WritingAubergine

I enjoyed the prologue @MasterJack As I go: I found "Master Ditanu TonHar" hard to pronounce, in the sense that I had no idea of how to go about pronouncing it and it threw me out of the story a little. I've been rereading Elantris by Brandon Sanderson out loud to someone and I've found the names in that hard to pronounce, so popular novels do include hard to pronounce names. In this case though it threw me off, but once I got past that I got into it. By the end of the first paragraph I was drawn into the story. I don't know yet what expectations I have about it. I was briefly thrown by the three clause sentence saying the guards had masks on and were hiding their expressions. Then when none of them answer his question my immediate thought is that they are going to turn on him, because non of them speak and we can't see their faces so we don't know who they are and they could be anyone. This didn't jump out to me on the reread though. I felt myself skimming over the first paragraph on the second page, but then the action further down that page with Master FangTar coming pulled me back in. One thing I did wonder when FangTar appeared was whether the master of the monastery had the members follow them. In which case I wondered why Master FangTar was alone. Did the members of his monastery not follow him? I don't think this needs to be answered now, but if it (and similar questions) weren't answered for too long in the book I would feel like the author hadn't realised they were there, rather than had and was holding back the answers to a time they would fit well in the story. Not that every question has to be answered, especially in the introduction, but answering some of them convincingly is one of the things I look for in an author (and I feel one of the things to work out after first draft sometimes too). "To any normal person, it would have seemed as hard as sandstone, to a Slasher like himself, it was like a knife through Trak butter." page 3. I think this sentence begins saying that the tendril is as hard as sandstone, but that the Slasher's hand moves like a knife through butter, but the grammar of the sentence says it's the tendril moving like a knife through trak buttter. Knife and butter would need to be reversed or the sentence rewritten. No one else seems to have noticed this though, so I'm not sure. I picked up on the fact that the sand turned into dust too, and wondered if that was intentional or unintentional. I felt that this bit of the fight flowed really well and drew me in. TonHar ducking the tendrils felt good and motiony to me, but I did wonder why he wasn't slicing them off in order to protect his men. If it is as easy to slice them off I would expect him to slice them off to protect the men. Is it just that he's not used to fighting a swifter with men around and so does what comes naturally? Then we have him watching other people, and the way I pictured him in my mind was just standing there watching people, which seems non-dynamic to me. I think that's because he looks after he ducked and then there's the long description, I'm not sure though. I feel like the fight scene picks up motion again. When FangTar says he asked that question to see if TonHar would be willing to side with him, I wonder why FangTar couldn't have approached him earlier before they were all at war. It seems odd to me to ask this question during a fight after he'd killed other people, rather than pre that. Then when FangTar says to TonHar, "You are nothing to me", and had felt he'd already said that when he was retrieving the lifestone by turning his back and not dealing with TonHar. For some reason, and I can't fully say why, I found "May the Sands have mercy on me" jarring. I think it's because I felt that the sands can only have mercy on you once you're alive, and if you die you not going out in the sand. However, if the Sands are their afterlife judging thing then I guess it would make sense. I'm not certain that's the thing that jarred me either, or even why it jarred me, which I realise isn't very useful but there it is. After I Went: It drew me in. Bits of the fight scene really flowed for me, bits of it felt a bit more stilted. I found I skim read a few bits here and there, but that's normal for a first draft. I realise I said alot, but I feel like the two main things for me would be to make the rest of the fight as great as the great bits, and explain either now or later why FangTar's alone and why he didn't approach TonHar earlier (because that bit left me puzzling). The other thing that left me puzzling was why the guards were sent then. Had they only just heard, why hadn't the guards been there earlier? I think this question occurred to me on FangTar's approach once I realised that the guards weren't going to jump TonHar, but I'm not sure. I realise I'm in the minority but I personally wouldn't choose world over planet, I feel like both of them would give the feel of there being more, since some scifi and some dimension hopping fantasy use the word world instead of planet for a multitude. Perhaps land or something would be better? Then again, I'm in the minority so it's safe to ignore me. As for the Slashers and Swifters, I agree with how you feel about the name. I actually don't mind the Swifters name, but I do feel it doesn't quite describe what you've shown of the powers. If you plan on giving them English names based on what they do, maybe something like Builders for the Slashers (assuming they can leave the sandstone afterwards without it crumbling), Order of the Stone, or The Makers or something. Swifters could be something like Order of the Flow, manipulators, Sand as Liquid Order or something. Ok, none of these are particularly good ideas together. What is it that the Thumpers do? (Though I realise we might get to learn that in subsequent readings). 2) Did you find it interesting? Yes. Depending on what way you take the story afterwards it may or may not be to my tastes, but I did quite enjoy it. I also felt it had a lot of promise. 1) What promises am I making for rest of the story? Action, magic, a fight over a life stone and a dead city. I actually felt that the city would die straight away and so I'd expect everyone to be dispersed and a dead city, but reading your comment above I see that the life stone provides water and they might have up to a three month supply. I think the reason I thought it would be so quick is that the details of the life stone aren't particularly specific and that they grant it "water and life" which I read as granting the city magic to stay alive rather than a resevoir filled with water that they can survive on while they try to take it back. I also feel like I would be expecting magic and fighting and coolness quickly. I know that Brandon Sanderson's prologue philosophy is that it promises what you're going to get towards the end of the story or series, and you can take books to get there potentially, but the way I always read prologues before that was that they should have some immediate reprecussions for the story earlier on. (In this case I imagine it will, as I imagine that the city will need to survive and By Brandon Sanderson's philosopy I would expect more of what @industrialistDragon said, with a ragtag bunch of heroes (especially an unlikely main one), that don't necessarily do that much related stuff for a while. If the stuff they were doing was really interesting I'd be down for that, but like I said I usually prefer it to be more related. That said, if we then jump a few hundred years to something were people live in small moving villages and struggle really hard to survive, I guess it would suggest to me a theft of the life stone but for the good guys this time. Having said all this, since this is all just my opinion, you might want to ignore where I disagree with a bestselling author about what prologues are for. On a more prosaic note, since we won't see the prologue character again in viewpoint (which I don't have a problem with), I imagine there will be some viewpoint switching in the story. I probably wouldn't mind if there wasn't. I hope that was helpful and not too long. I enjoyed reading the prologue, I felt it was good for a first draft, and depending on where it goes really hope to see more.

Hello all, I was unsure whether to include the violence tag, but I thought better safe than sorry. There isn't much though, but it is there. I'm looking for anything and everything, but the three specific things that come to mind are: - Does the framing work, or do I need to bulk it up more at the beginning? - Are there any bits that jarred you from the story? - Which bits, if any, made you laugh? I hope this finds you all well, and thanks for having me

Haha, no worries. That is many times more exaggeration.

If I may, I've got a story to submit on the 13th.