Writing Dump and Critique

Questions, skill improvement, and respectful critique involving game writing.
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mysterialize
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Writing Dump and Critique

#1 Post by mysterialize »

I looked all over the forum and, strangely, never found a writing version of the art dump topic. It seems like a nice thing to have, for when people have short stories and such that they can't really fit anywhere else.

For the most part, this would probably be treated about the same way as the art dump. If you have a piece of writing you want to share, then post it here. A few rules I've considered for this, though:

1. If you want to post a piece of writing, you need to at least make some kind of comment on the previous piece posted. Something more detailed than "Nice." would be appreciated. Obviously, this doesn't apply to first writing poster, as there won't be a previous piece.

2. Perhaps some kind of length limit? To keep the topic from getting stretched too much. It might be okay to post a link to a longer piece, though.

Otherwise, it's pretty much just a writing free for all. If it has words in it, you can toss it here.

This may very well be a terrible idea and not work, though.

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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#2 Post by Rilxi »

Well I was going to make a separate topic for this excerpt but I think I'll put it here instead. This came about from a previous topic I started here. Sorry if this turns out to be too long!

The premise behind this is gender reversal in fairy tales.

Once upon a time, there was a beautiful kingdom with two benevolent rules who desired a child above all else. After many years, they finally had a baby boy and the country rejoiced for their rulers. The king and queen named their son Beau for he was the beauty in their lives. At his christening, they invited noblemen and gentry alike as well as fairies. The fairies each bestowed a gift on the infant prince: strength, bravery, beauty, humor, and justice.
However, it was only before the sixth fairy was about to give her gift that the Queen realized she had made an error in the guest list. One fairy had been forgotten. At this moment of realization, a strong, chilling wind swept over all in the hall. A billowing column of smoke announced the arrival of the last, uninvited fairy.
The scorned fairy wasted no time in casting the first horrible spell she could think of:
“He may be strong and brave in war,”
“He may be beautiful and full of humor in company,”
“He may be righteous in diplomacy,”
“But forever more he will be a fool!”
“On the eve of his sixteenth birthday,”
“He will prick his finger on the spindle on a spinning wheel and die!”
With a satisfied cackle, she disappeared in another wave of billowing smoke and chaos erupted in the hall. The Queen clutched her small son to her, weeping and the King begged the last fairy to undo this curse. Though the fairy knew she could not undo such magic, she offered an amendment to the curse.
“Though he will prick his finger on the eve of his sixteenth birthday,”
“He will not die,”
“But instead, sleep for 100 years.”
“Only the passing of time,”
“Or the kiss of true love will free him from this curse.”
Though grateful for the help of the fairy, the King and Queen lamented over their son's fate and sought to keep it from happening altogether. Spindles and spinning wheels were banned from the castle altogether and the entire kingdom soon followed suit.
Almost 16 years passed and the prince grew strong and handsome, brave and charming, and with a clearly defined sense of right and wrong. However, he was indeed foolish beyond reason.
Though he had a sense of justice, his believes started more fights and disputes than he could handle. Though naturally strong and brave, he insisted on taking on opponents twice his size and was often beaten in fights that he started. Though naturally handsome and good humored, he would often say or do something foolish to offend someone or other. He never backed down from a challenge, whether he expected to come out victorious or not. In all, it was a rough 16 years.
It was on the eve of his 16th birthday that he was strolling the castle halls when he noticed a staircase that he had never seen before. Deciding on a bit of exploration, he set off up the stairs. The stairs wound higher and higher but the prince kept climbing, feeling unnaturally driven to reach the top.
He finally came upon a door at the top of the stairs. Opening the door revealed a barren room, empty of anything except a spinning wheel.
Now, the prince was fully aware of his curse but the spindle on the spinning wheel seemed to be taunting him somehow, challenging him. Never one to back down from a challenge-

“Woah! Wait just one second. You're talking about Prince Beauregard of Hamill aren't you?” Princess Adelaide interrupted, sitting up straight. “I thought that curse was just a rumor!”
“No princess! The curse is true. The prince sleeps as we speak,” her nurse answered her, never missing a stitch in her sewing.
“I always said he was an idiot,” Adelaide replied, returning to her lounging position on the chaise.
“Princess! You shouldn't speak of other royalty so,” her nurse chastised.
“He is a fool and everyone who didn't know so before knows now,” the princess continued. “And that nonsense about being awakened by love's true kiss! He'll sleep for 100 years, that's for sure.”
“Now princess, how can you say that?” the nurse exclaimed, finally setting her sewing down.
“Easily. He's offended every noble or royal lady that he has ever come into contact with and a good many more that have only heard of him through word of mouth,” the princess explained. “He's a fool that no one but his parent's could ever truly love.”
“Maybe my princess is still upset about that incident a few years back,” the nurse commented, resuming her sewing.
“I most certainly am not,” the princess argued, stiffly. “I'm not upset about that at all. It happened ages ago and after all, he can't help being stupid.”
“Well, maybe someone will surprise you and step up to the task,” the nurse continued. “After all, they say love is blind.”
“Then it must be deaf and dumb as well if it applies to Beauregard of Hamill,” the princess finished with a huff.
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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#3 Post by OtomeWeekend »

Well, might not have noticed but there is already a thread called ideas dump somewhere though kinda lazy to look for thelink since im replyinh through my smartphone right now (*^-^)ヘ_/
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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#4 Post by HigurashiKira »

It's not necroposting if it was never alive to begin with
@Rilxi I got to say, if you wanted to have the flow of those old Brother's Grimm/Mother Goose tales, you got it down. Very plesant.

Silence. That is all that there is in this dark prison cell. And it will be all I will ever know for the rest of my life. The only reason that I have not yet gone mad like those in the cells next to me is because the silence is all I need to remember. The life I lost…the life I could have lived…

A part of me wants to forget what happened that night, but I know that if I forget that moment, I would forget the times he and I were together. That simple life of joy and pleasure…will never be recovered, but at least I can reminisce and keep myself sane for one day longer.
Oh how we would tease one another as we planted playful kisses on each other…how we would always cuddle underneath the sheets after a long day…those 4 years were perhaps the most wonderful days of my existence, but no other moment would top the moment in which I told him my secret; that he would be a father.

That moment is perhaps the only memory of which hay yet to be corrupted by the nothingness of this cell. It is the one thing that still lets me cry. Lets me remember that I’m still a human being.

But after that day, the world seemed to have suddenly turned on us…on me. Had I decided to listen to him and stayed at home that night with him, perhaps someone else would be in here instead of me; and, perhaps, my…our children would be alive right now. From that moment on, everything went to hell. Not only did I have a miscarriage due to the trauma those goons had inflicted me, but the events of the crimes had him believe that all I have ever told him was a lie. The last thing he told me? “I hope you rot in that hole.” Those words are still burned into my conscience, it reminded me just how far I had fallen.

It has been 5 years since I was sentenced; I’ve given up trying to prove my innocence, instead I’ve decided to give them what they want. The woman who sits in this cell isn’t a human being, it’s a monster; a calculating killer who looks at you with murder in her eyes and only wishes to see your guts spilled all over the dull concrete floor. I already knew how to manipulate those around be, but only now am I truly using those skills, sometimes even turning those incompetent guards into doing favors for me.

I let myself become the killer they wanted, that is the show I give them during the day; but when night falls and the world is asleep, I take of the mask and allow myself a moment to remember who I am and to imagine what my life might have been.
I have moved to a new account. Please contact me here from now on. T/Y~

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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#5 Post by Omnificent »

HK: Not a bad basis, but breaking up some of the run-on sentences would improve the impact of each individual point. There's a lot of sucker-punches to this character and each one should hit as hard as it can.


I guess I'll put my little yandere-ditty here.

There was nothing she enjoyed quite so much as the feeling after rain.

Skipping along the puddles. Letting the drops soak through her clothes, into her skin, coating her face and leaving that slight metallic taste in her mouth.

But what she loved most of all was the feeling of an umbrella in her hand.

The rain was dying down. All that was left was a red mist, the puddles, and the piles of flesh that used to make those terrible noises. Those insidious, horrible noises that they dared to call language, that rankled her to no end.

But she had ended that. She had brought the sound of the umbrella, and the sound of the rain, and now there was only silence.

She shook the blood off her umbrella. A couple of its ribs hung limply, traded for the satisfaction of having broken the ribs of the thing lying at her feet. The unrecognizable thing that might have been called human, an hour ago.

More of those maddening noises in the distance. She shouldered the umbrella, extracted a taser from her right-hand pocket, and resumed walking.

She was in the mood for a thunderstorm.
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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#6 Post by Applegate »

@Musket: There are a few awkward word choices and details that are really unimportant. Particularly one of the last lines "extracted ... from her right-hand pocket". Where the taser was is not important, and extracted is a little too stiff a word to use.

Otherwise it is a nice enough piece, woefully short.
As soon as we step outside, we’re met with rain.
Fantastic. Just what I needed to make a bad day a lot worse.
“It’s raining,” she says.
“Yeah. Er, yes, it is.”
A silence falls. Awkward, as always, when you don’t know what to say.
“So… you have to go quite a way home, huh," she says.
“I do.”
“How long do you take?”
“About thirty minutes, give or take, I guess.”
Just moments ago we played out that dramatic encounter from T.V.: the guy blurted out a clumsy ‘I like you’, and the girl retorted with a nonchalant ‘I knew’ and amused chuckle.
I knew being turned down would hurt, but that’s the lousiest way I’d imagined to be turned down.
“I wish I’d brought an umbrella,” she sighs.
“Weather forecast even said it’d be sunny. So much for trusting those guys to get things right.”
“You watch T.V. in the morning?”
“I guess. Dad always watches it over breakfast."
“Oh, yeah. Me mum’s like that, too. I usually eat breakfast up in my room, though.”
Across us, a couple hurries out of the park. The man holds his coat over his girlfriend’s head.
It’s kind of romantic, I guess. Except with all the cussing going around, there’s no way I can think of this as one of those touching moments you read about.
Well, reality and fiction don’t agree anyway. Where’re the meek girls who blush and shyly go ‘okay’ when you confess to them? All I have is a girl who just turned me down like it was nothing.
It makes me want to throttle her and ask her what’s up with that.
“Uh, hey, no hard feelings, right?”
“Huh? Oh, no, no hard feelings.” I lie, there’s no way I could do that to her.
“Ah… heh… heheh… good, I was worried we wouldn’t be friends anymore.”

‘Sure’ is about the only thing I can say to that reasonable thought, even though I don’t think it’ll really be possible.
Even if we stayed friends, I’d probably keep looking at you, hoping you’ll one day turn around and realise what an amazing guy I am and how I should be your boyfriend.
I’m sorry, but I don’t think we should stay friends.
“It feels like we’ll have to wait here forever for the rain to stop.”
“Well, unless you want to brave the rain.”
“I think I’ll just chance it. I’ll take a nice warm shower when I get home.”
She looks at me, as if inviting me to come along. But I already know we’ll go separate ways. The times we clung together have ended today.
“I'll wait out the rain here.”
“All right,” she smiles, "see you tomorrow then."
She dashes out, cowering.
There she goes. My first love.

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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#7 Post by WatchJessieGo »

Just dumping some random scene/notes that came to my head regarding "Requiem for You" (a project of mine). Since I had been having some writing block, I listened to some music that reminded me of the story, and a portion of a scene came to my head, as well as some notes.

Some backstory first to put things in context:

May and her boyfriend (the protagonist) who has yet to be named and will heretofore be known as "the young man" have known each other since they were children, and have now been dating for a year. They've always been close, and their romantic relationship has strengthened their bond even further. They're currently about 23 years old, around a year out of college.
One day while out on a date, May experiences severe stomach pains, and she and the young man go to the hospital. May has apparently been having these pains for some time. She initially brushed them off, but they soon grew in severity. Though she was worried, she had recently been put out of work, and could not afford to go to the hospital. She did not want to worry the young man, so hid these pains.
At the hospital, May is told she has advanced ovarian cancer and will die in a few months' time. At this point, chemotherapy would have almost no chance of working, and would diminish the quality of life she had left.

The story focuses around the relationship between May and the young man as they spend May's remaining days together, their bond growing even stronger. They move in together, get married, and make love for the first time within the first three weeks or so. Soon after this, though, May falls, and is weak to the point of needing a wheelchair. Soon after this, she is admitted to the hospital so that her pain can be treated as she begins to die.

Right now, the two are just talking about things. Whatever comes to their minds. They've got a relationship at this point where they can talk about anything with each other. The young man wants to know if May has any regrets, both because he genuinely wants to know and because he wants to help put her mind at ease if she does have any.

"Do you have any regrets?" I asked her.
"No regrets." She said with certainty, shaking her head. "How about you?"
This was just like May. She cared about others just as much as she cared about herself.
I thought about her question for a moment.
"I wish I would've told you sooner how I felt about you."
"I knew." She said.
This made me laugh. Of course she knew. May always knew.
"Why didn't you say anything?" I asked.
"I wasn't in a hurry." She said. "I knew we'd have lots of time."
I stopped smiling. My heart felt heavy.
"I still believe that." May's expression grew even warmer. "I know that we'll see each other again."
She squeezed my hand.

Here are some notes regarding May's and the young man's views on the afterlife:

May and the young man talk about various things as they lie in bed at night. They come to discuss what they think happens after death, both admitting that it had been on their minds. The young man had never thought about this subject much before, but had recently come to believe that there is something more out there. May had come to think this after her parents' deaths. They both say that they believe that there is a happy afterlife waiting for everyone. The young man says that he just could not accept that someone like May could just go away after they die. May said that she couldn't accept that her parents could just go away either. (May's parents died when she was 18.)

I've written about and developed these two with Mulder and Scully from The X-Files in mind in terms of their relationship. Before romance (which took awhile to happen), they were very close friends and had a strong bond based on respect and genuine love for each other. They cared about each other, protected each other, laughed with each other, and cried with each other. Scully even says during the course of the series that a strong romantic relationship is based in a strong friendship, which is a statement I think fits May and the young man very well.

So yeah.

-crawls to bed-

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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#8 Post by Gambit74 »

OtomeWeekend wrote:Well, might not have noticed but there is already a thread called ideas dump somewhere though kinda lazy to look for thelink since im replyinh through my smartphone right now (*^-^)ヘ_/
To be fair, that topic is about sharing ideas for projects while this one is (I assume) about sharing a piece of your project or showing your writing skills. In any case, I'm glad a topic like this got start up because I was actually thinking of sharing a short story of mine based on my current project once I complete it (Hopefully by the end of this week).
Nothing to see here, folks. For now, anyway...

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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#9 Post by wakagana »

Here's a little something I came up with in my free time, Heh, I lost interest in it towards the end, so my writing may have gotten worse, -shrug- SORRY ITS SO LONG x.x
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The arid wasteland that expanded out along the massive hollow canyon was depraved of life, because of its position between two mountain ranges that betrayed the land they both had sprung up from, creating a rain shadow in which nothing could survive. The heat scorched at the earth, and you could almost hear the sizzle of the sand and rock that had littered the same landscape for thousands of years. It was quiet, at least for the time being, and ‘luckily’ an air current pushing inland from the nearby ocean along the other end of the valley had created a swift cauterizing breeze, whipping long lashes of sand debris about, shredding the unprepared down little by little. The echo of distant thunder, and the roar of what sounded like the very land beneath prying apart, as if the gates of hell were opening to unleash the unrestrained fury upon the known world, after having been forced to wait millenniums.

The sound vanished as quick as it revealed its self, the spine tingling vibration could be felt, and the very air around would be disturbed from its violent gusts to accommodate to the force that was being unleashed onto it.
All went dark for a short time as a cloud of sand billowed up from ahead of where I stood, I opened my mouth to instinctively yell, and my tongue felt as though it had dried up immediately. I imagine it is the same sensation of force-feeding a prisoner cinnamon by the spoonful. My voice was silenced and the tsunami of sand rushed into our direction. Quickly enshrouded by the deathly veil of sandy mist. Quiescence and an eerie peace followed, but it was short lived as the wave of sand was followed by the smell of burning oil and what one could assume was the stench of chemicals and searing metal, the stench burned at the nostrils, and it felt like the air was matted with poison, clinging to skin like a leech, it burned, and itched. Almost as soon as the first quake had occurred, another roaring boom could be heard in the distance, followed by a sudden tremor nearby, and another cloud of sand launched its self to rise above the mounds of sand coated land to the east.

This countless repetition of noise followed by the vibration of the waves of sand being thrown up into the air was reminiscent to that of a child kicking their feet with each step as they trotted along a beach. Twenty-seven crashes, or so my mind would tell me as it counted each thunderous impact around myself, after what seemed like hours the distant roars would stop. Soon enough the land would clear, the sand settled about back to the scorched earth, now coated with a black tarry ash. It was silent, calm.

I buckled up from my position in the sand, getting back up on my feet and trekking forward, only for a few steps before I glanced behind me to catch the remains of what I was originally surrounded with, scattered bodies littered the ground, and massive chunks of the tanks I was deployed with were disembodied from their carapaces, only a few were still functional, and it was hard to maneuver with their treads to begin with, they started up again and as my mind cleared I could finally hear the screams and yelling of the people around me, men and women dressed in thickly armored tan and brown clothing.

A small group of men were clustered around a small metallic box, one of them was screaming at it with all of what energy he had left from surviving the impacts, the metallic box simply gave off a thick ring of static followed by that of a distorted voice, one of the other men twisted a knob on the radio while another lifted the antenna higher, the same man began speaking again, this time a bit calmer as he recomposed him self, I could see the beads of sweat dripping down his black skinned face, and I instinctively reached up to wipe my own forehead, only to find it was littered with condensation from my pale frame, my other fist clutched tightly at the gun I had been trained to use, to kill with. This was my first experience in the field, and it dawned on me it may be my last. Adrenalin began to pump into my veins, coursing through my blood like a drug as my body clung to its knowledge of what it had to do to survive.

“We need that air support now, now dammit!!”

The black skinned man screamed as the radio began to go static again.
I could hear it. The sounds of roaring engines in the distance, and at first the group of men clustered around the radio grinned eagerly, but soon they realized the noise was not from the direction they had hoped for, almost instantaneously the smug grins on their faces cleared and was replaced with that of sheer horror and confusion. They remained silent for a moment, and glanced up towards the skies to see the faint glints of glass from the flying death machines that were inbound, the roar grew louder and closer.

“This is Lieutenant Varius of Java team, E. We’ve lost contact with the other ground teams, and we’ve got hostile aircraft inbound…Please, send air support, Mid-Western Yuvian Desert.”

The black man dropped the phone that was part of the radio and slowly took a few steps back, and climbed aboard one of the remaining vehicles towards the back of our convoy, a simple truck with a massive turret balanced on the back of it designed to shoot down slow flying airplanes. He climbed in and unlocked the guns to position them upwards to help fend off the incoming air with the help of a few surviving allies, the radio went silent for a short time and a reassuring voice could be heard.

“Air Support Inbound, We bagged you a present Varius, think of it as an early birthday gift.”

The radio began to static again, and as the black man who was now gunning the turret along the back of the truck would uplift its massive barrel the sudden vibration of air around us could be felt, and an almost silent roar was heard as a cluster of five aircraft positioned in an arrow head soared over head from the opposite direction of the aircraft that had first been inbound, one of the men still by the radio would once again twist one of the knobs along the metallic box and the new current was being fed with what sounded like a recording of a piano being played.


A muffled voice, that of a confident man could be heard, speaking out from under the melodic rings of the piano’s keys being struck, his voice was thick and had a Slovak accent to it.

“Tally, counting four A-10A’s, don’t let them drop their payload, they’ve already taken enough of a beating. Fox Two, Fox Two.”

As he spoke this, streams of white exhaust could be seen billowing out of missiles the five-plane formation had shot off towards the incoming aircraft, all of the missiles following the arrowhead positioning that the five jets were in. It was melodic, graceful. The five-plane formation split apart, each cluster of two on the sides would break away in sharp turns, one back in the direction towards Java Team E, and another forward in an arch to cut through the small trails of smoke the missiles had left, While the head of the arrow, the leader and coordinator of the acrobats of the group flew straight forward. Keeping in line with the previous missiles that had been shot off by each of the planes, diving nose first into the oncoming aircraft, to make it difficult for them to sustain and recover from maneuvering from avoiding the incoming death threats.

The blinding glint of bullets being shot out through the air towards the arrowhead of the formation could be seen, one of the four A-10A’s being within range of firing said bullets for only a few moments before the massive hunk of metal would curve to the right, in an attempt to avoid some of the heat seeking missiles that had been shot off by the five-plane formation. It would quickly be heard over the same radio-current.
The sound of a very upset pilot, seeming to have an English or Australian accent, yelling over his broadcaster as the four planes that had originally been seen descending towards the battered ground force to finish it off, began peeling off trying to evade the oncoming projectiles that could sense the fuel and heat radiating off the anti-ground aircraft.

“We need support, There’s Five Su-37’s, we don’t stand a chance we nee-“

The Radio current from the pilot would cut short, and the sudden roar of an explosion could be heard, black smoke filled the air above. One of the four A-10A’s plummeted towards the sandy dunes of the desert. Shortly after another pilot with the same accent reported what had happened to their allied air command, which couldn’t be overheard via the radio-signal the men on the ground were on.

“Grey 6 is down…G-…Grey 3 is down as well.”




The man’s voice seemed to tremble as his plane had already turned back, and his voice was starting to fizzle out into static. Two trails of husky black smoke could be seen billowing out of the planes that were falling from the skies, the five-plane formation had picked off two of the four anti-ground jets, with only the first round of missiles they had fired off. The burst and vibration of earth and noise that filled the men and women along the ground would make them shake as the two nearby aircraft exploded, into the dunes of sand a few kilometers away.

The black man who had put him self in charge of the Anti-Air guns slumped down in his chair, whipping off his dark sandy camouflage designed hat and gave out a quiet sigh, sweat coated his forehead and his arms trembled slightly as his fist clenched at the throttle of the weapon while his other hand reached upward to stroke along his cleanly shaven head. After a moment he tugged his body away from the cockpit of the anti-air weapon and paced over to the radio, clearing his throat before muttering to the pilots above who had saved them.

“You’ve got my thanks.”

He slowly leaned back before flopping onto his rear in the sand, taking in a deep breath as he looked at the soldiers and engineers about him that had survived the assault from before. He gave a little cheeky grin and raised his fist upward as if signaling a victory of some sort, if anything he was just happy to be alive.

“Well, look at what we have here.”

A soft-spoken tone and a gentle demeanor could be assumed because of the sweetness to the voice that had spoken the words.

“I’ve got visual on three mortars to the east of Java’s position…Looks like their out of ammo though…”

The five plane squad that had separated at the first moment of engaging flew about scattered and distant with one another in the skies above, looking almost as if they were untrained and could care less about the standards of flying in a formation now that the threat was gone, one of the five planes ducked inwards towards the mounds of sand, soring about the air and making quick turns and contrails, seeming to almost show off to enemies on the ground and to that of the comrades in the air.
The sound of an explosion filled the air, followed by the cackle of a man who sounded rather youthful and cocky over the radio.

“That’s what you get for bombing Xelta, you Grenuvian fucks.”





The static cleared as the sound of the same woman from earlier could be heard, letting out a long drawn out breath before she would seem to go about speaking, but was interrupted by another woman who sounded much like that of the man himself.

“Xavier, shut up.”
“No you.”

The cocky sounding guy blurted out in response. His plane seeming to swivel and twirl in the air as if he was upset by the order, although eventually his plane would balance out. The five aircraft above pairing back up in groups of two while the arrow head leader could be seen flying solo near by, different from the other planes because of a Black Star and Moon adorning the sides of his aircraft.

“Stop.”
The Slovak accented man spoke sternly, leaving not much room for either of the two to argue.

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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#10 Post by WatchJessieGo »

Ah, I've got to get off the computer for a bit, but as soon as I get back, I'll read what you wrote! I love it when people write long things. :3

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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#11 Post by WatchJessieGo »

@Wakagana

Okay, so I read your story, and it was really good! I loved how you described everything so vividly, it really did give me an image in my mind of the scenery and what was happening. The only problem is that there are some grammatical errors and A LOT of sentences that go on too long and should be broken down into multiple sentences.

I took some of the sentences that were too long and made some corrections. :3
I buckled up from my position in the sand, getting back up on my feet and trekking forward, only for a few steps before I glanced behind me to catch the remains of what I was originally surrounded with. Scattered bodies littered the ground, and massive chunks of the tanks I was deployed with were disembodied from their carapaces. Only a few were still functional, and it was hard to maneuver with their treads to begin with. They started up again and as my mind cleared I could finally hear the screams and yelling of the people around me, men and women dressed in thickly armored tan and brown clothing.
A small group of men were clustered around a small metallic box, one of them was screaming at it with all of what energy he had left from surviving the impacts. The metallic box simply gave off a thick ring of static followed by that of a distorted voice. One of the other men twisted a knob on the radio while another lifted the antenna higher. The same man began speaking again, this time a bit calmer as he recomposed him self. I could see the beads of sweat dripping down his black skinned face, and I instinctively reached up to wipe my own forehead only to find it was littered with condensation from my pale frame. My other fist clutched tightly at the gun I had been trained to use, to kill with. This was my first experience in the field, and it dawned on me it may be my last. Adrenalin began to pump into my veins, coursing through my blood like a drug as my body clung to its knowledge of what it had to do to survive.
The black skinned man screamed as the radio began to go static again.
I could hear it. The sounds of roaring engines in the distance. At first the group of men clustered around the radio grinned eagerly, but soon they realized the noise was not from the direction they had hoped for. Almost instantaneously the smug grins on their faces cleared and was replaced with that of sheer horror and confusion. They remained silent for a moment, and glanced up towards the skies to see the faint glints of glass from the flying death machines that were inbound. The roar grew louder and closer.
The black man dropped the phone that was part of the radio and slowly took a few steps back, climbing aboard one of the remaining vehicles towards the back of our convoy, a simple truck with a massive turret balanced on the back of it designed to shoot down slow flying airplanes. He climbed in and unlocked the guns to position them upwards to help fend off the incoming air with the help of a few surviving allies. The radio went silent for a short time and a reassuring voice could be heard.
The radio began to static again. As the black man who was now gunning the turret along the back of the truck would uplift its massive barrel, the sudden vibration of air around us could be felt, and an almost silent roar was heard as a cluster of five aircraft positioned in an arrowhead soared overhead from the opposite direction of the aircraft that had first been inbound. One of the men still by the radio would once again twist one of the knobs along the metallic box. The new current was being fed with what sounded like a recording of a piano being played.
A muffled voice, that of a confident man, could be heard speaking out from under the melodic rings of the piano’s keys being struck. His voice was thick and had a Slovakian accent to it.
As he spoke this, streams of white exhaust could be seen billowing out of missiles that the five-plane formation had shot off towards the incoming aircraft, the missiles following the arrowhead positioning that the jets were in. It was melodic, graceful. The five-plane formation split apart; each cluster of two on the sides would break away in sharp turns - one back in the direction towards Java Team E, and another forward in an arch to cut through the small trails of smoke the missiles had left - while the head of the arrow, the leader and coordinator of the acrobats of the group, flew straight forward, keeping in line with the previous missiles that had been shot off by each of the planes. It dove nose first into the oncoming aircraft, making it difficult for them to sustain and recover from maneuvering to avoid the incoming death threats.
The blinding glint of bullets being shot out through the air towards the arrowhead of the formation could be seen, with one of the four A-10A’s being within range of firing said bullets for only a few moments before the massive hunk of metal would curve to the right in an attempt to avoid some of the heat seeking missiles that had been shot off by the five-plane formation. It would quickly be heard over the same radio-current.
This part below doesn't seem to make a whole lot of sense. You're talking about the sound the pilot is making, and then you write "began peeling off trying to evade the oncoming projectiles..." which would refer to the pilot himself, not his voice.
The sound of a very upset pilot, seeming to have an English or Australian accent, yelling over his broadcaster as the four planes that had originally been seen descending towards the battered ground force to finish it off, began peeling off trying to evade the oncoming projectiles that could sense the fuel and heat radiating off the anti-ground aircraft.
This part as well.
The echo of distant thunder, and the roar of what sounded like the very land beneath prying apart, as if the gates of hell were opening to unleash the unrestrained fury upon the known world, after having been forced to wait millenniums.
It should probably look more like, "The echo of distant thunder and the roar of what sounded like the very land beneath me prying apart made it feel as if the gates of hell were opening to unleash its unrestrained fury upon the world after having been forced to wait millenniums."

Anyway, I think you get the idea. Just split your sentences up more and you'll be golden, and keep an eye out for grammatical errors. :3

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wakagana
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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#12 Post by wakagana »

Thank you very much ^,^ I do have the problem of making my sentances and segments way to long >.< I kind of rant inside my head when I write, so I just jott down everything I do, and I'm not so great at the grammar either. Bahaha. Thank you though! I will make these revisions >:1

WatchJessieGo
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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#13 Post by WatchJessieGo »

No problem! The same thing happens to me when I'm writing assignments. XD I just kind of go off on a tangent and end up with some really long-winded sentences that I have to go back and correct later.
Just wanted to compliment you on your story again. It was very good. :3

EDIT (because I don't want to double-post):


I wrote some background details regarding the couple from my kenetic novel that I'm working on (and wrote about in this thread earlier) -- May and the as-of-now unnamed protagonist who I'm still referring to as "the young man" -- and thought I would share. :3
May and the young man had been friends since they were children, and used to play together every day. Even as they grew older, they maintained this bond and valued each other very much. At the end of high school and beginning of college, the young man's feelings for May grew into romantic ones (which, over time, grew from "like" to "love"), though he was very shy about the matter and didn't have the courage to tell her this until the end of college.
As he told her, his voice shaking, that he loved her, the first words out of May's grinning mouth were "What took you so long?" May had been harboring feelings for him for quite some time, and though it didn't occur to him at the time, May had known about his feelings all along. ("I can read you like a book," she'd often joke.) Being the relaxed type of person May was, though, she hadn't been in a hurry to confess to him. And besides, she'd figured that once he was ready, he'd tell her.
The two began a relationship that day and continued to grow closer, their bond becoming stronger as each day passed and they were able to be around each other and know each other in ways they hadn't before.

May had always been able to tell what the young man was feeling and thinking, and so it was no surprise to her when he tried to kiss her for the first time on their first date. She knew that he had been thinking about it and planning the perfect moment throughout their entire date - after all, it was hard to get anything past her. As many would say throughout her life, "May just knows." And besides, anyone could take one look at the young man and see just how nervous he was.
When he finally leaned in, his face beet-red, May grabbed him and planted a kiss on his lips, much to his surprise but certainly not displeasure.

It didn't take longer than a week for the young man to grow out of his shyness regarding his feelings for May - the two could hug, kiss, hold hands, cuddle up to watch a movie, and do various other normal couple things without the young man blushing or stuttering or shaking out of nervousness, which made May very happy.
Since these are just background details and won't be included in the kenetic novel, I wrote them in the third person rather than the first person (which is what the novel will be written in). XD

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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#14 Post by Argeus_the_Paladin »

Cross-posted from another forum. This might as well be my best snippet in a month or two, so I reckon I'd just put it here.
"From the diaries of Adven Turer, loyal vassal and sworn man of King Harlaus of Swadia.

February 12th, Year of the Gods 1258

It is barely the third week of the First War of Vaegir Aggression, and already we have taken far heavier losses than the previous ten put together. My army of loyal sergeants were gone, down to the ten from almost five scores on its eve. The knights I have rescued from enemy warbands and sworn loyalty to me suffered the same fate - of the original nine, only two remained.

That my duty to them as an overlord unfulfilled was but a small disgrace in the grander scheme of things. For my comrades, the lords of the realms whose duties as a Swadian vassal... noble... citizen, have failed greatly in their task for reasons unknown. Our lords never manage to raise any army worth mentioning - what use are their hundred-odd host, when half of them are recruits barely knowing which end of the sword to hold? Our lords' sergeants are few and far between, fewer still were the knights, the flowers of Swadia that were meant to turn the tide of the war in our favor and to restore the Old Calradian Empire's crown to righful hands.

I am but one man, and my army, however well-trained, is but eight-scores in number. If I had eight-scores of knights at my disposal, things would have been vastly different. As a foreigner, however, one dozen is the best this realm can grant me, at least until my renown improves. As things stood, my ragtag bunch of soldiers-of-fortune stands a snowball's chance in the Sarranid desert of victory against six hundred Rhodoks, half of whom were literally the best that this country could afford, paid by what means I can't imagine.

Meanwhile, a Sarranid flag looms in the horizon, with a disgraced and exiled Nordic lord standing at its head. Behind him stood dozens of huscarls and veterans, raised from whose money I can't fathom.

There is only one thing I know.

They are coming."
One Province Minor - 120 class variables and still counting!

Because there is no such thing as too many variables.

WatchJessieGo
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Re: Writing Dump and Critique

#15 Post by WatchJessieGo »

@Argeus

There were some grammatical errors, but judging by your location on your profile, English isn't your first language, so it's entirely understandable. ^^

That aside, I loved how it was written, and I'm definitely interested in knowing more. :3

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