Dreams of Giants -- Chapter 6, Part 1

Well... vacation finally hit and I shall try to get through as many parts of this as possible!

Also, I haven't reviewed in ages so this might be a bit rough.

The pub was filled with a nauseating stench of rotting wood. It was a small pub, located inside the slums of Kavaria. At dusk every day, a consistent crowd would arrive, order drinks, and gossip about whatever might have been the flavor of the day.

This introduction does exactly what it's supposed to do, give us the setting, but it does nothing else. The stench, size and location of the pub are never carried through the work until the very end, making this look cheep. It's like you simply wanted to get the information out so the end wouldn't have details floating out of the blue. However, if you want much greater impact, weave these details in and make them fade more into the background as the stranger talks. The barman can compare what happens normally to what happens after the stranger begins talking, giving this more value.

I also don't see why the pub is there in the first place. "Flavor of the day" doesn't tell me anything about what goes on, when obviously this pub is a very important nerve-center for the slums. Hint at that more, again to give more weight to this passage.

The stranger, the barman noted, was unusually short.

Pretty minor thing, but I was somewhat thrown by the sudden introduction of the barman. The PoV switched from omniscient to distant third, and I find that rather jarring considering you've never made such a sudden switch before (if memory serves). Maybe have him observe the normal crowd from a distance and only then note the stranger?

The rest of his mannerisms were wholly unremarkable.

The question that entered my mind upon reading this line was, "why does the barman even notice?" You've alluded to the answer, that this stranger stands out because he is just that, a stranger, and the barman seems to know the crowd. I'd add in just a little more weight to that allusion, so we're not left guessing.

He did seem slightly more refined than most of the usual pub crawlers, though. He reached into his trouser pocket and withdrew a pipe. He struck a match and lit it before proceeding to relight the wax-candle in front of him that had been blown out by the wind.

You pose a question with the first line (Why does this man seem more refined?) and answer it slightly with the second line (it is assumed that a pipe is not common in the slums; no weight is given to this assumption, however) and I just get confused by the last line, really. It would seem that I won't stop talking about this issue for the rest of the chapter: weight. Him lighting the candle doesn't make him seem more refined, and I wonder why he'd light the candle instead of the pipe. I can see later why, so the stranger can show his magic, but it feels like a cheep insert of information.

The wooden bench soon filled up with the usual crowd, but the bar was unusually silent.

~ I thought the stranger had arrived after the crowd, not the other way around. You say in one line that, "the usual crowd were joined by a stranger." Now you seem to be saying the opposite. Establish when the stranger entered for this to make a bit more sense.

~ It's assumed that the bar is unusually silent because of the stranger, but why should he make any difference? They might be quieter because of the stranger, maybe leave some space around him, but be silent?

If he really is causing silence in the crowd, then that should be cause for great alarm. I'm not seeing any sort of alarm at all here, which leaves this line without much tug.

“You an outta-towner?” a more familiar voice asked. The barman recognized it as Igan.

"More" seems out of place here. I'd nix it, personally. If the barman knows the name behind the voice, couldn't the description simply be "familiar"?

“And what they gonna do to me?” he said, “Bunch of big talkers. That's what they is.”

It's very unclear who the "he" is in this sentence. It's assumed that "he" is the stranger, but since you've had two men talk since the stranger last spoke, that isn't obvious.

“Yes.” He paused.

~ It's not clear who "he" is again.

~ "He paused" is a slightly confusing tag (it took me a moment to decipher that "he paused" was an action, not a break in speech) To make the stranger a slightly stronger character, I'd replace "he paused" with some sort of movement.

Cayn had just entered the bar.

At this point, I no longer care about the names. You can drop this sentence and give us one less name to remember, since I'm really not keeping track of who's talking.

Instead of it's usual reddish-gold, it was now a striking crimson. The color of blood.

~ I'm about to be rather hypocritical here, since I do this myself, but the fact he changed the flame to the colour of blood sets up this stranger as the antagonist. If he's had a main speaking role the last few paragraphs, and he's suddenly shown to have magic that alludes to destruction, then his personality would need a twist or two in order for me to stay interested.

~ This is the line I was talking about when I said the candle-lighting looked like a set up.

The strangers voice was controlled.

Stranger's voice.

The smell of the rotting wood was all but forgotten. The candle in front of the newcomer had turned back to it's usual hue.

Again, you're dumping details on us with no real reason other than to give a setting. These details aren't so bad, because you're implying that the setting is forgotten after the stranger's words, but because of how you dumped details on us on the beginning and haven't mentioned those details since, these details are still bad.

The barman felt himself tense up at these words. He couldn't quite work out why, though.

And I'm not almost completely positive that this guy is the antagonist. Which, when he's just been introduced, isn't such a good thing. Since he seems to have his own section of the book, readers will know exactly what he's up to and might lose interest. If I see more evidence that the stranger is the antagonist, then I'll certainly lose interest more quickly.

*

Feel: Just about every detail of the setting felt like I was just there. No real rhyme or reason, just to have more than one person speak and to have some location for this to take place. Include just a handful of details so these characters don't look like they're speaking in a vacuum. I've seen you manage to weave details into a story before so I know you're capable. And, even if this part is supposed to have a sparse feel it simply feels so weak. As I mentioned in my nit-picks, there's no flow, no coherence to this part other than the dialogue. You just give details without explaining any of them.

Crowd: I can see why you have to name each member of the crowd; with the bartender knowing each of them, it only makes sense. However, with no backhistory, truly individualized speech patterns, and how little each of those characters speak, I tuned out to the names very quickly. They just felt like a way to create the illusion of a crowd but that left the reader with a name overload. I've done something similar in an old draft (yes, it's posted, no, I'm not putting the link here) where I had three named characters speaking and I had several people tell me there were too many names. I'm sure you'll find a way around this, somehow. If these characters become important later than you can reintroduce them so we know who they are more in-depth.

PoV: Rather rough here, I'm not happy to say. Had you stuck to just an omniscient perspective or distant third you would have been alright, but because you kept switching between the two I found myself very uninvolved with what was going on. When the bartender suddenly tensed at the end, I'd mostly forgotten he was even there. Because he never seems like a true character in the scene, I wasn't at all emotionally invested.

Overall: I cannot say more than this was weak. You've just now introduced a new character, when you hadn't in awhile (it caught me off-guard) and the whole feel... yeah, I didn't really enjoy this. It was slightly better than your first chapter (I believe you remember how I went on with emotional investment there?) but still not the best.

PM me with any questions!

~Rosey

He wore a shirt typical of the slums: brown, ragged and unwashed.

Comma after ragged. I think that you're supposed to put one before the and as well.

_________

Good job with your writing, I only found one mistake. Overall, this is interesting in a weird type of way. A good weird, I might add. I might have to read your other chapters for fun! xD