Reading Excuses - 12/12/16 - aeromancer - Scissors & Bows Part II (V)(4500 words)

[aeromancer]

Subbing today because there's a blank space. Also, I got a lot of responses last week, so feel free to respond to everyone else first. In fact, please do.

This is Part II of S&B which gives a taste of the fighting and political games within Scissors & Bows. Mostly fighting. There's a violence tag. S&B is a steampunk/fantasy political thriller (hopefully). S&B is the sequel-of-sorts to an unpublished novel I wrote, which may / may not get published. That means this needs to make sense as a standalone. Abbreviate all character names, please. 

Looking for thoughts on: Complicated bluff scheme, flow of combat.

[kais]

Fun with scissors, eh?

Overall

The writing got much tighter the farther into the narrative I got, and flow picked up as well. Unfortunately, since I don't have a grasp of the stakes, or the characters and their motivations, it mostly read as a faceless, plotless fight. A neat one, to be sure, but all meat and no bones. 

Complicated bluff scene: bluff only makes sense if I have a feel for the world, the stakes, and the characters, all of which I don't have grasp on yet.

Flow of combat: rough, very rough, early, especially with lack of blocking and scenery. Got better as you progressed, and was enjoyable towards the end. However, the witty banter served to kill the tension every. time.

As I go

- The word 'bridge' is redundant in the first full paragraph. Also info dumpy.

- The start doesn't really hook me. What are the stakes? Plot direction? Emotional connection?

- Is there a POV shift between pages one and two?? Confused.

- He led four members of the swarm this sentence and the one proceeding it do not go together. Need fill between for a transition.

- tense issues in first sentence on page three

- page three: too much talking, not enough blocking. The Hello Captain comes from nowhere. Generally we'd get to read about an approach, with a physical description and maybe some scenery description, before the dialogue.

- end of page three: I don't understand what they are talking about and since I have no feel for stakes, I don't much care, either.

- page four: still no idea why they are... attacking? defending? going in guns blazing?

- page five: wood nerd alert! weak timber grumble grumble specifics grumble

- page six: you skim over blocking in the battle, which makes me a sad panda

- page eight: has more blocking but with the forced witty dialogue looses tension

- page ten: so the mercenaries were bogus but... their ship got stolen? Yes? 

- page ten: too many uses of 'quickly'

- by page twelve I'm bored. I need to know stakes to care why they are wandering and killing still

- what how typo on page thirteen, first paragraph

- page fourteen: the witty banter kills tension

[rdpulfer]

- The beginning is a little maid-and-butler-y, at least in my opinion.

- The quip about Fyor's meditation doesn't really go anywhere.

- Okay, I do like the revelation that the admiral is Seyn's mother and the resulting banter.

- After the admiral blows the building, there is very little view of the aftermath. We only see the admiral barking orders. It's a bit confusing, like she's reacting to something we should have seen.

- It seems a little redundant that yet another person recognizes Seyn during the mission.

- Overall, I like the banter and the action, but I think it still feels generally a little too much, too soon - like the reader hasn't gotten their bearings enough to buy these characters, their quirks and their banter. 

 

[Hobbit]

On December 13, 2016 at 7:19 PM, kaisa said:

The writing got much tighter the farther into the narrative I got, and flow picked up as well. Unfortunately, since I don't have a grasp of the stakes, or the characters and their motivations, it mostly read as a faceless, plotless fight. A neat one, to be sure, but all meat and no bones. 

Complicated bluff scene: bluff only makes sense if I have a feel for the world, the stakes, and the characters, all of which I don't have grasp on yet.

Flow of combat: rough, very rough, early, especially with lack of blocking and scenery.

This is a good summary of how I felt.  Your first chapter didn't give me a sense of stakes.  What is in this for Se?  I know a little more now, after this chapter - he disagreed with some things happening in the military so he left - but I don't know enough to really root for him.  He seems likable enough, but I want to know what will happen to him if this mission fails, or if things don't work out with Sin's Swarm, or why he cares about joining them in particular over just becoming a potato farmer or a guard or something.  I'd also like a better sense of what the stakes are for your world if this mission fails.  Who's the ambassador?  Or if you want that to be a fun reveal later, then just tell us more about what will happen to Sin's Swarm if they fail.  Do they really need money and won't be able to repair their ship if they lose?  Will they lose face and break their record of 49 straight successful missions?  Just throwing out ideas, but I need some reason to care, or else the story has no tension.  As it is, people never seem worried or scared (and if they do, it's in a vague sense), and therefore I never feel worried or scared.

The combat has good potential, with fun reveals and good pacing.  My main issue is that I feel like people are jumping around on a stage with no setting.  I'm really aching for set dressing, blocking, and details.  Without them, I can't fully appreciate their battle antics or picture what's going on.  

Here's some specifics:

I thought we were in Se's POV, but you have details that he can't possibly be seeing, such as: Fy looked up from his meditation within his private chamber...

“Three years in prison for wielding a sword..."
Loved this paragraph.  It was fun.

Here's an example of a place where I would have benefitted from more set dressing and blocking:

Quote

“Well, that was fun. I’ll never be tired of being underestimated, and WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING!?”

The ambassador and his guards turned at Kob’s yell. “T-t-they know we’re here! We must flee!” He ran up the ramp to his ship. The ramp closed behind him, and the ship started to rise.

Kob’s eyes grew wide. “No! Admiral, stop him!” 

You're going for a surprise here, but I was still unsure of what was happening until I read it twice.  I don't realize that Kob was yelling at the ambassador at first.  Maybe add some details about where Kob is looking (at the ambassador), or Se realizing that the ambassador is not where they'd left him.  My confusion is increased because I didn't realize his ship was waiting nearby.  And as a side note, if the ship is already in the air, how does Kob think the Admiral is going to stop him?  Also, should I be picturing a spaceship here?  A dirigible?  A plane?  My brain fills in the Millennium Falcon because when I read "people running up a ramp onto a ship" it's the most vivid image I've got.

“Relax, it can’t hit us on the ground.”
Why not?

Here's another place where I could have used more detail, but in a POV kind of way:

Quote

Se was flying to the ship within the whirlwind, when he heard Fy’s voice in his ear. “I’m modulating the wind so I can speak to you. Where’s the best entry point on an Imperial hunter-killer?”

“If this is an Empire ship, there’s an emergency hatch on the far forward section of the ship. It’s not locked, and it can be opened from both ways.” Seyn shouted to the wind, unable to even hear himself. “That’s the best bet. Trying to get into the crow’s nest or bridge is stupid, they’re usually surrounded with guns and made of shatterproof glass.”

Here we have good strategy detail, but I still feel bored.  The reason is because I don't feel like I'm experiencing this through Se's POV.  First of all, is he freaked out at all to be carried by the wind?  Or is he just like, "Whatever, this happens all the time."  Because this seems like a big display of cool magic (if it was common, wouldn't their enemy be using wind magic?) but our main character has no reaction to it whatsoever.  When he hears Fy's voice in his ear, is he surprised?  Does he jump?  As far as we know, he responds like it's a normal conversation.  Since as a reader, I don't believe that he would just take this like it's ho-hum, it throws me out of the story.

The rest of the Swarm quickly entered, Se slamming shut the hatch behind him. “Defensive perimeter!” Kob barked, as the Swarm formed a defensive circle.
Here I'd like more blocking.  When one jumps into a ship (without further detail, my brain has filled in the Red October), I'm expecting them to be in a hallway. So how do they have room to make a circle?  You give us no idea what it looks like in here.  Is there cover?  Is it dark?  Red lighting?  Corners that we don't now what's around?  Metal floors?  Canvas walls?  Pictures of the Imperial Queen?  I want to know!  Partly because it's fun to picture things, but also because if there's going to be a battle scene, I want to be able to anticipate and appreciate how they use the setting to their advantage.  This is something the WE cast has talked about - good fight scenes use the setting.  Let me know if you want me to dig up the specific episode. 

Hopefully the above examples help illustrate ways you can enrich your story.  You have a cool setup, it just needs more detail!  And more stakes!  (Steaks?)

Also, if we're going to be rescued by dragons, I need to have a hint there are dragons sooner than the end of the chapter!    Otherwise it feels like a hack.

[aeromancer]

On 12/13/2016 at 7:19 PM, kaisa said:

Fun with scissors, eh?

As I go

- The start doesn't really hook me. What are the stakes? Plot direction? Emotional connection?

- end of page three: I don't understand what they are talking about and since I have no feel for stakes, I don't much care, either.

- page four: still no idea why they are... attacking? defending? going in guns blazing?

- page five: wood nerd alert! weak timber grumble grumble specifics grumble

- page six: you skim over blocking in the battle, which makes me a sad panda

- page eight: has more blocking but with the forced witty dialogue looses tension

- page ten: so the mercenaries were bogus but... their ship got stolen? Yes? 

- by page twelve I'm bored. I need to know stakes to care why they are wandering and killing still

- page fourteen: the witty banter kills tension

The chapter is actually beta-titled 'Just follow orders!', though 'Fun with Scissors' might actually be better. I'm constantly shifting titles.

Stakes: The stakes are fully explained yet. There's an expo-dump next chapter (I think) which explains it all. My thoughts were to get out the characters and baseline them before firing the stakes up (because the stakes only rise. This is at least one part thriller), though I'll probably get lectured on the info dumping next submissions. Eh, I'll worry about it then.

Combat: I tend to be weak at group combat, especially this early in a novel when I'm just getting a feel for how the characters mesh together. I, also, very much enjoy witty banter in a fight (most likely from growing up on a steady diet of Spider-Man comics), so it's everywhere. A few characters don't do it, but it can get excessive. Let me know if I should try stopping myself.

Weak timber: I ... I'm sorry? Wood isn't my forte, so I can't go into specifics without a lot of research. Can you give me a quick idea of a good tree to destroy?

On 12/15/2016 at 8:50 PM, rdpulfer said:

- The beginning is a little maid-and-butler-y, at least in my opinion.

- The quip about Fyor's meditation doesn't really go anywhere.

- Okay, I do like the revelation that the admiral is Seyn's mother and the resulting banter.

- After the admiral blows the building, there is very little view of the aftermath. We only see the admiral barking orders. It's a bit confusing, like she's reacting to something we should have seen.

- It seems a little redundant that yet another person recognizes Seyn during the mission.

- Overall, I like the banter and the action, but I think it still feels generally a little too much, too soon - like the reader hasn't gotten their bearings enough to buy these characters, their quirks and their banter. 

I've gotten the maid-and-butler-y line a few times, and I don't really knows what that means. Could you explain?

Fy: So, Fy is ridiculously powerful. The magic that humans can use, (called Shaman) is a magic based on storing energy in precise symbols, and releasing them. Fy can control the elements with merely meditating. He doesn't need symbols or specifics, which isn't supposed to be possible. As such, I mention this a few times. I can probably do it a bit better, though.

On 12/16/2016 at 1:38 PM, Hobbit said:

The combat has good potential, with fun reveals and good pacing.  My main issue is that I feel like people are jumping around on a stage with no setting.  I'm really aching for set dressing, blocking, and details.  Without them, I can't fully appreciate their battle antics or picture what's going on.  

“Relax, it can’t hit us on the ground.”
Why not?

Yes, details is needed. Everything you mention will go into my draft two notes.

Perspective is usually third-person centering on Seyn, but it shifts around a bit. I'd say an even half and half, overall, early novel focuses more on Seyn, later focuses more on the rest of the Swarm, especially when they split up.

It can't hit them on the ground because the cannon is embedded alongside the body of the aircraft. Guns that can fire multiple rounds are invented yet, so aircraft need to be designed to fire at ground targets, which hunter-killers aren't. 

On 12/16/2016 at 1:38 PM, Hobbit said:

Hopefully the above examples help illustrate ways you can enrich your story.  You have a cool setup, it just needs more detail!  And more stakes!  (Steaks?)

Also, if we're going to be rescued by dragons, I need to have a hint there are dragons sooner than the end of the chapter!    Otherwise it feels like a hack.

Stakes have been dealt with. Steaks are good medium-rare, though D likes them rare, and N likes them well-done.

'Tis not a dragon. Thar be no dragons whereabouts the regions of Scissors & Bows. 'Tis a dragonling, which is smaller, has four wings, and more details are given in later chapters. They don't serve a purpose other than mounts for Hunters. They aren't sentient, and they can't breathe fire.

 

Sorry for the delay in responding, I've had a busy week.

[kais]

2 hours ago, aeromancer said:

The stakes are fully explained yet.

The problem with this is I have no hook. So if I am an agent or a reader at a store, without a hook or stakes I have no motivation to keep reading. I would put the book down without ever giving it a chance. 

2 hours ago, aeromancer said:

so it's everywhere. A few characters don't do it, but it can get excessive. Let me know if I should try stopping myself.

So, I'll give you the advice @spieles once gave me. Witty banter is fun. We all like it. But it kills tension. It has its place, and its place is to give the audience a breather after something tough. Without tension, you have no buy-in. Cut the banter until you have your fight scenes down and smoothed out. Then add it back in, sparingly, when you need the characters to have a bonding moment or recovery from something grave. Tension always >> banter.

2 hours ago, aeromancer said:

Can you give me a quick idea of a good tree to destroy?

Well heck, let's get nerdy! Are you trying to imply that the person who did the construction was crap at their job, or just that the trees that grow in the area don't have great wood? For the first, you use a frame and panel wood door of something like aspen or birch. For the second something like alder would work. Make the color light, not dark. Lighter woods are usually weaker woods.

[aeromancer]

9 minutes ago, kaisa said:

The problem with this is I have no hook. So if I am an agent or a reader at a store, without a hook or stakes I have no motivation to keep reading. I would put the book down without ever giving it a chance. 

The intention was that I'd introduce the characters, who draw the reader until the hook (which is literally next chapter). Hmm. It's not so hard for me to throw in a line during the chapter one briefing talking about the possibility of a civil war / coup within the empire caused by a rebel faction within the army and/or possibly the government.

11 minutes ago, kaisa said:

Well heck, let's get nerdy! Are you trying to imply that the person who did the construction was crap at their job, or just that the trees that grow in the area don't have great wood? For the first, you use a frame and panel wood door of something like aspen or birch. For the second something like alder would work. Make the color light, not dark. Lighter woods are usually weaker woods.

The village actually has a developed history within the greater world, so I know a bit about it. The construction was done using medieval means, and was recently (~25 years) abandoned, meaning that the wood has begun growing weak from lack of maintenance. The wood is suppose to be fine, just old and a bit rotted. Also, Admiral S has a rocket launcher.

[kais]

14 minutes ago, aeromancer said:

(~25 years) abandoned, meaning that the wood has begun growing weak from lack of maintenance.

Eeeeeh. But there are plenty of wood species that do not require frequent maintenance, and a door isn't in ground contact so it wouldn't actively decay. Basically 25 years in a door would not have any real decay. If you're hitting it with a rocket launcher, fine, but it's not 'weak' wood. It's just wood that's been hit with a rocket launcher.

See, some people here have physics. Some have chemistry. I have... wood. 

[rdpulfer]

Maid-and-butler dialogue is where you have two characters infodump via dialogue. It gets it's name from when old plays would use the maid and butler conversing to fill the audience on what had been happening. If it's overused, it can feel too stale and stilted. 

[Robinski]

On 19/12/2016 at 10:48 PM, kaisa said:

I have... wood

[Robinski]

After the discussion that went before on the first part, I’m interested to get into this second part. I’ll try and not duplicate the observations with my previous (and others’ comments previously), but might just high level some of those things as (or if) they appear.

• I wonder if a meeting place with civilians might be safer, due to the greater political fallout if innocents were harmed?

• S. mentions the admiral, knowing it’s his mother. Reading this now, it seems like a bit of a sneak to not have any reveal, or even hint, here.

• I do like S.’s protests about how could they not know about the admiral, like, ‘Man, you guys are dense.’

• I’m no expert, nor an enthusiast, but the term ‘large bore’ seems kind of irrelevant to a rocket. I tend to associate it with rifles. Also, how large bore can it be if it’s a hand-held rocket. Surely it’s smaller bore than your average rocket, to be portable?

• I’m feeling that all of the attackers have failed their competence roll and suddenly are inept. One guy running at a bunch of attackers with guns and no one can hit him? I’m not seeing how this comes about.

• If the enemy is blinded by the dust, how come the Swarm can see through it?

• “Let’s go before they can reload” – but they don’t all fire, or reload, at the same time. This doesn’t make sense to me.

• How does he get that they are good mercenaries; they haven’t laid a glove on the swarm and there’s no indication and of the regular soldiers have gone down? Also, how is it that he gets 3 years in pokey for wielding a sword but there was no chat about him being punished for using a pistol, which earlier, were indicated to be outlawed for mercs?

• S. thought they were decent mercs, now they are horrible ones?

• She’s using a bow inside a tank? Hmm, maybe the problem is that I can’t picture the imperial ship at all. I had thought it was sound kind of ground cruiser thing, because it couldn’t bring guns to bear on the ground, although that seems odd either way, not a god design.

• “injured earlier” sounds like much earlier, like half an hour ago, but it’s just happened right that moment, basically, it’s still happening.

• The guys being no match for her, and her cleaning them out are not contrary things, so the word ‘but’ doesn’t fit.

• Why is S. sorry? He beheaded someone about 5 minutes ago. That seemed out of character to me, rather than this being so.

• This is an imperial ship, but it’s been high jacked by anarchists, right? Because the admiral is an imperial admiral, right?

• So, is this vehicle flying? They’ve gone into the bridge, but we get no sense of what it looks like, how many people, the damage or the view out of the front of the ship. It really hurts the sense of place and the reader’s sense of what is happening. The vehicle is subject to turbulence or uneven ground, so you could give a sense of movement (and therefore place) by the forces acting on the characters.

• “What are you doing here?” the man continued. “We reassigned you to the eastern wastes. We couldn’t risk you getting involved.” – Sorry, but this exposition is horribly crude. I think it’s just the phrasing, or maybe it’s me, but I feel like “S.? You should be XX miles away, your assignment…” I reckon it’s about testing dialogue by reading out loud to see if it sounds like something someone would say.

• I struggle to believe ‘full draw’ is an archery term. Maybe worth a bit of investigation to make and similar references convincing. Unless full draw is industry-approved, in which case, objection withdrawn!

• J****** looks awfully like Iwo Jima. I think quite a lot of readers might make that association.

• We know M.’s badly founded, he’s been on the edge of death for the last 5 minutes. Don’t need to tell us how badly injured he is.

• Wha….? Did S. just say ‘dastard’? Is that a typo? I know it’s a word, but I just thought the circumstances called for the other word ending in –astard.

• Whose POV are we in? I don’t we should be getting feelings from D. Okay, are we in D.’s POV? If so, it seems unnecessary to add a POV when S. is in the room with her. This makes me doubt my assumptions about POV from the start.

• Most things fall downwards, hunter-killers included. (Sorry, couldn’t resist that one.)

• Where does the rubble come from? I might have expected fragments of metal, but also, surely it’s so far away that they cannot see such detail. If they can see that, they’re too close.

• WHHHHHAAAAATTTTTTT??????!!!! …just happened?

The ending of this chapter just blew my mind, and not in a good way. I was uncomfortable before with the inclusion of magic. We’ve got guns and swords and mixed future tech (yes?) and suddenly there’s a dragon? It’s like Daenerys Targaryen just appeared in the story. I just can’t get a handle on what kind of story I’m in and it’s starting to bug me. Maybe that’s my problem, but I’m still trying to assimilate plot and all the characters and what seems to be a twist that, somehow, they’ve found themselves on the wrong side of the fight, but now all that is bombed out by a dragon.

My difficulty, I think, is that I want to know what genre I’m in and I just don’t.

I don’t want to end on a downer though. I am growing content with the main characters, although I think they could be more rounded quicker, and more smoothly introduced. I also like the idea of the plot (as I’m seeing it presently) although I need more description of scenes like the ambush to enjoy them properly. The thing is, now, I don’t know whether to expect a balrog, a TIE fighter or…., the Spanish Inquisition!

Oh, and I did enjoy the pacing, I felt some buzz from the combat and felt the threat, although some of the beats didn’t land for me, and I don’t really feel any actual threat from the other side, like they could lay a glove, or even wound one of our group.

<R>

[Robinski]

On 20/12/2016 at 1:25 AM, rdpulfer said:

Maid-and-butler dialogue is where you have two characters infodump via dialogue. It gets it's name from when old plays would use the maid and butler conversing to fill the audience on what had been happening. If it's overused, it can feel too stale and stilted. 

What RDP said. WE characterise it as two characters saying things that they would already know, and therefore would never actually say. So, for example...

Maid: "I do not need to polish the silver today, Mr. Potts, because the master and mistress is away."

Butler: "That is true. As you know Mary, they has gone to the city in order to visit the master's soh-li-si-tor. Now put the kettle on, there's a good girl." *

 

(*Clearly, I have included this last bit in order to make sure that my period drama dialogue is effective and convincing, and not to court a response from @kaisa. I've never seen Downton Abbey, but I am given to understand that this sort of thing actually happened in those times.)

[Hobbit]

12 minutes ago, Robinski said:

I don’t know whether to expect a balrog, a TIE fighter or…., the Spanish Inquisition!

[aeromancer]

@Robinski So, it's a dragonling. The one shows up is not magical at all, it's just a mount. I guess the problem is that fantasy readers see the word 'dragon' and they immediately think 'High Fantasy'. So, to avoid your Balrog/TIE fighter response (and don't forget that no one expects the Spanish Inquisition) should I just call it something else, or shift it entirely?

Also, yes, I meant to write 'dastard'. The word similar to that is not really much of an insult, it merely reflects someone's birth origin and you don't really have control over that. 'Dastard' is a character attack, meaning the target chose to be a despicable person. I select my insults with care. Wouldn't want to offend someone the wrong way, you understand.

[kais]

10 hours ago, Robinski said:

I like to keep an air of mystique about myself.

[kais]

10 hours ago, Robinski said:

and not to court a response from @kaisa

LOL! I'm a kind and gentle soul, I swear!

[Robinski]

3 hours ago, aeromancer said:

no one expects the Spanish Inquisition

Thank you! I was worried that no one was going to 'knock that one over the line'. 

3 hours ago, aeromancer said:

should I just call it something else

Hmm, I mean, at least - give or take - I can imagine what a dragonling might look like, as opposed to having to use some other word that I can't visualise - like that parallel discussion about 'olyve'. It was more the unexpected genre 'jolt' - as I felt it - as if I'd been cast adrift from the story I thought I was reading. It's probably my entrenched expectations coming in.

12 hours ago, aeromancer said:

dastard

That's cool. I've heard the word used in a medieval context so, again, it probably just stood out for me as feeling a bit out of place, as the rest of the language is quite contemporary  casual, with contractions, etc.