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Fleur Du Mal -> RE: Crescent War: Shadows of Dawn - Comments (6/8/2009 8:53:42)
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Hi!
Sorry that it took me so long to return to your story. I'm continuing from where I left off in the WA, that should be around scene two in chapter 2. I did read the rest of chapter 2 already earlier but got swiped away before I could sit myself down to write the comments. Anyways, I hope you don't mind my butchering, do remember that these are my very much non-professional opinions only.
On a general note, you have pretty good descriptions there. It's easy to imagine the surroundings and the mood of both of the sets you present there, it's easy to live and breath with the story. I saw you used quite a lot repetition there. Was it intentional, to enhance the mood? I'm asking this because, imho, there's something slightly off with the repetition now, it doesn't quite give all the impact it could give. I'll try to point out what I mean when going through the text.
1)quote:
He brought up his head, blond-tipped locks bouncing around startlingly blue eyes, and stared at the empty suit of armor. The armor that would now finally be put to use.
Here, imo, the repetition works. Not all of the 'empty suit of armor' are repeated, giving the latter sentence nice emphasis and continuity.
2)quote:
He had been sitting alone in his room for nearly three hours now, just sitting in his room ever since Ken had told him to go rest up for the next morning. Luca found the concept of sleep laughable now though, and didn't believe he would rest this night. So he just sat, looking around the drab room he had called home for six long years.
In contrast to the previous point, imo, the repetition isn't optimal here. Partly this may be because you just used repetition in the previous paragraph, partly because there's too much of it here. The 'sitting' gets repeated 3 times, and then there's the 'rest' repeated twice that I probably wouldn't even have noticed lest there already was the repeating of the 'sitting'. (Made me sensitive to all repetition =P)
Might I suggest some rewording?
You could finetune this by removing the second notion of it, so the emphasis moves to the end of the paragraph, giving the 'six long years' more weight.
Eg.
'He had been sitting alone in his room for nearly three hours now, ever since Ken had told him to go rest up for the next morning. Luca found the concept of sleep laughable now though, and didn't believe he would catch any. So, he just continued to sit still, looking around the drab room he had called home for six long years.'
Note that I also removed the other instance of 'rest' to put the weight on repeating the 'sitting' not on the 'resting'.
Feel free to use or ignore!
3)quote:
Not any longer though, for now he was going home. He was going back to the land of his childhood; back to the land that had robbed him of all he had ever loved. He was going back to Nightfallen,
This only my personal preference, but repeating the 'was going back' this many times seems like overdoing it. Furthermore, you are repeating very nondescriptive words - 'was' and 'going' - that aren't the most illustrative ones around, so it drags this paragraph down a notch, imo.
One possible way to cut some of the repetition out could be to merge the first two sentences:
'Not any longer though, for now his was going home; back to the land of his childhood, back to the land that had robbed him of all he had ever loved. He was going back to Nightfallen,...'
You could also replace the 'was going' with 'was returning' if you want to use a stronger verb than 'going.'
'Not any longer though, for now his was destined to return home; back to the land of his childhood, back to the land that had robbed him of all he had ever loved. He was returning to Nightfallen,...'
Don't know if this suggestion messes up your style, though... Perhaps its purpose is to just give you some ideas
4)quote:
Luca allowed himself a small, sad smile.
...
Luca gave another sad smile as he regarded the darkening horizon.
Again my personal opinion only, but when describing these kinds of little gestures, it could be worthwhile to reword the description to be more distinctively different, if one is repeating the exact same gesture/expression in the same scene.
Because now this two sentences seem so alike, both even starting with the same subject, Luca.
Eg: In the ending, you could write:
'As Luca regarded the darkening horizon, another sad smile crept to his lips.'
Just a suggestion, though.
5)quote:
Despite all the time that had passed, Luca still remembered well the night that had robbed him of his family and home.
Uhm, I'm sorry if I sound overly harsh here, but this seems like a huge understatement, in my honest opinion. Of course he remembers that night well. The splendid description you provide after this is vivid enough to make this sentence sound totally off, we are now experiencing the death of his family! Imho, 'to remember well' would fit better to describe his reminiscing of the name of a casual acquaintance.
How does the memory haunt him? Does it torture him? Weigh heavily on his mind? You could describe him flinching as the memories comes back yet again, for example, thus showing us that he /does/ remember, and that the memory is utterly painful to him.
6)quote:
Luca looked straight into her lightless, blue eyes; those eyes that would forever be opened;
Just a suggestion, if you want to use a stronger verb than 'to be' here: 'stay' and 'remain' would fit in here equally well, imo.
7)quote:
Glass shattered and tore at his skin, drawing angry lines of read on his face and hands.
Just a typo, I think. 'red'
8)quote:
He stood wearily, the fires of pain briefly overwhelming his mind.
Not 100% sure, but shouldn't this be 'stood up' ?
9)quote:
When he looked up, the werewolf was trying to tare through the same window that he had come through, the considerably larger beast only managing to stick its head and one flailing arm through.
The word 'through' gets repeated here a lot. Also, since it's pretty obvious what window we are talking about, you actually could remove that bolded part, imo.
10)quote:
In his fear bridled mind, The twisted forms of Nightfallen trees loomed up threateningly,
Me suspects 'fear-bridled' is a compound modifier and thus needs a hyphen. Also, there's a typo: uncapitalization of the 'T' is needed. =P
11)quote:
Yes, Luca remembered all to well that night six years ago.
Just a typo: 'too'
Also, if you end up modifying the 'remembering well' sentence I nagged about previously, you might want to do a little edit to this, too.
That's all I got for now. I hope at least some of this will be useful to you and even more I hope I didn't overdo this criqueing... Do note me if I did!
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