Give it to me straight doc(feedback)

Doxxx

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Joined
Nov 14, 2024
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2
Points
18
Hi I'm doxxx could I get some feedback on my story be brutally honest I'm trying to get better at writing and this is my first fiction so I'd like to better myself before I get too far ahead in the story

House of Huels
 

KingofPizza

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Joined
Oct 27, 2024
Messages
34
Points
18
I read the first chapter.

First off, I really appreciate the dialogue-rich storytelling here. It seems like to made a good effort to avoid making walls of text. It made it easy to read.

Unfortunately, there are many spelling and punctuation errors, but this is nothing that a bit of grammar study or ai tools can't fix, so it's not much a of a sin.

However, there are at least two big issues here:

1. On-the-nose descriptions/telling-and-not-showing: "Show, don't tell" is repeated ad nauseam and sometimes feels more like religious mantra than serious advice, so I don't care for it much. But in your case, I think you really need to try to leave a bit more to your readers' imaginations. For for example, when you described the mage locker thing, you should just describe the locker, show the character using it, and leave us to infer the rest. Also, reactions emotions: "Their faces went pale with shock" should just be "Their faces went pale." This will help a lot, I think.

2. Not enough setup or substance: While the dialogue is nice, I feel like I didn't learn anything about the protagonist or the other characters, yet more characters and mystery get piled on before anything substantive can develop. It's going too fast and doesn't allow for us to learn about anyone and doesn't permit any tension to develop. I would have cut it up like this: Chapter 1: Introduce the MC and maybe one buddy, with the setting.. Chapter 2: Flesh out MC and pals more and sew the seed of ONE mystery. Chapter 3: Spooky Headmaster visit with tense moments that hint at sewn mystery. Chapter 4: Event that forces the characters to visit the spooky cabin or whatever the eff.

That's the best I can do. Fix the on-the-nose stuff and giving it a slower pace to build mystery and tension AND allow characters to show some personality will help this. You show some promise as a writer, you just gotta get your conventions and dramatization skills up.
 
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