Reading Excuses - 18/05/2015 – Majestic Fox - The Green Ocean, Chapter Two (Willow) - (5000 words)

[Majestic Fox]

The final book will interweave Willow and another character's story, chapter by chapter, but never mind that for now. I'm going to write the first five of her chapters, then the first five of his. 

 

Changes made to Chapter One:

• Introduced the vora (large herbivores that migrate through the hills above the forest in enormous herds)
• Taken out the final scene with Willow and Olga, reworked it into this chapter 

Thanks for taking the time to read. Any kind of feedback is appreciated.

[Turos]

I'm going to try a method I've been seeing used a bit by others and comment as I read:

 

The "crystal cold air" sounds cool, but perhaps "ice cold air" would fit better, unless crystals are all cold in Willow's world.

 

Bonus points for evoking immersion with sensory details!

 

Why does Willow feels like she will drown? Is there a painful experience from her past that these senses are triggering?

 

'Then we'll go back.' Who is 'we', I wonder.

 

You have a very poetic way of describing how things look and feel. I'm not used to reading it, but sometimes find I write this way, too. It's nice. Example: descriptions of the giant.

 

The same poetry is in her motivations, like the feelings drawing her to inspect the giant.

 

I personally would like to see her approach to the giant. It seems she is watching from a distance, then immediately close enough to touch it.

 

'Out of nowhere' might not be necessary here. Again, I write like this all the time and am trying to cut out filler like this from my own stuff, though I don't tend to catch all of it.

 

I like the power behind her ability. The picture of a boulder moving to release it is a nice touch.

 

I'm curious what exactly the giant looks like. Does it have human-like skin or is it made of stone or moss?

 

I enjoyed the unspoken communication between them.

 

Is the giant still damaged? You described light escaping from it's chest. Maybe that's normal for a giant.

 

Does she really believe Olga will cover for her?

 

My imagination is able to play in filling out how the temple looks inside, but with your ability to create vivid pictures, it's a shame to let this opportunity to paint the scene go to waste.

 

The little bit of doctrine is intriguing and adds depth.

 

How much time has passed since she started training with Olga?

 

Ah. The giant IS still damaged. OK. I like the dialogue between Olga and Willow. Things are getting interesting.

 

What is night soil?

 

Why do the children raise their hands if the teacher is blind? Kids these days... no respect.

 

EDIT: Oops. I posted this before I was finished. xD

 

I'm confused. If reading the scroll makes them go blind because they were never meant to read God's language, why are they trying to build up a resistance to read the scroll? I guess I don't understand the religion very much, but wouldn't this be blasphemous?

 

Now I want stew-filled flat bread. 0_0 Hungry...

 

Awesome story! I definitely want to keep reading this.

Edited May 18, 2015 by Turos

[Mandamon]

I'm still really liking this.  I think Turos caught most of the same places I did.  It reads very easily and you have a very poetic style.

 

At the beginning, there was some confusion with the giant, which Turos already covered.  I made some similar comments.

 

pg 3: "she could clearly see creature before her"

--see the creature

 

pg 3:  you give the giant a  lot of "stony" adjectives: jagged, rocky, etc, but don't actually describe what it looks like.  Does it have rocky skin?

 

pg 3: Willow reaches up to touch the giant, but you don't mention her moving in front of it, so I was taken out of a story a bit by that.

 

pg 6: "Lady Olga"

--I didn't get that she had a title from the first section, unless it's something you added.

 

The two other issues I saw were where some description could be added, like in the temple, as Turos says, and how the religion works.  I was also confused how the words both cause blindness and help to build resistance.  

 

There were a lot of actions around Jena that I wasn't sure she could see.  I think you have her name as both Jena and Jenna in the text.

 

Overall, still very intrigued by the story, and looking forward to the next entry!

[Turos]

You have a very poetic way of describing how things look and feel. I'm not used to reading it, but sometimes find I write this way, too. It's nice. Example: descriptions of the giant.

 

"I'm not used to reading it" translates to "I haven't seen other authors writing this way. They totally should!"

[Robinski]

I continue to enjoy your writing and your story. There’s something about Willow as a character that is engaging, maybe her curiosity and that, classically, she is set apart from the society that she lives in by her origin. I felt in the first section that there were a few too many names to cope with. That is not so much the case here, and I'm starting to get a hang of them, I just feel that maybe you don’t need to throw so many at the reader in the first chapter.

 

Your magic is pretty much undefined, which is a perfectly valid choice of course. I actually find it quite refreshing since so many magic systems these days follow a Sandersonian model, being heavily defined by rules and laws.

 

There are quite a few typos and missing words, but that’s editing. You paragraphs can be quite long as well, which can be off-putting for some readers (wall of print syndrome). Still, I find your style comfortable to read, and it does pull the reader along nicely.

 

Detailed comments below. Looking forward to next submission.

 

(p.s. - Night soil, lol, I've always loved that euphemism, it's sh*t!)

 

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“stalked forward deeper into the shadows” presumably.

 

“peered out from a thicket of ivy” – also, can ivy be in a thicket?

 

“light was still bleeding freely”

 

I didn’t get a sense that she had brought the beetle back to life. What is her basis for thinking that? I thought that effect was something intrinsic to the beetle.

 

I like the tone of this opening scene of the submission, there is a nice emotional level to it. I did feel a bit underwhelmed by Willow’s use of her power, like it wasn’t astonishing enough, that she wasn’t sufficiently amazed by it.

 

“It’s as if they don’t want me to read them” – nice line.

 

(Quite a few typos – I haven’t attempted to note them all.)

 

Did you mean “Is this not what you wanted? To help protect the village...”

 

I thought it a bit strange that Willow was not more panicked by the glowing mark on her chest. Imagine if you found something like that yourself. I know we’re all different, and her frame of reference includes actual magic, still, I thought she would have done more than just shrug (almost) and go to sleep. I think maybe if I’d had more of a sense that she was fighting fatigue and was dragged into sleep, but I didn’t get so much of that.

 

It did pop into my head that your lost city of Tarispire corresponds phonetically quite closely with Michael Moorcock’s considerably better known ‘lost’ city of Tanelorn. Maybe it’s not a big deal, but it was the first thing I thought of.

[Young Bard]

Having read Chapter 1 & 2 together, I found a few slight clashes, but I presume that that was due to editing you made to the first chapter.

 

I think you've done a great job with setting up the opening of the story. You have a clear internal an external conflict set up, ready to be set in motion. You have intrigue and mystery set up about the protagonist's past, and have me wanting to read more.

 

One thing that I think was the biggest issue with the story so far was the bullies in the village. They seem to have no - originality to them. I do this myself sometimes, but you should try and find a way of giving some depth to those characters. Maybe you should give those characters some reason to hate the character, rather than something vague about not fitting in because she wasn't born in the village. Maybe some specific event that caused (I think the name was Violet?? I don't have the book in front of me) to stop being friends with Willow.

 

But the rest I thought was absolutely great. You have a professional level writing style, a hint of an interesting story to come, and I would definitely buy this book if I had read a preview of it.

[Turos]

(p.s. - Night soil, lol, I've always loved that euphemism, it's sh*t!)

 

Ha ha! Thank you for the enlightenment, Rob.

[Majestic Fox]

Thank you for the feedback all. It's appreciated.