Gamer_2k4 writing a story? Nah.... Yeah?

[{LAW} Gamer_2k4]

Dunno how many of you remember it, but I alluded to a story I was designing and planning in this thread:
http://forums.soldat.pl/index.php?topic=27776.0

Well, I finally decided to put some of my ideas into story form, and here are the results:
http://people.msoe.edu/~brayshaj/files/story/Chapter%201.pdf

I've made some changes to the text after PDFing it (for example, near the end I changed meters to yards to maintain English system continuity), but overall this chapter is pretty much finished.  I don't plan on making any major edits to it, anyway.

I guess what I'm looking for is some input, some constructive criticism.  Does it flow logically? Does it make sense? Are the characters reacting realistically to their situations? Is the plot (what you can see of it) too far out? Have I alluded too strongly to my notes, leaving you guys with a "what the heck is going on" feeling?

Also, since the story takes place in Europe, with references to real locations, I'd be interested in hearing some of you Euros (Germans, ideally) comment on my descriptions of those places, specifically Berlin HBF and Teufelsberg.  Would you have been able to figure out I was referring to them if they weren't explicitly named (here or in the story)? Are the descriptions accurate?

Anyway, take a look and tell me what you think.  I'll happily accept both praise and criticism, as well as any suggestions you may have.  I've got a lot of writing left to do, and every little bit of input helps.

[iDante]

I read through the whole thing, and I don't like reading. AKA you managed to ensnare my interest.
One thing however, have at least some scientific reason for having kids instead of adults. Just saying "it's complicated" is not particularly convincing.

Keep writing, I'll keep reading.

[STM1993]

Read it through once, and I can safely say that I agree with iDante - the story catches interest easily and I think that it could use at least a simple reasoning to why only selected people can yield certain effects, rather than pass off as "It's complicated".

I'd like to see more, I want explanations for every unanswered question in the story through further writing.

There are six protagonists right? Currently, I'm seeing 3 of them so far - main character, the girl and the roommate. Are the 2 instructors + the lieutenant amongst them?

[Demonic]

Well.

First and foremost, you have a thing for this. The words roll smoothly, there's no jitter or clumsiness what so ever.

And now for the not so good stuff.

The mother's reaction seems unnatural. Two strangers basically come to abduct your son, and you... well, let him go because the government knows best? What the f**k? And that kind of goes for the other characters aswell. Besides Markus, everyone just accepts things blatantly - which is especially awkward for the fellow coming from France, of which country's population had been wiped out.

That also was the point of the story I almost stopped reading. There is no build up what so ever, no foreshadowing, while surely a catastrophe of that scale would have sent half the world apes**t through the media atleast. It's unrealistic, even for pseudo-science fiction. This is the bigger problem, making the 'kids can battle we can't and it's complicated' issue almost meaningless.

There would be some other problems, like the whole 'feeling' you're trying to give with the story is based on Markus' rants and conversations. Your descriptions of the world are accurate and well made out, but they serve no purpouse for the plot and are rather lump paragraphs there only to make the story have a reasonable size. You've wasted fine opportunities for building up tension and meanwhile made the 'plot twist' more of an abrupt break.

Sorry if I were harsh, but come on man. In the end my feeling was that you wrote this because you really wanted to picture a teenage girl smashing robots with high tech weaponry.

[{LAW} Gamer_2k4]

One thing however, have at least some scientific reason for having kids instead of adults. Just saying "it's complicated" is not particularly convincing.

Well...unfortunately, the REAL reason is about as far from science as you can get.  But that explanation, as well as a few others, are one of those things that the reader just kind of has to accept until the truth is revealed.

There are six protagonists right? Currently, I'm seeing 3 of them so far - main character, the girl and the roommate. Are the 2 instructors + the lieutenant amongst them?

Currently you've only seen two.  It's only the first chapter, after all.

The mother's reaction seems unnatural. Two strangers basically come to abduct your son, and you... well, let him go because the government knows best? What the f**k? And that kind of goes for the other characters aswell. Besides Markus, everyone just accepts things blatantly - which is especially awkward for the fellow coming from France, of which country's population had been wiped out.

Yeah, I admit that seems forced.  Maybe I'll tweak the intro, but I wanted to get into the action right away.  Also, I'll have to amend that section of the story about France being gone; the "affected zone" that I drew on Google maps took up all but the top part of it, so there still are some people left alive.

That also was the point of the story I almost stopped reading. There is no build up what so ever, no foreshadowing, while surely a catastrophe of that scale would have sent half the world apes**t through the media atleast. It's unrealistic, even for pseudo-science fiction. This is the bigger problem, making the 'kids can battle we can't and it's complicated' issue almost meaningless.

Duly noted and second draft planned.

There would be some other problems, like the whole 'feeling' you're trying to give with the story is based on Markus' rants and conversations. Your descriptions of the world are accurate and well made out, but they serve no purpouse for the plot and are rather lump paragraphs there only to make the story have a reasonable size. You've wasted fine opportunities for building up tension and meanwhile made the 'plot twist' more of an abrupt break.

Well, my whole plan for this is to make the reader assume the role of Markus.  When I give descriptions of the world, it's because that's what's important to him at the time.  That's why the first train station is almost undescribed, while the second one has a brief "rush of sights/sounds" description.  That's also why events are just dropped on the reader.  He's sitting around, thinking "Wow, this is pretty weak...who decided to put me here" and suddenly someone's all "go fight dangerous stuff" so he goes off on them.  Granted, that style of writing may not be conducive to story-telling in general, but it IS the style I wanted to write in.

Sorry if I were harsh, but come on man. In the end my feeling was that you wrote this because you really wanted to picture a teenage girl smashing robots with high tech weaponry.

Harsh is good.  You brought up valid points, ones that I'll definitely address.  However, your feeling is just a little bit off.  My plan for this story is written as "action fiction with a heavy focus on character development," and naturally it'll take a while to get into that.  This is only the first chapter, after all.

Anyway, thanks everyone for your input.  I'll keep working on it with those points in mind.

[Demonic]

Well, if you want to hop in as soon as you can on the action, why start off with the whole shoe tying thing? Hell you could get into Markus's head, there he was, gazing out through the train window, imagining as ninjas jumped along the landscape. His eyes wandered at his badly tied shoes and he just remembered how a day ago yadda yadda yadda whatever. You're the writer, we're the readers. If it sounds crippled or forced, it's your duty as sole God of your own universe to cut its guts out.

If you want to explore more of Markus, then let's get in his thoughts. His quirks (those are you going to need anyway, it freshens the text), his memories of a life long destroyed by f**king metabots. Working on that, placing emphasis on his thoughts and reactions (the more out of context he wanders off the better for the sake of 'getting the feeling', and it's a sort of relief after you shove down a bunch of info down the readers throat).

Also, I urge you to select your descriptions. Everyone knows what a katana is. Everyone knows katanas are just plain cool. (I also recommend reading a lot of tvtropes.org articles too) This is just an example that can get in your way in the future, because with the guy explaining how stuff works it's not so bad - however, these are still kids getting drafted into a camp and hearing a lecture about high tech weaponry before anything else, with the main threat getting elaborated in... two, three sentences? What? Come on, surprise us, surprise them. Throw them in the fray, let them figure out how s**t works. Go into gory details about the numbnut kid failing to find the 'on' switch.

Also recommended reading is Nick Hornby's Slam, on how to move a realistic teenager who ain't got magic powers and a mad powermonging wizard seeking to cut out his pancreas.

[Thinkto urself]

The story itself has a good backstory, but the dialogue is very boring to read. To be honest, you can portray alot of personality in dialogue, how the character speaks or if he/she uses perfect grammar or can't be bothered to care for it. Just because your writing is perfect doesn't mean everybody in the story has to have a master's degree in english. Also some, not alot, of parts between dialogue are bland. They don't give much atmosphere when reading them. Similes could have also given this story a very surreal feeling. Also Demonic got lots of the other things spot on.

[{LAW} Gamer_2k4]

@Demonic:

I said I would be accepting of criticism, but I guess I lied, because I *really* want to argue my side here. =P

While I fully agree with your first two paragraphs, I want to plead my case relative to the third one.  The metabots aren't elaborated much on because 1) The HDF people either don't know or don't want to explain what they are or where they came from, and 2) It doesn't matter WHAT they are; the important thing is that they're attacking.  For this reason, it IS important to know how to fight them and what tools are available to do so.  The HDF people know what the weapons are and how they work; they DON'T know what the metabots are (beyond "stabbing them with these kills them").

Furthermore, the battle reads pretty much exactly how I want it to.  The buildup, the waiting, the anticipation, the apprehension, etc. are all drawn out, while the actual combat is short and vague (roughly two or three times the writing is spent on the former, IIRC).  Heck, the aftermath is longer than the battle.  This is because Markus has a sort of "tunnel vision" throughout the thing.  I know I'm the same way when I'm playing football (and if it happens when I'm having fun, I assume it'll be much more extreme in actual danger); if I have the ball, I'll dodge or run over people in front of me, but I don't see or remember what's going on around me.  Also, for another example, my brother says that he didn't even hear the gun firing when they doing shooting practice in basic training, though it was quite audible when he was spotting.  The point is, when you focus on something you DON'T know what's going on around you.  If someone dies because his weapon doesn't work, you're not going to notice it.  Consequently, Markus doesn't know about it, so naturally the reader won't either.

I concede that my introduction needs work.  I have all this prewritten text in my notes (the battle was pretty much me just copying and pasting a chunk of text), because I like writing when something is actually happening.  I mean, come on, this story is going to go on for two years or so, and they're fighting on the third day.

I really like your idea about altering the intro so that's it's mainly a flashback while he's on the train to Berlin.  That reduces the abruptness and brings more focus to the main character (and let's face it, also makes it more feasible), while still not requiring me to go into any detail of stuff that doesn't interest me.

I'll see what I can do.  However, I'm definitely glad that I decided to submit this first part for review, rather than waiting until it was mostly done before sharing. =D

[Demonic]

Oh per sé, the combat is pretty good as it is - my main concern with that was how the adult explaining things to them seems like a 'our shit is better than your general fantasy crap' type of word jinging. Some questions arise in the reader which -when answered- could further the dramatic tension. Like, why are we going up with swords? We're humanity, we could incinerate the planet with nukes, we got tanks and choppas. See where I'm getting with this? He tells how everything basically got trashed. Bots attack, you fellows use this. They panic, minus for the girl, battle frenzy commences, and the reader is like 'i don't know what those weapons are but man THAT SOUNDED COOL.' This is just playing around with how do you want to deal what the reader needs to know. Conversation, descriptive paragraph, found documents, asteriksed information or in-the-fray. You experiment and see what goes best - it's not that the part is bad this way, just a bit... I don't know, feels like food chewed for me.

That being said, a bunch of writers from Vonnegut to Asimov and Philip K. Dick and Palahniuk had already written a bunch of 'pointers', mainly speaking about the technique to spice up what you want to say.

[PANZERCATWAGON]

• for a first draft it is good
• it needs work
• for 22 pages - you might want to write a couple of 'back of the book' lines so people know what sort of story they are giving up their time for, cause its not my cup of tea
• try not to capitalize your letters like THIS instead of bolding
• everything else has been said, good work

[{LAW} Gamer_2k4]

Thanks for the dialogue advice, Thinkto urself; it's good stuff.

Like, why are we going up with swords? We're humanity, we could incinerate the planet with nukes, we got tanks and choppas.

Well, a global demilitarization had been alluded to earlier in the story (on page 6, I believe).  It'll come up later in the story as well.  Also there was an acronym that wasn't explained: EAA.  It stands for Eurasian-American Alliance.  There's sort of a NWO thing going on, which means that the world is largely at peace.  If there was a military available, yeah, they'd definitely be rolling out the big guns.  There simply isn't though, so they need an unconventional means of defense.