Hey /lit/ this is my first piece of writing, and I'm really invested in it. I'm only eight pages in and I've scarcely revised it. Check it out.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1esrpB70RUyMVN7jB_TGTrvnE6Aj_QqPusI_z7w4vbBo/edit?usp=sharing
Adjectives/10
>>7319509
the road to hell is paved with adjectives
adjectives wow i literally couldn't make it past the first ten sentences i felt drained and physically ill
you really, really, really need to work on your delivery before we even discuss any other part of your work. you are hollowly over-describing to the point of tedium and disgust for the reader.
Vocabulary, story telling, story crafting, and ability as a writer do not all correlate directly.
Every layer of the technical side of your writing is poor. You must know the rules to break the rules. Your story telling is irrelevant when your writing is so cartoonishly saturated in lame, boring imagery and mistakes that can be placed directly in the seat of simply not knowing what makes good writing. As they say in high school writing classes - show me, don't tell me.
I don't want to be harsh, but entirely ignoring the story this is honestly unreadable. I advise you look into classes and/or books on writing fiction.
You may have good ideas for stories but you do not have a natural talent for delivery and that should be your first focus above developing your story telling.
>>7319509
>https://docs.google.com/document/d/1esrpB70RUyMVN7jB_TGTrvnE6Aj_QqPusI_z7w4vbBo/edit?usp=sharing
reduce the word count by half and post again.
you're seemingly trying to immerse the reader in the setting with all the adjectives you use, but it is having the opposite effect. you obviously seem to have a decent vocabulary but it doesn't translate to shit when you write it like that. master the everyday words before you whip out a thesaurus. in my opinion the only time to use a $10 word is when a $2 doesn't capture the essence of what you are trying to convey.
seriously, reduce the word count by 50% and you'll have a much better sample to critique- if the only thing you're bringing to writing is a vocabulary then you are bound to fail.
good writing and use of language to me is reading something and every so often you think "wow what a beautiful passage", kind of like how discovering the scent of a flower when you're walking down the street is very different to having a bottle of rose perfume shoved under your nose and sprayed. if you try to be a genius with every single line it's going to be obvious that you aren't, and it is going to be writing that is awful and constantly reminds the reader that they are reading a book and not experiencing it.
it's nice to see all the genuine advice being given here. Its all spot on. OP. Show. Don't tell.
Not OP, but I actually learned something from this thread. Thanks.
>>7319509
Although i don't fully agree with the 'show dont tell' advice everyone's throwing your way, it definitely feels like you're overcompensating.
Use way less adjectives, it is better to use them more sparsely. You could say the same for the big words too, but it might work once you cut the word-count down.
You're trying to sound smart but it just comes off as smugness and it makes it really inaccessible to most readers. Also, it's boring to read.
>>7319656
>Your story telling is irrelevant when your writing is so cartoonishly saturated in lame, boring imagery
Nigga, if the story sucks ass, it doesn't matter if you got the Majin Buu equivalent of a writer writing for you, shit will suck. If the story is good, people will forgive the writing. It doesn't work the other way around.
>>7319847
With writing like his story telling is entirely irrelevant. He needs to get to an acceptable point in his writing, then hope his story telling can shine because that's his last hope to find talent.
I'm going to bust out a few Mark Twain quotes that I think will be helpful:
1) Use the right word, not its second cousin.
2) Eschew surplusage.
3) Employ a simple and straightforward style
>>7319509
Is your primary influence Jim Theis?
Thanks for the advice guys, Re-reading it I can see where you all are coming from.
>>7319890
feel free to make other suggestions, I understand the overuse of adjectives, but I could use some more critiques.
>>7319905
Here is a critique asshole. Post your shitty writing in the designated critique thread
>>7319913
well if there is one, it's not stickied.
>>7319918
Now I think you should just go to r/books where all the writing is like this anyway
>>7319930
I presume youre not going to direct me towards that critique thread?
>>7319865
many, many writers would disagree with No. 3.
Would you call Shakespeare simple and straightforward? It might work for mark twain and his regional populism sort of deal, but simplicity 'tis a matter of opinion.
>>7319509
I couldn't make it past the first line, but I think I can give you some critiques of it.
Don't tell me he's a curmudgeon; show me that he is a curmudgeon. Don't even tell me he's old. Show me that too.
Don't tell me his cabin is messy; show me that it is messy.
You don't need to tell me that the candle is flickering. It's a candle; it flickers whether you tell me or not.
That's just the first line, so...yeah.
>>7319509
>odd looking cabinet
What does this tell the reader? The only thing the reader knows is that it is a cabinet that does not look like a cabinet. Read your story like your not the person that wrote it. Step out of yourself. You have potential, but your prose is impossible, and completely revamp the way you convey imagery to your audience.
>>7319977
On point.
>>7319980
Saying this guy has potential is like telling a wizchan poster he has potential as a humanbeing.
>>7319977
Thats great advice, I'll do my best to employ it.
>>7319986
No, it's like being a wizchan poster and telling another wizchan poster he has potential as a human being.
>>7319990
That is always cute
>>7319986
Everyone that writes has potential to be a good writer. I'll hold to that belief. A bad writer can tear down his writing to the very foundation and build something better.
>>7319994
So then the comment was redundant.
>>7319850
>this is what english majors believe
top kek
>>7320002
I guess. You got me there.
>>7319509
Are you feeling like shit right now? You should. It's hard to be told you suck. However, if you just keep writing and especially keep reading you'll get better. William Gibson (as asinine as I think he is) didn't get to where he is by only reading sci-fi. Thomas Pynchon didn't become Thomas Pynchon by only reading Joyce. His favorite novel in college was a western called Warlock. What I'm saying is that it is obvious that you're only reading Tolkienesque fantasy.
And as another note of encouragement: my writing went from being reviled for all but its opening sentences to being fairly well liked by a few of the tougher critics here. All it took was for me to listen to what people hated, and figure out what they liked (workshops also helped). Just keep writing and don't lose hope. Even if all you do is a paragraph a day, rest assured that's more than most.
>>7320021
I'm trying not to let my ego get in the way of my learning, most of the advice posted here is quite valid once I looked at my story from an outsider's perspective. This is the first time I've ever taken the initiative to write something of my own, I'm more or less treating it like a learning experience. I'll try to broaden my reading horizons and continue to write daily. Thanks for the advice
>>7320021
To be fair Warlock is pretty crazy and postmodern in its own right. Its hardly as foursquare as your typical western or even something with substantial literary merit like Blood Meridian.
>>7320097
I purposefully didn't mention that it's also a existentialist legal thriller with the auspices of western for a reason.
It's fucking ornate. This is the very definition of "lived in." You're trying to write a story not build another dimension.
>>7320021
Was Joyce even a primary influence on Pynchon?
>>7319509
Shrekattemptingprose/10
Adjectives gone wild and that's rather >insert infinite jest meme
>>7320148
Nah, but it's the one everyone associates him with. I always thought he was closer related to Melville (Against the Day practically quotes it) and especially Hawthorn and his Pyncheons. Some scholars also claim a big Nabokov influence, but I've always felt it was just a similar attitude towards aesthetics more than a clear cut influence.
>>7320158
I should also mention a few nonfiction influences: Wittgenstein, Henry Adams and a shit ton more.
>>7320168
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Adams#Second_law_of_thermodynamics
>>7319509
I disagree with the minimalism being suggested itt, I personally think a lavish prose really does make for a more enjoyable read but that's just me. Regardless, there's a time and a place, cut down a bit, quite a bit is unnecessary and exists for the sole purpose of existing, but do indulge every now and then, I always savor some wordy shit.
>all this show dont tell shit advice
God damn you're all retarded.
>>7319509
We have a critique thread. Post it there.
Don't make a thread to get attention.
Use the damn critique thread.
>>7319966
>Would you call Shakespeare simple and straightforward?
One has to get ahead with the times. If you were living in the XVI century it'd be wise to write like Shakespeare, if you were living in the XVIII century you could write philosophy like Hegel too.
No decent journal will take a Hegel-like paper (referring to writing style) and no editor will take a story written like Shakespeare anymore.
Language mirrors reality.
>>7320038
then what the hell are you doing on 4chan starting a thread about the writing? write more nigga. write a hundred of these stories. 8 pages? what the fuck i write that before breakfast and toss it out and write another while shitting out the rank coffee i just drank. write, write, write. don't think about the fact that you are writing, or the quality of what you are writing. just focus on the images you are trying to put into words. focus on them, and make the words focus on them, and make the story the focus of the story, not -- like many anons here already said -- the adjectives.
WRITE GOD DAMN YOU WRITE
>>7320689
The problem is that they will take it seriously if you are already successful.
>>7319509
You start almost every sentence with "The".
>>7320021
This. Dudes only read one genre, then try to imitate it. Read everything, brah.
