Young Writers Society

This comic, historical novel tells the tale of brave crusaders who rather spend their time "waging war" against harmless peasants and pillaging women. Alas, unforeseen misfortunes await them.
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Setting out

The hut door flew swinging open as I marched out into the beautiful sunlight. The fresh breeze smothered my cheeks as the dandelions danced in the melody of the midsummer morning. Only to my misfortune the girl was still clutching my arm, determined not to let go.

“You must take me with you! My master will give me a real beating if he finds out!”

A lump of digested onions almost forced their way up my throat.

“A battlefield is no suitable place for a woman, besides if a drooling barbarian decides to ravage you, I won’t be there to tap him on the back.”

“But our bab-“

“Listen up mademoiselle, you are a witty farm laborer, and I am but a humble knight who in the name of the pope and God himself severs the chains of bloody darkness that have been bestowed upon this land by atrocious evil. I place my life on the line in order for you to sleep peacefully and to protect and prevent unspeakable immoralities that are being constantly subjected to petite villages such as this handful of farms that smell like shit from the depths of hell itself, comprenez-vous ?”

“But I-“

“Now now, the left hand of God himself has fertilized you, I’m sure that your master will be proud to acknowledge that the seeds I so vigorously planted will grow into a beautiful shrubbery one day.”

“Fertilized? Shrubbery?”

“Yes, fertilized. But now if you would excuse me mademoiselle, I have urgent and pressing matters that cannot be postponed any further. Au revoir!”

I’m sure the girl had experienced abandonment issues before, but this blow rendered her genuinely speechless. The life of a holy knight is a cruel and shameless one indeed.


Pascal’s head sprung out of a thorn bush. The drunk bastard had passed out into a seemingly comfortable spot. What a jolly meathead he is.

“How did it go?”

“Like strangling a le eunuch” I chuckled whilst Pascal brushed dust off his bald forehead. “For God’s sake, why is thy robe in tatters? And where’s your le holy helmet of salvation?”

“Well you see...” Pascal stuttered. “I met up with a couple of these Irish fella’s, who in turn offered me a few shots…”

“Do go on ma copine” (I knew this wasn’t going anywhere good)

“Well, we played some rounds of good ol’ poker, and then this rather slim guy stood up and accused me of cheatin’! “

“Oh boy...”

“And you know I don’t like false accusations!”

“Don’t tell me that…”

“So we had a little intellectual conversation!”

“Aha-“

“THEN I smashed his face in. The whole lot sprung on me but I sorted em’ out. Careful not to wake em’, ahah!”

“Sleeping, huh?”

This is Pascal, my good childhood friend and cousin-in-law. He was born and raised in Scotland, so he’s rather blunt about his words and actions. I prefer him that way; actions speak more than words, as we French claim.

One foot after another, we head off towards the rendezvous point. A omnious front of clouds forms over the east, and agonized howls and yelps can be heard from the farm in the west.

We march on under the fair sky, and only the ever-passing motion of father time will clear the mist of unforeseen space-time currents, as we say in France.
(TO BE CONTINUED)

Hey there!

So, this would be amazing if it were a graphic novel. However, it's not, therefore you need a little help in the 'looks' department, meaning I can't picture any of this at all, whatsoever.

I think right now, you're starting a new story, and you're so excited that you're rushing through things. That's fine, many of us do it. Now that you've posted, you need to go back and take the time to read it with a different mind. Do you have enough description? (I'll help, you don't. ) And how do I add it in? I'll help to point out a few things:

- The beginning. Why is this girl clutching his arm? And I don't want the actual reason that you would tell other people when describing your story. I want your main character's view on it.

- Where is he traveling to and why? And he's going through a battlefield? Strange. These things should be lightly touched on, I think, in the first few paragraphs. You can't leave everything a mystery until the end!

- Where is he when he meets pascal? Is it two feet from where he shakes off the girl? That'd be nice to know - if he traveled anywhere?

Just work on the minor details and you should be good. Interesting start!

Keep writing,

Classy

Hey! I'll be reviewing your writing today. It's fairly short so it's a good one to start review day with.

Punctuation changes will be in red and in brackets and anything else will either be in brackets of after in-between paragraphs. You'll see what I mean soon.


The hut door flew swinging open as I marched out into the beautiful sunlight. The fresh breeze smothered my cheeks as the dandelions danced in the melody of the midsummer morning.(I really liked this bit of description, although the word 'smothered' felt slightly out of place. Perhaps you could add some more description here to give a fuller image of the scene before your character? Only(,) to my misfortune(,) the girl was still clutching my arm, determined not to let go.

Commas are just put in to break up the sentence a bit and help with the flow, etc. Boring stuff


“You must take me with you! My master will give me a real beating if he finds out!”

A lump of digested onions almost forced their way up my throat.

“A battlefield is no suitable place for a woman, besides if a drooling barbarian decides to ravage you, I won’t be there to tap him on the back.”

“But our bab-“

“Listen up mademoiselle, you are a witty farm laborer, and I am but a humble knight who in the name of the pope and God himself severs the chains of bloody darkness that have been bestowed upon this land by atrocious evil. I place my life on the line in order for you to sleep peacefully and to protect and prevent unspeakable immoralities that are being constantly subjected to petite villages such as this handful of farms that smell like shit from the depths of hell itself, comprenez-vous ?”

“But I-“

“Now now, the left hand of God himself has fertilized you, I’m sure that your master will be proud to acknowledge that the seeds I so vigorously planted will grow into a beautiful shrubbery one day.”

“Fertilized? Shrubbery?”

“Yes, fertilized. But now if you would excuse me mademoiselle, I have urgent and pressing matters that cannot be postponed any further. Au revoir!”

I had no idea of how the characters sounded or what they were doing whilst they were speaking. It would be use and much more engaging for the reader if you could add some description of their actions here.

I’m sure the girl had experienced abandonment issues before, but this blow rendered her genuinely speechless. The life of a holy knight is a cruel and shameless one indeed.


Pascal’s head sprung out of a thorn bush. The drunk bastard had passed out into a seemingly comfortable spot. What a jolly meathead he is.

“How did it go?”

“Like strangling a le eunuch” I chuckled whilst Pascal brushed dust off his bald forehead. “For God’s sake, why is thy robe in tatters? And where’s your le holy helmet of salvation?”

“Well you see...” Pascal stuttered. “I met up with a couple of these Irish fella’s, who in turn offered me a few shots…”

“Do go on ma copine” (I knew this wasn’t going anywhere good)

“Well, we played some rounds of good ol’ poker, and then this rather slim guy stood up and accused me of cheatin’! “

“Oh boy...”

“And you know I don’t like false accusations!”

“Don’t tell me that…”

“So we had a little intellectual conversation!”

“Aha-“

“THEN I smashed his face in. The whole lot sprung on me but I sorted em’ out. Careful not to wake em’, ahah!”

“Sleeping, huh?”

Again, I had no idea what Pascal looked or sounded like. And I was a little unsure of why you chose to use 'le' before some words. Just the whole way that they spoke seemed very informal, I'm sure that a Medieval Crusader would have been more eloquent with their speech.

This is Pascal, my good childhood friend and cousin-in-law. He was born and raised in Scotland, so he’s rather blunt about his words and actions. I prefer him that way; actions speak more than words, as we French claim.

One foot after another, we head off towards the rendezvous point. A omnious front of clouds forms over the east, and agonized howls and yelps can be heard from the farm in the west.

We march on under the fair sky, and only the ever-passing motion of father time will clear the mist of unforeseen space-time currents, as we say in France.

A good, although slightly abrupt ending. It would have been useful to add in some information about the characters here. Whilst they're travelling do they have any conversations that could lend the reader a better insight into who they are. I think that the characters in this need to be brought to life much more. Sorry if that sounds blunt, but it's just how it is.

Overall, quite a good piece. I'm not sure when I can get round to reviewing the rest of this story but, since this is review day, I'll try and get it done today.

Keep writing!

medievalwriter(Sean)