20150810 - Kashimir - The Democratization of Magic 1 (L,V)

[Kashimir he/him]

The beginning of the novel I'm currently working on. 

 

This is my first time submitting, but I hope you won't pull any punches. 

[Shrike76 he/him]

I thought this was a very interesting chapter, and I think the overall quality of the writing is very good.

 

Thoughts:

 - The name Alduin: I immediately thought of Skyrim, as Alduin is the big bad in that game. This is something that will likely be noticed by anyone who has played the game, and it may not get the reaction you want. You may want to change it.

 - "as their bones drained the heat to sustain their inner fire": I thought that this was a great line, and a great feature of skeletons. Then to have it paid off as the basis of the magic system made it even better. Good job.

 - At the end of the first section you say "the mayor sent a message lightward", which piqued my curiosity as to what that meant, but the entire last paragraph about people beyond the Balance point felt superfluous, like too much exposition. You could keep the first and last sentence of that paragraph and it would have more punch than it has now with the lines about the favor of the people.

 - Speaking of sections, I don't feel that this chapter benefits from having multiple points of view. There's nothing happening here that we couldn't see through Alduin's eyes, especially since the person we switch to, Henrik, appears to be a throwaway character who snuffs it. I think the chapter would be greatly improved by staying in Alduin's POV.

 - I find it odd that these armed men know they're dealing with something they're violently opposed to, but don't immediately react with their weapons when they see it. Not even when he starts draining torches of their fire (the source of his power). Henrik even tells Alduin to draw his weapon. I can't help wondering why.

 - The command word "Ordon". We hear it spoken and the men shine with brilliant light, but practically speaking what is the impact/meaning of using a command word? We're in Alduin's head when it happens, but we don't get any sort of reaction from him at all, or any information about what the implications are of facing down someone using things called command words.

 - During the fight Alduin is nailed in place by a spear, then the scepter rips it out of him, and then he's nailed in place by it again. The section needs a check for consistency.

 - The fire behind the door: This was too much of a surprise, especially since you refer to it as "the inferno beyond". Where was this fire before and how did it get there? If it was that much fire, I would have absolutely expected the men to feel its heat, to hear the roar of the air it is consuming, to smell the smoke of its burning, to see the light it is producing through the cracks...

 - The later combat scene, one of the men fires a crossbow and throws a knife, and the knife taks a long time before it hits his colleague? But that colleague jumped into the line of fire? Then the struck man pulled the knife out and light came out? Was he hit by the knife on purpose? The action in this paragraph confuses me greatly.

 

Page 3: "He walked blindly up to the pile of bones and wiggled his hand into it, carefully, not to break any of the fragile bones." I feel this line could be tightened up to only reference the bones, and their fragility, once.

Page 6: "The specter slammed" should read scepter.

 

Again, overall a great effort. I was interested by the character of Alduin, the system of magic, the world revealed (even if only a small slice of it), and by the action. I very much want to read more.

[Mandamon he/him]

I liked the old woman bossing the skeleton around and telling it how to rake.  Reminds me of Nanny Ogg from Discworld.  Or maybe Granny Weatherwax.

 

pg 5: "Henrik held his breath as the the door "

--extra "the"

 

 

Very cool story so far.  I like that the protagonist is the "evil" one and the men trying to kill him are what we would consider holy.  I'm interested to see more of the Light and the Fire.  You have a good intro to the world, which is easy to pick up on.  I also like that Alduin cares for his skeletal creatures (whether out of concern or just because it takes effort to raise more).  You have a couple humorous spots mixed in with necromancy, and the odd combination helps draw me in.

 

I don't really have anything negative, except that some of the blocking in the fight was a little confusing.  I had to read a few of the sentences twice to figure out where a dagger was thrown or who got killed.  Shrike76 mentions this same thing above.

I also agree with Shrike76 on Alduin's name (I thought the same thing) and on Henrik's POV.  That said, they didn't really bother me.  I didn't mind the extra explanation about the Balance.  It didn't feel like info-dumping too me.  It maybe wasn't necessary, but at this point, it just raised my curiosity a bit more.

 

aside from that, very nice!  I'm looking forward to reading more.

[Shrike76 he/him]

 

I'm interested to see more of the Light and the Fire.

 

I had made a note about precisely that and forgot to include it.

I'm also interested to see the logic behind Fire and Light being on opposite sides. It's not something I remember having seen before and I'm curious to see how/if it gets paid off.

[Kashimir he/him]

Thank you for the feedback. This is all extremely valuable for me.

 

 

-The name Alduin: I guessed that it might be a problem. I just like the sound of the name and it gives me the right feel when I'm writing the character. I'll probably keep it as a placeholder name for the time being, but in the end it'll have to go.

 

-The additional POV: Thanks for pointing this out. It seems that I initially put it in there to give another angle on Alduin, yet during the process I apparently thought that this angle was not worth exploring. I'll either expand the POV, or cut it.

 

-The command words: It appears that I made them clear only in my head. The extent that it was supposed to come across: With the command word, Henrik is temporarily able to take complete control of his comrades, allowing for highly coordinated attacks.

 

-The combat, the confusion: This is definitely the area where I tend to struggle the most. The few 'beats' of the fight are probably just too complicated, with everything happening at once. I'll try simplifying the fight a bit, or think of better ways of wording it.

 

-The fire behind the door: I actually noticed that this was a problem after the whole scene was written, and tried to place few tiny fixes, but apparently the fixes were too tiny.

 

Thanks again. Even though the action scene will need a bit of an overhaul, I'm glad that the piece managed to pique your interest.

 

It's highly encouraging that you thought the writing quality to be good. Up until now, I've written without any feedback, so any signs of improvement were easy to dismiss as wishful thinking.

 

 

 

EDIT:

 

 

 

I liked the old woman bossing the skeleton around and telling it how to rake.  Reminds me of Nanny Ogg from Discworld.  Or maybe Granny Weatherwax.

 

She was initially a young woman in the outline, but the course of the dialog turned her into Granny Weatherwax.   

Edited August 11, 2015 by Kashimir

[rdpulfer he/him]

- Minor grievance, but the spacing is definitely off. It feels like the section breaks are four spaces, which is a little disorienting in already-double-spaced.

 

- I would like more descriptions of the skeletons in the first passage. If he's digging up graves, what is the state of decay on these skeletons? Are they Ray Harryhausen-style skeletons or shambling corpses?

 

- I also agree having multiple perspectives seems weird, since so much of the action centers around Alduin.

 

- Overall, I'm very interested to see where this is going, especially if Alduin is a major character. I'd really like to see the next chapter!

[Kammererite]

First off the "Old lady" was awesome.

You magic is really interesting, and I feel like you handed the learning curve well.

The blocking in the fight could be a little clearer. The fire in the room came out of nowhere to me, as I was like he just drained the fire. On further reflection I realized that Alduin was stalling by draining the torches but that didn't come to me until I though back on the whole fight.

 

Some minor points that I feel obligated to mention.

Throwing a knife. I own throwing knives and while i cant hit anything with them I now people who can pick them up and hit the target in a few tries. That being said, it is hard to hit a moving target  with significant penetration with an balanced knife at an unknown distance especial under pressure.  Just bear in mind that throw would be very hard to make. Then again it was cool so realism doesn't bother me to much on it.    

 

Fire swords. I love these, I think they are awesome. However, fire is not a solid and has no significant mass. So a sword of fire would in fact pass through a blade rather then stop on contact with it (at least that is my understanding). But its magic so I can get on board with it . Just some food for thought.

 

I am interested to see what happens next.

[Robinski he/him]

Detailed comments below, but I must say that I did enjoy this. I like your style, for the most part, although the tendency to repeat the same word several times close together is quite disjointing.

 

I thought that you delivered initial information about the world and the set up well through showing in actions and little bits of exposition, not overloading at this early stage. I like seeing the perspective of someone who looks like they’re on the dark side. I think that’s an interesting choice. I also like the title of the story, which makes me ask some interesting questions – it’s intriguing. I also like the humour, which I thought was well judged, not too much and in the right places.

 

All in all, I think this is an engaging start to a story and I'm keen to read on. Hope you’re submitting next week.

 

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What an excellent first sentence, it drew me in straight away. It’s a great image.

 

The third sentence made me stop for several moments trying to work out what your point is. I'm still not sure I see it – could be clearer.

 

“The woman shoved the rake at one of them. Alduin sighed again, and the skeleton stood up, took the rake from the woman and started to even out the ground of the grave.” LOL – I'm enjoying the wry humour, which is nicely judged so far. Not too much.

 

“wielding it against the ground” felt awkward to me. Are we to deduce she is doing it angrily? I didn’t think that was clear.

 

The woman’s dialogue is rather simple. Is she supposed to come across as uneducated?

 

Nice balance of mystery and exposition in this first section, I though. I felt like I was gaining snippets of knowledge, and asking questions, without getting any info dump.

 

“with the ferocity of an inferno”

 

“large pile of bones to his left that his critters” – suggestion: unnecessary and spoils flow.

 

“The Fire raged within him” – Hmm, so I take it ‘Fire’ is different from ‘fire’?

 

“carefully, so as* not to break any of the fragile bones.” - * or ‘careful not to break...’ – also use of ‘bones’ twice in the one sentence.

 

“resolved into their intended configurations” – this is a lovely phrase, I thought.

 

A bird has wings, surely, not arms.

 

Again, in this section I feel that I'm learning about Alduin’s powers through showing rather than telling, which is good.

 

“The walls of the hall were lined” – suggestion: repetition of ‘hall’ and third use of ‘-alls’ in same line.

 

Again, repetition of ‘hall’ twice in one sentence, quite distracting a breaks up flow.

 

How can the men circle him in a corridor/hall?

 

Why is there a section break after Alduin being struck down? The narrative seems to continue unbroken.

 

“in the blink of an eye”

 

Again, I feel I am learning through being shown it in the fight scene. Command words, artefacts, etc. Feels natural and effective.

 

The repetition of ‘eye’ is quite awkward.

[Kashimir he/him]

Thanks for the additional feedback.

 

-The skeletons: They are indeed Ray Harryhausen-style skeletons, due to reasons. I'll have to sneak in some indication to the visual early on.

 

-The knife throwing: Good point. I haven't thrown any knives during my days, so I didn't even stop to think about it. Whether I'll keep it or not, this is good to know.

 

-The fire sword: Actually the fire is supposed to "condense" into a form of steel. This is not communicated well enough.

 

 

Robinski raises many good points. I'll comment on a few.

 

-The first line: I'm glad you like it. That image was enough to hook me into writing this story.

 

-Fire and fire: there is indeed a difference, one being the normal everyday fire, the other being the energy to do the magic. The differentiation might not be necessary, and the method I'm using might be a bit clunky, but I'll see how it plays out.

 

-Bird's arms: Bird skeletons look absurd and their wings do look like arms. I attempted to convey the image but it probably isn't worth pushing so hard.   

 

-The repetition of words: I'll keep this in mind on the next pass, as well as while writing along.

 

Thanks again.

Edited August 17, 2015 by Kashimir

[Shrike76 he/him]

-Fire and fire: there is indeed a difference, one being the normal everyday fire, the other being the energy to do the magic. The differentiation might not be necessary, and the method I'm using might be a bit clunky, but I'll see how it plays out.

 

If you've read Mistborn, the way Brandon writes Pushing and Pulling vs. pushing or pulling makes it pretty clear what's going on. Maybe I've just read enough fantasy, but I immediately understood what you were doing. I found the differentiation between fire and Fire helpful and effective, not clunky.

Edited August 17, 2015 by Shrike76

[Mandamon he/him]

If you've read Mistborn, the way Brandon writes Pushing and Pulling vs. pushing or pulling makes it pretty clear what's going on. Maybe I've just read enough fantasy, but I immediately understood what you were doing. I found the differentiation between fire and Fire helpful and effective, not clunky.

 

One caution on this though, which bit me on a submission last year, is the audio aspect.  While reading, it's easy to distinguish, but if this is in audiobook format (which is increasingly popular) it's harder to differentiate.