May 17 2010 - Ryos - Benders - Chapters 1 and 2

[ryos]

Here you are. "Benders" is a working title. This novel takes place just after the events of one of my previous submissions, the short story Dalrymple, the King, and the Future, though I should note that reading that story is not a prerequisite for this one. In other words, I tried to write this to an audience who hadn't read the prequel short.

Those who read DtKatF and follow the Progress and Submission Reports thread will note that Dalrymple's brain be a'talkin' again. Yes, I cut it from the short story. Yes, I'm bringing it back in the novel. AND YES, I know that most of you hated the brain. I think I have a pretty good in-world reason for bringing it back. I still think it's pretty funny. But! Please let me know if you still hates it.

[Drew P]

Ryos let me start by saying I really enjoyed this. I am the reader you spoke of who has no preconceptions because I haven't read any of your other stuff yet.

The opening sparked my interest right away. I really liked the casual hints at the magic system (intriguing) and I thought the flyover was a good way of laying out the setting.

I would have liked to know more about Nmae, however. (And I'm not sure how i feel about her name. Part of me thinks you just typo-ed "Name" and ran with it.) Her chapter seemed to be more about plot and setting, so I'm not sure if she's a main character or not. You hinted that she's searching for someone, well more than hinted I guess, and I am assuming it is Dalrymple. Maybe if you included something about her motivation for her search. It doesn't even have to be detailed, just a hint. Like is she out to kill him? Capture him? Recruit him? Marry him?

I actually enjoyed the brain. The initial conversation had me a little confused as to who was saying what but the dialogue was fun.

It seemed to me that Dalrymple is much more developed in your mind than Nmae. I assume this is because you have written him before? As a new reader who wouldn't know that it just seemed like you liked him more, though.

I really don't have too many negatives. I am looking forward to reading more.

[ryos]

I would have liked to know more about Nmae, however. (And I'm not sure how i feel about her name. Part of me thinks you just typo-ed "Name" and ran with it.)

LOL, that's exactly what I did. I commonly mistype name as nmae, and one day I looked at it and thought, "You know, that kinda looks like a name. Hmm..."

I'm...bad at names. I may wind up renaming her. We'll see.

Thanks for the comments!

[clarissavandell]

Like Drew, I haven't read your earlier work.  But I really get a clear idea from the first chapter (how do you pronounce Nmae, anyway?) what the magic system is like.  I'm assuming it has to do with the 'tones' Nmae heard above the castle? 

But then we have Bending, which may or may not be related to the 'tones'.  So that'll be interesting to see if there's a connection or not.

And I like the wings in the first chapter; it's just a cool image in my head, but I think there's so much you can do with. I think you should hint at Nmae's motivation, however. 

[ErikHolmes]

Good stuff. But it can be better.

Unless you are going for a really short YA and want that as a selling point, I'd think about lengthening both of those first chapters. We really don't get a sense of Nmae's character in the first chapter. You hint at something odd about how she handles fears but its really just confusing if anything.

I think whats missing from the Nmae chapter is that we don't know why she's afraid or of what. If we knew this, there would be a lot more tension in that first chapter.

As for her name, Nmae is kind of hard. Maybe it's just me, but I kept reading it as N'mae and pronouncing it like Nah-may, which is a pretty cool name, imo.

In the second chapter we have a better sense of Jonas's character, but it felt a little rushed. I think this might be ok if you're target audience is younger, like early teens but adults will want more.

Also, after reading Jonas's first chapter I'll probably never take him seriously. Which is fine, if that's what you are going for. I think its because he doesn't seem to take anything seriously.

Good stuff though, but I think it can be a lot better.

[ryos]

Thanks, Erik.

On how to say Nmae - I don't really care how people say it. I say it like you do, to be honest. How would an apostrophe make it more pronounceable? Personally, I've never quite known what to do with arbitrary apostrophes in fictional names.

Is there anything specific you wanted more of in the Dalrymple chapter? I suspect it feels rushed for two reasons: one, I was rushed when I wrote it (actually, both these chapters are unedited first drafts; I didn't even proofread them. That's what I get for setting an arbitrary public goal); and two, as I was writing it I was thinking, "They're just going from point A to point B, this is boring." I was actually considering cutting Dalrymple's chapter down, for that reason.

[Justice1337]

I would have liked to know more about Nmae, however. (And I'm not sure how i feel about her name. Part of me thinks you just typo-ed "Name" and ran with it.) Her chapter seemed to be more about plot and setting, so I'm not sure if she's a main character or not. You hinted that she's searching for someone, well more than hinted I guess, and I am assuming it is Dalrymple. Maybe if you included something about her motivation for her search. It doesn't even have to be detailed, just a hint. Like is she out to kill him? Capture him? Recruit him? Marry him?

This.

I have little idea after this chapter 1 what this character's motives are and why I should empathize with her.

[LongTimeUnderdog]

Well . . . I can't say I was happy with the chapters.  Everyone is very interesting, but everything is getting cut off before it gets interesting.  And that's really it.  It's just . . . almost . . .interesting, and then bam, chopped off  by a big axe marked CHAPTER.

Anything else I could say was already said.  I mostly just wanted you to know I read your piece.  Needs more setting.  But if you've read anything I wrote you'll know I'm nerd about settings.

Oh yeah, I liked the brain.  But now that you've got something like that, I'll have to fix up Six Stones to not do the same thing.

[Chaos]

I haven't read it yet, but Nahmae from a textually standpoint looks pretty cool as a fantasy name, and makes the pronunciation clearer. You may want to try that.

[Recovering_Cynic]

So I read the short story, loved it, and was somewhat disappointed by this follow-up.  I will second everyone else's comments, and add a few of my own.

First, keep the events from the short story and add them to this.  You reference them in Dalrymple's thoughts, and they were awesome, so add them in.  You might have to edit them, but they will do a lot to make the story more interesting.  I really think you should add them.

As to the chapters, just flesh them out more.  Everything is good, just not enough of it.

Oh, did you ever submit the short story anywhere?  What was the result?  You might consider sending it to Writers of the Future.

[ryos]

I sent it to Orson Scott Card's Intergalactic Medicine Show, and they rejected it. I've not gotten around to doing anything else with it. WotF wasn't really on my radar since I've heard they're even more competitive than other markets, but I'd consider anything.

I might end up prepending that story to this one. I've thought about it, but in my mind it just doesn't fit for some reason. If you couldn't tell, I'm really really new at this novel writing thing (yeah, I'm new at fiction writing in general; DtKatF was my second story worth mentioning), and I'm mostly just going on instinct for things like structure and pacing. So, I appreciate these comments; hopefully I'll be able to get the story on track.

[Recovering_Cynic]

So far I have only tried to write one novel (which failed).  If I had one piece of advice I'd give you, it's to not workshop your novel while you write it.  Some people can do this, but it killed my novel for me.  For my second try (which I will be starting soon, hopefully), I will write the first draft, then workshop it.  That way I don't get hung up fixing things and redrafting my first 10 chapters like I did last time.

Someone gave me some good advice (that I will heed next time).  They said to go ahead and workshop the first few chapters to see if the tone and idea of the story works.  If it does, then write it on your own, then come back and workshop it.  I'm a perfectionist, so I think that's the path I'm going to have to take.  If right now you have a driving, undeniable urge to re-write the last two chapters according to the feedback you just got, well, I'd recommend writing the rest of it privately.  Your theme is great.  Your characters work.  Just write it, then re-work it.  I plan on sending mine to family and whatnot for moral support, but not critical feedback.

[Chaos]

So far I have only tried to write one novel (which failed).  If I had one piece of advice I'd give you, it's to not workshop your novel while you write it.  Some people can do this, but it killed my novel for me.  For my second try (which I will be starting soon, hopefully), I will write the first draft, then workshop it.  That way I don't get hung up fixing things and redrafting my first 10 chapters like I did last time.

This is quite possibly the best advice one could possibly give.

I'm delving back into Rebirth, but you all won't see it for a long time. Also, I refuse to rewrite what I've already done.

[ryos]

I appreciate the advice. While I won't reject it out of hand, I'll also say that I don't feel any great need to rewrite my story right now. The single most substantial criticism I've received is that there's not enough here. I'll react to this feedback by trying to write more complete chapters, but I'm very cognizant of the fact that this is just the first two chapters, and the rest of the story that everyone wishes were here is still in my head, queued up for later chapters. I literally can't rewrite the first two chapters without putting more down and seeing how that works.

So I'm not too concerned about succumbing to the desire for early revision, and I feel that your critiques will provide me with valuable course corrections as I go. I'll keep submitting, at least for now.

[Justice1337]

   The above is really great advice about when to workshop a novel.  I rewrote my first so many times that likely not a single word of the original survived.  I sort of wish I still had it, if for nothing other than nostalgia.

   That said, I think I can add a little qualification.  When starting off as a new author, you’ll probably find that the innate, talent-oriented aspects of it are strong, or at least, stronger than the technical aspects.  And the characters and such will probably be so strong by the end that you’ll feel they deserve a solid novel.  Save them.  Start a storage bin where you put all your imperfectly executed but otherwise brilliant ideas.  This is one aspect of writing that doesn’t get easier with time.  Even some best-selling authors will say that their ideas were the best at the outset.

   In the meantime, don’t feel bad about writing story after story with your favorite characters in them.  You don’t even need to make them cogent with one another, though you may be tempted.  Inspiration may lead you to try a plot twist on an old story, for example, and you shouldn’t feel that the characters are real somehow and have already passed that point in their lives.  Until they first hit print, they’re yours to hone your storytelling skills with.