Timewaster's Guide Archive

Thanks for the annotated version. I am a little unclear on what you said in your last post. Are you suggesting that there should be more action in the chapter? And by saying that the only thing that really stood out was the scene with the scholar, what did you mean exactly, at least in regard to the rest of the chapter. It's a little unclear.

And yeah, Darkclaw handling situations (threatening, etc) emotionlessly does come up again. I actually believe there is an similar incident slated for the next Darkclaw chapter. (Though it ends differently.)

Chapter 3, where the plot starts to get moving.

As I mentioned in the email, any thoughts/ suggestions about chapter length + chapter length consistency would be appreciated, along with any other comments.

Thanks for the feedback.

^^Sorry about that; apparently I had made an account a year ago and forgot about it, and when I went on the site using firefox instead of chrome, it auto logged me in and I didn't notice the difference. You can delete that post.

I also have another chapter I can submit next week. (Of course, if we pass the limit and people who haven't gone recently want to submit, I have no problem waiting.)

I as well didn't see anything that seemed related to a magic system, and I agree that the story did, for the most part, feel like it was moving quickly. The only place I can think of that felt a little slower was the paragraph about the water; it was the only part of the piece where there was a chunk of just information and not something happening.

Actually, after reading it again, I'm wondering if the part about the water is the info about the magic you were referring to. It seems like the water isn't just regular water, but I don't really see how it is related to a magic system. But then again, this is a short section, and I haven't read the first two parts. Other than that, I just want to see what happens next!

(Regarding the title question, I'm probably the worst person to give any advice; as I mentioned when I sent my chapters out this week, I also seem unable to figure out a title for my story. You're a step ahead of me though, as you at least have some ideas.)

As I mentioned in the email, this is essentially the fourth draft of my novel, and I aim for it to be the first completed one. As of yet it's titleless(one thing I know I fail at), so if anyone has title suggestions I would be grateful (granted, without knowing the whole story it'd be hard, but I am getting tired of calling it 'story' or 'the Troodon story'.)

As an additional note, while it is draft 4, chapter 2 is new, and was not in any previous drafts. It was added to both introduce Nayasar earlier and to break up the early Darkclaw chapters, for reasons that may become evident after you've read the first chapter.

That said, I'll stop talking (typing) and see what comments you guys have.

Thanks

(Note: I apologize for forgetting to put the date in the email subject; I knew I forgot something.)

Hello, everyone. I am a twenty year old college student from New York. I am currently majoring in English with a Creative Writing focus, and I plan to have at least one minor or a second major, probably History or Psychology. I have also been taking my school's Publishing Certificate Program, which is geared toward getting people jobs in the industry. It's basically my not so much fall-back as something to do if I don't get published before I finish school, and the publishing classes may have even been more useful than writing classes, as I have learned quite a bit about publishing, which should help make me a more savvy writer. (Not to mention that part of the program involves getting an internship, which will allow me to meet people in the industry and form relationships that could be helpful when I get to the point of being able to submit a manuscript.

I have been writing, on and off, since eighth grade, when I first got the idea for a novel that I finally think has a proper direction, and I have sufficient writing skills to finally complete a draft (longest previous draft was somewhere around 120 double space WORD pages long). As of now, I am at almost 12,000 words into my novel, and I have a full chapter-by chapter outline.

My novel is probably best described as an epic fantasy in space, or a sci-fi epic (I'm really not quite sure exactly what classification it would fall under). It has a sci-fi setting, but to me the novel feels more like an epic fantasy, and there are some fantasy elements in it.  I also have several ideas for fantasy novels, which are all still in the worldbuilding/outlining stage, though I have written short segments/scenes for some of my writing classes (including a scene which I workshopped in my Fiction Workshop class yesterday, which makes me confident that I am capable of making a living writing). I don't intend on telling that whole, strange story in this post, but to put it simply, the class liked my writing, and gave some good feedback (as they have in my other classes where I wrote sf/f stuff) and the older professor said he 'could not encourage that' and did not give me any useful feedback.

I really should have joined Timewastersguide a long time ago, but I'm glad I did now. I desperately need people who actually read and write in my genres to give me comments on my writing, and everyone in my classes writes the most dull literary fiction (which my current professor, of course, loves). I  hope to get useful feedback that will help me finally complete my novel, and get me working on more things. (I apologize for the length of this post)