Feedback for the Prologue

[EdwinLovato]

Hello, I tried to rewrite my Prologue for my web-novel : Battle Mage.

Please give me your thought about the content of my prologue. Any kind of feedback is welcomed.

Link : Prologue

 

[Eldoria]

Honestly, dude. In terms of writing style, I prefer your old prologue.

The old prologue had a solid narrative. The scenes were very easy to visualize. The characters felt alive in their world. And there was almost no narrator voice leakage (except for a minor error in character name pronunciation).

While your current prologue, hmm... not bad but the narrator's voice is quite dominant and seems to 'guide' and explain the reader to the scene.

For example, when the protagonist is drained of mana, the narrator's voice provides the explanation to the reader; instead of a subtle narrative that lets show mana exhaustion through psychological reactions.

As the beam dissipated, Janett straightened her posture and took a deep breath to regain her composure. Her hands shook slightly, but she clenched her fists to hide the fact that the spell had nearly depleted her mana.

The sentences I bold are the narrator's voice guiding the reader. If you want the scene to be more immersive, you should give the protagonist speaking thoughts. For example:

"Mana.. my spell—hold on, Janett!" Her hand patted her chest.

The atmosphere in your old prologue is lively compared to the new chapter. The new prologue opens the scene with dialogue. This is not good, because the reader has to guess what the scene is about before entering your world.

I prefer your old prologue to start the scene with the environment, the burning mansion is very easy to imagine. I felt like I was standing in the burning house before seeing who the character who set it on fire.

Therefore, I suggest you use an atmospheric approach in the old prologue.

Describe the environment first, before getting into character introductions. Describe the protagonist's surroundings, what she sees, smells, and hears about the horse caravan.

This way, the reader will be immersed in the story world before they even know who the protagonist is.

In terms of the hook, I prefer your current prologue. You demonstrate your protagonist's appeal through real-life battle action. This is a bit mainstream, but it does a good job of mysteriously establishing the protagonist's identity.

If you use the writing style of the old prologue and incorporate the hook into the new prologue, your narrative might be more impactful.

Well, it's a little feedback from me.

Regards.

 

[BernKatstel]

I gave it a read. I mostly agree with what Eldoria said: there’s a very distinct lack of description and immersive writing overall. I don’t think the way you wrote her being short on mana is wrong in this instance, though. It didn’t seem to be a particularly important detail to the narrative considering she didn’t need to use any other spells after the first and she seemed entirely unconcerned.

One thing I think is worth mentioning is that there’s not much at the end to keep me reading. The hook is good, but you end the first chapter as soon as all the noticeable tension dies. It doesn’t really make me go ’are they safe now?’ nor feel invested in the question of why she’s different from other mages. You don’t usually want to end your chapters directly on the climax or tranquil aftermath.

 

[Rolanov]

For some reason, your writing here feels like a First POV forced to Third POV narrative. Like Eldoria and BernKatstel suggest, for third POV narrative the environment feels lacking. But, I'll not talk about technical stuff.

The fighting scene is quite good, but it seems you miss some detail in this part :

In an instant, her energy sword sliced the monster cleanly in half. The upper torso hit the dirt with a heavy thud, soaking the ground in dark green blood.

She immediately cast a scanning spell to detect any remaining threats within a five-hundred-meter radius. Beads of sweat began to pour from her skin, and her vision darkened at the edges as her mana completely drained.

Since you tried detailed combat, the action between slashing and scanning are too sudden. Maybe swap the sentence, like this :

Beads of sweat began to pour from her skin, and her vision darkened at the edges as her mana almost drained. Janett used her last drop of mana, and casted a scanning spell to detect any remaining threats within a five-hundred-meter radius.

Well, that's my opinion, hope it help!

 

[EdwinLovato]

Honestly, dude. In terms of writing style, I prefer your old prologue.

The old prologue had a solid narrative. The scenes were very easy to visualize. The characters felt alive in their world. And there was almost no narrator voice leakage (except for minor errors in character name pronunciation).

While your current prologue, hmm... not bad but the narrator's voice is quite dominant and seems to 'guide' and explain the reader to the scene.

For example, when the protagonist is drained of mana, the narrator's voice provides the explanation to the reader; instead of a subtle narrative that lets show mana exhaustion through psychological reactions.


The sentences I bold are the narrator's voice guiding the reader. If you want the scene to be more immersive, you should give the protagonist speaking thoughts. For example:



The atmosphere in your old prologue is lively compared to the new chapter. The new prologue opens the scene with dialogue. This is not good, because the reader has to guess what the scene is about before entering your world.

I prefer your old prologue to start the scene with the environment, the burning mansion is very easy to imagine. I felt like I was standing in the burning house before seeing who the character who set it on fire.

Therefore, I suggest you use an atmospheric approach in the old prologue.

Describe the environment first, before getting into character introductions. Describe the protagonist's surroundings, what she sees, smells, and hears about the horse caravan.

This way, the reader will be immersed in the story world before they even know who the protagonist is.

In terms of the hook, I prefer your current prologue. You demonstrate your protagonist's appeal through real-life battle action. This is a bit mainstream, but it does a good job of mysteriously establishing the protagonist's identity.

If you use the writing style of the old prologue and incorporate the hook into the new prologue, your narrative might be more impactful.

Well, it's a little feedback from me.

Regards.

I gave it a read. I mostly agree with what Eldoria said: there’s a very distinct lack of description and immersive writing overall. I don’t think the way you wrote her being short on mana is wrong in this instance, though. It didn’t seem to be a particularly important detail to the narrative considering she didn’t need to use any other spells after the first and she seemed entirely unconcerned.

One thing I think is worth mentioning is that there’s not much at the end to keep me reading. The hook is good, but you end the first chapter as soon as all the noticeable tension dies. It doesn’t really make me go ’are they safe now?’ nor feel invested in the question of why she’s different from other mages. You don’t usually want to end your chapters directly on the climax or tranquil aftermath.

For some reason, your writing here feels like a First POV forced to Third POV narrative. Like Eldoria and BernKatstel suggest, for third POV narrative the environment feels lacking. But, I'll not talk about technical stuff.

The fighting scene is quite good, but it seems you miss some detail in this part :


Since you tried detailed combat, the action between slashing and scanning are too sudden. Maybe swap the sentence, like this :



Well, that's my opinion, hope it help!

Oof, I thought that more blunt description would be easier to understand and I removed some environment details because I thought the reader will be bored including the action scenes.
I will revise my writing, probably I will try to be more confident with my writing like before.

Thanks for the advices, I really need it.