Got a chapter I'd like critiqued.

[An Enemy Spy]

Okay, nothing too out of the box here. I've got a chapter for a story I'm writing I just finished today and I'd like to know what you fine beautiful people think of it. Be aware, this chapter is not an introductory chapter, in fact it actually occurs in the second half of the book, so there's a lot of characters here you're supposed to already know. If you want to have an idea of what is going on, read here...

Spoiler: The Essentials

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Our protagonist is Lyra. She's is a fourteen year old girl and also a faerie. Unfortunately for her, she is a very rare kind of faerie who was born without any wings, which makes her an Earthbound. Other faeries consider Earthbounds to be abominations and they are often left in the wilderness after they're born. Nobody wants one, it's considered bad juju. So poor Lyra's already starting life out on a bad foot. She knows literally one thing about her mother, and it's that she threw her away. Luckily for Lyra she actually was raised by someone, and his name is Orph. Orph and Lyra have no biological connection, but she calls him her big brother(Male faeries don't take any part in raising their kids so there's no real concept of fatherhood for them outside of the purely reproductive sense. However, older siblings do take part in bringing up the younger ones so a brother/sister relationship is an easier context for them to understand than a father/daughter one, even though to us he would basically be her adoptive dad.) Lyra's life isn't the greatest. She's a complete social outcast among her own kind and has a complicated sense of self because while she resents the other faeries for treating her like dirt, she also can't help but internalize the societal values she's grown up with and also kinda thinks, yeah, she really is a piece of trash. She does have one very special talent though and that is a supernaturally keen affinity for learning and performing music. Like, in the sense that she has inborn enchantment abilities that take the form of song. So there's this big tree and it's called the World Soul and it's very important because it's the source of all life energy in the world and also millions of faeries live there.
So our two faeries go there, shenanigans ensue and hey Lyra, turns out the immortal spirit of life has an interest in you because you are the only person it can directly communicate with through a telepathic link. Also, it's a condescending emotionally manipulative fatalistic jerk who saddles her with the news that the salamanders(fire guys) who live in that big volcano over there are planning to set off an eruption so big it'll wipe out every living thing.
Now go deal with it. Yes I know you're only fourteen years old and that this task is utterly impossible for someone of your ability to accomplish. Also, Orph gets stabbed. Don't worry, he survives, but Lyra doesn't know that. The World Soul does know that but doesn't tell her because it's easier to get her to do what it wants if she thinks she has nobody and nothing to go back to. Now, Lyra obviously can't drag a gigantic tree behind her everywhere she goes so the World Soul gives her a seed to talk to it with. If she's holding the seed or wearing it in a pouch or something,
they can talk telepathically. If she's not in contact with the seed, they have no connection. Also, her music powers are stronger when she has the seed with her. Shenanigans ensue and Lyra has found herself in the dwarf city of Arden as the ward of a guy named Dust(Dwarfs name their kids after things in nature, the males after nonliving things and the females after living things. This is the only way to tell what sex a dwarf is without taking their pants off.) of the House Darkstar, so named because of the legendary black sword forged from a falling star he wields. Anyway, bad for Lyra and the dwarfs, the kingdom is being attacked by goblins, as goblins are wont to do, the cheeky rascals. Lyra tries to tell the dwarf king, hey you've got bigger things than gobbos to worry about, the freakin' world's gonna end,
and she gets laughed at and thrown out of the throne room. We pick up about a week later when the gobbos are attacking the city itself and Lyra's sitting in Dust's apartments, feeling useless.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...it?usp=sharing

[Shoreward]

I'm just going to mention that I didn't read your primer until after reading. I didn't want my criticism and experience of the work to be coloured by the way you presented it outside the prose itself. I'm going to leave technical critique out of this and focus on my personal experience as I read it. Keep in mind that this is all subjective and I'm not much good at critique.

Spoiler

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On one hand, the World Soul conversations had enough exposition packed into them that I didn't really feel confused without prior context anyway. On the other, I found myself losing interest in them by about half way through the chapter. The one after the messenger came from the Tyrant King felt especially long-winded (as did some of the TK's dialogue later for that matter), since I was interested in this new development and then it took several more meaty paragraphs of Souly's needling and expositing for Lyra to leave her room.

Most of this felt very... slow, with a lot of exposition. That's not necessarily a bad thing in parts, but it was consistent enough that I had a lot of difficulty with the early half or so. I wasn't really feeling the tension or the stakes.

In general, Lyra feels like she's being controlled more than making decisions on her own. Based on what I read you are definitely trying to make her sort of willfully passive until this point (she's basically a kid who doesn't want to be on an adventure), but this seems very extreme at times considering you say this takes place in the second half. This honestly felt like what I'd expect in the earlier sections of a story, and I'm not sure if I would have stuck with half a novel of it myself.

All that said...

I actually quite liked the way you handled the song. Too many authors think they need to write a poem like grandpappy Tolkien, when feeling is something which can be conveyed in a tenth of the time without losing much.

When the betrayal scene hit, despite knowing very little about these characters, that was something that did add some serious drama. Plus, having the person who just agreed to help get stabbed is a pretty serious setback when it took all chapter (and some before) to get that to happen.

The last quarter or so was flooded with tension compared to the rest. I'm not sure exactly about the super ki punch that occurred, but it didn't distract me too much from the scene. Seriously, that last section flew by with how invested I suddenly became. There was a clear idea of Lyra's goals, what she had to lose, and a sense of paranoia when the guards turned up at the end. She made some real decisions, albeit still with Souly's prompting. I'm glad I pushed through the earlier sections for it.

What I'm saying is that despite the things I personally took issue with, you did have a section of real, thriller-like pacing which I enjoyed. Your slow scenes could do with a little more action like that, I think (not of the fighting kind), to help keep people wondering what happens next. As I mentioned, even the scene with the guards was filled with intrigue, obvious stakes, and legitimate emotion.

Hope I didn't come across as too harsh here. Keep at it and tighten things up, because I genuinely think you can pull out some kickass stuff when you're really hitting that momentum.

[An Enemy Spy]

Hope I didn't come across as too harsh here. Keep at it and tighten things up, because I genuinely think you can pull out some kickass stuff when you're really hitting that momentum.

The only bad criticism is useless criticism. And y'know, unwarranted personal insults. Anything you'd expect to find in a Youtube comment section, really. "U suck. Kill urself. Anyone who likes this is Hitler." On the flipside, I despise the notion that you should never say anything negative about someone's writing out of fear that you'll hurt their feelings and crush them like the delicate rosebud that they are. Well nuts to that, I say. If you're willing to let someone stagnate in mediocrity, then you're just an enabler and no true friend. Baseless praise inflates the ego(as does baseless criticism because it's easy to dismiss), and there's no greater hurdle to cross in becoming a good writer than your own ego. Bring out your big guns, I say. Tear me down to size, put me in my place, shatter my delusions of grandeur. Just be respectful about it.

I'm just going to mention that I didn't read your primer until after reading. I didn't want my criticism and experience of the work to be coloured by the way you presented it outside the prose itself. I'm going to leave technical critique out of this and focus on my personal experience as I read it. Keep in mind that this is all subjective and I'm not much good at critique.

On one hand, the World Soul conversations had enough exposition packed into them that I didn't really feel confused without prior context anyway. On the other, I found myself losing interest in them by about half way through the chapter. The one after the messenger came from the Tyrant King felt especially long-winded (as did some of the TK's dialogue later for that matter), since I was interested in this new development and then it took several more meaty paragraphs of Souly's needling and expositing for Lyra to leave her room.

Most of this felt very... slow, with a lot of exposition. That's not necessarily a bad thing in parts, but it was consistent enough that I had a lot of difficulty with the early half or so. I wasn't really feeling the tension or the stakes.

In general, Lyra feels like she's being controlled more than making decisions on her own. Based on what I read you are definitely trying to make her sort of willfully passive until this point (she's basically a kid who doesn't want to be on an adventure), but this seems very extreme at times considering you say this takes place in the second half. This honestly felt like what I'd expect in the earlier sections of a story, and I'm not sure if I would have stuck with half a novel of it myself.

Yeah, get frustrated when writing dialogue scenes because my favorite authors can write pages and pages of conversation that leaves me enthralled, and when I see that my scene hasn't even filled a single Word page, I think "I have to stretch this out somehow." And no matter how long I make it, it never seems like enough, and then I get bored with it, and that boredom displays itself on the page.

All that said...

I actually quite liked the way you handled the song. Too many authors think they need to write a poem like grandpappy Tolkien, when feeling is something which can be conveyed in a tenth of the time without losing much.

Yeah, the effect I'm going for is twofold here. I want to show that Lyra is not just opening her mouthing and belting out a tune. The song is a supernatural effect that is being funneled through her, so she's somewhat detatched from her own actions. The other reason is that I stink at writing songs and poems. The best I can manage is something like,

There once was a parrot
Who dined on a carrot
A carrot that glittered with dew
Along came a ferret
Who spotted that Parrot
And wanted his carrot too
"Give me your carrot!"
Shouted the ferret
"Or you'd better be ready to fight."
And so the ferret
Climbed after that carrot
And learned how hard a parrot could bite.

Your move, T. S. Eliot.

When the betrayal scene hit, despite knowing very little about these characters, that was something that did add some serious drama. Plus, having the person who just agreed to help get stabbed is a pretty serious setback when it took all chapter (and some before) to get that to happen.

The last quarter or so was flooded with tension compared to the rest. I'm not sure exactly about the super ki punch that occurred, but it didn't distract me too much from the scene. Seriously, that last section flew by with how invested I suddenly became. There was a clear idea of Lyra's goals, what she had to lose, and a sense of paranoia when the guards turned up at the end. She made some real decisions, albeit still with Souly's prompting. I'm glad I pushed through the earlier sections for it.

What I'm saying is that despite the things I personally took issue with, you did have a section of real, thriller-like pacing which I enjoyed. Your slow scenes could do with a little more action like that, I think (not of the fighting kind), to help keep people wondering what happens next. As I mentioned, even the scene with the guards was filled with intrigue, obvious stakes, and legitimate emotion.

Thank you. It warms my cold merciless shark heart to know that you enjoyed my work. The super ki punch I hope it's understood was a blast of wind like out of Avatar rather than a bodily punch. The World Soul used Lyra's Air Spirit(Which all faeries have. Nixies are Water Spirits, Dwarfs are Earth Spirits, Salamanders are Fire Spirits.) to manipulate the air. Since doing this requires it to come into contact with Lyra's soul, it needs her permission to use this power, which her mental plea for help counted as. A small blast of concentrated air was enough to drain Lyra's stamina, and later on we'll see even more power used that will endanger Lyra's life. The upside to continued use of the power is that as Lyra's and the World Soul's spirits merge, Lyra's ability to use it grows as does her tolerance to its tiring effects. The downside is that as their spirits merge, Lyra's own identity is slowly subsumed by the World Soul's. This effect is permanent, so every time Lyra is forced to let the World Soul channel its power through her, she comes a little bit closer to being absorbed into it. Use too much at one time or use it too many times, and her spirit will be subsumed entirely and her body will die. This will hopefully add another level of tension to the story. Even if Lyra can overpower the danger she's facing, there's a very good reason for her to not just go Super Saiyan on everyone.