Elf Son

Elf Son

His tears numbered more than the massive multitude of icy raindrops pouring from the sky. His fists clenched, his cheeks numb, and his heart throbbing, he wept under the dark autumn sky with a bright blue moon overhead. Vasôac fell to his knees in his agony, his hands splattering in the mud.
Why me?
He punched the moistened ground below him, and screamed. He stared down at his mud covered hands.
How could I have done this? How could this have happened? No, this is a dream, just a horrible nightmare . But it’s so real. It can’t be a dream. I need answers
He looked up at the sky, beginning to lose his senses, due to the bitter wind eating into his skin.
Is this how the nightmare will end? If it is, then so be it, I deserve to be ended. I’ll just give up.
The large gashes on his cheeks were still bleeding, still tormenting him. He lifted his quivering arms, shaking violently while he said. “I give in. I give up. I will not go on.” He abruptly felt something in his heart. It felt frozen. As hard, as cold, and as barren as the landscape around him. And then, he felt nothing. Nothing. Not the cuts on his face, nor the sadness or frustration that he had been feeling moments earlier. No hate, anger, loneliness, happiness. Nothing. The tears on his face felt as foreign as the forest looming nearby. As did his heart. If he hadn’t know better, he would have considered it not his own. It didn’t feel like his own.
Vasôac was a sturdy young boy about the age of 13. His facial features were sharp and acute for his age, and his skin was pale. His eyes were a dark shade of viridian, as clear as a shard of crystal. His face was bleak and expressionless. His hair was black, disheveled, and

Green = Comment/Correction
Blue = Suggestion
Black = Review

*

Something happened before this scene and I don't know what to think of this boy's anger/hurt (his cuts, tears, etc).

The large gashes on his cheeks were still bleeding, still tormenting him.

As the reader I needed to know why he was hurt, if you don't want to go into detail what happened take out 'still' so it would be: The large gashes on his cheeks were bleeding, tormenting him.

You should repost this when the full chapter is done, you come to an abrupt stop with the 'and'. And you need to have the boy's thoughts in italics. Use spacing and have numbers written.

Hope that was of some help.

-- Myth

I like this a lot!!

His face was bleak and expressionless. His hair was black, disheveled, and

And?

I think you need to copy and paste it again. Right now, it doesn't include the full chapter. And, even if it's only a part of the prologue, you ought to at least finish the sentence. ^_^;;

Good description but you make it sound very cronological.

~instead of~ , and screamed. He stared down at his mud covered hands.

~try~ He punched the sodden ground below him, screaming, His attention the turned to the mud tainting his hands.

Thanks, and nice idead sp2580, I am almost done with the chapter and will be updating this topic.

I need a good name for black entities of darkness ruled by the dark wizard in my story. Does anybody have any ideas?

Here is my complete prolouge.

Elf Son
His tears numbered more than the massive multitude of icy raindrops pouring from the sky. His fists clenched, his cheeks numb, and his heart throbbing, he wept under the dark autumn sky with a bright blue moon overhead. Vasôac fell to his knees in his agony punching the soft untrodden ground, noticing his mud covered hands.
Why me?
He punched the moistened ground below him, screaming. He stared down at the ground, wishing he were not in the predicament that he had put himself in, just a matter of hours ago. He could not grasp the thought of what had happened without beginning to slip out of consciousness.
How could I have done this? How could this have happened? No, this is a dream, just a horrible nightmare . But it’s so real. It can’t be a dream. I need answers
He looked up at the sky, beginning to lose his senses, due to the bitter wind eating into his skin.
Is this how the nightmare will end? If it is, then so be it, I deserve to be ended. I’ll just give up.
The large gashes on his cheeks were bleeding, tormenting him. He lifted his quivering arms, shaking violently while he said. “I give in. I give up. I will not go on.” He abruptly felt something in his heart. It felt frozen. As hard, as cold, and as barren as the landscape around him. And then, he felt nothing. Nothing. Not the cuts on his face, nor the sadness or frustration that he had been feeling moments earlier. No hate, anger, loneliness, happiness. Nothing. The tears on his face felt as foreign as the forest looming nearby. As did his heart. If he hadn’t know better, he would have considered it not his own. It didn’t feel like his own.
Vasôac was a sturdy young boy about the age of 13. His facial features were sharp and acute for his age, and his skin was pale. His eyes were a dark shade of viridian, as clear as a shard of crystal. His face was bleak and expressionless. His hair was black, disheveled, and dirty.
“You should not be foolish enough to do that, Vasôac. Why did you give your heart up?” A voice behind him inquired.
Vasôac spun around to meet the dark, hooded man’s eyes, and asked, “Who are you?”
The stranger began slowly walking towards him, while Vasôac was stepping away from him.
“I am not important, Vasôac. What is important is that you stay safe. We need you. We all need you.”
“Stay away from me ”
“I do not wish to hurt you. You are too valuable to damage. I know what you are upset about Vasôac. It is not your fault.”
“Yes it is It wasn’t anybody else who did it. It was me I didn’t mean to, but it happened.”
“This is good, remembering brings healing of the heart.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You weren’t feeling before. You had given up half of your heart. But now you have recovered some of it. Slowly, over the months to come, you might begin to recover your feelings again. But beware of the soulless lands, Vasôac. If you ever travel there, then your already weak heart will die. However, you will have trouble feeling any good emotions, but if something right happens, the emotions might break through the ice of your cold heart.”
“I do not understand what you are talking about.” Vasôac stated.
“In time you will.”
“How do you know this? How do you know me? What are the soulless lands?”
“Those questions are for another time. For now, I will assign you what you need to do next.”
“Why should I listen to you? I don’t want to go on any quest, I want thing to go back to normal I want to go back to my warm house and be greeted by my loving parents.”
“Your wants are not the same as our needs ” The man hissed. “And even you know that things will not go back to normal. You are not normal and you never were. Those were not even your real parents.”
“Of course they were. They were my parents.”
“No, your parents are somewhere else. Your mother is alive and healthy, and even I don’t know where your father is. You will discover these things in time.”
“Tell me when!”
“I told you, you will learn. Be patient.”
“No!” Vas ac could feel the anger swelling up inside him. Although it was an emotion, it was bad, and even though he had been hoping for an ounce of emotion a moment before, he was shocked he was feeling so much hatred.
“Wait.” The man whispered. “Be quiet.”
“What are you talking ab...”
“Shhhh!”
The two ducked down, spotting two large black dragons overhead. On their backs were figures, seeming to be vast entities of black mist, in the form of humans, but appearing to be inhuman.
“What are those?”
“They are servants of the dark sorcerer V sdem. They were created by smothering together broken souls with a very powerful black magic. They are called the Zokda.”
“Well, why are they here?”
“I truly don’t know.”
The giant, armored dragons passed by overhead, after circling overhead for several minutes. Vas ac and the man stood up, relieved that the dragons had passed.
“Vas ac, I must leave now. But I have something that I must confide in you. Listen. You are the one to find Demorciana, it has been prophesied.”
“I still don’t understand.”
“Trust me, you will. Just take these, and begin your journey.”
“What journey? Listen, I don’t want to go on any stinking journey, I just want to...”
“I don’t care! Stop being selfish! Now listen, you must take these things and begin traveling to Seloba. I will meet you in the scroll store there and instruct you on what you must do next.”
The man handed him a tall wooden stick with a luminous glass orb on top of it. Also, he was handed a long silk black leather hooded robe, laced with a golden colored thread. Vas ac slipped the robe on himself. It felt hundreds times more warm and comfortable than the torn, dirty rags he had previously been wearing.
“Fine. But don’t leave yet, I still need to ask you some things.” Vas ac turned around to talk to the man, but he had vanished just as suddenly as he had appeared.
“And with that,” Vas ac said to himself, “I set off.”

His tears numbered more than the massive multitude of icy raindrops pouring from the sky. His fists clenched, his cheeks numb, and his heart throbbing, he wept under the dark autumn sky with a bright blue moon overhead. Vasôac fell to his knees in his agony punching the soft untrodden ground, noticing his mud covered hands.
Why me?
He punched the moistened ground below him, screaming. He stared down at the ground, wishing he were not in the predicament that he had put himself in, just a matter of hours ago. He could not grasp the thought of what had happened without beginning to slip out of consciousness.
How could I have done this? How could this have happened? No, this is a dream, just a horrible nightmare . But it’s so real. It can’t be a dream. I need answers
He looked up at the sky, beginning to lose his senses, due to the bitter wind eating into his skin.
Is this how the nightmare will end? If it is, then so be it, I deserve to be ended. I’ll just give up.
The large gashes on his cheeks were bleeding, tormenting him. He lifted his quivering arms, shaking violently while he said. “I give in. I give up. I will not go on.” He abruptly felt something in his heart. It felt frozen. As hard, as cold, and as barren as the landscape around him. And then, he felt nothing. Nothing. Not the cuts on his face, nor the sadness or frustration that he had been feeling moments earlier. No hate, anger, loneliness, happiness. Nothing. The tears on his face felt as foreign as the forest looming nearby. As did his heart. If he hadn’t know better, he would have considered it not his own. It didn’t feel like his own.
Vasôac was a sturdy young boy about the age of 13. His facial features were sharp and acute for his age, and his skin was pale. His eyes were a dark shade of viridian, as clear as a shard of crystal. His face was bleak and expressionless. His hair was black, disheveled, and dirty.

...

“No!” Vas ac could feel the anger swelling up inside him. Although it was an emotion, it was bad, and even though he had been hoping for an ounce of emotion a moment before, he was shocked he was feeling so much hatred.
...

The man handed him a tall wooden stick with a luminous glass orb on top of it. Also, he was handed a long silk black leather hooded robe, laced with a golden colored thread. Vas ac slipped the robe on himself. It felt hundreds times more warm and comfortable than the torn, dirty rags he had previously been wearing.
“Fine. But don’t leave yet, I still need to ask you some things.” Vas ac turned around to talk to the man, but he had vanished just as suddenly as he had appeared.
“And with that,” Vas ac said to himself, “I set off.”

*Ahem*....
Enough said...

All right. You make several mistakes here with regards to writing. Let me just outline a few of them.

1. Emotional Scenery.

His tears numbered more than the massive multitude of icy raindrops pouring from the sky. His fists clenched, his cheeks numb, and his heart throbbing, he wept under the dark autumn sky with a bright blue moon overhead. Vasôac fell to his knees in his agony punching the soft untrodden ground, noticing his mud covered hands.
Why me?
He punched the moistened ground below him, screaming. He stared down at the ground, wishing he were not in the predicament that he had put himself in, just a matter of hours ago. He could not grasp the thought of what had happened without beginning to slip out of consciousness.
How could I have done this? How could this have happened? No, this is a dream, just a horrible nightmare . But it’s so real. It can’t be a dream. I need answers
He looked up at the sky, beginning to lose his senses, due to the bitter wind eating into his skin.
Is this how the nightmare will end? If it is, then so be it, I deserve to be ended. I’ll just give up.
The large gashes on his cheeks were bleeding, tormenting him. He lifted his quivering arms, shaking violently while he said. “I give in. I give up. I will not go on.” He abruptly felt something in his heart. It felt frozen. As hard, as cold, and as barren as the landscape around him. And then, he felt nothing. Nothing. Not the cuts on his face, nor the sadness or frustration that he had been feeling moments earlier. No hate, anger, loneliness, happiness. Nothing. The tears on his face felt as foreign as the forest looming nearby. As did his heart. If he hadn’t know better, he would have considered it not his own. It didn’t feel like his own.

This massive glob is a glob of emotional scenery. It is annoying as heck to the reader. You go in expecting a story, but instead you see a character angsting. We want to know who, what, where, when, and why. Emotional scenery is worthless because it doesn't tell us anything about any of this. Or, if it does, then we completely skip over it because it is emotional scenery.

2. The Mysterious Stranger.

The mysterious stranger is the most annoying thing in the world. It's almost an excuse for a writer to make his character do something. In this case, your character was so busy grieving that you needed to send a mysterious stranger in to make your character move.

3. Oh, let's not forget evil.

To make your character even more proactive, your helpful mysterious stranger goes out and says "Oh, by the way, those guys are evil." There are better ways you can introduce evil, having some guy point it out to us is kind of insulting.

4. Let's not forget that prophecy.

Oh yeah, did the mysterious stranger mention that this guy is the guy mentioned in that prophecy? Because he is. The mysterious stranger says so.

5. No more time! Go on a Quest!

Notice how the mysterious stranger rushes the character off on an adventure?

Let me just sum up what has happened here.

You have a main character. You've given that character so much angst and drama that the character is unable to move (read grow) in a positive direction. This is a problem, since you want him to go on a quest.

To do this then, you need to somehow nudge the character into action. You chose the mysterious stranger. Whenever I see a mysterious stranger that is too helpful, I know that the writer is behind it. It's like the curtain falling in "The Wizard of Oz."

Your character, or events that happen to your character should be enough to start a story. You shouldn't have to rely on mysterious strangers.

On top of this, there are some cliched elements.

#4 is a big one. In fantasy land, every other person seems to be the person described in some prophecy. Ask yourself a question, why does he need a prophecy to discover some city?

#3 is another one. Really, the bad guys can be rivals and they need as much motive as your character does to find this city. What's so important about this anyway?

#5 says, "go on a quest" but why should the character go on this quest anyways? This isn't satisfactorily answered and it should be.

This technically doesn't fit the description of a prologue. A prologue is something that gives information about something critical to the story that happened long before the present events.

For Lord of the Rings, the prologue was the story of the ring. I think a story about Demorancia would be better, if only to give us an idea on why somebody wants to find it.

Generally speaking, when your prologue ends at the beginning of Chapter 1, then it isn't a prologue, just a pre-chapter 1.

This is only an indroduction to who the character is, to give the reader more emotion. The questions you asked will be explained later in the book, although I will change the amount of pronouns in the book. I would talk about Demorciana, but it would give away a lot of the story. Besides, there is a clue in the name of the place anyway. If you think about it a lot you might know what it is, especially after what the man said about the demons, and why the quest is so important. Thanks for the critiques everyone. I will post chapter one soon.

lillizard wrote:His tears numbered more than the massive multitude of icy raindrops pouring from the sky.

Okay, I'll give you more feedback as I continue toread your updated versions, but this line caught my eye, and not in a good way. There are much less purple ways of saying that he's crying like a baby and it's pouring rain and freezing cold.

When I skimmed through the replies, I noticed this:

lillizard wrote:This is only an indroduction to who the character is, to give the reader more emotion.

Naturally, I can't speak for others, but as a reader, this whole passage really aleinated me, which is bad. As a writer, it's your job to draw the reader in, not push them away.

I'm working on reading the updated version right now, I'll get back to you ASAP.

edit: I've skimmed your story, although admittedly I didn't finish it. Just wondering, though, is there a reason you spell "Vasôac" with the little "ô"? I Google'd it, and all I got were .PDFs about some sort of medicine, or something. Does the little ... hat ... thing (sorry, I don't know what it's called) change the pronunciation? If so, how? (I'm not exactly up to snuff on my French. Actually, apart from a little fangirl French, I don't know any at all.) Is "Vasôac" a real name, or did you make it up?
Right, I'll read s'more and come back and keep editing as I go.

Oh, also - it's a personal preference, but I usually prefer to read "thirteen" and not "13" in actual prose. Unless it's a very large and very specific number (eg: 5,673,854), an address (eg: 555 Whatever Drive), a phone number (eg: 555-555), or a price (eg: $99.99) I'd spell it out. (Does anyone know the grammatical rule invovled here?)

Meep wrote:Oh, also - it's a personal preference, but I usually prefer to read "thirteen" and not "13" in actual prose. Unless it's a very large and very specific number (eg: 5,673,854), an address (eg: 555 Whatever Drive), a phone number (eg: 555-555), or a price (eg: $99.99) I'd spell it out. (Does anyone know the grammatical rule invovled here?)

Your intuition is right. Unless it's any of those, the number is written out.

fine, I'll put thirteen.

It's an early draft, right? So now you know, and in the future, it's something to remember. That's all.