Hi,
My comments@@
Everything I say is gospel.
<grin>
Bowbow
Just kidding. It's all IMO only.
You're the author, you know more about
your story than anyone else. Write what you
want and have fun.
Agree. Though cnc from noted authors will help
your exposure. I myself didn't read the original
fic, before Allyn's cnc.
And the best way to get Cnc?
(all together now!)
Send lots yourself!
Hmm... Allyn, this wouldn't be a clever ploy
before you send something yourself?
(I just hit the 99% mark on Bedlam Fire
and I'm taking a break from carnage and
angst by catching up on my C&C)
You LUCKY person you.
A-ha!
Episode One
The tower was tall. It extended far into the
sky, but was short of Heaven by a hair.
@@Nice. Lyrical, descriptive and
attention getting.
Nodnod. Also, a tad funny.
Outside, all around the tower lay dust, which
was the remains of a forest, covering the land
for miles around.
.not so good.
Inside, on the top floor,
worked a very short mage named Morris, wearing
suggest:
vertically challenged
^.^
a tattered green robe, conducting strange
experiments with odd twisting equipment,
creating small explosions with smoke of many
different hues.
@@Hmmm, not as good. This just doesn't
quite make it for me. Try thinking about what is
going on in detail. What precisely is "Morris" doing?
That might help you build a better picture of
what's going on in the "lab". I often write
quite long and involved scenes that NEVER get
posted, but they help me build depth in the story.
I think the problem with this, er, paragraph(?) is that,
while it tries to describe things with detail it doesn't
actually show anything.
Morris, or predictably, Morris the Mage
considered himself a simple man. Others who
knew him, there were few others, considered him
a madman, because he held a deep fear Lina
Inverse, the enemy of all who lived, would one
day destroy him, in some terribly contrived
fashion.
@@OK, lost me on this one. This was a
very awkward and convoluted paragraph.
Yes, but funny. Read this three times out
loud then rewrite it, and it'll be bueno, methinks.
It was such a great fear Morris began
researching obscure magic so he could protect
himself. Unfortunately, obscure magic drew Lina
Inverse, like a moth to a flame, but Morris
didn't know.
suggest:
but Morris didn't know that
or:
which Morris didn't know / was unaware of
TJSP(OSLT)
Inevitably, she was opposite him standing on
the other side of his lab admiring his decor.
@@I don't really have a picture of Morris, what
he's doing or why. I may be mistake but
it seems as if you're relying heavily on
readers being familiar with "Slayers"
and jumping directly into your story
as if it were a "Slayers" episode.
IMO, take some time to build up "Morris"
his motivations, fears, etc. I found this
to be very abrupt and choppy- - to the point
I didn't care much about what happened.
Easy way to do this is letting us see the world
through his eyes. Have him do something, or
think something.
Like many wanted posters of her Morris had
seen, Lina Inverse was as described: a young
teenage girl, with long red hair, a black cape,
and red modest clothing.
Wanted posters? So this place can't be
A)Sailoon
As she is a personal friend of the Royalty,
B)Zephielia
Unless Luna's feeling REALLY(well, averagely) nasty,
C)Elmekia Empire
As they have built a statue dedicated to her(If you take movie
1 as canon... Remember, due to Lina's actions the part which became
Mipross Island never separated from the mainland.)
It's your story, though. Maybe this's near Atlas City...
@@LINA: "Is that a crack about my BREASTS!-- GIGA
SLAVE-----
Nah, Lina'd only use a Dragu Slave...
Never before did Morris ever feel such immense
fear.
@@Why?
I can see this, but still, elaborate. Though if he's
been living in terror all this time, it might actually be
a relief.
"Wow, makes the last lab look just like a
blight in the sky!" Lina casually said.
@@Huh?
The tower was insanely tall...
Morris slowly replied, "Thank you." After
taking a moment to reflect on false bravado
lessons he attended years before
@@Cute.
, he continued,
"Now then, please allow me one small pleasure.
How did you manage to sneak past all of my
nefarious traps?"
"It was easy! I just followed you in!" Lina
cheerfully answered. "If you want to be
secretive about anything, then you should look
behind you once in a while. You never know who
might be there!" She winked at him, wagging her
right pointer finger.
@@As opposed to her "wrong" pointer finger?
Right!
er, not left, I presume. It IS a bit convoluted...
A moment passed as Morris mentally scrambled to
remember his contingency plan.
Looking at the floor, he remembered it.
@@ Because he'd cleverly chiseled the plan
on the floor, tele-prompters not having been
invented yet.
"Inverse, don't think just because you made it
all the way here with no problem that I have no
tricks! Look below your feet! With that, I
won't let you take my life's works!"
@@LINA: "You won't let me take your life's work
with my feet? How ^�bout if I pick it up with my
hand's?"
MORRIS: "That's different. Go right ahead."
Er, wasn't his life's work keeping Lina away from him?
Ain't that a failure, already?
"Do not mock it! It is a summoning spell that
will bring into this room a very violent and
chaotic creature...and it will be ready to do
as I bid!" Morris struck the floor with the
butt of his staff.
@@STAFF: "Owwwww, that huuuuurrrrts!"
Violent and chaotic . . .Asuza?
Most likely.
The room began to shake. A hot light began to
pour out of the arcane symbol lines. A sweet
smell began to fill the room from the melting
candy.
@@I'm still trying to figure out where
the candy came from. Remember your readers
can't SEE what you can. You need to add
a little more description.
nodnod
It was this moment a young, tall blonde
swordsman wearing blue armour entered the room.
He was Gourry Gabriev, considered by some
Lina's formidable bodyguard. In reality though,
he was Lina's formidable enemy, at the
breakfast, lunch, and dinner table.
@@Hmmm, almost works. The
timing is a little off. Too wordy, IMO.
Has potential. Worth keeping. I'd
try playing with different word groupings.
Example::
At that moment Gourry Gabriev
entered the room. Thought to be
Lina's formidable body-guard, he
was, in reality, Lina's formidable enemy^�
at the breakfast, lunch and dinner table.
OR
Gourry Gabrieve entered the room at that
moment. Lina's true friend, and truer rival
at the dinner table.
This is the sort of little word play that
_seems_ easy at first glance, but takes
hours, many, many hours to tweak until
it works just right. It's worth the effort in
this case.
The blood drained from Morris' face. He
would've shouted, "Hey you!" since moving an
object on an arcane symbol when it was being
used to cast a spell would have serious side
effects.
He would've continued speaking, "Don't touch
that, unless you want to kill us all by
summoning a star into this room, or voiding all
existence!"
Instead though, he chose to turn around and run
towards his broom closet. But when there was no
explosion or sudden loss of everything behind
him, Morris stopped running. He slowly turned
around.
@@Started out cute, but fizzled just a bit.
Again, it seems to me as if you're giving a
summary of a video you're watching. Give
the reader more detail.
Ref:
Pratchett, Discworld.
Works nicely with Slayers.
Or, You could go by the original novels
(which are mostly written as Lina's internal dialogue.
Insightful, that.)
@@MORRIS: "You've ruined my ^�Bring forth
Big-Breasted-Biker-Bimbos-From-Hell who will
crush my enemies with their massive mammaries'
spell!!!"
the Naga Summoning?
The two people, who were teenagers, seemed to
be bickering. Evidently one, a black hair boy
with a pigtail, red shirt, and black pants,
said something incredibly insulting to the
other, a short brunette hair girl, who was
wearing a blue dress, since after the boy had
finished speaking, the girl hit the boy over
the head knocking him unconscious.
@@Description stilted.
Pigtail+Red=Ranma.
Pheh. Don't have to actually READ the sentence to know what happens.
'tis the corruption caused by powers of Law and Order
Morris fell to his knees in despair. One
thought passed through his mind before he hit
the ground, "Tomorrow, I'm digging a deep,
unending hole, so I can jump into it, and never
come out!"
@@Cute. However, try:
Morris fell to his knees in despair."Tomorrow,
I'm digging a deep, unending hole, so I can jump
into it, and never come out!"
@@Simply cutting one, redundant IMO, sentence
changes the tempo. Again, play with things like this.
You've got some good stuff, but it's getting lost
because you're being too wordy. There's got to
be a balance between too much detail and not enough.
Yup. Use as small amount of words as you can while expressing
what you want as accurately as necessary.
An old, cracking voice boomed through the room.
"It is only the greatest summoning spell ever
created by myself, Morris the Mage! Behold the
monstrous creature from another dimension, Rip
van Winkle!"
@@Cute.
Translation:Funny, as in I'm smiling, but not laughing out loud.
The monstrous creature from another dimension
blinked a couple times to shoo sleep away from
its eyes. "So little human, it was you who
awoke me from my three thousand year slumber?"
Everyone looked at the old mage. Morris
acknowledged the question with a nod. Very
quickly, the monstrous creature from another
dimension threw a ball of fire at Morris.
"That's for waking me up!" Rip's voice boomed.
As suddenly as the monstrous creature from
another dimension appeared, it disappeared.
@@^_^ OK. I laughed. I shouldn't have, but I did.
Ditto.
Everyone, minus Morris who was burned to a
crisp, blinked.
"Wow, what a grump! And that's after three
thousand years of sleep! I'd really hate to
wake him up after only five hundred!"
<SNIP>
<SNIP>
It grew from her hands, a red ball of light. It
shot forward towards the falling tower, and
then hit the tower with the force of Ruby Eye
Shabranigdo's, the mazoku lord, personal power.
A look of terror passed over Gourry's face.
"No, not the Dragon Slave! She didn't use -
that-?"
The force of the explosions pushed Zelgadis and
Lina back. "Everybody stay behind us!" Lina
shouted. "Zel and I have shields up protecting
us from the spells!"
Ranma looked at Gourry rolling up into a little
ball. "Um, Akane, do you think, maybe, that we
should be scared?"
That's quite nice.
@@AKANE: (shoving Ranma in front of her)
"I'm a martial artist too. I'M not scared!"
Question: Does this "I'm a martial artist, too" phrase
come out of Anime or something? I see it lots, but in the
manga I have MAYBE seen it once.
I mean, I don't see Ranma continuously repeating some unique
comment in the 'fics.
Hm. Here's a couple:
RANMA:"I hate comedians"
AKANE:"Kasumi, you always overreact to everything"
<SNIP>
"Now, who are you, and where did you come
from?"
"Jeez, how many times do we gotta say who we
are?
@@ Naga (the serpent):"As many times as I ask, little
man!"
Me Ranma. Her Akane. Come from big city
called Tokyo on little island called Japan."
@@TONTO: "White man steal land. Now yellow-man
steal schtick. Red-man no can get break."
Shan Pu: "No work for ugly man. Only work cute
big breasted girl."
LOL
<SNIP>
Ranma and Akane watched Zelgadis leave.
"Wow," said Ranma, "I never thought I'd meet
someone as depressing as P-chan!" He received
an elbow in his gut from Akane for the comment.
@@RYOUGA: "Where in the Multi-verse am I now?"
RANMA: "What are you doing here?"
RYOUGA: "It's cliched, but the work is steady."
<SNIP>
End Episode One
@@Overall: C
Some VERY cute stuff and an absolutely
brilliant opening line. However . . .the descriptions
are minimal and much of the dialogue is rushed
and stilted. I like the idea and I think it's worth
continuing. IMO, you only need to spend some
more time on developing the story. It reads as if
you were trying to rush to get it finished.
I know the feeling. ^_^
You've got a good beginning here. Just go
back thorough and build a more detailed word
picture of what's going on.
When I'm writing it's as if I'm watching the action.
THEN I have to figure out how to put what I'm seeing
into words. In your case . . .just give us some more
detail.
Build a clearer picture of what's happening. Dialogue
is
very difficult. Don't be afraid to play with the
words. Try
several variations of a particular line until you get
_just_ the right combination. Sometimes just changing
the punctuation can make all the difference.
Mm.
Though, making people run around head over heels, works,
if they have some sort of breakdown later.
Now my own personal disclaimer.
I do C&C in the hopes that it will help
other writers improve their writing. In the same
way I WANT to get C&C.
However, C&C is very personal and subjective.
Because I say something, does NOT make it so.
If you have ten readers, you'll get ten different
opinions. SO . . .this is MY opinion, flawed,
subjective
and . . .not very good. IF I have said ANYTHING that
helps you, I'm very glad. But, it's your story. NEVER
let ANYONE take that away from you. Write WHAT you
enjoy
the way you enjoy it. Write a lot, read a lot. That
will
help you much more than I ever could.
Keep writing and good luck.
Ditto.
________________________________________________________________
Ilmainen Internet @ http://www.nic.fi/