1 - 19 - 09 - jwdenzel - The Gates of Heaven: Prologue - Ch. 1

[jwdenzel]

I continue to be humbled by everyon'e feedback.   Thank you very much for all of it.  I'm planning to consider every suggestion on my next re-write of these opening chapters.

Two things that have come up a lot which I'd like to respond to:

1. The Prologue was written in that "First Person Present" (as Reaves called it) for very specific reasons related to the story.  Yes, the narrator is talking to YOU, the reader.  (S)he'll do that a lot more in coming chapters. (Chapter 4 is the next time you'll see it).   Eventually, the reasons behind this will be revealed, and it actually ties to one of the major themes of the book.   Also, for terms like "gas giants", "nebulas", and "galaxies"... yes, that particular character is well aware of those terms.  By the end of part 1, you'll see why.

2. Aric seems to have conflicting personalities.  That's probably because his character has changed so much.  I have a much stronger feeling for who he is now (25,000 words into it, finally!), so these earlier chapters might feel awkward at points.  I plan to revise chapters 2 and 3 before submitting them to you, so hopefully he'll be a little more crystalized by then.

Thanks again!
J

[jwdenzel]

The floating mountain was horribly obvious, and I actually expected the dialogue to reveal that it wasn't floating after all.

Thank you for this feedback.  May I ask what specifically "gave it away" that it was floating? I'd like for it to be a suprise at the very end of the chapter. Any tips or insight on what I could revise to make this happen would be greatly appreciated.

[Flo_the_G]

"Well that's the interesting thing," Laudney said, coming up right beside Aric. "There's nothing to be seen on the horizon." He directed Aric's spyglass to angle upwards to a point somewhere above the horizon line. "Look there."

That passage pretty much made it obvious, I think. I might not have known that it was floating, but the fact that he couldn't see the mountain on the horizon and then raised the spyglass at least made me think "so is it floating, or what?" - the following dialogue then reinforces the impression and makes it seem as though Aric were a tad slow on the uptake.

Someone suggested that fog could obscure the lower part of the mountain, that might work. Or, what just occured to me: the upper part would be visible above the horizon long before the lower part, right? You could have them see that, let Aric look through his spyglass at the top of the mountain as the fleet moves towards it, more of the mountain becomes visible, he moves the glass down to see how large the mountain really is and then sees that the expected lower part is in fact missing.

[jwdenzel]

I see

Yeah, good idea.  The fog idea was a good one and will probably help here.   I'll give it a shot

J

[Revast]

I had two at odds thoughts while reading the prologue.
1. wow this is really well written and quite descriptive
2. but for some reason I don't care.

It was as if the flying away from the body of the mage bored me, but approaching the body of Aric finally began to intrigue me. I did love the fact that it began with one person, moved away as far as possible, and then zoomed down upon a different individual.

Overall though it felt wordy, passive, and not until you begin to descend upon Aric was I remotely engaged.

Question: Are there other instances of first person viewpoints where you actually ask questions to the reader again? If so this may tie in quiet nicely, if not it may seem out of place and just not a good fit for the rest of the novel.

The scene where Aric is getting dressed. The Gem seems important and intriguing, getting dressed does not. I know the character is putting on armor, but frankly he is still just getting dressed. Perhaps you dragged this out to emphasize the fact that he is making everyone up on deck wait so he can be fashionably late, but just saying that he is dragging it out would suffice.

If I ever was in a bookstore and a writer began the first chapter of his book by telling me that the character got out of bed, put on his underwear, followed by his socks, then he pulled up and buttoned his pants before pulling his shirt on and tucking it in. Sitting down he pulled on each sock, then tied his tie.

Well I would put the book down. Perhaps describe the pieces of armor you feel are important, (the ornate chest piece and the bit about the gem) and put the rest of the gear on off page.

The king interests me, how he rules interests me, the fact that no one ever gets to see him intersets me, his suggested or implied divinity interests me. I hope I get to learn more of this culture.

The 140 ships being mentioned three times in the span of a few sentences: my first thought was that he's going to tell me he started with 140 ships and now due to rough travels, pirates, and scurvy the fleet is down to 7. But then you just moved on. What was the purpose of mentioning it so many times if all you were doing is telling there were 140 of them? I got that with the first telling. (and damn that is a lot of ships... you going to colonize these islands or invade?)

WHAT HAPPENED IN THE NINE MONTH PRIOR ON THE VOYAGE? Did anything interesting happen? Did Aric really just meditate everyday and give a speech once a month. Surely there was some hardship? Some political intrigue? Maybe there wasn't, perhaps this was the most boring, uneventful 9 month voyage ever (boggle), but I'm curious one way or the other.

Why do they call it the Endless Sea if they believe the world is round? Endless implies that either: 1. you will sail forever and never find anything. Or 2. You will drop off the world at the end. Doesn't it seem that if they had discovered that you would simply circumvent the globe by traversing it that they would have renamed it something else? (this point is probably really nitpicking and should most likely be ignored).

I know its just my crude mind, but everytime I read Pellis I thought Penis.... I know I'm hopless and stupid.

How are they going to get up to the mountain? Tell me already.

Summary: The prologue was beautifully written, but bored me. It reminded me of one of those chapters where for some reason the author feels he must describe the scene to me in agonizing detail for 6 paragraphs before he gets to the good part. I usually find myself skipping such over-reaching descriptions, much as I had the urge to do to the first half of the prologue.

The culture you are creating intrigues me, however the gem in his chest seems a little marvel superhero ish. I am assuming it is a highly important part of the story however, so entirely necessary. To be honest if this was a book I was skimming to decide if I want to keep reading, the answer so far is not really. Something exciting better happen soon, or more emotional pull needs to occur to keep me wanting to turn the page.

The actual writing flows nicely, and I never found myself stopping to try to figure out what you were trying to say, or saying myself, well that just doesn't flow.

Hope my rambling thoughts help in any small way, and that I wasn't to negative. (This is my first critique of anyones wirting other than my own in a long time. It has made me fearful of submitting my own work.

[jwdenzel]

Revast - Thank you very much for your feedback.  I found it to be very clear and helpful. 

Seeing as every single one of you was bored to tears over the opening part of the prologue, I'll pay special attention to that when I revise next.  ;-) 

Question: Are there other instances of first person viewpoints where you actually ask questions to the reader again? If so this may tie in quiet nicely, if not it may seem out of place and just not a good fit for the rest of the novel.

Yes, there are other chapters where this narrator directly addresses the reader. 

(and damn that is a lot of ships... you going to colonize these islands or invade?)

Glad you asked.  You'll learn more in chapter 2.

WHAT HAPPENED IN THE NINE MONTH PRIOR ON THE VOYAGE? Did anything interesting happen? Did Aric really just meditate everyday and give a speech once a month. Surely there was some hardship? Some political intrigue? Maybe there wasn't, perhaps this was the most boring, uneventful 9 month voyage ever (boggle), but I'm curious one way or the other.

LOL!!!  One really helpful suggestion earlier from this group was that I needed a stronger sense of conflict in chapter 1.  To address this, I plan to make that "meeting" that Aric has into a bitch-fest for the other captains.   In that revised scene I'll hint at other events.

For the most part, however, there isn't really much for Aric to do.  He's probably fawned over, made comfortable, and told not to lift a finger.  Heck maybe he took up meditation only because it was something NEW to do.  Aric isn't the sort of guy to be interested in something like that on his own.   (More on that in future chapters)

Why do they call it the Endless Sea if they believe the world is round?

It's just a name that implies the vastness of the ocean.  It literally encompasses the entire globe - a World Sea - except for one continent in the middle.   More in chapter 2.

I know its just my crude mind, but everytime I read Pellis I thought Penis.... I know I'm hopless and stupid.

There's some truth to it.  I didn't choose that name consciously for that reason, of course, but the character is pretty wishy-washy and wimpy.  I wanted a name that subtly implied that.  He was probably called a penis a lot as a kid in school. ;-)

How are they going to get up to the mountain? Tell me already.

Chapter 2 addresses this.  And for what it's worth... Aric is asking the same thing!

Hope my rambling thoughts help in any small way, and that I wasn't to negative. (This is my first critique of anyones wirting other than my own in a long time. It has made me fearful of submitting my own work.

It wasn't negative at all!  Thank you for the fair and honest feedback  If I had wanted nothing but praise, I would have showed it to my Mom.

Keep it coming if you think of more

[deckacards]

If I had wanted nothing but praise, I would have showed it to my Mom.

Hehe...THAT should go into our signatures...

"If all I wanted was praise, I would have had my mom read it...and you sure ain't my momma..."

[RavenstarRHJF]

Better late than never, right?    Here goes...

I assume you sent me the unrevised version of the prologue and Ch. 1, and everyone else has pretty much already covered the issue with holding the reader's interest... but have you thought about holding the interest of the reader by simply addressing us more?  For example, your narrator is an Archmage.  Perhaps he's training us, the audience, using the dream as a catalyst.  That way, there's some purpose behind mentioning all those features of the land around him, and the journey into space.  Show us the comet with more emphasis (I remember reading that part and not really taking much note of it, but if it's important we shouldn't be allowed to simply skip over it), and use IT to begin your story.  Anyway, just a thought, and if you've already got a revision you're happy with, feel free to ignore!

On another note, you describe things very well.  I could clearly picture the scenes in my mind as I read, and not every author can do that for me.

A minor point of consistency... When Aric is meditating in the cabin, we're given the impression that it's dark: there's only one lamp lit, and when he opens his eyes, you say they're already adjusted to the dark.  But on the next page, when he's dressing for the "audience", he mentions light coming in through the large windows.  Were they covered with curtains before?  And if so, when were they pulled back?  Or was it night while he was meditating and the sun is just now rising (seems unlikely, considering the amount of coordination involved to get everyone of importance to the flag ship at the same time)?

Also it strikes me as odd that Aric, being the so very important Ambassador, and speaker for the God-King, would stoop to putting on his own armor.  If there is some warrior rhetoric or ideal behind that, or he simply has too much reverence for a gift from his king to let inferior persons touch it, you should let us know.

Overall, good read!  Especially when we get to Aric's POV.