Topic ID: 28336
|
View previous topic :: View next topic |
| Author |
Message |
yoha_ahoy
yoyo
Speaker of the Forum
Gender: 
Age: 18
Joined: 28 Aug 2005
Posts: 805
Reviews: 364
Country: Can I eat it?
713 Points
|
 Posted: Sat Apr 05, 2008 8:05 pm Post subject: Circus Pirates 6 |
 |
|
*continued from Part 5!*
Circus Pirates - Part 6
Inside, there was the largest room I had seen thus far on my earlier “tour” of the ship. There was a long table, with a hodgepodge of men sitting about it. There was a small, yet impressive chandelier hanging from the low ceiling above the table. It was lit with two dozen dripping candles. The table was set with a mostly complete collection of china, and two silver candlesticks.
At the head of the table across the room sat Henry. He smiled at me as I came in. I quickly put my attention to Angie as she led me to the right side of the table. She took the seat next to Henry, across from Kross. She motioned for me to sit in the chair next to her. I sat between her and muscular bald man with impressively intimidating tribal tattoos covering a large portion of his naked back.
Angie had started talking to Henry, and others around the table were talking amongst each other. I looked at the man across the table from the tattooed one and my jaw dropped. The man had a horrid, warped scar down his chin. He smiled at a comment made by the two men at the other end of the table and his bottom front teeth were missing.
The tattooed man noticed my staring, leaned over to me, and in a quite voice said, “Nasty, eh?” I quickly shut my mouth and stared at my lap. The man chuckled. “It’s alright. He’s friendly enough. That’s Red, our ship carpenter.” He looked back over at Red. “Oh! Where are my manners? I’m Tré,” he said, twisting in his chair and offering his massive hand for me to shake.
Was it just me, or was everyone on this ship huge? I thought to myself. I shook his hand and stared up at him. There was the tail end of one of his trailing tribal tattoos surrounding most of his right eye. It disappeared behind his ear and down the back of his neck, joining the patterns of swirls and triangles across the top of his back. He smiled and his eyes twinkled. He almost looked like a little boy when he smiled and his eyes were a blazing blue.
“You must be Iza.”
“Yes. Pleased to meet you,” I said, reverting to polite manners. I shook my head, my forehead wrinkling. I didn’t want to be submissive. That got me into trouble before, I thought. Be brave, I told myself. Just ask him. “So what’s the story with him?” I nodded to the toothless man. “Red?”
“Ah. Yes,” Tré leaned back in his chair, to be closer to my ear. I leaned in, curious. “Freak accident with a lion.”
“Lion tamer?” I asked.
“Yes, well,” he hesitated with a grin, “not so much. Hence, the nasty scar. That devil of a cat clawed at the man. It managed to tear his tongue out bringing his teeth with it and nearly took all the skin off his chin too. Man can’t grow a beard no more. Shame. Ugly sight that scar is.”
I cringed at the thought of the aftermath. “What happened to the lion?”
“Got out during the rampage,” Tré said.
Rampage? I thought. Angie nudged me. “Have you met Andrew? No, of course not,” she answered before I could. “This is Andrew, Henry’s First Mate. Andrew, this is Iza.”
I looked across the table from me, and there sat Andrew. I don’t know how I hadn’t seen him before. Oh my god! I screamed at myself. Was I an idiot for not seeing this boy sitting before me? I felt my face turning red. Not good.
I inclined my head to him from across the table, mostly to avert my eyes. “Elizab- er, Izabe- Isabelle, uh. I’m Iza,” I stuttered.
He nodded to me. “Andrew, First Mate to the Captain, Henry.”
Henry watched our exchange with curious interest and a grin. “Andrew is very good at his job.”
“Aye, right he is!” Angie heartily agreed, completely oblivious of my awkwardness. “He’d make you believe the entire British Royal Navy was chasing after your arse to get you to do your job faster.”
Andrew laughed. It was a deep, comforting laugh. “What can I say? I like to do my job, and I like to do it well,” he said.
Henry and Angie laughed. I smiled at him and his gorgeous sun-bleached blonde hair. He looked at me, still smiling. I grinned. His dark brown eyes had a certain sparkle to them that made me curious.
“Ah! Dinner is here!” shouted a man at the end of the table.
*Part 7 is here!* |
_________________
@(^_^)@ Got YWS? Rick, FTW!
OMG! Circus Pirates!
Check out my blog: Paint Your Palette Blue and Grey
You wanna know something?
Last edited by yoha_ahoy on Tue Apr 22, 2008 8:43 pm; edited 2 times in total |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
|
JabberHut
the One and Only!
Speaker of the Forum
Gender:
Age: 16
Joined: 04 Nov 2006
Posts: 723
Reviews: 377
Country: Whats you wants? My blood? Get your own!
1595 Points
|
| Posted: Sat Apr 05, 2008 10:51 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Quote: |
| Inside, there was the largest room I had seen thus far on my earlier “tour” of the ship. |
You walk into a room. The beginning of this is weird because you don't walk into a room and spot another spacious room like this. Maybe they walked into what was the largest room she had seen.
| Quote: |
| There was a long table, [no comma] with a hodgepodge of men sitting about it. |
| Quote: |
| There was a small, yet impressive chandelier hanging from the low ceiling above the table. It was lit with two dozen dripping candles. |
The second sentence could be tied in with the first. There was a small, yet impressive chandelier hanging from the low ceiling above the table, lit with two dozen dripping candles.
| Quote: |
| The table was set with a mostly complete collection of china, and two silver candlesticks. |
...with a nearly completed collection of china... I think, not sure. Nearly, at least, works better, but unsure if complete should be past tense or not.
| Quote: |
| I sat between her and a muscular bald man with impressively intimidating tribal tattoos covering a large portion of his naked back. |
| Quote: |
The tattooed man noticed my staring, leaned over to me, and in a quite quiet voice said, “Nasty, eh?” |
| Quote: |
| He looked back over at Red. “Oh! Where are my manners? I’m Tré,” he said, twisting in his chair and offering his massive hand for me to shake. |
It may just be personal opinion, but I think back and over are redundant.
| Quote: |
| Was it just me, or was everyone on this ship huge? I thought to myself. |
You may have this in the original draft, but maybe the thought should be in italics?
| Quote: |
| Ugly sight, that scar is |
Gah, you ended it. Again! This was amazing like the rest. And Andrew's a sexy name.  I wish I could criticize your writing more. I feel so unhelpful. 
Jabber, the One and Only! |
_________________
"I want to puke happiness all over you people..." –Suz on finishing Death Machine
OFFICIAL CONTEST: The Best Review -- First place gets a FREE Young Writers Literary Journal! |
|
| Back to top |
|
yoha_ahoy
yoyo
Speaker of the Forum
Gender:
Age: 18
Joined: 28 Aug 2005
Posts: 805
Reviews: 364
Country: Can I eat it?
713 Points
|
| Posted: Sat Apr 05, 2008 11:40 pm Post subject: |
|
|
Hehe, thank you for your wonderful reviews Jabby. You're very helpful. As the writer, I can't find all those little, obvious mistakes, so I really thank you for pointing them out to me.  And as far as my cliffhanger endings, I do it to keep you strung along. ^_^ Thanks for staying with it!  If I ever put this together as a novella or something, I'll probably change the chapter spacing. I dunno. I feel like this is sort of the skeleton of my story. Once I draft out the entire thing, I'll probably come back and put some more meat on it's bones, you know? Thanks again to everyone who has helped critique so far!
~Yoyo  |
_________________
@(^_^)@ Got YWS? Rick, FTW!
OMG! Circus Pirates!
Check out my blog: Paint Your Palette Blue and Grey
You wanna know something? |
|
| Back to top |
|
kitty15
Your friendly neighbourhood kitten
Epic Novelist
Gender:
Age: 18
Joined: 15 May 2007
Posts: 4234
Reviews: 1223
Country: England
469 Points
|
| Posted: Sun Apr 06, 2008 10:35 pm Post subject: |
|
|
Angie had started talking to Henry, and others around the table were talking amongst each other. [Just a small suggestion but I think this should either be '...were talking amongst themselves.' or '...were talking to each other.']
I think you should extend this chapter a touch to include more dialogue. Rather than saying that others were talking to each other, you could have snipets of the conversations, some bizarre, some ordinary. I think it would just add a nice atmosphere to the piece and give a sense of there being other people there.
I liked your setting and character descriptions in this chapter but I think you should add more too. Describe how your persona feels as she enters the room. Is she nervous about meeting the rest of the crew? Is everyone else in there and do they stop talking and turn to observe her? In the monkey sitting somewhere, maybe pulling faces, maybe swinging from the trampoline. Are the twins there or have they been forced to eat downstairs in disgrace? Sometimes extra little details can really improve the story.
In general, it's a good chapter though. I like the addition of Andrew and the almost normality of this piece is good, how it's a group of people sat down, sharing conversation and eating dinner. How about you describe what they're eating actually. In the last chapter, Angie covered her eyes as she passed the kitchen so has the food not been served yet? If not, make that clearer.
Good work. Hope this helps a little,
Heather xx |
_________________
Love is but a lie to tame the heart,
To trap and chain; ensnare the soul.
Love is just the end and not the start
Of life. In truth, love has no role. |
|
| Back to top |
|
Rei
E.A. Extraordinaire
Epic Novelist
Gender:
Age: 22
Joined: 01 Feb 2005
Posts: 2946
Reviews: 673
Country: Canada
629 Points
|
| Posted: Tue Apr 22, 2008 8:26 pm Post subject: |
|
|
I agree with you on this being somewhat of a skeleton, yoyo. I'd love to see it with more detail and drawn out more. With this section, I have three main comments:
1) Why do you use "tour" and not just "tour"? Might help if you changed your wording a bit.
2) Vary your sentence struction a little more in the first half. It was a little dull and almost mechanical.
3) I don't remember. Did you mention Andrew before? If yu haven't, you need much more detail here to make Iza's reaction to him plausible.
I'll check out your next installment when I get home. |
_________________
Please, sit down before you fall down.
Belloq, "Raiders of the Lost Ark" |
|
| Back to top |
|
JFW1415
There IS a logic to my username!
Speaker of the Forum
Gender:
Age: 14
Joined: 07 Jun 2007
Posts: 736
Reviews: 235
Country: USA
5143 Points
|
| Posted: Sun May 04, 2008 1:34 am Post subject: |
|
|
Again!
Paragraph Edits
| Quote: |
| I inclined my head to him from across the table, mostly to avert my eyes. “Elizab- er, Izabe- Isabelle, uh. I’m Iza,” I stuttered. |
What’s with this? She doesn’t know her own name? If she's just stuttering, use the actual name. 'I...Is...Isabe...'
Overall Edits
Much better than the previous ones.
- Keep up the description. You can’t just let us forget where she is after introducing the room!
- Build the atmosphere. Really expand on the awkwardness! How do others react? How old is Andrew – possible love interest?
- Noises. Really, there are a ton of hungry men in there! Work on your sounds a bit. (Oh; smells, too. You’re doing better with vision; don’t forget the other senses!)
- Tags. You don’t need to tell us ‘he said’ ‘she said!’ *Has flashback to Ashley Tisdale song* We get the picture after a while. Also, work on expanding their voices. Make them all unique.
- Ages. I’m still pretty clueless about how old everyone is. Work on showing it through actions/dialogues/experiences.
- Italicize all thoughts.
Overall, much better! I’m no longer a broken record! *Claps*
PM me for anything.
~JFW1415 |
_________________
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth. -Oscar Wilde
Spiffy Little Contest...
Want A Review? |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
