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Author Topic: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___  (Read 291041 times)

Tiruin

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #30 on: January 17, 2012, 06:42:43 am »

Another note: If in doubt, write! Keep at it even if it's filled with errors that would make Mark Twain twist in his grave! Just, make sure you proof read your own work. It's easy to miss errors on things you, yourself make.

If your sentence leads to another and needs a comma, put that comma.

"This includes words that a character says that are followed on by things not said," the narrator continued, rubbing his temple as he inspected his writing.


Quotation marks (' '),(" ") have no difference in their usage.
'One can be stated like this.'
"Or this."
And the meaning is still the same, if you read older books (~1900's) or the Lord of the Rings six books "trilogy", then you would know the difference.


there are two stories on which i have worked for a long time. i want for someone to check them and criticise.

The Diary

The Librarian

thank you.

Taking these then. Apologies if my criticism isn't what you expect as I don't criticize others that much, or their works (I can't even word this sentence right.)

Spoiler: The Diary (click to show/hide)

Spoiler: The Librarian (click to show/hide)
Again, sorry if it sounds too much. I'm unsure as to which PoV (Point of View) you're narrating from in the first. Unsure too, about when you wrote both.

It may be partly biased as some tips are drawn from my own experience in writing stories and crafting lore, another apology there.

For future reference, if I'm having a 'first time' moment, I'm pretty self-conscious about my work.

Should update the links, will edit below

> Becoming a Writer - Climbing the stairs on the road to writing.
> Grammar errors? I say nay! - This shows common beliefs on grammar broken down by the hard facts of a writer's world.
> Writer's Block, need pushing - Some tips on what you can do when you can't think of what to write, a bit opinionated though.
> "I can write!"- The page name is 'Finding your Writer's voice', the whole website is basically a treasure trove of information! This is a guide.

@Phantom: If you're going to use these links, please edit as you see fit.
« Last Edit: January 17, 2012, 07:21:55 am by Tiruin »
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Tiruin

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #31 on: January 17, 2012, 06:44:44 am »

Edited out, you have to hate those Gateway Timeouts...

So as to not waste this post.
@Phantom of the Library: A character limit for future prompts could help, a short story can vary in length.

Also, suggested thread rename to +The Bookkeeper's Archive+ or something that revolves around the DF theme. The Bookkeeper noble is the nearest I could find in the vanilla game  :) .
« Last Edit: January 17, 2012, 07:42:14 am by Tiruin »
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kerlc

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #32 on: January 17, 2012, 07:16:51 am »

thank you for the criticsm. As far as the capital is concerned, that's more a Gdocs problem, because it isn't automated, and when i write, i forget to do it.  :P

But thanks anyway!
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The Fool

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #33 on: January 17, 2012, 09:09:05 am »

I would get into the habit of capitalizing. Sometimes you will want something capitalized, and sometimes you won't. Character names, city names, and the odd reference to an event should all be capitalized and the machine won't catch all of it, even if it is automated. It's better to be sure and do it by hand than to leave it to the machine.
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Steam ID: The Fool [B12]
A Flexible Mind (Suggestion Game)

kerlc

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #34 on: January 17, 2012, 09:21:21 am »

oh, nononononono. i am well used to capitalizing Names. it's the beginnings of sentences taht get me every time. like just now. plus, these two stories were a lot about experimentation. you see, english is not my native tongue. these weere two attempts at making a longer story written in english. and i publised the Diary on a forum. it sparked a flame war between the local teenager club and bronies, and was about whether i was gay or not. it lasted 2 days, then the topic got deleted, i got perma-banned. well, enough about me. i am way better at writing short stories than long ones anyway.
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Tiruin

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #35 on: January 17, 2012, 09:28:22 am »

Get into the habit of noting down your capitalization, mostly when people on forums see things like that (sorry, just stating) they would think lesser of you just by the wording.

English is also not my native tongue, though you can get it easily. Note, that if you do publish things like those, beware that it may likely get to the emotions of other people. It is a story by the way, and stories give part of your thoughts out, most likely it was a misunderstanding. But...watch what you type though, the proper use of words and formatting would at least give the impression that you know what you're saying; and not trolling or flaming.
« Last Edit: January 17, 2012, 10:41:51 am by Tiruin »
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kerlc

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #36 on: January 17, 2012, 11:00:41 am »

yeah, i know what you mean. but you must understand that i am a 15 year old teenager, and a shy one at that. so jsut making a topic in the "creations" section was hard enough.

oh, and have a look at this short story. it's about someone going batshit insane.

Spoiler: Laughter (click to show/hide)
« Last Edit: January 17, 2012, 11:09:46 am by kerlc »
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EmeraldWind

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #37 on: January 18, 2012, 10:48:25 pm »

I'll take a stab at the "Quest for the Orb of Zot."
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
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We do not suffer from insanity. We enjoy every single bit of it.

Tiruin

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #38 on: January 18, 2012, 10:58:50 pm »

I'm...taking
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
this, though Phantom hasn't said anything if I can critique or not.

Also, will edit post + my own story for the Orb later.

Spoiler: Criticism (click to show/hide)

It's (my spoiler) a bit opinionated, just to point it out. Good story! Needs a bit more detail, the ending eluded me. Then the analogy sunk in  :D
« Last Edit: January 19, 2012, 12:45:02 am by Tiruin »
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The Fool

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #39 on: January 19, 2012, 12:26:13 am »

If this works like any of the other Guild threads I'd say that you can feel free to critique the writing.

I'll take a stab at the "Quest for the Orb of Zot."
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

While I did like the idea of the story, you didn't develop your characters until near the very end. You didn't explain how they knew what they knew, or why they were there. I spent half the writing trying to figure out what race they were since they knew about both elven and dwarven craftsmanship without explanation. While my own writing could use more, you need to describe your characters appearance to give a better mental image of the two.

The same goes for your dungeon. It's called a catacomb, and it's dark, but what do they see? You need to describe the room in general, and not just the important things they're running up to.

Another thing is that while your paragraphs work, they don't show emphasis. Several of the paragraphs where people aren't talking can be combined with either the paragraph above or below, because sometimes it's better to reserve single line paragraphs for something with an impact.

I hope I wasn't too harsh, because I actually did enjoy the story.
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EmeraldWind

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #40 on: January 19, 2012, 08:28:08 am »

Yeah, my lack of description was me trying to convey the atmosphere. The two characters are in the dark and can't really see the setting or each other that well. I wanted to make more emphasis on sound, but ended up forgetting to do that. I got a little caught up in the flow of the idea.

the ending eluded me. Then the analogy sunk in  :D

Did you mean the ending was confusing? I wanted it to be a little bit until the image on the artifact was shown. Then I was hoping readers would figure out what happened without me needing to say more. I wanted the reader to have that same moment of realization as the character.

If this works like any of the other Guild threads I'd say that you can feel free to critique the writing.

While I did like the idea of the story, you didn't develop your characters until near the very end. You didn't explain how they knew what they knew, or why they were there. I spent half the writing trying to figure out what race they were since they knew about both elven and dwarven craftsmanship without explanation. While my own writing could use more, you need to describe your characters appearance to give a better mental image of the two.

The same goes for your dungeon. It's called a catacomb, and it's dark, but what do they see? You need to describe the room in general, and not just the important things they're running up to.

Another thing is that while your paragraphs work, they don't show emphasis. Several of the paragraphs where people aren't talking can be combined with either the paragraph above or below, because sometimes it's better to reserve single line paragraphs for something with an impact.

I hope I wasn't too harsh, because I actually did enjoy the story.

Yeah, I realized I didn't give them enough characterization part of that was story length. I wanted to have them casually chat about their search for the orb and deepen their characters, but I also didn't want to make the story too long. I also had the initial idea of two silhouettes in the dark, so for the bulk of this that was what they were.

I also wanted to give more details to the catacombs but not much more. Though I guess I subconsciously left that out.

Thanks for the critique both of you. It wasn't harsh at all. The point of this thread is to get practice and criticism. I had a good deal of fun writing this.
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We do not suffer from insanity. We enjoy every single bit of it.

Tiruin

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #41 on: January 19, 2012, 08:32:49 am »

Another note:

Got a story cooped up in that head? Write it down, no matter how bad it is or how foul the grammar may be, a story in the mind is like a treasure in a safe. Valuable, but unknown. Don't be afraid, experience will come as you work.

@EmeraldWind: Confusing idea, at the start. 'The analogy sunk in' - It hit me. Been a long time since I've played DF  :P

To those who are reading this whole thread, post down your stories if you need help. None of us are perfect, and we learn by helping each other out.
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Phantom of The Library

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #42 on: January 19, 2012, 08:36:13 am »

I will write more criticism later when I have the time, but for now te only thing that sticks directly out at me is that at times the dialogue seems a little stinted and unnatural.

@Tiruin: Feel free to critisize any time you want, my hope is that this thread eventually becomes independant enough to where I won't have to post much other than moderation and other OP stuff. Of course I will continue criticizing no matter what, but I am easily distracted and I might often forget that there is something left that I haven't critisized (and I haven't forgot about yours kerlc)

Another prompt will be coming soon if there are no more entries.

Oh, yes and I should update the OP to include the new resources soon.
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kerlc

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #43 on: January 19, 2012, 08:51:49 am »

here's a batch of my short stories that i have written during the years. it's nt very good, but i guess it's fine.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1CxDE8-Fsuv1g9ne37eeQzQCxwpHp-oc8vnpYWST-DWE/edit

edit: i have also found this great article on the Escapist:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/issues/issue_249/7420-From-Fanfiction-to-Just-Fiction
it deals with how fanfic can be a great way to help you get into full-time writing. or just make your writing better. read uit, it explains much better than i can  :D
« Last Edit: January 19, 2012, 01:31:15 pm by kerlc »
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Urist McScoopbeard

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #44 on: January 21, 2012, 12:13:01 am »

Well hello, since I have otherwise contributed nothing to the community here and writing peaks my interest I think I'll post a...scene, it's not so much a story as a short exchange of thoughts and words, in any case i would really love for someone here to critique, I hardly get any around my residence.

So it's a couple of sentences about a story about what is essentially a germaphobic hitman...

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Please Critique!!! Also seeing how it is VERY damn short I might post some more tomorrow but now it's late so, thank you in advance

Also, sorry in advance for the whole shining a heel thing it doesn't make much sense but I didn't really know what to put and it just sort of...flowed
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This conversation is getting disturbing fast, disturbingly erotic.
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