feedback/review swap anyone

[Zenomew]

Hi,I have recently been working on this new fantasy story please let me know what you think about it!

Constructive criticism are welcome

I am the Hero (NOT)

'Being a hero was everything to me... but if this is where it all leads, then I’m done.' The world is on the brink of destruction, and its last hope—the legendary hero—has been put out of comission. Now, the impossible task of saving everyone falls to...

www.scribblehub.com

 

[DismaiNaim]

I read about half of your first chapter, and I can't post a review on this, sorry. The prose is littered with errors and typos, things are introduced with little to no context, stuff kinda just happens. Overall it feels rushed. Your MC has some elf girl land on her, and they just start talking like no biggie. The intro is pure expository, and offers no emotional connection to her life.

Just my 2¢

 

[Zenomew]

I read about half of your first chapter, and I can't post a review on this, sorry. The prose is littered with errors and typos, things are introduced with little to no context, stuff kinda just happens. Overall it feels rushed. Your MC has some elf girl land on her, and they just start talking like no biggie. The intro is pure expository, and offers no emotional connection to her life.

Just my 2¢

The entire point of the story is that it is rushed without any logic

It's a parody it's not into serious worldbuilding, emotional damage and stuff thing just happen

It will be explained why getting people thrown on you is not a big deal for that perticular 'village '

There is no emotional connection yet for a reason it's not very important for now

Thanks for pointing out the typo errors though I fixed it

Just let me know what more to improve

 

[CharlesEBrown]

The entire point of the story is that it is rushed without any logic

It's a parody it's not into serious worldbuilding, emotional damage and stuff thing just happen

Actually parodies may require MORE world-building than a serious setting. Look at Terry Pratchett's Diskworld novels - yeah, he does sometimes contradict himself (occasionally intentionally as part of the joke) but there was some very heavy-duty world building at play in those books. Just defining the City of Ankh-Morpork, with its Watch and the Patrician...
Or Douglas Adams "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" - it works because he put so much thought into the setting, enough to be able to poke fun at both genre conventions and even his own work.

It will be explained why getting people thrown on you is not a big deal for that perticular 'village '

There is no emotional connection yet for a reason it's not very important for now

Then you're wasting your time writing it for anyone but yourself.
Without an emotional connection - without Arthur Dent about to lose his home (which is ultimately irrelevant since he's also about to lose his WORLD ...), without Rincewind meeting Two Flower and The Luggage (and having the Spell trapped in his head) - there is no reason for the reader to CARE, and thus no reason for them to continue reading.
Humor alone will not carry interest past a chapter or two. And some of the most effective humor comes from having an emotional bond between the reader and the characters.

 

[Zenomew]

Actually parodies may require MORE world-building than a serious setting. Look at Terry Pratchett's Diskworld novels - yeah, he does sometimes contradict himself (occasionally intentionally as part of the joke) but there was some very heavy-duty world building at play in those books. Just defining the City of Ankh-Morpork, with its Watch and the Patrician...
Or Douglas Adams "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" - it works because he put so much thought into the setting, enough to be able to poke fun at both genre conventions and even his own work.


Then you're wasting your time writing it for anyone but yourself.
Without an emotional connection - without Arthur Dent about to lose his home (which is ultimately irrelevant since he's also about to lose his WORLD ...), without Rincewind meeting Two Flower and The Luggage (and having the Spell trapped in his head) - there is no reason for the reader to CARE, and thus no reason for them to continue reading.
Humor alone will not carry interest past a chapter or two. And some of the most effective humor comes from having an emotional bond between the reader and the characters.

I know but this is literally the first chapter it's kind of hard to start with explaining the whole world especially since the story starts with the pov of a girl living in the village

True a lot of world building details are added in other chapter but it's more of a general world with the typical world building elements with more finer details being added slowly

We learn how the world is ,how it works,the culture and lore with the protagonist

Spoiler

She lives in a place where magic is super common and used by everyone in her village but the outside world is like a crapsack world where mages are rare and magic is generally considered dangerous and terrifying power with kings usually having a small number of mages to serve as an elite force

That's why the explanation is put off to drive home the impact of how much the world and heroing journey sucks for the MC but she must do it anyways

True there is a lot of emotional aspect but right now she is more of getting swept by the events before she can find a foothold to stand and reflect

Plus she is technically a 51 year old loli so her emotions are more controlled then say a teenager

 

[Racosharko]

Do another draft,
try to tell your story at a different point of the narrative, see what happens.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

You do not need to show the worldbuilding, really not EVER - but you need to make it clear that it exists, that there is some logic behind it all.
In a visual medium you can get away with a lot more than in pure text - look to the better of the Marx Brother's movies, for example - there is world building in the background, but it is unimportant compared to the antics of Groucho and his relatives (IIRC most of the "brothers" were actually cousins), but it was their presence and delivery that made up for any shortcomings in plot or actual story. On the other hand, you have acts like The Three Stooges who worked mostly in short films because you don't NEED world-building to tell an extended joke there - and you still have the visual elements, again, to overcome any shortcomings in the actual narrative (and when they did feature length films, like the one with Shirley Temple, there was more world building, more detailing of the background, than in their shorts).
BUT a novel, especially a webnovel, is not a visual medium, and an extended joke needs a platform to rest on while it builds up to the punchline. An example of doing this would be the Henry Rider stories of @ThatAdamGuy - he's built up a world that you only see bits and pieces of because Henry is not very forthcoming and only shares what she feels the reader needs to know (which sometimes gets her in trouble with the other characters).

 

[Zenomew]

You do not need to show the worldbuilding, really not EVER - but you need to make it clear that it exists, that there is some logic behind it all.
In a visual medium you can get away with a lot more than in pure text - look to the better of the Marx Brother's movies, for example - there is world building in the background, but it is unimportant compared to the antics of Groucho and his relatives (IIRC most of the "brothers" were actually cousins), but it was their presence and delivery that made up for any shortcomings in plot or actual story. On the other hand, you have acts like The Three Stooges who worked mostly in short films because you don't NEED world-building to tell an extended joke there - and you still have the visual elements, again, to overcome any shortcomings in the actual narrative (and when they did feature length films, like the one with Shirley Temple, there was more world building, more detailing of the background, than in their shorts).
BUT a novel, especially a webnovel, is not a visual medium, and an extended joke needs a platform to rest on while it builds up to the punchline. An example of doing this would be the Henry Rider stories of @ThatAdamGuy - he's built up a world that you only see bits and pieces of because Henry is not very forthcoming and only shares what she feels the reader needs to know (which sometimes gets her in trouble with the other characters).

Ok so what should I do to show this in my story?

 

[CharlesEBrown]

Ok so what should I do to show this in my story?

First, remove the disclaimer - telling the reader there's not going to be any logic is a bad way to start.
More description of the setting - not in painstaking details, but some colors and smells and feelings beyond pain and fear. Right now, it feels like the characters are actors at a dress rehearsal where the set designers have only gotten the layout complete and are still working on backdrops and props. They're in costume, they know their lines, but have nothing (but each other) to interact with. Some playwrights can get away with this (Harold Pinter, for example, or Samuel Becket who made a point of minimalist set design, making it almost a character itself), but not a novelist.
It might help to try to rewrite the scene in third person, look at what works and what doesn't, and then either revise it to BE third person, or to incorporate what you discovered in shifting perspective. One example to follow with this would be Peter David's Howling Mad - the chapters shift between two characters - sometimes in first person, sometimes in third person limited. Like describing a scene where the heroine comes home to find a wolf in her kitchen. The wolf immediately walks up to her and sniffs her crotch. The next chapter is from his POV and is simply: "It seemed the polite thing to do" - and the next chapter is from her POV.

And I can see what DismalNaim meant with the first chapter after the introduction (The Cave) - spacing issues, some places that need commas, some clumsy wording; feels like a bad translation at times. Much harder to get through than the part called Ch1: Beginning After the End - plus no explanation of how the characters got there. This could be a better opening than the first if it were put together well. Describe the fight, and then have a "record scratch" moment where the narrator realizes the audience has no clue what is going on and rewinds to earlier in the narrative to provide those details before resuming the adventure. COULD be... but, instead, it feels more like a dead end.

 

[Zenomew]

First, remove the disclaimer - telling the reader there's not going to be any logic is a bad way to start.
More description of the setting - not in painstaking details, but some colors and smells and feelings beyond pain and fear. Right now, it feels like the characters are actors at a dress rehearsal where the set designers have only gotten the layout complete and are still working on backdrops and props. They're in costume, they know their lines, but have nothing (but each other) to interact with. Some playwrights can get away with this (Harold Pinter, for example, or Samuel Becket who made a point of minimalist set design, making it almost a character itself), but not a novelist.
It might help to try to rewrite the scene in third person, look at what works and what doesn't, and then either revise it to BE third person, or to incorporate what you discovered in shifting perspective. One example to follow with this would be Peter David's Howling Mad - the chapters shift between two characters - sometimes in first person, sometimes in third person limited. Like describing a scene where the heroine comes home to find a wolf in her kitchen. The wolf immediately walks up to her and sniffs her crotch. The next chapter is from his POV and is simply: "It seemed the polite thing to do" - and the next chapter is from her POV.

And I can see what DismalNaim meant with the first chapter after the introduction (The Cave) - spacing issues, some places that need commas, some clumsy wording; feels like a bad translation at times. Much harder to get through than the part called Ch1: Beginning After the End - plus no explanation of how the characters got there. This could be a better opening than the first if it were put together well. Describe the fight, and then have a "record scratch" moment where the narrator realizes the audience has no clue what is going on and rewinds to earlier in the narrative to provide those details before resuming the adventure. COULD be... but, instead, it feels more like a dead end.

Thanks I fixed that part

 

[TheIcMan]

The entire point of the story is that it is rushed without any logic

It's a parody it's not into serious worldbuilding, emotional damage and stuff thing just happen

Writing a parody doesn’t mean you can throw shit to the wind and wave everything away because “it’s a parody” lmao. As Charles said, parodies actually have more work put into them because you need to know what you’re parodying.

Some of my favorite stories are parodies. Not because they’re just goofy and have an “I don’t care” attitude. But because they’re also genuine and love the thing they parody.

 

[Zenomew]

Writing a parody doesn’t mean you can throw shit to the wind and wave everything away because “it’s a parody” lmao. As Charles said, parodies actually have more work put into them because you need to know what you’re parodying.

Some of my favorite stories are parodies. Not because they’re just goofy and have an “I don’t care” attitude. But because they’re also genuine and love the thing they parody.

I know I know,I even edited the whole story to make it better, more worldbuilding, better characterization,heck I even spent time developing a magic system and researching mediveal Europe

 

[Zenomew]

Anyone still interested in review swap yet

 

[DismaiNaim]

Here's mine if you want to swap: https://www.scribblehub.com/dashboard/

 

[CharlesEBrown]

If I ever do more than bits and pieces of feedback, like in this thread, feel free to pick any of my stories, but no rush.

Here's mine if you want to swap: https://www.scribblehub.com/dashboard/

Psst: That link goes to the dashboard of the person who clicks on it.
To reach your story I think A Place To Bloom | Scribble Hub works

 

[NOTkaosin21]

heres also mine if you want to swap
https://www.scribblehub.com/dashboard/

 

[Zenomew]

heres also mine if you want to swap
https://www.scribblehub.com/dashboard/

I am actually getting sent to my dashboard so can you please send me the story link instead

 

[CharlesEBrown]

I am actually getting sent to my dashboard so can you please send me the story link instead

See my post, above.

 

[RepresentingPride]

Anyone still interested in review swap yet

If you want review swap to attract more views/readers it's not useful here. Unlike webnovel and royalroad, the ranking here is based on number of views your story have, not the score it have.

But the review swap can be good for criticism

 

[Zenomew]

If you want review swap to attract more views/readers it's not useful here. Unlike webnovel and royalroad, the ranking here is based on number of views your story have, not the score it have.

But the review swap can be good for criticism

I care more about the criticism and quality of my story

A good story will naturally attract more views