posted
Please find the following 13 lines (hope its right - although the fourteenth line is a great one :0) ) from the first chapter of a fantasy/crime novel. The novel is set in an alternative Renaissance period and is fantasy/detective crossover. The MC is a reluctant investigator. Don't want to say too much as I'm interested in reader's impressions of him.
Just feedback on this fragment would be much appreciated. Thanks.
As soon as I heard the tread of the guards’ footsteps on the cobbles three stories below my bedchamber, I was worried. I was up and dressed before they’d began pounding on my door. I did a mental check. Stolen anything lately? No. Someone else’s wife? Not lately. Someone else’s daughter? Ditto. I scratched at my perfectly trimmed beard. I had done nothing wrong. No doubt about it: I was in trouble. “Open up, in the name of the Emperor.” That did it. It was time to leave. I opened the doors to the balcony, not seeing the guard stationed in the street below. Unfortunately, he proved more alert. “Sir, he’s in there,” he shouted.
"Someone else's daughter." As opposed to what -- his own? Yuck. I'd say "Someone's daughter."
"I had done nothing. No doubt about it: I was in trouble." At this point, I don't know your world well enough yet. I *think* he's making a joke -- but why? Surely being arrested is serious. (BTW I hope you'll avoid a problem that Tomb Raider, the movie, had: the MC gave a little half-smile the whole time, so that you knew she wasn't the least bit worried about the horrible phyiscal dangers she encountered. As a result, neither was I, and I was bored. I prefer anxiety -- at least in fiction!)
posted
Good start. For clarity I would substitute "cobbles" for "cobble-stones" I didn't like the "perfectly trimmed beard" I realize it gives info about the character and what he thinks about himself but it felt a little corny. I'd drop the "perfectly". I agree, "somebody's daughter" is better than "somebody else's daughter". It gives info about the treatment of women in this society.
Posts: 507 | Registered: Jun 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
Isn't it "three storeys" below, not "three stories"? Or is that a US/UK English difference I'm not familiar with?
You do a fine job of establishing the narrator's character, but that character does appear somewhat cliched - vain, clever (or thinks himself to be clever), obsessed with style.
Dressing, in Renaissance times, was a pretty major task, with all manner of ties and hooks and the like (indeed, for anyone but a peasant, it often required a groom/maidservant to assist).
I'd read on, but I need to know pretty soon that you're really comfortable in handling the milieu.
Oh, and fantasy-detective is an incredibly hard sell, judging by the guidelines I've been looking at lately.
posted
I'd keep reading. I'm on the fence about the bread, but it bugged me a bit too. It says something about him that he's thinking that, though.
Posts: 811 | Registered: Jan 2005
| IP: Logged |
One chief nit, which is the line "Open up, in the name of the Emperor" that somewhat seems to just materialize into being from the vaccuum. Although I did read about the MC's expectation about the imminent door poundings that were sure to come as the guards approached, but then we hear no footsteps outside the door, nor a door-pounding. Not a serious nit, but there were a few neurons firing in me when I read that part, saying in essence 'Where did that voice come from, anyway? Is it coming through the door? Hmm, I suppose it is. But why wasn't there a knock? Guess it was just implied.' The lack of any specific mentioning of a door-knocking had me just *this much* distracted. For me, if I was writing this, the door-pounding would have psychological value, as a device that makes the MC jump out of his skin, the knocking mirroring his confused, possibly fearfully beating heart. It makes me think of those times when someone was after me...a parent, a bully, a landlord...and that damning Pound Pound Pound on the door, shaking me to the core, as if they were actually pummelling me directly with their fist. And it never fails to scare the daylights out of me. The pounding brings it all home, loud and clear as day: Oh man, I'm so screwed. Others may have a bone to pick with me on this, I fear, however.
All in all, a good beginning tho, I admit.
[This message has been edited by Nietge (edited June 16, 2006).]
posted
Thanks very much for all your feedback. Much appreciated. Although this is the first time I've posted on this site I've been reading it for a while. At first I found the whole thirteen line thing tremendously frustrating, but I have been won around! It really made me think about what I was writing.
Mommiller, I would love to send you this, but its really not ready to be read yet. Mainly fragments that I need to work on! I will let you know when its ready to be read.
Printer-friendly view of this topic
