First thoughts: The opening sentence is very wordy. Very descriptive and nice, but I felt like I was gasping for breath by the time I was done reading it. It comes across clear that Anne is in a dormitory or sorts but it doesn't seem apparent that there are multiple age groups or what their relationships are. My mind spent a fair bit of time trying to figure out how old Anne is or why there are apparent 'of age' individuals sneaking around at night. It gives a whip-lash feeling. Maybe make it obvious that its a mixed dorm/housing situation up front with a couple of sentences? (also, was this intentional?) Also, Anne wakes alone, but then later its shown her mother is present. Are kids kept separate from adults? Is there a reason for this in the story? Is she attempting to go outside or is she simply looking through the door? Are the dorms housed separately? I don't know where she is when she encounters Tom. I liked the emotions invoked and the overall tone. It gives off a creepy if not ick vibe. Personal opinion: I would continue reading.
#Vampire Farm - Prologue, Act 1 + Act 2's first third
terse mist
spark ledge
It's not a dormitory or anything like this, this is a farm where humans are the livestock
but thanks, glad to hear you'd keep reading
terse mist
I get that, if only from the title alone. So, if not a human equivalent of using dorms...make it more apparent she's in a barn?
spark ledge
to be fair, the building isn't a barn either
Did design the house to house humans, but it sure isn't traditional to much I can think of when it comes to real life housing
terse mist
A lack of detail here would be good for a creepy short story...but you have it flagged as long fiction. I would recommend more detail for that. I would like to 'see' the whole place. Be immersed, if you will.
spark ledge
fair, more would be shown over the course of the story, so trying to not spam too much info in one part
Part of the fun really is seeing more of it through the main story
terse mist
👍
waxen halo
(Commenting so that I can find this channel much easier for future reference)
waxen halo
@spark ledge since you didn't mention this in the forum's body, I'll ask directly:
- What sort of feedback are you looking for?
- If you want feedback on the prose, are you open to sharing a link (private or otherwise) with inline comments on?
- What is the target audience for this story?
- What is your experience level? (e.g. first story, wrote for a while but never thought of, or managed to publish, etc.)
- What is your native language?
- How easy should I go on you? 🙂
spark ledge
Am down for any feedback really
Can open the doc link for commentary, which could help when getting feedback on prose
Target audience would be adults, I don't really write for kids and while the story will be harmless for a while, it will get real dark eventually
Not my first story, wrote for a while, just never published anything so far
Native language is German
And eh, I can handle critique, I think, so no need to go soft
waxen halo
Cool, if you could share a link for the Prologue and Act 1 (which looks to be Chapter 1?) with comments on, I'll get right on them 🙂
spark ledge
alright, opened all documents up for commentary
waxen halo
Danke :3c
spark ledge
Bitte bitte
waxen halo
Finished the prologue 🙂
If I'm honest, I don't entirely understand its purpose. It feels out of place, and incongruent with the common function of a prologue, which is to present an event far before the story's beginning, event that provides an introduction to the story. It can set the mood, establish some themes, create atmosphere. With this being as short as it is, not being too abstract or otherwise poetic, nor actually presenting any sort of event that could be considered as special, meaningful or insightful, it's difficult for me to appreciate the point.
I do have to wonder if this couldn't be reworked, concatenated to the first chapter, or otherwise removed. Beyond giving us two names and perhaps a bit of symbolism with the couple that I'm fairly sure may not be relevant until far too late to matter, this introduction establishes nothing of real narrative value.
spark ledge
It is admittedly a bit of a first part of the first act
but yeah, it does actually serve quite a vital purpose, setting a spookier tone that I'll admittedly ignore for a good part of the story, illustrating the main conflict between the two most vital characters and already giving us a small insight into the setting by showing how odd it is
I mean, Anne sleeps in a room with 4 other people that leads right outside onto a porch
and even tho Tom isn't doing anything outright hostile, Annes behavior and the way he is framed, especially leading to the reveal of his undead appearance which is a less intense version of what Anne saw in her nightmare, still shows him as our source of horror for this particular tale
waxen halo
setting a spookier tone that I'll admittedly ignore for a good part of the story
This alone makes it sound like, you might be better off not setting this up in the first place? Doubly so if it's your opening act that ignores this.
As for the rest of the points, perhaps they are true, but I really struggle to believe in them when the prologue is not even 500 words. Perhaps expanding it may help?
spark ledge
feel free to make a suggestion, dunno myself how to do so
waxen halo
Well, again, one suggestion would be to expand the prologue. Maybe we can see something that actually makes Anne fear those fangs? A vampire biting someone, herself surviving an attack, maybe we can actually see what that nightmare she mentioned in the beginning was about?
Or, failing that, this prologue could be added to the first chapter in the following way: we could see Anne waking up with a start, the image of fangs still fresh in her mind. Then on her first meeting with Tom, you can show the same weariness you've shown in the prologue
spark ledge
Sure can't have a vampire biting someone or anything like that, I'm afraid
admittedly going for that feeling of having a bad gut feeling about someone everyone else around you likes and respects
only to be proven right about your gut feeling later, so there can't be anything too drastic too soon
The most drastic I am willing to go is with the first reminder scene in the first third of the second act, where Tom briefly gets tempted when helping a kid with a scraped up, bloody knee
just a brief instance where the mask sorta slips and his hunger gets the better of him for a moment before helping to patch up the wound and trying to make light of the situation
if anything, Annes feelings towards Tom so far is a kind of instinctual fear, not rooted in something she herself experienced
like someones fear of spiders, something that puts you off even tho nothing bad really happened to ya
well, maybe that wasn't the best example xD
but yeah, it is why she feels generally conflicted about her feelings and wants to move past them while still being more able and willing to see where things are generally messed up
waxen halo
Tbh, all of this sounds like it belongs in the first chapter rather than a prologue 🙂
spark ledge
did say the prologue is kinda just part of act 1
am able to recognize it myself after I got done writing xD
still keeping them separate for some reason
waxen halo
Strongly advising you against that nod nod. It's usually just seen as a mark of amateurish writing
spark ledge
Admittedly mostly keeping the story split up for easier reading and editing on my end
longer texts can be overwhelming
sure will combine them once it is all done into one big document, so if it gets picked up, it'll be easier to print/send
waxen halo
Nod nod, I tend to use GDocs's heading system to organise my documents 🙂 Real life saver that one
spark ledge
yeah
I probably still have a few things to learn with it, still new to using google docs
waxen halo
@spark ledge I've finished chapter 1 as well 🙂 May I ask, do you often read books in German?
spark ledge
not often xD
Last ones were for when I redid some of school
can't say I liked them
waxen halo
Do you read more in English then?
spark ledge
yeah
waxen halo
Noice, noice. May I ask how often and how much as well? Just as a reference point
And if it's YA, NA, litfic, middle grade, LNs, etc.
spark ledge
Honestly not too often, just short stuff usually here and there
mostly fanfic actually
can have a hard time focusing on longer texts, easily forgetful of what happened before when picking a book up after a break of reading
Mostly got myself to read through both Alice in Wonderland books as for the Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mister Hyde
waxen halo
I think it should go without saying that you should try to read more 🙂 A good reading pedigree is imperative to being able to storytell with words.
spark ledge
yeah, sometimes it can be hard to channel the visual images in my head into words
honestly wish i could just connect my brain to the computer and upload those instead
waxen halo
I can dive deeper into the intricacies of your prose, I believe my comments do so already, but I want to address the elephant in the room: you write too much as if you're trying to describe the picture in your head. A lot of the time, I feel like you are too taken with making sure the reader see things the way you imagine them, that you forget everything else. You don't often entertain the other senses (sound, in particular, is lacking), nor do you attempt any introspection or emotive writing. Almost the entirety of your prose is focussed on narrating the stage movements of your actors, which is not too engaging; a reader often relates to character not to scene, and the character of a story is only visible through its deeper means: plot, character (again), prose and the underlying thematic that ties them together.
The chapters also lack a certain structure. It feels like they are less chapters (and lesser so 'acts', the name of which suggests far grander narratives) and more like singular scenes, snippets almost. They are very rushed and often tend to break off abruptly, without creating any sort of hook. There is, I'll give you, progression, but there's no dynamism. We have an inciting incident towards the middle (Donation day), then a climax that doesn't logically follow from there. If anything, Kai's outburst feels like more of an inciting incident, which makes it all the more disconcerting that the chapter ends there.
Whilst not at all rule of law, you should aim to have every chapter follow at least vaguely a certain variant of Freytag's pyramid (there are plenty of those out there, all the same thing). Initial situation -> inciting incident -> rising action -> climax -> denouement (latter can be absent, or implied).
You should also, through prose, attempt to delineate these elements. There are plenty of techniques, too many to recount, but confounding them, the throughline is simple: each stage of the chapter should feel different. You should feel the mood dropping when Donation Day is announced. You should feel the tempers boiling when Kai refuses to comply. Unfortunately, at the moment, all those moments bleed together.
I remember asking for your target audience, and you said adult. For one, I'm not sure how young Anne is, but she's probably a teenager? Bit unusual, but I can appreciate that. However, the chapter length I'm not too sure of... Even for middle grade fiction, they often go into the 2,000-3,000 words ballpark, but you sort of cut them before 1,500. It feels like there's a lot more breathing room you can allow your writing, in short. Don't be afraid to pencil in some filler; you won't bore the reader. In fact, I'm sure a reader would prefer more 'ballast' than the matter of fact accounts they have at the moment.
spark ledge
Admittedly, while I haven't given Anne a concrete age(Or anyone), I more so see her even younger than teens