Critique thread bitches

R8 if you speak spanish

En español, por si alguien quiere leer. Es el prólogo de la novela que estoy escribiendo. El punto de todo el prólogo es mostrar a Ignacio como un niño pseudointelectual ridículo que no sabe nada de lo que está haciendo. No importa si no lo leen todo, son unas 16 páginas, pero si leen un pequeño pedazo me ayudarían mucho.

Aparte de esto, llevo ya unas 100 páginas de la parte central de la novela.

Aún no he editado la mayor parte (como la conversación con el hombre de la casa abandonada, o la conversación con el Tío Alfonso).

De todos modos, aquí va.

http://pastebin.com/E6D2HkQX

http://pastebin.com/tCYRdCDN
I posted this in both earlier threads and it killed both of them. I'm not sure how to take that

In my chartel, thou must commemorate
The skulls soon tell. How wilst thou prove such hate?
Alas, bones swoon hell, the dust blows through thou soul
And ashes to ashes, a scorch marks deeds of coal
To each of such men of pernicious vice
I beg to hie felts of amorists lies
A dreg of thy helms of victorous tries
To raise your sword and masts of hate today
Seize cries and sharpen thy talons with ease
No man of god, when glad, has hold of creese

>>8944444

>2040
>be 48 year old virgin
>sleeping on the subway
>hear some sort of screeching sound
>assume it's just the ancient subway car catching fire again
>but its some woman screaming
>realize i started man-spreading while asleep and forgot to keep my legs closed
>goes on some stupid rant about me not being in the women only car and im a rapist for spreading my legs in-front of her biracial genderfluid children etc etc
>mutter "roasty" under my breath
>oh shit she heard me, she looks upset, she must know about /r9k/
>she proceeds to kick me while screaming something about being a single mom
>a fat trans non-genderbinary person of color sees me being attacked and rushes toward me help
>nevermind shes just using the opportunity to steal my shoes
>black out from my inuries
>wake up in a basement tied to a wall
>the trans person of color explains to me that i must live in her basement
>says i must eat zebra cake and uncooked hotdogs or she will force me to live in the small animal cage
>realize im not alone in dungeon
>a naked, emaciated, spanish manlet with a micro-dick named Paco becomes my close friend
>forced to watch vomit porn on a constant loop

>one night our masters open the door to the basement and throw a naked woman down the stairs
>overhwhelmed with the desire to mate I start screaming "FEMALE FEMALE FEMALE FEMALE"
>Being the alpha male of our subterranean world due to my penis being larger and girthier than Paco's I manage to beat Paco away from the woman whom I then rape
>months later, the female is visibly pregnant, she has resigned to her fate in our underground world, subsisting off the left over bits of food from my plastic dog bowl and the semen from my penis.
>shes even enjoying and asks for rapings from me.
>Paco no longer attempts to rape her when I am not looking and is happy with his station in life, spends his days masturbating with a vomit filled sock and eating his own hair while talking to the genderless actors in his vomit porn

3/3
>begin feeling good things for the pregnant female
>would be sad if Paco raped her, would be sad if she did not have food, and after some talk I find out she feels the same
>realize I am feeling "love" for a female
>have the overwhelming urge to claim her as mine
>think back to the before time, of my parents, they did something called "marriage"
>I tie a small piece of garbage to her to signify our bond
>one night we can hear music from the above world
>the door opens and it is our masters, the large one and a negroid whom ive never seen
>the fat one unchains my female and gives her to the negroid
>NO! SHE MINE! FEMALE MINE!
>they laugh at me
>mfw as the only thing that truly meant anything to me is taken from me
>S-SHES MY WIFE!
>the large one, astonished, and offended at the mere idea of a heterosexual union of any kind and enters a violent rage.
>begins beating me with her disability cane while my wife screams, terrified while being groped by the negroid.
>My wife'd screams catch Paco's attention, he runs to my aid, splashing the large master with his bucket of vomit
>the negroid drops my wife and runs
>I manage to grab my wife and and i ascend the stairs, I look back
>I can hear the howls of pain coming from the darkness that was our home
>l knew I would never see my friend Paco again

>>8945443
>nevermind shes just using the opportunity to steal my shoes
Was where I laughed.

You should describe what he did before he got captured to give an idea what free males do in the dystopian future. Also maybe instead of just vomit porn it should also have some sort of fem show like ellen degeneres and a house flipping show with a lesbian couple. Name the wife.

If /r9k/ is still around I can only assume you would make a small shrine to pepe and sacrifice a portion of vomit and food to the frog god.

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>>8945443

That part with the negroid had me on the edge of my seat, very suspenseful!

>>8945443
rip paco... u will be missed

He dials his first wife, listens to the regular sounds and when another woman’s voice answers he remembers she is away and he hangs up. What if he were to tell the strange woman the news? Just a moment now; hold still. He smiles as if he is his own oldest friend behaving familiarly. He is bewildered, but he knows it. Some other being is here with him and it comes to him that it is not the angel of death because he doesn't believe in angels. He has to wait here in the apartment, he can’t go out yet; but if he doesn't, he is finished. But outside he is going to be embarrassed by the plain weight of what he now is. He will be thinking about every step he takes. Learning to walk again! That’s pretty good. He weeps. Destination unknown.

He dials his second wife and sees that a child of his might answer and today he hangs up. He feels good. He doesn't need to do anything. He has to do everything. He doesn't need to do everything. He doesn't have time to do nothing. Has he ever done nothing? The buzzer is going to go in a minute, and there is someone or something else not unfriendly but interesting here in the apartment. His girlfriend is going to phone, and he is looking forward to that. He has arranged for her not to know, but though he doesn't think she knows, he has always loved her for knowing things even before she knows she does, and so today when she asks him how he is, she may not mean merely his whole beautiful and beloved being and self. She will tell him what time to meet her.

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If you ring in, I'd like to read more about the lighthouse keeper with the girl monster.

>>8944306
You are beautiful. The very definition of it. Your long hair, your perfectly toned face. Could it really be that you are perfect? I had a dream of us holding hands miles from here, breaking free of this world, loving truly, the span of a moment, pure love unleashed. And As we stare into the bright light of the moon and time passes without remorse, I know that this dream has come true. We slowly go to sleep as each of us holds hands. I wake first the next morning, noticing your head on my left shoulder and how your smooth, long hair flows like a river over my arm. You sleep so fair, so quiet. With every breath you take I notice more and more that yes, you are the one. I caress the locks of your hair ever so gently. Smooth like silk. You suddenly awake, and smile to see that I am the first thing you see. We talk about things that don’t matter, but I really could care less. You are the best I will ever have and I think, no, I KNOW that I am the luckiest man in the world. Oh Takara, a maiden so fair. Your imperfections are perfect. Your voice is melodic, like that of an angel. Your beautiful eyes ever so entrancing, your skin as smooth as that of a newborn’s. We are trapped on this island, but neither of us could really care. We are happy, and that is all that really matters. As I stare out into the ocean waves, I imagine our future. Bright, like the sun. We are the perfect couple, and both of us know it. We love each-other unconditionally, and our love is everlasting like the very universe we inhabit. We are never sad, always happy. We never argue, only love. You wish to bear children, but I cannot bring myself to think of polluting something that is so innocent. This does not stop me however, of thinking of how those beautiful beings would be. Three boys, all with the eyes of their mother and the nose of their father. They would be mischievous but we would love them all equally and unconditionally. I would teach them how to fish, and hunt, you would teach them how to love. We would name them; John, Isaac, and Thomas, and they would all grow to be strong and intelligent. As you and I grew older Takara, our love would never wane. It would be as strong if not stronger than the day we both met. With every kiss, every embrace, our love would grow one hundred times stronger than before, and it would further strengthen our already unbreakable bond. I sometimes ask myself if such a vast amount of love could make a human immortal? I certainly hope so, living eternally alongside you would be everything I would ever need. If I could make a wish right now it wouldn’t even be for you to fall in love with me, but for me to get the opportunity to meet you. That alone would make my life already one that is fullfilled….

>this entire thread

0/10 quit while you can

>>8946142

oh shit,hey I'm here. full story is here

http://pastebin.com/5cpxUxB0

>>8944376

your writing is really dense you could say exactly the same things with half the words. Its just seems like a substitute for style

Amber oak trees stand
around a rusting tarn
and leaden sky.
Atoms scatter
through their spindles,
fall on soil to form
a shattered web of sense
that hides the fact
no shadow knows the sun.

A thick white fog blurs night and day.
Willow feathers fall and rot,
fall apart in toddlers' hands
like smoke.
The thread of self is glimpsed
and lost in garden shade,
tangled with the strings that
shallow faces left to find their way -
blind phantoms haunt the tracks as if
their will were not the maze -

and while the driveway gravel crunches
under fallen leaves,
the Himalayas
shrink to dust and pavements grind
to sand, the car to rust.

>>8946635
It's a part of the pretention, the whole thing's a metajoke on modernism and postmodernism.
It is in need of a cleanup though - I'm trying to get it all on paper before I begin the endless editing. I'm also going to add more grounding chronological elements, especially to the first few paragraphs, to keep it centered on the character and less rambly.

>>8946678
a parody of the undreadable is inevitably even less readable.

>>8944460
for what purpose?
do you even read poetry?

also, bump

>>8944376
I liked the actual story, but your prose doesn't flow very well at times. Try to keep your sentences simpler, and never, ever, ever refer to paper as bleached wood pulp.
>>8945967
>>8946407
If you are wondering why nobody is critiquing you, it's because you copy and pasted your story into the thread, which is already annoying to read, and also you haven't critiqued anyone else in the thread.

Here's mine: first 500 words of a short story I'm working on. Experimenting with frame narration.
http://pastebin.com/cmH2Dkj2

>>8947443

I'm not very great at crit but it engaged me and I read it all the way to the end so well done, it's hard to judge your use of frame narration because of how short it is so I didn't get to see how the two flow as you develop it

>>8947479
Thanks, and yeah I just want to make sure that it's clear that the dialogue is taking place at a time separate to the action

thread bitches I love no more
those loose and spindly ugly whores
I take my bitches crocheted now
and miss not I do those ugly cows

>>8947443
>never, ever, ever refer to paper as bleached wood pulp
I'll keep that in mind when I go to edit, it seems I may be going overboard on the sarcastic pretention at the expense of the clarity of the humor.
I'll update the pastebin with the next 500 words or so before I go to work, would appreciate more criticism

>>8946770
Good point

>>8946658
Your last stanza was good, but the rest needs some editing, I think, but better than most shit here

>>8947823
>needs editing
how? why?

I need to to send a second draft in a few days

>>
The Direction of the Wind

The alarm clock abruptly woke Jake up. He let out an anguished and desolate sigh and reached over to shut it off. For a few moments he stayed in bed wondering why the alarm clock disturbed his sleep. He read an article the night before about sleep being essential to the body’s testosterone levels. This initial thought was the gateway into much deeper thought that Jake would always get stuck in. While lost in thought, the minutes going by, the reason suddenly came to him. His distant cousin’s wedding was today. He didn’t want to be late so decided to get up in a hurry. After getting out of bed he went to the bathroom and brushed his teeth and took a shower. The neighbor’s dog started barking wildly. “I really wish my neighbor would stop his dog from barking”, He thought, trying to fight back the resentment growing inside of him. At his last psychologist appointment he was told to fight feelings of resentment whenever they came about. This proved hard for Jake throughout the day, as you will see throughout the story.

>>8948307
which alarm clock? how did it wake him? did it tap him on the shoulder? by golly, i can't get into this at all

>>8948335
Reading it again, I realize how choppy it sounds, but that stuff a swell after you mentioned it.

>>8947443
Differentiate between the direct recollection of past events and the rest of the narration by changing tense.

For example, the past events are fine as "he did/I had" etc, while the first few sentences should be "they would/they will" depending on the timeframe.
Just a little change makes delineating the order of events easier. Otherwise, I'd also say work on making the dialogue a tad more colloquial unless you intend for it to feel detached

Now the newborn gasps of a new year,
and still, each day suffers
alongside me a pitiable,
slow death.

destined 2 return 2 de_dust
will i be elided even from the pages of history
will there even be any histories left to forget me
...doom

was well... a swell time when Nguyen went whaling with wicked western wogs, sailing surreal swells at the bottom of a well, he was like a frog... but not french

1,000 word excerpt from a novel I've been struggling with: http://pastebin.com/BdQduQMv
If anyone critiques I'll be glad to return the favor.

>>8948307
>“I really wish my neighbor would stop his dog from barking”
has an autistic vibe to it. It's more realistic to: 1. get annoyed at the fucking dog, as you're still sleepy and the barking forces upon you an abrupt awekening ; 2. Think of the neighbour.

> as you will see throughout the story.
this is just bad

>be me
>diagnosed severe depression since middle school
>khv senior in hs
>dad asks me who im thinking of inviting to the prom
>doesnt know im an epic loser
>always telling him about all the babes I saly
>"yeah pa, you should have seen me, tearing up that ass, cummin on them tits"
>"im practically Chad Pitt of the school"
>would hate to let him down, and not have a 10/10 qt show up to take pictures and get a beej in the limousine
>"yeah dad, you know how it is the more better options you have the harder to pick: Stacy Mellons, Stacy Asche, or Stacy Fase"
>night of prom
>vomiting multiple times
>wanking multiple times
>no specific order
>nose starts bleeding
>shotgun a 6 pack of natty ice
>pop a molly
>start sweating
>dad knocks on the door, "hey bud, its getting pretty late, your grandparents are waiting in the living room, and the photographer should be arriving in about 10 minutes"
>"dad... theres something I have to tell you"
>afatherlyfaceInaywanttoseeagain.vlc
>"you know you can tell me anything boy, your my only son", he grabs his nuts, "I grew you in here you fucking faggot, you can tell me anything you little fucky bitch, Ha!"
>"alright, can you come in and close the door behind you?"
>he locks the door
>my heart feels like its going to explode, I am getting dizzy, freaking out, stomach hurts, feel like im gonna hurl again
>he put his arm on my shoulder and I do not know what came over me but I punched him in the face as hard as I could and knocked him out
>pulled down his pants and started sucking his dick
>then I fucked him for like 4 minutes
>about to cum, when my stomach starts to feel a sharp pain
>start to shit right as my mum and grand folks pop in to "see what all the commotion was"
>but my question is, is it a crime if you dont get caught?

>>8948603
Cant really offer much critique or advice, and dont have anything to share, but I liked what I read. Nice variety of ideas, nice sensual word uses, nice imagery, nice theme, nice characterization.

>>8948879
Thank you!

>>8944376
Jesus Christ I couldn't make it through the first paragraph

>>8949026
Do you mean you couldn't actually read it or that it just wasn't worth reading? Because if the former, you're either a non-native speaker or clinically retarded.
I'll admit its sloppy and intentionally dense to the point of damaging the prose, but it's not illegible

>>8948490
this honestly speaks to me for some reason and I can't quite pin down why.

I grab the orange
then peel it gently
juice proceeds to squirt in my face

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Help me make this less shitty and cliche. For context it's part of a much larger story. The father is giving his son his knife before they battle their way out of a massive superfortress they have captured, and the enemy fleet is closing in. I just want to improve the writing, not change too much about the actual scene itself.

http://pastebin.com/SYNyKH92

>>8944376
> Foster leaned tentatively back in his office chair, testing the upper bounds of gravitational attraction from a position of relative comfort in the rarely inhabited perch.

You have way too many adverbs and you really need to cut down this shit. Cut out "tenatively" and get rid of the "upper bounds". Write something like "Foster leaned back in his chair, trying to see how far he could go before gravity took over" or something like that. *Then* you can add in the complex words. But right now it is dense as fuck. Readable, but not enjoyable.

> While Scheister & Sons Publishing had found its clientele shrinking exponentially for over a decade

Remove "exponentially." No one cares.

> One thing was for sure - Foster would hate to be the sorry fool submitting this particular fire hazard for review.

This is actually a decent sentence.

You're not a bad writer, just a bad editor. And it's much easier to learn editing than writing, in my opinion.

>>8949199
>You're not a bad writer, just a bad editor.
I actually disagree completely, it's easy for me to edit but hard to write - that's the inspiration for the story. This piece hasn't been revised at all yet though, so thank you for the concise specific suggestions.

When Wallace was born he came out weighing 7 pounds, POP, he stretched his mommys tight little pussy wide open and made afterbirth flow like a waterfall. His first thought was, “Dear me, i’ve turned into the object of my own affection.” Mommy’s head perked up something fast, “Is it a girl?” she asked, “Well,” she wrung her hands, “ is it doc?” The doctor turned his head slowly from side to side, his smirk hidden by his white medical mask, skin yellow like a chinamen with a cool sweat topping. “ARGH!” She yelped, foaming at the mouth a little, same as the ocean on a rainy day. “Cut it off!” “Cut it off!” Her pupils had dilated. “I wanted a little girl, prim and proper. I wanted to teach her how to spread her little pussy lips wide open for money; and how to shoot without a belt.” At this point the doctor’s eyes were wide with delight. He had always dreamed of fucking a little girl’s tight hole. “Well,” he spoke softly, “perhaps...that can be...arranged.” The doctor glanced at her wild eyes, and walked over to his medical table. He picked up a pair of sharp surgical scissors. “With these my dear, anything is possible.” First he sniped the umbilical cord, then with a special precision honed from many, many fantasies, he snipped the little Wallace’s cock right off. “Yes. Yes!” A crack in his voice from excitement echoed through the room. “Now then, onto the main event.” The mother was transfixed, her breath held, as the doctor pulled his 7.6 inch cock out of his wrinkled grey slacks. He positioned it gingerly at the hole where the little penis had been, and thrust with the power of a deprived maniac. Wallace screamed loud, “Ahhhh!” Blood poured from the little hole, leaking around the doctors thick cock. “I'm gonna’ cum!” He shouted, and shot his seed deep in the former little boy. “Beautiful,” said Mommy, “absolutely beautiful.”

>>8949047
Of course it's not illegible. But holy shit it's like those memes that are popping up that turn simple phrases into obnoxious discourses

>>8949333
>yellow_jean_claude_van_damme_performing_standup_comedy.tiff

What’s the bug think
When raindrops fall?
Inundate home
In it’s tote stone

Perhaps in fall
The bug can doze.
Ride upon a leaf,
Visit neighbors’ sheafs.

Fly was it I?
In progeny --
Of my one youth?
Where are my wings?

>>8948476
way too bland.

>>8948307
there's some nice lines in there but... some of those are awful. >as you will see throughout the story

*Time freeze*
You're probably wondering how I got here

Rock that Ass She Goes Again

Black shirt, rocking ass,
rock that ass she goes,
she rocks that ass so fucking hard
and everybody knows
that there is none that compares,
no better derriere
than the one that belongs to her,
that sexy fine figure
coming out of the dark,
black t-shirt hanging
above her naked ass,
face, shirt, ass,
it never stops,
it cannot stop,
as long as you are looking,
the ass is always there,
and when you’re not looking,
rock that ass she goes.

>>8944324
Bumping for this

>>8949691
beautiful

Nightshift

In the store window, you appear,
bent over inventory, placing it well
as shown on a white list
distributed by a bureaucrat.

Something to call your own.
Sturdy to the touch.

Both of these things occupied a space within my eyes.
Wide as a formidable assurance,

Sky holding these things in place,
the handshake before the departure.

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Let me chew glass twist bottle bits
Its all needed to sate wits
No more half though lies
All traded in hours for short-night mind dye

Away with your quick-spun lies
Only temporarily I surmise
You, I, are filled with fear
Out of the head!

No next week's tomorrow
Don't wish to drown but float a sorrow
So quiet you, broken record head
I know what you said

Let me soak that new desire
That new flume of hopeful fire
Let it fulfill the needs for now
That looming bottle, yet how!

In this lonely afternoon
and all the others,
do you know our cold progress?
Do you know our labour under the stars?

In the calm do you ever
think of him anymore,
buried under thoughts of thoughts
of sales and careers and wars?

Do you spare any moment to keep him alive in memory?

In the soft afternoons,
in my lonely little room
I always cast back
to my lovely life.

I miss my boy.

>>8949242
>This piece hasn't been revised at all yet though,

Ah that would explain it then.

Usually I try to give it a few days and edit before posting in critique thread but I didn't do that with what I posted so I'd be a hypocrite to really force it as a rule. I think most of my advice still holds true.... if not I will be happy to read an edited piece of yours.

>>8949317
What the fuck? Saved to my copy pasta folder.

>>8948307
holy............

>>8946621
That's kind of what I thought. I'm glad I know what happened to them all. And also I'm not sorry for any of them, since they all seem to end up where they belong. It seems to me to be about the sad nu inevitable process of letting it all go. Linked in my mind to a kind of family of sirens going about their necessary work. The family he never had filling in his last days as a kind of favor from the ocean. Now, it's young, and it's a stage, but it is a story.

Since you don't have an editor or an agent, you are going to have to do the hardest part all by yourself, which, hey, ain't it true for all of us.

You have the young writer's problem of hitting the occasional clunker. It can happen in as little as one word. Like "infant" before.

Here's a few.

84. "creed" is in the right lexical neighborhood, but I think you really mean "chant" or "incantation" or "chorus." Since it's really loud, you need not only semantic accuracy ("semantic" itself does not mean "trivial" - that's an effect of popular media), you also want sonority.

79 "shined in its waxy nature." A case of I see what you mean, but it sounds like you wanted to get to the next line and bailed out on this image. Working writers frequently take moments like this and work them. Like, write ten different ways to express the concept of waxy skin. What are ten objects that resemble the way you see this? List them out. See which ones also fit thematically. Beware the cliches. "Parchment" has been done to death. "like the inner layer of an onion," "like a jellyfish desiccated on the beach" Do ten of them. Then, if necessary, do ten more.

64. howled in fury. There many opportunities like this one to punch it up.You don't want to over do it and become a thesaurus queen, but this is what they were made for. Also, nautical sources wouldn't hurt for this one. Sailors refer to the "shrieking fifties" for example, to describe the sound their rigging makes below 50 south latitude.

64. dregs. Dregs are literally gummy partially dissolved solids or grinds, or residue.

clouds took on a ferocious quality - punch up

"he simply sat down in a leather chair and sunk into its soft embrace." - notice you have him doing the same action twice, just so you can add the feel of it. You can figure out how to get him in the chair once.

You get the idea. Lightning versus lightning bug. Editors will get a tick in their face on every single one, so it's worth the effort to iron out every last one.....

>>8946621
...About the mysterious force that gradually overtakes the keeper, cf 62. I get you want to leave it unnamed, unlabeled, etc. That's fine. It will work that way. But it needs some kind of noun referent to describe it because as is it's almost not there at all. As in it's almost so abstract as to read as forced. You give the girl an aura, but then sometimes its there, and sometimes not. I suspect because you left it out, not because she has on off switch. Maybe the force of mind that is lulling the keeper is related to that, somehow. Maybe it's linked to the weather, which is so important in this piece. Maybe it's linked to the increasing number of ritualistic symbols etched in the sand outside. As vaguely as you want, something needs to be the totem that represents it.

Take a cold and clinical look at the ending. For a big supernatural like this, you need to stick the landing. I'll start you with a hint - what is the temporal sequence in which these things happen...

ocean sealed
gods descended
lighthouse stood empty

...versus the order in which you give them to us? And the last sentence is a fragment. Which is fine stylistically when intentional, but I want a real Dubliners Dead sentence here:

"His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead."

That is not a first draft. I'm not saying imitate Joyce, but imitate his work ethic. I would bet he wrote at least twenty versions of that sentence before he figured out he could indulge in that adverb and excuse it to himself by inverting it on the second instance. "falling faintly" then right back with "faintly falling." It has rhythm like a line of poetry.

Do that.

I want to read this again better.

http://pastebin.com/fqK8Y7ZB

Got inspired to make this poem from this DFW quote

“What if you just imagined that this absent lover they’re singing to is just a metaphor? And what they’re really singing is to themselves, or to God, you know? ‘Since you’ve left I’m so empty I can’t live, my life has no meaning.’ That in a weird way, I mean they’re incredibly existentialist songs. That have the patina of the absent, of the romantic shit on it just to make it salable. . .(but) they’re singing about something much more elemental being missing, and their being incomplete without it. Than just, you know, some girl in tight jeans or something.”

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>freeverse cucks think I'm going to read their shit

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My try at a Children's Fantasy - again, sorry for the noobishness, I'm just starting out here.

http://pastebin.com/GLcKFXvh

My most recent short story

>>8949199
The father is having a crisis of identity due to combat fatigue, and he wants to avoid its worst consequences by making a meaningful gift of an emotional totem object. The son isn't buying any of it because his image of dad is a superhero.

So we start with dad:shaken, son:confident; we have to end up with dad:restored, son:sadder but wiser.

To take the easy one, the good luck, you too, exchange. This is a "May the force be with you" moment. I don't mean add a flaky supernatural element to the story, but it's a place where characterization can be nailed down by having them express an idiodialectical phrase that calls back to a previous moment. Something known only to the two of them, and the reader. "Don't let the krillbaggler bite your shoe." So we remember the earlier scene where the younger one almost let the krillbaggler bite his shoe off and ruin the mission to Warfl. Then the son can reply, "and you keep your glaggons dry" so we remember when the son saved the dad at the battle of Fognl. It's a technique for layering on the narrative illusion that the characters remember the story they've "lived" along with us.

The knife hand off. I'm thinking.

The dad's confession needs a zinger. The sentiment "tired of war" is not new, nor for the tenth time. It's about the dad's identity and how he's losing it to another one. Something like "you'll end up with a commander rather than a father." Or, "I'll end up being the kind of father who would send you into a suicide mission without telling you." Jeopardy has to attach somehow. Orion has to be shocked into realization in order for it to play as sincere. Then he can watch, "as his father walked back across the hangar with restored purpose, looking nothing like a doomed man headed for the gas chamber." Or something. Restored, is the point.

Unless you want us to be unclear about Orion's conviction. Maybe your intention was to leave his emotional state ambiguous. Either way, the hinge, the dad's confession, will make this scene. Again, since you have a lot more of this elsewhere, don;t be afraid to look back toward the beginning for what he could say here. "I can't let you watch me turn into [name of tragically lost character from earlier]" for example.

>>8944376
Dropped after the first sentence sounds pretentious as fuck

>>8949199
OK, the knife thing. If you've read deeply in this genre, you already know that there is a fine line between cute and poignant, and that when the dialog lands just on the right side of that line, something special can happen.

So I'm thinking of some kind of play on "knife."

"I'm cutting it loose." "It's your turn to cut people free." Something thematically related to the story that has to do with the knife's purpose or history.

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>http://pastebin.com/5gb6QPDg

^The start of something I am intimate with: the death of DVD rental stores.

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>>8952980
Part 2 - if you don't mind to read of course.

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http://pastebin.com/eYK9uBZD

r8? Getting rejected by literary agents left and right but they don't offer any critique or perspective.

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I've never written anything creatively before, only ever essays, but I've been given an assignment to write a short story.

Could I get some feedback?

>>8953315
Cosy. Prose might be vaguely pedestrian, but I still like it. If there's the as-yet unwritten potential for a good story in there, then do keep going.

>>8953380
Thanks anon, I'm not sure where to go with it honestly, as I only have 750 words. I was considering writing a short dialogue, as I don't think I could get much out of the 500 odd words I have left without it sounding rushed. Either way, cheers lad.

>>8953380
>>8953315
I'd also add, just now having an afterthought: driving on with that kind of exposition might be better substituted for delivering expository points through dialogue (human interaction is one of the most sub-textually telling phenomena I know of) and reactions to those pieces of dialogue (human reactions are the icons of the unspoken).

>>8953416
Solid idea, thanks again mate, I'll work it in.

>>8953414
>>8953423
Well, regarding my afterthought >>8953416, if you're taking it on, then since exposition and the heart of the story looks as if it has to revolve around dialogue, you should ask yourself: "What is the big question?"

What do I mean by this?: I mean that most good stories have an over-arching question, the answer to which is synonymous with the wrapping of the plot, the deceleration of reader-curiosity, the: Resolution. The question is whatever the reader is going to be asking themselves is the situation, which must be one of conflict, will turn out. think of all your fave stories, and then in reminiscence, ask yourself the corollary: what was I, the reader, wanting to know?

EG...
The Iliad: "who will prevail?"
Titus Andronicus: (christ, what questions AREN'T there to ask?)
Stoner: "Will this sad sack ever catch a break, whether from his own self-trappings or the pure chance events of the universe?"
Candide: "Will Candide ever be free from evil events befalling him purely arbitrarily, and will he ever accept that Descartes' beat-horse-meme of an idea of ~best possible world~ is a stack of shit?"
Gravity's Rainbow: "what the fuck is happening?" (a question like that is harder to execute, but somehow the pynch did it)

From all these questions can perhaps be sifted a commonly denominated nugget ... they all contain, in some way or another, the corollary inquiry, circling around this syntactic structure: "will <conflict> be <resolved>?"

I'd argue some of the best stories ("stories" here can be distinct from "literature"(!)) nurture this central question, given shape by characters, their environment, scenario and overall situation resulting in some form of conflict, so expertly that the reader's inquiry is forcefully evolved into more of a readerly anxiety --- one which YOU hold captive by doing, what?, why of course you are the only one who holds the Answer, thanks to which the reader now has a near existential need to find, literally held captive.

Did I make any sense? I'm hoping that helps.

>>8953527
Wasn't expecting such a helpful response anon, thanks a lot. I wasn't sure how to actually weave a story into the writing but you've genuinely really helped me. If I could give you an upvote, I would.

>>8953561
It's fine. If it makes the exchange here any less altruistic, I might say I helped with the aim of accelerating the writing of more stories, since we need them in the world.

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>>8952932
>i'm not reading anything that's not a nursery rhyme

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>>8953243
Bump. Please friends

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>>8944324

No iba ni un párrafo y me encontré con tres adverbios casi seguidos. Tuve que dejar de leer eso.

Quita esas cosas, camarada; te harás un favor.

>>8944306

How do you correct more than 300 pages? I'm sick of rereading my own shit over and over again.

Do you simply... divide everything in batches and resist the urge of rereading and redacting from page 1?

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Before going out on his way, Sonic, an extremely fast-moving English Major living in a typical non-conformist neighborhood in Seattle, made a short prayer to a drawing of a clown he had nailed to his bedroom wall.
“Dear Lord, I pray that I have the strength to defeat the enemy. Let my fists and words be like heavy stones that fuck shit up. I’m tired of running away although it’s true I’m very fast.”

In the later years of Sonic’s adolescence, he was placed in the candidacy for the “Nobody Grant”, a prestigious prize awarded to those who were “completely dedicated to being nothing and nobody at all times.” He was denied the grand prize however, after it was discovered he made private statements about wanting to “write something good or something maybe I guess.”

Sonic took the bus to his classes, where he slouched in his chair and tried his best to look uninterested. “What if I’m so cool I could die,” he thought. He raised his hands and asked everyone if they’d ever read Nietzche and walked out of the room.

On his way home from school Sonic wrote a poem in his iPhone’s notes:

I smoked a cigarette
and flicked it
it fell into a void
and I was a void
and have you ever read Nietzche

when he posted the poem to a thread on 4chan that evening, the responses to his writing were moderate to apathetic.
“Your writing is okay even though its sincere,” said Anonymous. “You are weak. You will not survive this world,” said another. Sonic googled “how to kill someone through an internet connection,” then thought better of it and watched a youtube video of a man smashing melons with a sledgehammer and fell asleep.

>>8954376
Later he went on a date and tried his best to act uninterested.

“Just because I wear yoga pants doesn’t mean I’m an object,” said his date.

Sonic grunted.

“Do you want to go to a show I have later?” said his date.

“I don’t have a car. And only if it’s free.”

“So you can’t come?” said his date. She batted her eyelashes and prepared to melt into the ground.

“You’re stupid,” he said. “Stupid and dumb. Why are you such a steaming pile of goo?”

“Date a model then, all I know how to do is buy fast food and cry,” said his date, crying and eating a McChicken. “Touch me,” she said.

“No, you’re too ugly,” said Sonic.

“You’re in no position to call anyone ugly,” said his date.

“It takes one to know one,” sneered Sonic, as an inversion of the usual usage of the phrase. He laughed at all of his own jokes.

“You’re poo.” said Sonic’s date.
“You’re a figment of my imagination,” said Sonic.
“No I’m not.”
“Yes you are.”
“Am not.”
“Are too.”
“Am not times a million.”
“Are so times a trillion.”
“You act mean because you’re a tiny tiny man inside,” said his date.
“You always go in for easy stabs,” said Sonic. “Fuck off.”

He got a call. He picked up.
“If you keep on taking drugs I will make your life miserable,” said the voice of Liam Neeson. “I’ll go after your family, then your friends, and I’ll keep on going and going. I won’t stop until your reputation on fanfiction.net is completely ruined.”

“How did you know I have an account there? Who is this? Who the fuck is this!?” screamed Sonic (anyone that knew of his My Little Pony fan fics had to be silenced), but the voice hung up. “Damn it.” He looked at the caller ID—“Sanic the Hedgeheg (lmao)”

“Who was that?” asked Sonic’s date
“Shut up,” said Sonic.
“Don’t tell me to shut up,” said Sonic’s date.
in his extremely God voice Sonic said “Nah” and warped into another dimension.

>>8954379
Later that night, while he was trying to jack off, Sonic was visited by the ghost of David Foster Wallace.

“Come on,” said DFW in exasperation.
“I’m trying,” said Sonic, gritting his teeth. He tried to laugh at his own joke but saliva caught in his throat and he doubled over. David Foster Wallace crossed his ghostly arms.
“If you think you’re so clever, why are you alone?” said DFW’s ghost.
“Good line.” A vein was standing out in Sonic’s temple. “The Smiths. Early work better than later work.”
“I wasn’t the one who called you earlier,” said DFW’s ghost.
“I know. You do drugs all the time. You can’t tell me shit.”
“I’m trying to help you.”
“How?”
“Do you anything about the real world? Can you love without making ironic jokes to protect your fragile ego?”
“Huh?”
“Have you ever even tried?”
“Huh?”
“Ever been there for someone else? Looked towards something higher than your own self esteem?”
“Huh?”
“Didn’t think so. I’ll handle the thinking.”
Sonic took his hands off his penis. “Alright, I guess you should. Where did you learn all of this stuff?”
“Out there.” DFW’s ghost pointed towards the door to Sonic’s apartment.
“There’s nothing beyond there,” said Sonic. “This is a fictionalized setting created in the author’s imagination.”
“There is something beyond there,” said DFW’s ghost. “IRL.
“Huh?”
“Reality. It’s a world where you’re judged by what you look like, not by what you say and think. A world where curiousity and imagination are for little babies.”
Sonic sat back in his chair. He stopped masturbating. “I get it,” he said. “This is also a possible world. The world of reality might not be so bad. But! I hate myself!”
“Everyone hates themself a little bit. But if you also love yourself, it’s not as bad, even though loving and hating yourself at the same time doesn’t make sense,” said DFW’s ghost. He began to fade into the air. The effect looked cheap. “Also if you do drugs it makes it easier too.”
“Okay,” said Sonic slowly. “I think I can do it. I think I can exist in the real world.”

Sonic left his room. He then realized he hadn’t finished masturbating. “Rosebud,” said Sonic. He went back inside and closed the door.

>>8954376
hahah i howled at the end

>>8947443
>until the sun peaks over
>peaks

M8!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

>>8947443
also the first sentence is confusing. I've reread it three times and I still don't know wtf it means. what tense is it in?

>>8948490
ya this is hella good, espeically b/c I'm playin CS:GO right now (on dust)

>>8950611
it might be cause I just started listening to music when I read this but good

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>>8952932
>poecucks in general

>>8952980
almost incoherent, sorry

>>8953315
dont start with long descriptions of weather unless they're hella interesting

>>8954379
>“Just because I wear yoga pants doesn’t mean I’m an object,” said his date.

this is a little flat strawmanny. like blow our minds man c'mon

>“You always go in for easy stabs,” said Sonic. “Fuck off.”
kek

>>8954390
This is nice dude. I'd read this unlimitedly, don't go too off the rails though.

This is real.

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>http://pastebin.com/5gb6QPDg

^Whoring out this one again, just in case no one saw it. The start of something I am intimate with: the death of DVD rental stores.

Bumping myself again because I'm a slut

http://pastebin.com/BdQduQMv

Seriously, I'll read and give feedback to anyone who gives me some critique.

>>8954832
it's ok. a lot of your words seem like filter. you need more variation in your sentence lengths/structures. reading one long, descriptive sentence after another after another gets tiring. also
>"The Digital-Versatile-Disk-watching family is out of the plausible picture now, excluded from screen space, deliberately de-framed by our ‘future is now’ idea which has been stuck in a perpetual becoming, committing cyclic suicide like a phoenix for the last decade > an infinitely recurring meme."

get rid of "meme" and this will be 1,000x better.

>>8945443
very bizarre, I like the degradation into primal natural urges

Come,
let me lead you, love, by crook of hand,
with step that soon will fall in line beside
you, through the borders of adulthood and
the boundless no-man’s land.
No, put away your passport, for inside
the customs booth,
your splayed, unchartered palm is paper proof
enough; a spurt of scarlet pressed from weave,
a bruise, a ring of oozing ink; the roof
through dormer oculus observes our leave.
Don’t turn,
but tread in dirt a trail for me to tail;
each wisp of hair is a tendril prising dust
from space, concatenated cells in rails
of air of new nativity, whose gusts
shoot vertical and rend
the span of time and space.
But we, compatriots-in-arms, can pause
and tend to love here as the sun withdraws.

>>8944324
man i read spanish like a dull-highschooler but im getting some weird nostalgia schooling at anglo central now

>>8954839
Plain and at times pedestrian in prose, reading sometimes a bit like YA. But easy to understand, which most will take over elaborated word play. You've got a vivid enough picture going on. Work on bringing forth those character subtexts, which are already latent within the work, and you'll have more shine to the piece. Study up on some Hemingway or Steinbeck to see what I mean.

Ends on a nice little awkward caper, giving the piece potential for some conflict, which will foster a plot of some kind.

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Those moments were conducive to breathing, when I could say to myself that all that mattered was the moment. I could say it to him as well but he wouldn't want to hear it. He would dismiss my nonsense for what it was but why couldn't nonsense be meant as well? I almost asked him if he ever wondered about the fact that our hearts had been beating since the day we were born and had continued to beat into this very moment, and did he ever wonder why we found that fact so astonishing but never marvelled at our own pulse when checking it at the wrist out of boredom? Just clutter - from my hung wrist I held a pot aloof in my fingers with suds painted on the glass until the bright lager that was alive and shifting. Drank it and toasted the victory that was Monday afternoon, the hardest fought for and the most hollow, dinner was eaten, a schnitzel from the special board well worth the price and neither of us felt cheated.

>>8953185
not the author but I like this idea

a deep poem? well well... well.
a deep well equipped for its depth
is good when I'm thirsty,
but for all the most part
it's just scenery.
like and re-tweet please
...deep dungeons of doom

First time I've heard the call in years.

There's some context needed for this, since it's written as a piece in a collection. The "seat" mentioned at the end of the first stanza is a reference to an earlier poem, actually the first I ever wrote, in which a boy describes the anxiety of sitting on a bench by the sea next to his date. The title of the poem in between that one and this one has to do with the end of summer, and as a result, this poem begins in autumn. The rest of the necessary context is in the chat log included at the top. I'm kind of iffy on including it, though. Do you feel it's out of place?

I started digging pretty deep for this and it obviously grew out of control (for reference, my next longest is 23 lines). I took a few weeks to clear my mind before scrapping eight or ten lines earlier tonight and I'm still not happy with the ending, but here we are.

It's pretty obvious by looking at the verse what my influences are, although I definitely didn't do them justice. The last line is probably first on the chopping block since it didn't occur to me until a few days after that the Fool was directly out of Eliot rather than an original idea inspired by him. Does that happen often?

Without further ado.

http://pastebin.com/t229mRCr

>>8953243
barrage of images, reads like a poem. consider the lilt of your sentences, and how they flow to the next. also, too reliant on adjectives

>>8954839

>>8954839
Comma after eventually, "but this is fun" because earlier you referred to the thing as this rather than it, "low-growing blackberry brambles"... are my minor nitpicks here and there regarding grammar. There are also plenty of either loose, or redundant sentences such as:

>partly to stretch and partly to introduce Marcie to what lay ahead of them
>not the big, intimidating kind, but the smaller kind for children

On the other hand, this sentence

>"Marcie’s initial thoughts were, Oh, so maybe he is planning on raping and murdering me"

is particularly clumsy and under-developed. Perhaps it's because of insufficient context given that it's an excerpt, or that Marcie is *that* submissive but you cannot just drop that sentence without introductions nor follow-ups.

My advice: try to recreate this excerpt, but taking only half of its current word count. Not that its too long, but just as an experiment regarding volume. The environment is spacious, but so is this excerpt.

>>8955211

Yeah, it's very Eliot-esque, or say, Prufock-esque. The conversational cadence hits the mark, though I'm concerned about the abundance of cliches, e.g.:

>The temperature between us drops
with every tick
>I'll sweep you off your feet, I say--
toward rosy skies and lazy dreams

Also, it would be better if you format it like:

>My Autumn wither paints the sight of cherry petals pink and white
>In orange arrows striking down, directed by the wind to meet
>the earth and rest in listlessness.


...Cuando Quiere No Puede

Dreaming, biflamed candles demonstrate the virtue
Of self-erasure, a month in, tape-looper fugues
Efface my speech. Awake, I remain an ape of words
Slinging the names learned on this throat
On classrooms, on wetmarkets, charming seducees
With the hushed whirrs of wet superstrings
(Grammar books translated
to commas and dashes)

Last year's ash made a monk of my shadow,
Gone off to study violence in ambient
Amongst processions of stags at Sussex
And in Sussex alone do deers
Have pain's halo spiral on their hooves

And I ask myself:

"Are your ears wise enough to sift
The ambivalent notes of muscle and desire
Stuffed in browtine stabs caulked by fur
From the wind's tussled treacheries
Engirdling deer, leaf, and rifle?"

Cervine austerite, sin luz
Adiós, luz del sol caliente, adiós, adiós.
My shadow in loam, now undirts for the city's
Spectres of tax that hover in pavement
For a decade of dreaming the barber pole's
Trick : movement without displacement.

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critique the first chapter of my epic novel pls

I know you guys are gonna lash me for making a chapter less than 300 words

Rusted thorns of clotted blood crown the prisoner's head, seated with his hands bound to a chair in the center of the room. Reluctant and exhausted, the man raises his head to answer a question. He squints into the light aimed at his face. The light source, an industrial halogen lamp, sits at the edge of a very heavy-looking desk: a bureaucratic desk. It obscures the face of the man spitting out questions. The man, as far as we can tell, doing the interrogation. That's Thomas Sloan (30s), the guy behind the desk. He's seated, but it's easy enough to tell that he's much taller than whoever the desk was intended for. The same goes for his uniform; the tasseled epaulettes stretched over his trap muscles barely reach his shoulders. And it's hard to see in this light, though more light might not help us either, what his uniform represents. Not the marines, or the army, but he definitely looks American. I think it's his haircut.

Other than that, the room is pretty sparse. Tom is reading from a folder of documents, and there's the lamp on the desk, and the guy on the chair, but other than that, it's empty - except, oops, I forgot the third guy in the room, but he's easy to overlook. A sober guy - like a doctor, or maybe a scientist. His mustache bobs as he silently takes notes on a clipboard, his white lab coat unseen by the prisoner. That's intentional, if I had to guess.

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Help guys I'm translating a novella for this thread, does it make any sense to say that a house was "on a rock"? Or should I say that it was "on solid rock"?

>>8955511
solid rock sounds better, unless the plot involves the house getting destroyed by not being on solid rock..

>>8954806
Or integral to the story's development or crisis. The character appears to work clearing snow, so getting to him by way of the snow storm may excuse it. Depends on where it goes.

>>8955455
Rusted thorns of clotted blood crown the prisoner's head, seated with his hands bound to a chair in the center of the room. Reluctant and exhausted, the man raises his head to answer a question. He squints into the light aimed at his face. The light source, an industrial halogen lamp, sits at the edge of a very heavy-looking desk: a bureaucratic desk. It obscures the face of the man spitting out questions. The man, as far as we can tell, doing the interrogation. That's Thomas Sloan (30s), the guy behind the desk. He's seated, but it's easy enough to tell that he's much taller than whoever the desk was intended for. The same goes for his uniform; the tasseled epaulettes stretched over his trap muscles barely reach his shoulders. And it's hard to see in this light, though more light might not help us either, what his uniform represents. Not the marines, or the army, but he definitely looks American. I think it's his haircut.

Other than that, the room is pretty sparse. Tom is reading from a folder of documents, and there's the lamp on the desk, and the guy on the chair, but other than that, it's empty - except, oops, I forgot the third guy in the room, but he's easy to overlook. A sober guy - like a doctor, or maybe a scientist. His mustache bobs as he silently takes notes on a clipboard, his white lab coat unseen by the prisoner. That's intentional, if I had to guess.

The questions and answers are in a regional dialect of Spanish - the man giving the answers is Argentinian. If it's an unfamiliar dialect, it's clear from reading their body language that Tom isn't getting what he wants. Tom looks, very badly, like he wants to hit the man; spill his brains out on the cement floor; finger paint with his gray matter; split his skull. But, something's holding him back. Probably the man taking notes, if I had to guess.

What's going to give first? Tom's temper, or the prisoner's will? Does it end violently, or will the guy rat?

...Oh. ...Well. ...That was unexpected. Not your answers, but what happened. I'd give you a taste of what was said, but all it sounded like to me was, "taco, taco, burrito, salsa, burrito, churro, etc., etc." Anyways, for the rest of the interview, Tom exhibited a commendable level of discipline, or maybe just a healthy fear of the guy with the mustache. And the prisoner, who isn't Mediterranean (at least it doesn't look like it from the lack of grease in his hair) seems to hold dear some form of the Italian code of silence: omerta.

>>8954832
My willingness to continue on through this text block of filmic scene setting would be enormously bolstered by the presence of a character actually doing something in relation to it. If you read the first paragraph of every story in the Fiction 100, you will meet at minimum, 100 characters. This is not an accident.

Place Dennis in the action, and let him give us the world-build through his perspective. Have him do something meaningful to the piece.

>>8947443
As a whole this passage is pretty solid, so I'll just nitpick...

>marched steadfastly onward at my side
>unerringly responds with a short tail wag
Awkward phrasing here, consider removing the adverbs

>I don’t want my seed...
Just say son, desu

9/10 pretty good

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>>8955224
Could you elaborate on what you mean by lilt? I model my sentences after Faulkner's (particularly his style in Absalom, Absalom!) and how they're so winding, so complex, that they almost become incantations. The images I present are also integral in establishing one of the novel's major themes - how societal and personal decay can be masked (the beautiful lawn and flowers) even with a preponderance of evidence to the contrary (the violence beneath the green, the neighborhood ravaged by economic downturn). Suburban life, one of the piece's focuses, is built upon a collection of such outward-seeming hypocrisies or illusions.

>>8952927

man you have given me a lot to read and work for which I can't thank you enough. I'll be around in this and any other crit threads so if you want I hope you'll take a look at the final product.

I made the mistake of submitting this too early as I got three rejections, thought one was higher tier which was some encouragment.

>>8955309
Thanks for the help. I think there's an argument to be made for the cliches since they're set up in those lines to be subverted in other ones ("Or does it tear up at the seams?"). They are the speaker's "rosy dreams", used here to mean the same thing as "rose colored glasses", a theme I also used in the first poem of the collection (this is currently the last). Maybe I could stand to write something more grounded? I'd imagine it would be something more like the fourth stanza.

Also, that formatting idea is genius. I feel like I was unconsciously writing in octameter and cutting it in half the whole time. I'm making those edits now.

As for yours... I machine translated the Spanish in order to get a feel for what you're saying. It's very good and your imagery is excellent, but you might want to ask yourself if there are any better ways to state the following:

>an ape of words
Note that "bereft of words" has the same metrical arrangement. Which is better for the image you're trying to create? "Ape" is probably closer to that but it kind of attacks the sensibilities. Of course, I can only speak for myself and this could be entirely a stylistic thing, in which case disregard the above.
>monk of my shadow
Is the speaker actually talking about his "shadow", or is he talking about himself? If it's the latter, make that clear.
>in Sussex alone do deers
I would suggest "stags" again. Do not be afraid to use the same word twice if it is the correct one.

And your prepositions:

>learned on this throat
>On classrooms, on wetmarkets
>hover in pavement
These phrases are abstract and suggest impossibilities when taken at face value. If that's the point, carry on.

part of a Prologue - To Jules, To Julia
I did this for fun and exercise...

-Flower shop-
Fernando: Bouvaria does hardy blossom.
Foyer: But of cases and folds, Fewer people than flowers.
Fernando: The insult is: dearly mankind, The sultry deeply divided.
Foyer: As rueful things, The flowers can withstand But of others, the mating is salubrious unkind. All man and woman seeks can forgo none if any is scornful so than the hardy bouvaria.
Fernando: Do not mention the jealousy! A flower is delicate and strong.
Mary: It is but so, for I am holding. The flower speaks hardily, But the woman is hardly speaking.
Foyer: Then entrance is neither great nor evil.
Fernando: And because you speak so delicately, The flower is more temptress Than woman.
Mary enters:
I will splay what needs order For like the ocean
Where daffodils and roses Can to sides grow
Never in sands lot Do they brow Their petal to distinction. The sand is dry, fellows. The temptress is hardly enough!
Fernando: But she speaks mockingly, But he speaks motley,
And I am seeping slowly to this seat. May you pass mine flower?
Mary: Certainly!
Mary passes the bouvaria to Fernando.
It is her condition, not her general Existence which forbears heartier hands,
Foyer: Then perhaps mine.
Fernando: It is fine for her experience in mine brumal.
Fernando collects the flower in his hands.
Foyer: What of Julia?
Fernando: She weakens. She is despondent to us, Since we neither possess Our care to her, In matters of sexuality.
Foyer: What makes us from homosexuality, Than her to be gay?
Mary: It is kindred spirit from Julia.
Foyer: Fernando, do not you find that straight men Seek not our straits, the same endeavor of depression that Julia subscribes?
Fernando: It is fair and annoying unlike flowers.

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>>8955535
Thank you

>>8955511
Here it is, took me three hours just to translate this text
Much more than I would've expected, I hope you cunts appreciate it
It's not perfect english, but rate the text

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>>8955983
And forgot the link:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yNjMymqgSwhuzXQ-NxzzRmJ_dq5AVVYfxj4skdV29nc/edit?usp=sharing

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>>8955983
pls critique me now

>>8955993
The phrases seem a little disjointed here and there and the subject of "My diary desu" could be lightened from its passive unwillingness to be by a little humour
For ex. Instead of "Today is a good day to kill myself" I'd write "Today would be a good day to kill myself", as it is kind of speculative, making the thought a little hopeful, even naively so, but the following phrase "John thought that every day" would confirm that he wont do it, working as a punchline of sorts.
I liked the part where he read only the back cover of the poetry book. Write more like that if you want to write a shit life on paper, for nobody will want to read it without a little humour in every turn of word

>>8955866
When you get there, consider sending this to Spinetingler. Yeah, it's a zine, and it's not paper, but they pay, and it's a real publishing credit. They actually have a pub/sub ratio less than 1:1. I first heard about them from Miss Snark, back when she was still blogging, and I got my first pub credit from them. It feels as good as you think.

http://www.spinetinglermag.com/submission-guidelines/

>>8956052
thanks friend

>>8953185
I like it too. I think I'll put it in. Thank you anon.

>>8953118
>This is a "May the force be with you" moment.

That is a perfect way of putting it.

> The father is having a crisis of identity due to combat fatigue

That's kind of it, but he's able to deal with it, it's more him realizing his time has come to an end. He and his wife die in the upcoming battle and after that the story takes a completely different shift.

I still have to write more further back to support this part but adding a little memory phrase between the two would be good.

> Maybe your intention was to leave his emotional state ambiguous.

More for Peter than for Orion, since after Peter's death Orion is meant to question some of what his father wanted / intended, like wondering if he wanted to die. Because much much later Orion thinks about choosing the means of his own death, and thinks back to his fathers. So it should seem like a "I'm never going to see you again so here's this knife" rather than a pre-mature passing of the torch.

I've never really decided if Peter meant to die or not, character and writer motivations are so mixed up in my head, and I "wrote" this part many many years ago so I guess I don't really know either.

Anyway thanks a ton for that critique, I am keeping it bookmarked as I work on that scene.

>>8946658

I really liked this. Only thing I can think to say is cut dead wood.

>>8949691
Genius

>>8950611
I don't know why, and there's a very good chance it's just me, but the bureaucrat part seems forced.

>>8951068
Really like this.

Branches & Leaves

you gave me seeds
and I took them.
tiny little seeds.
I took them all, thought
I had them all.

I buried them
in me. I dug and dug
and buried them under the
blanket of wet leaves
into the soil.

no vines came,
and there was no warmth,
for no sun came.

all that’s left
is thick green moss
that covers this
damp forest floor.

-------------------------------------


Branches & Leaves pt. 2

These boots have trouble
gripping the hardened snow
on the sidewalk, so when
I step onto River Avenue,

the side of my body meets
the frigid earth with a woeful
lack of grace. This ground
is still softer than the

eyes that were watching
my shameful attempt to rise
back to my two feet which could
only be described as a frantic scramble.

Perhaps vegans in England don’t experience winter…

***

How heavy must an axe be to
drive itself through a tree?
How long will it take for me
to hack off the limbs one by one?

The dead, rotting
branches drop to the ground and
rot away into the earth. I am
consumed by morose for before

this wood had rotted and became
riddled with sickness it could
have been a book, or a folded
sheet of looseleaf.

***

There is nothing here for you.

Just silence,

So go ahead and walk on your two feet and hypnotize someone else with your ember eyes like your choices could possibly make anyone happy.

I swish you in my mouth and spit you out like warm bathroom tap water mixed with salt that doesn’t do anything to help a sore throat.

>>8954927
Please?

And I saw in that moment how the days pour into one another in an unbroken stream, and how every day is the same. And I saw how dreams exist to hide this from our sight, because if we saw it all at once it would be too much. And I knew all at once that living was terrible, that the unbroken cycle of day after day after day was too much for my brain to handle. And so I went back to sleep.
But I could not sleep. I now felt as though a protective mucus had been peeled from my brain, and was now stuck to the wall of my skull like a chewed up wad of gum, cold and still and dry. I could not sleep because it could not sleep. And I knew now that I would never sleep again, and the days would stretch before me like an endless desert. And that would be fine for a while, until the sand seeps into my eyes, my throat, my lungs, and my body dries up entirely, and my corpse is devoured by ants and buzzards until I am nothing.

>r8 me please

>>8956059

oh cool mind linking what you got published ? I'm interested in giving it a read.

>>8956466
It has my real initials and name on it, so I can't do that. It was also some years ago, so, ironically, I'm no longer nearly as proud of it as I was then. It's one of the things few people mention - the best way to see your own faults is to have them published.

I wrote this after a long night of drinking by myself at about 4 am:
Father, I want you to be near me
I want to feel your touch on my skin
I long to be warm in your embrace
I feel cold inside and
I am distant from you

Father, I long for a life of happiness,
A childhood warm
With you to come home to
I wish you were home
I am distant from you

Father, god I miss you
I long to be with you I long
For your words in my ears
As I drift into sleep like a babe
I am distant from you

Father, Jesus fuck I miss you
I fucking hate you with a
Tender love, you've hurt me
And I fucking want to kill you
I am distant from you

Father I miss you
Oh my god I miss you please
Come back to me I miss you
I never had you there in my home
And that is all I wanted
I hate you and I wish you were with me
I am distant from you

Father father father
Father father father
Father I am distant from you

>>8953199
Passed this by and stopped to read it finally. Feels a little overlong before it gets to its apparent point, a little too tryhard, though there is nice writing within it.

>>8956413
Think this might be better if you utilized a more "heightened" diction. Also think it might be better if it was written in 3rd-person, but that's just personal preference. Also the chewed up wad of gum metaphor is a little awkward, especially because a chewed piece of gum (along with the protective mucous you mention) seems like the opposite of being "cold/dry," and the "still" thing seems a little obvious. You also confuse metaphor again in the passage, wherein you refer to days as being an "unbroken stream" and then like three sentences they're suddenly an "endless desert." There's also some problems with sentence construction and their general flow, but once again I think that's more of a personal preference sorta thing yknow.

Regardless of my criticisms, I actually thought this was pretty good anon, definitely on the right track.

>>8956466
Here is a piece of scene setting from a failed novel that I broke into pieces and got out as stories. I am setting up a conversation between two main characters, and I want to place them in the specific setting, which has plot relevance, and I want multiple sensory inputs to create the narrative illusion of reality. The novel is also a political thriller, so I want to make it clear the perspectives of the characters are of that milieu.


They walked along the Strandweg, past off-season tourists bundled in thick coats and mufflers mooning at freighters’ weighty progress down the Hoek van Holland channel, the main entrance to the Port of Rotterdam.

“The ships lumber so. Like hippopotami at the zoo, pebbled and stinky,” she said, following the gaze of a pair of toddling moppets out to the water. Their mother dragged them reluctantly along, holding each by one hand, hers at her sides, theirs as high as their heads. The girl keened in German for every item of carnival food at every closed stand they passed, while the boy sneered and pulled toward any door that might hold the promise of warmth, both as single-minded and forlorn as a dream of the master race.

Here is a description of an adult's recollection of her abduction as a child that I worked on for several days:

One year earlier, she walks past the beanstalk house and she hears two footsteps behind her and is about to turn around when a burlap sack covers her head and her feet sweep up off the ground and her back hits the metal floor of a large vehicle pretty hard and then the angry growl of a powerful engine lurches the van and pushes her around on her shoulders and she heads away from the beanstalk house and then the burlap sack gets wet from the outside and the smell is like cleaning the bathtub only stronger and every time she screams the sound shoots from her throat in a jet of air, and the scream-jet condenses like a magician's endless kerchief erupting in shiny, black, rippling-satin gulps from her mouth and this black fabric of her scream wraps around her head and the last thing she feels, every time, is the vacuum panic of suffocation and she wants her father to rescue her like she wants her next breath.

This is one of my favorite lines of dialog. The character is talking to a room full of disbelieving VIPs who hate her plan to save the world from nuclear war. Think the "I don't know" scene from Sum of All Fears where Affleck/Ryan can't stop himself from telling the president he can't prove Nemerov got a bad rap.

"You are the dead bodies I'll be stepping over when things go from bad to worse. Unless you are in good enough condition to cook, in which case, you are the dead bodies I'll be eating."

Wrote this today:

I text to ask if you want to get some coffee
You’re busy so I ask about another day
You say you should be free
We go on Friday
You tell me about your cat
That ran away
I tell you that I’m sorry
Sometimes cats are like people, I say
They like to go on adventures
You accuse me of being insensitive
I was just trying to lighten the mood
You tell me it’s alright
And that the coffee here is good
But that you enjoyed the other place more
I like this place, though
The barista girl is hot
I don’t mention this aloud.
Maybe we could come here again, I ask
Yeah, you say
Cool, I say
Cool
Cool
Cool
Cool
Cool
C
oo
L

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>>8955986
Anyone?
Did it after all just for you guys

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new thing i'm working on. let me know what you guys think.

http://pastebin.com/PzKE7DdB

>>8955309
Thank you, friend!

And by the way, for the three guys in this thread who appear to be serious, the best resource ever created regarding the inner workings of the publishing industry, and how to get in as an aspiring writer, is still up, as a searchable archive of her blog:

http://misssnark.blogspot.com/

She had the insider's natural bias against the self-publishing route, but the technology has come a long way since then. For the traditional approach, her advice is timeless.

Also, and kind of incredibly, Evil Editor is still critiquing cover letters for novels:

http://evileditor.blogspot.com/

>>8955555

>>8955573
I disagree. That's like 3 sentences to say "It was snowing."

I know I kind of sound like a Nazi, but I think that you gotta start curt and snappy and once mr reader is hecka engaged, at that point you may bubble over and surprise yourself and them with weather shizz

>>8957478
That's the formula, no dispute about it. But he did at least get a character in the first paragraph.

>>8953243
>In the den’s squalor and lightlessness was the pale ghost of Arthur Canary.
>In the X was Y

m8 no offense but you're talkin like Yoda RN. That's a backwards sentence.

>He sat there in the product of basement’s botched contracting what left

what? what contracting?? why "what?" shouldn't it be "that?"

>no windows for him to see the spring’s sun, the lawn trimmed and primmed each clockwork week by a contracted crew of swarthy laborers, the anarchic kingdom of writhing worms and other monsters what crawled over each other, devoured each other in the long damp dark beneath the impressive green.

Dude this is purple AF and says little. Mexicans do lawns OKAAAY?

And it just goes on and on and on

>>8946635
I'm pretty sure "dense" writing is writing that says a lot in fewer, more meaningful words and expressions and can sometimes be difficult to "unpack." Unless you are referring to a text formatting issue, in which case please disregard.

>>8955993
tense is fucked but hoo boy that is relatable. lrn2grammar and you'll be good

>>8956792
nigga shut da fuck up

>>8956751
this stuff blows to me. sorry

>>8957047
>the man, as far as we can tell
tf? is this a screenplay?

>Reluctant and exhausted
TELLING!

>I think it's his haircut.
I thought us was we

Breakfast marked what would be my most memorable event for June 19, 2014. It’s this early meal, a feast which included toast and eggs, which made it so great…. I awake from my slumber at the voice of my alarm; Note I’m quite lethargic at this moment in time. After a short period of regaining consciousness, I emerge from my bed and walk into the bathroom. I flip the switch sitting on the wall. The brightness of the restroom light blinds me.
I turn on the shower; half-fiery, semi-icy drizzling water pours out; ‘twas a nice warm cleanse. Shampoo and body scrub washes me clean. Moist became me, so I become dry out of shower and through a blue towel. No longer has wet taken me. I gaze into the bathroom mirror but cannot view my reflection because the steam covers it. I’m too lazy to wipe the fog off so I get dressed instead. First, I enrobe myself into fresh, dry undies while joy envelops me. Second, I apply my dark jeans onto my legs via induction; third, a jet Spiderman tee is applied over my body. And at last, I put on my charcoal ankle socks and wizard hat. Black clothing is good, I convince myself.
Whilst running upstairs to wish guten Tag unto Grandmother Jay, I manage to trip and fall. Shame fills my lungs, and I die from hypoxia. The awkwardness of the trip lasts several macroseconds. I was okay in the end though; it really wasn’t a big deal. Top of the morning to you I say to her; the rest of the day to you she tells me in response.
She begins her quest on making toast and eggs while I sit in the chair at the table in the kitchen and wait for her to finish inventing food. I yell ándale arriba to her, but she does not respond. When the toaster finished with the toast Grandmother Jay spread ghee over my buns. I like gheetles. The eggs finish cooking as well, so she plops the eggs atop the buttery toast. I devour the entire loaf with a fork-- not a spoon.
So concluded what marked my greatest memorable event of June 19, 2014. I don’t remember what ever happened in my life before or after since the event; but in the end the only thing that matters is toast and eggs.

http://pastebin.com/QZsdnB2y
Is it too generic?

>>8957564
what on earth kind of gay ass format is this? I have never seen something posted so awkwardly. pastebin that shit man lmao

>>8957542
>Dude this is purple AF and says little
I'm trying to convey a sense of ugliness, dysfunction, violence, and terror lurking beneath a healthy-seeming facade. 'Anarchic kingdom' is a phrase I used to try to indicate this. The Mexicans doing lawns ties into a theme of familial/male abdication I play with throughout the novel - how there are three men in the home yet they don't personally tend to their own property.

Not everything written has to be some bare bones Carveresque derivative but I will consider what you've said.

>>8957680
As my boots met fallen leaves,
And worms disturbed the soil,
I saw a death I did not mourn,
but met with some turmoil,

lol that fourth line sounds so goofy. read it out loud you goofy ass cracka

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https://docs.google.com/document/d/1GbywSXiPMwKCJhbvrtjUbxERc1vEvWa9hZavxqHNZyA/edit?usp=drivesdk

It's a bit long, but finished.

It's a fantasy/sci-fi story set during the Neolithic. The more simplistic style is deliberat.

Hope someone enjoys.

>>8957687
DESU, if you're trying to convey a sense of ugliness dysfunction, violence, terror, etc lurking beneath a healthy facade (fyi I find that all corny AF) then I don't think what you wrote is doing that.

Where is the facade? All I see is the bad stuff. It seems to me that if you're trying to do the bad stuff lurking beneath the good stuff, then there should be just as much good stuff, or even more, at least at first.

ALso DESU I don't think authors like... lay out their themes like that. Like isn't it the case that most authors just write stuff and deny that there are any explicit themes? Don't you just write a good story, and identify the themes after? It seems like putting the cart before the horse to me

you dont need to do sports
or have a gf
shower at least once
every three days
get good at a videogame
jerk off

>>8956751

>"You are the dead bodies I'll be stepping over when things go from bad to worse. Unless you are in good enough condition to cook, in which case, you are the dead bodies I'll be eating."

I like this line a lot but I really didn't get the nod to a master-race, maybe because it's an excerpt

>>8957734
>fyi I find that all corny AF
It's essentially the story of human history and humans themselves.
>Where is the facade?
The facade is the "impressive green" - the well-tended lawn and the beautiful flowerbeds. Everything looks in proper order but if you strip this away you find the lurking ugliness.
>Don't you just write a good story, and identify the themes after?
I had certain things I wanted to explore initially and those things evolved as I went along with the project. I'm not convinced that authors go into writing without a clue as to what they want to talk about, some point that's on their mind that they wish to articulate.

$> vi real_niggas.cpp
#include<get>
#include<money>
who are you?
I only get money
nigga
money. money. money. money. money
Money. /* #define money RICH NIGGA */
i $weep past the
lingering
rustling of Benjamins
of the dollar $igns in
my soul
the mummy in my $oeur
et o ces voix d’enfants,
chantant dans la coupole
dynamically cast me
as the nigga rich disciple
of Allah
the C-style cast
of the mullah mummy
nigga. :w :q!
$> rm -r ~

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Two for one here bitches.
1/2

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>>8958491
2/2

I've been redirected here by some cunt.

http://kessler-event.blogspot.de/

>>8956737
Thanks for the feedback senpai !

Did you think my message came across well / was interesting?

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>r8 me please

>>8958657
change it to Times New Roman and I'll critique it

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>>8958664

>>8958664
exploade into a zillion peaces

>>8954390
the only half decent thing in this thread. the rest of you write like the only thing you want to do is let everyone know how smart you are. you have all been made to look like fools by an actual sonic the hedgehog fanfic.

>>8957626
This guy

R8 my crap first attempt at writing. Something is wrong with it but I just can't work out how to fix it.
http://pastebin.com/ZkEE1trL

>>8958923
could be much more persuasive. keep at it though, champ. you have potential.

>>8956751
In my head I read the abduction bit in the voice of the red haired band chick from American Pie

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>>8958972
here you go. basically you need to "iris in" more and not stack exposition at the front. throw that exposition in 30+ pages later, and think of a more organic way to show it rather than tell it.

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/iris-in

>>8955448

Reas and write more

>>8958692

Just post it on Literotica you will have a better audience

>>8959148
I will

>>8959141
so satisfying

There is no way you can incapacitate me, only hinder. There are no boundaries, no boarders of education that I will not claim as mine. I yearn for knowledge yet you deny me. You deny me the very core of growth and development for what reason. What reason have you stuck onto me to have deem me not worthy of the fruit of knowledge? What could I have done to conjure your wrath? Whatever reasoning may be behind your motives it will no longer set me back; only drive my determination to succeed at my ambitions to learn and to flourish. You have gifted me something unmalleable in this world yet still, one can only beg the question of why. Cursed yet blessed all in the same notion and only under the influence of man-made pellets may I be able to comprehend my emotions and structure them into words. When sobriety peaks my mind is when I feel my thoughts, feelings, and preservation feel the most misty, and within that mist creations of wonder spark and burst within the heavy fog. At those moments I can only hope to make sense of the ill-figured handiwork that you have helped formulate. You have gifted me a mind that speaks in colors and listens to expressions rather than grant me something that could be used to comprehend and speculate the world around and the only translator between the languages being a small blue pill. I have considered you an enemy, a friend, and whatever lies between. I have sworn damnation on you, yet in the same light have given my thanks for your complexity and as I continue my misshapen path you have built for me I can at least admit that I am thankful for the colorfulness you have given me.

Sorry for the edge, just needed to get something off my back.

Context: I'm writing a short story about the Russian scientist team responsible for building the first ICBM - the R-7 - in 1958. The short story is set at a party, where the scientists are celebrating the success of the first test launch.

Outside, not quite so idyllic, the shadow of the War looms persistent still, like some permanent spectral projection, the ashen outline of runners in Hiroshima just seconds after the boom… There is a second mark, of a different kind: the stamping of a boot, the iron fist slammed for twenty years behind the thick moustache, the twinkling public persona, the wide-brimmed laugh, the Gulag… Krushchev has his ass firmly on the seat of the White House now, the Russian White House, wondering ‘Do they really like me? Do they really? Maybe if I raise the temperature another little bit, we’ll really kick off this thaw...' Indeed, the newspapers are loosening with every successive edition, and occasionally American press leaks in with the passing of some athlete or Olympian, a cramped icon in the classifieds, a dripfeed of hidden information but do they realize?

The fences are coming down now yet the War remains. The starved, gangrene-brown bodies spilling from cramped flats and silos, bone and skin forming an interface, a system communicating the sight, the smell of death. Where is this? Dora? Buchenwald? Belzec? Moscow, Kazan, Vladivostok - the camp archipelago stretching like the railway line connecting Germany to Poland, Poland to Belgium, Belgium back to Germany… The bulldozers move in and topple what’s left of the constructions, burying under dusty detritus entire oceans of browned blood and sweaty soil.

The televisions are back on yet the War remains. Strikes are slowly stripped from mass market paperbacks. 'Yes yes yes, we’ll relaunch Amerika magazine – and soon!' echo the PR men. Supple, air-breathed notes of Tchaicovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 float through the connection, along with short, sharp breaths and ‘Mr. Prezident, the American, well ... he is simply brilliant!' Krushchev frowns, and taps on his nose, ‘Well I guess you’d better give him the award then.’ Click. He picks it back up. ‘Operator, can you get me such and such, he works at the War Department… yes, yes.’ Another click. ‘Vladimir, about those nukes you’re holding… Well, you see, Castro just called … let’s say we move them into Havana about, hmm, 3 years from now?’

>>8959351
thank ye

>>8955448
This is nice, high percentile relative to other posts in the thread.

Very relatable considering my monitor just died in the middle of the night. You need some direction though. I get a sense this isn't going anywhere, but I believe that you can make it go somewhere. I mean it's already going somewhere, it's just not going there at the end, you know?

My first time writing fantasy.

His feet were numb. Pressed against the cold floor of the dungeon cell. His ass sat on the rough wood bench that was against the wall. Splinters in ass. Naked, except for the gauntlet. He had told the guards the only way the gauntlet was coming off was if they severed his hand completely (although he wasn’t even sure that would work). After a solid half-hour of pulling and prying they started to believe him. Finally the guard with the Mexican hat looking thing pinned to his shoulder entered the cell with a massive sword in his hands. The blade was curved like the hips of a woman who had good birthing hips. Long story short the guard failed to cut off the prison guy arm and he was like “See what I told you? This gauntlet ain’t coming off until I find the magical mcguffin tower of towerness. JK it’ s a bass guitar. You don’t know what that is, but it’s funky. Trayvon SMARTin;

A Morally Reprehensible Desktop Computer Considers Suicide

The last we spoke in outer space, in some
no oxygen, imminent death sort of way
we profaned my socks with stains of cum
to phantom sighs of pornstars, or
a shameful hentai rampage.

You look like a bitch through the headaches and bad breath,

and a putrid odor chokes me.
It recalls a blinding primal fit, the tides
Of fresh defeat, the brain torched melody
Of solitary anesthesia dreams.

And I sleep to lulling pulses of bluish light
Hoping from this wreck that one of these nights
You’ll find a way to drink my yellow-black bile
And kill yourself.

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http://pastebin.com/PzKE7DdB

>>8956496
any1 gonna do this shit?

>>8959076
Then it worked for you.

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>>8956496
its sincere, and it reads like song, you should make song and sing it, Poetry not so much

http://pastebin.com/SYrM7iLV

>>8952980
>the soft spot of those breasts which curdled out of her chest
>all the men of King Adrien was at a cheer
>he thrusted the dagger

>>8960871

calkiem zajebiste ale co to za font ? Uzywaj Courier lub times new roman

>>8960433
Are you telling me that the prisoner's head was seated with his hands bound to a chair?

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I've been trying lately to make more natural, free-flowing dialogue and this is just an example of mine, so I would like criticism on the dialogue

Set up:
Disinterested and all around enervated man is visiting a woman at her house (man speaks first)

http://pastebin.com/TUWMS4hq

>>8960433
Not really a fan of the present tense, it just sounds really amateurish wherever it's used, that's really my main gripe. A few other things, like unnecessary colon use, and the words in the brackets? Are they your notes? Dialogue is solid though. The part about shirt cuffs looking like vagina's is pretty off-key and childish, and detracts from the previous paragraphs. Don't put the word "like" after a sentence like you've done (did the prisoner want to cum? Like, he’d understood that the guy wasn’t gay)

>>8960433
Is this gay porn? wtf

>>8957846
i dig it homie

>>8962254
good call.

>>8963385
the narrator's voice is supposed to be amateurish/distracted until it sobers up at the end of that section in the discussion of torture. maybe it's too much. i've never written anything but movie scripts so that's probably the source of a bunch of these quirks.

>>8963831
nope.

once there was an ugly barnacle
he was so ugly that everyone died
the end

Jeffree Somners, the one man in the village who can repair a kite. Do you know him personally? No, but I know his mother. I used to play cats and cradles with her. Oh my, so you know her husband then? Yes, the hairy man. I could make a rug out of those hairs. That's not polite. Oh I thought.. yes, I'm sorry. It isn't polite. I what do you do for a living? I think i'm going to go now. Oh okay. Well I'll talk to you later. Why is it that whenever i bring up how hairy a man is i get looked at like i'm some sort of lizard? Am i not allowed to mention these things? They're just observations. Should i have told her that it was merely an observation and that i won't do it again? Fine, i won't make observations like how the car's moving. The engine's on. Sometimes people forget these things are happening. The lights are on, Betty. Maybe you forgot to look up and notice it. I like to keep track of these things so they don't slip away in the middle of the night like my husband did. If i had a husband he'd slip away in the middle of the night. My fake sons know that. Don't you sons? If i had sons they'd agree with me.
Meow says the cat.
I'm on a diet and i can't mess it up this time. Whenever i tell the womens about my diet they laugh at me and tell me to throw up into the toilet. I can't very well afford a toilet when i'm on this diet. I won't throw up into my fake toilet. I could throw up outside but then i might as well not eat food to begin with. They think food just grows on trees. Not the food i eat doesn't.
One time i stuffed my face with everything i had made for dinner then went to sleep. I pooped my sheets! Grandpa had to come and clean it all up. That was one year ago. Aren't i blessed for having a grandfather who is still alive? Whenever i think about people and their grandfathers they're all dead. Every one is dead and they have no grandparents. No great grandparents either. Whoever has a great grandparent shouldn't be able to speak. They don't know anything about the world. Isn't that true? That people who have great grandparents who are still alive don't know anything about the world. I believe the scientists are working to prove that right now. It will save many people. Get out of bed and kill your great grandparents is what they're saying. I don't disagree. These are the people who ruin our world.

>>8963385
btw - thanks for giving some of it a read - going to check yours when i get to a computer.

>>8963385
have you read the dialogue out loud? a lot of the exposition within the lines is unnatural. think about a typical conversation between two people - it's balanced with what that pop psychology guy called 'strokes.' unless it's a formally structured conversation or one person is telling a long continuous story, the beat goes boom, boom, boom, boom. or boom boom boom, boom boom boom. you dont get one person saying two sentences, then getting a one word response, and repeat. of course there are exceptions. additionally, conversation is naturally a lot more discursive than you have here. think about ways you can use interruptions, mis-head words, repitition, forgotten stories, tip-of-the-tongue stuff to sprinkle the exposition (if needed) into the conversation without making it clear that's what it is. put yourself in the character's position; if someone asked how are things, would you awkwardly re-cap your career to someone who already knows what you do? or would you just say, "same shit." i'd read out loud, and if you're on a mac or maybe it works on pc too you can get the robot voice to read it if you're too caught up in it all. sometimes that helps. that and changing the font.

>>8944306
what concessions do i make
what concessions don't i make

what alternatives are there to conceding this

i accept this

what do i think i can do

they do this so i accept this
i do this so they accept this
this happens so they don't accept this

i am this so i don't accept this

ideal person

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>>8959551

I've been revising and see chapter 2

http://pastebin.com/5cpxUxB0

posting this again because I've gotten some primo tips from you guys

>>8964725

shit my bad thats the old version. Here's the revised

http://pastebin.com/wBA6AAbR

>>8964355
Your tenses are a fucking mess

>>8964789
explain pls

>>8957687
>>8957766

Not him, but I think you need to be more thoughtful about when and where you delve into prose like that. The very beginning of the book needs to be sharp and to the point. You need to be have more powerful and concise metaphors and be considerate with how you arrange your sentences. That doesn't mean stripped back prose. But you need to be comfortable with "relaxing" for certain sentences.

Otherwise, what you have written is better than anything I have seen in a critique thread desu.

>>8953315
Really good. I enjoyed reading that. It flowed. Only thing I disliked was how you re-use the same words a lot, which strikes me as awkward.

Glad to see some contributions to these threads that aren't faggy poetry or first person edgy teenage cynic tells it like it is

I am nothing and none.-
effigy of a man-
I pray to the winter sun
and prostrate before nihl

a light without no heat
a song without no sound
a flesh bonehouse without meat
a pain in all my joints

entropy;apora
is where i might reside
beautiful antumbra
unholy being I

This be the verse of agni
my words a haughty kiln
pagan ashes adorn me
dionysus reborn.

a hero is what I could not become
life is played with die of zero sum.

Thanks for the critique

Most of the meat of the dialougue was actually molded after conversations I've had with my friends from highschool, and that's what I envisioned here with this meeting is that they're two friends who knew each other from university (probably should've stated that beforehand) and I find that the majority of topics I talk about with my friends from highschool go from what they're currently doing, to current happenings with others from highschool, to finally rounding down to events from highschool. I don't know why but it seems to be a common theme with every friend I speak to from highschool, maybe it's because we have nothing to talk about besides that and that we only really talk anymore because of some respect for the past

As for tip-of-the-tongue stuff, what exactly do you mean? I'll take into note putting more digression into the dialogue but as I said before, I tried to model the subjects after what I've personally experienced, which don't range much besides past events.

>>8964312
Forgot to quote
>>8966400

1/2

He found himself sitting once again at the same small metal table at the same bustling ritz as the last time. And once again, Amy sat before him. This time wearing a black outfit fit for a cultureless funeral--nondescript save for a decorative cufflink in the shape of a pill capsule which shone dull platinum in the waning daylight that now surrounded them, which glared in Declan's eyes and made him squint. They waited a minute more for the sun to pass behind a building, and the cafe was once again bathed in calm. Amy sat calmly, dreamily, her body falling perfectly into the small wire chair as she tapped a small spoon against the rim of her glass. "Tell me something nice," she decided, after a pause. "Well... nice?" Declan thought, wishing he could enter her bizarre aura of relaxation. The tapping stopped. "I can't really..." "Tell me about your first experience of making love." Declan felt his eyebrows raise as thoughts of Florence flooded his head. Just behind his eyes were the sights, smells, sounds of a bruised London sky overhanging the hydroponics greenhouse in which he spent much of his seventeenth year. His eyes returned to Amy, who was still examining him gently, her retinas lazily passing over him: right eye, left eye, mouth, halo. Keeping a wary eye on her, he ventured; 'Would, uh... would you like to take a tour of the apple garden?"
Amy smirked and rose from her seat. I pushed my chair in and followed out of the bustling hall and through a narrow hallway towards the greenhouse in the back. She had a nervous, crooked smile that managed to betray an unmistakably unique brand of societal nihilism. I noticed it as she looked back at me in the hallway. I noticed it as she followed me into the nursery and quickly climbed onto one of the many wait-high hydroponic shelves and undressed deftly between the Red Gala bushes. The greenhouse resembled a giant glass coffin, I mused.

>>8966468
2/2

I was jolted into focus by a reverberating snap of Amy’s fingers.
“There’s a worm over there, would you get it please?” her finger was extended and pointing to a sleek, featureless metal cylinder as her other hand did her hair up into a bun. “Oh, yes.” I replied, eyeing the object curiously. I then realized where I was, and what I was doing. I felt a warmth rise up into my throat as I scooped up the silvery worm, which emitted a sudden silent hum as I made contact. I found myself flustered as my gaze fell upon Amy’s pale body, perched deliciously among the rows of brightly-coloured winter apple bushes. I stepped towards her and placed my free hand on her hip, her flesh yielding pleasantly to my touch. The muffled din of the party was barely audible from where we were, and I noticed that her eyes were the colour of the apple trees. Muffled clanking of plates from somewhere else as I drew myself nearer. I could feel the worm gyrating slowly to match our breathing. She purred as I reasserted my grip on the delicate cleft of her thigh, and the worm’s tip found her. It began probing around her slit, slowly at first before increasing in its enthusiasm, much to her audible pleasure.
“Sorry,” she managed to wrench her face into a smirk again, “I’m all wet.”
I exhaled pithily, pressed up against her now. The worm detected her increased arousal and began oscillating, softly at first, then with a renewed, almost organic resolve. It seemed so uncannily organic that I almost lost hold of it. Amy was engrossed. I looked down at it, the worm, then back up to Amy as she was gently eviscerated by what I was beginning to see as a “thing”, an “it.”
She was moaning loudly now, as I felt myself becoming engrossed by the strangeness of it all. I leaned into her, the worm gaining more ground, her moans became urgent as her hips moved against the thing, her juices running down the worm and onto my hand.
We were leaning into each-other now, her arms slung around my neck. It was then that we both fell sloppily, softly, down to the concrete floor, supported by our wayward limbs and knocking over some plants in the process. We continued down there until she came, her face contorting with the shock of pleasure as I watched intently, almost as if worried I would miss some crucial moment, some errant detail in her face that would reveal the world...

My phat-ass boner was poppin’ like mad, it was all in my pants and I was finna give her some of this heat.
“Step into the thunerdome, bitch,” I declared, casting the worm aside. It clattered to the ground as I whipped out my massive erection. She squirted right then and there as I spun my dick around like a true champion.

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Another one of mine, posted twice now, but I hope I can get better this time yo.

Page one of two

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>>8966589
Page two of two

>>8966589
Break up your sentences more, spell "rifles" correctly, and actually get a narrative underway by page 2 or people will give up.

>>8966589
>>8966597
First paragraph was solid, then it all fell apart and resembled something like YA

The froth of boreas’s verglass
Swept I, the lone wanderer, from height
The lamina had undergone the chemistry
And perforated by my tuffs I held ground.

>>8966017
not quite digging the trailing thoughts in this one

>>8956792
rupi kaur?

>>8956496
not poetic, like a previous anon said. I feel this would better be shown through prose

>>8956300
not bad anon <3

As a result of growing up with Spongebob the SquarePants I have in my possession three hundred and seventy two Scotch Rite Scrubbing Sponges covered in ejaculate and an old green plastic bucket full of glass starfish, scubadivers, a treasure chest, and scatterings of coral in which I use to dunk my head in until near asphyxiation. In my house yellow is love and love is too much.

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>>8966807
I would try to change 'the lone wanderer' to a proper name (slightly obscuring) and invoke Olson's 'I, Maximus' thingy he does, while establishing a stronger world.

one one one
who am I
who are you
touch the sky
kill the dew
who is to know
what we should do
despite we try
to go for you

I can't read
you fucking cunt
get out and go
and smoke a blunt

You forbidden center and puncture
around which many revolve.
You, hiding behind awkward slant rhymes,
broken meter, forced latinisms and clarifying footnotes.
Often spoken of, by others, in terms of reverence,
known by biographical detail,
triangulated by translations and vague appraisals.
Scintillating, decadent, bruise colored and beautiful, somewhat holy.

I have not your structured history,
your dead memories, the limpid pleasures and pains.
More importantly, I was not lain to steep
in past glories of form or bred in taste,
made to swallow my vegetables of western traditon
until my whole consitution contained the rules of a civilization.
When I first drew myself out of my past
and squeezed myself in mind's palm for material
only this came out.

I admit. Often have I wanted and then felt you,
just in a once, a low and far off tone near the stomach.
At night, about asleep
I touch with my fingertips
the imagined taste of rat poison absinthe,
obsidian skipping stone on green water.
All this ungraspable, later, on command.

A journey to know you would drastically undershoot
these violet pregnancies born to your shadows.
They only appear to belong to you. Mine are that damp sidewalk,
that black 2004 Honda civic carelessly drenched in blueing moss,
rain rising around above, poking holes in stormclouds.
These perfect structures of metal and screen, with
Humming and snapping wires beating mystic patterns
sidereally regular. The steely glass in the distance
grown taller than you knew, strangling the dimmer, dimming stars.

>>8967733
i literally lol'd

>>8963385
>“Mind if I smoke?”
>“Uh…no, no—let me open a window.”
>“Not much. Yeah. Not much at all,”

I don't get this exchange

>>8964850
Your first sentence is in the present tense, but your second sentence is in the past tense.

>>8964748
>bruised water

?

Ok I know what you mean but I don't think it works. Cause a bruise is a weird soiled-banana color spot on an otherwise pink space. And the ocean is expansive. Well I could conjure up rationalizations all day and they wouldn't effect you, but that phrase, bruised water, doesn't work for me.

>>8966468
>>8966475
Elegant writing, but anachronistic in places, and you have small errors.

For example, I would say that "nondescript SAVE FOR..." is anachronistic.

And I would say that "bathed in calm" is weird (bathed in calmness)?

>>8968451
odnt screencap your blog u dolt!!!

post it in pastebin or something. goddamn

Manilla slowed to a stop and hugged Maggie at her waist. The relief the girl felt from these kind words that promised protection and a home filled her with an irrational joy. She had worried about what was going to happen to her in the wake of all her badness, but felt now that there was an answer, even if it were confusing and surprising. She could learn to live beneath the bridge, so long as she would be protected from the things that scared her. Her emotions danced inside of her, ricocheting between fear and love and beset on all sides by that persistent hunger that had stuck with her through the night and sunk its claws even deeper into her empty belly. She began to cry into Maggie's white parka, her body trembling. Maggie pat the girl's head and rubbed her back.

>>8969169
I understand what you're saying thank you


should I change tenses between paragraphs or when?

>>8969270
why would you ever change tenses? are your characters inter-dimensional time travelers?

>>8969270
I hate Neil Gayman but he has what I think is a good piece of advice:

"Listen when they tell you it doesn't work for them, don't listen to what they suggest as a replacement."

TLDR: I can't tell you what you should do with the tenses. Personally I'd make it all past tense, cause total present strikes me as incredibly cheesy. I'd stay consistent though. Maybe experiment.

>>8969280
Aren't there some books where tenses change from time to time? I have a weird sense that I was once reading a book and the author changed stuff up and I didn't even notice it...

>>8969286
Well, if an author changes tenses to give the reader a sense of immediacy for some lines or to change the perspective or perception of a moment, that's one thing. What matters, though, is what you said yourself; you didn't notice it.

In your writing, it's very noticeable. It comes off as sloppy rather than calculated. So, while that is a tool you could use, maybe you're not ready to use it yet or haven't figure out how to use it correctly. Figure out how to say what you're saying while remaining within one tense. It may be more challenging, but it'll help you get more comfortable with one tense before you try writing in two at the same time.

This advice/critique is coming purely from my own experience, I'm not just being a dick for the sake of it. When I started my first novel, the first 20 pages or so were written in a very confusing mix of past and present tense, because some things were just easier to write in a different tense. But once I got more comfortable with what I was writing, I picked a tense and stuck with it.

>>8969297
change 'your writing' to 'his writing', sorry. thought I was responding to the guy

>>8969200
why?

>>8944324
Lei el primer parrafo, lo que describes no es un artista, es un Autista.

>>8969750
Not him, but,

it looks a bit precious,
it could be accused of being advertising,
and,
4chan is the last place you want to look for clicks. Trust me.

>>8964748
Ok. "Simon Gillaley" here. I'm going to show you what I think you should do next. Most workshop types absolutely hate this technique, and that's why they are in workshops. Here is a current pasta of part of the opening passage:

The bruised water was freezing and a living labyrinth of currents. Rough winds rode the sky and the toppling waves slammed on him, trying to force him back down. He focused ahead on the shoreline of his island. Without him, the lighthouse was dark and the house silent. Standing as though they were waiting for him. The keeper started kicking and swimming back to land in a trail of bubbles.
Tired and sore he stumbled onto the speckled sand and collapsed. It took a few moments before he could steadily prop himself on the battered muscles again. However tied to a rope around his waist was the prize that made diving out into the freezing waters worth it. Two whole baskets of lobster, hooks full of screeching Humboldt squid and a research sphere brimming with data.
The keeper pulled the writhing catch out of the water with some effort. Seeing with dismay that something had taken a bite out of the squid. Leaving most as little more than heads. The squid was rare and a respite from his never ending supply of SPAM cans. But in a way, he was glad that whatever was in the water preferred their tentacles to his legs.

Here it is again:

The water was a freezing labyrinth of currents. Rough winds rode the sky and waves slammed on him, trying to force him back down. He focused ahead on the shoreline of his island. Without him, the lighthouse was dark and the house silent. Standing as though they were waiting for him. The keeper started kicking and swimming back to land.
Tired and sore he stumbled onto the sand and collapsed. It took a few moments before he could steadily prop himself on the battered muscles again. Tied to a rope around his waist was the prize: Two baskets of lobster, hooks full of Humboldt squid and a research sphere brimming with data.
The keeper pulled the catch out of the water, dismayed that something had taken a bite out of the squid. Leaving most as little more than heads. The squid was rare and a respite from his never ending supply of SPAM cans. But he was glad that whatever it was preferred their tentacles to his legs.

...

>>8964748

Look at all those adjectives and modifiers and phrases like 'however" and think about pace. People talk about "flow" - an artless way to describe what is elsewhere called the "narrative dream," the experience we have when we forget we are reading and we are instead having the experience of the characters in the plot and setting. Remember there is plenty of time to become the next Faulkner. What you want first is to get control, and hold it from beginning to end so you can sell this and call yourself a writer. The narrative dream depends mostly on economy. My specific decisions are an example of how to do it, not the best possible version. You are trying to get the prose clean enough that it can proceed through the readers eyes, into his brain, and turn into an effortless experience of each scene. If you ruthlessly red-pencil this and re-read it yourself, you'll see what I mean. Each little extra "trail of bubbles" draws our attention away from what the character is doing, instead of focusing us on him.

Last thing for this cut. Go read something you like, but listen to yourself thinking as you read. You might notice something. The difference between "stumbled onto the speckled sand" and "stumbled onto the sand," is that the second allows the reader's imagination to fill in the details about the sand for themselves. So unless something central to the story requires the sand to be speckled, let the reader see it their way. That also contributes to creating the narrative dream. Every reader does it, though most don't realize it. The crafty working writers think about it all the time. It's why /lit/ types argue over what characters or places in their favorites look like. There is only enough description for each reader to fill it in themselves.

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>>8969931
>>8969959

>>8969750
It also cancels first world-wide publishing rights. Those are the good ones. The ones everybody wants.

>>8969959

But I mean is allowing the reader to fill it in themselves the most important thing ?

Its a good point and I can see how it clears up my writing but I feel a bit conflicted because I want to SHOW my readers the scenes how I imagined them.

>>8969979
I'm not even....

>>8969983

ps

I greatly appreciate you bothering to write out a full essay for me, thanks

>>8969959
>The difference between "stumbled onto the speckled sand" and "stumbled onto the sand," is that the second allows the reader's imagination to fill in the details about the sand for themselves. So unless something central to the story requires the sand to be speckled, let the reader see it their way.
I hate this advice. The "show me, don't tell me" sort of platitude you get from people is horse shit.

You're writing a story. Tell me. Tell me everything you want to tell me. If you're a decent writer, you're telling me something for a reason, even if it's just to make the setting feel more real.

Telling writers to cut out adjectives so the reader can fill in the details is sophomoric shit that doesn't actually matter. Never once have I ever read a harmless but informative adjective like 'speckled' and thought OH FUCK THAT TAKES ME OUT OF THE STORY

so fuck you

Forest

A train-whistle stutters,
and the field rings its grasses around it.
The birds sigh with their strange vernacular.
Hairs of light grow from the clouds, the brittle sojourn.

From my body a thin supplicant
wades into the area steepened from overcast.
Fattened from the weather, she gazes at me,
stark with singular dimension.

The trees surrounding us see themselves into grass,
like a resting protestant, at the end of a hot day.

>>8969983
>I want to SHOW my readers the scenes

I know you do. That's why it's so hard. Let's assume we are talking about preparing to attempt publication. Which means we have to get someone to agree to, in small part, hang their publication's reputation to your work. It's a big ask, if you think of it from their side. And they have to believe that someone will want to read you. Another big ask.

So let's, for that assumption, put up on a shelf labeled "academic theoretical hogwash I managed to defend for my dissertation which was almost certainly bullshit the moment I thought it up," and just describe the experience of reading fiction - it's cooperative. You have to do your work, and the reader has to do their work. Readers reward writers who allow them to cooperate. And the editor who agrees to publish this is your first reader. Let him, or her, cooperate with you. Let them have their narrative dream. I can guarantee you one thing - when they get it it is the greatest relief of their day. Because it's the gold ingot they search for every day and so rarely find - evidence of control.

>>8970059
>workshop guy

Mark found the mirror disinclined to meet his gaze. The thin, upturned nose, the gold-speckled green eyes, the slightly pudgy cheeks, all unwilling to impose themselves on a youthful face. Each feature shrank away under observation into a total and undeniable blandness. He had always despised his cheeks and their lack of the contoured bone structure that the other boys in his class boasted.
Taras was one of those blessed few, a young man gifted with those protruding cheekbones and a carved jawline. He was two years Mark’s senior, and one scarcely needed the view of his profile visible in the bedroom mirror to confirm this. He toyed with a smartphone held above his face, legs splayed out on the bed behind Mark. Mark, meanwhile, sat and waited his prompting.
It came with the shifting of heavy desert shoes from the bed, and a sudden thud as they dropped to the hardwood bedroom floor. Then, as always, came that masculine and confident voice.
“So I was looking on the Deep Web..”
Taras paused, as if awaiting an interruption. None came.
“And we can get one for around two hundred and fifty dollars. No shipping. He lives a few miles away and he’ll arrange a meetup once we’ve paid.”
Mark stared at the floor as Taras ploughed on.
“I mean, split 50-50 it’s gonna be pretty doable. And they won’t notice shit if you do it incrementally. Be smart.” advised the elder boy.
At this Mark nodded. There was little else he could do. Taras had been his sole counsel since they’d met online playing Runescape four years earlier. The shut-in Bosnian sophist had taken the equally friendless thirteen year old Mark under his wing, where he lectured on the Runescape craft of smithing, before making the natural progression that all teachers inevitably make to the subjects of ethics and meaning. Of those lofty subjects Taras elected to quote endlessly from Nietzsche, and from the eccentric German’s work he had drafted the plan that now made Mark’s leg quiver beneath the padded wooden chair.

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>>8969959
fantastic advice

>>8970279
>Mark found the mirror disinclined to meet his gaze.
tf does this mean

>>8970473
I dunno.. it bizarrely sounded good in my head. I was trying to say he was nervous, that even in his reflection he seemed afraid to look into his own eyes.

fuck 4chan but idk where else to get good critiques :/
been trying writing short stories by hand without thinking about my subject beforehand and not stopping my hand until the story comes to a close, it creates a clipped style I kinda like:

A woman and her wife were planning on preparing brussels sprouts for dinner. Only one of them was going to cook but they both planned it together. They were going to have brussels sprouts with salt. The first woman began to cook the brussels sprouts while the second woman watched her cook them. They looked good. The brussels sprouts were almost done. The first woman realized she had forgotten to salt the brussels sprouts. This was bad news. And there was no more salt. But the brussels sprouts were cooked nonetheless. Both of the two women ate the unsalted brussels sprouts and they were grateful to have one another’s company and love and respect in these modern and difficult times.

>>8970525
so deeply autistic that it's mildly humorous

Masturbated
Not yet
Baited
Damp breath
Heated member
Burning ember
Lack of air
Closing distance
Breath now dry;
Exhale moist
Fade to white

>>8962108
Dziękuje, co ciekawe - u mnie jest "times new roman", screensh z libre office, więc może dlatego wyszło tak dziwnie. Jestem niedaleki skonczenia tej historii, mam już wszystko w głowie, natenczas zacząłem inne opowiadanie, mam tu naszkicowana taką koncepcje
http://pastebin.com/fjgTYSyD
Zerknąłem także na twoje
>>8964748
długie, postaram sie przeczytać i napisać dwa słowa. Co moge powiedzieć od razu - twój angielski jest dobry, czy zamierzać w nim wyłącznie pisać?

>>8969297
thanks I get it now

>>8969822
Exactamente esto, anon.

Será que estoy mas acostumbrado a la literatura inglesa que ahora las escrituras en español no me provocan o inculcan la misma emoción, pero aparte de eso (y las fallas gramáticas) no encuentro una idea original.

So many things I wish I would’ve said,
With both our hearts succumbing to the frost,
These fond and cherished memories will die,
And never fail to tell me what I’ve lost.

>>8971132

Tak, smutnie bylem wychowany w Ameryce większość mojego życia. Wiec mój Polski jest o wielie słabszy i jak pisze nie mam wogole stylu

Section of a novel I'm starting to write.

None take notice of him. They are in their own worlds. Headphones playing a juxtaposing soundtrack to their monotonous lives. The bus is a sea of blues and greys. Men in suits enjoying their final moments of peace before an arduous day of completing the same task they did the day, month, year previous. Some wear flamboyant, comical ties as a last effort in individuality. A quality they reminisce on during their years at university; a quality they never held.

>>8952980
There is fanfiction with better grammar than this.

>>8971132

naprawdie mi sie podoba twoja drugo opowiedz. Twój bohater nawet ze okrutny jest bardzo wciągający jak Alex z Pomarańczy. Moje pytanie jest gdzie zprobujiesz ja sprzedać ? Poza nowa Fantystka nie znam wiele polskich gazet literackich

>>8972137

this has been done to death. You can't really complain about the grey-ness and walking death of modern society because about 50 people have already said the same thing. I'd try to take a long look at a deeper theme that you could run with along the same lines.

>>8972137
I am in agreement with >>8972402 and also, you need to know that the conversation about characterization by means of consumer products has been going on among writers and critics since at least the fifties. Bret Easton Ellis is the arch fiend in this meta-narrative, because he succeeded at it. Once. And his solution to the question, "Modern America is a wasteland of consumerism - so what?" was to create a case where the logical conclusion to consumer de-personalization is a serial psycho murderer. Which was fun, and even kind of insightful. And it sold. Which is nice for him.

So if you want to go down this road, it has to lead somewhere we don't expect. You have to really knock our mental socks off. You have to answer the same question, with something more than the statement of the obvious.

"Modern Western Civ is a wasteland of de-personalized consumerism - so what?"

What do you want to do about it? What do you want to change it into? How do you want to enoble it, or run it into the ground?

We already know it's there. You can safely skip describing it. Start at the startling part. Invent a character who does what you want to do. It's your universe. You are literally the GOD ALMIGHTY of this universe. You can do anything. Think that through.

>>8970271
What the fuck are you even talking about? What 200 lit class did you skip to write this? Go die behind the counter at Starbucks, pleb

Here is an opening paragraph from David Means. The title is Lightning Man. It's good.

"The first time, he was fishing with Danny. fishing was a sacrament, and therefore, after the strike, when his head was clear, there was the blurry aftertaste of ritual: the casting of the spoon in lazy repetitions, the slow cranking, the utterance of the clicking reel, the baiting of the clean hook, and the cosmic intuitive troll for the deep pools of cool water beneath the gloss of a wind-dead afternoon. Each fish seemed to arrive as a miracle out of the silence: a largemouth bass gasping for air, gulping the sky, gyrating, twisting, turning against the leader’s force. But then he was struck by lightning and afterward felt like a fish on the end of the line. There was a paradigm shift: he identified purely – at least for a few months – with the fish, dangling, held by an invisible line tossed down from the heavens."

As a writer trying to get published, I am looking at how he does that. "The first time" tells us that he will be struck more than once. He gives the process of catching the fish so that people who have never caught a fish can come along with the story. And notice that the body of water can be any type you want. Whether you have fished or not, you are filling in a specific body of water. We also imagine what he looks like without being told. The paragraph is singly, and from before you realize it, only and ever about what it felt like to get struck by lightning. Look again at "after the strike." The temporal inversion sets up the elaborate comparison and signals that it is coming. It knows what it is about.

http://www.shortstoryproject.com/the-lightning-man/

>>8972800
I am a member of the equestrian order. The patricians are all inbred hemophiliacs and the plebes literally have fleas.

You hate me because I'm right and you know it. Artless and young. Every time.

>>8972137
>Headphones playing a juxtaposing soundtrack to their monotonous lives.

sentence fwagment

>>8964725
this is so bad I had to stop reading out of embarrassment.

Not being a dick, but quit now please. Try to do something else with your life

I thought about writing erotica to ease some sexual frustration but I think it just makes me want to fap and therefore hsve no gf. I don't know if it's worth improving my prose through erotica if it's just gonna encourage me to have fetishes.

Pastebin.com/VAwtL2XdJ

>>8973063

anything constructive to add ?

>>8973188
I did--stop writing and find a new hobby

>>8973194

no I meant what's bad about it ? Unless you can clearly tell me then fuck you

>>8973122
I'm literally editing a humongous visual novel as I write this. This fucking narrator is so goddamn awkward to deal with since he is a first person narrator, who is not an omnipotent one, yet the guys in charge want him to speak in constant past tense when it doesn't always sound proper that way due to tense traps. Like I can't edit this shit to make the guy narrate "She was always so annoying" because she (as far as the current storyline goes) is not done being annoying, nor would the fucking narrator know she would be; he doesn't know anything the protagonist knows by about one line ahead of himself.

>>8973228
>he doesn't know anything the protagonist knows by about one line ahead of himself.

Doesn't know anything the protagonist *does not* know.

"I'm so glad I live next to the mall," said Deshaundra to her friends. "It means I can buy my clothes on the same day that I wear them."

A little context:
This is an opening to a story/novel/novella/ idk yet. basically this scene is a young guy and his love interest wandering through the basement his dead grandfathers house after it being abandoned for years.

Autumn returned and calm settled over the hill. At its crest, a timeworn oak writhed from the soil and its extremities clawed the weathered farmhouse and gnarled against power lines. The fierce sun had just touched the boundary of the distant headlands; its parting rays emanate from the steel dome of a silo and the wind sent waves shimmering through the grass down the slope of the valley. The rural dwelling is seated low beneath the roadside, with its plywood threshold meeting the end of a beaten gravel path. Its ashen cladding stripped like bark revealing raw flesh underneath. At its southern-facing wall, the boy unfolded rusted bilco doors with a metallic screech, revealing a decrepit concrete stairwell. Amidst his descent he had felt the step begin to crumble beneath his foot and hastily braced the inner cement wall. The soles of his shoes skated down the stairway and the jagged fixtures grazed up the back of his shirt. He landed with his bare back to the clammy foundation with gravel embedded in his palms. He whisked cobwebs from his stubbled face and brow.
“Did you bust your ass, my love?” the girl jeered from above ground.
The boy peered up behind him at the inpouring daylight that illuminated the turbulent dust particles kicked up in a plume. Conscious of the rafters above, he slowly rose to his feet, brushed the dust from his pants and flapped the back of his shirt.
“I scraped my back a little but I’m alright.” he replied.
With charming timidity, the girl followed his lead, concentrating on her footing and sliding by her rump down each step, wary of a similar fate. The boy studied her calculated, dainty movements as well as each responding contraction in her facial expression. The white of her thighs flashing from beneath the hem of her denim shorts tantalized him.
“Very graceful.” He bantered.
“Why thank you, sir.” She returned, patting out the dust around her hips and buttocks.
They began to venture with crooked necks through the narrow decay. The air was saturated stale with unstirred sediment and musty timber. Putrid fumes of aged motor oil lingered from rusted cans stockpiled years ago in the outer recesses of the crawl space. A brick column stood as a monolith dividing the cavity into cardinal pockets of darkness, each hoarding their own plunder.
“Who crammed all this stuff down here like this?” the girl inquired.
“I don’t know, probably my grandpa.” the boy replied. “Or maybe someone else came through to clear out the house and tossed it all down here.”

Pretty rough but it's a start.

I don't smoke for the nicotine but for the feeling of the world standing still while I focus on the glow of the tip and the strew of smoke.

>>8974484
Ayn Rand waxes poetic about cigarettes in much this same vein.

>>8974226

I'd say this piece is way to overwritten without any need to be.

> At its crest, a timeworn oak writhed from the soil and its extremities clawed the weathered farmhouse and gnarled

is purple,purple,purple it's feels like you're trying to assault me with style.

>>8974538
I would add to everyone I didn't say anything to in this thread, stop trying to make fiction into film. You are visualizing like the movies, and trying to capture every little visual detail. You are infected with film and television's visual information overload, and that's not how the written word works.

>>8974555

wait were you the guy who talked about the narrative dream ?

>>8974568
Yeah. And I would bet my last dollar that not a single person in this thread went and read about how Simon Gillaley appears to the narrator of Bone People.

>>8974579

I'm the guy who wrote the lighthouse story here. Tbh I looked it up and then felt like a dumb-ass at how similar the plots are. Although in my defense I have never heard of it before.

>>8974606
Yeah, but it turns out that Simon is a real human and she's the one connected to the supernatural. Keep working on it. There is a real story there.

>>8974629

I've starting working on a "clean prose" draft when it's done I plan to print both out and read them side by side.

>>8974638
When you were 0-5 years old, did your parent(s) primarily speak Polish or English?

File: PubPoemFinal.png (34KB, 613x753px) Image search: [Google]

34KB, 613x753px

Poem I wrote about alcoholism.

>>8974664

Parents spoke Polish in the house.

But I went to an English school and so naturally I read and began to write almost entirely in English.

Which does make me sad because when I do read Polish classics I feel disconnected from them.

>>8974691
Are you old enough to have been exposed to phonics?

>>8974718

well I'm 22 and have lived in America for 17 of those so yeah

>>8974733
Never mind. I have been idly assembling a thought experiment which would require mountains of un-obtainable data showing that when the US public schools killed phonics for early reading skill acquisition, they accidentally (on purpose) killed a future generation of fiction writers. But I think in your case, instances like "infant" for "adolescent" is just bilingual imprecision. I do the same thing in Russian.

>>8974750

sounds interesting if you could back it up with hard evidence. Also are you a native Russian speaker ?

You all need to read more poetry. That is my critique.

>>8974763
No. My early speech model was English. That's why my Russian is less precise. The first five years have been shown to be insurmoutable in terms of habit forming and intuition of novel utterances. Phonics excelled at teaching how to interpret sentences and words never before encountered (novel utterances), and by a process to develop vocabulary with depth and subtlety. "Whole or "Natural" language" has turned out to be a disaster in its place, because its victims have to find aural models to figure out how new words sound, and lack any concept of using context in sentences. And it was totally political. The great Oakland Ebonics war of the 1980s.

>>8974781
where to start?

I find poetry frustrating because I have difficulty detecting the rhythm. I watch videos about Shakespeare and iambic pentameter and I feel like I understand it in the abstract, so then I try to apply it to the text, and when it doesn't quite fit, I can't tell whether I'm looking at an exception or if I'm missing something fundamental.

>>8974786

I guess that puts in a similar boat in terms of bilinguality. I tried learning Russian to read the Master and Margarita in its original but lost motivation quite quikcly

>>8974808

do you listen to hip hop/rap ? I'm a poetry-pleb/total prose cuck myself but I find the two quite similar. I think if you can find the rhythm in rap then it'll make it easier on poetry.

Maybe not Shakespeares straight away but still.

>>8974808
Start by reading good poetry aloud. Try Whitman, Dickinson, Blake.

>>8949639
RAIN DROP
DROP TOP

>>8955309
Cuando Quiere No Puede was fantastic, incredibly good. Do you have anymore?

>>8974808
you're probably trying too hard. if you internalize the rhythm properly the words will just appear to you in a way that fits the rhythm. it's like composing lyrics to fit a pop song melody.

>>8974808
Hip hop has a definite flow and form that is easy to pick up and emulate once you've got it. The way they preform it is pronounced and attractive too, it just works, if you wanted to start somewhere like that. if you're looking for more tradition maybe analyzing and shakespearian is a better route though.. Just a suggestion. I know it's hard, good luck!

I have not written for years, so I ask you to be gentle, please. But be honest.

There I stood beside the edge of the canyon, below me was sheer nothingness plunging several hundred feet to the ochre-coloured rocks below, and above me was the same except it rose so far that I could not ever hope to see the end of it. It was that sensation you feel sometimes when you gain a sense of scale, of how miserably puny you are in this realm. Nothing could overcome it because it was the God's honest truth. I am miserably puny. I am. I am. I am. But that was not this. What this was, was escape from the traitorous priests who will chase you down and gut you and pull your teeth out and cut your limbs off and curse your name. I lived in a greener place. I don't live there anymore.

What is truth? What determines our purpose in life? What is just, what is the way we must not venture, what is the path we must crawl? I'll tell you these things are questions to be made to God, He the Holy One who saved us from our sins, He who knows the answers, He who loves indiscriminately. The sun is like water trickling through a crack in a stone wall, the windows and doors of the abbey being the weakened spots where it dribbles. It is a nuisance sometimes when it gets in your eyes, but you would die without it, so really, you are happy even when you think you are not. What is that? Is it a bond?

I strike the rocks together to make a little spark, and the wood goes up in flames, doused in oil to get it blazing quicker. I brought oil because I know it was cold out there at night, and by God there are no inns out there to speak of. There being the desert, the wilderness, the mountains, the everything outside of the city. You think you want it, the adventure and the dirt, but really it is a fantasy in your head. You taste the copper taste of your blood and you look over your shoulder in the dark and you wish for a haven, to be back in a comfortable bed and copying scripture directly from the tome. You miss being shouted at, even if you resented it, and then you realize that it is a bond, and I then think; what is love? Is that love?

>>8965147
Thanks lad, yeah I didn't realise I'd written "little more" twice, and also I wasn't sure about reusing "crumbling". I'll probably revisit that and edit it out.

TB
That stands for TiledBattle
Yes, lads, one of the greatest games to ever touch the surface of the earth has now come to us
It is online and already free to play
It is such a magnificent thing, you can't even imagine it until you open up your browser tab and start playing
You will cry, you will laugh, you will kill and die and be reborn, and you will feel

So wait no more, it's TiledBattle
T-i-l-e-d-B-a-t-t-l-e

As she sat and typed, with his image in her mind, she was dissappointed by her words... All the of the inspiration she felt thinking of him was stuck in her heart and her stomach and she couldnt get the words to travel to her fingers fast enough to encourage the prose. Hours turned into days and weeks, as they naturally do, and still she sat and typed, firmly believing the only subsititute for good work is hard work. So she kept at it; with the hope that one day, his eyes would see her words, or his ears would hear of them, somehow, and then she would be in his head too.

Now, she wasn't really a dreamer. And she doubted a man so busy even had time to read a story, but she felt compelled to do something. Had to do something. Must find a way to be a blip, no matter how small, on his radar. And as she typed - and tried to build a bridge to him with her words, it struck her. What does he need help with? She would use her life in his aid. And if she did a good job, he will notice. And if the job was not good, at least she would die working hard, with a clean conscious. And she became impregnanted by the idea; this conception set her afire and while she was dissappointed by her new work, she was overfilled with passion. For years in this way she continued doing the only reiable thing; she worked hard.

>>8975449
>But that was not this. What this was, was

little slippery here, but I loved the opening scene. felt my head moving up and down the cliff.

You lose credibility though when you start talking about truth and god in the same paragraph. :\ Go read some more before you start writing about the truth, kiddo, because sadly, I didn't get the impression this was supposed to be a fantasy.