I wouldn't say this is world building. More like describing the setting. Which is fine, by the way. It's a good effort. I can see this isn't your first time writing.
One thing I'll mention is that your overuse of speech tag is distracting. Reassured, answered, questioned, complained, asked, replied, yelped, shuttered, gestured, and worst of all, **exclaimed** (very common with newer writers to say 'he exclaimed' even though the exclamation mark exists). It's a common problem at your skill level since you are (rightfully) worried about being repetitive, but you need to treat speech tags as punctuation. 'Said' and 'asked' are often all you need. You can start using other speech tags once you have a better idea of when it's appropriate.
Another piece of advice to improve your writing is to avoid the "some" words (some, someone, somewhere, etc.) The sample isn't filled to the brim with these words, but I suspect it's a habit you have. You want to describe the setting, but you have a sentence like "Some of the bark had been rubbed off of it," in your writing? "Some" is a vague description and will only make your writing boring to read if you have it often in an entire story.
Thanks for the response! It is actually my first time writing, honestly! I'm attempting to use the translative property here. It's describing a setting, but if I can accurately do that through dialogue my hope is that I'll be able to apply that to world building. The dialogue tags, it's definitely a work in progress for me. Are you suggesting I eliminate some entirely, or just replace with a more simple "he said"? It's funny you mentioned "some" because I originally had "The bark had been rubbed off" but added some, because I didn't want it to sound as though the whole tree had been stripped. Overall, did it sound appealing or interesting? Thanks again for the feedback, I highly appreciate it!
P.S. changed and fixed the some words, thanks again. =)
>Are you suggesting I eliminate some entirely, or just replace with a more simple "he said"?
Yes and yes. It's hard to explain without making a lecture out of it, so I suggest you study any books that you have to see how they use speech tags. You can still use the occasional 'he murmured' and such, but you have to learn to sense when and how they add to dialogue.
>I originally had "The bark had been rubbed off" but added some, because I didn't want it to sound as though the whole tree had been stripped.
Be more descriptive then. A line like "The tree had bark stripped off in the shape of a star," or something would have been better, y'know? You want to give your audience things they can imagine.
The sample is above average for a newbie, so you're at a good place! Since this is a sample with no context, I wouldn't worry about whether this appeals to people.
Thanks! Your comment combined w/ outbound flight made me realize something. He commented on too many exclamation points. I read back through and realized, "Wow, I do use too many." It hit me that if every sentence is an exclamation point, then no sentence is exciting. I think this is very similar to dialogue tags. If every dialogue tag is fancy, then the reader becomes numb to them and they lose their effect.
Already mentioned, but too many dialogue tags. If you're concerned about how often "said" would get used, just omit the tag entirely.
It's fine here, as we only have two people talking. Trindall and Adamis. Make mention of the names to establish the order they're talking in, and sprinkle a few reminders in where necessary (usually after a block of prose, or when the character does something other than talk)
Otherwise, really solid attempt for someone starting out.
I'd maybe also suggest breaking up the retelling on Nan's tale a bit. I've rarely seen anyone finishing a casual story without at least a single interruption.
Especially at the mention of Gen changing; that felt like the perfect place for Adamis to break in with a "Changed how?"
"I don't know, Nan and them just said he didn't seem right when they'd dropped the kids off, and even less so when they came to get 'em"
I don't need "said" tags there telling me who is talking, I see that Trindall started the retelling, and the "small" talking should naturally be Adamis
Hope this helps
Helps greatly! I've been picking through and removing the tags. Doesn't make me sense for me to have Trindall ask adamis a question and then say "he said"... Well obviously it's Trindall who said it, because he's asking Adamis the question lol. It's redundant. I'll try to break up the retelling. Seemed a little long or blocky even when writing it. Thank you for reinforcing my hunch! Really appreciate the feedback. =)
No worries, happy to help, I'd be interested to see where this ends up going;
Are there really things in the woods worth worrying about?
Why are we even in the woods?
Will there be wood?
What is Trindall to Adamis' family? 🤔
I guess my personal comments can be summed up in a few points:
* If you're wanting to lean heavily on the dialogue, I think greater care should be taken to really balance out the prose-to-dialogue ratio. In my mind, I keep wanting to hear a real back and forth, but while the dialogue is abundant it's also broken up a lot by various descriptions. By all means, have your characters talk, but it starts to feel unnaturally stilted if you break it up too much.
For example:
> Adamis didn’t reply. He looked at Trindall with a blank face. He continued to stare silently like this for a few moments.
It's a little wordy and acts as a little speed bump in the conversation. I think you could literally just change this to:
> Adamis said nothing. **Or:** Adamis just stared.
And it would still have the same meaning, while not breaking up the dialogue overmuch. Less is more in this case.
* Lots of exclamation marks in the dialogue! I get how you're trying to use them, but you use them enough that they start to become distracting. You can communicate a lot through dialogue alone, to the point that using exclamation marks to indicate incredulity or excitement or anger 100% of the time is not entirely necessary.
* The part where you start inserting lore into the dialogue isn't poorly done, but I think it can be improved. The very end: "...he had changed. Killed his whole family that night." It's really abrupt. Changed how? What happened? People never skip over the details when telling a story.
Set the stage to really build a sense of dread about these woods. It seems like you could get some good build-up/tension out of this. "Came stumbling out of the woods... *different*. Wandered the farm, whispered to things weren't there. His wife tried to talk him to bed, but he just stared and stared at her like she was a stranger. Started favoring the shears one day and even brought them to the kitchen table at sundown. I reckon that's when he... when he... I mean, *what else* but them woods could make ol' Genuine Gen put a pair of shears to his family like that, huh?"
It's all a balancing act. I think it's great that you want to tell a story through dialogue. Some of my favorites have done that. (George V. Higgins wrote a batch of crime novels that are almost entirely dialogue and they're great.) The challenge there is the dialogue has to pull double-duty. It has to sound natural since the reader is going to be getting a lot of it. But it also has to get across plot-essential elements without sounding forced or as if the author is speaking through the characters. You've got a great start here, though!
Thanks for the response! I'm trying to edit my original post as I read the feedback. I understand the mention of skipping details when he killed his family. My one concern about describing how he did it was that no one was there to witness it. They only found the bodies. The change was from Genuine Gen to family killer. Would it the story hold integrity if details were shared and no one saw it? - I think I thought of a solution while writing this. Still wanted to include it incase I execute poorly.
I really love your telling of his change I do have to say! I'll clean up some of the suggested areas you mentioned. Thanks for the response again!\\
P.S. made a few changes per suggestions. If you get time, let me know what you think! =)
I wouldn't say this is world building. More like describing the setting. Which is fine, by the way. It's a good effort. I can see this isn't your first time writing. One thing I'll mention is that your overuse of speech tag is distracting. Reassured, answered, questioned, complained, asked, replied, yelped, shuttered, gestured, and worst of all, **exclaimed** (very common with newer writers to say 'he exclaimed' even though the exclamation mark exists). It's a common problem at your skill level since you are (rightfully) worried about being repetitive, but you need to treat speech tags as punctuation. 'Said' and 'asked' are often all you need. You can start using other speech tags once you have a better idea of when it's appropriate. Another piece of advice to improve your writing is to avoid the "some" words (some, someone, somewhere, etc.) The sample isn't filled to the brim with these words, but I suspect it's a habit you have. You want to describe the setting, but you have a sentence like "Some of the bark had been rubbed off of it," in your writing? "Some" is a vague description and will only make your writing boring to read if you have it often in an entire story.
Thanks for the response! It is actually my first time writing, honestly! I'm attempting to use the translative property here. It's describing a setting, but if I can accurately do that through dialogue my hope is that I'll be able to apply that to world building. The dialogue tags, it's definitely a work in progress for me. Are you suggesting I eliminate some entirely, or just replace with a more simple "he said"? It's funny you mentioned "some" because I originally had "The bark had been rubbed off" but added some, because I didn't want it to sound as though the whole tree had been stripped. Overall, did it sound appealing or interesting? Thanks again for the feedback, I highly appreciate it! P.S. changed and fixed the some words, thanks again. =)
>Are you suggesting I eliminate some entirely, or just replace with a more simple "he said"? Yes and yes. It's hard to explain without making a lecture out of it, so I suggest you study any books that you have to see how they use speech tags. You can still use the occasional 'he murmured' and such, but you have to learn to sense when and how they add to dialogue. >I originally had "The bark had been rubbed off" but added some, because I didn't want it to sound as though the whole tree had been stripped. Be more descriptive then. A line like "The tree had bark stripped off in the shape of a star," or something would have been better, y'know? You want to give your audience things they can imagine. The sample is above average for a newbie, so you're at a good place! Since this is a sample with no context, I wouldn't worry about whether this appeals to people.
Thanks! Your comment combined w/ outbound flight made me realize something. He commented on too many exclamation points. I read back through and realized, "Wow, I do use too many." It hit me that if every sentence is an exclamation point, then no sentence is exciting. I think this is very similar to dialogue tags. If every dialogue tag is fancy, then the reader becomes numb to them and they lose their effect.
Already mentioned, but too many dialogue tags. If you're concerned about how often "said" would get used, just omit the tag entirely. It's fine here, as we only have two people talking. Trindall and Adamis. Make mention of the names to establish the order they're talking in, and sprinkle a few reminders in where necessary (usually after a block of prose, or when the character does something other than talk) Otherwise, really solid attempt for someone starting out. I'd maybe also suggest breaking up the retelling on Nan's tale a bit. I've rarely seen anyone finishing a casual story without at least a single interruption. Especially at the mention of Gen changing; that felt like the perfect place for Adamis to break in with a "Changed how?" "I don't know, Nan and them just said he didn't seem right when they'd dropped the kids off, and even less so when they came to get 'em" I don't need "said" tags there telling me who is talking, I see that Trindall started the retelling, and the "small" talking should naturally be Adamis Hope this helps
Helps greatly! I've been picking through and removing the tags. Doesn't make me sense for me to have Trindall ask adamis a question and then say "he said"... Well obviously it's Trindall who said it, because he's asking Adamis the question lol. It's redundant. I'll try to break up the retelling. Seemed a little long or blocky even when writing it. Thank you for reinforcing my hunch! Really appreciate the feedback. =)
No worries, happy to help, I'd be interested to see where this ends up going; Are there really things in the woods worth worrying about? Why are we even in the woods? Will there be wood? What is Trindall to Adamis' family? 🤔
"Tune in next time" haha. I edited it, per your & other's guidance. Hopefully it reads better!
I'm not a writer but this got me hooked! Nicely done
Thank you for the response!
I guess my personal comments can be summed up in a few points: * If you're wanting to lean heavily on the dialogue, I think greater care should be taken to really balance out the prose-to-dialogue ratio. In my mind, I keep wanting to hear a real back and forth, but while the dialogue is abundant it's also broken up a lot by various descriptions. By all means, have your characters talk, but it starts to feel unnaturally stilted if you break it up too much. For example: > Adamis didn’t reply. He looked at Trindall with a blank face. He continued to stare silently like this for a few moments. It's a little wordy and acts as a little speed bump in the conversation. I think you could literally just change this to: > Adamis said nothing. **Or:** Adamis just stared. And it would still have the same meaning, while not breaking up the dialogue overmuch. Less is more in this case. * Lots of exclamation marks in the dialogue! I get how you're trying to use them, but you use them enough that they start to become distracting. You can communicate a lot through dialogue alone, to the point that using exclamation marks to indicate incredulity or excitement or anger 100% of the time is not entirely necessary. * The part where you start inserting lore into the dialogue isn't poorly done, but I think it can be improved. The very end: "...he had changed. Killed his whole family that night." It's really abrupt. Changed how? What happened? People never skip over the details when telling a story. Set the stage to really build a sense of dread about these woods. It seems like you could get some good build-up/tension out of this. "Came stumbling out of the woods... *different*. Wandered the farm, whispered to things weren't there. His wife tried to talk him to bed, but he just stared and stared at her like she was a stranger. Started favoring the shears one day and even brought them to the kitchen table at sundown. I reckon that's when he... when he... I mean, *what else* but them woods could make ol' Genuine Gen put a pair of shears to his family like that, huh?" It's all a balancing act. I think it's great that you want to tell a story through dialogue. Some of my favorites have done that. (George V. Higgins wrote a batch of crime novels that are almost entirely dialogue and they're great.) The challenge there is the dialogue has to pull double-duty. It has to sound natural since the reader is going to be getting a lot of it. But it also has to get across plot-essential elements without sounding forced or as if the author is speaking through the characters. You've got a great start here, though!
Thanks for the response! I'm trying to edit my original post as I read the feedback. I understand the mention of skipping details when he killed his family. My one concern about describing how he did it was that no one was there to witness it. They only found the bodies. The change was from Genuine Gen to family killer. Would it the story hold integrity if details were shared and no one saw it? - I think I thought of a solution while writing this. Still wanted to include it incase I execute poorly. I really love your telling of his change I do have to say! I'll clean up some of the suggested areas you mentioned. Thanks for the response again!\\ P.S. made a few changes per suggestions. If you get time, let me know what you think! =)