>is it any good, and where can I find a publisher if it is?

>>9589256
>op here
Erad whilst worthy by merit, but not of morals, was blessed with three paragons in his court, in which he bestowed the loathsome task to bring aboard, or set bellow the few still adrift retainers of the old lord. The first among them was his most valiant of generals. A man sturdy as oak, and wise as owl whose name was Atlan. The second was his steward, Soro. A gaunt man of many years, and much coin. Soro was a man who’d not brave a walk in the night, but would brave an inferno for a single copper. The final paragon, was Erad’s own daughter Delphine. A young lady with hair as black as the times, skin with a luster to rival Soro’s riches, wit as sharp as Atlan’s blade, and beauty fit to contrast father’s butchery.

>op
Erad himself, while vile of spirt, was not vile of flesh. A handsome man despite being past his prime. He set himself on a throne of snow white ivory, inlaid with gold, and jewels. His raiment as fine a hue of crimson, as his hands. Whilst promise of replacing the people’s cuffs of iron with bracelets of gold thrust him onto throne, it was not long before the people found, that he’d merely made their chains the weight of gold.

>op
Erad had four great vices in this world. The first three seemed to embody the nature of his retainers. They were his lust of wealth, lust of blood, and lust of women. While all of which, where the fuel for the fires, of the hell in which he bestowed, his final one was fuel for his own hell. This, the eye in a swirling torrent, of horrors was his desire to always be right. Oh, the depths of depravity Erad would plunge, to convince others of his omniscience, were as mole dwellings next to pits to hell, when contrasted with the depths he would go to convince himself. Erad, who would oft after slaying, a retainer for uttering correct contrastments, would then not even find comfort in his gilded bed, nor harem of maidens. ‘Twas, this very gem of depravity, which led to the demise of his bride, and Queen. Whilst his Atlan, could weather the might of a legion, and his Soro, turn ash into gold, only his Delphine could steady his nerve, with honeyed lies sweet as his own.

>op
Alas, as waves oft creep, before crash, the crest of Erad’s rule came to pass on a normal night of vice, and tyranny in the throne room. He sat half in slumber whilst on his snowy throne, spying maidens dancing, in front of the crackling fireplace, casting mesmerizing shadows upon the floor. At their desk beside the throne, Soro scribbled away at his ledgers, whilst Delphine wrote perfumed letters of false pretenses to the other lords in the land. Erad’s most trusted bodyguard Hector, watched as Erad’s harem preformed with lustful envy. Just as Erad was slipping into dream, a crashing bang shook the room, and the cold night air nearly snuffed the fire. Standing in the doorway was Atlan. The room went silent, save for the sound of blood trickling on the stone floor from the head Atlan carried toward the throne. The only one seemingly unfazed by the spectacle was Erad himself, who slowly reseated himself into a lax lean. As Atlan approached the throne, Erad started into a slow, near mocking clap.

>op
In a manner of mockery only one so vile as Erad could conceive, he asked unto Atlan “oh, did you do as I asked, and thin your network of former compatriots?” Atlan, who had been convinced into service of the former king’s false grace, had by now long realized that he had repeated his old folly once more, and was thus unsurprised by the response, and at first unmoved. He held the head of his former peer high, and then dropped it onto the floor. Erad then pointed to one of the dancers, and snapped his fingers. The horrified girl then picked up the head, and rushed it back outside, as her fellow dancers rushed to clean the mess. A smirk went across Erad’s face as he asked “do I sense a hint of defiance?” Atlan after all of this time finally felt he had to speak. “I’ve killed for you, bled for you, betrayed for you, all the while thinking, that it’s what was best for the people. Yet you’ve sat here, and whored, and butchered, and cheated this nation, into an even greater hell, than I thought possible. All the while my warriors have fought to put you on that throne, and what have you done? Fornicated with women, and spoken.” Hector who had long hated, and envied Atlan, started to rush forward, only to be halted by a lazy wave of hand by Erad, who then said to Atlan. “Oh, do you intend to kill me, like your former master? Dog” To this Atlan replied “no, I’ve learned what treason brings. You taught me of that.” Erad grinned, and said “you’d be amazed what women, and words can do” With this Erad, waved his hand in dismissal towards Atlan, who bowed, turned, and departed.

>op
Unless upon request, that's all I'll post for now.

Bumping. Damn, how hard is it to get people to not talk about shit which should be in /poi/, or /b/ for like 2 secs here?

>>9589256

Sorry for the very limited input but here it goes: Across the whole thing, I find it hard to keep my own pace because of where some commas are/aren't (e.g "While Erad, may have fought a war for his right of rule, it was the glint of gold, and not of steel in his honeyed words that [...]").

Also because of that, at times it felt like reading it was just "reading it", rather than the words taking form and shape so that I could envision the setting. I'm not sure but this might be due to describing abstract concepts (how characters are, why characters act, the moral standing of their acts, etc.) comma after comma with no breaks for world-building.

In spite of this, it's not that bad really in my opinion, and the story itself might have something going for it. You might even get away with publishing after a couple re-reads, but since I'm not really a fiction-oriented guy I'll concede to it that you need more criticism from others, so don't take my words too harshly or too well either.

>>9589335
Why not post it in a critique thread?

>>9589335
I find the prose very tiring. It's comprehensible but it's more work to read through it and, no offense intended, when I see lots of talk about thrones and kings and fantasy names the less I have to think about what is actually happening the better. If I see it and have to work a bit to make sense of the very stylized and complex prose (more complex than most people are used to reading, anyway) I get bored and don't want to read it.

>>9589390
>>9589380
>>9589377
Thanks for the input.

File: 14358832_1135706606526240_9055449762422330291_n.jpg (102KB, 960x960px) Image search: [Google]

102KB, 960x960px

>>9589256
I'm sorry, man. I immediately felt bored as soon as I read "wizened king," but I forced myself to read through the next two paragraphs and just felt tired afterwards.

It's obvious you put a lot of time into this, but it just doesn't feel right. It's like driving on a road whose potholes have just been filled recently.

I wish you the best of luck, man.

>>9589256
At times the text should be far more prosaic. It is pointlessly tedious and difficult to parse when you fluff the prose like you do.

Ask yourself, are you trying to relay a story or imitate a certain style? If you are trying to relay a story, drop this act with the narrator speaking with romanticized quasi-old English, - else write narrative poetry.

Save the stylized stuff for character dialogue.


Also, for readability, you want the sentence length in each paragraph to form a sort of elegant pattern. Your writing becomes flat when the sentence lengths aren't aesthetically pleasing.

Take for example
>Erad had four great vices in this world. The first three seemed to embody the nature of his retainers. They were his lust of wealth, lust of blood, and lust of women.

Short sentence, pause. Slightly longer short sentence, pause. Slightly longer short sentence still, pause. The result is unappealing, uninviting, and flat.

>>9589256
Your story fail to intrigue or fascinate me. If the reader isn't curious, they will not spend their time educating themselves about the personalities you try and introduce.

The introduction you posted fails to explain:
1) Who are these characters?
2) And why should I care?

You should explain who they are, a lot quicker and with less cliché. Get to the point and not to the poetry.
Then you need to explain their immediate goals. So I know what I'm looking at.
Otherwise I have no real context to attach your descriptions.

If you don't explain the goals, but rather leave it as a mystery, you need to be a very good writer and keep your main focus on one single character, so the reader can speculate around the clues you so generously must sprinkle.

>>9589256
you literally started with an exposition info dump??? this is fucking amateur hour, kid. this will never get a publisher past paragraph 1. no one cares about your world building, just make a interesting character do something exciting or strange

Reads like the intro of a D&D campaign

Try to introduce characters and background within the story, if they are necessary.