‘You know, from here I can see the book covering your face,’ Haka said.
Gael looked up from his book and raised his eyebrows to his friend. They sat in the academy library, Haka twiddling with his quill, trying to finish up his homework while Gael reading History of Magic. Haka had tried to plead to him to help with the questions, but upon a glance, he had refused. They were easy enough that he considered Haka would find the answers eventually.
‘Well, this book is bigger than my head.’ Gael resumed reading, continuing at the part about the arrival of Naturals, their deities. ‘Finish your homework quick so I can check it.’
Haka let out a loud sigh of relief and got the nearby librarian’s shush as a reward. ‘You are going to help me with it then! You should’ve told me earlier, you know.’
‘What you want me to do is give you the answers.’ Gael flipped to a new page. ‘What I’m going to do is tell you where you’re wrong over and over again until you get it right. There’s a difference.’
‘Okay, fine,’ Haka said begrudgingly. Gael could hear his quill moving. ‘I’ll make you check only once. I can be smart too, you know.’
Gael knew, but he didn’t say anything. Over his book, he glanced at Haka. His friend had short midnight’s hair and tanned skin. While Haka wrote, his arm that was shown by his sleeveless tunic had lines that clearly defined his biceps. Gael gulped. Realizing it wasn’t the time to stare at Haka like a creep, he couldn’t help it. Haka’s face was covered with enough wrinkles that made him approachable and the sharp jaw line boosted his attractiveness. And his lips. Gael had never seen those so deliciously red belonged to a male before.
When Haka looked up, Gael quickly turned to his book, feeling his heart failing for a second. ‘I think I’m done. Here you go.’ He shoved the exercise book over to Gael, deliberately too hard to collide with Gael’s book and tumble it.
Gael gave him a flat stare that said, ‘Really?’ and set his book aside. He checked Haka’s answers. The questions Haka had been working on were from The Four Main Types of Tuning textbook, one of Gael’s favourite reference books. Looking at the answers, he nodded several times and only frowned once. He returned the book and pointed at the last question. ‘You got this wrong.’
Haka looked at the said question with an excited smile. ‘Only one? Wow, I’m smart after all.’
Gael snickered. ‘These are basic questions, Haka.’
‘Whatever.’
Gael looked at his book, losing the mood to read it. He loved knowledge especially about the Naturals and the blessing they gave to people, but the history book was too thick. If he was mistaken, its pages reached a thousand over. The author didn’t make an effort to deliver an interesting, entertaining explanations. It felt like reading an emotionless person’s diary, lacking the ability to hook the readers. He wished to be a professor someday, and he didn’t want to be as boring as the author of the book.
Haka nudged his elbow with the book. Gael took it and checked his answer. Nodding in satisfaction, he returned it.
‘Have you heard about the rumor?’ Haka asked him, closing his book and set it away as far as possible as if he was allergic to it. ‘We’re going to get a new student, and it’s Mrs. Venaria’s daughter. I heard she’s eleven-years old, which makes her the youngest person ever admitted to Quasar Magica Academy.’
‘That is if the rumor is true,’ Gael said, his attention now to the subject at hand. ‘How old was her son when he entered this school? Ten?’
‘That’s been years, Gael. No one remembers it.’ He paused, then smiled sheepishly. ‘He was twelve, by the way. One year younger than the standard age to enter the first year. I heard he’s now doing business with his father.’
‘Well, I guess he’s a successful person now.’ Gael had been in the school for a couple of months, this year being his first. The same went to Haka, though previously he had studied at Quasar Elementica Academy, an institution for seven to twelve-years old students aimed to enter Quasar Magica Academy. Both academies belonged to Mrs. Venaria.
Get away from him. He startled and scratched his ear. It was the whisper again, but this time, it happened when some was around him. He looked about him. A few more students were in the library, none of them able to whisper something like to him. He looked at Haka, suspecting he might be the one who caused it, but the latter seemed intent to play with his quill. He had been humming, trying to spin the quill in between his two fingers.
Get away from him. He will become a danger. The whisper raised the hair behind his neck. It felt like the the winter kiss, or the phantom lady in the children stories. There was a hint of melody behind it, but it got lost beyond the hushing tone. What was happening to him? While his inside was worried, whirlwinds rampaging in between his ribs, he stayed still on the outside, staring at nothingness as if he was lost in thought. A trickle of sweat he quickly wiped away.
Haka looked up and pulled his mouth at one side. ‘What’s wrong, Gael?’ The Lio-blessed Companion knew him too well. ‘You seem uptight.’
Gael waved away Haka’s worry. ‘Nothing, nothing,’ he said, grateful to have his voice steady. ‘I’m just thinking.’
Haka leaned forward. ‘What are you thinking about? Girls?’ His mouth twitched.
Gael stared at him. I wish, he thought. It’s better than thinking about boys. One of them is in front of me right now. ‘I’m thinking about something else, dimwit. I wonder what does it feel like to cast advanced spells.’
Haka looked at him with sympathy. He took Gael’s hand and squeezed it. ‘I don’t know what it feels like not to be a Companion, but from what I’ve read, some people just attune to their element later than usual.’
Gael stared at Haka’s hand, hoping the latter didn’t see him blushing. He wasn’t thinking about his magic-less state when he stated about the advance spell. He was past the self-pitying phase. ‘I’m pretty sure you’re right. Frankly, I was surprised when I got into this academy.’ Carefully, he placed his other hand on top of Haka’s. ‘Mrs. Venaria said sooner or later, the Natural would bless me. I’m grateful to enter this place through my previous academy’s result.’
Haka smiled. ‘I’m sure she’s right. She’s the principal after all, the’ - he made gestures -’know-it-all. The blessing will come, and you’d be a better student than you already are.’
Gael returned the smile. He was grateful to have a friend like Haka when others isolated him. He was the only student in Quasar Magica Academy who couldn’t perform spells. One of the Naturals hadn’t blessed him, giving him attuning to a certain element. He was too ordinary, having nothing with himself that could stand out. He didn’t know why Haka wanted to befriend him, but he had come to accept not all students were prejudiced to people like him. A few talked to him with kindness enough to pass as fellow pupils.
End of chapter
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140,691 Literary Works • 673,612 Reviews
Good Morning/Afternoon/Evening/Night(whichever one it is in your part of the world),
Hi! I'm here to leave a quick review!!
First Impression: Okay, so two new characters introduced here, and a whole lot more detailed worldbuilding, which is pretty cool. We get to learn quite a bit and you've snuck this information to us in some pretty good places here rather than listing it all out so that's great. Also we have a bit of a crush involved, and I absolutely love seeing those in a story so this is just getting better and better with each chapter.
Anyway let's get right to it,
Okay...so we have a POV change for this chapter, so I'm gonna assume these two are perhaps going to be main characters along with Ilami but these two seem to be in a bit of a different setting at the moment so we're having them introduced this way. At any rate, right from the get go, we got to know this there's some kind of magic based education going on here and that these two are probably pretty good friends.
Hmm, this is a lovely little exchange to introduce these two here. You can sense an easy friendship in the way they speak and they seem to genuinely care about each other and how they do in their studies if Gael's reaction is any indicator. Only true friends are going to refuse to let you copy answers when they know you can do it yourself.
Oooooohh....I'm already loving this, a friend that has a crush on the other one makes for a very interesting pair in a story...and now I can't help but try and figure out how this is going to end. Its a good thing Gael isn't the one doing homework or he'd never be able to finish with him being this distracted.
Hmm, there's a little bit of nice awkwardness there when Gael wonders whether he got caught staring...and hmm, well, looks like the easy conversation from earlier is simply going to continue here.
Hmm, this is a little bit of an odd place to start describing this book here, it comes a little bit out of the main flow of the piece, cause we were in the middle of a bit of a conversation and now we've Gael essentially lost in thought. This does tell us some interesting things however, so you should keep this in, but maybe slip it into the silence that was there when Haka was working rather than put this in essentially the middle of a conversation.
I'm gonna make a wild guess and assume that this person that's being admitted is maybe Ilami...although she was nine so uhh...I'm not terribly sure. Did you age her up accidentally? Or am I reading too far into this trying to connect the first two chapters to each other? It seems like a natural point to mention there not to mention I love the way you give away these little details on the worldbuilding here...it fits the flow much better than if it were just a passage explaining things. The dialogue ends up being slightly clunky there, but I think it can still get a pass cause that does sound like useful information.
Hmm, a little more information there, once again I really like how you still manage to balance the information you're telling us so that we know what's happening without letting us know so much to the point that this becomes a bti boring.
Ooooh, well, I was expecting this to be more of a casual thing throughout but we've ourselves a far more powerful mystery happening here. This mysterious certainly gets your attention and adds even more questions on top of what we've already got here. Now where can this possibly be going.
I'm getting a general sense that this is something a little knew to Gael judging by how he seems lost as to how this happened and he's getting a little scared and worried...although I also get the sense its a slightly more muted reaction. If it makes, it sounds almost like something that used to happen to Gael some long time ago, but hasn't happened for a while and is now happening again. I'm not sure, but that's the vibe I'm getting here and it's all definitely quite scary here.
Hmm, well whatever this is Haka clearly knows nothing about it and we have some nice little teasing which creates a nice little contrast there, cause we've got all of this turmoil happening in Gael's mind, but Haka is just continuing the friendly conversation they had earlier knowing nothing about what's going on.
Ohhh...that's an interesting turn, the excuse that Gael though up sounds a bit like what you'd come up if you were as confused and simultaneous also embarrassed as he is but Haka's reaction there suggests that something about magic is a bit of a soft spot for Gael for some reason. That certainly adds even more intrigue to this piece here.
Huh...okay....maybe the girl is not Ilami after all, her mother doesn't seem like the type to do something like is being described, cause if I'm understanding this correctly, Gael is someone who is not capable of doing magic but was accepted to the magic academy cause he did really well in his previous one and the principal was kind enough to take him on the hope his magic ability would surface at some point. It certainly adds an entirely new dimension to this character here. I'm already very curious to see how all of these scattered threads that you've introduced will tie together.
Hmm...a bit of an odd ending point but I'm guessing this is cause its only half the first chapter, so umm, well this looks to be him reflecting on how he's treated and how Haka is different and I'm assuming things will continue directly from here in the next part, so I'll talk about that one once I get around to that.
Aaaaand that's it for this one.
Overall: Overall, I already love where this chapter is going and these two characters seem pretty nice. I'll give my full thoughts on the chapter as a whole in the next part
As always remember to take what you think was helpful and forget the rest.
Stay Safe
Harry
Thanks for the review!
You're Welcome!!
Hey, Lelu here again. This was an interesting chapter, though the plot could advance a little more while still introducing Gael and Haka (like Ilami killing Whatsisface). The story itself is great and easy to understand, but the main problem here is grammar. It can make or break a story, and yours isn't quite broken, just obscured. Here are some things that might help: People don't roll their eyebrows "to" another person. Always "at." You don't plead "to" someone, you plead "with" them. When Haka looks up from his book and pushes it over to Gael, you have Gael thinking and acting just before Haka talks. These could be separated to make it clearer to the reader who's doing what and when. Haka looked at "the said" question. It's just "said." Nobody can be expected to get all this stuff right (Not me either, ha ha) but your story is cool and clear so far. One more issue is that sometimes you swap words with each other, putting them in the wrong positions. This isn't a big problem; none of these are. I'm just mentioning the small stuff because there's not a lot of big stuff.
Thanks for the review!
I realize I have an issue with grammar, but I would prefer if other aspects like characters, plot, worldbuilding or flow is given more attention. This is the first draft, after all, and I'm not a native English speaker. Be assured, grammar will get my attention during future drafts.
Sorry to bother you about grammar, but I'm really not good at spotting other stuff. I will try, though. Thx
I've been working on getting back to your novel (and all the other novel requests), now that the storm warnings in my sector have died down a bit.
Alrighty let's get started on this new perspective and new character I guess I'll soon learn a lot about. The opening line as well as the first section of banter between these two seems friendly enough with the slight dips into humor and teasing. The explanation saying that they are friends, just gives me the vibe of air-quotes and that the term 'friend' is kind of loosely applied. That and what I accidentally read at the bottom as I was trying focus. And then came the time when the awkwardness of being described as friends, further set in for me. Maybe it's from all of the cheesy and dimestore romance novels I've read, but that part put me off for a bit, as I thought of the possible ways this story was going.
The hardest thing for me going through this story was the bouncing from topic to topic and the ability to find similarities between this and other books. Like it's always good for people to be able to connect to the story and find those parallels but this just seemed over explained in some parts and underexplained in others, if that statement makes any sense to you. The jump to gossip was the easiest thing to accept because it changed the mood of the conversation. But then it switched right back the awkwardness existing a scene earlier. The best way to describe it is that the author couldn't decide which way to go with a scene, so he just went with both. In some respects that's pretty cool but in the long run, it becomes confusing.
Oooh. Whispers from a mysterious source, maybe one of the Naturals being talked about a few lines back. I realize once getting to the end of this chapter, that it must have been connected to that story you asked me to review way back when. With the magic-less student that suddenly found his power in that moment of need. The pieces are starting to click more together now as the plot amps up.
I'll actually be back in like 20 minutes or so once I finish the next chapter, just because I'm on a role tonight.
Hi there Lightsong. This is Kays here back for another review coming in at the very end of this lovely Review Day. Let's cut the long intro and delve right in because I'm interested by the point of view shift to Gael who I have been dying to see as a child. Without further ado, let's delve right in.
Well, this is definitely not how I expected Gael or where I expected Gael to be at the beginning of the novel. Gael's already in an academy? Nice! The first couple of paragraphs can be strengthened in the quality of writing with revision because the wording there is a bit awkward. The setting and atmosphere though as well as how the chapter starts definitely interests me because of the contrast between this second chapter with Gael as the main character and the first with Ilami--Gael at the moment seems to be in a better situation than her? Ilami's mother definitely doesn't seem ideal.
The description of Haka I have to say is confusing. 'His friend had short midnight's hair and tanned skin' doesn't sound right, so reword. That's probably the biggest consistent problem throughout that I've found so far--wording. While I can agree with DarkPandemonium that this section is probably my favorite so far as well, there's still an issue with the wording and at times 'was' and 'had' are a bit overused when they're able to be swapped out for stronger verbs. There's another paragraph here that I wanted to point out below because the explanation is a little off? Or, seeing as this is a paragraph based in thought, the execution is a little off.
The concept of Gael wanting to someday become a professor at this age is interesting but there's something missing in the impact. Maybe play around with the wording because I do enjoy him comparing his future teaching (if he ever teaches in the future) to him not wanting to be as boring as that book. The purpose is to see his appreciation for knowledge but similar to most other people, Gael doesn't enjoy when knowledge is put dryly and in a boring manner.
I see that this chapter is tied to the first in the sense that Ilami is being entered into the academy. We see that Gael is actually pretty bland in terms of not having magic which I found to be extremely fascinating. This fact adds a whole new layer for me and overall, this chapter is very solid and a lot easier to follow than God's Assassin as well. Nice job on this one, Light. You've hit your stride.
If you have any questions, don't be afraid to ask! I hope I helped and have a great day.
Hi, Lightsong. Back again.
This is probably my favourite segment so far. There's still a lot of nitpicks and grammar bits to work on, but it's a nice introduction to Gael and Haka and the scene characterises them well. I like books with multiple POVs. There's something exciting about them, because they provide the opportunity to see characters from their own perspectives and other people's. I'm looking forward to seeing Gael's storyline converge with Ilami's.
Nitpicks
It does depend on Haka's speech style, but I find this line a bit awkward. Something like 'Y'know, I can see the book covering your face from here' strikes me as a more natural way to say it, but dialogue is a bit more flexible than prose when it comes to how things can be expressed. If you think Haka would talk like that, keep it as it is.
The more common expression would be 'at his friend'. However, I think this sentence would actually be better if you scrapped 'to/at his friend' entirely. We can gauge from the context what he's raising his eyebrows at.
Expression. It would be better as this:
Haka had pleaded for his help with the questions
Or this:
Haka had pleaded with him for help with the questions
As a general rule, you plead with someone rather than pleading to someone.
Ahh, poor pining Gael. Generally I think Haka's description is quite naturally done - because Gael fancies him and can't help staring, you can insert a description of him with veritable ease. However, this bit stands out as convoluted. It makes it sound like he only has visible biceps while he's writing. If you had something like:
As Haka wrote, Gael watched the tendons shifting in his muscled forearms.
It's a bit clearer, isn't it? The moving tendons also provides an active reason for Gael's attention to shift to the arms.
I think you could easily show this rather than telling us it. Perhaps Gael tries to focus back on his book, but the words squirm on the page and his eyes keep drifting back to Haka? That would get the point across more subtly.
The phrasing is off here. Perhaps:
Gael had never seen lips so deliciously red belong to male before.
*Cracks knuckles* time to talk about filter words.
Filter words such as 'felt', 'saw', 'heard', 'realised', 'noticed', etc. are often used to clarify what action is happening to who and they can be useful in scenes with several characters. However, when used unnecessarily, they reduce the immediacy of an action. Compare this:
She realised the candle had gone out and heard footsteps thumping up behind her. The next moment, she felt a hand grab her collar.
To this:
The candle went out and footsteps thumped up behind her. The next moment, a hand grabbed her collar.
The second, most would agree, is more direct and effective. Filter words are an extra reminder that the action is happening to someone else, so by removing them the events feel closer and more immediate. Of course, you can't always get rid of them, and nor do you always need to. They're perfectly fine in the right context. They're just something you need to look out for. If you spot a filter word, always test what the sentence would be like without it - you might find that it's better.
Expression. Tumbling isn't something you can do to an object - you could make it tumble, but in itself tumbling is something a subject does, not an object. You could rephrase this as something like:
He shoved the exercise book towards Gael, deliberately too hard. It collided with Gael's book and knocked it over.
Stick a comma after 'knowledge'. Also, would 'blessings' be more appropriate than 'blessing'? They didn't just give them one blessing, did they?
Like MJ says, you could have 'Unless he was mistaken'. You could also have 'If he wasn't mistaken'.
Delete 'an' seeing as 'explanations' is plural.
Beware of what I call For The Audience dialogue. For The Audience dialogue is when two characters speak about something that would already be common knowledge between them purely for the sake of informing the reader. Gael would already know that eleven was very young to be admitted, so it seems odd that Haka puts so much weight on it. It's also odd that he uses the academy's full name - when I chat with my university friends, I don't say 'are you going into the University of Huddersfield today?' because what other university would they be going to? I just say 'are you going into uni today?' and they know from common sense which one I mean.
The two of them would also know what the standard age for the first year was, so there's no reason for Haka to highlight it. It feels unnatural.
Here are examples of the quotes with the For The Audience bits taken out.
‘We’re going to get a new student, and it’s Mrs. Venaria’s daughter. I heard she’s the youngest person ever admitted to the Academy.'
‘He was twelve, by the way. I heard he’s now doing business with his father.’
Expression. 'The same went for Haka' would the more appropriate way of saying it.
I'd change 'he' to 'Gael', because it's not immediately obvious whether 'he' refers to Haka or Gael.
What do you mean by this?
You could definitely make this much more concise and showing. If you just had:
He looked at Haka, suspecting he might be the one who caused it, but he was busy humming and spinning the quill between his fingers.
Something like this would be a lot simpler. The image itself is nice, by the way - it characterises Haka well.
Expression. 'He wiped away a trickle of sweat' would be better.
As a rule, people don't really use people's names in conversation unless they're calling for their attention or in a big group. It's a picky nitpick, but 'What's wrong?' would work fine by itself. Come to think of it, just 'Gael?' would work as well. I'd pick one or the other, but it's your call.
Expression. Maybe something like:
‘I’m thinking about something else, dimwit. I'm wondering what it's like to cast advanced spells.’
I get you're trying to avoid confusion, but 'the latter' just feels too formal to me. If you had 'hoping he didn't see him blushing' it would be perfectly clear from the context who 'he' referred to.
Expression. To be honest, if you had something like this:
He hadn't been thinking about his magic-less state at all.
It would be fine.
This dialogue just seems too formal considering how close Gael and Haka are. It's also teetering on For The Audience dialogue, because I can't imagine Haka doesn't know a lot of this already. You could still work it in, you've just got to make sure it comes across more casually, like a subject they've touched upon before. If Gael said something like this:
‘I’m pretty sure you’re right. I'm still surprised I got in here, though.’ Carefully, he placed his other hand on top of Haka’s. ‘Mrs. Venaria said sooner or later the Natural would bless me. I’m just glad she let me in.’
Obviously this is just a random example, but you can see how it's more casual, and how Gael is talking like Haka already knows a bit about what he's saying. How you alter the dialogue is completely up to you, but it definitely needs mellowing out a bit.
Misaligned tenses. It should be 'you'll'.
Expression. 'One of the Naturals hadn't blessed him' makes it sound like the other three have. Something like this might be clearer:
He hadn't been blessed by the Naturals, hadn't been attuned to an element.
Or something like this:
None of the Naturals had blessed him or attuned him to an element.
Expression. Perhaps just have this as two sentences, as in:
He was too ordinary. Nothing about him stood out.
Generally people are prejudiced against something, not to it.
Overall Thoughts
1) I really do like this part. It captured my attention more than the first two segments did, perhaps because it's in an environment I can identify with. Expression hitches aside, there's a nice banter between Gael and Haka, and there's something very human and relatable about Gael. I'm interested to see how the pair's friendship will change, especially in regards to whether Haka does or doesn't reciprocate Gael's deeper feelings.
2) Your distinction between showing and telling isn't bad, but you do over-clarify sometimes. Take these bits:
You see the trend? You have a habit of telling the reader what emotion the character is feeling rather than letting us work it out from the context. In the cases of quotes one and three, neither 'excited' or 'with sympathy' are necessary, as the following dialogue/gesture makes the emotion behind them obvious. We know Haka is being sympathetic because he squeezes Gael's hand, for example.
When I write, I try to describe actions over motivations. If a character taps their foot, I don't say they're doing it because they're impatient. If a character crosses their arms, I don't say it's because they're being defensive. Trust in the behaviour of your characters to inform the reader what they're feeling. Only clarify it if there really is no other way to get it across.
3) Cutting down on For The Audience dialogue is the other thing you need to be mindful of. When you write, act like you're ignoring the reader. The same way stage actors don't acknowledge the vast audience watching them as they perform, writers have to give the impression that they're paying no attention to the reader, at least most of the time. Information that exists only for the reader's benefit is incredibly noticeable and can easily shatter the immersion. Just write the scene as it unfolds and try not to think too much about whether the reader understands what's going on.
You're good at finding the distinction in the prose, by the way. Your exposition never feels like it's being spoonfed to me. It's just the dialogue you need to watch out for. I want to feel like the characters are talking to nobody but each other.
I'll leave the review here. As always, all of the examples I gave in the nitpicks section are just suggestions and ways to illustrate what I'm getting at - it's completely your call if you use them or not. I'll try to review the next part of this chapter soon. I've read everything that's been published so far and I'm really getting into it, it's just difficult finding the time to critique it.
Keep writing!
~Pan
Hey, you must've been putting a lot of time making this review. Thanks!
You're welcome!
Hey there! MJ stopping by for a short review
This sounded a little odd to me, so maybe you could rephrase it to say something like "Even though he knew that this wasn't the time to stare at Haka like a creep, he couldn't help it." That seems a little more natural.
Usually, people say "Unless he was mistaken", rather than "If he was mistaken".
You used 'state', or some form of the word 'state' twice in this sentence, so I would replace one of those usages.
My one question/concern here was when you mentioned the exercise book. How do you answer questions about an exercise book? It doesn't really seem like something that there would be a class on, and it was a bizarre subject to choose. Personally, I would replace that with something else so that it didn't stand out so much and it could seem more like a normal class, making the scene just two friends working on homework together.
Other than this, I think that this fantasy-themed novel is a very intriguing idea, and this new development gave it a few different angles. I like how you split it up into different perspectives, and I'm excited for when Gael will meet Ilami. I also thought that it was interesting how Gael is possibly gay, and what that will mean later on in the story and how it will affect all the action. Sorry for the incredible amount of nitpicks, but there were several spots in the story where I felt that I should correct it, just small details that I wanted to point out.
That's all I have for you today! Hopefully this was helpful, and if you have any questions, feel free to let me know and I'll do my best to clear them up. Until next time, keep writing, and see ya around!
Best wishes,
MJ