Family business

[alexvss]

I recently rediscovered one of the first stories I've written. I wrote it in Portuguese for one of those predator anthologies that make the author buy copies in order to publish. I paid 400 of my currency and didn't sell anything. I had to throw the books away when I moved.

It's not long; just 1650 words. What happens after is that the dragon's family appears, making it family vs family.

I translated the piece to English a couple months ago. Been rejected four times ever since.

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“It’s coming, honey,” whispered the mother, squinting. She could feel the feeble—but not less scary—rumbling in the ground.

“Yeah, I feel it too,” said the father, crouching beside her. He clutched the hilt of his sword.

They swallowed hard when the creature emerged from among the trees and appeared in the clearing. It strode towards its meal and sniffed it, then sniffed the air and looked around, wary of its surroundings.

Father held his wife’s trembling hand, mouthed: “Hold”.

Birds flew away when the monster roared. It looked at the pile of animals with drool coming out of its mouth. Not resisting, it sank its teeth into it.

Father bellowed: “Do it now!”

Mother pulled the rope. The explosion sent bloody meat flying everywhere. Mother began to hear a high-pitched, single toned sound that she taught it was from the blast, but it was the dragon.

“It failed!” screamed the mother.

The explosion had left the dragon with no mouth. Its face was a bizarre gap with two eyes on top. The dragon’s scream sounded like a thousand teapots. It began to lash out, knocking down trees with its tail.

“What now?” said the mother.

“I’ll take care of it!”

Father unsheathed his sword and lurched toward the dragon. With teeth clenched and eyes wide open, he leaped to chop what was left of the dragon’s head. But the dragon’s frenetic tail walloped him. He gasped and his sight became blurred when his back hit a tree.

The dragon opened its wings and took off.

“Honey!” Mother ran to her husband’s body, who had slumped to the ground. “Are you okay?!”

Father coughed. “I’ll be fine… the armor saved me. Think I have two or three broken ribs… But I’ll be just fine.”

Mother looked skyward and saw the dragon flying and blowing fire like crazy. “It managed to escape, honey.”

“Let’s pray for the children to do their work properly, then…”

***​

Uneasy and anxious, a girl was biting on her own lips while looking at the sky. She let out a deep sigh, said, “Oh, hell! How much longer do I have to wait? I think I may be losing my—”

“Patience is a virtue, Sis,” said her Brother, as if he could read her thoughts. He leaned against a tree and cleaned the pieces of fruit between his teeth with a stick. “You can’t just lose it.” He smiled wryly.

Sister rolled her eyes and snorted, “this is so annoying! I’m hungry. Bro, I wanna go home!”

“We are a long way from home, Sis.”

“Yeah, but even so—”

“Hush,” Brother lifted his hand on the air. “Did you hear that?”

Sister grimaced. “No, I didn’t hear anything.”

 

[JS Wiig]

The writing itself is quite good.

I’m having a hard time understanding the motivation behind grievously disfiguring a seemingly innocent dragon.

In fact, I find myself rooting for the dragon, and find the mother and father quite despicable.

 

[alexvss]

@JS Wiig I wasn't expecting that! I'll give it some thought. "Innocent" dragon is an interesting take... It makes sense if you compare the dragon with a regular animal. But my take is that a dragon is a fantasy monster, like a troll or a goblin; so it must be put down.

Further on, the story shows that they were hired by a village to hunt this dragon (as it is what they do for a living).

 

[Wayne Mack]

Some thoughts.

sound that she taught it was from the blast

Have an editor with strong English skills review before submitting to another publisher. There are still some typos.

A lot of descriptive info is deferred. To me, it comes across as being added in at the last moment. For example, dragon is not mentioned until the end of the seventh paragraph and the children not until the scene change. Perhaps including "family run dragon hunting business" in the first sentence would provide a good lead describing genre and plot.

It strode towards its meal

I initially thought that the dragon had chased down some prey. I had to keep rethinking things as it is revealed that it was a pile of (possibly dead) animals set out by the family. This distracted from tension otherwise inherit in the scene.

Father coughed. “I’ll be fine… the armor saved me.

Giving Father armor only after he was knocked a distance makes it seem like an after thought.

Uneasy and anxious, a girl was biting on her own lips

She let out a deep sigh, said, “Oh, hell! How much longer do I have to wait?

Sister rolled her eyes and snorted, “this is so annoying! I’m hungry. Bro, I wanna go home!”

The girl's description does not seem to match her words. She seems tired and bored rather than anxious.

I would concentrate on getting a strong opening sentence. I feel it is better not to expect the reader to have to read too far to get the basic intent of the story.

 

[The Judge]

Well done for putting something up. However, while I appreciate this is one of the first stories you wrote and undoubtedly you’ve gained a great deal in writing skill since then, to be frank in my view this needs a good bit of work to get it to publishable standard.

I recall your saying that you don't revise your stories much, though I'm not sure if that's because you don't see the need, or you just lack enthusiasm for revisiting a story once you've written it. I'm a nit-picker, that is I go through texts and make lots of comments in red and purple, particularly as to word choice and grammar, but in the circumstances that probably won't be the best help for you at this stage. But do be aware that although your English is excellent, it isn't wholly idiomatic and there were a number of errors of word use -- eg "frenetic" isn't right for something like a tail -- so I'd agree with Wayne that before you submit anything further you ensure your work is reviewed by someone who is a native English speaker and preferably one who has a good vocabulary and a strong grasp of grammar etc.

Instead of nit-picking every line, what I'll do is pull out a number of major issues which we all need to consider when writing and relate them to how I read and react to this particular story. Sorry, but this is going to be long and detailed. (I'm a lawyer, it's in the training!) It's also, I suspect, going to sting, rather.

Story structure – it’s good that you’ve started the story in the middle of the action, since a lot of new writers make the mistake of dumping backstory onto the page. However, it is important to have a first line that catches the reader’s attention, and here this one isn't quite good enough, then to drip-feed in details of the plot and background throughout the story with the most important issues coming in quickly eg here we should be told early on that they are hunting a dragon which is terrorising a village. (NB In UK sensibilities nowadays it probably won't be enough that it’s a fantasy monster and therefore must be put down; it must have done something to warrant its extermination.)

World-building – where SFF is concerned, even in a short story there should be some world-building evident from the get-go, so we have an idea where or when it’s taking place. Here you’ve given very little and that just in generalities eg “trees” which tells us it’s unlikely to be set on a beach or in a desert but that’s about it. You don’t need paragraphs of description, but some hints are good, and specifics are better eg silver birch would suggest northern Europe, while eucalyptus would indicate Australia. However, it's important that the world-building is coherent, and here to my mind the sword and armour, which hints at the usual cod-medieval Western European setting for fantasy, is wholly at odds with the dialogue which is entirely late 20th century American. I’m not suggesting you should have the characters speak in Ye Olden Times Englisshe which would be nothing but pastiche, but in my view you ought to think carefully about how all aspects of your writing – description, dialogue, word use – should point to the same world.

Readership – I assumed from your comments about unfamily-friendly in the other thread that you are writing for very much an adult market. However, to my mind aspects of your writing here such as the mostly short sentences, the simple sentence structures, the lack of real threat or apparent danger as written, and the simplistic word use in narrative (eg “scary”) are all far more suited to a children’s story, and then in the second scene with the whingeing/bickering teenagers, it moves into what feels like YA territory. Obviously a story designed for adults requires an adult plot and themes, but it also in my view requires the language and structure to reflect adult usage by being somewhat more complex for the most part.

Lack of tension – stories thrive on conflict and tension, but here although you’ve given some indicators of stress eg with the Mother trembling, it didn’t work for me, and the only real conflict shown is between the brother and sister which doesn’t appear to be integral to the plot. Tension can be difficult to create, but one way is to emphasise the stakes at risk eg “If they failed, another village would be destroyed” and increase the stress as they wait for something to happen eg “It was the final seconds as the dragon sniffed the air, searching for traps, that always made her mouth dry.” Alternatively, you could remove the obstacle by starting later eg here, by beginning with the booby-trapped meat exploding.

Characterisation – it’s hard to give characters any sense of depth in a short story, but what I find useful is considering how I want readers to react to my characters. For instance, I'd want my family of dragon-hunters to come over as calm professionals, so I’d have them acting and speaking calmly and professionally eg they’d have proper back-up plans, they’d speak as little as possible, and they wouldn’t scream. Here, by contrast, your dragon hunters appear to me to be somewhat amateurish, which is fine if that was your intention, but not otherwise.

Dialogue – dialogue needs to show character but, like everything else you write, it also needs to move the story forward in some way. Here very little dialogue does that and indeed there’s a large element of the characters stating the obvious eg “It managed to escape” when we’ve already seen it fly away. So for my taste much of it – including almost every line in the second scene – could be removed without loss. If you keep in mind “Can this line be binned without harming the story?” that will help you better judge what your characters should say and do. And also what you should be removing from the narrative, come to that.

Names – failing to give characters names can bring problems, because it serves to distance us from them so we’re less invested in them as people, meaning here we don’t care if the dragon kills them. Where it can work is if the character’s job has effectively subsumed his life eg “the Official” in a Kafkaesque story, or where there’s a fairy tale aspect where creatures don't need names. Here, to my mind, the use of “Mother” etc doesn’t work since there’s nothing to suggest that they are defined by their family relationships, notwithstanding the title. If you don’t want to name them, then in a case like this I think you’d need to emphasise the family more – it’s not until the last line of the first scene that we’re actually aware there are children, and then in the second scene it isn’t “son” and “daughter” which would surely be the obvious corollary.

Those are general points, but there's also a specific issue here which you might want to think about, namely Inadvertent comedy. A dragon thrashing around in great pain would clearly be a very serious matter, but I have to say that to me the scene as written felt almost comedic eg a scream “like a thousand teapots” which struck me as the kind of bizarre nonsense simile that one gets in a parody or a humorous children’s book. And this is probably just me, but that comedy aspect wasn’t improved with the man saying he’s got multiple broken ribs but he’ll be OK, which might come a little too close to the Monty Python sketch of knights making light of injuries.


Overall, although I'm sure your writing has moved on since you penned this story, I do think that there are a good many aspects which you need to consider a little more deeply in your writing and it would be best to ensure you're confident in your handling of all of them before making more submissions.

Sorry I can't be more enthusiastic about this piece, but good luck with your writing in general.

 

[SonicSouls]

First, my critiques in regards to grammar and the word choice:

This is a nitpick, but I found a spot where you can avoid redundancy. It’s with this sentence:

“It strode towards its meal and sniffed it, then sniffed the air, and looked around, wary of its surroundings.”

You can remove the second “sniffed” and it still works:

“It strode toward its meal and sniffed it, then the air, and looked around, wary of its surroundings.”

Also, the sentence below, I think you meant “thought” instead of “taught”.

“Mother began to hear a high-pitched, single toned sound that she taught it was from the blast, but it twas the dragon.”

You also do not need to use “screamed”, “bellowed”, etc. Any modern book that I have read mostly uses “said”, and occasionally “whispered” and “yelled”. Using terms beside that is a typical beginner mistake, so don’t feel bad. From personal experience I remember being taught in elementary and middle school that you should never use “said”. Yet every professional author says that you should mostly be using “said”. This is because “said” is a tool. It needs to be there for it to be a grammatically correct English sentence. Also, the majority of publishers view using something besides “said”, “whispered”, and “yelled” as unprofessional.

I also noticed a sentence that might be the result of going from Portuguese to English. However, I’m not familiar with Portuguese in the slightest, so I could be completely wrong. However, this sentence:

“He gasped and his sight became blurred when his back hit a tree.”

You don’t need “his sight became blurred”. It can be “his vision blurred,” or something along those lines.

In this sentence you forgot to capitalize the first letter in the dialogue:

“Sister rolled her eyes and snorted, ‘this is so annoying! I’m hungry. Bo, I wanna go home!”

That’s my critique in terms of grammar and word choice.

In regards to the story I agree with JS Wiig in questioning why the mother and father were disfiguring a seemingly innocent dragon. I did notice your reply to that which stated that further down the story that the couple were hired by the village to hunt the dragon. However, at the moment the opening scene may give the wrong impression of the mother and father. Perhaps you could use the expectation created and surprise the reader by flipping it on its head. Or, you could make it clearer why the mother and father are doing it to put them in the right light for their characters.

Other than that, I thought the story was fine. The action felt tensionless though. I think that making the stakes and the motivations clearer would do a better job. If you’re looking for an interesting take on doing action I have some stories from author Robert E. Howard to recommend. However, forewarning, this man wrote in the 1920s. You’ll see racism, sexism, xenophobia, etc. That said, you may find some of his techniques interesting. He was a poet as well, so some techniques such as alliteration sometimes translate into his writing. At his best, this gives it a unique rhythm. He also creates sentences structured to mimic the pace of the fight. Lastly, because of his poetry background, he’s skilled at creating metaphors to create more vivid images.

Here is a collection to find these stories amongst others:

The Horror Stories of Robert E. Howard A Del Rey Paperback ©2008

Here are some stories to demonstrate those techniques, alongside notes on where the specific action is if relevant:

• The Spirit of Tom Molyneaux
• The Hills of the Dead (Chapter IV for the action)
• The House of Arabu (Action towards end)
• Black Canaan (Chapter IV The Dwellers in the Swamp)
• The Fires of Asshurbanipal (pg 466-470)

I hope that this helps.

 

[alexvss]

Thanks, @The Judge. I think I'm pretty much immune to the stinging at this point, so no worries whatsoever. This story is just something I found in my trunk, and it's meant to be YA. That means that what I said in the other thread doesn't really apply. (I've subbed this story to Deep Magic and Cast of Wonders!). There is also at least 30 stories between this one and my last one, so I think I've evolved.

Thanks again.

P.S.: You mentioned that you're a lawyer. So I must ask: are you really a judge? I'm a Law student here in Brazil.

@SonicSouls Thank you. Seeing the story as I am today raises red flags, and I cringe. I was much more immature when I wrote this, years ago.

Robert E. Howard is one of my favorite authors. It was after reading the complete Conan The Barbarian collection that I decided to write--I was stupefied! I also read all of Dark Agnes and Solomon Kane. That said, I never read the stories you mentioned. (though I did read Worms of the earth which features the Cthullu mythos). I'm reading Clark Ashton Smith now; I'll try and read the stories you suggested when I finish the collection that I bought.

Cheers.

 

[SonicSouls]

Glad to hear that. And I think similar things with my earlier work. I'm still an unpublished author, but even with the first draft of the story I'm working on now, I cringe upon rereading it.

 

[The Judge]

There is also at least 30 stories between this one and my last one, so I think I've evolved.

Then it would be a good idea if you put up something that is a little more recent, so we can help you judge how far you've come on.

By the way, something that occurred to me about your writing is that you are missing a trick if you are still writing this mock-medieval stuff. Fantasy is looking for different voices and perspectives so anyone with an insight into a non-European culture has an advantage. Instead of mining old tropes, reach into your South American heritage and use that as the basis for your work.

P.S.: You mentioned that you're a lawyer. So I must ask: are you really a judge?

No, fortunately. I had the seniority to apply to be what's known here as a District Judge, dealing with relatively minor civil issues, but sitting dealing with that all day would have driven me up the wall. The username arose because when I joined here I was confronted with having to choose a name and my mind went completely blank. At the time I was writing SF which revolved around a judge, so I picked that. The only other name that occurred to me was a family joke, namely Duck. I think I made the right choice.

 

[Edoc'sil]

Hey alexvss, just a few notes, the others have talked about the possible grammar or different word choices and given some good tips on where to look for some examples so I'll just talk about what I liked and didn't like.

I quite liked your opening got the right amount of tension, and it's the right place to begin the story although I would like some more description on the characters themselves. Wayne wrote about the description being deferred and I agree. Either dont describe them to keep the focus on the action or do it before. I would also consider giving them names rather than "Mother" "Father" etc seems too generic for me.

If the sister explicitly says she's bored of waiting, the brother doesn't need to be a mind reader to work out she's impatient, show she's impatient through her actions e.g. hoping side to side on each foot or sullenly sulking then have him say "patience is a virtue." It shows that they are two different characters with different opinions which is good but having them both say things means he doesn't need to read her thoughts, she's telling him.

I don't really like the mother character, if she's part of a family of monster hunters then shouldn't she be fierce and ready for action? Seems like she's there to be a character who goes "ooohhh" and "aaahhh" and is just basically put there to be the generally weaker person. Now take this with a grain of salt because maybe she's the brains behind the schemes and is the one who made the explosives or something like that, we don't know from this extract but thats just what I got from reading this, she seems a bit two-dimentional.

Apart from the exchange between the bro and sis (and the mother could do with a bit more strength) I liked the dialogue, it had tension.

Keep on writing man, there's a good story here with some development of the ideas.

 

[therapist]

I am a beginner writer so i'm just giving my thoughts as a reader. The Mother and Father seemed very plain, 2d, and boring to me. The scared trembling wife, and the stoic husband is very cliche.

I was surprised by how badly they disfigured the dragon, I instantly felt bad for it.

I didn't mind the lack of motivation behind the act, it gave a sense of mystery which I would hope to learn about later in the story.

“Let’s pray for the children to do their work properly, then…”

Same with this line. I am now wondering what the children's 'work' is. And I like that.