What's gone wrong?

I have just written a new prologue to my novel, yet I feel there is one sentence that spoils it, but I don't know why.

Can anybody help me?

"The wound was deep, and the aim had been deadly accurate."

Where have I gone wrong with this, or is there nothing wrong with it and I'm just thinking there is?

RR*

Try replacing 'and' with 'as'. Or you can just post it, without knowing what has happened I don't know how to help.

Hmm.... I'm thing it might be an ordering issue. Like, the most powerful stuff is put at the end to create a more dramatic effect.

Otherwise, you might want to describe the wound better. Play with that a little, if you dare!

Well what disturbs me is the deadly accurate deadly accurate... it just sounds wrong. I tried to find something that replaces, but no luck.

Other than that I'd suggest leave the "had been" and as said before the "and" I think that could be removed. Maybe I'm fitting a stanza line here hehe my mind is set too poetic but you could use it.

so it would be :

"The wound was deep, the aim deadly accurate"

RoxanneR wrote:I have just written a new prologue to my novel, yet I feel there is one sentence that spoils it, but I don't know why.

Can anybody help me?

"The wound was deep, and the aim had been deadly accurate."

Where have I gone wrong with this, or is there nothing wrong with it and I'm just thinking there is?

RR*

You have order problems. You've told us about a wound, and then gone backwards to refer the aim of what we don't necassarily know. You're killing the point of your sentence. ^_^

Perhaps if you tied the wounds deepness to the accuracy by describing their relation to each other? Like so - "The wound was deep, aim so accurate it had left a neat hole straight through shoulder/bloody gash from shoulder to hip/his head half off his shoudlers..."

As I don't know what happened, I can't be specific. ^_^ But you see how, with the above, the accuracy now describes the wound?

I do hope that's somewhat helpful.


IMP

If you'd like to keep the same general wording, I'd try something more like this:

The wound was deep; the aim had been deadly accurate.

Sometimes when a sentence is bothering me, I try recasting it and inserting a colon or semi-colon; a lot of times it does the trick.

Thanks for all that help! I have jiggle it around a bit and it sounds much better now!

I owe you one!

RR*