Workshop: Prelude to Souls

[Rayleigh]

Name of Completed Thread: Prelude to Souls (http://www.althanas.com/world/showthread.php?30611-Prelude-to-Souls)
Name of Authors: Kryos
Type of Thread: Quest
Thread Length: 8 Posts
Feedback Rewards: (Post Length of Thread/10) * ((EXP Needed to Level)*0.05) EXP
Date Closed: April 3, 2017

Critique Guidelines:

1.) Standard rules for etiquette apply. No spamming or off-topic posts, no personal attacks or trolling. Focus on critiquing the thread, not the writer. Use constructive criticism and try to speak in terms of "strengths" and "weaknesses". For example: "Your story was strong, but the action seemed a little weak. Try using more adverbs to describe actions or use a thesaurus to spice up your word choice."

2.) Likewise, those who have asked for a workshop should take criticism gracefully. Use it to better yourself. These are not intended to offend or belittle, only show you opportunities to grow.

3.) If at any point you notice improper conduct, contact an administrator immediately. Bullying of any kind will not be tolerated. Arguing will also be regulated heavily. Polite, constructive debate is permitted within reason.

4.) In order to receive EXP & GP for your feedback (see Workshop Guide), a critique must be helpful, elaborate, and considerate. It is suggested that the review be at least 3 paragraphs and focus on strengths, weaknesses, and overall content. You may use the Althanas Rubric as a guide.

5.)Those that leave an exceptionally detailed review with plenty of constructive advice may be eligible for double rewards. This will be up to the posting judge's discretion. The authors of the thread may request the additional reward be given if they found a review to be particularly helpful. The request must still be approved.

[Wings of Endymion]

Hi Kryos,

I've been looking forward to this one ever since you started writing it. Let me begin by saying it's good to see you back and writing again!

With no further ado...


***

Story: First of all, great use of a narrative hook. The first few sentences of your story proper drew me in, in particular your description of the beast and the sound and scent of its captivity, and the fact that Kryos 'marvelled' at it told me a lot about his character with only a few words. To complement this successful use of imagery and characterisation, though, I would make the following two suggestions:


Frayed feathers erupted from the scaly flesh, at least in most areas.

"At least in most areas" is a weak phrase. I would combine it with your next sentence, which explains what you mean a lot better. Which leads to...


Over the neck, breast, and most of the legs there was the lack of the reptilian skin;

This phrase stuck out in your first paragraph, because alone of your descriptions it was passive and lacked impact. Hence, how about...


Frayed feathers erupted from the scaly flesh on its back. Upon the bare neck, breast, and much of the legs, newly created muscles and tendons instead...

In one stroke you clarify your meaning and tighten up your opening paragraph. I realise this is a bit nitpicky, but please forgive me - this is the first paragraph of your story, which absolutely has to grab your reader, and it was very well written other than these two points.

As a reintroduction of Kryos to Althanas, your story certainly did its job - sowing the seeds of future plot lines with hints of Kryos's recovering memory, the means by which Maeril is keeping him alive, his struggle to understand souls, and mentions of Gilgalion, Madison Freebird, and Ingwe. One could possibly argue that your story doesn't quite feel complete - it's very much an introduction - but Kryos certainly does undergo development in between the two rituals you depict in the thread, and you end the tale on an uplifting, forward-looking note that left me satisfied and looking forward to the next step.

Your reveals throughout the thread were well-timed. I also quite appreciated the fact that Kryos didn't have it all his way, and in particular he started to conflict with Maeril and his lieutenants after regaining more of his memory. I spotted one or two minor continuity errors - for example, Kryos sat down twice in the first post - but didn't find them too much of a distraction.


Background: As I said above, you did a great job of setting your story in initial paragraph: in sight, in scent, and in sound. Your description of Trenyce was apt, as was your reasoning why Maeril would have left it rubbled - kudos! - and I liked the way you walked Kryos through the city rather than just described it passively. Your settings felt vivid and alive, but while I'm nitpicking, I might encourage you towards the end of the thread to keep up the interaction with smell, sound, taste, and props as well as you did with visual cues. As classic examples, the stench of blood during the battle, or the taste of apprehension on his tongue during his showdown with Maeril; in the last three posts or so, you focused more on the visual and less on the other senses, which was a bit of a shame as they were so well done during the early parts of the thread.

It's also very heartening to see that you did thorough research of the current situation in Raiaera, and that said research shines clearly through your writing. From Archivist to mention of Xem'zund's true character, from Beinost and Anebrilith to Mirdan Timbreth and the Plaguelands, I really got the sense that Kryos was doing his utmost to study the situation in Raiaera and to use it to his advantage when possible. Well done.

My suggestions in this category, then, would be in the small details. For example, you missed a grand opportunity to add flavour to the Dwiilar in your third post, when you open with "February 20th, 1815". Do they really use the Earth calendar with the Raiaeran year-counting system? Another example is in post four, where you state (while purifying the water): "While it didn’t do much for the taste, it beat the alternative." An easy way to gain setting points would be to spell out this alternative: is it gutrot? The Raiaeran Retches? Maeril's Maladorous Malady of Many Mutations? These small details are a great way to build up the world around Kryos, and would be a nice way to build on your obviously expert grasp of setting and Althanas in your next thread.


Characters: I repeat myself again - great characterisation of Kryos in your initial paragraph: the use of the word 'marvelled' really serves to define him here. Good use of Madison Freebird and Ingwe as well to contrast Kryos, with the line "silence the only acknowledgement either of them needed" really sticking in my mind. It's a shame that you didn't touch upon them in your ending, just to bring things full circle, but I can understand that Kryos is looking forwards at that stage with regaining portions of his memories and his freedom.

Amnesia as a reason for working with the enemy is a trope that's quite effective when used correctly, and I think you did a good job here in showing his circumstances first, then relating them directly from his point of view, and finally depicting him trying to overcome them through dream and associative memory. Then you hinted that Maeril has some further undisclosed power over Kryos, beyond controlling the amount of knowledge in soul magic the Dwiilar is gaining, and kept him off balance. Good job challenging your character in this way.

Kryos is a man of many facets - his thirst for knowledge regarding souls, his concern for his people, his sleep haunted by the Corpse War, his willingness to work under Maeril challenged - and I appreciated that you highlighted each of these in turn. On the other hand, you only really revisit the first of these in your ending to the thread, which leaves the other three hanging somewhat. I also notice that Kryos didn't speak much during the thread - he had three lines of actual dialogue until post 6 - so it might be worth investing in a distinctive character voice for him. What makes him stand out when he speaks? How can you differentiate him from, for example, Maeril?

The thread really only had enough room for Maeril as the other NPC, but you did a good job of showing him as a shrewd commander and not just a powerful warrior. I might have liked to get a bit more flavour for the Archivist travelling with Kryos, but I get the feeling that you're saving him for a later thread, and the fact that he's not undead is interesting in itself for what little screentime he got. To pick nits again - and this applies to Kryos as well - I might have liked to see a tad more character in their subconscious actions, particularly during dialogue. Maeril steepling his fingers was the one example that I noticed, but Kryos didn't do much here.


Technique: I liked how you used the tools of Kryos's introspection in the early stages of the thread: journal entries, dreams, and memories. It's a technique I've used before, and though it's not for every character, I find that it's a good way of giving first-person perspective to third-person writing. I would suggest not relying on it too much as a crutch for exposition, though I realise that you tried to use your first journal entry, for example, to succinctly convey the basic tenets of Kryos's soul magic and his struggles with it. The journal entry perhaps was the worst offender in this category, since it took up an entire post of its own with no action whatsoever. Your dream sequence, and the subsequent recovery of Kryos's memory of Ingwe, was well written. As stated above, perhaps another quick memory sequence towards the end would have brought things full circle.

Another round of proofreading might have helped to pick out the few definitive mistakes that I did spot: for example, post 2 "There harmony"; post 5 "flash through Kryos's mind"; post 8 "essence of a the soul", "A feeling of excitement fill him". A few phrases sounded too modern-day Earth colloquial, and thus out of place on Althanas: for example, post 1 "out of sync" and post 5 "what with them being undead and all". One other thing I noticed was your use of the word 'undead' as a noun. I find that this can be confusing, and thus try to stick with 'undead' as an adjective instead.

I have two concrete suggestions regarding technique. The first is that I would suggest skimming your posts for noticeable passive voice, in what I call the 'was-zat' technique. After any draft, I go through my writing and highlight every instance of 'was', 'were', 'be', and 'had been' that I can find. Then I scrutinise the sentences closely. Is there any way I can rewrite the sentence to use stronger verbs? How would I restructure the paragraph so that I can introduce more active voice and/or personification? The second suggestion I have is that I notice that you often use 'as' to tie action and surrounding together (for example, "as this happened, Kryos did this"). I would suggest avoiding this as much as possible, because in similar to the above it's a very passive way of writing about what's going on around Kryos. As an example, allow me to take the first instance of this in your thread:


As the glowing runes which held the griffin captive dimmed, he watched closely.

If you restructure as...


He watched the glowing runes, which held the griffin captive, dim.

... you immediately get a better feel for what Kryos himself is doing, as opposed to simply what's happening around him. It's a minor matter of nuance, to be sure, but used repeatedly the "as this happened, Kryos did this" sentence structure can dull even the best of descriptions.


***

I hope the above is of use, and that I haven't gone overboard with the feedback. I very much enjoyed the thread as a reintroduction of Kryos to Althanas and as an explanation for why he's been 'missing' all these months, and I'm looking forward to his next set of adventures in Beinost!

[SirArtemis]

Story

I am mostly disappointed that I didn't realize the title said prelude, because this certainly feels like a prelude. With that said, if I were scoring you, you'd lose points there. You only started a story, and this isn't enough for me to feel like you've done a full piece. Fortunately, it's Althanas and you can do what you want. So I'll focus on what worked and didn't work for me and what I feel you can work on.

I was certainly compelled by the character and setting. I loved the vivid picture you painted of the characters, of the mention to Maddy, of the integration of the world of Althanas and its history. You gave me a backdrop to your character, where he's at in his life, and a touch about his research and magic. I'm curious about the guy and want to know where his life leads, and that's a great achievement in just 8 posts, the first of which was just a general statement. I will say some of the scenes felt like they jumped and it was fragmented. I'm sure this was intentional but I have some vague feeling that this could have been strung together more cleanly. I can't tell you how, unfortunately; it's just a hazy feeling.


Character

Again, I was intrigued. I got a clear image of him in my mind physically, the reality that he's connected to Maddy and where he falls into the world of Althanas and its history is interesting. His relationship with a Death Lord, Maddy, necromancy, soul magic. I know he has a marred past, that he has connected with mind magic and scrying amongst his allies, that he rests upon an army of undead, that he has demons that are scratching at his dreams, and that his magic has much more potential than I think he realizes.


Prose

So this is usually where I don't have much to say but hopefully I can be helpful. I took 9 screenshots on my phone while reading this. The first note is that I can tell you are experienced as a writer, and your level reiterates that you've at least done some work here. So the first suggestion is to try to see if there are moments where you can use less words to convey meaning. Admittedly I suck at this and only found one instance, but I think it's useful to be reminded of in general. The example I have is you writing "Kryos hoped to speed up the time the ritual took" which could be reworded as "Kryos hoped to speed up the ritual" as an example.

The next note was a sentence that left me confused. You wrote: "There harmony between the two souls came out of sync for a only a second before they realigned." Firstly, an extra "a" found its way into that sentence, but furthermore, I still feel like you meant their and not there. Later on, you said where instead of were as another instance of this. You said a feeling of excitement fill him as opposed to filled, a spark of recognition flash instead of flashed, and used women to describe Maddy instead of woman. At another point, you wrote "it was for defense reasons" and I imagined defensive would be a word better suited there. And on one instance I noticed a double usage of the word "the" in the case of "drew his gaze the the corner of the wall" which I expect one of them should have said "to."

The last bit refers to a point where Kryos returns to his room and you describe his actions. They were very bullet-point in format and I always dislike that personally. Closed and locked the door. Added a log. Unstrapped his swords. Poured water. Purified it. Drank it. Just seems like that could be restructured to flow more freely.

EDIT: the use of the letter was actually also exceptionally well done. I forgot to note that!


Wildcard

Honestly I really enjoyed this thread. It feels like the beginning of something that will be great and I'm compelled to want to know more. If I come across the body of the soul rather than the prelude, I'll surely read it. My qualms with it are that at the start it felt a bit clunky but it started to smooth out as I read on. There were a lot of fragments that bundled together and there was enough there to leave me curious. How does soul magic work? How does this author define a soul? Is he actually combining souls or just mushing them together, without actually them becoming one item as much as a cluster of two? What about souls seems to carry with it the memories of the creature that came before, and how are we applying what we have been exposed to on Earth in the world of Althanas? There's so much here to work with and be intrigued by and explore, and I'm compelled to learn more about where you take this. A bit more attention to edit and a lot more body to the story (if you want it in one thread) and this could be something pretty phenomenal.


Hope that helps!

[Rayleigh]

This workshop is now closed. Thank you to everyone who contributed. Rewards will be posted soon.

[Rayleigh]

Thread: Prelude to Souls (http://www.althanas.com/world/showthread.php?30816-Workshop-Prelude-to-Souls)
Type: Workshop Rewards

Wings of Endymion receives 400 EXP, 40 GP, and 4 AP.
SirArtemis receives 500 EXP, 40 GP, and 4 AP.

To compensate for your wait, and thank you for your patience, and additional 25% EXP and 50% GP have been added.

[Rayleigh]

All rewards have been added.