Young Writers Society

Hey yiz~
So, you asked me to review Chapter 7 in August, and I never got around to it because I'm really terrible at keeping up with my WRFF thread! But I'm finally here now, and to make it up to you I'm going to review everything you've got so far I'm going to chain review it, so some reviews may be long, some may be short, some may be paired with other chapters. It'll depend on what I find. Thank you for you patience!

I've read through all of the previous reviews, but you've been blessed as far as reviewers go, so if I repeat something, I apologize!

You have a person of color and a woman! I wouldn't call your prologue a beacon of diversity, but it is definitely more than other stories have. Fantasy is notorious for being whitewashed and male dominated. I'm already excited about what we have here.

I have to agree with what almost every other reviewer has said. There's a lot of showing instead of telling. Weird wording and sentence structure that messes with the flow of things. An absolute ton of repetition. I won't go into any detail because the other reviewers handled that fairly well. I will take the opportunity to answer some questions you asked other reviewers that weren't answered. Obviously we aren't the same people, but maybe my opinion will help?

Dueling Scene
I didn't read the first draft, but I'll leave my thoughts on what you have now.

You start it off like so:

Naxzaros deflected Croft’s spell with ease before firing his own spell towards Croft which Croft then easily deflected as well. Both wizards engaged in a ferocious duel, with both parties firing spells towards one another in quick succession and deflecting spells[b] [b]fired towards them equally quick[b]ly.

So, I'd like to know what your ultimate goal is for this novel. Do you have any plans on ever looking at publishing, or is it just something you write for fun/to improve as a writer? I ask this because if the latter, I'd to focus more on the story itself than pointing out freak typo/grammar mistakes that aren't likely to be repeated. This review I'll get to both, but if there's something you'd like me to focus on just let me know :p

Anyway, I thought the story was pretty intriguing. The general idea of battles between these "dark wizards" and "Praestux" has potential to go in a lot of different angles. I'll put it this way; if you hadn't asked me to review the entirety of the novel, and just the prologue, I'd more than likely want to go ahead and look at chapter one, too.

The world has potential, as well. It's a unique fantasy setting, but without being fleshed out yet there isn't much more to add. I do have something to point out that I'll get to in a second.

The writing was...okay. I'm sure you've gotten better, this was written four months ago and you've got a ton more feedback than you do now. It was a bit confusing at times, and your choice of wording tended to be bizarre. However, I do commend you for the action scene. I've always struggled at action scenes in the past, and while I felt it was a bit dry and not as well vivid as it could be, that's more due to the lack of build. It's quite a great effort.

Some things I noticed reading through:

A dark hooded figure limped quickly through the dark forest, the only source of light illuminating his way through the pitch black forest was the faint and slightly eerie green glow coming from the tip of his wand. His pursuers were closing in on him, the white-bluish glow from their wands grew ever brighter with each passing moment. I will not go down like this, hunted like a dog, thought the hooded figure to himself angrily as he swung around to face is pursuers. The hooded figure mumbled a phrase which produced a spectacular bolt of greenish energy that crackled as it hurtled towards his pursuers before causing a massive explosion. The destructive force of the spell created a massive crater in the ground as well as producing green flames which burned the trees near the recently created crater.

I will not go down like this, hunted like a dog

“That’s the end of the line Naxzaros,” said the lead pursuer with a British accent with his wand drawn and pointed to the hooded figure. The lead pursuer had black coloured hair which was slightly greying. It was also combed back neatly. He also had an eye patch covering his left eye and several deep scars on the right side of his slightly wrinkled face. "We're arresting you for mass murder and the crimes you have committed against all the other sentient magical beings of this world."

Naxzaros chuckled. “You think you three can defeat me?” asked Naxzaros confidently as he stood his ground, his wand drawn. “I have defeated countless Praestux and wizards and witches of high calibre before you. Even the greatest of the Elven sages, Elvindal fell before my might.

“We can try,” replied the Asian Praestux with short neatly cut black hair who stood next to the lead Praestux with his wand drawn.

“Very well then,” said Naxzaros. Naxzaros with one horizontal movement of his wand and without uttering a word or incantation, produced a horizontal green crescent energy that made a high pitched screeching sound as it hurtled towards the three Praestux . Each of the three Praestux cast a shield spell to protect themselves respectively. However two out of the three of them were hurtled back by the sheer force of Naxzaros’ spell. The only one that stood, was the leader of the group.

“Most impressive,” said Naxzaros as the dust cleared, “I see your reputation as a master Vigilux and the moniker ‘the greatest Praestux in his generation’ is well deserved Mr. Croft. No wonder you defeated so many of my brethren during the battle.”

Croft then walked over to where Naxzaros’ wand was lying. He picked up the jet black ebony wand that was dirtied by the wet mud of the ground. It was a finely crafted wand, there were runic patterns that were intricately carved on the wand, however its beauty was somewhat dampened because of the mud and dirt that was on it. Croft could feel a dark aura emanating from the magnificently made wand. A powerful dark aura that Croft had not come across in all of his career as a hunter of dark beings and artefacts. Croft admired the finely crafted wand for a moment before placed it into one of his trench coat’s pocket and walking off to join Shan and Lucia . As he walked off to rejoin his two colleagues, the seasoned Vigilux did not notice a brief and faint flash of green light that emanated from the depths of the cliff.

Hey!

Finally getting in that review you requested

So first off, I'd like to say I overall enjoyed this prologue. Despite not clarifying a time period, I have to say I was fond of the quick beginning. It reminded me of Eragon, almost. I read that book a whiles back, but from my memory, it resembles the opening scene in the pursuit of Arya. Though this has some similarities, it's great in it's own way. I have to say I LOVED the duel descriptions. The use of magic was very fun to read, and the descriptions very much captured how I would imagine arks and bolts of energy flying from one wand to another. However, in the early goings I feel like you used "massive" too much, so I suggest throwing in some synonyms to prevent too much repetitiveness. The vague but effective introductions worked well in my mind. I thought they fit well with the opening scene.

I have to point out two cliches I noticed, however. Neither ruined this for me, but I feel obligated to point them out. The villain describing his plan on the brink of defeat was a cliche I noticed. It's used a lot; the villain openly discussing his plan to the protagonist either while about to attempt an execution of the plan, or while being defeated. Another cliche is the villain assumed to be dead, with "no way" of surviving, but a last minute sign they indeed survived (and that the protagonists also missed). That last cliche I don't see as avoidable, unless you wanted to rewrite Naxzaros barely defeating the other magic users and escaping.

I didn't notice much grammar wise, except in one sentence I wanted to point out.

"The hooded figure than begun limping quickly again."

The "than" should be "then," as "than" is comparative (ex. greater than), and "then" is time related. And I also believe "begun" should be "began," but I confuse those a rather good amount so I may be wrong.

Like I said, i overall really enjoyed this piece, and I wouldn't be surprised to find myself reading any future chapters. Feel free to link anything else you'd like to have reviewed in my thread

Hello!

I'm here because you have requested a review from me in my WRFF thread!

Since you didn't specify something that you wanted me to specifically review on, I'm going to just write down anything I think needs edited or that you should work on!

As I've seem that many people have already reviewed this, I will try and make this mostly an overview, not very specific review. I don't read the other reviews, so if I repeat something that someone else has said, that means that you might want to edit that specific part

also, another disclaimer lol, I review as I read usually, so I may edit something and then correct myself, but that's just so you know how the reader (me) analyses your novel as he or she reads

A dark hooded figure

I will not go down like this, hunted like a dog, thought the hooded figure to himself angrily

You're going to hate me for this but: why don't the Vigilux or whatever they're called just have guns and use the shield spell? You haven't laid out a time period yet so it's still a possibility! Come on! It'd be fun! Bang! Bang! Kapwing! Kapwing! That and bullets seem a bit more efficient than green bolts of energy. But, I digress, that's not what I'm hear to talk about.
What I am here to talk about is the...oh, I should probably use the critique Ham & Cheese shouldn't I? Well, you had very vivid storytelling, something it's becoming harder and harder to find on YWS these days. The scene was set well and the fighting was well described. However, there is a minor problem in your description, being you forgot to add your major set-piece. You should have added "Oh and by the way, there's a cliff somewhere around here. Lalalalalala" Getting that out the way would have helped with your ending.
The reason being is, imagine your story as a window, and like all windows the clearer it is the better, but if you make the reader abruptly add a set-piece in (like a cliff) at the end the window that is your story get a small crack in it, and, though it can be ignored, it does fracture the suspension of disbelief.
But I digress. Well set, well described, you've just got a wellscene here...
except (you knew that was coming, didn't you?) you could have started somewhere more interesting, after all, you're only setting up a single element of the story, which is in this last paragraph:

Croft could feel a dark aura emanating from the magnificently made wand. A powerful dark aura that Croft had not come across in all of his career as a hunter of dark beings and artifacts.

Well, I just burned down my favorite burger joint. How was I supposed to know that waitress was a vampire?

Hey there, here to review as requested. This is a fun start, full of action and dramatic imagery. It also has a solid arc with a beginning, middle, and end, and leaves some questions hanging on the air to keep us interested.

One thing that confused me was who to root for. I'm still not entirely sure who the MC is meant to be. At first I thought it was Naxzaros since that's who we started with, then I wasn't so sure, but maybe the story is meant to be told through the villain's point of view. One thing I'll mention about the opening is that I can't tell you the number of times I've seen a story start with a figure fleeing through a dark forest, so you may want to look for something more unique, possibly the same story but in a slightly different setting.

For me the biggest thing was the wordiness of the writing. I noticed a lot of redundancy, which slowed down the pace and made it hard to get really immersed in the story. For instance, take a look how many times some words are used--dark, forest, hooded figure are repeated more than a few times in the first few paragraphs. Like the other story I reviewed, I would suggest breaking some of the longer sentences up, or at least adding more commas. And IMO, things only really need to be said once; you could probably get away with more pronouns to help reduce the wordiness and make it speedier reading. I think the word repetition and long-winded sentences were the biggest difficulties for me while reading this.

I can tell the imagery in your head is really exciting and beautiful, but I'm not sure it's translating as well into the narrative. My impression was that this was imagined like a movie, and so you're writing it a bit like a movie, blow by blow. Consider the strengths and weaknesses of being in a written medium vs if we could see the flashy images on a screen. As writers, we can get really into the characters' heads, feelings, and frame of mind. On the other hand, the descriptions take a long time to get across fully. Where there's lots of mention of spells and energy over and over, I think they start to lose their impact. Maybe you could vary the wording, but I'd also suggest reducing some of the description and using that space to show some more internal thoughts and feelings.

Thanks for sharing and happy writing!

Hey there! Here to review as requested!

I think that this chapter has a fir amount of potential. I can see something really strong coming out of this, but there is a few things that need work.

Something I noticed was that you used a rather considerable amount of adverbs and adjectives. Instead of making your writing more descriptive, it made the flow feel somewhat stifling and trickier to get through than it ideally would have been. Now, there's all sorts of debate about whether or not you should use adverbs, and how many you should use, but something that is key to remember is that if you over-use them, they'll lose some of their effectiveness. See which adverbs you can cut out without losing meaning, because a lot of your verbs are already pretty strong.

As for adjectives, try not to pile them on too much. It does become a little too wordy as a result of having too many adjectives when a single strong one would do the trick. I'd suggest doing the same as what I recmmended for the adverbs -go through and see which ones aren't really needed. The problem is, although you have a few moments that have some rather nice imagery, the adjectives aren't as effective in creating description as they could be. It's an oft-quoted adage, but it holds true: quality over quantity. Using a few powerful adjectives (and adverbs) will go far further than using too many that aren't so great.

This is a little nitpicky, but a little technically tip is that when you've got a character's thoughts, it's a good idea to italicise them. Just makes it clearer to the reader that it's separate from the narration.
Another thing I noticed was that you have a tendency to add 'ish' onto the ends of colours. Doing it once is okay, and you mught be able to get away with it, however, doing this consistently is a bit jarring. Just get rid of the 'ish' and your writing will sound much more confident. Your reader won't lose any meaning if you simply say 'green' or 'blue' or 'brown'.

Occasionally I found that you had a strange kind of order when it came to your sentences, which resulted in a weird and somewhat uncomfortable flow. In some cases, things could have been made clearer with added commas, or by cutting up any run-on sentences into separate sentences. Reading aloud can help with this, as you'll be better able to see where the pauses naturally exist. As for the sentences with the issues with the order of what you were saying, I'll admit that they're not so easy to fix. My best suggestion would be going through it slowly, with a fine-tooth comb - print your story out, if it helps - and making sure each sentence makes sense and the information is presented in a logical way. It's kinda tricky to explain the issue here, but sometimes the ideas were a little disjointed, within each sentence.

A reviewer below me has already spoken about showing versus telling, so I won't go on about that too much. Just keep an eye on it, where you can.

I think that the writing here did improve as the chapter went on, and by the end was more coherent and less stuffed with adjectives adverbs. That gives me good hopes for following chapters!

Plot looks interesting so far, although I want a little more world building. You mention Croft having a British accent and Shan being Asian, which leads me to believe this is a modern setting, however the cloak that Naxzaros wore, as well as the feel of this chapter suggested a more old-fashioned setting. Some more clues are needed to make the setting clearer.

Even though there's a bit of work to do, I did enjoy reading this chapter, and I'll definitely check out the subsequent chapters. Apologies for any typos, as touchscreens and I don't get on too well.

Any questions, let me know!

Hey there, LordofLit here,

Awesome start! I love a good chase scene, especially when you threw us into the action like that, brilliant!

This whole world seems pretty cool, I can picture a magic system and I reckon these three are the magic policing system (lol yogscast reference, oops!) yet I love the names you have chosen, Naxzaros is a very imaginative name!

As for grammatical errors I can't seem to find any, yet just remember to set the scene a little bit more, is it day, or night?

But even thought what a descriptive piece! The duel gave me goosebumps, and the way you built a cliff hanger like that at the end of the chapter was really well written.

I can't wait for the next installment!

LordofLit101

well i think, it's great. and i'd really want to know whether Naxzaros would survive the fall.

however when it comes to magic or combat of any sort, the way you describe your scenes and the flow of action is very important. i had a little problem with how it all when down when the Vigiluxes lol, dunno whether i can say that. anyway when they cornered Naxzaros, i wasn't caught up in the fight, i was just reading some lines.
another thing is, your choice of words and how you put things together.
Example:

in this line: "The energy streams from Naxzaros’ wand and Croft’s and Shan’s wand clashed in mid-air, producing an extremely blinding light as the streams fought for dominance"

there were too many nouns in this line.

instead of Naxzaros' and croft's and Shan's, it could have simply been ' The energy that zoomed ( considering you over used the word stream) from the three men clapped in mid-air, ......then blah blah..

one thing that bores readers is when the writer one way minded. and too much word repetition.

overall, this story is cool and if you just better your skill, who knows this might end up being the new 'Harry Potter'

I love magic. I love how much potential is here.

Let's start with the first paragraph. The description of the wand light is the first place I trip. The phrase "faint and slightly eerie greenish glow" is a lot of words for something simple. There's too much specific, but still somehow nonspecific information there.

Faint is good. It says the light isn't bright, it adds to the mystery of a hooded figure, and already makes eerie unnecessary. Normally, color isn't as important, but it makes a character contrast. So what color is it? Greenish? Is it green or not? If you leave it at "faint, green light" you're allowing the reader to continue without putting too much effort in visualizing, and therefore distracting from the scene. Same goes for the word 'whiteish'.

The spell casting in the first paragraph is cumbersome, too. The whole sequence is told instead of shown. Try adding dialogue here. Make up a word for the spell instead of just muttering something. The bolt of green light is good, but instead of saying 'it made a crater', describe it. What sound did it make? Was it blinding? Did the ground shake? Does the air smell like charred flesh and burning wood now?

The second paragraph is overburdened with repetition. You established the hooded man is, well, a man, but still you write out 'the hooded figure' over and over. I'm sure you were trying to keep who's who straight, but it actually made things more confusing by not using pronouns. And what's with the lack of synonyms? You used the word 'bolts' three times in two sentences.

Later on, there's an a line about someone being unconscious from the beginning coming to. That is entirely unnecessary and kind of makes me feel stupid. It doesn't really matter when he was knocked out, or that he came to and rejoined the fight. It only matters that he rejoined the fight, especially when you explain that his companion is still down for the count. Try not to explain EVERY detail. The reader will fill in the gaps on their own.

Showing seems to be the greatest problem you face. I was once given the advice to have a funeral for the words 'was, is, before, then, are, after, when, and am'. You will write so much better if you use them less. You don't have to cut them out completely, but they need to take a vacation in the majority of your sentences.

When I was told this, I threw my laptop. I could not comprehend how you could write without those words! How do you describe without sequence words? I pondered this, frustration building dangerous pressure in my soul. Long nights spent writing swirled down the drain. I'd write and write, my finger joints groaning at every keystroke, only to delete every last character, and pass out angry at three in the morning.

Books were disgusting to me. How did they know how to write without telling?! Was there an ancient cult I needed to join? It was a dark time. I did read, but I did so grudgingly. I marked pages, underlining and scribbling furious notes in the margins, sometimes even tearing out pages. Just when the darkness seemed eternal, the lights of heaven illuminated the answer.

More words.

Even now, I have a ways to go in the study of showing, but this is a good start: use more words. Basically, instead of:

I didn't like coffee until my friend made it.

Can become:

Coffee repulsed me. Yes, the scent allured me, but the bitterness kept my lips shut.
"Trust me," Mat said, "there's a coffee for everyone." He stirred the black liquid vigorously, adding dashes of cream, squirts of chocolate, and a few spoonfuls of sugar. Nodding, he handed the glass to me. I hesitated, nervous I'd hurt his feelings if I didn't like it, my curiosity arguing that I'd hurt his feeling more by not trying it. I closed my eyes and took a swig.

Bitterness scurried away from the sweet, earthy river flowing across my tongue.

See what I did there? If not, there's a lot of resources online to help you that I wish I had back then. You have a great imagination, and I do want to know where this goes and how it got where it is now (bonus points for unpronounceable names)! I know I almost seem to contradict myself, too, but it's not actually a contradiction. Specific language (green instead of greenish) paired with more description (refer to coffee example) works great, and people do it all the time.

Of course, practice, practice, practice, and you'll get it.
Best of luck!