08-03-2009, 04:02 PM
It's difficult for me to respond to work like yours. Not because it's so bad that I can't find anything good with it, and not even because it's so good that I can't find anything wrong with it.
If "Shadow Play" was submitted to me as a novel at my workplace (imagine that it was completed, longer, and had the same consistent quality), I would pass it through. Seriously. That goes for both writers. I have no idea what my boss would do, but it would go past initial inspection. There are a few mistakes that I see with your writing, Kaden, and I'm sure I could pull up something from Belle's too. I would suggest a few things, of course:
-Don't use adverbs as modifiers. I do it all the time because I don't read my own work, so I feel like a hypocrite. But whatever. You don't do it often enough for it to be a problem, but I've seen a few that made me go back and read over it again.
-Don't put sound effects in dialogue. I do this, too, and I only recently found it to be a problem in my own work (I've done it as recently as my third KK quest). When putting things like "ugh" and "gah" in your dialogue, try pronouncing those things out loud. At least when I do it, it sounds like my character has a speech impediment or is dying from some horrible disease.
-Let the dialogue tag finish the sentence. In other words, don't end your character's sentence with a period if there's a tag coming right after it, since it's like putting two periods in the same sentence. That's something that I had to stretch for, since it didn't bother me as the reader one bit.
So...yeah. I guess I'll go to the praise section.
Your character is probably my favorite on the site, aside from my own, of course. Like Sage said earlier in this thread, Kaden is so real. I mean, he's not real in that he's fictional, but he acts so down-to-earth that if people actually did fly around and shoot beams of energy from their hands I can see him living next door to me.
Kaden is actually the kind of guy I sometimes dislike in real life, though. xD He's so calm and cheery, even at times when he should be absolutely outraged and pissed off. But it rings true, again, because I know some people that act like that.
I like how you've turned something so pure like a moral compass into something that could be viewed as a flaw in some eyes. There are times when Kaden should kill, or should destroy something, but he doesn't because his stupid conscience gets in the way.
In that same vein, he inwardly despises his own abilities because of his destructive potential, like he's afraid of who he could become. The flaw is that he might hesitate a bit too much someday. It makes Kaden very relatable as a character because we as people are rarely satisfied with what we have or who we are.
Annnnnyway, yeah. That's at least my interpretation. You might have been going for something completely different. xD
Kaden and Belle as characters go really well together. Kaden's subtle humor and casual nature really offsets Belle's impulsive and abrasive attitude. I'd definitely like to see you guys write together more in the future. Maybe you can even throw Sophia and I into the mix sometime as well.
If "Shadow Play" was submitted to me as a novel at my workplace (imagine that it was completed, longer, and had the same consistent quality), I would pass it through. Seriously. That goes for both writers. I have no idea what my boss would do, but it would go past initial inspection. There are a few mistakes that I see with your writing, Kaden, and I'm sure I could pull up something from Belle's too. I would suggest a few things, of course:
-Don't use adverbs as modifiers. I do it all the time because I don't read my own work, so I feel like a hypocrite. But whatever. You don't do it often enough for it to be a problem, but I've seen a few that made me go back and read over it again.
-Don't put sound effects in dialogue. I do this, too, and I only recently found it to be a problem in my own work (I've done it as recently as my third KK quest). When putting things like "ugh" and "gah" in your dialogue, try pronouncing those things out loud. At least when I do it, it sounds like my character has a speech impediment or is dying from some horrible disease.
-Let the dialogue tag finish the sentence. In other words, don't end your character's sentence with a period if there's a tag coming right after it, since it's like putting two periods in the same sentence. That's something that I had to stretch for, since it didn't bother me as the reader one bit.
So...yeah. I guess I'll go to the praise section.
Your character is probably my favorite on the site, aside from my own, of course. Like Sage said earlier in this thread, Kaden is so real. I mean, he's not real in that he's fictional, but he acts so down-to-earth that if people actually did fly around and shoot beams of energy from their hands I can see him living next door to me.
Kaden is actually the kind of guy I sometimes dislike in real life, though. xD He's so calm and cheery, even at times when he should be absolutely outraged and pissed off. But it rings true, again, because I know some people that act like that.
I like how you've turned something so pure like a moral compass into something that could be viewed as a flaw in some eyes. There are times when Kaden should kill, or should destroy something, but he doesn't because his stupid conscience gets in the way.
In that same vein, he inwardly despises his own abilities because of his destructive potential, like he's afraid of who he could become. The flaw is that he might hesitate a bit too much someday. It makes Kaden very relatable as a character because we as people are rarely satisfied with what we have or who we are.
Annnnnyway, yeah. That's at least my interpretation. You might have been going for something completely different. xD
Kaden and Belle as characters go really well together. Kaden's subtle humor and casual nature really offsets Belle's impulsive and abrasive attitude. I'd definitely like to see you guys write together more in the future. Maybe you can even throw Sophia and I into the mix sometime as well.