May 24th-Drew P- Untitled Prologue

[lethalfalcon]

Alright, new blood. Hooray!

Okay, if I were to sum this up in a single word, it would be... charismatic.

I suppose I should explain now, eh? The piece drums loud the sights and sounds of the scene. The crowd's volume is mentioned several times. The changes in light are brought forth... you really work on the senses a lot. It's like you're trying to make the scene come alive in our minds with vivid clarity (and coming from me, who most people around here will attest to being ripped on for unclear scenes, that's something). I love it!

But then it falls a little short of the goal. Very little actually *happens*. The whole 6 pages are: he walks to the alter, the herald rattles off some stuff (the vast majority we don't get to hear), and then Martee dies. Hrm.  Now, as a hook, the only thing for me to really find out is *why* the guy just got the axe. This doesn't bode well, unless you're going for one of those books where the prologue is the ending, and the first chapter starts with "One year prior..." The reason is that the information is going to be passed by other characters who are likely biased. So we'll hear from person A that he died because he was an evil man. Well, was he really? We have no clue. For some, that might be a good enough hook, but for me, that's definitely a secondary story arc. Something bigger had better be happening.

You mention that this is actually important for the boy. That's good and all, but (and I hate to say this) I think it might be better if this were a flashback from the boy's perspective. The reason I feel this way is because then you can tie it to the relevance it actually has with the boy. You can show how it affects his life better, which is critical if he's a main character.

The only other problem I have (and this might just be personal preference) is that your language use dips a bit into fancy/archaic styling.  Things like

The Hanu held secrets the Endari knew not.

are an example. Now, I'm not too concerned with this as long as that's what you're going for, but it *does* slow my reading down a little bit.

So, TL;DR: Scene is very vivid, but needs more happening. Welcome to the group, and I hope to see more from you.

[Dark_Prophecy]

Well, I liked it a lot. I wouldn't change anything at all, if it doesn't jive with the rest of the book.

The way you worked the senses almost made me think this person had a magical ability that was effected by the noise of the crowd, the heat, etc. That's cool. If not, it's still good to see someone that can work the 5 senses well.

Honestly, I often wonder why we submit small pieces of a novel, since it's really hard to judge anything but the most basic grammar and spelling without knowing the rest of the story. The senses could be important, they could not. This prologue could be exactly the things that Recovering Cynic was looking for: historically relevant, showing powers, etc....or it could not. We won't know until we read more.

From what's here though, I liked it. Of the five or so pieces that I've read tonight, this one seemed to be the easiest on my eyes. Meaning that reading it wasn't any sort of a chore, and something about the word placement, dialogue, etc. reminded me of how I would write a similar scene. That's not really praise, though, since I'm not every reader in the world. Still, it's something, right?

I really enjoyed this piece. Nice job!

[Silk]

"Those in the vicinity moved away a step or two in what he took for poorly masked revulsion." This line makes me think that those with him aren't of the same ethnicity, or race, or whatever as Druka is. Interesting. (And a couple of pages later I find out that they're not. Well done.)

That Martee was going to be killed in ritual was obvious from the very first mention of the altar. That's fine if it doesn't matter to you, but if you were going for surprise you didn't get it.

Not sure I have mcuh to say to you at this point beyond "keep going." So, uhh... Keep going.

Now, as I read the others' comments on this material...

Cynic was wondering why you used this event as your prologue; I thought it worked just fine. I assume that because you included it as your prologue, this event does in fact have the kind of significance that Cynic was talking about. Also, I think that the disparity between what was supposed to happen (the High Whatsit being honoured for... well, whatever it was he did) and what actually happened (ritual killing) provide enough disparity to be interesting.

Justice commented that:

It’s also odd that he knows the name of the one leading him to his execution.

Pardon me for seeming flip, but... umm... Why?

Ahem. Seriously, though, I assumed that these people had some kind of prior relationship--probably something to do with whatever Martee was being "honoured" for.

Onto a couple other things that Justice said: He commented that there was a lot more buildup to the execution itself than necessary, and that it was all worldbuilding rather than character building. To be honest, I didn't feel like this was a problem when I was reading, but I do see what he means about insofar as this scene may be a little more effective if we're a little closer to the narrator, about whom we really know very little.

If you go back and try to add a little more about the character you might want to do so at the expense of some of the worldbuildling stuff (or the details which people have mentioned are repeated) since I think this scene will be better if it remains short and punchy.

I disagree (sorry to keep picking on you, Justice) that revealing more of the character's emotions necessarily means revealing more of what Martee has actually done. Nor am I convinced that Martee (in his own mind, anyway) has done anything worth execution.

Since others seem to have gotten something rather different out of this than I have, here's my take: Martee has done something noteworthy that has led to this ceremony in his "honour." He has no idea that he is actually being led to his execution.

I think Cynic's problem with the sun-splashed wall's line was that the structure of that sentence was particularly convoluted, not with the "sun-splashed walls" image itself, which is fine.

...And now I appear to be anticipating the responses. Maybe I should read ahead before I type this stuff out?

Like Ryos, I picked up that the tone was "off" from the beginning. Err... that sounded rather more negative than I meant it to. What I mean is that the tone of the story made it clear early on that not all was at it seemed. I spent the first  few pages wondering how it would go horribly wrong, and when the altar was revealed it was an instant "Ah-HAH! THAT's how it'll happen!"

Regarding what lethalfalcon said: I'm not convinced that this should be a flashback, and I'm not sure I'm convinced that this scene needs more to "happen." Honestly, I think that the conflict that you have in this scene is sufficient. What I am noticing is that other people don't seem to be picking up the same things that I did--or I'm just making stuff up--so I would suggest that maybe the underlying conflict(s) of this scene need to be brought out more.

Those are my (as per usual) rather lengthy thoughts on your prologue.

Prophecy: The process isn't perfect, that's for sure. I WILL say that it gets a lot easier to make useful comments once each project gets farther along and we can start to see the shape of it. We've been getting a lot of prologues and first chapters lately, and yeah, the sum of the comments for those is rarely more than "Keep going."