Let's help Peanut edit his Untitled NaNoWrimo Novel
PostPosted: Fri Feb 19, 2010 1:05 pm
by Peanut
What the titled says. I happened to really like the idea I had for my NanoWrimo novel this year and would like to maybe, someday try and get it published. Before that can happen...it needs a lot of editing (and for me to actually finish it, but that's another matter entirely...). You can find the novel
here.
Any comments, suggestions, criticisms are obviously appreciated.
PostPosted: Sat Feb 20, 2010 7:59 am
by Esoteric
By edit you're referring to grammar, yes? Sorry I can't spare the time to give you an in-depth edit, but can point out a few things.
I glanced at the first chapter and noticed it jumps back and forth between present and past tenses a lot. Definitely needs fixing. Also watch for word redundancy: A wind whips up, whipping dust... Or awkward combinations: ...the bar erupted into uproar...
And if your story will pretty much follows Alistor the entire time, you might want to consider shifting the narrative style from Cinematic to a more standard character-driven Limited Third Person. Right now, it reads very much like 'a movie'--just the narrator telling what's going on with no genuine viewpoint character. This is fairly common with new authors, I used to do it too until I could understand the difference. Now, there are a few people who write in Cinematic, but by and large, the most popular and majority of modern science-fiction is character-driven. The more I read science fiction, the more I realize how different the presentation is from that in movies. The pacing is entirely different. Less action is often required: suspense can be generated merely by a character thinking about some future danger, and so on.
If you're serious about eventually publishing this, great! But I recommend you do a good bit of research first by reading lots of modern sci-fi and maybe a few books on how to craft a strong narrative. Good luck.
PostPosted: Sat Feb 20, 2010 9:42 am
by Peanut
Esoteric (post: 1375050) wrote:By edit you're referring to grammar, yes? Sorry I can't spare the time to give you an in-depth edit, but can point out a few things.
Yes and no. I'm also looking for opinions on characters, plot, narrative style, etc. So...basically everything you just posted (which I'm rather thankful for by the way).