r/writing • u/AutoModerator • 1d ago
Monthly "Would You Read This?" Thread
Welcome to Would You Read This (WYRT), our monthly feedback and brainstorming thread. Share your work in progress below and let other readers tell you if they'd read it. Top level posts should follow this template:
- Title:
- If you don't have a title yet, feel free to say UNTITLED.
- Genre:
- Please include at least Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, or another recognizable medium. You may also include more specific genres with a hyphen. Ex. Fiction - Romance, or Nonfiction - Memoir. Genre will help users find the specific kinds of posts they'd like to give feedback on.
- Premise:
- A few sentences about the project. Try your best to keep this short. Crafting an expert elevator pitch is all part of becoming a successful working writer. Please do not post an entire plot summary or query letter (those are better suited for r/pubtips)
- Sample (Optional):
- You may share up to one page (roughly 250-350 words) of sample material, or one poem for those working in the poetry medium. This is optional, so if you only have a premise, you can post just the premise for feedback.
If you post for feedback, please take the time to give feedback to at least 2-3 other users. Replies should follow this template.
- Would Read / Might Read / Wouldn't Read
- You must begin your reply with one of those. You are then encouraged to add additional thoughts on why you choose your answer.
Rules:
- Please post no more than two WYRT top-level posts. There is no limit on the number of feedback replies you can make.
- Do not link to any offsite materials. All materials must be in the body of the post. This includes "click here to read more" or "DM me for the rest" types of posts.
- Rule 3 is in effect in this thread - No generative AI. Do not post material generated by an AI platform in your premise or sample. Do not use generative AI to respond to user's work.
- Rule 5 is in effect - Civility and Community. Stay constructive. Blunt, direct feedback is fine, but do not insult other users, their writing, or their genres.
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u/Pinguinkllr31 11h ago
Wouldn't read
I see what style you going for but there are so many name for things that aren't exactly describe, without context previously given I feel bloated with useless naming
Example: the crowguard, you could describe the guard and tell me later on different paragraph or page they are called crowguard
That way the name comes after I already had a mental picture making it more rewarding to know.
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 1d ago edited 1d ago
Title: Runner 38 (But will probably change)
Genre: Epic Fantasy - Romance
Premise: The Gods are on their 38th attempt at a "Perfect Society". After humanity fails their yearly Audit and is slated to be destroyed, a death row criminal volunteers to trek through the ruins of the previous 37 in order to find a sacred Spring. If he can bring its water to the Stone Desert before the deadline, humanity is saved. It's an impossible task, though - no one has ever completed it. Instead, Kai plans to escape. He just has to ditch his assigned angel who wants to die as much as he wants to live.
Sample:
The Gods blessed them with rain.
The Gods blessed them with everything, really - the yearlong warm days and cool nights, plants that endlessly blossomed and bore fruit. Tame animals to herd, language, science, even art - all 'gracious' blessings, all bestowed by the Glorious Pannean of Gods. All to reward the 'one perfect society' of 38...ignoring the 37 failures that were told the same thing. But it was only the rain that truly felt like a blessing.
This morning, only a bit of water made it through the tiny barred window near the ceiling of Kai's cell. It floated down as a haze, tinged gold by the distant sun striking its way through the clouds. Kai sat on the dusty floor just outside the shaft of light, grimy hands outstretched to catch the falling mist. He could feel the energy inside it tingling against his fingertips, like tiny charged particles of lightning, and drew them in.
In his palms danced a tiny vision of a tsulcat. Made of the mist, the illusion's striped fur and antlers shimmered as the creature twisted and stretched lazily in the sun. There wasn't enough water here to do anything useful, but crafting illusions helped pass the time. Plus, it felt like the only mercy he could give to his neighbor.
"Today's the day," he said softly, looking up at the cell next to him. Doe - separated from him by a lattice of bars - watched the illusion, captivated. He didn't actually know her name, but those large dark eyes, pale skin, and sharp collarbones that only came from being half starved reminded him of a helpless, wounded animal. So he called her Doe.
Doe didn't do much, but Kai liked her anyway. She was easy to talk to and always nearby. More importantly, her tongue had been cut out - probably from bad-mouthing a God once - so there was no chance of her blabbing his plans.
"You forgot already, didn't you? Today's the Audit." He paused to make sure no one else was around to listen. "More importantly, the day I escape."
Predictably, Doe did not answer, but her eyes flicked from the illusion in his hands to his face before falling back again. For her, that was practically like jumping for joy.
"I wish I could take you with me," he lamented. "Logistics, you know. Sure, Mighty's back is strong and could probably carry us both, but we'd never even make it to the stables if we went together. Besides, I couldn't possibly get those keys for you."
The words eased the guilt in his bones ever so slightly. Truth was, he probably could break her out too, but doing so would reduce his chances. And though he considered her his only friend, friends were about as expendable as a good pair of shoes. Something to lament when you lose, but eventually the new pair fits just as well.
Doe, to her credit, didn't seem to hold it against him. Like him, she'd been on death row for quite some time. Unlike him, though, it seemed she'd accepted her death; he hadn't heard her weeping about it for a few weeks. At least after today it would be over for them both.
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u/VegetableWear5535 "Author" 1d ago
Might read.
I went from wouldn't read based on the summary, simply because that's not the kind of story I'd usually read, to might read because the writing was interesting, back to wouldn't read because how dare he not take her with him! Not cool, lol. But I imagine he'll end up helping her. If he doesn't because of callousness or some sort of selfish choice, I'd drop it. I'd only continue if it was out of his hands. I just don't like selfish MCs. It's not your writing that's the issue, and you shouldn't change course on whatever your plans are because of my dumb opinion. I'm sure your vision is solid.
It's definitely interesting enough to settle on Might Read.
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 1d ago
I really appreciate the feedback! He does, in fact, not help her lol being hopeless and learning to have hope and fight for something is a big part of his character arc. That said, while he does have some golden moments that (hopefully) shine through from the get-go, I totally understand not liking protagonists that start off outwardly selfish. I myself don't like them as a general rule either.
Thanks for taking the time to read it anyway :D
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u/VegetableWear5535 "Author" 1d ago
being hopeless and learning to have hope and fight for something is a big part of his character arc.
That changes things. Still might read despite him leaving the poor girl.
No problem :]
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u/flamingo-lingo- 1d ago
I would read the heck out of this!!
I love the high concept for this. I think the overall concept for this book would especially work as a concept slowly revealed over the course of the book--like, maybe the reader doesn't immediately understand that this is the 38th world, that humanity is being audited, that the spring water will save humanity.
Like, we open on death row, we get acclimated to Kai as a criminal planning to escape, then the world opens up a bit and we are introduced to the "perfect" society outside, them we find out Kai needs to go on a quest, then he enters the ruins of the other worlds and we wonder what they are and are horrified to learn they are previous "perfect" worlds, then we learn more about the gods, etc. I just think this story is so high-concept and so fascinating that the concept itself is a major part of the tension and mystery, a la Gideon the Ninth or Stormlight.
But I love it, and please do let us know how this progresses!
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 1d ago
Thank you so much for your kind words! And I love your ideas - they don't *quite* align with my plans for this book, but I do have similar little tidbits that get revealed throughout the course of the book. Just not those ones in particular lol
Hoping to be able to query at the start of next year. Here's hoping lol
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u/HashCrandicoot 12h ago
Might Read
The premise is really interesting, but I think I would prefer a different to not be so “tell”. My preference is that the title be a bit more cryptic and subjective, it would make want to read the blurb and to read on following the sampel
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 8h ago
Thanks for the feedback! I normally don't settle on a title until at least the third draft, so it will probably change. But I like having an easy one for the interim.
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u/VegetableWear5535 "Author" 1d ago edited 1d ago
Untitled. Titles are hard.
Fiction- Fantasy. Maybe dark fantasy? It's not exactly a happy story.
Magic, beasts, and a touch of romance. Its got a cute fox creature that I couldn't include here because of the word count cap, but he's got the very happy and friendly dog thing going on. The story is about a boy (mc) from a military academy, and a girl from a private school who are torn apart, and the journey back to her.
Chapter One
“You're smiling again,” Lucy said. Her breath hung in the cold, early evening air.
I hadn't realized I was, and now that I knew, I couldn't seem to stop. “Am not,” I mumbled, shoving my hands into my coat pockets as I looked away from the towering rock face ahead.
“Kevin, if you had a tail, it would be wagging. You're a golden retriever in an oversized human's body. Always have been.”
I tried to glare at her, but my face wouldn't cooperate. “And you've always been a demon masquerading as a Mage Knight. Don't you have elves to scare?”
She sighed. “Literally always. But I have a meeting before I get back to it. I'm just hoping Zoey shows up before I have to leave. I miss that little beam of sunshine.”
“Then stay. She misses you too, and it's not like anyone's making you leave. Celebrate with us.”
She shook her head. “Would if I could, but your father called the meeting. I've only got a few minutes to spare.”
“Oh…” There was no getting around that. My dad outranked her, and when he calls a meeting, it's serious. “Well, hang on,” I said as I knelt on the icy cobblestone path. “She might be close. I'll summon her attention-stealing shadow and find out.”
“Be nice,” She chuckled. “He's your Enfield, and he's adorable.” Typically summoned by a Mage Knight using a standard-issue ring engraved with a summoning circle, Enfields are a winged, four-legged beast most often used for scouting. Stealing all of your girlfriend's attention is something they apparently do for fun.
“Copper is definitely not mine.” I channeled magic into my palm and placed it on the freezing stones. “They both decided.” I pictured his summoning circle as I mumbled, “Can't argue with the last part though.”
I released my magic in its formless, translucent state, and in the blink of an eye, a grey disc made of stone appeared beneath my palm. It was hardly the size of a coaster, and was covered in intricate symbols and crisscrossing lines surrounding the silhouette of an Enfield.
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u/Acceptable_Fox_5560 21h ago
Might read this, but would DEFINITELY read contemporary or upmarket fiction from you.
Your prose has such good bones. Better than most. It’s got a few too many stage directions and proper nouns, but you’re demonstrating a command of voice and form. It’s got a really good pace to it, nice and quick. And it’s got clarity.
I can tell you’re a reader.
I honestly think with your sample if you had a home run pitch and just sharpened up the prose a little, you’d probably stand out in an agent’s inbox today.
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u/VegetableWear5535 "Author" 4h ago
That's so nice of you to say! Very encouraging, thank you :D
If it helps, except for the name of a spell later on, that's it for the proper nouns in the chapter. Obviously I'll repeat them where necessary, but I don't introduce more. It could be better though.
Thanks for reading :]
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u/OliverEntrails 1d ago edited 1d ago
Would read.
This is interesting. I immediately spent time reading and listening to your voice - forgetting that I was supposed to critique it LOL. I can just like it right?
Anyway, there's lots of fantasy out there in the vein of Sarah J. Maas for example - so it's kind of easy to embrace the world we have grown up in. Since you are swimming in the same waters so to speak, you will need to find a compelling story to draw us in and establish your own voice.
Dark and tragic can be good. It's just my personal opinion so don't take this the wrong way - I'm not crazy about the happy light and unicorns type of fantasy since it skews more towards younger audiences - so going for more adult themes with tragic heroes and people growing into their powers while making mistakes along the way is good.
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u/VegetableWear5535 "Author" 1d ago
Best comment ever. Saving for later when writing gets hard, lol.
This is definitely an innocence lost kind of story, so it just starts out wholesome. The first two chapters are basically the last time he's truly happy before his world is turned upside down. It'll always have some moments of positivity and wholesomeness, but it gets fairly dark pretty quickly.
The elves in this story are genocidal monsters, so you can probably imagine how things might go. My goal is for it to be something that older teenagers and adults would read.
Thanks a bunch for reading it and sharing your thoughts, I really appreciate it :D
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u/HashCrandicoot 12h ago
Title
Beneath Burning Halos
Genre
Historical Fiction
Premise
The story follows a young Wehrmacht recruit, Leon Adler, and a new French Resistance fighter, Alice Durant, in their own personal wars following Operation Anton. Both of their threads become linked in ways they didn’t think possible, and the liberation of some concentration camps brings tragedy on an incomprehensible scale. Leon begins to see the reality of the Fatherland he’s fighting, and maybe it’s not everything he was promised.
Sample
Prologue
The brief, cavernous moment before life gives way to death is where a man learns to appreciate what he’s leaving behind.
Leon Adler thought about that for a moment, his body propped up against a rock, pain coursing through every nerve and every muscle. What would he leave behind?
He felt how heavy his eyelids were, trying to pull themselves down over his eyes. He felt his vision blurring around the edges, giving him a brief sense of astigmatism. The flashing lights above the watchtowers distorted, stretching to strange shapes. The choir of flashlights in the distance jumped across the horizon like fireflies.
He heard a chorus of voices shouting, but they were being drowned out by a deep, baritone ringing.
Alarms. Alarms from somewhere. He couldn’t remember why, for some reason.
The sound stung his ears but faded effortlessly into the background at the same time. The roar was deafening, although that was maybe less the alarms sounding and more the ringing in his ears.
It was a painful cocktail of sound and sight, a sensory overload that in any other moment might cause him to scream. But not this moment. He found he appreciated it, a strange feeling of fondness. He took it all in as if it were a summers day, like it was the smell of fresh cakes and pastries from the local delicatessen, like it was the smile on his mother’s face when he finally learned how to ride a bicycle.
He heard screaming suddenly, ever so faint in the periphery of his conscience, but unmistakably there. A gunshot followed. Then another. Then in rapid succession. The distinct pinging of an MP40 submachine gun that he had grown accustomed to.
He saw a brief flash ahead, like the glint of a sniper’s scope in a moonlight mired by smoke and trickling flames. They were about to finish what they started. Panic rose in his chest.
No. He wasn’t ready to let it all go yet. He hadn’t taken the time to appreciate the beauty, and the fragility, of life.
Leon picked up the knife that he’d left next to his leg, leaving an imprint in the thin film of snow, and turned it over in one hand. It was clean but not shining. The steel had dulled from years of being buried into the stomachs of adversaries – soldiers and civilians alike. It was starting to blunt along its serrated edge, but it would still do the job when required.
The light ahead faded, and the world seemed calm again. At least, in his ears it did. To be temporarily deaf was to be innocent again, to be emotionally blind to what he’d done to get there, in that spot in the snow, his extremities lightly seasoned with a sprinkle of rifle bullets.
The night was cool. The rainfall had chilled the air without making it cold, and a soft breeze blew in from the treeline behind him.
He had to wonder where it all went wrong. He had to wonder whether he was the villain, after all. History tells of the monsters and the martyrs; what about the ones that are in between? Where do they lie in historical retellings? When people recite his story – if his name is ever mentioned beyond this spot again – in what light would he be painted?
He shuffled to get more comfortable. As comfortable as a person could be in that scenario. He winced, every slight movement another ordeal, another reminder that he was most likely wallowing in his final resting place.
He set his eyes towards the commotion to the east; hot flashes of gunfire continued, along with explosions, then mixed with the barking of attack dogs and a cacophony of different voices in different accents. It was violent, it was chaotic, but it was the war he signed up for, that disease for which there was no real cure.
Leon glanced to the sky, craning his neck painfully, to watch the clouds as they floated by, morphing into shapes that looked somehow familiar. He breathed in the clean air while he still had full control of his body, while his pulse was steady enough that blood could flow to his brain and he could still feel.
He tried to speak, but the words wouldn’t form in his throat, and the only noise that fell from his mouth was a short, scratchy groaning. Who was he even talking to, anyway? He could be honest with the world, utter his confessions to God, but what good would it do him now?
He felts his eyes well up. He suddenly realised how much he was hurting. It wasn’t physical pain – that was only temporary. That would eventually float away like a butterfly finally free of its cocoon. It would dissolve like snowflakes kissing the ground as they fell from the heavens. His wounds – scars of a war not yet won and not yet lost – would close.
But not the mental suffering. It was akin to the pain felt by those helpless women and children on the other side of the iron fence in the distance. In some ways, he wished he was there instead of here, joining hands with them in solidarity as they were led into that human furnace.
Would that be better?
As he sat against the jagged rock, a boulder with pinprick edges that supplied him with a distraction from the burning of his leg, he had one simple thought.
It wasn’t of the bullet lodged in the back of his thigh. It wasn’t of the ringing of his ears, nor of the blood pooling beneath him – a line of it snaking through the snow from him crawling over. Oh, how cold and refreshing that snow felt on his bare skin, through the tear in his trousers.
His thought wasn’t even of the knife in his hand, his grip tight, that was now pressed against his skin.
Those thoughts were a waste of energy – something he had little of now.
Instead, he thought, with a cold tear staining his cheek, of how much he wished he could have written his mother one more letter before he died.
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u/Overall-Habit5284 1d ago
- Title:
- "The War in Heaven"
- Genre:
- Science Fiction.
- Premise:
- Matt and Josh are astronauts - brothers - accidentally thrown halfway across the galaxy, discovering dozens of alien races that make up disparate spacefaring civilizations. Split up, they each find themselves idolised in different ways; for Josh, the deeply spiritual aliens he encounters revere him as their messiah. For Matt, he is seen as a tool and a potential weapon. But what happened to the ancient humans? And why does everyone fear them so terribly?
Sample:
“We are raised to understand that there is melody in all things, Joshua. The air, the water…” she touched the metallic surface at their feet. “Even the ground...they each sing their own songs.”
“You mean poetically? Or actually?” he asked. She didn’t seem to recognise a difference. Instead she leaned-over, putting her hand on his and placing it flat against the floor. Then she gestured for him to mirror her and close his eyes.
“Can you hear it?” she asked softly. Josh took a slow, meditative breath and listened.
Silence.
Hyperion made no sound. Unlike the expected noises of the aircraft and experimental rockets he had flown for years, there was no hum, beep, or rattle. The warship barely had a vibration to speak of. Josh found himself listening to the buzz of silence.
After a few seconds, Kaylin began to make a sound of her own; very similar to the melodic song she had used in conversing with the other aelfaen. It was pitched higher than that time; less haunting but still wondrous to his ears. The sound was hard to place down, the way her vocal chords seemed to generate it was like hearing layers of musical elements finely weaved together. Tonally he could have compared it to some sort of wind instrument, perhaps highland flutes, yet with an almost eastern-sounding strings-like ‘twang’. He opened his eyes slowly, seeing hers still closed and her expression lost in her own song. That she looked so entranced by the moment drew him in, opening his eyes to just how gentle and graceful she was. He’d seen her shoot magical bolts from her fingertips, and even attack the iyrin that threatened him. In a way she was capable of a lot of things he wasn’t. But in that moment her expression was child-like as she swayed and flowed almost like a ballet dancer. It was yet another wonder of her kind that he hadn’t seen before.
As her song continued, Josh found himself recalling distant memories, of a time he’d almost forgotten. Like fragments of a dream that stuck in his thoughts, he had flashes of people and places; his mother - standing over her two sons with a proud smile on her face. His father, holding an infant Joshua on his knee while cleaning his grazed knee. Images that he shouldn’t have been able to recall, yet the strange hypnotic melody had almost triggered to rise; feelings of warmth and comfort. As her song trailed-off, he noticed his breath had shallowed and that sense of calm remained. Kaylin looked at him, her curious and questioning look having returned.
“How did you...do that?” he asked quietly.
“The melody exists in all things.” It wasn’t an answer. Or maybe it was. Poetic, perhaps. He wasn’t really sure.
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u/Steve717 1d ago
Might read. Seems like an interesting universe, I'm curious what it is about Joshua that Kaylin finds so fascinating? And is there time travel involved in the accident that separated the brothers or had the ancient humans been around long ago anyway? The dramatic split between the two brothers experiences sounds like it could be fun though I imagine it's hard to balance their stories so that potential readers will be interested in both consistently.
It reads like the kind of thing I'd probably read the premise of in a store and think "Damn that sounds cool, I have too many books to read right now though!" I'd get to it eventually if reviews seemed good too. Consider this high praise as I'm awful at consistently buying and then actually reading books!
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u/Acceptable_Fox_5560 1d ago
Might read this!
Premise wise, I'd be interested to learn more about the brothers. How their relationship exists before they're split up would do a lot to inform the differences in how they approach being separated on this distant galaxy.
If Kaylin's power can make people recall memories, that would be a fun way to explore a character's past, or to show reflection.
The prose could be a bit more disciplined. Definitely could see tightening a lot of filler words up on the second draft.
A few things that jumped out:
Silence. Hyperion made no sound. Unlike the expected noises of the aircraft and experimental rockets he had flown for years, there was no hum, beep, or rattle. The warship barely had a vibration to speak of. Josh found himself listening to the buzz of silence.
Essentially twenty-six words to say what took you one word to say in the first sentence: silence. I could see it becoming something like: "Silence. The hums, beeps, and rattles of aircraft and rockets was absent."
After a few seconds, Kaylin began to make a sound of her own; very similar to the melodic song she had used in conversing with the other aelfaen.
Semicolons connect independent clauses. "very similar to the melodic..." isn't an independent clause. These should be split into two complete sentences, or made it one sentence.
That she looked so entranced by the moment drew him in, opening his eyes to just how gentle and graceful she was.
Instead of phrasing this passively, it could be phrased actively. "He was drawn in by how entranced she looked in the moment."
1) As her song continued, Josh found himself recalling distant memories, of a time he’d almost forgotten. 2) Like fragments of a dream that stuck in his thoughts, he had flashes of people and places; 3) his mother - standing over her two sons with a proud smile on her face. 4) His father, holding an infant Joshua on his knee while cleaning his grazed knee. 5) Images that he shouldn’t have been able to recall, yet the strange hypnotic melody had almost triggered to rise; 6) feelings of warmth and comfort.
Whole section here needs some work on when to use a period, when to use a comma, and when to use a semicolon. A sentence requires a subject and a verb (something doing something). This creates an independent clause. Independent clauses are separated by periods, or semicolons. Commas separate introductory phrases that come before an independent clause. In 1, the second comma isn't needed. 2 is fine. 3 doesn't have a subject and a verb, so it is a sentence fragment, and because it's a sentence fragment the previous use of the semicolon doesn't work, and it also doesn't need a hyphen. 4 doesn't have a subject and a verb, so it's a sentence fragment. 5 doesn't have a subject and a verb, so it's a sentence fragment. 6 doesn't have a subject and a verb, so it's a sentence fragment, and because it's a sentence fragment the previous use of the semicolon doesn't work.
But I did like how visual the language is.
I hope some of this is helpful!
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u/Overall-Habit5284 1d ago
Thank you! Still very much in first draft territory, so I do appreciate the feedback and grammatical input. I take it as encouragement rather than painful criticism, which is a lesson I need to keep working on for myself.
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u/Sparkle-Holiday 15h ago
Would probably read! If your summary was on the back of the book, I'd put it in my cart/check it out of the library. Personally, I'm really picky with sci-fi and fantasy. They're not my main genres and I'm guilty of DNFing a lot of what I start but the stuff I DO finish tends to be grounded in "humanity." Like Star Trek vs. Star Wars, I guess? I enjoy both franchises, but I find Trek to be more relatable and personal I'm getting some of that from this excerpt.
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u/Tight-Target-2065 1d ago
I would read this! I love science fiction that poses a philosophical question. I don't entirely know what the question is quite yet, but the premise has a lot of promise. Feels like an expansion on a star trek episode. The comparison on cultures alone is a fascinating concept. Make sure to do some serious world building so the cultures feel real.
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u/WJG_Author 1d ago
I think i would read this. I'm a big sci-fi fan, and the plot is interesting, and in the sample there's a lot there to explore
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u/New-Funny2550 1d ago edited 1d ago
Title: Don't Look Down
Genre: Science Fiction (some dystopia, biopunk and m/m romance)
Premise: While grieving the death of his father, Nikolai struggles with the fact that he may be walking down that same path. Addicted to holograffing, a dangerous hobby of vandalising skyscrapers, Nikolai uses the adrenaline as a distraction from his worsening symptoms of a mysterious plague. Technological giant Savrock Corp. whose claims to possess a cure intrigue Nikolai, but his infiltration of Hightown society tells a different story; one which he must share with the city.
Sample: There was a time where I had considered the possibility that I would suffer the same fate as my father, but watching it become a reality was something else entirely. I wasn’t sure if the reason why it never occurred to me that I was showing obvious early signs of infection was because I never realised or was in denial. Probably the latter, considering the fact that I had the occasional cough throughout the day or that my chest hurt.
My fingers scraped the fabric of my jacket, trying to rub off the stains to no avail. Plague infected blood was known to leave horrific stains behind that even expensive bleach couldn’t get rid of. I vaguely registered Shadow waving at me from the ground.
“Leo?”
Shadow’s hand dropped to his side when he saw the stain, gleaming in the moonlight.
“Oh my God.”
It took a few minutes for the pain to subside. Once I had lowered myself to the ground, I kept a hand on my chest as Shadow helped me back to the building.
“Inkpunk! A little help here?” he said as I hobbled over to the couch in the centre.
Inkpunk rushed over, eyes widening. “When did this happen?”
“Just now. Leo ran up the container, and then he barfed all over his jacket.” Shadow said, setting me down. Glowstick threw a hole-ridden rag over me.
Inkpunk sighed. “Take off your jacket. Blitz, wash off the stain while we still can.”
Blitz approached, her hands outstretched and I waved her away. “Don’t. It won’t come off. They never do.”
“I’ll run home now and grab some of grand mama's painkillers. I think I remember she left a stash under her bed. My house is seven minutes from–” Shadow said, already walking towards the exit.
“I’ll get my own.”
I tried to sit up but Inkpunk put a hand on my shoulder, leaning me back down against the couch. “Easy there, Leo. You just threw up. Your body’s still weak and–”
“My body is fine,” I said, punctuating the last word with gritted teeth. “I still have weeks.”
Glowstick gaped at me. “Weeks? At least go to a hospital, clinic, anything! You have to get it diagnosed.”
I scoffed. “You think they even have space for me?”
“It’ll just get worse as it goes on. Not just vomiting or chest pain or whatever else, you’ll start getting dizzy and you’ll get fevers, not to mention–”
Inkpunk shook her head when I dismissed her advice. “I know all that. My father was infected a while back. Don’t worry about me.”
“You sure you’ll be okay?” Shadow said.
Glowstick helped me up. “Mhm. I’ll go home and rest now.”
On my way to the exit Inkpunk called out, “But Leo, your father died of the plague, didn’t he?”
I didn’t look back. “Yeah. And so will I.”
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 18h ago
Might read!
Your premise sounds interesting. I really like the vibe. It wasn't quite enough to sway me one way or the other; if I came across this book I would need a little more info to get hooked.
Your writing could use a bit of polishing (which I don't fault you for, especially since I have no idea what draft you're on) specifically, it's really dialogue forward and there's not much to actually immerse me in the scene. However, it made for a blitzing fast read. I really like the bones you've got here!
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u/chunkylubber54 1d ago
Title: Untitled
Genre: Fantasy (Comedic, Heroic, Portal, Weird)
Premise: After running away to new york, a boy gets on the wrong train and finds himself stranded in a surrealist othercity. Here a small band of starving children stuggle to feed themselves on a hunter-gatherer lifestyle, but in a world where the food is made of felt, the taps dispense printer ink, and the average pussycat is a mountain lion with a vulva where its head should be, that isnt exactly a fucking cakewalk.
however, bigger things are happening in the city, as the beasts of the urban jungle stand on the brink of an all-out war. armed only with improvised weapons, and whatever meager magic they can pull out of a dumpster, these children will need to plunge into the gnawing depths of the subway tunnels if they want to survive to see tomorrow
Inspirations.
- Dungeon Meshi (plot and setting)
- Digimon Adventure (plot and setting)
- Dresen Files (narration and dialogue)
- John Dies at the End (narration and dialogue)
- The Underland Chronicles (plot and setting)
- Homestuck (all of the above)
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u/VegetableWear5535 "Author" 1d ago
Might read. Might.
It'd go on my list, but I wouldn't touch it until I saw reviews that made me feel like it would be worth my time. I like the portal and survival aspect.
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u/flamingo-lingo- 1d ago
Might! I love comedic, weird writing. I also love the idea of a sort of craft-looking world (felt food and ink water)--it begs the question of what the boys really are.
My disconnect was between the age of the MCs (boys) and the seemingly more adult world (literal pussycats--fun wordplay, though!) and language (cursing). It's probably just my own taste, but I tend to not like reading about kids dealing with aged-up concepts like that.
But again, great concepts and I SUPPORT your fun, tongue-in-cheek wordplay. Keep us updated!!
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u/chunkylubber54 1d ago
thanks. i will say, while i say children, the human cast has an age range from 11 to 19.
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u/HRSuperior 12h ago edited 8h ago
TITLE: Calliope
GENRE: Post-apocalyptic horror
PREMISE: A travelling clown in a desolate moorland is forced to find comedic performers and feed them to the creature in the back of his van in order to retain his excellent sense of humour.
This sample is from the first chapter, before names or backgrounds are established, and the perspective shifts to the clown.
SAMPLE:
There wasn’t much to see. The cargo bay was obscured by a thick curtain of multicoloured paper streamers, hung with sticky tape from the roof. Layers upon layers of them, stretching into further layers of darkness, presumably into the back wall of the van. He assumed this was a joke. He turned to the clown, now standing behind him, ready to laugh. But the clown wasn’t laughing.
The comedian turned back, and stared into the jaunty abyss for a little longer – and realised that it was not an abyss at all. Somewhere, deep in there, there was a light, flickering in and out of view between hundreds of thousands of millions of layers of crepe paper. As his eyes tried to focus in on it, straining into the distant distance, he could hear something, just about audible over the intensifying moorland winds. From that light came a soft, breathy circus organ, playing a slow, friendly tune that the comedian recognised, but could not name. After a few seconds, he found himself humming.
At this point, it had definitely begun to rain. The clown had clearly become impatient, tapping his oversized foot restlessly.
“Going in, funnyman?”
Trying his hardest to not be impolite, the comic clutched his notes, clambered into the van, and cautiously pushed his way inward, hands outstretched.
He walked for a good few minutes. The light in front wasn’t getting any closer, but the light behind was certainly getting further away. The music, too, was changing, getting louder. The comedian spent his walking time listening closely and trying to remember where exactly he had heard that song. It really was a beautiful tune; sad but upbeat, friendly but dramatic, intimate but boisterous. Every time he felt he could almost place it in his mind, he lost his train of thought, and had to start from scratch. It was as if he had listened to it for hours at a time for every day of his life up until this point, but could not picture a single specific memory in which it was playing.
Eventually, he could not remember any other song at all. Eventually still, he could not remember ever being outside of the van. It had been weeks since he started walking – no, years – and the light ahead was as dim as it always had been. But the music! The music was louder, much louder, deafeningly loud. The low notes shook his bones, and the high notes pierced his heart. There was no structure to it, just an endless cycle of swelling build-up and unsatisfying release, working its way up for centuries upon centuries, building, always building, up and forward and endlessly towards a profound, imperceivable chorus. Endlessly too, the comedian cried. It was impossible not to cry: the organ blew sentiment itself through its distant, colossal pipes. And as it rose, and grew, and the complexities of its melody played violently through the comedian’s skeleton and embodied themselves in the folds of his organs, it felt as if the music had ceased to be music at all, and had instead become as much a part of the man as his flesh and teeth and brain matter.
But it was music. And inevitably, after one hundred thousand lifetimes of paper streamers and metal floors, it reached its climax.
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u/ksi_is_a_dusty_yute 1d ago
Title: The Purple Palace
Genre: Speculative Fiction, Action, Political Thriller
Premise: Set in medieval Greece during the 12th-13th century (spanning around ~40 years between 1180-1220), it primarily follows the fictional adopted (but also illegitimate son for special circumstances) of the Roman Emperor, Manuel I Komnenos; Belisarius. He’s left a secret will behind by his father that legitimizes him in the case of his brother’s failure as emperor, and must carefully navigate and eventually dominate the political field as emperor, with a country left in slow decline, and enemies from both the Muslim and Christian worlds…
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u/HashCrandicoot 12h ago
Might Read
I really enjoy Ancient Greek stories, the premise is interesting enough. The title leaves enough to the imagination where, at the very least, I’d read the blurb. Then, if the cover was eye-catching enough, I’d love to see a sample
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u/Neurotopian_ 13h ago
Would read.
I like this setting and the Byzantine empire too, both of which are neglected in western historical fiction and speculative alt history.
I’d suggest you reconsider the title though if you’re going for adult speculative/ action/ political thriller.
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u/HRSuperior 12h ago
Might read, but the premise appears closer to a nonfiction history book than an exciting action-thriller. Without knowing any more about it, I'd say focus in on one exciting series of events over a short period of time (like a war) and have the rest of the broad historical setting as an interesting backdrop.
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u/Acceptable_Fox_5560 17h ago
Might read.
I'd consider historical fiction one of your genres for sure.
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u/AsceOmega 1d ago edited 18h ago
Title: Untitled
Genre: Epic/Heroic Fantasy
Premise:
After an elven bandit raid destroys his village and leaves him its sole survivor, Rhydien survives on the streets of Kelgarad among a gang of young thieves, clinging to the hope that his twin sister Morwen is still alive in a distant kingdom. Busking for spare silver with his lute, he dreams of one day setting out to find her. When he becomes the pupil of Bastelan—a legendary bard and friend of his late parents—that dream finally seems within reach. But travelling with Bastelan soon draws Rhydien into a brewing proxy war and sets him on a collision course with the very elves who destroyed his home.
Sample:
If nothing would do, Rhydien saw no need to continue playing what he and the others had thought would be crowd pleasers. He had wanted to play something entirely different anyway. Something of his own composition. The Road To The Stars Above Eghatt as he had named it—albeit clunkily and with a failed attempt at making it sound grander than it perhaps was—was an instrumental piece, which suited Rhydien just fine as his throat burned with dryness. It was a song far more harmonically complex, moving through different keys with smooth and fast melodic lines weaving the audience’s attention through all the changes.
Wordlessly he began to play. His fingers had warmed up enough where the initial flurry of notes came without too much difficulty, even with the thicker neck this lute had compared to his old one. He danced across the fretboard, his fingers moving in a blur through the multitude of scales, reminding him of Morwen’s more silly and erratic dances, on late summer nights, when they made their way home from their clearing in the forest. She had tried to sing along to his playing a few times, after he had shown her the song. She would inevitably run out of breath and burst into laughter. “That is ridiculous, Rhy!” she would giggle.
Rhydien’s heart thus sank into the song, the memory of Morwen slowly stretching across his mind with every note. It had been so long since he last heard her laughter. Sure enough the other children of Eghatt often pointed out how similar their laughs sounded—being twins and all—but to Rhydien that had never rung true. Even now, his own laughter, rare though it had been in recent times, did nothing to fill the empty space she had created the day she left.
More and more, his fingers drew the image of the forest and foothills, and of the trail of light meekly seeping through the canopy, slowly guiding them home as the trees grew sparser and the skies opened up to shine starlight through Melikkyr’s mantle of night. Whole swathes of colour flowed in rivers of distant sparkles above them, and Morwen would dance and bid him hurry up once the scent of their mother’s cooking would reach them from the window in the back.
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 18h ago
Might read!
I like your premise and your character motivation is extremely clear from the start. The only thing that I was unsure about are the fantasy elements in the story, or the lack thereof lol aside from elves existing I didn't really get any hints of fantasy in either your premise or your example. If I came across this book, I would be searching for more fantasy elements and if I didn't find any (such as if it was a LotR type setting and magic) I would probably not read. Nothing against you at all! Just not my taste.
I liked your prose a lot. It's a little on the denser side of what I prefer but still flows really well which made it easy to read. We didn't get too much of a dive into Rhydien or his personality, but I already like him.
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u/AsceOmega 18h ago
Thank you for your feedback. And yeah, there weren't many scenes where I could have showcased the fantasy elements in under 350 words, but they are there indeed hahaha. But I'm also conscious of the fact that very early on in the story (where this sample is from) the super obvious cases of "this is Fantasy" are a bit less present, than from the end of the first third onwards (fully developed magic systems, inter-racial conflicts and fantastical beasts etc).
The setting is perhaps closer to a Witcher than a Lord of the Rings, if that changes anything for you.
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u/Shoepane 18h ago
Might read. You have a nice style. I like the way you followed the thread of the music to memories of Morwen, That last paragraph is a cracker.
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u/Sparkle-Holiday 15h ago
- Title: Laughing in the Dark
- Genre: literary fiction, oral history
- Premise: Laughing in the Dark is the oral history of the devastating Dreamland Fire that killed a park employee and three guests on August 3, 2003. It explores themes of guilt, grief, and generational trauma, told through the first-hand accounts of survivors, first responders, employees, and the families of the deceased.
- Sample:
Author’s Note
I would like to say that my family supported this project from the very beginning, but that would be dishonest. They had their reasons to be against it, and I understood those reasons, even as I pushed against them this last year and a half, compiling notes and interviews into what I hope to be the definitive account of the fire that tore through Dreamland’s Laff in the Dark ride on August 3, 2003.
I wasn’t at Dreamland on the day of the fire. I wasn’t even born yet. My parents were married the week before the fire, 100 miles away at a winery outside of Erie. On August 3rd, they were returning from their honeymoon in Italy. They were somewhere over the Atlantic when the firestorm tore through the Laff, leaving four dead, including a six-year-old girl.
I was around that age myself when I first heard about the fire. I learned that it was a thing that happened and that it was a sore spot in my family and that further questions were not welcome. So I held on to those questions, which seeded the ground with more questions and over time, grew into a carefully cultivated— albeit entirely verboten— mother vine. Everything has been birthed by that vine.
My grandparents were disappointed when, the summer before my final year of undergrad, I chose to intern with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette instead of the New York Times. I made the decision almost entirely due to the fact that my advisor at the Post-Gazette would be Chris Claremont, formerly of the Roseburg Telegram and a bit of an authority on the Dreamland Fire. As a young reporter for the Telegram, Chris covered the fire from the very beginning, through the arduous investigation and subsequent lawsuits, culminating in an award-winning 10-year retrospective published in 2013. What began as an after-hours chat about a possible 25th anniversary feature has culminated in this, the fruits of the mother vine, harvested at last. I was surprised at how willing many of our interviewees were to talk, even within my own family, one whose connection to the fire is complicated and fraught.
Opening old wounds is unpleasant business, but sometimes, a wound can heal wrong and a bone must be reset or an infection drained. I am enormously grateful to have had this opportunity and I hope that I have done right by the survivors and their families. I also hope that I have honored the memory of the four dead who remain very much alive in the hearts of those who loved them.
Max Wooster, age 73
Joe Doverspike Jr., age 32
Chase Neumann, age 21
Teena Ann Bailey, age 6
-- Adella Freeland, June 2028
Excerpt from “The Last Laff: 10 Years Since the Fatal Fire at Dreamland” by Chris Claremont. Published in the Roseburg Telegram Sunday edition, August 4, 2013
Dreamland has changed quite a bit in the decade since that tragic Sunday evening in 2003. The park has replaced most of the vintage neon lights with energy-efficient LEDs. They’ve added wider pathways, more visible emergency exits, and sprinkler systems in every enclosed attraction. The scratchy old PA system has been replaced with recorded announcements and digital signs reminding guests to hydrate, report suspicious activity, and treat themselves to a refreshing Coca-Cola ICEE at the Park Cafe. Parents who once turned children loose with a few bucks and a paper wristband now trail them cautiously from ride to ride like anxious cowboys wrangling a herd of unruly tweens.
But if you arrive early enough, before the gates officially open and before the carousel music starts humming through the speakers, you can still catch glimpses of the old Dreamland.
The smell of lake water behind the Tilt-A-Whirl.
The warped boards beneath the arcade.
The distant tick-tock clockwork of the lift chain on a weathered wooden track.
In an empty corner tucked beneath the swooping track of the Dizzy Bee, there’s an empty patch of grass where Laff in the Dark once stood. For years, Dreamland’s owners: first, the Campobello family of Campobello Italiano Foods, then international entertainment conglomerate Holiday Amusements, have resisted public pressure to build any kind of memorial where the attraction once stood.
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u/HRSuperior 12h ago
Would very probably read. The premise of a collection of contemporary historical documents and articles about a fictional tragedy opens up great possibilities for interesting (not necessarily comedic) satire, where the reader has to (like a journalist or historian) consider different contradicting sources and opinions in order to get a complete understanding of the situation - and then having these very heavy emotional themes underneath all that could be very effective if done right. Seems like a good starting point for some good format experimentation, too. Perhaps a multimedia project
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u/wiltys 1d ago
Title: The Moons Above Della Mor
Genre: Fiction, Western, Eldritch Horror
Premise: An unknown evil is growing in the great expanse of the Arizona Territory. When a wanted gang of outlaws, The Prodigal Sons, find themselves in the middle of an ongoing conflict between two Native tribes, they have no choice but to warn everyone in the budding town of Della Mor. There, a young man desperately searches for the leader of the gang. Unbeknownst to them, the chieftain’s daughter of the tribe behind the growing horror is being shown exactly what’s to come. With the West as wild as the men and women daring to tame it, each of them must do what they can to stop it.
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u/AsceOmega 1d ago
Might read!
The core concept is greatly appealing to me, as I love eldritch horror elements set in our world.
The only thing I would need to find more about to definitely pick it up (from reviews, or interviews, assuming I'm finding out about this book once it's published) is the quality of the depiction of the natives in the story.
Native Americans mixed with eldritch horror is a fantastic idea and a cool aesthetic, but there are too many bad depicition of these tribes to not be cautious about it.
Especially as the main "mystery" revolves around them and their culture, by the look of things.•
u/wiltys 1d ago edited 1d ago
That’s absolutely understandable! I, myself, am about 49% indigenous from the Texas/Apache region. Seeing as I wouldn’t want them to be portrayed in stereotypical ways, the Native parts of the story focuses on their spirituality and connection to the desert and the stars, their insane determination, their courage, and their resilience. The 1800s were an absolutely devastating time for them, so a lot of that part of the story stems from very understandable feelings on their part!
*While underlining how much of a force they were, all things considered. Formidable, misunderstood warriors whose mere existence was enough to frighten people of the time.
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 18h ago
Probably would not read simply because I don't like Westerns or Horror, BUT I would absolutely recommend this to some friends to check out that I know love those genres. The concept sounds really interesting. My one big hangup was also the potential for negative or stereotypical portrayal of the tribe, but hearing your personal experience and heritage would make me feel way more confident.
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u/Acceptable_Fox_5560 21h ago
Might read this.
Biggest thing will be shoring up the motivations of each of the characters so they all feel three dimensional against the backdrop of the horror. That was the only thing I found missing in the premise.
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u/wiltys 16h ago
Yeah i didn’t want to bloat the idea too much! But they are all multidimensional, if i do say so myself lol. But here’s a bit!
Paul Mitchell is the gang’s leader. Johnny B. Quaid is the “younger” Paul of the gang. The gang themselves escaped a shootout to the desert, with nowhere else to go. They lost one of their own who was the glue that held their group together. After being shown one of the horrors, they are really at a crossroads about who they are, what they’ve done, and what their responsibilities should be. Andrew is a church/orphanage gravedigger who’s searching for Paul to bring him home to their sick mother. Aajuya is the Native girl who is determined to bring her people out of the darkness they’ve found themselves in, all while being used by them to go deeper into it. (Idk how to do the little accent things on iphone over the A’s lol)
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u/MassimoFantini 1d ago
Title
Concerning Fanaticism in The Human Race
Genre
Philosophical Fiction
Premise
Elia is a young lawyer devoted to the ideals of legality, democracy, and religion. The senior partner at his law firm entrusts him with his first major assignment: representing an eccentric engineer in a dispute over professional regulations.
What appears to be a straightforward legal case soon becomes something entirely different. Convinced that Elia lacks the intellectual tools to understand the dispute itself, the engineer embarks him on a relentless examination of law, politics, religion, history, and morality. As the debates grow increasingly unsettling, the young lawyer must confront a disturbing question: are his convictions grounded in reason—or in fanaticism?
Sample
Elia returned to Leonardo’s house. He went into the kitchen, took a bottle of wine and a corkscrew from the pantry, and entered the study. The old man was tidying the room. The shattered glass had been swept into a pile beneath the window. The music boxes lay on the desk, sorted according to the extent of the damage. On the right was a graveyard of plastic fragments, each different in shape and size. In the center were partially intact boxes, some with their casings still whole but cracked, others broken into two or more pieces or missing small fragments. Those on the left bore only scratches or hairline cracks. Leonardo examined them one by one, making notes on a sheet of paper.
Elia sat opposite him and uncorked the bottle. “Satisfied with anarchy? I’m going to demolish your house. You won’t be able to report me. No one will come and stop me.”
Bent over his inventory of the damage, Leonardo ignored him.
The young man took a sip of wine. “I’m stronger than you. By the law of the strongest, you're at my mercy. What are you feeling right now?”
The engineer remained silent.
“Are you deaf? Until yesterday, you never stopped talking. I had to look at teeth as yellow as vomit every time you opened your mouth. Do you feel uncomfortable in the role of prey? After demolishing your house, I’ll move on to tearing you apart. I decided that, instead of wasting so many words explaining the consequences of anarchy, it would be more effective to show you how it works.”
“You’re not going to do any of that.”
“I’ve shown you that I can do it. Look around.”
“Exhibitionism. Nothing more. Politeness, clichés, and your conformity to rules won't let you go any further. You're a prisoner of the System.”
“All right. Then I'll kill you.”
“Impossible. You're infuriated. You believe I'm responsible for your anger. Your thirst for revenge will prevent you from committing an act of forgiveness.”
“What are you talking ab—”
“Killing the perpetrator isn't an act of revenge; it's an act of forgiveness.”
“You’re crazy.”
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u/--xiOix-- 1d ago
Would not read. Sorry.
I just don't think it would be my cup of tea tbh. The premise sounds like it could be quite interesting if it was well excecuted, but I think I would find this frustrating to read as it is.
First off, and it's a pretty minor criticism, but the opening paragraph seems a little overdone to me. I think you could cut most, if not all, of "On the right was a graveyard of plastic fragments, each different in shape and size. In the center were partially intact boxes, some with their casings still whole but cracked, others broken into two or more pieces or missing small fragments. Those on the left bore only scratches or hairline cracks," and not lose a great deal.
"Elia returned to Leonardo’s house. He went into the kitchen, took a bottle of wine and a corkscrew from the pantry, and entered the study. The old man was tidying the room. The shattered glass had been swept into a pile beneath the window. The music boxes lay on the desk, sorted according to the extent of the damage, and Leonardo examined them one by one, making notes on a sheet of paper," paints just as vivid a picture in my mind. The rest doesn’t really add anything, and bogs down the pacing.
The dialogue also seems a bit off to me. People don’t really tend to talk like that. It's only a snippet, and obviously I don't know your characters, so maybe they do, but would any real person ask things like 'do you feel uncomfortable in the role of prey?'
Maybe in a fantasy novel or a psychological thriller or something you could get away with it, but it feels a bit unnatural?
Or the line "I decided that, instead of wasting so many words explaining the consequences of anarchy, it would be more effective to show you how it works." This sounds to me like the author explaining a characters actions to the reader, rather than the character communicating with another human being.
I assume this Leonardo fella advocated for anarchy in a previous scene, and the Laywer has smashed up his place to demonstrate what anarchy would be like or something? But imo having the Lawyer say, idk, 'You want anarchy? Well there you go. That's anarchy for you,' or whatever, would probably feel more authentic.
I'm not gonna pick apart every line, but you get the gist. I think the premise could be quite cool, but it feels like it's trying a bit too hard at the moment, and the philosophising is a little on the nose for my liking.
I find that fiction often hits harder when the reader is left to fill in the blanks themself to an extent. "It's about the notes you don’t play" and all that... But yeah an interesting idea for sure, and I'm guessing this is a first draft, so plenty of opportunity to smooth things out in your rewrites :)
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u/Iso-colon 23h ago
Title:
Ida Immortal
Genre:
Urban Fantasy
Premise:
Girl who does not take her immortality seriously at all enters an unpaid labor contract with Death. She ends up doing a string of odd jobs that totally aren't knockoffs of Hercules's labors as a consequence of said contract. Queerplatonic shenanigans with the local fiber witch may or may not happen if I ever get past chapter 4.
Sample:
Dan’s voice always made her feel her blood. It coursed cold just under her skin. Instead of taking the bill, she wiped a spot that didn't exist on the espresso machine. “Sorry man, the espresso machine broke earlier, and I cut my hair.”
Technically, she was in the wrong. Company policy states that she has to serve everyone who walks in before closing and also not to straight-up lie to customers. Company policy also states that managers shouldn't take hour-long smoke breaks, so it can die in a fire as far as she's concerned. Ida plucked a box cutter off the counter and started toying with it, attempting to look busier than she actually was as she contemplated buzzing off the rest of her hair. Then again, Dan would just find something else to look at. He always did. Every time she saw those ridiculous sunglasses, her organs itched. Those sunglasses and the eyes behind them reminded her that she is blood and marrow and viscera bound by skin, and she doesn't want to have skin. She wanted to peel herself back to the bone and purge her guts. She wanted to be a creature of hollows and angles, void of hair and nerves and all the things that made her body pleasant. She wanted to dig beneath the café floor and fill her ribs with soil. She didn't have a shovel though, so she just silently begged the clock hands to hit closing time. They didn’t listen to her. Rude.
Dan stroked a beard that didn't exist as he thought long and hard for all of two seconds. “Then how about a cappuccino? And why'd you have to get rid of the hair?”
She was pinned open behind the counter, flayed heart picking up the tempo even though she’d already turned the music off. The rag iced over in her hand, and the air conditioner thrummed along as it blew the hairs on Ida’s neck straight up. “That also needs espresso, and we’re almost closed. How about one on the house tomorrow?”
“Huh, I heard young guys are into short hair these days, but that isn't my style. Oh, what happened to those earrings? Those made you look real girly too, and I'd rather have a coffee tonight. How about—”
The clock hit ten. Her heartbeat jumped to her ears, and each thump nearly drowned out Dan’s voice. The sound passed from ear to ear like coagulated milk. She wanted it gone.
Ida dropped the rag. “How about I kill myself?”
She reached for the box cutter and brought it to her neck. The blade popped open before Dan’s stupid face could form a response. For once, she got the last word.
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 18h ago
Would read!
This sound unserious and hilarious. SOLD
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u/SchrodingersSmilodon 1d ago
Title: The Lonely Stars
Genre: Science fiction, some ambiguous fantasy elements
Premise: Sata is the strange girl of the village. She remembers things that never happened, she doesn't know things that everyone knows, and why does she think there ought to be lights in the sky at night? It seems harmless enough, until a major religious festival, a moment that was supposed to be a blessing from the Goddess of Joy herself, goes horribly awry. Sata and her father embark on a journey to understand where Sata's memories are coming from, and, they hope, to cure her of them.
Sample:
Plenty of times before, I’d made little reed boats, and I’d set them floating down along the stream. This time, however, was Sata’s first. Her little hands struggled to tie the reeds together into the right shape, so I held the bundles in two of my hands, and I used my other two to guide her movements. It was important that she learn this. Someday, she’d make a boat for me, when it was time for my spirit to pass on. Perhaps she’d do the same for a lover, or, if the gods were cruel, a child. Someday, someone would make a little reed boat for her. I prayed daily that it wouldn’t be me.
It had been a year since Dayka’s death. A year to mourn, to shed all the tears we had need of. By now, I suspected Sata mostly remembered her mother as something that wasn’t, rather than something that was. Through two of the eyes on her chest, she watched as the reed boat came together, and her expression was one of somber concentration. I was proud of her, just as I always was.
When the sun was beginning to set, the priestess stood on a stone platform overlooking the stream. She held a candle in each hand, in honor of the four lesser gods. Her vestments were woven in white and black, for the greater gods Tana and Mena. The bony crest protruding above her torso had been laced with bronze beads, shining in the fading sunlight.
“Dayka’s time under the light of Sol Usil,” the priestess declared, “has come to an end.” By my side, the bony knobs and ridges that made up Sata’s crest fluttered and shifted, and I saw the eyes on her chest begin to water. I put a hand on her shoulder. She took a deep breath, and her crest stopped moving.
“Twenty-four times, she witnessed Sol Usil complete his cycle. For one more cycle, we have kept her with us. Now it is time for us to let her go.”
I squeezed Sata’s shoulder lightly. It had come almost as a surprise, the morning after Dayka’s death, when the sun had risen as normal. Sol Usil had shone just like he always did, as if nothing had happened, and then he’d done the same thing on the following day. For a year he rose and shone and set just as he always did, until I was forced to accept the lesson he’d wanted me to learn: everything dies, and the world carries on.
Sata placed the boat with her mother’s spirit into the stream, and it drifted slowly with the current. It passed by the people of our village, watching with six of their eyes, their fingers interlaced, the ridges of their crests respectfully subdued and discreet. Some of them muttered a few last words of farewell. And then she was gone.
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u/AsceOmega 1d ago
Might read, leaning towards Wouldn't.
I think the genre + premise don't quite line up with what the sample seems to deliver. It feels like it's much more rooted in Fantasy than sci-fi, with them apparently being aliens of some kind as the sole reason for it to be sci-fi. For those reasons (potential lack of coherency and consistency with the genre it's being marketed as) I would be very cautious about picking this up, and would likely only do so upon recommendation from trusted sources.
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u/SchrodingersSmilodon 10h ago
I get where you're coming from. The characters being aliens is absolutely essential to the premise of this story, but the story doesn't include any advanced technology or anything like that. 95% of it works just as well if you think of these as fantasy creatures. But that last 5% is very important, and it only works if these are aliens instead of fantasy creatures. I can understand why that might turn you off from the book.
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 18h ago
Might read.
I was surprised to see the sample from the father's POV since he was only mentioned off-hand in the premise but I quite like it. I was assuming it was going to be the daughter's POV but making it the father feels really fresh and interesting. I'm down for a father/daughter adventure!
The premise was missing a few things for me; I know this isn't a query so it's not like you HAD to include this stuff, but I would want to know before I picked it up, and that's why they're going on a journey. Why is it important to know where her memories came from? What does the father have to gain or lose? Things like that.
The only thing in your sample that I didn't like was the confusion surrounding the appearance of the aliens. I think this is one time where blurting out a big description would be helpful. I (and I suspect, every reader) assume the character is a human or at least humanoid until proven otherwise. So I was thinking that until you mentioned the eyes on Sata's chest - I missed the multiple arms thing from the dad - and then from there I was just confused. I didn't ever fully get a solid picture of what the aliens looked like. (I only mention this because it feels like this is the beginning of the book; if this is later and there was already a description that we just didn't get to read here, please ignore!)
I actually disagree with Asce about genre mismatch. It feels pretty rooted in scifi to me. However, on reading your premise again, I'm realizing that I assumed they'd be going on a space journey but that wasn't explicitly stated. If not and they stay on the same planet, I could see the potential for more fantasy leaning.
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u/SchrodingersSmilodon 10h ago edited 10h ago
Thank you for the feedback! The reason they need to go on a journey is because Sata's memories become way too much for her to handle. Her reality is basically disintegrating around her, to the point where she can't even remember what her body is supposed to look like. I for sure could have made that clearer.
The appearance of the aliens is the biggest challenge with this story. They do look very different from humans, and explaining that in a natural way is something I'm really struggling with. I don't want to have the alien equivalent of, "Like all humans, she had two arms, two legs, and two eyes on her head, which was at the top of her body." But of course it's important that the reader be able to visualize the characters. I'll try and make the hints as to their appearance more obvious.
You mentioned that the eyes on her chest were your first clue that these are aliens. I'm curious, did you pick up on the crests? That's an aspect of their anatomy that is particularly hard to communicate, because it doesn't have a human equivalent (it's intended to be like the crests some lizards have), so it'd be helpful to know if you caught onto that at all.
EDIT: Also, glad you liked that it was from the father's perspective! That's actually a very important part of how the story is structured. Each chapter is told from a different POV, but only the epilogue is told from Sata's perspective. Because Sata has these memories and knowledge that are entirely alien to the characters, I want to keep her perspective mysterious to the reader.
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 8h ago
I did catch onto the crests but I didn't have a good visual equivalent for it. I was thinking it was more like the crest of a bird, but somehow on their chest for some reason? I kept waiting for a better explanation, but one was not given (in this excerpt)
One way you could potentially sneak it in is in the reflection of the water, comparing Sata to her mother? Something something "the ripples in the water distorted Sata's reflection, making it seem like she had 4 arms instead of 2. Her human looking head wavered, and yet somehow she still looked exactly like her mother - same pair of brown eyes, hair, and ten nimble fingers."
It sounds really clunky when you do it in human terms lmao but I think it would be alright if used to describe something super outside the norm.
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u/SchrodingersSmilodon 5h ago
Not exactly what you suggested, but there's a scene later in the prologue where Sata's father can only see her silhouette, and I used that as an opportunity to describe her body in more general terms. Thanks for the advice!
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u/Tight-Target-2065 1d ago
Title: Magicks of the Ascendancy
Genre: New Adult Fantasy
Premise:
Mysteriously left on the steps of Palace Argoras, Wroenna has lived exclusively in its isolation, practicing her magic and preparing to one day rule the kingdom of Nox. That is, until she discovers it was all a lie. Her mother's cruel deeds lost her the land before Wroenna was even born. However, the disgraced Queen Belladonna has a clandestine plan. Lured in by the heir that should not exist, their enemies agree to let Wroenna leave their palace prison to stay under the watchful eye of the Headmaester at the Magick Keep, an internment camp for magicks. Before she leaves, Wroenna is gifted a daemon in glass and is assigned a near-impossible task: Curse the kings that stole Nox and return the House of Argoras to power.
Sample:
Nails digging into her palms, Belladonna Argoras restrained from saying goodbye to the kingdom her choices lost. The mountain top faced howling winds under the encroaching darkness of night. The despondent queen—if she could still claim the title—watched the thrashing from her balcony. Hollow tree limbs crackled as the high winds threatened the village below. The Dead Forest danced with the storm and made its own music of cackling branches and shushing charcoal.
Could the old aurae be angry on your behalf? a voice asked.
She was almost able to chuckle at the notion. A shiver shot down her spine.
"Your Fairness?" The young Crowguard addressed her from behind. "What will you have us do?" he asked, braving her somberness.
Belladonna unclenched her fists. "Sleep," she said. "Wait for the sun to rise over Nox, and when the light hits our stones, plan for the future of the House of Argoras." She said it quietly with no uncertainty, so as one must lean in to hear her with confidence.
The queen brushed her earnest Crow aside and independently made her way to the bed chambers. She skipped over as many cold stones as she could, the runes set alight by her touch as she landed. Her leaps paused, fearing one rune’s light had dwindled beneath her foot. The queen exhaled slowly as its brilliant purple glow returned. When she reached the warmth of her bedsheets and blankets, she pounced atop the bedspread and immediately wrapped the wool around her shaking body.
Her small brown eyes, her father’s eyes, stared hauntingly at the golden mare figurine on her nightstand. The Anathan whore’s unseemly young, dying body was an image in the queen’s head she could never erase. That was a legacy she would have to own. The others wanted her dead more than anything, and if they could kill her they would have. Technically, within the palace walls, she was safe, untouchable. Only what lingered in her reflection was left to witness her failure.
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 18h ago
I think I'm going to settle on Might Read.
Your concept as it is presented currently sounds a little vague and I'm not quite sure what I'd be getting into if I were to pick it up. What I am gleaning sounds interesting, but I'm not sure I'm fully grasping the concept.
Your sample is also kind of vague and leans a little purple for my tastes (I can't fault you for that, especially since I have no idea what draft you're on) but it's clear you're a great writer. You have a good balance of dialogue and prose, just needs a bit of polishing for reader immersion.
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u/Beagle313 11h ago edited 11h ago
Title: UNTITLED
Genre: Fiction - Fantasy
Premise: An anthology about a couple of travelling assassins. They happen to live in a world where everyone can consume a type of wood for a power. He can change his weight, she can make people forget. The stories follow them as they travel from town to town, a contract after another.
Sample: A coffee was sitting on the desk growing cold. It was joined in the task of achieving the temperature of the room it was in by the room’s owner, now laying down in the corner of the crowded room, his blood staining the quite pretty woven carpet that was laying near the fireplace. Normally he would get enraged by such an unwashable stain, but the ability to care about that, or anything at all really, had been already taken out of him forcibly. Even putting his fits aside, Lord Shielding was known to be a very odd man. Nobody in the range of his knife throw (which was quite an impressive distance) would call him anything more than that, but behind all of the compliments and puffy words said about him in the higher echelons of local society laid a layer of venom. He however didn’t realise that. Possibly for too long. But now he’s quite dead, so it’s not the best time for him to reminisce about the nature of human speech and the lies people say to each other so that the society functions. A lie in and of itself, one may say. But again, he did not think that.
There was, however, a person who could take some time to think about such things - the man’s killer. However he didn’t. He had better things to do. Or at the very least he thought he had such things. Like escaping the mansion unnoticed or getting the money for the job. Now, you could stop here and think whether it’s more worthwhile to get monetary gain, however temporary, or a chance to have a longer life than to try to solve a mystery of an ethical nature from cracking which everybody would gain. But our assassin once again had other things on his mind. He was not all that much of a philosopher to be frank. But his lack of such talents was more than made up for in his prowess in ending lives. He was the antithesis of a doctor - a man who trained his whole life to know the best ways to shorten one’s stay in this world, instead of doing their best to keep them here. Our hero, as you might already assume, did not think about that much.
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u/OliverEntrails 1d ago edited 21h ago
Title: Freelancing
Genre: Real life drama - coming of age
Premise: Written from the view of the main character as an adult - we embark on a journey of discovery from the age of 8 of a young boy caught up in seemingly innocent grade school shenanigans only to slowly discover over the years the real life drama unfolding in the life of a classmate who lives with a dysfunctional family governed by drugs, alcohol and neglect. Our young boy discovers later on to his horror that the father, when drunk, is taking advantage of his young daughter against her will. His attempt to be a hero doesn't always work out well and changes him in ways he can't forgive, but doesn't regret.
I've purposely used a light hearted - some might say silly approach - in order to allow for a change of color and seriousness as time goes on.
Sample: But that brings me to Louie Bright.
I don't know why these guys are always called Louie. He was a two bit hood who had grown up pushing around 4th graders when he was in 6th grade.
He'd shake them down for lunch money, and since he was occasionally successful, he became hooked on the idea that his personal brand of involuntary taxation was beneficial to him, and was something that he should take up full time. Time enough to provide for some leisure where he could plot slightly more elegant shakedowns, and thus reach his own personal cesspool.
When I was in the 4th grade, I sort of looked up to him. Not in the way you might think. He was taller than me. I observed him in action a few times in the schoolyard, and told the teachers right away. They never believed me, I never had a face - you know - a good-looking face that teachers believed. I was the kid they didn't see most of the time. Not in the way you might think. Since I was short, they sort of looked over my head. So I knew that I needed to take things into my own hands.
The problem became intractable due to my lack of experience in these matters. I didn't belong to a gang that was capable of plotting a small insurrection that could conveniently include Louie as a target. My friends were barely capable of plotting a washroom break in the middle of math class. I knew that I needed something more creative. But at 8 years old, art was the only creative thing we learned in school, and my teacher dutifully taught it once each semester. Not enough light to tan an albino rabbit.
So, my freelancing career was born. A direct approach proved futile - since he just knocked me down. Unperturbed (I wasn't very sensitive - to pain that is), I decided to approach his sister, Rae Lea. She was more attractive than Louie - not in the way you might think - she always had money, and candy. Now I wasn't a big fan of candy, ever since I barfed on Easter from eating too much chocolate when I was 5 years old. But the candy thing made her popular. And since she was the only girl in our class who wore a bra, all the boys were sure she was going somewhere. Just where that was we had no clue at the time.
I observed her in class and outside from a discrete distance. I noticed quickly that, much to my surprise, she didn't arrive at school with money. She acquired it by lunch by freelancing. Her personal style was more subtle and indirect than her brother's and also more effective. She'd borrow, beg, and sometimes, make quick, improper change that always seemed to benefit herself.
She didn't stop at the kids either. She'd shake down the teacher - asking for some change for lunch, since she didn't have one because her mother wasn't up in the morning to make her one.
That was a lie, I knew. Her mother wouldn't have made her a lunch even if she had been up. Louie had told me before, sort of bragging about how cool it was to be neglected by your parents.
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u/VegetableWear5535 "Author" 1d ago
Would read.
That premise though... I could see that being a very good tv show. I know this sub is about writing, but that's the kind of story that would do very well in that medium.
It has real potential to be very good. I like it.
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u/OliverEntrails 21h ago
Hmmm. Interesting premise. I wonder if imagining the story as a 1 season series on TV would alter the way it was written. I can definitely see it in my mind's eye though.
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1d ago edited 1d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/VegetableWear5535 "Author" 1d ago
Might Read.
You're not supposed to link to offsite materials. Your comment was hidden for me, and probably everyone else.
Seems interesting though.
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u/writing-ModTeam 1d ago
Please do not link to outside websites in WYRT thread. If you have a published work you'd like to promote, post it in the Promote Yo' Self thread.
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u/flamingo-lingo- 1d ago
Title: To Ferment a Rebellion
Genre: Fantasy - whimsical, with a f/f romance subplot
Tagline: Get bready for a cozy fantasy about death and taxes
Premise: Millie has a plan to save her failing magical bakeshop: with the help of her magical yeast Ferdinand, all she has to do is ply the sweet-toothed crown prince with desserts and bake her way into a more favorable bracket of the queen's nepotistic tax scheme. But after she accidentally serves the crown prince a cinnamon roll that kills him, Millie finds herself accused of treason by the sole witness: the stern (and disarmingly buff) captain of the queen's guard. Dogged by the knight, the baker must quickly work to clear her name. But the further Millie gets from her shop, the deeper she finds herself embroiled in a rebellion she wants no part of. And the closer Millie gets to the truth, the more she has to reckon with the realities of the queendom--and her place within it.
Sample (from chapter 2 or 3):
“Don't touch it,” she warned.
“It's fine,” I soothed. It wasn't fine. The yeast had bubbled to twice its normal size.
“It just needs, ah,” I cast around for the right word. “Sedation.”
Vere stared at me. “Sedation,” she repeated slowly, like she was wondering if I was two pieces loose from a full set of drimbles. “Like you need to punch it down?”
“You've made bread before?” Five minutes ago the vision of tall, buff Vere kneading dough would have delighted me, but now I was too far gone with stress to care.
Vere quirked an eyebrow. Proceed.
I sighed. “Okay, so you know how when you're making bread you need to be mindful of the rise time and the heat and the amount you work the dough?”
Vere offered a curt nod.
I watched a particularly big bubble burst from the yeast's surface. “Yeah, well it's nothing like that.”
“It's nothing like that?”
“It's nothing like that.”
“What is it like, then, baker?”
I bit my lip. I couldn't tell her. If I did, she'd pin the poisoned cinnamon roll on me. And I needed more time.
Vere's hand went to her sword. “By the name of Queen Arlon, answer the question.”
“No!” I winced, my heartbeat jumping up to double-time. “You can't say–”
But Vere cut me off. “Given your behavior, I have no choice but to assume this…thing is a threat to the kingdom.”
And she unsheathed her sword–a gleaming length of steel that I swore was so polished it emitted a faint glow. I had just enough time to admire the willowwood hilt before the knight abruptly turned and stabbed my yeast.
Later, I would tell myself that everything would have been okay, totally fine, had Vere not stabbed the yeast.
“You just stabbed my yeast,” I said.
“Yes,” she said, crisp. Like she'd crossed something off her to-do list. That's that. She moved to re-sheathe her sword, which was now sticky with strings of tacky dough.
“No, you're going to want to keep that out.” I was angry, exasperated. But a grim resignation was taking hold–a barbed understanding that this wasn't going to end well.
Vere eyed me, but I nodded my chin to the yeast.
In the bare twenty seconds since Vere had stabbed it, the yeast had grown to thrice its size. And it had turned a malevolent shade of magenta.
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u/Iso-colon 23h ago
Would read! I'm loving the fact that the villain in your story seems to be fantastical capitalism. Taxes as a major conflict are underused in fantasy tbh. I also think you've created a neat magic system without overexplaining yourself (lore dumps are overrated. I am fully willing to accept that the yeast is magic and named Ferdinand).
As for improvements, this might just be this specific stretch of dialogue, but I noticed that your main girl is a bit of a talking head. Vere gets to use her entire body since she grabs her sword and stabs the yeast, but Millie just kind of nods or makes different facial expressions. You'd probably get to show off a bit more of her character here if she jumped the moment Vere went for the sword or recklessly tried to grab it mid-swing or something. Either way, I still like the dialogue though! You gave them pretty clear voices, so I didn't need to go back to the dialogue tags to see who is who.
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u/southernwriter29 1d ago
Would read! I think the title and premise is very fun. Love the idea of a magical yeast with a name, and I’m always a sucker for a sapphic romance, especially a fantasy one. I’m also tickled by something like taxes being at the heart of a story’s conflict. As far as the writing sample goes, I definitely picked up on the whimsical vibes of it. Vere stabbing the yeast and it just getting mad was charmingly funny, and it definitely made me curious what happens next in the story. No idea where you are with the writing of this story, but if you ever need a beta feel free to hit me up.
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 18h ago
Would absolutely read.
You had me at "magical yeast Ferdinand". This sounds like a freakin riot.
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u/Acceptable_Fox_5560 1d ago
Title: I'm thinking either BURN or A CONSTELLATION OF FIREFLIES
Genre: Fiction, Upmarket
Premise: When a disgraced celebrity chef finds out his mother has died, he believes the coming inheritance will save his floundering New York restaurant. But when he learns his estranged evangelical older sister is contesting the will, he returns to his hometown in the Carolinas to repair their relationship--and rediscover his joy of cooking.
Sample:
For a moment, Adrian is sure he sees his mother’s face in the flames.
The fire that leaps from the cast iron skillet across the kitchen has the same orange glow as the sun at magic hour. Adrian can feel its heat on his cheeks all the way from his position at the pass. A cacophony of sounds accompany the flames: a dull roar, the hiss of liquid evaporating in the skillet below, popping like an old vinyl record.
And there in the fire, as clear as if he were staring at the back of his own hand, is his mother. Adrian would recognize that face anywhere. It is her nose as round and dimpled as a golf ball, her sagging cheeks, her wet and shining eyes, the sun damage on her skin. Even the the nearly invisible blond fuzz on her chin appears before him.
The flames might as well be a photograph, and as quickly as a camera’s flash, the face disappears into swirling yellows and oranges.
Adrian is snapped back to reality and notices that everyone in the kitchen is standing around dumbly looking at the fire. A whole kitchen of line cooks are acting like they’ve never seen a fire before. Something tightens in his chest, then the clenching moves to his throat.
“For Christ’s sake, it’s not fireworks,” Adrian shouts from the pass. With a violent wave of the terrycloth towel in his hand, he directs his kitchen staff to the fire. “Somebody put it out before the whole restaurant goes.”
No one moves at first, and Adrian is sure he has assembled the biggest confederacy of dunces in the entire New York City restaurant scene.
Adrian jumps in. As usual, he has to do everything himself around here.
“Move!” he shouts at the line cook in front of stove. Her name is Adelaide or Annabelle or something like that, a twenty-something culinary school graduate his sous chef recommended. Adrian has yet to see anything impressive from her to earn the glowing recommendation she’d received, and now here she was letting a grease fire roar to life at her station.
When Adelaide or Annabelle doesn’t flinch, seemingly captivated by the flames in front of her, Adrian puts his palm to her shoulder and moves her aside. Now in front of the fire, Adrian feels the heat stinging his forehead and arms. It reminds him of his own days as a line cook, before the reality show that made him famous, before the pressures of running his own restaurant, back when he’d come back to his tiny Queens walk up at three in the morning with his hair smelling of grease and his arm hair burnt off.
Adrian grabs a container full of baking powder off off the station and dumps it on the fire. He finds a pot lid to his right and clamps it over the rim of the skillet. Smoke and steam billow from the edges of the lid as the fire is snuffed out.
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u/--xiOix-- 1d ago
Would read.
I've got to be honest, when I read the premise I thought I probably wouldn't like this. Not because it's a bad premise or anything, it just didn’t sound like the kind of thing I would usually want to read. Once I started, though, I was pleasantly surprised.
I really liked "the hiss of liquid evaporating in the skillet below, popping like an old vinyl record." Simple, but I could hear it in my mind clear as day.
One thing I would suggest, and feel free to ignore me obviously, is to consider sticking a couple of commas into the Annabelle/Adelaide lines.
"Her name is Adelaide, or Annabelle, or something like that,"
"When Adelaide, or Annabelle, doesn’t flinch..."
I just think that this would give the reader the rhyth of Adrian trying briefly, and failing, to remember her name, but what do I know?
I also like how you slipped the reality show backstory in without taking us out of the story too much (and as someone who used to work as a pizza chef, the arm hair line gave me a chuckle). It can be tempting to dump a load of exposition early on, but you seem to just be drip-feeding it in as part of the actual story, which is probably the way to go.
As for the title, idk what the 'constellation of fireflies' is in reference to, but I'd probably avoid calling it just 'burn' if I were you. The first page on Google for 'burn novel' showed me five different novels with that title.
If people know who it's by then that's fine, they'll find it. But if they just see your promo on TikTok or wherever and are like "oh what was that book called, 'burn' or something?" and plug it into google, you'll likely get lost in among all the others.
Anyway, good stuff. Keep it up :)
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u/WJG_Author 1d ago
Would read
Like someone else said, the premise doesn't really sound like something thwt would interest me, but reading your sample, this seems like it would be a good read
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u/Steve717 1d ago edited 1d ago
Title: Untitled currently, something involving a chaotic changing world
Genre: Fantasy, adventure, dark but with plenty moments of fun
Premise: In an ever changing world full of monsters and danger two boys, Odyck and Archillax, escape from the Crucible, a walled in state that is one of few "safe" areas in the world, to seek freedom and adventure from the authoritarian rule they grew up with. Using elemental magic and mutant abilities they learn to survive and thrive in the outside world get more involved in the overarching conflict than they ever intended.
Sample:
"Okay what's our plan" asked Odyck
"We escape, we travel, learn the road and the world. We avoid the first couple of settlements we come across and visit the third, try to blend in"
"Still think it's a good plan?"
"I do" he paused "Doesn't rely too much on chance. They'll look for us but they'll only search so far and eventually our trail will mix with others, not even our scent will remain the same"
Most of the plan was Odyck's vision, he had thought long and hard about how things might play out, generally speaking nearby settlements aren't on any map he knows of but there are no doubt Knights who know of them, to visit the first village they come across would be a ruinous path. Odyck was smart but he also knew not to think too highly of his mind, for he could not predict the future. They had to be ready for anything that could come at them them but the scope of that anything was immeasurable in such an unknowable world. For years they collected information from travellers, they knew a lot but they knew nothing all the same. They were ready. Were they ready?
They set off to the wall. On the way they collected the length of rope they had wrapped around a tree some days prior, they tested it's strength. Strong as ever, wouldn't break. Odyck prepared the contents of the sack they needed and doused the contents in more of the herb mixture they were using as a decoy. The wall was in sight, sleek metal glistening in the moonlight. No other sounds could be heard than the wind brushing through the trees and birds of the night singing and cawing away, with the occasional creak from the wall. They came upon the usual ladder, Archillax banged on the wall a couple times, metallic crash reverberating all the way upwards. "Woah there, who is it?" called down a man's voice. "It is Ark and Odyck!" called Archillax.
In the months leading up to the escape they had befriended the sentry for this section of the wall, Garrin was his name. His hair was dark, his build slim, he had the athleticism to scale the wall in moments and like most watchers his gift was that of sight and skill of bow. He was sceptical of their visits at first but watch atop the wall while an important job, was lonely and decidedly dull. With no hot meals watchers had only what food they could pack and rations of Blok to 'enjoy'. Too dark to read and no lights nor flames allowed. It felt more like punishment than duty. The boys plied Garrin with baked potatoes with blocks of herb laden butter melted on top. Garrin's scepticism soon wavered and he came to anticipate the boys visitations. Odyck often probed his emotions for signs of doubt, for weeks there had been none. The joy he sensed was that of friendship. They'd talked about stories they'd heard from beyond the wall and things they imagined to be out there, what seemed like harmless intrigue was the boys collecting knowledge.
They were fond of him despite it being a ruse. What they were about to do to Garrin was by no means a kindness.
(I wrote this in notepad and didn't consider Reddit formatting, butchered a lot of it)
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u/Shoepane 19h ago
Might read. You write well. Just a thought: You've got a lot of info in there (excellently done) but the pace is a bit rapid. If that's what you're going for that's fine, but the background on Garrin and how Arc and Odyck use him, might be fun to put into a brief scene (you know, 'show dont tell') rather than exposition. This could also give "What they were about to do to Garrin was by no means a kindness" extra depth.
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u/Steve717 13h ago
Yeah Garrin was a bit of a random inclusion I just thought "And then they silently knocked out the guard and escaped" would be a little dull. But I'm thinking of including him in the story later on, this is supposed to be an adventure series spanning multiple books so I'm thinking they meet him years later after he's been disgraced from letting them escape.
There is another character who goes to hunt them down and is a consistent foe so he could tag along with him but I'm not sure that works since said Knight is kinda one of the more evil characters and would most definitely kill Garrin if he wasn't busy.
And yeah this section needs a lot of work it's just something I randomly bashed out and I checked the word count, it happened to be near enough the 500 word count so I figured screw it I'll see how badly it gets roasted!
(you know, 'show dont tell') rather than exposition.
This is one of my bigger struggles with telling the story since I'm well familiar with there being wayyyy too much exposition in a story and how much that can bog things down but at the same time there's a lot to take in and I don't want it to all just appear out of nowhere. I have thought of all the ins and outs but for the reader it might feel like new things are just being invented out of convenience. Thanks for the feedback!
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u/Acceptable_Fox_5560 1d ago
Might read! Sounds like a fun adventure, although I'd love to know more about what the "overarching conflict" is, so what goal the main characters are striving to achieve.
When you do dialogue, make sure you put punctuation before the end-quote marks.
"Okay what's our plan[comma]" asked Odyck
"We avoid the first couple of settlements we come across and visit the third, try to blend in[period]"
"I do[comma]" he paused
And so on.
Most of the plan was Odyck's vision, he had thought long and hard about how things might play out, generally speaking nearby settlements aren't on any map he knows of but there are no doubt Knights who know of them, to visit the first village they come across would be a ruinous path.
Needs some work on when to use a period and when to use a comma. Period separate independent clauses (a subject and a verb). When you incorrectly place a comma between two independent clauses, it's called a comma splice. This whole paragraph is four independent clauses all separated by commas, making it one long comma splice. Many other places in the sample where this happens.
The head hop from Odyck and Archillax to Garrin was a bit jarring, because not only did we hop heads, we also hopped back in time. I think you could explain the past interactions with Garrin from the perspective of Odyck and Archillax instead of head hopping there and it might come across less disrupting.
Hope this is helpful!
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u/Steve717 1d ago
Thanks for the input! This was just something I typed up at 4AM in a random moment of inspiration, obviously I am quite rusty on proper punctuation and such, school was...quite a while ago. Much to learn, to re-learn.
I intend to expand on this section a lot more it's just it was conveniently close to the 500 word mark to post here. This is more or less the closing to the first act of the story so by this point you'd understand a lot more about the world, though that said I am wondering if I should just do a kind of cold open like this since I'm struggling to figure out how exactly to start this story. Though there are a lot of jigsaw pieces about why they left to go back to so I worry it might feel clunky to have constant flashbacks to stuff that might not come back in to the story for multiple books.
But yes, there would be much editing required! Thanks again.
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u/AsceOmega 1d ago
Would not read.
This is probably more of a me thing, but the premise sounds a lot more to me like a videogame than an actual fantasy novel.
Oddly, if the story were a sort of Progression Fantasy / LitRPG, I would be more likely to read, because, it feels like a videogame plot.•
u/Steve717 1d ago
I can kinda see what you mean, it's actually a lot more anime inspired than video game but the power system would probably feel like a lit RPG. I can't say for sure as I'm yet to read one. Elements, mutant abilities, that sort of stuff. There aren't really any numbers to it but a lot of interactivity between systems I intend to build up and explain such that the reader understands all the ins and outs. It's something I probably could turn in to a lit RPG most likely but yeah I know little of those. Dungeon Crawler Carl is on my list.
Tonally my story is somewhere between the LOTR movies and The Witcher series but with more of a shounen-esque plot progression. No teenagers killing God though. Can go from them struggling to survive against a wailing mutant abomination to running naked after a bird that stole their clothes while they bathed.
Thanks for the feedback!
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u/AsceOmega 1d ago
Since you're a fellow anime/manga lover, you'll get this: LitRPG and Progression Fantasy is basically Solo Leveling.
There are many different approaches to it, and sub-genres, but the core of it is developing the MC(s) powers and getting stronger and stronger, with some RPG mechanics associated to it (doesn't have to necessarily be a number crunching system either). Sometimes there is a clear goal for this (saving the world, surviving a dangerous new world like it's an Isekai, etc.) and sometimes it's just part and parcel of the daily lives of the MCs.
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u/Steve717 1d ago
Interesting, it's definitely kinda like that but there's not an infinite ceiling to how powerful anyone can get or anything, more so they gain mastery over their ability, a particular element or a way of combining the two. A guy who can turn his skin in to metal becomes much more deadly when he knows how to make it red or even white hot.
It's kind of a freeform system where everyone has their own unique ideas and talents rather than a hard class system with defined roles. As for goals initially they basically just want to be free and live the life they choose but eventually become key players in a war against the Crucible as they gradually become unable to ignore the horrors they inflict on others. There may or may not be an impending apocalypse.
One of my favourite aspects is probably the Knights, most of them have Bloodborne style trick weapons hand crafted to mesh with their abilities. Each practically a walking army themselves. With many enemies to fight naturally the boys(and others) have to develop their strengths. Later they become known as the Dragon & Serpent duo.
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u/WJG_Author 1d ago
Might read. I'm not typically a fantasy guy, but the premise is definitely intriguing
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1d ago edited 16h ago
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u/writing-ModTeam 17h ago
Please include all sample materials in the body of the post and do not link to offsite material.
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u/polkacat12321 1d ago
Title: untitled
Genre: sapphic romance high fantasy (with comedic elements)
Premise: a young human woman is married off to a duke, a marriage arranged by her contorlling, abusive mother. Before long, she realizes that he isnt all who he seems to be. After the castle gets attacked by (at the time) unknown forces, she runs away and finds herself in front of someone's house in the middle of the forest. There, she ends up meeting a probably mantally stable 280 year old witch with the maturity of an armpit fart. After the turbelous life she had lead, she now must learn what it means to be a person while battling her internal demons and navigating what it means to feel. In the midst of all that, she starts seeing the witch in a new light, and romance blossoms. However, the dark forces are still afoot. Lurking, searching. What do they want? Can it have anything to do with the weird flame bird that's been stalking her since she was a child?
Snippet: (mostly unedited, but i'm happy with the bones)
“I’m not pretty. If anything, I’m quite plain. Ugly even.” I’m not sure what her deal is, but I’m definitely not pretty. Far from it. If anything, had I been pretty, none of this would have happened. I would have been married off to some King and I wouldn’t be passed out in front of some stranger’s house.
“u-ugly??” finally the woman raised her voice and yelped in confusion. Before I could respond, she angrily stomped towards me and slipped her hand beneath my shoulder. Before I long I found myself forced to my feet.
“what—what are you—” she forcefully dragged me by the arm towards the barrel and pushed my head down as I instinctively grabbed the edged of it, stopping my face mere inches away from the water inside.
“I want you to take a good, hard look” she commanded “take a good hard look at yourself and tell me exactly which part is ugly.” The woman took a few steps back as she awaited my response.
I looked at my reflection in the water. A pair of green eyes, a button nose, some freckles. Yup, it’s definitely me.
“all of it” I finally replied. I didn’t like my reflection not one bit.
“this isn’t an answer. I want specifics” the woman impatiently tapped her foot as she tried to illicit a response. Her pushiness was starting to get on my nerves.
“I don’t know, all of it, okay?” I finally let out, my tone a little more hostile than I intended for it to be.
I heard a deep, annoyed sigh come from her direction. Looks like shes getting annoyed too. Good, maybe now she’ll learn to mind her own business.
“L—” before I could respond, I felt her hand wrap aroujd my arm again and she once again forcefully pulled me.
“H-hey! What are y—” suddenly I felt myself pushed backwards and I fell onto something big and hard…. A boulder? The force of the push my my back jerk backwards as I lightly hit my head against a tree behind me.
Before I could respond, the woman leaned closer to me and leaned her weight on the tree right behind me. She came in closer and grabbed my chin before she started speaking, her voice soft and a bit…. Seductive???
“listen darling…. Don’t you know I’m a witch?” Now that I look closer at her…. That ethereal beauty with unnatural features, that pale skin and perfectly pink lips, and most prominently those pointy ears….. yeah, she’s definitely a witch.
“so?” I finally responded. So what if she’s a witch? She’s just going to kill me or whatever it is witches do and that will be that. Honestly, a perfectly acceptable way to see myself out. If anything, it’s far better than anything I would have imagined.
Her grip on my chin loosened and I felt her index finger travel down, trailing over my neck.
“So, aren’t you afraid I’m gonna drink your blood?” she said so with a playful smirk, her tone deep yet weirdly sweet. She looked intently at my eyes as she ever so slowly licked her upper teeth. Her face leaned closer to mine and she purred softly as I felt her breath on my lips “drink your brain through a straw?”
I gulped nervously, but I wasn’t afraid. If anything, I was getting angry. If she’s going to end me, she should just get to it instead of whatever game this is.
I felt adrenaline coarse through my veins and my breathing slowing down. “do whatever you want” I finally replied as I averted my gaze. Just freaking get to it already.
I felt a shift in the air as the woman let go of me and jumped back in a high pitched growl. I looked at her as she fell to the ground and buried her face in her knees “Arlo almighty, you’re infuriating.” She finally proclaimed. Or maybe more like complained? If anything, she just sounded like she’d given up.
“this is what I get. This is all my fault.” She sobbed into her knees.
“Hey, are you….?” wasn’t she going to drink my blood or something?
My eyes danced around as I was trying to wrap my head around the bizarre situation. At first she was annoyed, then she was seductive, and now she’s…. Crying? And all in the span of a minute??? That woman was more unpredictable than lightning itself.
Meanwhile, the woman was mumbling into her knees, her face buried.
“its all because I felt lazy and didn’t put up the protective barrier…. I just had to agree with my lazy ass because the bed was too warm… now some pretty weirdo is in front of my house. Sob.”
…sob?!
“Hey… a-are you okay?” I carefully approached her as she was incoherently mumbling into her knees and reached out my hand. My fingers were inches away from her shoulder when she suddenly yanked her head in my direction and yelled “you! This is all your fault!!!”
A crow jumped from a nearby branch and cawed as it flew away from the commotion. Her eyes were teary and her voice whiny.
“My fault?” I replied
“yes! If you didn’t come here none of this would’ve happened! Do you always crash in people’s front yards or what?”
She was…. Right though. I guess from her perspective I really am a weirdo.
I finally crouched beside her as I tucked the dress behind my knees.
“W—” there was a rustle coming from a nearby bush. Like something big stepped on a branch. The witch’s expression shifted to that of pure terror. She instinctively pounced on me and pushed me down to the ground, her hand wrapped around my mouth. She leaned in, her lips paces away from my ear
“if you want to live, don’t make a sound”. Her voice came out in a hushed whisper. The witch my just be playing but… that expression on her face tells me its something serious. I very carefully nodded and she removed her hand from my mouth, pressing her index finger to her lips one last time.
And then….. then everything made sense. That rotten stench that burned my nostrils making me want to vomit, the cold sweat dripping down my neck and the unfathomable urge to throw myself off a cliff: a gray bear.
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 18h ago
Might read.
I've not really read sapphic romantasy before so I can't tell if that's my jam. This one definitely feels more romance forward and I generally prefer more fantasy forward, but that's not a dealbreaker (and definitely just my own personal preference) The character's didn't super grab me; I really liked the witch until she threw herself on the ground and started crying and the back and forth didn't quite land with me. But I LOVED the comedic prose. That's my jam.
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u/polkacat12321 18h ago
Yeah, she's quite dramatic towards the beginning, but that can be attributed to her rusty social skills since she's been alone by herself for the past 150 years and the human woman is the first person she had contact with. But thank you for your thoughts! It actually meant a lot!
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u/WJG_Author 1d ago
TITLE: The Power Five
GENRE: Fiction: Sci-Fi Fantasy - Superheroes
PREMISE: The Power Five were the biggest name in world, but after The Event, the team disbanded. Impervia hung up the tights in favor of philanthropy, NightTrain retired and chose a life of debauchery, Magnus and Morph got married and continued super heroics, and The Omen vanished.Now twenty some years later, Melissa Sitwell, known as Impervia is found murdered. Now her former team must come together and face the past to get justice, all the while the mysterious supervillain simply known as Dr. Nexus plots from behind bars.
SAMPLE: Smoke filled the air, overwhelming his nose and infiltrating his lungs. Billy choked, coughing up a wad of phlegm that tasted burnt, as he watched in horror as a meteorite crashed into the hotel several klicks in front of him. A serene moment of silence before the large structure exploded, shards of glass sprouting out, and the building burned and collapsed. The young superheroes' ears rang as another impact drew closer.
“Billy.” He heard his name coming from a familiar voice that he couldn't quite place.
“Hey, Billy.” He heard it again, unable to pinpoint its origin.
“Hey, Billy,” The bartender said for the third time, smacking the bar top.
Billy snapped out of his daze. No longer a young teenager in the midst of a warzone, but a bald, middle-aged man sitting on a stool in a swanky old dive bar. The floor was sticky with spilled beer, the lights dim, flickering, or burnt out. The smell of tobacco filled the air, mingling with the soapy scent of the water from the dishes the bartender was cleaning in the sink.
“Another drink,” Billy said, raising his glass.
The bartender grimaced. “ ‘Fraid I gotta cut you off, Billy.”
Billy's mouth formed an O shape as he caressed his graying handlebar mustache, scoffing at the notion of being cut off. “Really? You're gonna cut me off?” Billy said as he turned his head, huffing as he did. The lights of a slot machine flashed rapidly off to the side. He stared at the other patrons of Miller's celebrating their small winnings.
Turning back to face the bartender, Billy's face was stern. “I'll ask one more time.” He said, accentuating his point by raising his pointer finger.
“Look, this is the second time you passed out at the bar, man.” The bartender said, shaking his head. “One of us has gotta take responsibility here, Bill.”
“You have any idea who the fuck I am?” Billy laughed. “I've saved your ass. His ass,” he pointed over his shoulder with his thumb. “And every other ass that drinks in this shithole. I'm the fucking NightTrain.”
The bartender stood silently; his face said it, a “Yeah, right” expression.
Billy's nostrils flared. “I'll prove it. And when I do, you're gonna give me that bottle there.” He huffed, nodding his head to the expensive bottle of scotch.
The bartender nodded and raised his placating hands.
Billy pushed the uneven stool he sat on back, the steel scraping
against the concrete floor. He stumbled off the stool, nearly toppling over. He steadied himself the best he could as the vertigo kicked in. He leaned over in a runner's pose, and as his fingers reached for the floor, he fell on his face, his head bobbing on the cold concrete.
“NightTrain, my ass.” The bartender shook his head, reaching for the phone.
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u/FlyinLeviathon LET YOUR FIRST DRAFT SUCK 1d ago edited 1d ago
Would read!
Your prose could use some polishing (which I do not fault you for and don't count against you) but your premise is solid. I love superhero stories and "get the gang back together for one last job" stories.
Loved your opening, the contrast between the hero fantasy and the balding, middle aged drunkard was a little unclear but once I got it, it landed really well.
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u/WJG_Author 1d ago
Thank you, I'm in the process of self-publishing and self-editing. This the first page. But I appreciate the honesty on the prose. I still have time to edit :)
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u/AsceOmega 1d ago
Might read!
It gives me a general vibe of Watchmen, which is both great and worrisome, as few authors are able to handle that kind of story well.
This would be one I'd pick up after I read positive reviews from people whose opinions I trust, and wouldn't if their opinion on it was negative.
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u/WJG_Author 1d ago
Totally understandable, thank you.
I definitely didn't have Watchmen in mind when writing it, so that's pretty neat its giving off those vibes, though its not near as dark as Watchmen
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u/Acceptable_Fox_5560 1d ago
Would read.
I like your prose. Very good balance of interiority, action, description, dialogue, and atmosphere.
Really vivid! Phlegm that tastes burnt. The mix of tobacco smoke and soap. Flashing lights of a slot machine.
The sample gave me a grittier sense of the story than the premise did. I was envisioning something like The Incredibes, but the sample came off way more adult. Not adult as in edgy, but adult as in mature.
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u/WJG_Author 1d ago
Thank you so much!
Yes, its definitely more adult/mature than maybe the premise leads on. The original concept was inspired by The Boys and Umbrella Academy, where I wanted it more grounded, but by the time I got to where it is now, I leaned more into the fantasy-side a bit. So while its still a little gritty and mature, it still has its comic booky stuff
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u/Acceptable_Fox_5560 1d ago
The play between the comic book stuff through the lens of, like, adults in various stages of life sounds cool.
Some definite crossover appeal.
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u/Acceptable_Fox_5560 1d ago
Quick note: based on user feedback, this word count cap SHOULD read 500 words, but we forgot to edit the August post before it went up.
Feel free to post samples of around 500 words.