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Love and Hate

7 years ago

hello I am working on my first serious attempt at a story and i would love to get some feedback on some of it. I feel like this section does a good job of showing my skill and writing style, Please and thank you in advance,

 

As the man ran off the girl turned towards Tyler, and he felt his heart insintly start to pound harder than a jack hammer. To say she was gorgeous was an understatement,she was nothing short of breathtakingly beautiful. The girl was asian, about the same height as Tyler,so about 5 ft 4 inches tall. She had long flowing black hair that cascaded down to just above her waist. Her facial features were delicate yet proud. Elegant was the best word Tyler could use to describe her. Then she smiled, calling it radiant was like saying the sun was slightly bright. Still wearing the smile that was oddly comforting the girl begin to talk. "Thank you my brave hero. My name is Amy, what would yours be?" Tyler was surprised at how unsteady his voice sounded, "My name is Tyler." Tyler then realized something, "listen lady I ain't no God damn hero. In fact I would say I'm nothing more than a failure." Tyler had started his statement with a seething anger before the anger morphed into a sad and distant tone.

_

Seemingly oblivious to the odd change of tone Amy continued to talk, "though I could have handled it on my own I appreciate your help. I call you a hero because without thinking you risked life and limb to save a damsel in distress. If I'm not mistaken that sounds an awfully lot like some knight from a fairy tale." The only way Tyler responded to Amy was with a sarcastic wave of his hand. "No matter, I view you as a hero and since perception is reality you are a hero. I reward those who earn it, but be warned in the near future I will come to you with a request." Tyler stared at Amy for a moment before he let out a weary sigh. "Great a crazy person, why are they always so beautiful." Amy smirked before snapping her fingers, "Let us see how crazy you think I am in the morning." Tyler stood there perplexed for a brief moment before his eyelids grew heavy. In the next moment Tyler felt a distant thump as the world faded into nothingness.

Love and Hate

7 years ago

Why is Tyler 5'4? Is he Danny DeVito? 

Love and Hate

7 years ago

No but him being short will definitely have an impact on how people around him treat him. Unfortunately some people are just short I should know that's how tall I am. :(

Love and Hate

7 years ago

This isn't an author self insert is it?

Love and Hate

7 years ago

Negative I'm just using my height because it is a good way to plunge into him being bullied. I know back in school I was picked on for being short and skinny. So I'm trying to have that be my writing from experience part. The name is just something I use in most of my stories as a tribute to my late uncle who was pretty much the only male role model in my life for quite a while. My name is actually Ted. Hope that helped to clear some things up

Love and Hate

7 years ago
The dialogue feels pretty stilted and unrealistic. Try reading it out loud and ask yourself if people really talk that way. Tyler in particular seems like someone I would avoid ever hanging out with because he has no inner filter stopping him from angrily and sadly blurting out how much he sucks during unrelated conversations.

This section has a lot of dialogue so unfortunately, the dialogue having issues like that is a major distraction while reading it. It could use some proofreading and polish as well and the whole thing is formatted strangely. (Don't just mush everything up into fat paragraphs, especially dialogue.)

Love and Hate

7 years ago

Thank you I will try to work on the dialogue. Amy has a specific reason why she talks so formal like and I was trying to foreshadow something with him rejecting being called a hero but I also understand that dialogue is definitely not my strong point. Thank you for your feedback

Love and Hate

7 years ago

Here is a bit  not so dialogue heavy part. Since I know my dialogue is iffy I want to see if there is any other major problems.

 

The next morning

Tyler woke with a start, and to his surprise found himself in his bed at home. Laying there Tyler took a moment to check his surroundings. The same old white roof that greeted him every day was still above him. Tyler held his breath, intently listening. Nothing, no sounds of life or happiness could be heard from the structure. Letting out his breath Tyler relaxed, that lack of sound was confirmation he was home. He didn't quite live alone but his house was never filled with sounds. Probably because just he and his older sister were the only ones to live there. The last Tyler had heard of his mother she was on some corner trying to get enough money for her next hit of heroin. His father had pulled a smash and dash on his mother, so he was never a part of his life. Apparently though he was the one who paid the bills, something about a deal with his mother.

_

"No more vodka before bed that was a crazy ass dream." Tyler muttered to himself. As he got up and prepared to get ready for the day one thought kept bothering him. Tyler had no memories of getting home at all. Shrugging it off Tyler hopped into the shower. About halfway through he heard the front door open, great his sister was home. After drying him self off and pulling on a pair of pants he wandered into the kitchen looking for some breakfast. Sitting there obviously hung over smelling like sex was his sister.

_

"Lisa." Tyler barely acknowledged her. "Shut the fuck up, your voice is hurting my head." Lisa growled at Tyler. "You know if you keep missing school your ass is gonna get held back, again." Tyler added in a dry tone of voice. " Fuck you my grades are good, so what if I miss a couple of days? Besides that of course you talk about my ass. It's the only one you ever see you sick fuck." Tyler just sighed, gave up on food and went to go finish getting ready for school. After an uneventful journey Tyler found himself self sitting in first period waiting to start another day of bullshit. Surprisingly the teacher had an announcement to make, "Class today we have a new transfer student joining us. Come on in Sunny." The teacher stated in his boring monotonous voice.

Love and Hate

7 years ago

I'll just point out the use, or lack of, punctuation marks in your piece.  When you have a list, such as "same old white roof", use a comma to separate the adjectives.  So, it would be "same, old, white roof" or "same old, white roof."  Depends if you are using same as an adjective here, so I think people could argue both cases.

As a quick note, yes the Oxford comma is necessary.  The use without it really is distracting, at least to me, and the debate going on whether we should use it or not is ludicrous.  

This sentence is grammatically confusing, although it isn't distracting, if that makes sense: "Nothing, no sounds of life or happiness could be heard from the structure."

The next sentence that follows could use a comma and replace one of the commas with a semicolon.  "Letting out his breath[,] Tyler relaxed[;] that lack of sound was confirmation he was home."

Subsequently, the next sentence, "He didn't quite...live there", is unnecessary, at least in the way it was written.  If you find that information critical, I would rewrite it.

  From there, another comma: "The last Tyler had heard of his mother[,] she...of heroin."

Your "father had pulled...his life", sentence is choppy.  "Smash and dash" sounds extremely colloquial, like an adult trying to tell their child about sex yet are being as ambiguous as possible.  The entire sentence just doesn't feel as if it belonged with the rest of your writing.

Like others have stated, dialogue could use a bit of work.  Furthermore, you have missing commas that are littered throughout what you wrote.  An editor would definitely help, although I would take it upon yourself to perhaps understand about comma usage before you publish anything.  Yes, it's boring.  It might not be distracting to a common person, but this is a writing site with good writers, despite all of the Edge Lord contests we have, (Okay only one, but it drew people in like a Walmart during Black Friday) so I'd recommend learning a bit.  That is, if you're staying.

 

Good luck.

Love and Hate

7 years ago

Thank you for your feedback. I understand what you are saying about little things having a major impact. I was aiming for a under the rough exterior Tyler is actually kind of wise beyond his years moment but I can see how that comment came off as sounding a bit off the mark. I wasn't quite aware that my punctuation was all that bad I thought I did I decent job but I guess that's why I wanted an unbiased opinion in case something like this happened thank you for the helpful comment.

Love and Hate

7 years ago

There are a few issues here, but each line of dialogue needs to be shown separately. You don't just put several lines of conversation in one great big paragraph. It can be hard for your readers to tell who is talking - especially in that last paragraph - which can put them off from reading any further than that. Start each new line of dialogue on a different line and use some extra spacing. This will make it a lot easier to read.

Also, I can only assume we're supposed to dislike Tyler. He's pretty annoying. Maybe this is deliberate. Maybe he's supposed to undergo personal development and grow as a person throughout the story, but it's hard to say at this point. If you want your audience to like Tyler or even empathise with him, then perhaps put in a few positive aspects about him (aside from the sob story which is his background, that is). Your readers need a reason to care about your characters.

Your first post doesn't grab me either. A man is mentioned in the very first sentence and almost nothing is said about him. Instead, most of the entire paragraph describes how beautiful Amy is and how Tyler is attracted to her. In fact, she's described in more detail than our main character, who we know nothing about at that point. So far, I'm inclined to like Amy more because she has more substance than him...and apparently has some kind of superpower.

I still have no idea what Tyler "saved" her from. What was the man doing? Was there a fight? That would have made a pretty interesting read if there was. If she can just put people to sleep with a snap of her fingers, did she need saving in the first place?  (Sounds like she could, from her admisison). So many questions.

Your second post tells me a bit more about Tyler himself, which is good. A bit of family background helps us know where we are with him. We also discover that he hates his sister. So far, he's been a jerk to every other character, thus making us dislike him even more because he doesn't seem to have a reason to hate on people. (Apart from being in a bad mood all the time, I guess.) I get that he has issues, but it doesn't mean he can't have some positive traits. 

I also get the feeling that you're trying to give Tyler a "tough guy" image, considering the way he talked to Amy. Which is fine, but...look, he apparently saved Amy, acted tough about it, and told her that he was a failure. That doesn't sound very macho. It sounds like insecurity.

So far, what might keep me reading is the mystery surrounding Amy, and possibly this unknown man who appeared in the first sentence and then vanished from your story. There are some potentially good concepts but I'm not sure about the execution. The spelling is good too.

You mentioned that there would be something about Tyler being bullied. That would be a good thing to put in, it would certainly show a bit more about Tyler's insecurities and how he deals with them. Except...Tyler just saved Amy from some guy (apparently). He's fine with that, but he can't deal with bullies at his own school? Are these schoolkids tougher? Are there more of them? Or maybe it was just a fluke when he saved Amy...I don't know.

Anyway, I don't mean to be harsh, but that's what I get from your writing so far.

Love and Hate

7 years ago

The  man actually appears  for the first time in the page before that one  so all that is explained. I was trying to go for he is an insecure person who tries to cover it up since he believes if his bullies sense weakness it'll be worse . And don't feel bad if I wanted someone to just be super nice about it I would've showed it to my family or something:)

Love and Hate

7 years ago

"Besides that of course you talk about my ass. It's the only one you ever see you sick fuck."

I laughed.

Love and Hate

7 years ago

I was trying for a little bit of humor. I thought it was a good line myself.