Once again, I am attempting to get caught up with the submissions. There's something about having homework that makes me want to procrastinate on it, and start doing other things I had been procrastinating on previously. Anywho, here we go...
Thoughts while reading...
• Misspelled Alexander's name in the first sentence.
• "The King’s room was in perpetual gloom and very warm. " This line is very contrasting and a tad confusing; I realize that the gloom is in terms of the lighting and atmosphere, and the warmth is in terms of temperature, but the immediate response I had to this was that the room was simultaneously gloomy and cheerful. From the line right after, I can assume this was not the intent.
• " It would be difficult for anyone to overhear what went on this room when the doors were closed." This may seem odd, but this particular line feels too straightforward. If there's a way to show this, rather than tell it, I think it would work better.
• "the Empire was always inventing new technologies" This intrigues me. I'm immediately wondering what level of technology this world has, or, specifically, this empire.
• Following the last line, the rest of the paragraph feels a bit too info-dumpy, in my opinion. It's not infodumpy in a bad way, necessarily, but I'm wondering if this could be told more smoothly through dialogue between the war council.
• The empire must be truly massive, if it can afford to have an army in the millions. They'll need several million more people in order to grow the food and make the weapons to support such numbers.
Finished.
It's not bad, and I see some potential. The plot that's been shown so far - small country going to war against a vast empire - has the potential to turn out incredibly unique and interesting, or incredibly cliché and derivative. This type of story has been done many, MANY times before, and unless there's something different to make it stand out, I can see myself getting bored with the story. It's very difficult to make an accurate judgment based of a single chapter, though.
I found myself wanting to be shown more of the personalities of the generals. Some argument on strategy, clashing personalities - their nation is on the brink of war with a vastly more powerful and, from the sounds of it, more resourceful enemy, not to mention their king is very literally about to die. These men seem too calm despite all of this; I'd expected them to be tense, shouting at each other, arguing over what needs to be done. One of them must think they have a better idea of how they should fight, or even a better idea of who should rule the country. As it is now, most of them feel kind of flat. I'm given an inkling as to individual personalities, but not enough. I'm also wondering what these men look like.
The writing, throughout most of it, felt very sparse. It was good, but it was sparse. Personally, I prefer things to be more decriptive. You don't have to overload me with details, but a line or two about General #1's bushy mustache, or the maps on the walls of the council room - the little things that give me a clearer picture of what's going on, where it's going on, and who is making it go on. For me, it also adds to the immersion factor of the story.
Alexander, I thought, was written very well. I got a strong impression of the character from the first few lines, and I could feel his pain near the end of the chapter.
The pacing is very good. I felt everything flowed very well, and was easy to understand. (Just needed more detail
)
In summation, there's a lot of good in this, but there is the strong potential that it could become derivative. I'd like to see more showing in several places - or maybe it's the lack of detail. I'm not certain. There weren't many places where I feel like I was being told things, yet it didn't feel like i was being shown them either...
Hope this was of some help. I look forward to the next chapter ^^
