[FFML] Mobile Suit Gundam Storm, Ch. 6

[Arthur Hansen]

On Wed, May 25, 2011 at 6:59 PM, Andrew Dynon <adynon at internode.on.net> wrote:
> Ouch.  Yeah, as I've said, I'm aware that descriptiveness is one of my
> weaknesses (and part of this is not being aware when I need to go into more
> detail until it's pointed out to me).  I do want to build better emotional
> intensity, and would appreciate any advice on how to go about it.  Nothing
> against you for pointing this out.

A lot of what helps evoke really strong feelings is the descriptive in
this, I think. Athene and Pallas being shown to to have dilated eyes,
shaking hands, invading other people's personal space with such things
as 'heavy sweat that left her cold as she exited her barely
functioning mobilesuit'.

> As for the first-person perspective, I have seen it used in various books
> (and I'm not into the detective genre), although I'll grant that those books
> usually followed a single character for their entire length, with no
> perspective shifts.  I did originally try to write the first chapter in
> third-person perspective, but didn't feel like it was gelling for me and
> ended up switching.

1st person narrative might have made *exceedingly* good sense for
Athene/Pallas... everyone else felt incredibly forced.

> I should try and proofread my emails better to try and make sure
> autoformatting hasn't done weird things.

Eh, that's the pure-text limitations of FFML. I argued that it should
at least allow Rich Text, but I was told 'nope, not going to happen.'

There's a reason I don't post most of my stories on the list. It rips
*too* much of my formatting off. Italics plays too much an emphasis in
how I write these days.

> Thanks for the C&C.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Arthur Hansen [mailto:arthurh3535 at gmail.com]
> Sent: Thursday, 26 May 2011 7:54 AM
> To: The Fanfiction Mailing List; Andrew Dynon
> Subject: Re: [FFML] Mobile Suit Gundam Storm, Ch. 6
> On Thu, May 19, 2011 at 3:09 PM, Andrew Dynon <adynon at internode.on.net>
> wrote:
> {snip}
>
> I know I'm going to sound like a broken record... but the descriptiveness in
> this chapter went beyond minimalism. And then the shifting first person
> perspective didn't help. I've always been a believer in 3rd person narration
> unless the *scene* needs first person narration. Really, the only time I've
> seen 1st person narration work is usually pulp private investigators
> introducing important plot points in a vaguely interesting way of Info-Dump
> or if it you use it to show why someone is apparently going nuts and making
> insane decisions, to let you understand their POV that can not be easily
> explained in their person.
>
> But even gum-shoe detective stories usually switch to 3rd person narration
> when there's more than three people around.
>
> "We returned to our ship."
>
> This is incredibly dull and doesn't really show us anything about the ships.
> Is it a big, ominous black ship with MS bays on its back and shaped like a
> preying mantis? Or does it evoke a flat-angled ocean-going missile cruiser
> and is covered in long range bombardment cannons?
>
>
> We are getting a lot of names thrown at us at times and nothing that
> triggers 'oh, that's the nervous doctor that wears glasses as an affection'
> or the slightly tubby commander with a crew-cut and mustache that is
> desperately trying to not show he's too old to command.
>
> I saw some other formatting bugs, but I think that was 'smart'
> punctuation copying of "..." that defaulted to a single "." and disrupted
> the flow of the conversation.
>
> While there is definitely supposed to be some very intense emotions shown,
> it didn't *evoke* those emotions to me that well.
>
> YMMV!
>
> --
> Arthur Hansen
>
>
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-- 
Arthur Hansen