up somebody that has those characteristics. The same goes for animals. People who write westerns need to know what a horse looks like in detail if they are going to describe one, comedy writing excepted.
Here's google search for a naturally red haired swedish singer on a pink background.
As others have said, you use a lot of passive voice. It's not a BIG problem, but your writing will really zing if you can eliminate any "ly" words.
You also might want to look into reducing the grand words. An Equestrian is a person who rides a horse, not the horse itself. Shorter words will make your writing clearer, cleaner, and a better experience. and as I always say, If in doubt, leave it out.
After completing each chapter you might find this useful. It will help clean up any extra words. Obviously use your own judgement, but it will help you get on the right track.
There is some really good feedback on this thread, and on the Google Doc.
The opening line was good, but then it felt forced for the sake of the story. A commander does not stand around on ramparts waiting for routine patrol to return. Also I personally dislike the 'cinematic' opening, where you start wide and sweep in on a character. Start with the character, and give me a name. Make me care.
The dialogue is needs some improvement, but that is my kryptonite, so I can't be much help there. (I love reading good dialogue, I just seem incapable of writing it myself.)
Now, all that being said, you have some fantastic prose that I LOVED and I would highly recommend that you keep writing because you have got talent.
Lastly, as my gift to you. Here are a two of the things that I use to edit, that I find tremendously useful.
Pro Writing Aid Free up to 3k words at a time. I plan on paying for their premium service, I like this one so much.
Hemmingway App which is also free, not sure what the word limit is, but if you put in too much text it will crash.
I clicked because the title "The Song Remains the Same" is great.
I agree with Shaelix--it's confusing, and focal characters would be nice. Please give the auteur a name. The word auteur is vastly overused. Everything is distanced by not using characters or names, which could be your intention. But I think this might be something you want to cut out and drop a couple chapters into the story. Prologues without characters are rarely engaging enough to make someone want to keep going. Start with a character and get them into trouble. Then you can take the time for a movie.
Stylistically, it could use some major touch-ups. I'd recommend dumping the whole thing into http://www.hemingwayapp.com/ and see if you can clean it, but I'll provide my own tips here:
The word "however" is almost never used in real life. Try to avoid. A lot of sentences can be simplified and a lot of commas are unnecessary (just because they are technically correct doesn't mean they don't break flow). Similar words presented together are always awkward ("contained conformed"). Big words like "juxtaposition of composition" are tedious, but it could be an effect of serious filmgoers using film lingo. "...distant black towers in the distance" is redundant. "Something the auteur had never told a story of before" is awkward. Rephrase. "...audiences moved to the edge of their seats" is cliche and cliches should always be avoided--though in this case it could be read as satirical (if that's the intention, great, if not, cut cut cut).
You clearly have a cool world in your mind and you should DEFINITELY explore it. At the very least, you need to make good use of that awesome title, because it's gonna make people (like me) take a look. I hope you take criticism in stride, because you should keep this up and make it the best it can be.
Thanks for sharing! Good luck.
Aeon Timeline looks great, but since it's not compatible with Linux I use "Timeline". It doesn't integrate with Scrivener (which I use extensively), which I'd really like, but it's simple and it works.
For notes, I use TiddlyWiki, which is a Wikipedia-like program that runs in your browser. I haven't tried synchronising it across devices, though.
Thanks, I seen some software called wikidpad in another thread I think that will be good for me to have a few files on the go.
The more I write the more I will understand my way of working, just need to keep going :)