Sept. 28 - Recoverying Cynic - Oathbound - Ch. 4

[Recovering_Cynic]

Hello Everyone,

Here is Chapter four.  Let the ripping begin

[Frog]

Thoughts While Reading:
Why is he randomly now scaling a wall? Did I miss/forget something?

You're answering the first question (Did you have to kill the servants) down closer to the second (Why not kill them?) with (Once he started killing he found it very hard to stop.) It's confusing.

It was kind of easy to make out her thoughts from his own

There shall be no wishy washiness in narration. Kill all "kind of"s, "sort of"s or "seemed to"s or anything like unto it. (Well, for the most part anyway. )

He was wearing moccasins to better grip the wall, and wearing moccasins reminded him of better times, before meeting Bathsin, before all the killing—he clenched his eyes shut—before becoming a monster.

Really? I would have thought moccasins would make it more difficult to climb a wall... but then I never wore real moccasins and am picturing something like a slipper. And I also thought that this line was a not so subtle way to transition into flashback mode and tell me some more of his back story, but then I was disappointed.

The parapet jutted out about three feet, and that, combined with the guards walking on top of the wall was going to make the last part of this climb difficult for all kinds of reasons, although difficult hardly bothered him anymore.

Too telly at the end.

Jagoth had never heard of anyone scaling the walls of Calthune before, not even during the war, but hey, after the fiasco yesterday, the gates were all double guarded and this was about the only way he could think of to get into the city without leaving a pile of bodies

'but hey' doesn't seem to fit the overall tone of this piece. Too informal. It shall be stricken with the rest of the wishy washy phrases.

a small stick figure joining the ant who was now running madly to see what had fallen.

Who is the stick figure and who is the ant? Or is there an actual ant? I am so confused.

Nobody answered the unasked question, at least not vocally.

This should be its own paragraph... and I don't think you need the last part so I am crossing it out.

Heh.  Nobody is going to recognize me anywhere.  Still, best to be safe

Don't underline, just go back to plain type.

Are there no laws about arming whoever, whenever? Like we have to register guns? I guess I was just getting the feeling that the knights kept order by being the only ones with the swords, but I don't think it would be a sticking point to me either way since the merchant seems a little less then honorable.

Overall impression:
Some good detail and lines that made me smile, but there is too much internal thought (some of it felt forced too, like he was just thinking it to infodump to the audience... not a natural thought I would expect him to have right at this moment), and I am getting annoyed with being left in the dark about his back story. Not intrigued to read more; annoyed. As in you-better-tell me-soon-or-I-will-throw-this-book-across-the-room. Which would be really sad because then I would have to buy a new computer. The main problem is that at this point I am not really sure who (or what) I should be rooting for. The knights? This crazed assassin? The king who barely made an appearance? I just don't know and it bothers me. But I suppose enough is happening that people reading this in one stretch might not have such difficulties.

That's it from me. Just keep cranking it out.

[Jexral]

Another good one, in my opinion.  I agree with frog that I expected a flashback at that one part (while he is climbing) and I was quite disappointed when we didn't get it.  Just a little something to make us see the man he used to be, so we can compare it with the man he is now would be good.  It would make him a more sympathetic character, too, I think, because we would see a softer side than he has shown us. 

I also agree that it was a little weird just opening up with him climbing.  It was explained later, so it probably works, but it just confused me for a moment, and left me wondering what was going on... Also, I thought he was already in the city before this, so I was a little confused about that as well.

I, unlike Frog, could hold out a little longer for the background.  As long as we see it sometime.  I kind of like that we have this picture of Jarl, and a picture of Jagoth, and they are both so incredibly different, and we don't know why.

[Recovering_Cynic]

I agree with frog that I expected a flashback at that one part (while he is climbing) and I was quite disappointed when we didn't get it.  Just a little something to make us see the man he used to be, so we can compare it with the man he is now would be good.  It would make him a more sympathetic character, too, I think, because we would see a softer side than he has shown us.

This is a good point made by both of you, and something I will consider when making my second draft.  I've located two different points where a good flashback might happen.  (1) where Jarl is laying in the sun paralyzed, or (2) here as he is climbing the wall.  Initially I hadn't planned on having a flashback (the general plotline I have in my head didn't call for one), but I think the character is needing one.  I don't know how much of his backstory I'll tell though.

Unrelated:

Currently the story is hating me.  I had Jagoth's story arc all layed out nice and neat, but the middle plotline was a bit fuzzy, as were some of the side characters.  I've just hit the point where the side characters are becoming important, and I'm not sure what to do .  I'm going to have to go back and outline some more, which is kinda depressing.  I'd hoped to sit down and just write it through.

[Frog]

I'm a hybrid outline/discovery writer, meaning I try to outline, but it changes and I am world/character building as I go. It always stays a bit fuzzy until I get to the end so your story woes sound like a normal day at the races to me. Does anyone really just sit down and write it through? How on earth do they do it?
Good luck, make those secondary characters shine or I will have to come and smack you later.  

[ryos]

Does anyone really just sit down and write it through? How on earth do they do it?

Isaac Asimov did. No outlines, ever. He'd just sit down and start typing, 90 WPM, straight through. The man wrote over 400 books...

Yeah. Obviously, not everyone can be Isaac Asimov.

[Bookstore Guy]

Stephen King is a pure discovery writer.

[Recovering_Cynic]

For myself, I've found that I am about a 90% outline writer, with other 10% discovery.  I have to know where I begin and where I will end, both on a macro and micro level.  I need to know roughly what will happen in a chapter, and then the little details of the chapter write themselves, but I also have to know how the book ends, or I don't know what happens in the chapters.

In Oathbound, I know how the book ends (mostly), and I know what Jagoth has to do to get there, but I've only just realized that some of the side characters are much more important than I originally thought, so now I have to go modify the outline and flesh them out.  Before doing that, first I have to figure out how the story ends for them.  huh.  I just now figured that out while writing this post.  I love think-writing.  It's therapeutic for me.

[RavenstarRHJF]

Ok, first of all, great continuation.  Jagoth seems more sympathetic here, but still not quite as interesting as the background story.  Yet.

One question.  Once he's up on the wall, why not use the grapnel to slide down the other side?  Also, moccasins would allow more "feel" while protecting his feet, but they wouldn't have as much grip unless they were made of something special- like sharkskin or something.

The by-play with the dog was... hmm... I can see you're trying to play up the beastly aspects of him, but I'm not sure you're going about it quite right.  I just have a hard time reconciling the fact that he's an exile who should be trying to blend in and instead goes out of his way to stand out.  He's grabbing up raw meat without even letting the butcher wrap it up for him, you know?  The smarter thing would be to let the butcher wrap it up- like he's going to take it home and cook it (perfectly understandable)- and then find the alley and tear into it. 

The same thing goes for the armorer.  He doesn't even try to dissemble or make the armor purchase (at least) seem like an impulse buy, or replacement for inferior armor.  Instead he just walks right in, demands what he wants, and doesn't take no for an answer.  Now, if he has a good reason for standing out, all of this makes sense, but I don't see it yet.

Keep pluggin,' though, it'll come together.

[Frog]

Okay, that whole thing was poorly phrased on my part. What I meant was that I couldn't imagine writing one outline and then sticking to it completely because my ideas tend to come a little at a time. Complete discovery writing I have tried. It wasn't a very good attempt, but there you go.