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The Seven Essences of Time

PostPosted: Wed Apr 01, 2009 5:23 pm
by Wind
this is the novel I plan on publishing any constructive Criticism is appreciated

Prologue:The Elf woman stood clutching her little one tightly to her. She glanced at the chaos going on behind her. She saw the tentacles of the ancient Leviathin which steadily put it's creeping tentacles around the hull of the ship. She spoke to the captain who came near her and said " Your Ship is lost, Captain Morgan but I can help you and your crew survive..." He came closer to her and said " How would you be able to do that My Lady?" She sighed saying " If you will take my little one to the nearest lifeboat..." She hesitated, the captain spoke " What about you, My lady?" She sighed again
" This is my final act I hope it is remembered by my people in songs..." The Captain spoke sharply saying " But My Lady!?" She gave a regal shake of her head " All I ask is that you take care of my little one... I have seen the future I know she will be a great one in her time... " The captain looked down at the splintering planks of his ruined ship and said " What is your name, so I may tell the child when she is older..." She then smiled a regal immortal smile that the captain wouldn't soon forget " I am Queen Eliora Orin Saldarize." He looked at her and said with genuine feeling " My lady, you will be remembered..." He did something then that he would have never dared to before, He leaned over toward the Queen taking the baby from her arms, Je kissed the queen on the cheek and she whispered in his ear " I will see you both again..." She smiled that beautiful smile once more and then the captain raced for the last lifeboat leaving the queen to her doom

PostPosted: Wed Apr 01, 2009 6:26 pm
by LadyRushia
Some helpful tips:

1) Every time someone new speaks, there needs to be a new paragraph. Also, you don't need to have a space after the first quote mark. So it would really look something like this:
Prologue:
The Elf woman stood clutching her little one tightly to her. She glanced at the chaos going on behind her. She saw the tentacles of the ancient Leviathin which steadily put it's creeping tentacles around the hull of the ship. She spoke to the captain who came near her and said, "Your Ship is lost, Captain Morgan but I can help you and your crew survive..."
He came closer to her and said, "How would you be able to do that My Lady?"
She sighed saying, "If you will take my little one to the nearest lifeboat..." She hesitated.
The captain spoke. "What about you, My lady?"
She sighed again. "This is my final act I hope it is remembered by my people in songs..."
The Captain spoke sharply saying, "But My Lady!?"
She gave a regal shake of her head. "All I ask is that you take care of my little one... I have seen the future I know she will be a great one in her time... "
The captain looked down at the splintering planks of his ruined ship and said, "What is your name, so I may tell the child when she is older..."
She then smiled a regal, immortal smile that the captain wouldn't soon forget. "I am Queen Eliora Orin Saldarize."
He looked at her and said with genuine feeling, "My lady, you will be remembered..." He did something then that he would have never dared to before, He leaned over toward the Queen, taking the baby from her arms; he kissed the queen on the cheek and she whispered in his ear.
"I will see you both again..." She smiled that beautiful smile once more and then the captain raced for the last lifeboat leaving the queen to her doom.

2) Commas and semi-colons are your friends. The commas you originally had were used properly, but there were many places where a comma was needed and there wasn't one there. There were also one or two comma splices, so definitely learn how to use semi-colons or just make sure you make them separate sentences.
3) Get rid of most of the "The captain spoke, saying." Not only is that redundant, but it's also unnecessary when there are only two people speaking.
4) Extend this scene. Have the characters show a little more distress at the situation and describe the setting more to convey the sense of doom. A giant sea creature is destroying a ship. The crew, at least, would be freaking out a little bit. Have they tried fighting back, or is it already too late?
5) At one point, you wrote the captain saying, "My Lady!?" I don't quite know how strict this rule is, but avoid putting two punctuation marks together like that. You can say something like "'My Lady?' he cried."

PostPosted: Fri Apr 03, 2009 8:06 am
by Esoteric
Publishing is an excellent goal and I commend you for it, but it seems like for us amateur writers (myself included) the skill level required is always farther away than we realized. So, if you want to be published, great! But you've got a good bit of work ahead of you.
LadyRushia has given you a bunch of useful comments. Grammar and format are a big deal when it comes to readability. To her comments I would add the suggestion that you look at the writing in some of your favorite books. Study how other authors order sentences in paragraphs and arrange scenes. One of the best ways to learn how to write better yourself is to emulate the style and methods of others.