Story Discussion: 5/29/10, Intertwined Fates by Acal

[Acal]

Right I imagine that was hard to read it was one of my first pieces when I first started writing. I just seem to totally forget about the practical, I don't exactly intend to go back anf fix those pieces specifically because theres so many of them it would take me a long time to fix them all. I have other things I need to focus on as well.

But thank you for your input i'll be putting that into future stories

 

[Dual_Triode]

Hey Acal,

Thanks for posting the piece, 'Let Me Take Care Of You'. I was also having difficulty reading through thirty chapters of vampires.

You have received some good advice about how to improve your writing. I am also learning this craft, so I benefit as much from the feedback as you do.

Rather than point out flaws in your writing style and mechanics, I'll tell you what I liked. The moment between Mathew and Clara was very intimate and touching. I could feel his desire to ease her pain, to try and make her world right again. His compassion was evident in the care he took in the shower. As their pain turned to passion and lust, I was moved by the power of the moment.

I think this is a nice vignette. With just a little work it could become a very powerful scene in a larger work.

Keep up the good work.

Cheers!
~Dual

 

[PacoFear]

As promised, here's feedback on "Let Me Take Care of You." Just my $0.02. Adopt or discard as you see fit. Since it was short enough, I went paragraph by paragraph, following each of your paragraphs in italics with my comments on it. Gave me something to do while drinking coffee and my wife did some knitting. Thanks for the morning project.


(Basis = Matthew's best friend and Clara's sister's husband just died)

-Why is Clara so grief-stricken by the death of her brother-in-law? Unless there’s more to the set-up, it struck me as odd. I like my sister-in-law, but her passing would be more shocking/unsettling than devastating.

"I know you're hurting, I’m hurting too," he said passionately to her looking into her eyes. "So let me take care of you, like you’ll take care of me," he continued. Clara closed her eyes and leaned into him, wrapping her arms around her back as he slipped an arm around her back and cradled her head against his neck.

-Ditch ‘passionately.’ First, it’s an adverb so it’s immediately suspect. Second, it doesn’t make sense in this context. “Sympathetically” might play better if you simply must deploy an adverb, but again, I wouldn’t.
-I gather the first “her back” should have been “his back.” Either way, the redundant language in that sentence feels awkward on my read. You’ve used an awful lot of words to describe a hug.
-To take this paragraph up a level, I’d end it by touching on how this embrace feels to Clara. That’s how to elevate these moments from a simple play-by-play of “he did X then she did Y.” How about ending it with, “Grateful for the comfort he so willingly offered, she sighed into his chest. Shelter, that’s what she’d wanted more than anything.”

They slowly broke apart Matthew looked at her, locking her gaze with his. He kissed her gently before tugging on her hand leading her to the bathroom. He slid the door shut behind them, he pulled his shirt over his head and dropped it on the floor and turned her around to face him. He brushed a hand across her cheek and said, "I love you Clara, I’ll take care of you." He pulled at her shirt and pushed it up as she raised her arms pulling over her head. He kissed her again before lifting his feet up and pulled off his shoes and socks and stripped off his pants and shorts. He rubbed her waist for a moment before taking her shoes off and pulled off her jeans.

-Ditch “slowly.”
-Not such a big fan of “Locking her gaze with his.” It’s a tad psycho sounding
-Ditch “gently”
-Why are we going to the bathroom? We have no reason to go to the bathroom.
-There’s no context for the “I love you” bomb. It’s deployed early, which lessons its significance (what significance there is, see comment below). He’s already said “I’ll take care of you,” we’re verging on the creepy here.
-As Penny noted, you’re on a run of sentences starting with “He.”

He swept his hands up her legs and tugged down her panties then pulled off her bra. He stood facing her and put his hands on her shoulders, "I'll be here for you no matter what," he said. He slid the shower screen open and turned the water on.

-You need a reaction from Clara in this paragraph. She’s more than just a mannequin that’s being undressed.

She stepped inside and sighed as the blast of hot water hit her, "Is the water fine?" he asked her softly. She nodded as if to say its fine, she really wasn't in the mood to talk. The pain that she felt was coming back on him. He hated seeing her so wounded looking, it sent sharp spears of his own pain running through his body. They needed this time together more than anything. He reached up and pulled the soap off the stand and rolled it through his fingers lathering up his hands he dropped the soap back down and began stroking his hands across her back. Then down her arms, she turned to face him as he pushed her hair over her shoulder.

-A bit of confusion from the beginning. Was the water too hot or not? If it was, she wouldn’t have sighed. She’d have “started” or “cowered” or “gasped.”
-The exchange re: “Is the water fine?” and her “she nodded as if to say its fine” is the sort of thing you’re doing in your writing that you need to catch on a re-read. I don’t want to read dialogue and narrative with the same words. Does the following paragraph read funny to you? It should.

-TEST PARAGRAPH-
She wondered if her husband was feeling okay. “Are you feeling okay?” She was glad when he nodded that he was feeling okay.

He brushed his hands over her neck, emotion clogged his throat. Almost everything was wrong right now. He never knew how he could have ever needed somebody as much as he needed this woman in his arms right now. He wet her hair fully as she turned around again, he leaned forward pressing his head against hers and wrapped his arms around her waist, pressing kisses softly down her neck and across her shoulders. "I love you so much Clara," he whispered. Quiet tremors rushed through her, how could she ever deserve such a man after everything she had done? And that he was still with her after everything that has happened amazed her. She leaned back against him and sighed softly feeling him up against her back.

-I liked “Almost everything was wrong now.” Not sure what it means exactly, but it’s simple and pithy and hints at what your character is thinking/feeling.

"Show me how much you love me Matthew, I need it so much. I need you," she said turning to him. She pulled him into the spray of the shower and kissed him softly. He looked into her grief stricken eyes, he would do anything to wipe that from her if only for a little while. He pulled her against him as the hot water ran across their bodies. He pushed her against the wall as the water streamed down his back.

-Multiple sentences/clauses starting with “He.”

He kissed her passionately as he slid inside of her, she gasped her arms wrapping around his back digging her nails in as he slid in and out. The feel of his chest up against hers made her feel more alive then she had in days. The rippling muscles working as they connected, sharing each other's pain. They would get through it together, no matter what faced them they would get through it.

-From the position you gave us before this paragraph they were standing directly in front of each other. This is an awkward, if not impossible position to initiate sex directly from. Real life tells us this. Why not have her “lift her knee and swing it out as a wordless invitation.” He could “catch it from beneath, stroking the tender skin where her leg folds then press himself closer.” Just a, ahem, thought.

He panted against her neck wrapping his arms around her back as the water sprayed over them. He groaned as the surge of pleasure built up, his head rested against her shoulder while her head did the same. They rolled together, trying to forget their pain loosing themselves in each other and their love for each other. Slowly their rhythm built up as they gripped each other more tightly. They moaned against the sensations as they pulled back slightly and passionately kissed, as the surge reached its apex, crashing over them. They swallowed each other's cries as they hugged each other intensely. He reached out and turned off the water, resting against her panting .

-Lose all the adverbs. Drop “passionately” from your writing vocabulary entirely, along with “sexy” and “sexily.” These words are bland and virtually meaningless. It's the equivalent of having me ask you what your favorite food tastes like and having you answer with "delicious."
-Again, you’re “wrapping arms around backs.” Vary this maybe? “He pulled her to him” or “With urgent tugs at his hips, she urged him closer”?
-Way too many “each other”’s.
-“the surge” might be better as “their surge”

Her hands stroked his back as they came down from the high. He pulled back from her and slid the screen open, helping her out of the shower. He grabbed the towels from the rack and followed her to the middle of the room where he wrapped one around his waist and sat on the floor spreading his legs. She sat down in between his legs and pressed back against his body the rough hairs on his chest rasping her back, sending fine tingles through her. He rubbed the towel over her hair drying the water from it. Then he dried the water from her body. He turned her head and kissed her gently, she got up from the floor and looked at him sleepily as she waited from him to dry the water from his chest and legs and run the towel through his hair. He draped the towels over the rack to dry out.

-This is just a giant “He…” bonanza.

She reached for his hand as he took it, when they reached the bed he let go for a moment to pull back the sheets. He slid into them and pulled her down with him, he tugged the blankets over them and wrapped his arms around her. "I'll be with you here all the way Clara," he murmured looking into her eyes. "I know, I love you Matthew," she said kissing him gently as she wrapped her arms around him resting her head on his shoulder.

-Matthew is “looking into Clara’s eyes” a lot and virtually every time he speaks. I’ve got two reactions to that and neither of them are good. One, psychopaths do it. It’s making Matthew come off weird. Two, I suspect it’s you trying, consciously or subconsciously, to give weight to what Matthew is saying, i.e. this is really important because, you see, he’s looking into her eyes when he says it and that’s what people do when they say important things. This may be a matter of style, but for my money it’s as significant or more significant when something is offered into the back of a lover’s neck or simply murmured into the dark. Either way, mix it up.
-This may be another personal pet peeve, but I don’t like concluding a scene, or worse, an entire story with an obligatory exchange of “I love you”’s. It’s a limp, unimaginative ending. It’s a sad state of affairs, but the trading of “I love you”’s just doesn’t carry much weight these days. If you feel the need to have them exchange some sweet tidbit of dialogue, you might want to dig into the underpinnings of their love: trust, comfort, safety, closeness, etc.

 

[Amontillado]

Right I imagine that was hard to read it was one of my first pieces when I first started writing. I just seem to totally forget about the practical, I don't exactly intend to go back anf fix those pieces specifically because theres so many of them it would take me a long time to fix them all.

I wouldn't suggest fixing them all. But you will get more useful feedback if you take one piece and revise it as best you know how, then submit it for review. That way you pinpoint the areas in your writing that need work.

For instance--if a reviewer gives you feedback on a story, and your response is, "That was one of my first pieces, I've outgrown the mistakes I made there," then that feedback wasn't very useful to you, was it? Fix what you know how to fix first, and then you'll be more likely to get advice that will help you grow as a writer.

 

[PacoFear]

Fix what you know how to fix first, and then you'll be more likely to get advice that will help you grow as a writer.

 

[driphoney]

comment regarding adverbs because there are quite a few littered throughout. Here's a little article concerning adverbs: http://www.users.qwest.net/~yarnspnr/writing/adverbs/adverbs.htm

There's head-hopping in this scene too. Here's a link to a brief explanation on that subject:
http://www.authorsden.com/visit/viewarticle.asp?id=47905

This is a hijack. Sorry.

Up until now I haven't been convinced of the 'ly' adverb thing. Even most of the anti-adverb arguments given on the above link still didn't convince me. But then the last explanation by Phil Phantom clicked. For grins I took out a stroke piece I started ages ago and specifically tried to be more descriptive. I discovered that I'd done just what Phil Phantom had said. Most of the 'ly' words were able to just be eliminated. All of them looked weak and a crutch, sometimes even just overkill. I'll never look at 'ly' words the same again.

Oh, but there is one exception we all know and love to the 'ly' rule: ". . . to boldly go where no man has gone before . . . "

Thanks so much, Penny, for the links. I read them all.

 

[Penelope Street]

I took a peek at the last installment of the novel. The abundance of proper nouns, which I think Honey touched on earlier, really jumped out at me, especially within the dialog. There were some other issues too, but on the whole, I thought the writing quality was much better than in "Let Me Take Care of You."

Grateful for the comfort he so willingly offered, she sighed into his chest. Shelter, that’s what she’d wanted more than anything.

While this line is well-written, with the possible exception of the immediately-suspect adverb, would you consider using it if we were also in Matthew's head during the scene?

This may be another personal pet peeve, but I don’t like concluding a scene, or worse, an entire story with an obligatory exchange of “I love you”’s.

On an erotic site with mostly happy endings, I'd say this is a relatively minor concern.

Thanks so much, Penny, for the links. I read them all.

You're welcome.

Oh, but there is one exception we all know and love to the 'ly' rule: ". . . to boldly go where no man has gone before . . . "

*gag*

 

[PacoFear]

While this line is well-written, with the possible exception of the immediately-suspect adverb, would you consider using it if we were also in Matthew's head during the scene?

Verily, nay, because I'm not a fan of head-hopping. Apologies, I missed that we were in Matthew's head at points. The gambit I would deploy then would be to describe Matthew's perception her reaction...

She clung to him and snuffled into his chest in a way that said that what he offered just then was what she wanted most. Shelter.

Okay, that was fairly wordy, but you get the idea.

On an erotic site with mostly happy endings, I'd say this is a relatively minor concern.

Embarrasingly, I'm a horrible HEA junky so I won't throw too many stones at the desire to serve one up. Still, resorting to the OILY (obligatory "I love you") isn't even trying. Really, wouldn't anything be better? A bit of tender teasing or a whispered "thank you" for the amazing carnal experience?

I say down with the dreaded OILY.

-Paco

 

[Penelope Street]

Verily, nay, because I'm not a fan of head-hopping. Apologies, I missed that we were in Matthew's head at points. The gambit I would deploy then would be to describe Matthew's perception her reaction...

She clung to him and snuffled into his chest in a way that said that what he offered just then was what she wanted most. Shelter.

Okay, that was fairly wordy, but you get the idea.

What's wrong with Clara saying, "Just hold me," when she clings to him, thus leaving it to the reader to decide why?

Still, resorting to the OILY (obligatory "I love you") isn't even trying. Really, wouldn't anything be better? A bit of tender teasing or a whispered "thank you" for the amazing carnal experience?

I say down with the dreaded OILY.

Considering your level of passion for this one, perhaps you should label it Saying an Obligatory I Love You instead.