Small Writing Excerpt - Critique Welcomed

[Aeonis of Blood]

Just thought I might as well submit something for my first time in the Writers forum. What you see before you, or rather, what you see below here is a small portion of a story that I'm working on. This is the beginning of one of its chapters, specifically that of Chapter 3, and it's largely unfinished if the ending to it isn't clue enough. Even still, however, I think it's a fairly potent few paragraphs, and I thought I might get some extra input on it (i.e. show it off ninja ). Because of the way it is written, the events and characters presented here require no knowledge of previous chapters to follow along, making it a perfect place to pull out and display.

I encourage criticism so long as it's constructive, and I reserve the right to take and leave whatever advice is presented to me. Criticism will be met respectfully with my own input and opinions, and I ask that you respect them in turn.

And yes, the words are italicized for a good reason. If it's hard to read, my apologies -- it should be easy enough to copy and paste over in normal format.

One last thing: this short clip is also posted up in the beta writing arena. While you don't have to look at it there, comments and ratings on the entry are always appreciated (though not necessary unless you feel like doing so). You can find a link to it in my signature, or you can search around.

Anyway...hope you enjoy this, as I enjoyed writing it.

---

Chapter 3

Elion, as all who knew him well enough could discern, was a very secluded, very bitter, very brilliant mind, accented with a maniacal acumen and gradually-reducing sanity. He always bore one of two faces underneath the signature black cloak he adorned himself with at all times: displeased…or plotting, both being to varying degrees at any given time; never was his expression anything else, contrary to what one may see or believe. The eerie smile that indicated a scheming, sinister being was practically his invention, as he took to using it more often than naught, and it was the one thing about his countenance that all could remember for the rest of their lives merely upon a glance of him. Rarely, however, did anyone see any other part of his body besides his mouth, nose, and the lower half of his brown eyes, for he took the most inexplicable and inconceivable of precautions in hiding the rest of his face. And the thing more frightening than his smile…was the voice behind it – deep with absolute authority, light with chilling cheerfulness, and barbed enough to slice the air when he spoke, he could be regarded as both an orator and a mastermind by even the faintest sound from his vocal cords.

Knowing this, the atmosphere in his throne room was ominous and foreboding to staggering proportions, the fallen archangel sitting on his black seat against the wall high above the stairs lined with red carpet; elbows on his knees; fingers coming together; chin on the backs of his hands; and that wicked grin known to cause inexplicable dread and terror etched into his face, unmoving and chiseled into his head as one would expect of a statue. Looking more like a miniature coliseum – one of many tiers, each level made up of black pillars of marble spaced equal distances apart from each other, twenty or so floors leading up to the glass-domed ceiling – his favorite place of seclusion would soon become just what it mimicked, and the angel eagerly anticipated and awaited this. More than anything, he kept his eyes focused and concentrated on the giant, stone doorway directly across from him.

Perhaps because he was expecting what was to happen next, his head rose from the arch of his connected hands, lamps and candles that were stationed around the room illuminating the color and flare of his eyes, to gaze upon the door. To anyone but him, it may have looked normal and calm, but something was indeed on the other side, and he knew it wasn’t simply his paranoia at work playing tricks on his mind. He seemed fixated on the entryway to his inner sanctum, patiently awaiting whatever it was that created this feeling inside him, yet it was obvious how anxious he was – there was always a specific form of his sadistic grim which he utilized to indicate this.

A low tremor rocked the room out of nowhere…

Like an explosive shockwave had happened in another part of his domain, everything seemed to jump suddenly and unexpectedly, a muffled booming sound following with the flickering of his lights inside the Gothic apex of his palace. Another followed, producing the same effects, and the angelic man’s intrigue was roused even more. Consecutively, small detonations in comparison to those before erupted from what sounded like behind the doorway only a few moments after the initial two quakes.

And in no time whatsoever…the door was immediately ripped clean off of its hinges, blown back with amazing force, and it stopped dead in its tracks at the bottom of the throne’s staircase after having slid the entire way, all whilst ripping tiles from the floor below and tossing them into the air in every possible direction among the clatter.

…Not even fazed by this, the man smiled almost approvingly, chuckling insidiously to himself, though the only movement he made was a resuming of his original position. The sounds of slow footsteps clanging like armor against the floor resounded and reverberated, and it took only this sound, all too familiar to the angel’s past, to know that it was who he expected who caused the ruckus and disturbed the tranquility of his mansion. The figure he had been expecting this entire time, who was normally known throughout Heaven as the epitome of impulsiveness, quietly and patiently strode into the court before him through the absolute and pervading darkness of the entry hall, his countenance reflecting that of anger, to suggest that it was worth keeping a level head to confront the angel he hated so much without distraction.

A valiant and stalwart man, his head bore locks of brown hair in a bowl-cut style – something thought unusual and peculiar by the people of his land – with highlights of pure red dye, gleaming on several individual hairs grouped together in sections, that circled the shortened bowl trim, and the strength of the glare that was cast from his dark green eyes beneath the cut was enough to neutralize even the Seraph’s piercing, maddening gaze – as hard as it was to believe, the man’s eyes inspired and bestowed a fierce confidence and bravery unto those who looked to him, such things that would be lost when staring down a daunting foe such as the one before him. Gold embroidering was carefully knitted into the silky, white fabric of the man’s long and regal robe in ancient patterns of lines and boxes, the base of the garment coming down to half of the length between his shins and ankles; more surprisingly, this fine article was something he preferred be used for combat, though the material used to craft it was more durable than at first glance. A white cape formed a collar at the neck of the clothing and flowed down to the backs of his knees, its borders hemmed with gold, but the robe’s vibrant and colorful designs were missing from this part of the arrangement, replaced instead by the large, circular insignia of his family’s crest: three concentric circles trisected equally by three lines – each coming halfway through the outermost circle and ending at the base of the innermost, the remainder jutting outside of the collection of tangible aureoles – arranged so that the first line pointed upward while the second and third pointed outward to the left and right diagonally. The final noticeable element of his appearance were the boots he wore, heavy and plated with a strange, black metal that created the clanging sound as he walked, though thick armor beneath the white-gold habit accounted for a greater source of the echo.

The atmosphere of the entire hall seemed to stand still in time, heavy with a strange, sudden, and inexplicable pressure that pushed the air down onto both of them – a phenomenon known to be caused when two mages of powerful rank came together, ready and determined to clash. Breaking the awkward silence between the two men – one smiling, the other glaring – the angel raised his head from the cradle of his hands, slowly used the armrests of his seat to help himself up, and stood erect on the edge of the stairs, staring judgmentally upon his opponent from the dark veil of his hood.

And then…he spoke.

“Welcome!” Elion cheerfully and menacingly announced, bowing almost formally to him. His voice disrupted the chill of his palace’s halls, ringing and echoing throughout to reinstate his commanding ascendancy, booming in volume. “So good of you to join us, dono! Please, do come in! It would be…” In such a simple gesture, one of complex meaning shrouded by purest deceit, his lips coursed through the fabric of time itself, every moment an epic in the making, every second a dramatic foreshadowing, until they stretched wide to show the most evil of his grins, wicked and haunting forever in the minds of the weak. “…An honor…to have you.”

[Aeonis of Blood]

Bump.

[erikakaiser]

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If it's hard to read, my apologies -- it should be easy enough to copy and paste over in normal format.

Issue being that's really inconvenient, and if the story is ever published you can't copy pasta an annoying format into a new document for easier reading.
Although, the italics thing didn't grate my vision so much as my sanity. I really can't think of any conceivable reason why you would want what appears to be an entire chapter, if not a good chunk of one, entirely in italics. If it's a flashback, the length alone would cancel out needing it to be italicized, I'd think.

You claim a good reason, and I'd definitely be interested to hear what narrative device you have going on that merits putting over a thousand words in italics.

Moving on!

I find your writing style a bit awkward. It sounds like ... almost purple prose, like you've had a Stoker/Austen/Dickens reading marathon and wrote somewhat unsuccessfully from the creative high afterwards. For instance:

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The eerie smile that indicated a scheming, sinister being was practically his invention, as he took to using it more often than naught, and it was the one thing about his countenance that all could remember for the rest of their lives merely upon a glance of him.

This is a long sentence that uses the words "naught" and "countenance" and is filled with inaction -- "he took to using it" instead of a sharper "he used it" and "all could remember for the rest of their lives merely upon a glance of him" is pretty excessive, as well.

I see a lot of passive voice, things being acted upon to lengthen sentences and broaden the formal style. And your description of Elion's manly bad-assery goes a bit too far, particularly with his voice; one of the three descriptions would work, but to be deep, light, and barbed all at once? And his voice alone (not even that, but the "faintest sound from his vocal chords") inspires people into thinking him a mastermind?
I mean, I can think of several people whose voices I like, but I can't actually think of a time when someone's non-singing voice has caused me to think of them as a mastermind. In fact, I don't tend to have Deep Opinions of people's voices unless they have a voice that's difficult to understand and communicate with, in which case I get annoyed.

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Knowing this, the atmosphere in his throne room was ominous and foreboding to staggering proportions, the fallen archangel sitting on his black seat against the wall high above the stairs lined with red carpet; elbows on his knees; fingers coming together; chin on the backs of his hands; and that wicked grin known to cause inexplicable dread and terror etched into his face, unmoving and chiseled into his head as one would expect of a statue.

By the holy light of James Barbour's purple leopard-print pants, that is a lot of incorrectly used semi-colons. In the first place, semi-colons should be used really sparingly, and in the second place, they're entirely inappropriate here. Commas, they are not. Semi-colons are used to indicate a stop between two clauses a period could normally separate.

Keep in mind, too, that semi-colons indicate a longer pause than commas do. If you follow that, the quoted sentence takes forever to read.

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Perhaps because he was expecting what was to happen next, his head rose from the arch of his connected hands, lamps and candles that were stationed around the room illuminating the color and flare of his eyes, to gaze upon the door. To anyone but him, it may have looked normal and calm, but something was indeed on the other side, and he knew it wasn’t simply his paranoia at work playing tricks on his mind. He seemed fixated on the entryway to his inner sanctum, patiently awaiting whatever it was that created this feeling inside him, yet it was obvious how anxious he was – there was always a specific form of his sadistic grim which he utilized to indicate this.

You could've probably started the story (er, chapter) here and I would've been slightly more interested. I like finding out what kind of person a character is as the story goes along, not getting a big dump about their personality and history -- we'll call it pulling a Crichton -- at the beginning and then getting to the action. I'm not even going to open Microsoft Word to check the word count and see how many words it's taken you to get to actual action, I just know it's been way too many.

Your writing continues to be awkward, as well. You don't seem in your element with the words and sentence structures you're using, and it comes across as pompous instead of effective.
I also find it odd that he's extremely anxious and patient at the same time.

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Like an explosive shockwave had happened in another part of his domain, everything seemed to jump suddenly and unexpectedly, a muffled booming sound following with the flickering of his lights inside the Gothic apex of his palace. Another followed, producing the same effects, and the angelic man’s intrigue was roused even more. Consecutively, small detonations in comparison to those before erupted from what sounded like behind the doorway only a few moments after the initial two quakes.

Your action, it is bogged. It is bogged by ineffective words and bad form. I feel like I'm reading while encased entirely in really sluggish jell-o.

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…Not even fazed by this, the man smiled almost approvingly, [...]

Care to explain what that apparently random ellipse is for?

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The figure he had been expecting this entire time, who was normally known throughout Heaven as the epitome of impulsiveness, quietly and patiently strode into the court before him through the absolute and pervading darkness of the entry hall, his countenance reflecting that of anger, to suggest that it was worth keeping a level head to confront the angel he hated so much without distraction.

Your ... I think I'm going to call this word rape. Seriously, read this out loud. It is so awkward and excessive. And there's that pesky word "countenance" again.

I'm going to stop the specifics there. I've already critiqued well beyond the point I was bored at, which was in the first few ridiculously long sentences of what I'm now officially labeling purple prose.

I can't even tell what your story is through all of the words. A vocabulary is a good thing, but only if you use it. Yours is using you, and like a skanky b***h, too.

[jestingly.yours]

And by "vocabulary," she means "thesaurus." Donate yours back to the library, because it's making your head a sad place to be.

[Aeonis of Blood]

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I really can't think of any conceivable reason why you would want what appears to be an entire chapter, if not a good chunk of one, entirely in italics. If it's a flashback, the length alone would cancel out needing it to be italicized, I'd think.

You claim a good reason, and I'd definitely be interested to hear what narrative device you have going on that merits putting over a thousand words in italics.

It would seem futile at this point to explain, as you still wouldn't agree with whatever reasoning I put forth, so I'll withhold that information.

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I find your writing style a bit awkward. It sounds like ... almost purple prose, like you've had a Stoker/Austen/Dickens reading marathon and wrote somewhat unsuccessfully from the creative high afterwards. For instance:

Quote:

The eerie smile that indicated a scheming, sinister being was practically his invention, as he took to using it more often than naught, and it was the one thing about his countenance that all could remember for the rest of their lives merely upon a glance of him.

This is a long sentence that uses the words "naught" and "countenance" and is filled with inaction -- "he took to using it" instead of a sharper "he used it" and "all could remember for the rest of their lives merely upon a glance of him" is pretty excessive, as well.

I'll claim fault on this one, only within reason. I truly wish I could reflect it more in this passage that the point-of-view starts as a rather ambiguous cross between first- and third-person, and it's hard to reflect it more one way than the other. The general idea was to reserve which one it really is until near the end, but since I never quite got around to writing it all...you get the idea. The story itself consists of a mix of both, though what you see here is first-person, and the "narrator" here has those kinds of speech patterns.

If you'd still like to debate this, I'm afraid you'll do little to sway how I go about writing in first-person. My general feel for it is that it mirrors the personality of the speaker -- calculated, attentive, calm -- and I'm sorry to say you'll merely have to take my word for it when I say the rest of the story would support that. Feel free to chastise me when I say I can't post the other chapters to prove this; you'd be within every right to.

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I see a lot of passive voice, things being acted upon to lengthen sentences and broaden the formal style. And your description of Elion's manly bad-assery goes a bit too far, particularly with his voice; one of the three descriptions would work, but to be deep, light, and barbed all at once? And his voice alone (not even that, but the "faintest sound from his vocal chords") inspires people into thinking him a mastermind?

When you have to pick a particular hallmark for a character, best make it something that fits him accurately. It may perhaps be an oxymoron to have a voice that's both deep and light, but think of it as a cross between vocalization patterns that define the way he interacts with others.

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Knowing this, the atmosphere in his throne room was ominous and foreboding to staggering proportions, the fallen archangel sitting on his black seat against the wall high above the stairs lined with red carpet; elbows on his knees; fingers coming together; chin on the backs of his hands; and that wicked grin known to cause inexplicable dread and terror etched into his face, unmoving and chiseled into his head as one would expect of a statue.

By the holy light of James Barbour's purple leopard-print pants, that is a lot of incorrectly used semi-colons. In the first place, semi-colons should be used really sparingly, and in the second place, they're entirely inappropriate here. Commas, they are not. Semi-colons are used to indicate a stop between two clauses a period could normally separate.

Thank you for pointing this out. I'm still in the stage of mastering semicolons, and I've rechecked the exact usage rule for it. With luck, I can prevent this in the future.

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Perhaps because he was expecting what was to happen next, his head rose from the arch of his connected hands, lamps and candles that were stationed around the room illuminating the color and flare of his eyes, to gaze upon the door. To anyone but him, it may have looked normal and calm, but something was indeed on the other side, and he knew it wasn’t simply his paranoia at work playing tricks on his mind. He seemed fixated on the entryway to his inner sanctum, patiently awaiting whatever it was that created this feeling inside him, yet it was obvious how anxious he was – there was always a specific form of his sadistic grim which he utilized to indicate this.

You could've probably started the story (er, chapter) here and I would've been slightly more interested. I like finding out what kind of person a character is as the story goes along, not getting a big dump about their personality and history -- we'll call it pulling a Crichton -- at the beginning and then getting to the action. I'm not even going to open Microsoft Word to check the word count and see how many words it's taken you to get to actual action, I just know it's been way too many.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the first paragraph only described a small portion of his "background," and not so much his history as a general glimpse at his personality. When you choose a defining trait for a character, it's sometimes thoughtful to expand on its effectiveness, and that's what I was aiming for here, along with how the narration constantly refers back to his face, and how time and detail is taken in drawing out each spec of character development.

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Your writing continues to be awkward, as well. You don't seem in your element with the words and sentence structures you're using, and it comes across as pompous instead of effective.

I respectfully disagree. My writing style receives generally split reactions among readers, so you're welcome to dislike it as much as you want, just as I'm welcome to dislike Hemingway for his simplicity.

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I also find it odd that he's extremely anxious and patient at the same time.

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Like an explosive shockwave had happened in another part of his domain, everything seemed to jump suddenly and unexpectedly, a muffled booming sound following with the flickering of his lights inside the Gothic apex of his palace. Another followed, producing the same effects, and the angelic man’s intrigue was roused even more. Consecutively, small detonations in comparison to those before erupted from what sounded like behind the doorway only a few moments after the initial two quakes.

Your action, it is bogged. It is bogged by ineffective words and bad form. I feel like I'm reading while encased entirely in really sluggish jell-o.

To each his own. It strikes me as odd that you'd say that to something that I feel goes at a slightly faster tempo than the previous events, but maybe it's because -- if I may adorn an opposing perspective -- the words seem to be "tripping over themselves" as I try to describe the scene. In my opinion, the action is either balanced enough with the detail, or the action needs to be drawn out slightly more.

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…Not even fazed by this, the man smiled almost approvingly, [...]

Care to explain what that apparently random ellipse is for?

I don't use ellipses in the conventional sense -- instead, call it an attempt to grammatically convey a silence, a hush if you will, in the flow of time itself that the writing displays. I could pop the excuse that it's part of the first-person narrator's speech style -- which it is -- but I won't deny what I wanted it to stand for here, nor will I deny how I use them to create visual effect. I'm terribly sorry to say it's the one piece of my writing style I will forever stand firm upon.

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The figure he had been expecting this entire time, who was normally known throughout Heaven as the epitome of impulsiveness, quietly and patiently strode into the court before him through the absolute and pervading darkness of the entry hall, his countenance reflecting that of anger, to suggest that it was worth keeping a level head to confront the angel he hated so much without distraction.

Your ... I think I'm going to call this word rape. Seriously, read this out loud. It is so awkward and excessive. And there's that pesky word "countenance" again.

Again, I respectfully disagree. I'll let people complain as much as desired about run-on sentences; it will do little to persuade me to change my style otherwise.

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I'm going to stop the specifics there. I've already critiqued well beyond the point I was bored at, which was in the first few ridiculously long sentences of what I'm now officially labeling purple prose.

I can't even tell what your story is through all of the words. A vocabulary is a good thing, but only if you use it. Yours is using you, and like a skanky b***h, too.

Then forgive me when I say I respect your attempt at critique, yet I don't respect your general opinion. It's nice to see another serious response to my writing, as I've only had a handful before, but there's simply a condescending attitude your words project that make them more intimidating and demeaning than helpful.

Thank you for taking the time to read, but please respect my decision to remain different from what you may normally consider the "right" style. If keeping the style I hold dear means becoming the next Hemingway, I'll gladly continue down this path, and you only give me more reason to.

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And by "vocabulary," she means "thesaurus." Donate yours back to the library, because it's making your head a sad place to be.

My apologies. I'll dumb it down next time.

[Kill The Buster]

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My apologies. I'll dumb it down next time.

She wasn't trying to say that using a lotta impressive-sounding intelligent words is too hard to understand for intelligence's sake, the point I think she was trying to make was that they sound, to use your words, like they're "tripping over 'emselves."

Besides the semi-ignorable fact that your run-on sentences (which I use way too much myself) are run-on sentences, the writing's too wordy, I think. It's insanely awkward to read out loud or in your head; try it and see.

You said that complaints about your use of run-on sentences won't persuade you to change your style, and I respect and understand that decision, but it's ultimately not a smart one, in my opinion. They're fine in some cases, a lot of cases, but here they just add to the confusion.

Anyway, the only comments so far have been on your writing style! As for the story itself, it sounds interesting and leaves you wanting to know more about the characters and their back-story, I dig it. The only thing is, to know more I'd haveta read descriptions that last paragraphs, which're all well and good for their own sake, from a writer's standpoint, but honestly, they don't stick. From a reader's standpoint, they're too long and wordy. I know the dude who walks into the throne room's wearing a white robe with markings on it, and the dude who chills there's got a wicked smile and an attitude problem. That's what stuck, for all the descriptions of 'em. Is that time, effort, and thought wasted on readers who only absorb so much? Probably, but why waste it, then?

[jestingly.yours]

Exactly, NoisyRulz. Vocabulary equals intelligence only when it's used smoothly and in the proper context.

By the way, speaking of dumbing down, I'd say the best way to do that would be to continue to ask for critique and upon receiving it, brushing it off as mere bleatings of the populace.

[erikakaiser]

NoisyRulz has it exactly. I wasn't saying that we, the aforementioned bleating masses, are too stupid to understand the words you're using, or that you should use simple words just for the sake of other people's intelligence. I was saying that you're not using your words well. You may think you're on the seat of vernacularly brilliance, but we've got three against one in this thread alone telling you your word choice is awkward and your story is difficult to read.
And I can probably speak for all of us in saying that we're at least of average intelligence, if not pretty damn smart. You asked for critique; maybe, just maybe, you should actually listen to us?

I also don't think that run-on sentences and verbosity go well together. I can respect kicking grammar around for stylistic purposes -- I think a story that's entirely, 100% grammatically correct would be very dry to read -- but the very nature of a run-on sentence is that it doesn't have the proper formatting for breathing. Punctuation is thrown out of the door a little bit, which can be fine, but when you have long words and difficult structure on top of that, it turns "style" into "death by asphyxiation."

And I'll respect your decisions as much as I see fit (admittedly the many times you demand I do isn't leaning me towards wanting to do so), although I'd like to point out that I'm not condescending -- I'm being honest. I am, and was, giving you my honest reaction to what I read of your story. I never directly insulted you (and my references to James Barbour's pants and skanky bitches weren't intended to be taken Completely Seriously). All of my remarks were intended to be taken in reference to the narrative and the story, which should be seperate enough from yourself so that you're not offended by it.
If my saying your story is awkward and excessive upsets you on more than the kneejerk "Someone said something bad about my writing" level, you might need to pull back a little bit. 3nodding

[jestingly.yours]

Also, no one else mentioned this, so I will: Erika specifically asked you a reasonable question about your story. There is no excuse for deliberately refusing to answer, other than Pure Douchiness. Which appears to me to be the reason. And while you sit there sputtering your protestation that "she won't listen!" I'd like to take a moment to gesture widely to your post. You know, while we're on the subject of not listening and whatnot.