Can I get some Opinions?

[SkuhPlew]

This is chapter 1 of a story I want to write that will be rather long, I haven't really ever written anything before so don't hate me too much for all that GRAMMUH mistakes. I feel asthough the pacing of my story is kinda blegh, but yes please tell me what you think.
As of right now it has no name or title. Its kinda just my ideas.

This story begins like any story of man. The nation's of Iternia and Graj, were battling for land, power, and greed. As with all wars while Monarchs sit high atop their throne, many men lose their lives defending an idea. The idea that with total control will come peace. That distant illusion of peace brings us to a small village in Graj and a young boy named Van.

As the 1 year old Van awakes from his nap he is greeted by his mother, telling him to not cry everything will be all right. Van's father then walks in, "Another bad dream?". Too which Van's mother replied, "Yes, Ricard, your boy seems to have constant nightmares of a father who doesn't contribute to the village." "Ahh, boy I sure hope you don't gain your mother's sharp tongue. I have enough knives in my back." "Aahahaha, honey I spite you out of love. For war only brings reward. Am I right?" "Reward and death. Which do you value more? Someone's son or daughter, or more land and food for the people." After hearing this Van's mother bowed her head in silence, in a way to atone for her ignorance and realising the sacrifice of many. "Alright honey, I'm off to collect wood for the village." As Ricard steps out of the tent they lived in, he is temporarily blinded by the sunlight. When his vision is refocused he is greeted by a wonderous view from the mountain side that his village inhabits. He takes in a deep breath and enjoys the wonderful view of Graj. Then he starts along the path, walking out toward the forest. "Hey, Ricard!" Ricaard glanced over noticing his friend was breathing heavily. "What is it Jean?" "The animals are excitable today, so becare. We almost lost some of the children to a boar while hunting today." "Aye, well noted I'll be sure to not make too much noise, but incase I do. I hope you place enough stock in me then to put me in the company of small children." "Ricard, thats not what I me...." "Ahaha, Jean I know how you meant it, I'll be careful. And when I return drinks on me my friend." Jean laughed and nodded. Ricard then began his journey again waving back to Jean. Ricard couldn't shake this feeling after hearing about the animals. "The animals always know when danger is coming" he thought to himself.

Now deep in the forest with the illuminescent light seeping through the vibrant green of the tree tops, one tree begins to crack and fall. Opening a large gap for the light to come through. Ricard, feeling accomplished, mutters to himself, "Ahhh, now that, thats over how about a quick nap." The grass soft and plush like a cushion seemd to call to him. And as he layed down and glanced at the sky he sees in the cloud a warrior with a very very large sword. Shrugging it off he closes his eyes and begins to sleep. During this sleep he has a dream, A female angelic warrior is descending from the heavens over what appears to be his tent. The angel has long flowing whit hair and is brandishing a rather large hunk of iron, in the fashion of a sword. While wearing barely any armor. Then Ricard wakes, to the smell of burning wood. He stretches and grab his take for the day before returning home. When he steps on to the path and can see clearly he sees a large cloud of smoke, coming from the direction of his village. Fearing the worst, he drops his load and begins into a full sprint. As he draws near he sees the flag of the kingdom of Iternia. And worries for his wife and child. Entering the village, a few heavil armored soldiers spot him. Ricard can see one having Jean pinned down, although it looks as though Jean is squirming and screaming Ricard can hear nothing. The soldier atop of Jean looks to Ricard and smirks before stabbing his sword through the back of Jean. Ricard drew his axe and seemed to disapeer into his rage. Then he began his full sprint to his family and their tent. Letting out a fearsome yell while in full sprint he kept repeating to himself, "No, No, No." Right as he was in front of the entrance he heard an approaching soldier, and turned to face him. The soldier was weilding a large axe and began to swing with a vertical slice aiming right at the skull of Ricard. Ricard could not block in time, but he would dodge it and then counterattack. Kill the enemy and save his family, but fate had a different idea for him. As he side stepped to the left, the soldier caught him at the shoulder and the connection ripped his arm off completely. Crying out from the pain he took the chance to go in the tent, and found his wife gripping young Van in her stomache. He fell on her then whispered, "I love you" with what energy he had. Young van not understanding what was happening was betweened his mother and father. When a soldier barged in plunging a sword through the back of Ricard's neck, cutting out a small piece of Van's ear, and the contuing through to plunge through the neck of Van's mother. The young black haired baby now covered in his own parent's blood began to cry. The soldier grabbed him up laughing," Ahaha, what is it young Graj scum? You don't like the taste of the spoils of war?" Right as the soldier was about to wring the yound babies neck, The commander appeared looking at the child. "That is a child of war, he will grow up to be a glorious soldier. Do not hurt him. " The soldier surprised and caught off guard retorted with a simple, "But sir, he is a Graj!" "He will not know that when he is of fighting age, even if I'm wrong he will die serving Iternia." The soldier bowed his head and carried the child off outside the tent. Even though Van was young he looked upon the slaughter of his people. And the dismembering of the dead for trophies. The soldier set him on a cart and said, "I may not be able to kill you physically, but I can mentally you Graj scum." The soldier runs away for a bit and returns back with a small bloody tather of skin. "This is from your father, to remind you of your roots." He then proceeds to sow that tather of skin onto the babies back. Laughing maniacally in the process. It is at this point the young Van sees many female angel warriors falling from the heavens and guiding the souls of the dead up to the sky. When he sees the soul of his mother she he screaming and yelling for him. But the angel refuses to acknowledge her. His father's soul is nowhere to be found. And at this moment young Van blacks out from the pain.

[SkuhPlew]

Oh and too help with pronunciation. It is Va-ug-hn. Kind of like that. There should be a tilda over the a, but I'm too lazy to find the alt code.

[Diki]

I don't recommend attempting a lengthy, multi-chapter story if you have little experience writing. It would be easier and more beneficial to stick to short stories, something like 1000 to 5000 words.

Your plot seems rushed, and pretty cliché. It reads like it's going to be the story of a boy growing up an orphan, raised by the people who killed his parents, to eventually exact revenge and become some sort of powerful lord. I might be off-base but that's the impression that I got. Having a character be thrust into dire circumstances beyond their control is fine, even if a bit overdone, but you should still strive to write something in a new or refreshing way. If there is something in your life that you're passionate about you should try writing about that.

Having said that, I noticed a few things in your prose that could be improved:

As the 1 year old Van awakes from his nap he is greeted by his mother,

This is what's called passive voice, and is generally frowned upon in literature. Passive voice is when an object is described as being acted upon, instead of an object being described as acting. Fortunately changing a sentence to active voice is easy, and that sentence there could be written like this:

The mother of Van, a one year old baby, greets her son as he awakes from a nap.

You should also refrain from using numerals for numbers that aren't large. If the number in question is less than ten then you should write it out as a word unless you have a good reason not to.

This is also the first instance I noticed of you switching between past and present tense. Van "awakes" from a nap, which puts the sentence in present tense, but is then "greeted", which is the past tense form of "to greet". Generally speaking it's easier to mess up a story written in present tense, so I would recommend sticking to past tense, especially if you're new to writing. So to change up that sentence to keep it purely in past tense it could be written like this:

The mother of Van, a one year old baby, greeted her son as he woke from a nap.

Van's father then walks in, "Another bad dream?". Too which Van's mother replied

Just for the sake of clarity there is another example of switching between present and past tense. Van's father walking in is described in present tense, but his wife's response is described in past tense. Since it would be redundant I won't point out any further examples of this.

Incidentally you also wanted the word "to" there, not "too", though that was probably just a typo. Just in case it wasn't a typo (since you did the same thing in your second post) you should only be using "too" if you're describing the amount of something, such as saying "this is too much" or "you ate too many donuts"; or if you're referencing something "as well", such as "he is going to come, too".

I also recommend putting each line of dialogue on its own paragraph. It makes it easier to read.

"Aahahaha, honey I spite you out of love. For war only brings reward. Am I right?"
"Ahaha, Jean I know how you meant it, I'll be careful. And when I return drinks on me my friend."

You also shouldn't write out laughter like that, it looks sloppy. If the character laughing is important then describe him/her as laughing. If the laughing is not important then you can remove it entirely.

Kill the enemy and save his family, but fate had a different idea for him. As he side stepped to the left, the soldier caught him at the shoulder and the connection ripped his arm off completely. Crying out from the pain he took the chance to go in the tent, and found his wife gripping young Van in her stomache.

This part doesn't really make sense. The beginning of the sentence comes out of nowhere and doesn't apply to anything; it reads as though Ricard's thoughts are being described, but it was never made clear that those words are his thoughts. I also don't understand how him being mutilated would offer an opportunity for escape. Why didn't the enemy soldier just grab him? It's not like Ricard would be capable of defending himself at that point.

---

And that's about all the advice I can give. Certainly not trying to discourage you; we all had to start writing somewhere, and what you wrote is better than the stories I wrote when was first starting out. I really do think you should stick to writing short stories for now though. Attempting a novel, or even a novella, when you're new to writing is like a beginner filmmaker attempting to produce a feature-length film, or a beginner musician attempting to write an opera. It really does behoove you to take it slow when you're starting out.

[SkuhPlew]

Thanks so much. It is very rushed, and very cliche at the moment. I wanted to just get my ideas down and start the story. I will defiantly rewrite it to give more time and depth to everything. I don't care if I spoil the story for you so, lol, but I tried to stray away from the cliches in the end. Such as he will never get his revenge. He won't ever even find out how his parents died, but that patch on his back will end up carrying the spirit of his father. And I am drawing heavily on Norse mythology for this with the constant appearance of Valkyries. Van in Norse means hope. So yeah. The next major plot part will be a few years lager when he makes a friend and they bond over the next few years. Then when them and many other children are thrown into something called trial by fire. Basically last man standing enters the elite corps for training. And yeahhh... things happen that becomes out main mans driving force to become a hulking badass that just has a bunch very tragic things happen. Lol I'm still coming up with it as I go. So yeah thanks for the tips. Will defiantly take your advice during the rewrite and extension.

[SkuhPlew]

Also I really want to try to stick to and convey 3 main ideas. The brutality of war, I hate reading or seeing things with war and it all having a happy ending, portrays war in the wrong way. Nothing good comes from it. The fragility of human life and the value of human life. As well as I want to draw emotion from the reader by building up great characters and having them face great obstacles and either fail or succeed, mostly fail to keep the idea of fragility. Obviously the main character doesn't get killed but he won't have much to offer in the sense of character seeing as how he will be emotional scarred and antisocial. :P So a support cast that I have no idea whom they may be will probably do the trick.

[nekros22]

I can't offer much more than what Diki's already said. It needs revision.

Repeating words to emphasize magnitude is generally ineffective outside of dialogue or very loose or comedic prose. Writing out laughter is also ineffective as is onomatopoeia at large. Grammatical errors and typos abound. The focus seems to be an omniscient third-person viewpoint, but it switches from that to a limited third. It's lacking in consistency of character and voice. I'll avoid the cliche discussion for now. Focus on improving the prose.

From a plot standpoint it's very bare-bones but you haven't really written anything yet. Don't stop writing.

[SkuhPlew]

At 11/22/13 02:57 PM, nekros22 wrote: I can't offer much more than what Diki's already said. It needs revision.

Repeating words to emphasize magnitude is generally ineffective outside of dialogue or very loose or comedic prose. Writing out laughter is also ineffective as is onomatopoeia at large. Grammatical errors and typos abound. The focus seems to be an omniscient third-person viewpoint, but it switches from that to a limited third. It's lacking in consistency of character and voice. I'll avoid the cliche discussion for now. Focus on improving the prose.

From a plot standpoint it's very bare-bones but you haven't really written anything yet. Don't stop writing.

Defiantly going to revise and expand. Lol. Its hard to say but I see it like a movie in my head and write it as I see it. So I plan for much better writing and description. As the reader through the entire thing have no idea what the characters even look like. Lol it is poorly written but it was more or less my way of recording my thoughts. But thanks so much for the review. It will certainly help me grow.

[SkuhPlew]

Lol and sorry for the bad grammuh in these responses. I don't text much with my phone so it takes too long to fight autocorrect at times.

[Kylpault]

You see it like a movie in your head, huh? And you wanted to make a novel length story?

I was once a lot like you in how I wrote. I could make a great plot but then completely fail at getting it down on paper, whether it was my tempo or my word choice. It just never seemed to work like I pictured it in my head.

I then had the idea to start writing scripts. Think about it; you don't really have to worry as much about spelling, grammar, word choice and all that stuff. But you are able to put so much more down on paper in a shorter, easier to write way. It can literally be how you picture it in your head.

Just a little suggestion.

[SkuhPlew]

At 11/22/13 06:39 PM, Kylpault wrote: You see it like a movie in your head, huh? And you wanted to make a novel length story?

I was once a lot like you in how I wrote. I could make a great plot but then completely fail at getting it down on paper, whether it was my tempo or my word choice. It just never seemed to work like I pictured it in my head.

I then had the idea to start writing scripts. Think about it; you don't really have to worry as much about spelling, grammar, word choice and all that stuff. But you are able to put so much more down on paper in a shorter, easier to write way. It can literally be how you picture it in your head.

Just a little suggestion.

I dunno if I wrote a script where would it go? Like its hard to imagine achieving the same sense of accomplishment from a structures story which I can be as specific as needed versus a script which leaves room to interpretation. Maybe I'm just too anal
Since I do voice work, I normally scrap projects I wrote because things just aren't how I've seen them, but then again an audio script just my do the trick. Audio play. I'll have to think about that.

[MiniShowsDOTNetwork]

Meh to much to read :l