Need another perspective on this description

[CylonScream]

Its all good. The world needs novice writers! The elite need someone to sh*t on to make themselves feels better.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Its all good. The world needs novice writers! The elite need someone to sh*t on to make themselves feels better.

I think you're taking it all a little personally. The first thing you'll need as a writer is a thick skin. No one here is ****ting on anyone - or feels the need to feel better. We've all been where you are. We know how it feels.

But - sorry - stop coming back with justifications and apologies and changes. Instead sit back and take time to take in what people are saying and then take what's useful and ignore the rest.

 

[CylonScream]

I think you're taking it all a little personally. The first thing you'll need as a writer is a thick skin. No one here is ****ting on anyone - or feels the need to feel better. We've all been where you are. We know how it feels.

But - sorry - stop coming back with justifications and apologies and changes. Instead sit back and take time to take in what people are saying and then take what's useful and ignore the rest.

I agree, dont mean it to seem as justifications. Just trying to have a conversation on why some of it is there with out posting a page.

I'm not upset about the comment. I was honestly joking with my reply. After I stepped back and read my original version again, it wasn't much different than the slam post. I know I'm a novice (if that). I do understand this isn't a forum for novice and dont want to become annoying.

 

[TheDustyZebra]

I do understand this isn't a forum for novice and dont want to become annoying.

On the contrary, this is a forum for all levels. You've come along after a lot of the regulars have been honing their skills for years, but everyone started somewhere. One useful thing you can do is hang out in the Critiques forum and see what is being posted there, and what advice is being given. You'll see that not everyone is elite, and also that most everyone is generally helpful. It will also help you out even if it's not about your own work, because you'll see the same advice given over and over to other people, and you'll begin to see what works and what doesn't, and why.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

This is absolutely a forum for a novice! We mostly all came here as novices! Stick around, get to a proper crit thread, and don't be tempted to put up a long, long piece. Get some good comments you can apply more widely and, slowly but surely, you become not a novice

Oh and crit others' - that really helps learn your own skills

 

[Kerrybuchanan]

Chrons is just as good a forum for novices as for more seasoned writers, @CylonScream. I first came here when my writing was less well developed than yours, I think, and I have learned so much. Am still learning so much!

Yes, it's really hard when a piece you think you've finally got right draws fire from the big guns. It can be soul-destroying, but it is a crucible that will harden you into a good writer, and prepare you for the much less benevolent responses of agents and publishers in years to come. Jo and Dusty advise you well: keep at it, keep writing, thicken your skin, thank people politely for critique (even when you really want to black their eyes) and you WILL get better.

Mostly, just keep writing. Complete that first draft. If you then compare your last chapter with your first chapter, you'll find your writing has improved tremendously. That's when you go back to the beginning and sort out the rest. I'm on my 6th full rewrite of one novel, and it's finally coming together at last, but if I hadn't finished a first draft back in 2014, I'd have been much worse off. It means you have a skeleton to work with, all ready for you to flesh out with muscles (finer points of character and plot), fat (info dump), connective tissue (the anatomical equivalent of description, perhaps: necessary but only sparingly), and finally skin (the last polish - usually involves a crash diet).

Edit: I think other Chronners will agree with me when I say we WANT you to succeed, to be a great writer. Success for one of us is success for all.

 

[crystal haven]

I totally agree, Kerry.

 

[The Judge]

Maybe I'm going about this the wrong way. I have my first chapter done, around 50 pages. (will divide up later). My thought was to go back through what I have and get rid of the info dumps, fix my past / present tense problems, and rewrite a little better.

I sympathise. Contrary to the advice I gave you about getting it all down and then re-writing it as a second draft, I'm an edit as I go person -- I'll be editing a sentence before I've actually finished writing it. So no way could I write even 50 pages straight without going back and worrying at them, trying to get each line perfect. However...

I started writing fiction when I was in my teens and I'm now... well, let's just say a lot older... and I was a lawyer, which meant my working life was spent writing and honing sentences so they said exactly what they needed to say, because if I made a mistake in a clause, it was an opening for trouble and litigation. So although when I came here I was a novice in creating novels which had pace and drama and such like, I knew the written word, and how to manipulate it to make it do what I wanted. You're not at that stage yet, so not only have you got all the problems of creating a novel, such as characterisation, point of view, description, pace etc etc, you've also got to learn to how written language works and how to use it to create the effects you want.

I have the structure of the story down in my head, so I wanted to improve my writing some, before moving on to decrease work later.

An excellent idea, but it's not going to happen, I'm afraid. No matter how much time you spend on individual sentences now -- and I can fuss and fret for hours over a dozen words -- you won't lessen the amount of work you have to do later on when you come to the second draft. There are no short cuts I'm afraid. You literally have thousands of hours of writing ahead of you learning your craft.

I often liken writing to learning to drive a car. You've ridden in cars, you've seen other people drive, and it looks really easy. But when you're there for the first time, trying to do everything at once -- watch the road, the other drivers, the traffic signs, keeping the car straight, keeping speed up but not too fast, and then having to change gear, and handle the clutch and gear stick with only one hand on the wheel and OMG there's someone crossing the road... Nope. It's not as easy as it looks, not when you're starting out. And you are at the equivalent of your first few minutes in the driving seat. And yes, you'll likely find a car behind flashing its lights and sounding its horn because you're driving at 15mph, or you've indicated right and then turned left. Some will do it to warn you, or make you think; some will do it because they're in a tizz themselves and need to move on and aren't thinking of you; some are just prats.

As I said before, just carry on writing and reading. You do need to improve your written English eg such things as grammar and spelling, so separately work on those issues. See if you can find some online tutorials to help you, or better yet see if there's someone like a retired English teacher nearby who might give lessons cheaply.

Meanwhile, has anyone pointed you in the direction of the Writing Challenges? What I'd suggest you do is start at the beginning of the sub-forum with the first of the 300 Word Challenges. Write your own story for each quarter's image, then read the stories members have put in, and re-read the ones which got the most votes and work out what techniques are used by them -- writers are manipulators of emotion, so how have they done it? Then go to the Improving thread and you'll see feedback on some of the entries that you've read. Would you have noted those same comments? See what they've done wrong and done right. Make notes. Above all, keep learning!

You're at the start of a long journey. Good luck!

 

[NbDawn]

Boones built like a tank at six foot ten and that’s not by chance. He comes from the frozen moon tundra Europa, Jupiter’s 6th satellite moon.

I would start with this sentence because it seems the most interesting and grabs my attention. And I was say, "Boones was built like a tank...", adding the word "was" so that it's clear it is his name. That he is from a frozen moon can lead you to the next part about his hair turning gray at such a young age, perhaps saying that one day his hair would be the color of the tundra.

 

[Danny McG]

Not really relevant but I always think of tundra as a mix of white and brown. Isn't that the initial description of Boones hair?
P.S. unfamiliar turf here re apostrophes but will there be one for Boones name? Asking this cos I got me a borderline insane ship commander in my WIP who is named Jenkins and am unsure about this.
i.e. the knife was held loosely in Brown's hand - but I get lost when a surname ends in S.
Thanks Danny

 

[NbDawn]

P.S. unfamiliar turf here re apostrophes but will there be one for Boones name? Asking this cos I got me a borderline insane ship commander in my WIP who is named Jenkins and am unsure about this.
i.e. the knife was held loosely in Brown's hand - but I get lost when a surname ends in S.

I always get thrown too. Is it Boones's knife or Boones' knife? Saying Boones' knife reads better to me. I'm not sure if there is a hard and fast rule, but I generally err no the side of readability and what looks less jarring.

 

[HareBrain]

Is it Boones's knife or Boones' knife? Saying Boones' knife reads better to me. I'm not sure if there is a hard and fast rule, but I generally err no the side of readability and what looks less jarring.

Properly, you have the extra "s" unless the name is Greek or Latin (for some reason). But quite a few people leave it off. I use the extra "s" myself because that's how I pronounce it, i.e. "Boonzez knife."

 

[Danny McG]

Properly, you have the extra "s" unless the name is Greek or Latin (for some reason). But quite a few people leave it off. I use the extra "s" myself because that's how I pronounce it, i.e. "Boonzez knife."

That's how I would say it too.
Thinking of Dad's Army and 'Jonesies van'!

 

[pambaddeley]

I usually leave it off, e.g. James' hair. But I wasn't sure in the extract if the character's name was Boone or Boones. If the former, it would be Boone's hair

@CylonScream, the 'norm' these days with 3rd person narration is to have "close third" where you are in the person's head although it's not the first person I/me viewpoint. One thing you could think about when rewriting is that a very tall person is going to be looming over others and might even get cricks in his neck from having to look down all the time, so if writing from his viewpoint, pains and stiffness in neck and shoulders might be a bodily sensation he experiences and he might try to massage the areas unobtrusively or even have to take painkillers.

I understood, by the way, why you had that he enjoyed his hair being brown still - used in the sense of "take delight or pleasure in". Sometimes in non fiction you come across something like 'Despite his years, Joe Bloggs still enjoyed robust health'. But you'll have seen from the reaction that most readers will find it an odd usage. They would, on the other hand, understand if you said that a character enjoyed lunch. The usage re his own hair was a bit unusual.

As everyone has indicated, writing takes practice like any skill so just keep working on it

 

[Phyrebrat]

Just catching up on this thread now, and re-reading my earlier post, I felel bad as it comes across as mean and smart-arsey. I hope you didn't take it that way. I just meant that 'enjoy' seemed an awkward term to use to say he still had brown hair (instead of grey).

My other point was that it was perhaps quite long and could be distilled.

Of course that's just down to personal preference, as all things are. If you ask me what some of my characters look like I couldn't tell you beyond tallish, black hair, male, whereas I could write a lot more about how religious/impatient/winsome they are.

All the best with it!

pH

 

[Idealect]

", I bounced over and opened the door to find Sgt. Keith Boone blocking the entire doorway. Despite the dire need of a shave, his military haircut was well groomed. His hair was peppered with grey like all Europians, but he’s still young enough to retain most of his light brown color. Built like a tank, its not by chance he’s such a large human being."

Europians should be europans imo, unless europe and europeans no longer exist, as the name would probably be chosen to avoid that confusion.

Third sentence mixes tenses- "his hair was" "but he's still"

('s= is)

not sure if that's a problem

_

It reads like this isn't a special timeout moment where the character tells the reader about boone, but an ongoing part of the situation.

As a result, I find it jarring how the character's thoughts (seem to) move to boone's hair at that moment.

-Is the guy standing in the doorway pontificating over this while Boone waits?

_

At the moment it reads to me like you're trying to 'tell' without telling.

Well telling is great! -you can just do it if you want.

Here's an example from Steven Brust's 'Taltos' series where the main character 'info dumps' an introduction of two mooks to the reader:

"Shoen walked like he was one mass of muscle, just waiting to explode as soon as he had a direction to explode in—and that’s pretty much what he was. Sticks was tall and lanky and he walked as if he were just out enjoying the ocean scent and wouldn’t notice a threat if it was right in front of him. He wasn’t really like that."

Note that the character is addressing this to the reader. It's not part of his in-scene internal monologue.

_

From the 'show' perspective:

After the MC almost bumps into boone, are they startled? or is this a normal event they're used to on the military base? (or wherever)


What does the character do next?

Do they calmly regard boone for a moment, to cover/prevent their being startled? -that would be a time for these thoughts

Do they say how's it going boone, and strike up a conversation? -that would be a time for these thoughts

Do they step aside and (magnanimously) say "after you, boone"? -after boone walks through would be a time for these thoughts



_

-So to summarise that, I don't think your problem is the description, it's how the description is positioned: It's a tell style description, but it's coming in the guise of someone's thoughts at a potentially high tension moment. (for the reader, -not necessarilly the characters).

_

As to the description itself, I'm going to use the one in the OP because that's what i started on before I read down:

"Despite the dire need of a shave, his military haircut is well groomed and peppered with grey like all Europians. He’s still young enough at twenty-five to enjoy the color of light brown hair. Within ten years it will most likely turn fully white due to the stress of childhood. Boones built like a tank at six foot ten and that’s not by chance. He comes from the frozen moon tundra Europa, Jupiter’s 6th satellite moon."


Some comments/reactions, disregard anything that sounds wrong:


comma after "peppered with grey" ?

Or put "like all europians" before "peppered with grey" ?


"the color of" -> "a head of" ? -I know you're using "enjoy" in the 'have access to' sense, but colours are enjoyable, which made me think of him looking himself in the mirror, or looking at other people's (females) light brown hair, rather than having light brown hair.


'childhood' might be unclear, depending on how familiar the reader is with the particular meaning


Would 'due to the stress of childhood' work better in the middle of that sentence? As in "Within ten years, the stress of _______ will turn it white."


'moon' twice. probably get rid of one. Otherwise this sentence is very good imo


comma after tundra, before Europa ?


europians to europans