12142015 rdpulfer Scholomancer Chapter 44 and 45 (5104)

[rdpulfer]

(Can't believe I forgot the forum post today!)

 

Robert Renfield betrayed his Master Dracula and left him at the bottom of the ocean. One year later, the hunters of Westenra continue the search for Dracula, unaware of their development. Their lead agent, Stephanie Van Helsing, is suffering from mysterious visions and soon finds herself on the run after being framed for the death of a colleague. Tracking down Renfield, she is eventually brought before the Council, a group of monsters who opposed Dracula. Alongside the werewolf Bannister, the Bride of Frankenstein Evelyn and the mummy Rewer, Stephanie and Renfield find the Wisdom of Solomon responsible for triggering Stephanie's visions. After finding the scroll, they are attacked by rogue hunters sent by Stephanie's treacherous mentor Irving. Stephanie is forced to kill one of them to protect her allies. When more hunters arrive, Renfield provides a distraction while the others escape, planning to move the Wisdom of Solomon to a secure location. 

 

 (Apologies for the length of this submission. There's only two chapters, but quite a lot happens)

[rohyu]

I was pleasantly surprised to find out who the Buyer was.

 

I'm not sure how Steph and the rest of the monster council escaped the air hanger. They had to have known they would be followed if they got away. There were helicopters at the air hanger. The idea of splitting up makes sense, but driving up to their destination instead of sneaking in doesn't make sense to me.

Even if Quaris and the other Hunters were supposed to be capturing Renfield, I don't think they would just let 3 monsters get away without following them.

 

Pg4:The train yard sprawled out before them. Stephanie expected to see more orange-vested working scrambling across the yard

 

 

I think you meant workers instead of working.

 

Pg5: Bannister was always walking alongside a nearby train engine in the opposite direct.

 

 

I think you meant 'already walking'

 

pg7:Getting out of her.

 

 

I think you meant 'Getting out of here.'

 

pg7:We aren’t doing anything. I’m guessing to lead these stormtroopers away,

 

 

I think you meant 'I'm going to lead...'

 

pg16:Money is still money, even if it’s forty years ago.

 

I think you meant 40 years old.

 

Pg17:For some reason, Renfield seemed to remember something called “Quaris” being a friendly to a Dracula.

 

This sentence confused me. I think you meant “'Quaris' being a friend to dracula.”, or being a friend of Dracula.

 

Pg18:The concept of a private military company was still its infancy when these pages were written

 

 

'was still in its infancy'

 

pg18: I'm not sure why Renfield needs the flashlight to read Rewer's name. He was reading the files without the need for light already.

 

Pg19:Between founding Quaris and bankrolling the Council, Renfield still had enough money to make Donald Trump look like a chump

 

 

I think you meant Rewer, not Renfield.

 

Pg20:He scanned dusty safe house room with his flash light.

 

 

'He scanned the dusty...'

 

pg22:He saw dark-haired man whom Renfield was pretty sure had some attachment to Stephanie along with the Asian woman

 

 

'He saw the dark-haired man...'

 

pg24:This time he definitely broke a rip

 

 

I think you meant broke a rib.

 

Pg24:'This man has issues with compensation issues'

 

 

pg25:”...but not until I’ve beaten ever answer out of you.”

 

every answer

 

I am looking forward to finding out exactly what Rewer wants to do with the Scholomance.

[rdpulfer]

Thanks rohyu!

 

I think I'll remove the helicopter altogether. It didn't really give much pay-off, and like you mentioned, it made it seem unlikely they'd escape at all.

 

Who did you think the Buyer was, if you don't mind me asking. I'm glad you were surprised by the identity. 

[AuthorityHellas16]

I'm coming into this fairly late, but I was really sucked in by the story (I should go back and read some of the older entries to get some context). On its own merits, I liked the content here. The dialogue was entertaining and the characters jumped out as being quite well formed. By and large, I liked the prose and I'm very interested to follow the story and see how Rewer's betrayal affects the characters. 

 

The biggest issue to me personally was a combination of repetition of names and phrases and a lack of personal pronoun use. I saw "Stephanie" repeated a lot when it was clear who was the focus of attention, and a "her" would have allowed the writing to flow more.

 

Also, one tip I stole from the Writing Excuses website as well as some other users here, is to watch the dialogue tags. Particularly in the conversation between Stephanie and Bannister in the Oldsmobile, you could probably get rid of most of the dialogue tags there, which again would allow it to flow. 

 

Another tip I stole from Writing Excuses was the hook at the end of chapter 45. Granted, I don't know if Stephanie's location has been mentioned or revealed before, but the guys on the podcast suggested revealing details about the twist before the chapter ends, rather than later on. This would be very difficult if it's not a location already known (or easily summed up e.g. Rewer's torture chamber), but if possible, it would make the dire straights Stephanie has found herself in resonate more. 

 

Finally, a third tip from the podcast (can you tell I have no original advice to give ), is to vary the sensations of your characters. You have the characters experiencing a lot of things purely through sight. It might spice things up if you tinkered with the other senses. For example, when Rewer is revealed to be the Buyer (which was a nicely delivered reveal, by the way), you could mention the stink of his bandages (he is a mummy, right?). You could have Renfield taste blood in his mouth after the pounding he gets from the hunters. Just little things to make the characters seem more than words on a page.

 

Overall, I really liked it, and I look forward to seeing where it goes.

Keep writing!  

[rohyu]

I really had no clue who the buyer was. I thought it might be someone new, who we hadn't seen yet. If I was forced to guess, I would have said it was Dracula, or whatever vampire/monster replaced Dracula (if someone did).

[Mandamon]

Lots of notes on this one, mostly on the first section.  I thought this was good, advances the plot a bit, and gives us some good personality building for Renfield.  There were some problems with logistics in Stephanie's section, as noted below.

 

 

pg 1: repetition of "arm"

 

pg 1: "kick off the Scholomance"

--does this mean "start the ritual" or "kill the person involved in the ritual?"

 

Pg 3: Probably Weekly Reader syndrome, but have we heard of Desdemona before?  The Shakespeare reference was what went through my mind as well.

 

pg 4: "The car squealed to a halt as both Bannister and Stephanie briefly surged forward from the brief recoil."

--was this from Bannister braking hard?  

 

pg 4: "If what Stephanie suspected was true, the best option was to communicate non-verbally."

--What?  I don't follow.  Stephanie seems to know something I don't.

 

pg 5: "BANNISTER: JUST ACT NATURAL."

--yes, two people in a suspicious place texting to each other looks natural...

 

pg 6: "She fired at a shadowy figure at the end of the train yard, "

--What?  I thought the yard was deserted?  There was no hint before now that this was a trap or dangerous situation.  Then Stephanie just pulls out a gun a shoots someone.  Need some more setup here.

 

pg 6: "saw a column of soldiers in full SWAT regalia marching down towards them"

--from where? to where?  There's no description of the train yard.  I don't have any sense of tension.

 

pg 7: "But even from her spot between train cars, Stephanie could see black-clad Quaris soldiers towing Bannister’s car off."

--that was quick.  Again, no warning for what was going to happen here.  I don't know how these people got into place so quickly.

 

pg 7: "Stephanie guessed he was stronger than he looked"

--or had solid proof from his actions the previous sentence.

 

pg 8: "what were they doing at a random train yard in Dallas? "

--my thoughts exactly.

 

pg 9: your car/our car

--I not sure the significance here.  Did Rewer know they rode together?  Does it matter?  I looked back over the last couple submissions (5-6 chapters) and couldn't find the place where it was decided to go to the train yard. At this point I don't remember what was going on in this thread of the story.  Probably some effect of reading week to week, but there were also a lot on intervening chapters.

 

Pg 9: "“Would this be the same car that impounded two minutes ago?” Stephanie said into the speaker."

--I'm also not sure how this is a giveaway, since I can't really remember how the plan went.  To give him benefit of the doubt, Rewer could be assuming they will be pulling up to Bannister's car since they're also traveling to the train yard.  Stephanie seems to latch on to his identity very quickly.

--Also, yes, I did assume Rewer was the buyer before now.

 

Pg 10: I'm not sure why Evelyn would fall over if Rewer stops holding her. Is she unconscious?

--ah.  You mention the EM pulse a couple paragraphs down.

 

pg 11: "what her sister would do in situation."

--missing a word.  Also, I thought her sister was the one who was cutting herself and suicidal?  Doesn't sound too much like a brawler, or am I remembering wrong?

 

pg 12: Good visuals with the dragon and the blood/oil

 

pg 15: "That name rang a bell. Something about that rang a bell,"

-repeated phrase

 

pg 15: "I really, really hope this works."

--And that the flare doesn't ignite the oil trail he's probably left from the car to his hand...

 

pg 18: I like the way Renfield found out about Rewer a lot better than the way Stephanie did. It gives a lot more connection to events in the story and is less mustache twirly.

 

pg 21: "He could use the outdated currency to trick the machines"

--wouldn't it just work in the machines like normal?

 

pg 25: Yeah, the hunters sort of come across as jerks, beating up a person they've already captured and who's offered them information freely.  I'm starting to cheer for the monsters more than Westernra.

[Robinski]

The biggest issue to me personally was a combination of repetition of names and phrases and a lack of personal pronoun use. I saw "Stephanie" repeated a lot when it was clear who was the focus of attention, and a "her" would have allowed the writing to flow more.

 

Hallelujah! Welcome to the Personal Pronoun Appreciation Party - of which I am founder member :-)   I've been banging this drum since Chapter 5. Sorry, RDP, I had to blow a fanfare when I read this comment.

[Robinski]

Detailed comments below. Strangely, this week I had most issues with lighting levels and what time of day/night it is, but there are various details that bothered me or seemed incorrect/confusing. Proportionally more comments to the length of the submission!!   : o )

 

In summary though, decent amount of action/movement and progression of the story. I like that Renfield is separated from his former companions, and that different characters are being put together so we can see what happens. Still looking forward to the next submission.

 

Thoughts that come to mind. I'm not sure how close to the end we are, but I sense we’re not all that far away. At 2,500 words per chapter (my guesstimate), we’re about 110,000 words, and I’d be surprised if the story runs beyond 130k / 140k(?). There’s been a reasonable amount of sexual tension between Stephanie and Renfield (from his side anyway), but I haven’t seen enough in him for it to resolve itself convincingly. I guess he made a gesture in putting himself in jeopardy to draw the hunters away from them, but it’s the first suggestion of higher qualities that might be considered admirable. Maybe I'm barking up the wrong railway car of course. Just a thought.

 

----------------------------------------------------------------

 

“The paper seemed to crawl up Stephanie’s arm as she peeled it off her arm and slid the letter...” – repetition of ‘arm’.

 

“The Oldsmobile didn’t even have a cassette player” – If this is a classic Olds – which it sounds like, it would never have had a cassette player, probably not even an 8-track, just a radio.

 

I presume the scroll is in the other car, but it’s not entirely clear that Steph and the scroll have been separated. Also, it says scrolls, but they only found one, is that because the baddies have the other one? If so, it is not that they have separate halves of the one scroll? It may just be a detail, but I have it in my head that there is an inconsistency in the referencing here.

 

Also, I'm properly disoriented here. Presumably we’ve skipped on, but how did they get away from the air base? Are we to assume that Renfield’s diversion allowed the others to escape? I would have liked a confirmation of that

 

“It’s bad enough you smell like a walking ash tray” – Lol, love it – I'm an anti-smoking person myself. That rust ain’t pretty.

 

“As opposed to what? Smelling like wet dog?” – cracking dialogue there, Grommet.

 

“Then the awkward silence continued unabated (suggest) reasserted itself” – But it’s just been abated by their conversation. You can’t say ‘It remained totally quiet after Stephanie had stopped talking.’ Don’t make no sense.

 

“I don’t think they say pipsqueak any more” – ROFL.

 

“The guy was from the forties, where when sharing your emotions weren’t wasn’t high on...” – singular, and the 40’s isn’t a place – unless you’re time-travelling, maybe, and even then.

 

“The only thing she knew for certain is was what she was feeling” – tense.

 

“Or so my friend was starting to tell me, before he died.” – Who now? I forget.

 

“They aren’t Westenra. We don’t have this many bodies” – really? That surprises me.

 

“Getting out of her. Finding a new rally plan. And another way out of her altogether.” – eh?

 

“Stephanie guessed he was stronger than he looked” – she doesn’t need to guess, he’s just demonstrated how strong he is, and isn’t it obvious anyway? I thought he was a big guy.

 

“Déjà vu.” She said to no one in particular.” – lol. It’s the quips that keep me going through the tough / unedited parts.

 

Do you need to say ‘smart-phone’? It feels awkward, and in 10 years, when we’ve all got implants, it’ll date the story, not in a good way.

 

“Rewer standing in the middle of the train car yard” – I presume.

 

“Stephanie thought back to what her sister would do in situation. Honestly, Serena was the badass, the brawler, the far bolder hunter between them.” – Did we know this? Other than the fact that her sister had killed herself, I don’t recall that she was a hunter – I had her pictured as the meek-and-mild one. My mistake?

 

“Stephanie said, doing her best to keep her poise in the situation” – redundant and slows down the flow, per my previous comments.

 

“with each one landing close to his head” – I would say a shot strikes rather than lands, which suggest no propulsion.

 

It’s Cessna, not Cesna – didn’t you’re spellchecker pick that one up?

 

“I hope it works,” Renfield said to himself. “This could come in real handy.” Why would he speak this out loud, risking giving away his position?

 

I'm very confused by the time of day. I thought it was daytime when the Council arrived here, judging from the way they could see things and the lack of description of any artificial lighting. Now it seems to be dark, but Renfield can still see things that he shouldn’t be able to at night.

 

“Black liquid started to gush upon him” – what in the heck is the black liquid? It sure ain’t gas or diesel.

 

Any flare gun I ever saw fired a flare which explodes in the sky, not a stream of fire, which is a flamethrower. And how does the flame spread across the ground? The fuel is leaking from the under the tank. Hang on though. What has leaving it running got to do with anything? Fuel will still leak out of a tank whether it’s running or not. This section doesn’t make sense to me.

 

“had little changed” – had changed little

 

“even if it’s forty years ago old”

 

“located right next to “Quasimodo” – ROFL

 

“Quaris clearly possessed large resources to afford choppers and military-trained personnel” – I don’t think this follows, a chopper and a few SWAT jumpsuits isn’t going to set a company back that much. Depends on the number of choppers they have, but he’s only seen one.

 

Why does he need a flashlight in the safe house, has someone turned off the electric? And if he does need a flashlight, how can he see anything without it?

 

I did enjoy the twist of Rewer founding Quaris – nice one.

 

“Between founding Quaris and bankrolling the Council, Renfield still had enough money to make Donald Trump look like a chump” – Do you mean Rewer has enough money? Btw no-one needs money to make Trump look like a chump, just need to stand next to him.

 

“if it hadn’t sprang all ready” – sprung already.

 

How in blue hell is Renfield going to be safe south of the border? These groups don’t have legal boundaries, do they?

 

That diet Renfield is planning has no protein in it – unless he’s going to chew his arm off, he’s not going to last months. Can’t he just go to the shops?

 

“He spun around to see four hunters standing behind him.” – How did he not notice them come into the room, given all the equipment they are packing, is there no door? And I say again, why is Renfield in the dark and how did he even see the filing cabinet without the torch in the first place?

Edited December 15, 2015 by Robinski

[Robinski]

I really had no clue who the buyer was. I thought it might be someone new, who we hadn't seen yet. If I was forced to guess, I would have said it was Dracula, or whatever vampire/monster replaced Dracula (if someone did).

 

Like rohyu, I liked the reveal of the Buyer. I wasn't trying to puzzle it out beforehand, but <spoiler> was a satisfying choice. Was <spoiler> surprising-yet-inevitable? I think <spoiler> probably was, but I like the little details you used to tie it back in to stuff that had gone before.

[rdpulfer]

Thanks for all the feedback!

 

I appreciate you jumping in here, AuthorityHellas16! I started a section on style notes just from your comments alone, and I really appreciate it (even if it means giving Robinksi more credit

 

I think setting is one of my biggest problems when writing the first draft - I'd get so involved in the action and dialogue that I'd neglect to mention time of day and that sort of thing. It's probably the first thing I'm going to start working on in the rewrites.

 

Thanks for all the help - I'm also glad the reveal of the Buyer was effective. I was worried it would be too obvious. 

[Robinski]

(even if it means giving Robinski more credit )

 

lol - good grammar is it's own reward  ;op

Edited December 17, 2015 by Robinski

[Comatose]

I'm running low on time today, and from the line edits you've already received it seems like you are going to be doing some revisions, so I'll stick to general impressions.  

 

It was good to get back into this story.  I was sorry to miss the middle, but I'm glad I could get back into things before it is over.  

 

I noticed  a lot of metaphors in these two chapters ('like a lighthouse', 'if he was a wolf' and ''like a firework left unattended' for example).  On their own, they work fine, but too much repetition can lessen the impact.  Jumping off of an earlier comment, try to change up how you describe things.  A consistent tone is good, but variety is your friend.  If this is just a quirk of how Stephanie thinks (I haven't read from her POV before), then you can probably disregard this.  

 

During the texting, try to keep in mind what texting entails, and the situation the characters are in.  Usually text messages are short and sweet, because most people find typing long ones to be annoying.  Removing unnecessary words will increase the urgency of the scene, and make the dialogue more believable.  

 

I don't have the context to properly critique characterization perhaps, but <spoiler> is coming across as textbook villain to me, bordering on cliche.  Focusing a bit more on who he is as an individual, rather than the role he is serving would help, I think.  

 

You use a lot of adverbs to the describe the action.  Some of this is well done, but remember to try not to repeat yourself too much.  When you do your edits, try to flag when you are using adverbs, and ask yourself what each one is adding to the scene.  If the answer is 'not much,' get rid of it.  

 

There are words missing here and there, especially in your action scenes.  Once your edits are done, try reading through things out loud.  I've found this is a good way to check it out.  

 

The pacing was generally quite good, and it seems like the story is reaching a climax.  Hopefully I'll be able to read more.   

[rdpulfer]

Thanks Comatose.

 

I'll try to cut out the metaphors down to the most powerful to maximize the impact - that's good note.

 

I'll also make sure the texts are more to the point and not too much like dialogue.

 

And I agree the Buyer . . . after the reveal . . . comes across too much like a Bond villain. I need to add more of the character's motivations and reasons for their actions.

 

Thanks again for the critique! 

[Asmodemon]

Ah, the big reveal of the big bad. Truthfully not that big of a surprise to me. Barring an unseen character he was the only real candidate, which became especially clear when he wanted to preserve the scroll for the power and knowledge it possesses. I liked that he’s also the founder of Quaris (though truth be told I’d forgotten all about them) – this guy is clever. His reveal of himself to Stephanie before he actually caught her was a bit rash though. Being as old as he is, he should be more inclined to play the long game, which means not revealing himself before he absolutely has to.

 

Language: Still rough, still a problem with me enjoying the chapters.

 

Trainyard: Last chapter Renfield ran interference to the hunters on the airfield. Apparently there are Quaris troops around as well. As such, how did Stephanie and the Council get away? The big bad might have arranged that with Quaris, but the hunters should have noticed, shouldn’t they? Timeline wise there seems a big gap between chapters 44 and 45, while the start of chapter 46 should take place before chapter 45 given that Renfield is still on the airfield.  Maybe you could rearrange the chapters a bit to remove that time-jump.

 

Found again: How did they find Renfield again after he got off the airfield? Did they follow him? Or just assumed that he would be there? In either case, it’s sloppy for the servant of Dracula who is supposed to be great at escapes.

 

Harker: I keep thinking about the previous chapters in which we’ve seen Harker, such as him laughing after Stephanie almost fell down some stairs, as well as his possessiveness towards her. And then this chapter, where he’s rather psycho towards Renfield, doesn’t make me like him any better. Renfield is willing to talk, to tell him where Stephanie is. Instead of hearing him out and figuring out if Renfield is lying, he knocks Renfield out with a cruel smile. And I think it’s the ‘cruel smile’ that makes me dislike Harker. If he’d done it because he had to, in order to get Renfield to a secure location quickly, I’d be fine with it. But he’s being cruel to be cruel.

[rdpulfer]

Thanks again Asmodemon.

 

We've definitely established Jason Harker needs serious re-working, because as it stands, he comes on as a full-on sociopath . . . even before he beats up Renfield.

 

It looks like my timeline isn't adding up, so I'm definitely going to have to figure out how to line this all up. I also might change the setting anyway . . . it feels like we've seen enough of the trainyard already. Maybe it needs to be an airfield instead.