The Young Writer's Dilemma

I'm not sure if this problem exists in other arts, but in writing, people are generally expected to write around their real job.

There's a pair of crappy words. They exist for the sole reason of forcing writers to answer their calling in a few hours of free time. Believe it or not, writing (and learning to write) is work. So a successful writer is expected to have no life outside of work, period.

One can't go to college to learn writing, specifically - at least not in my corner of the US -, which means that young writers must dice their writing time even smaller, between absurd amounts of homework, a job to keep them alive, and the job they actually want.

Society needs writers, and yet does nothing to foster them. Our services are expected to be done well, for a cheap price, and around the obligations that make us normal citizens.

Christ, but I wonder if there isn't something easier out there--like digging ditches, or swimming to the moon.

Critique: Night of the Demons

This is an excerpt from a piece I found at writingforums.org, used with permission.

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Danath hoisted the elk that was draped over his shoulders, [Comma error] in a futile attempt to spread the kill’s weight out over his back a bit more evenly. [You’re using a lot of extra words here. How many of these words are pushing you closer to the start of your story, and how many of them are just sitting there? “Danath struggled beneath the weight of the dead elk” expresses the same idea quicker and clearer. Beware of adverbs, especially ones that end in the –ly suffix, and forms of “to be.” They’re both stylistically weak. Compare my example sentence to your own. Mine may not cram as many ideas into the sentence as yours – but it expresses them all the same, and with fewer words. Also, try to avoid using phrases like “a bit.” Where they work well for certain narrative voices, they are disastrous for others. Notice how, in your original sentence, “a bit more evenly” can be sliced off the back without changing the meaning. Spreading the kill’s weight over his back implies a need for evenness. “A bit” literally serves no function for you. Treat it like any bad employee and fire it.] It was no good; he knew they would hail him as a conquering hero back in the little town, for bringing in a bit of meat in these trying times, but that certainly didn’t make the actual act of bringing the stag in any easier. [You’re trying to pack too many ideas into one sentence. In this single sentence we have several ideas: {1} His efforts aren’t helping (“It was no good”) – {2} The villagers will praise him for the meat he brings – {3} He lives in trying times, and – {4} their praise won’t make bringing the stag in easier. Relate ideas in complex sentences to one another more closely. Idea three really doesn’t connect well with the other ideas, so put it somewhere else. Also, consider that “the little town” and “they” do not tell me anything about your world. In fact, they make it seem somewhat generic. If Danath lives in this town, he’ll know what it is called. He might even have a cynical or endearing pet name for it. He won’t be thinking about the townsfolk as a faceless pronoun, he’ll be thinking about specific people.] Nor did the thick blanket of fresh snow; he desperately wished he hadn’t stayed that last day in the forest. But then, through the thicket of trees he would not have been able to tell if it was snowing, [How could a thicket impede one’s ability to detect snow? Spend a night out in the woods; believe you me, you’ll be aware of every single iota of horrible weather. If the trees are so thick at their tops that snow can’t fall through, you need to point this out.] and this new carpet might have been days old yet. He was nearing the tall, timber walls that protected the town from attackers, [Everyone knows what a town wall is for. You don’t need to specifically point out that it protects the town from attackers. Be aware, though, that Danath would be coming across houses and farmsteads long before he got to the wall. The walls would protect a central portion of the town, and people would flee to them for protection.] thinking that he might, after all, need to lay down his burden and rest, when an arrow whizzed past his head, whistling in his ear and making him whip around in search of its source. [Try to express this action sequence with fewer words, and disconnect it from the idea that he needs to lay the elk down. I would start a new paragraph and then go into the attack. EG, “An arrow sliced through the air by Danath’s head. He whirled around, his eyes moving in zigs and zags as he scanned the trees.] The force of his turn was carried mostly in the body upon his shoulders, and the weight swinging around him knocked him, unbalanced, into the snow. Furious, and fearful, Danath fumbled his sword and his footing as he tried to stand, wallowing in the white annoyance, and then his fear deepened; he heard the indistinguishable [Indistinguishable or unmistakable?] sound of laughter ringing towards him.

I have two pieces of advice for you.

1. Misusing a word (or using it strangely) will cause any editor worth his pen to send you a rejection letter, stat. You might consider buying the Merriam-Webster Vocabulary Builder. It is packed with information, and if you actually do the activities inside it, you’ll be a walking word expert inside of two weeks.

2. Use fewer complex sentences. A smattering of simple sentences will lend your prose readability. People reading fiction are generally doing so to relax. A paragraph full of 50 word sentences won’t let them do so. Many will stop reading for no reason besides, “I just didn’t like it.” Simple sentences, and even an occasional well-placed sentence fragment, add a pleasing rhythm to fiction.

But don’t abandon the complex sentence! Instead, pick up a few books by authors you enjoy and diagram a few of their paragraphs at random. Compare the number of simple sentences to the number of complex ones. Compare the rhythms of different ratios.

A human was walking towards him, her step light and graceful, the type of person who could move through thick undergrowth and beds of autumn leaves without leaving a trace of sound or step. In fact, he looked behind her, and noticed the tracks she left in the snow were neither as deep nor as pronounced as his own. She wore a tabard; the crest of the kingdom’s guard was upon her chest. Danath had to smile, now. Only one woman could wear those colors and send an arrow flying so tantalizingly [Tantalizingly?] close to his ear. [What does her ability to wear the town guards’ tabard have to do with her ability to fire a bow?] Jenna stopped laughing as she approached him, her expression turning to one of amazement as she saw the carcass he had dropped.

“Good hunting, Danath! And successful, I see!” She was still too far away to speak in normal tones, and Danath’s hand tightened on his sword. Jenna noticed, of course, [Of course is a lot like a bit. Kill the phrase and your sentence works better.] and although her tone was mocking, she did indeed lower her voice.

This is a point of view error. You’ve been inside Danath’s head right up until you introduced Jenna. Now you’re in her head. Danath won’t notice her noticing. He might noticing where her eyes are, but he’ll never be 100% sure what she notices. Also, I’m not sure how the beginning of this paragraph relates to the end of it. She indeed lowered her voice… because his sword hand was tightening… because she fired an arrow? I don’t see the logic. More logical would be his sword hand loosening because he recognized a friend… and her voice lowering as she approached.

“No one is around, you worrywart. I would have seen them from my tree… you were the only soul for miles.” She smiled, and he was warmed by the expression. Jenna wasn’t his; and in any case, it was a look of friendship in her eyes. She was not the sort he could harbor affection for. Even if she was not married, and a mother, Danath fell for the more ladylike; a woman who needed help climbing a tree was far more attractive to him than this, he had a hard time thinking woman, but forced himself to, who spent her days climbing trees to do the man’s job of guarding the town. [This sentence has 57 words. Remember your audience! They’re reading for fun, not to work.] Indeed, [Indeed either means “in fact” or else is used as a surprised exclamation. Would you have written “in fact” here? This word is over-used, especially in unpublished fantasy. Consider that, when you revise.] even though her children had often sat upon his knees, Danath had a hard time looking at Jenna and considering her a mother. He knew her to be a soldier, and a good one at that.

“Jenna.” He smiled back at her, meeting her look of kinship, and then looked to the animal on the ground. She followed his gaze.

“I see you made a kill on your hunt.” She repeated her earlier sentiment, but without the cheer she held last time.

“I did. A stag… I know. But there’s precious little else to hunt. Would you have preferred a bear?” He couldn’t meet her eyes when he said it. He tried not to kill elk for no other reason than her affection for them, and had probably known in his heart that she wouldn’t be able to join in the feast his kill would bring. She didn’t reply directly to him, nor did she continue to look at the animal. With effort, Danath pulled it back onto his shoulders. Jenna no longer looked at him, training her eyes on the town gates. He knew she would have preferred a bear.

What part of Jenna’s upbringing caused her to be fond of elk? Why does she hang around in trees? Why is she different? These aren’t necessarily questions you’ve got to answer here, immediately, but they’re factors you must think about if you do not want Jenna to seem like a stereotype.

“We’ve missed you ‘round here, Shea will be happy to see you back.” She paused, the abrupt change of subject was something she had never been particularly good at. “I think it’s because her house is snowed in to the windows. But that’s what you signed up for, isn’t it?”

[…] Jenna’s home looked like a frosted brown cake, with snow piling high on the roof and a candle glowing in every window. […][I love this sentence.]

And cut.

Every paragraph, you need to consider how your opening connects to your ending. Even in fantasy, the beginning sentence of your paragraph needs to be the leader of the rest of the paragraph.

If you open up a paragraph with an arrow flying past someone’s head, then the rest of the paragraph needs to support that idea. It needs to contain character reactions or events that directly unfold because of the arrow. The same is true of dialogue. A new topic will almost always equal a new paragraph.

Later in the segment you sent me, demons attack while Jenna and Danath are eating. You need to start your story there, instead of with Danath killing an elk.

Why?

Because the death of the elk does not appear to be central to your plot. You introduce your characters there, but you don’t give me any special information about them – nothing that you’ll be able to specifically draw upon later in your story. The demon attack, however, is an important event that appears to set your entire story in motion.

I hope some of this helps.

Over and out.

Critique: Hidden Canyon

Another excerpt from Absolute Write's Share Your Work forum, used with permission.

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George awoke to the feel of a rough gloved hand across his mouth. In the dim glow from the bedside clock, he could see his neighbor Bill, a finger in front of his lips, signifying silence. Bill whispered, "Get dressed and follow me, quickly. I'll explain outside." Bill had been his neighbor just long enough to earn a measure of trust, so George dressed quickly, then followed Bill down the hall and out the back door.

I like that you started at an interesting point in your story, and with an explosive first line. However, I see a few details jarred me from the story.

1. Starting with the main character waking up can be seen as a cliché, even though your character is waking up in an astonishing fashion. This didn’t bother me, but it may bother some editors.

2. In English speaking cultures, everyone knows that a finger over one’s lips is silencing. When you explicitly describe this motion, I feel like you’re wasting a little space. Bill could shush George, saving you words.

3. If the only light is his digital clock, and Bill just woke up, will he really recognize his next door neighbor? It might be better, both for your story logic and for your style, if you introduce George and let Bill be a dark figure for a few lines.

4. Telling me that Bill has earned a measure of trust isn’t enough to get me to believe that George wouldn’t have freaked out.

5. Why did Bill put his hand over George’s mouth instead of shaking him awake, whispering his name, or tapping him?


"Where's Amy?" asked Bill as he glanced back over his shoulder to make sure George was sticking close.

"Her mom's been ill, so she went to visit her for a few days. What the hell's going on, Bill?"

I have trouble believing that George would have gone into such detail, given the odd circumstances.

"Hold on, just a few minutes more. I want to get away from the house first. Trust me that long, ok?"

I’d really like to be in George’s head right now. What questions is he asking himself? What answers is he coming up with? For instance, wouldn’t he wonder how Bill got inside?

"Alright," said George. His voice was a bit gruff from being awakened in the middle of the night, and a little fearful from the stress of the situation. His concerns and fears rumbled through his mind as he followed quietly behind Bill, who moved swiftly yet silently across the yard, as he expected from the ex-marine. [The clause on the end of this phrase needs revised. Your “he” in this sentence, grammatically, is referring back to Bill, even though logically I know you must mean George.] Although he tried to emulate Bill's cat-like movements, he felt awkward and out of place trying to be quiet and inconspicuous. What was he doing, he wondered, sneaking through his own back yard like a thief in the night?

Thief in the night is a clichéd phrase. I’d consider finding your own way to say this. I would also try to find a way to kill the adverbs. They’re telling me that Bill is quick and sneaky – but you could be showing me the same details.

They crossed the lawn toward the thick woods that edged the back of the property. Bill led the way along a path that wound through the woods, then up the face of the hill at the back of the development. The full moon and crisp autumn sky allowed for a clear view of the landscape. The homes below appeared haphazardly [If you kill the adverb here, I think your sentence would be stronger.] strewn on their five to ten acre plots. Some of the homes were in the recent 'McMansion' style, but most were less easily classified, ranging from sprawling ranches to old-fashioned saltboxes. Swimming pools and outbuildings were common, including garages, workshops, greenhouses, and others with no readily-apparent use. [I’m not sure this laundry list at the end of your paragraph is helping any.]

I really like the McMansion line.

Bill led them behind a granite boulder the size of George's Grand Cherokee high above his home. Behind it, sitting on the pine needles and leaves, were two other men. One was older than George, somewhat familiar, and a bit rumpled looking as befit the time of day, while the other one looked perfectly alert, fit and trim, perhaps in his mid-twenties. They waved a casual greeting to the Bill and George, then cleared a spot for them to sit.

"George, this is Frank Stevens and Larry Winston. You probably remember Frank from the fourth of July cookout." George remembered the jolly, rotund man with the graying hair. The older man nodded at George as he reached out to take his hand in a firm grip.

"Yes, I remember," George said. "Nice to see you again, Frank. I remember that brand new bright red Jag convertible you were driving. That sure is a beautiful car."

The small talk about cars is really jarring me from the scene.

George noticed the grim look on Frank's face as he answered. "Yeah, it is, I hope I get to keep it."

"What do you mean, you hope you get to keep it?" When Frank just shook his head, George turned back to Bill. "Are you ready to tell me why you dragged me all the way up here in the middle of the night?"

Without answering George, Bill glanced over at Frank. "Anything happening yet?"

Frank shook his head in negation, keeping his eyes on the roads below.

Bill leaned back against the boulder and rubbed his hands together to ward off the autumn chill. "Well, I guess we've got time for the short version before the excitement starts. Not only is Frank a doctor, his hobby is firearms. He's a licensed dealer, and he has some guns that are illegal for the average guy to own. Apparently that's reason enough for the local ATF office to occasionally decide he must be doing something illegal and try to prove it. His home's been raided twice before, and it's going to get raided again in a little while." When George started to interrupt, Bill waved him off.

This feels like you’re giving this information for the reader’s benefit instead of the other characters’ benefit. It almost feels like an ex-marine quickly briefing someone, but it falls just short. Cut a few details, or perhaps reword it a bit.

"Luckily the county sheriff is a friend and knows Frank better than that, so he sent his son up to warn him when he heard what was planned." Bill gestured toward the younger of the two men. "Larry's a county deputy. Larry, this is George Adams. He's only been living in the area a few months."

I feel like this information is being presented solely for my benefit.

Larry stuck out his hand for a quick greeting, nodding to George as he did so. Larry's grip was firm. George noticed the well-defined muscles in his forearms and guessed that he was much stronger than his slim frame indicated. He wondered how many times someone on the wrong side of the law had underestimated the deputy, simply because he was a few inches shorter than the average lawman. The two men exchanged pleasantries, then George turned back toward Bill.

"Well, I have to say it's nice meeting your two friends, and I'm sorry to hear about Frank's problems," George said, "but what's that got to do with me?"

Larry took the lead in the conversation. "Mr. Adams, we're not really sure. All we know is there are two addresses on the warrants, and the second address is yours."

###

Eight matte-black ATF vans turned off the Interstate and rolled down Jefferson Avenue, their headlights winking off as they entered the subdivision. They turned right into a boulevard flanked by stone walls. A sign between the lanes of the entrance proclaimed that they were entering Hidden Canyon Estates. The trees that lined the boulevard rustled gently in the backwash of the wake left by the speeding vehicles.

In the lead vehicle, Agent Edwards shifted in the driver's seat as he thumbed the mike switch. "Strike Team, this is Strike Leader. We're go for operation. Units two through four, follow us; units five through eight, good luck."

Agent Edwards paid scant attention to the acknowledgments of the other seven units. His thoughts were on the upcoming action. He hoped there was no Kathryn Johnston involved in what should be a simple operation. If many more 92-year-old women were shot and killed during these actions, the Supreme Court might decide to reverse their position on 'no-knock' raids.

I feel like this scene should come at the very beginning. Then, if you still have Bill waking George up by grabbing his mouth, the reader will assume—briefly—that it’s your MIBs.

###

"My address?" George's sense of unreality, already triggered by the excursion up the hillside in the middle of the night, reached a new level. "Why my address? What's the ATF, and why would they be interested in me?"

"The ATF is the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. As for why, we really don't know, George," Larry said. "All we know is that no-knock raids are scheduled for two addresses in Hidden Valley. My dad was extended the courtesy of being invited along as an observer because he's the sheriff of the county. They told him to meet them at the entrance to the subdivision at 3:45, and the two addresses that were targeted. That's all the information he was given."

"Now, wait a minute. I don't own a gun or explosives, and I certainly don't have a still. I don't even smoke! I'll just go back home, and tell them they're mistaken when they arrive." His building panic was evident in the tone of his voice, although he tried hard to control it.

And cut.

I think the areas you need to focus on most are story logic and dialogue. Since I don’t know anything about George, almost all of his reactions strike me as unrealistic. I walk away from the first thousand or so words wondering why Bill is helping George, why someone would have tipped Bill off that George’s house was about to get raided, and why a group of men have risked getting in trouble with the government to protect him.

Also, I think you would benefit from reading your dialogue out loud. For the most part, your dialogue is decent – but every so often, something comes out sounding a little stiff and robotic. When you’re panicking about something, do you use words like arrive and mistaken? Those are not the words of a man who’s been woken up in the middle of the night be his neighbor and told that his house is about to be attacked.

On Critique Responses

This is an open note to everyone I do a critique for:

This is a chance for both of us to improve our abilities to critically evaluate writing. For me, it is a chance to criticize new fiction and give me both an insight into evaluating my own work, and (with luck) a chance to create a portfolio of critiques that proves that I would make a good editor.

Since this is on my blog, though, it gives you, the writer, a chance to critically evaluate opinions about your work. So, feel free to make my critique a dialogue. Want to argue with me about a specific point? Do it. You can't do this with a real editor, and you can't really get away with it at peer critique boards - but you can, and should, here.

All I ask for is civility, and in return, I'll give you as much running dialogue on your work and on my critique as you want. Because that helps both of us.

Critique #1: Devil's Angel

I pulled this from the Romance Share Your Work forum at Absolute Write, with the author's permission to critique it here.

Chapter One

“You want to do what to my what?” Nicholas asked. The music in the club was sonic-boom loud. Between drinks, he eyed the bartender at Heaven’s Gate. The local hangout for angels and the devil’s minion [Missing punctuation!]

I’d really like some indication that the bartender is female when you introduce her.

Do you mean Devil’s minion, singular, or Devil’s minions, plural? Why would demons hang out at a place with such a biased name? This is a detail you need to explain, but in the snippet I’ve got – you don’t.

Smiling, she said twice as loud as the first time, “I want to fill your glass, on the house.”

“Oh.” Laughing, he wiped his hand across his chin, slightly embarrassed. “I thought you said you wanted to feel my ass and pounce on my mou--never mind.”

This is cute, and I think you’ve got a functional opening, but I have a hard time believing that Nicholas really confused “on the house” with “pounce on my mouse.” Is he being silly or serious? It’s early enough in the book that a detail like this can jar the reader away.

The bartender arched a blond eyebrow. With a quick retort [missing comma] she answered, “That could be fun. I bet it’s more like a snake, though, not a mouse.” [In my opinion, With a quick retort, she answered is redundant. The retort is the following dialogue, yes? Or are you describing the dialogue as a quick retort? Either way, I’m thinking about it too hard. I suggest revising.]

Heat rose to his cheeks, [Comma usage error] as he spit out answers by rote. Though he acted like any other customer at the bar, relaxed and jovial, inside he was rigid and tense.

Consider this: You’ve told me that he’s rigid and tense, but without telling me why. Perhaps you could give some sensory information here instead, and show that he’s rigid and tense, while simultaneously giving a reason.

“Most definitely. But you can only touch if I get to feel yours after. Your ass, that is.” And from what Nicholas could see, she had a very nice ass.

I read through to this point twice, and I think it’d be much clearer with a speaker tag of some sort.

“That’s doable,” she said with a curious smile. “You gonna show me your wings?”

This may sound harsh, but I think all the other dialogue before this is just getting in the way. IMO, describe the bar, show us Nicholas and a sexy bartender, and have the first words uttered be, “You gonna show me your wings?” I think this would be a lot more powerful.

“Nah, that would be conceited of me. I’m not that kinda guy.” Always alert, he glanced around.

IMO, stick a speaker tag in here--and if you need to show him looking around and being alert, give it its own paragraph. This is a chance to give the reader more sensory detail.

“You know how the other male angels are about size. I don’t want to boast.”

For the briefest moment, I’m unclear about who is speaking. You don’t want this to happen! Confusion will make readers put your book down. Speaker tags!

She laughed a flirty, feminine laugh. “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours,” she teased.

Nicholas gave her a forced, but dazzling smile. “Deal. Later, eh?”

I’m not against omniscient third person perspectives, but be aware that they’re not in vogue right now. Describing his smile as dazzling betrays a bias, but I’m not sure whose.

This could’ve been fun, if he weren’t in such a foul mood. He hadn’t flirted in a long time, but imagined it was like riding a bike. At least humans always used that phrase. The only bike he’d ever ridden was a Harley.

To me, this is a close-in third person perspective, with the camera slightly inside Nicholas’s head. But in the paragraph above, you were a bit more omniscient—or, at least, your camera was in the head of a narrator who thought Nicholas had a dazzling smile.

Flirting wasn’t something he’d even considered tonight, but for some reason he forced himself.

[Why is he at this bar, then? His motive for being here has just become very muddy, and you’re not offering me an explanation.] Somehow, he thought it would magically take away his desire for Noelle. Under any other circumstances if he wanted to have sex, it was a quickie with whoever happened to be on the same wavelength as he was. In and out, literally. [Eww! Nice line, but—Ewww.] There was definitely no flirting involved.

Matter of fact, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d been with a female for sex. [Is Nicholas bisexual? If not, consider rewording this first line. It makes me think that he may have sought out some steamy man-on-man action at some point, even though the next line jibes against this.] He’d thought of taking a vow of celibacy. For approximately thirty seconds he considered it. [Cute line! Find a way to kill the adverb and make the line shorter and snappier.] Even if he were serious, it would take the approval of the Alpha and Omega [You’re missing punctuation here.] the real power couple. The puppet masters.

Nicholas wiped the condensation off the glass he held, thinking of a clever follow-up. He had none. No wonder I don’t flirt anymore.

The ice in his glass slowly melted, diluting the gin he was about to imbibe—for medicinal purposes. [The word imbibe surprised me here. It’s used correctly and all that, but it seems to go against the grain of the style you’ve been writing in.] The mind-numbing properties he loved so well were just what he needed, [Wrong punctuation: consider splitting this into two sentences, even, if different punctuation doesn’t work.] designed to cloud his better judgment. If there was any better judgment left in him, which he seriously doubted. [Good line.]

He swiveled on his seat and eyed the various angels and devil’s minions swaying and jumping on the dance floor. I’d once been just like them, [This jarred me. If other readers have said something about this line, I’d really consider revising it.] he thought as he lit the cigarette dangling from his swollen lip, a souvenir from a recent brawl.

Angels that smoke, drink and brawl. I like it.

Being carefree and looking for the next high had its perks. Bedding the next female on his long “to do” list used to be something he looked forward to.

You always use male and female and it really sounds inorganic. You’re inside Nicholas’s head most of the time, and I just don’t believe that he uses such sterile words.

Lately, emptiness filled him inside. [I’m picking a nit here, but how can emptiness fill something?] Years of battle wore on his soul like waves on a sandy beach leaving a yawning chasm of barrenness. The burdens in his life were eroding him bit by bit, until there was only a shadow of who he used to be. He once was proud and happy. But that was over a thousand years ago.

I think your POV has slipped again. Is this how a narrator would say this, or how Nicholas would say this?

Things were different now.

He thought [Filtering] about how he changed [Show versus Tell. It’s easy enough to show someone thinking.]. How he was not the same angel he’d been. [IMO, strike the first two lines in this paragraph.] Yes, he cared, [about?] but not in the angelic global way an angel is supposed to, it was in a more human way. And he cared about a very specific person, Noelle Spencer—in a very specific way—with all his heart and soul.

Out of the throng of sweaty bodies Nicholas noticed a hulking male pointed toward the bar, heading straight for him. The angel’s voice thundered over the loud music. “Hey, look who’s here. The oldest rookie angel in existence.” [I like this.]

Where are the Devil’s minions?

Bloody hell, it was Michael. The archangel’s arm stretched behind him, holding onto a beautiful golden-haired female. Gabriel.

Isn’t Gabriel traditionally a male? I like that you’re changing the mythology around, but I think some readers might be jarred here.

After guzzling down the rest of his drink, he growled, “Fuck you, Michael.” [People don’t exactly chirp “fuck you,” so I think your speaker tag is a bit redundant. Still, I kind of like the word where it is. I’m always torn on the raging debate about what is and is not a speaker tag. If you decide this needs your attention, focus on it last.]

He [Reword this so that you don’t open up with a pronoun. It’s confusing, though only for a moment.] nodded and winked at Gabriel, wondering how she put up with Michael. It totally baffled Nicholas. One of life’s secret mysteries, he supposed.

Gabriel was a sweet and kind, go-with-the-flow angel. Michael was the polar opposite. Not a very angelic personality trait, but who was he to talk. Then again, Michael did have the title of The Warrior and was a member of the hierarchy.

Nicholas was not. One thing or another always seemed to keep him a level above the lowly guardian status. Not that he considered guardianship a lowly position, but other angels did. In fact, he took his job very serious. [Nicholas is or isn’t a Guardian Angel? I can’t tell.] To the point where he had been teaching a few classes at the Academy about the responsibilities of the guardian angel, after all, he’d been at it long enough. [You imply that he IS a guardian angel, but state that he isn’t. Revise for clarity.]

I really like your vision of the angelic hierarchy, though. It’s a nice bit of world building.

As soon as he walked into the club that night, Nicholas realized he should’ve taken a table in the secluded VIP section. [Can he do that? I thought he was the low angel on the totem pole.] He wasn’t feeling very social tonight. His body ached to either beat the shit out of someone, or have the shit beaten out of him. Feelings, which were becoming more frequent lately, along with a sudden rash which would sometimes cover his whole body. [Huh? This sentence doesn’t make sense to me. Do angels break out into rashes when they get emotional, in general? If so, you need to specifically say so.] When the Almighty told him he was forbidden to see Noelle, his skin turned lobster red [Missing comma] like some [delete some, IMO] humans look after a day in the sun without sunscreen.

At this point, he wasn’t particularly interested in making small talk. And Michael was the last being he wanted to deal with.

Nicholas knew Michael loved a good fight. In fact, Michael loved any kind of battle as long as he could kill someone. Preferably a demon, but he’d been known to take out some really bad-ass humans. Something only Michael could get away with and maybe Lucifer.

Is Lucifer the angel of light, here, or the devil? I ask because, so far, everyone’s been an angel.

He watched as Gabriel, the slender female angel, kissed Michael’s cheek. “I’ll be back. I want to see what Lorenzo’s cooking in the kitchen,” she said to her mate. “You boys play nice.”
He observed [Filtering] as Michael kept his midnight blue peepers [Peepers?] on Gabriel. She disappeared through the heavy wooden doors down the hallway to their right. Michael then sidled up next to him.

Nicholas roughly motioned for the bartender to refill his glass. Placing a heavy hand on Nicholas’s shoulder, his muscles bunched up tightening underneath his T-shirt, Michael broke the silence. “Word is you were offered the position to look into the Abraxas organization. You gonna do it?”

[If the bartender isn’t the romantic interest, the paragraph above is where your story actually starts. Romance, if I recall correctly, has a rule about the hero and the romantic interest meeting on page one. So ask yourself which genre you’re writing in.]

“Does everyone know my business?” Nicholas lifted the glass to his spilt lip, swallowing half of the gin. He turned up the dial on his nasty meter. “What the fuck do you care anyway? You supposed to shadow me?”

Michael’s tone was calm. “Nah, you’re on your own with this. It’s go time for you. High stakes. You fail you’re back to guardian status. I tried to help you the last time but you’re too much of a hothead.” He pointed to Nicholas’s bruised lip. The taunting undertone in Michael’s voice was clear. [It isn’t clear to me.]

Hothead. Ha! “A bar fight last night with a human. I had to lose, of course. Stupid rule passed down from the Almighty: Angels could not to [Could not to?] beat up on the [Why use the definite article? Is there more than one type of human?] humans. No exceptions.”

“Make that almost none,” [I have no idea what this means.] Michael jibed his friend.

Oh, Michael was so looking for an ass kicking.

I think you're off to a good start. The story needs to have already started, though, and I really don't see that it has. You've got a fine writing voice, however, and the problems I noticed are all very fixable. I'm a enchanted with your world building.

If this had been in a bookstore, I probably wouldn't have bought it. But I might have looked at something else with your name on it. I hope I get to see a revision.

Bart Out.

The War on Grammarians

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28900351/

Aside from purporting that good spelling habits and decent grammar are solely the custom of "nerds," this article treads further into the retarded by basically saying that people who correct grammar are somehow psychologically disturbed.

Or that we're all just upset about the economy.

I'm glad the article gave me permission to notice grammar errors at work, though. It's hard to help someone with their paper and simultaneously ignore a page full of comma splices.

I'm willing to bet that, given the subject of the article, the author and the editor both poured endlessly over their grammar. In my book, that's ironic.

I mean, after all, if we're just psychologically disturbed and angry about the economy, they really shouldn't worry about what we think.

My first troll!

Lovely. I left one of his comments up and deleted the other. I'd be impressed at the vast stupidity required to take me seriously when I describe myself as perfect--but then, it's impossible to impress someone perfect. Like me!

At any rate, comments on this blog now require that you have a Google account. Balls and names go hand in hand. If you haven't got one, you can't have the other.

Britney Spears's Book Deal

Britney's book deal is a getting a lot of flak in the writing world, and I really don't understand why.

£10 million is a damn big advance for a book, so I could see a jealousy angle - it's basically every fiction writer's dream cheque. But I didn't see writers crying bloody murder when Rowling got her advances from the Potter books. (Ok, yes I did, but not nearly on this level.)

I think it all boils down to a sort of disease that afflicts those gifted with language - myself included. We writer types like to think that our gift with language and words is a measurable and direct sign of our intelligence. It's easy to trick oneself into thinking that skill with words is the same as pure intellectual muscle.

So take Britney Spears - she's pretty much the average superstar singer. I'd go on a limb and say shes a gringa version of Shakira, except that her hips do lie. She's got that right mix of talent and luck keeps getting her record deals. She does dumb things in front of cameras because the media won't afford her a moment of privacy. Worst, my God, she's blond.

People do not associate intellect with Britney Spears - they want to write her successes off as dumb luck and point to her failures and say, "That's what should have happened in the first place!"

So when someone outside our elite circle of talent lands a book deal, it's downright insulting.

Rich, famous people get book deals. People need to deal with it and quit bitching like jealous little brats. The publishing industry has been groaning beneath the weight of a massive recession, and when someone famous looks to increase our capital, people scream "unfair!"

Her book deal will probably result in the capital needed to take chances on new authors. And whoever her ghostwriter is will be living high and well for a long time to come.

This book deal is fantastic news.

On the various benefits of kitty litter

I like to think of myself as a cat litter connoisseur. I only have one cat, but I find it necessary to remove her waste into a lead biohazard tank every few hours.

Let us be like Dutch uncles. I do not fill my cat’s crappin’ box with sand. I buy the good stuff. I’m talking Arm & Hammer brand Stench Soaker Crystals for Multiple Sick Cats.

And yet, when come I home, I find that my cat either craps sixty times a day, or else invites her friends over. Or maybe she has a friend cougar. Something comes along, at any rate—perhaps some sort of cat litter fairy--and transforms the waves of smooth textured litter into a minefield of foul smelling clumps.

And it is the merits of these clumps that I wish to extol.

In olden days, see, I might have been forced to find some lesser projectile with which to assault the neighborhood dogs. Old apples or acorns, perhaps. But certainly not the Lovecraftian fecal matter, forged in the hell-bowel of the blackest cat, with which I am now provided. (She has a white patch on her tummy. We don’t discuss it.)

I swear on my mother’s Chihuahua’s grave, these clumps can kill a four pound dog. Maybe it’s their weight. Maybe it’s jagged shape. Most likely, it’s the solid tendrils of odor that actively seek mortal throats to strangle.

I used to have trouble with the local wildlife digging through my trash. No more. A clump in each barrel, and I find dead animals all over the driveway, every morning. And once a week, a garbage man crawls to my doorstep and manages a final, “Why?” before choking on his last breath and falling dead upon my bunny slippers.

Maybe I’m exaggerating.

But then, maybe I’m not. So keep your damn dog out of my yard.

Absolute Blog Chain

Veinglory, a pal of mine at AW, appears to have joined a blog chain. I can't resist.

It started with South Asia Blog,which was talking about economics. Then
Benjamin Solah replied with the idea that nationism is actually racism. (I'm inclined to agree.) Life in Scribbletown's author led this into his thoughts about racism, and Writes in the City spoke about racism in turns of phrase. Kappa no He connected this to a downright bizzare turn of phrase in Japan, (about urinating on venomous worms. I love Japan.) and A Thoughtful Life, after faltering for a topic (Seriously, pissing on worms?) wrote about how strange English sayings can be. (Again, I agree. Give the common question "Is someone sitting here?" two seconds of thought.)

Veinglory writes, at her blog Cliterature, "I really struggle writing in American English where 'they' is not accepted as a gender neutral singular, and use of male pronouns is still accepted as covering men and women."

Some of the other tutors were talking about this the other day, so I think it's a perfect place for me to pop in.

Since I have some authority as an English tutor in Kansas, I'll say that I prefer "They" over abominations like (s)he, he or she, etc.

I am somewhat old fashioned, though, because when I see the male singular linked to something that is obviously not specifically male, I do not immediately assume that the subject is always male. However, I am well aware that my perspective is not reflective of the typical reader.

Occasionally, I'll find a publication or an article that exclusively uses the female. I've found that, after a few minutes of reading, I lose interest completely. Is it because I feel excluded, or because the topic matter isn't something I care about? Whichever the case, I have a taste of what it is like, and I try to be as sensitive as possible.

In a writing book I have (I believe it's On Writing Well, but don't quote me.), the author mentions this subject briefly, and discusses how he dealt with it in different editions of his book. He settled for rewriting all of his sentences so that they didn't require a gender specific term.

English is an odd language, in that nothing comes with a gender. Spanish and German have genders attached to everything. La Silla (The Chair) but El Puerto (The Door). There are far more opportunities for inadvertent (and deliberate) sexism in other European languages, merely because many words that describe a human have the gender built right into them.

There is a movement in the US to get rid of innate sexism, and I hope that cheers Veinglory up -- but what baffles me is that there don't appear to be any movements in Germany, France, Spain, etc., to get rid of their own gender specific words. Is it because such devices are so welded into their language that removing them is impossible?

Or is it because they see the issue as pointless?

Open Wide the Slush Gate! (Volume One)

Greetings, writing world!

As an English tutor, a fiction enthusiast, and an author with a handful of publications under my belt, I'd like to dedicate a bit of my blogspace page to detailed critiques.

From now until midnight on Saturday (February the 7th, Year of Our Lord Two Thousand and Nine), I'll be accepting -- and, in fact, actively soliciting stories for me to critique.

I'll share snippets of said stories on my Blog, complete with running commentary.

Think Evil Editor, minus the snark. Don't be afraid to submit! I don't bite.

Stories should be shot to: perfection [dot] von [dot] klick [at] gmail [dot] com

The first step to submitting anything, anywhere is to follow a set of guidelines - so here's what I need:

.doc , .docx , or .rtf file extensions
Double spaced formatting
Courier, calibri, or times new roman font. (Or, you know, anything that comes with Windows that isn't wingdings.)
Fiction in any genre is acceptable - don't worry about adult content disclaimers. If you submit something smutty, I'll probably show it anyway.
All submissions will be considered anonymous unless otherwise stated.

My critiques mostly focus on style and voice, though I occasionally dip into grammar.

I'll truncate most submissions down to five hundred or so words. You might want to beat me to the punch. Maybe you want help with the intro, but maybe I feel like critiquing the end. Wouldn't that suck?

Hope I hear from you!

Query Shark

I've added a link to http://queryshark.blogspot.com/ over on the side. The author is a bit snarky for my taste, but that's often what it takes to get a point across.

Go and learn!

Dollar Savvy, the Magazine

I found a wonderful new rag, Dollar Savvy, which has a lot of cute, cool, and even useful ideas for saving money. It comes off as having a bit of a conservative spin, but I expect no less from a magazine that presents itself as a money saving tool.

One of their cuter ideas is a written contract between the household cook and the diners, which would give a firmament to any agreements regarding who cleans and who cooks. It really did need a clause for people who whine about the food. As a cook myself, I've had to deal with people whining about the quality, the texture, the smell, and even the taste. (My food tastes glorious. Just ask the cat.)

Fifty lashes is probably punishment enough for complaining about the food.

I don't criticize something unless I love it, so here's what's wrong with the first issue.

Fact Checking!

On page 21, Dollar Savvy advises its readers to leave lights running if you're not going to be gone for long, saying that it takes more electricity to turn them on or off than the bulb will consume if left powered.

But this isn't true; the TV show Mythbusters tested this statement back in 2006 and found that one uses less power by leaving the lights off.

The magazine also claimed that buying gasoline when it is cooler outside will get you more fuel for your dollar - the idea being that gasoline's density changes with temperature.

While this is true, I researched this myself last year, and discovered that most modern gas stations keep their fuel in a huge tank that regulates the temperature of the gasoline. Twenty Below or Sweltering, the gasoline stays at the roughly the same temperature.

There were a couple of other nits I could pick at, but they're of a debatable nature, so I'll let them be.

Utility of Information

There are a few pages that compare the prices of a product at different locations -- this is a fabulous idea. Except that the places they picked were a bit odd.

If you're comparing prices of coke, for instance, why include the free samples Coke gives out at a museum? And why, when comparing hamburgers, do they include such eldritch locales as DB Bistro Moderne and Old Homestead Steak House? Do the majority of hamburger buyers really frequent those places?

Far more useful would be the price-per-ounce comparison of a two liter bottle of coke, a twenty ounce coke, a six pack of coke, a twelve pack, and a twenty-four pack, at different grocery stores. Sure, the whole nation doesn't shop at the places around their office -- but they'd find a good representative sample, and it would show readers how to construct such a table themselves.

Still, on the whole, the magazine is full of great advise. Head over to their website (http://www.getdollarsavvy.com/) and see if you agree.