The Heir

Lisa,

So far the start of your book is very intriguing to me. I think you have a certain descriptive ease to your writing, if that makes sense, which pulls the reader in and puts them right in the story.

My only critique so far is that it is a little difficult to keep track of the characters since you introduced many into the story early on. Overall, I think you have a riveting story and I will continue to read on.

Kerry

YAL review:
First chapter:
I think you’ve got a really intriguing story idea here. It sounds very original.
I like the idea of the journal and you’ve got conflict right from the start which is good.
Since this is a journal, you might want to consider putting in some kind of date other than “day twelve” “day fourteen” etc. I was really curious as to what kind of time frame/world this story takes place in.
There’s a lot of exposition here, and a lot of character names all at once; they’re a bit hard to keep straight.
There are some typos throughout:
“quested forth with out magic” should probably be “with our magic”

Chapter two:
This is a much more dramatic start than the more summarized journal entries. You’ve got me interested in what’s going on. (I like her name, by the way.)
I liked how you skip to a later point in time after the storm; it made me quite curious as to what had happened to Rane and what was going to happen next.
I think you’ve got a great premise and Rane seems pretty gutsy; she doesn’t just sit around when she wakes up surrounded by strangers but makes a decent attempt at escape.
I did have a few areas of concern:
“the calls of the men” What men? Besides Rane, only a woman and a young man are mentioned before this.
It wasn’t immediately clear that she was no longer on the beach. Having Rane ran “into the thick trees” wasn’t quite enough for me. Depending on where/what kind of beach it is, you can have forests nearby and I assumed (mistakenly) that the trees just hadn’t been mentioned before. Maybe have Rane wonder where she is and how she got there when she first wakes up to signal more clearly that she is in a new location.
You drop a lot of information in Peter’s speech to Rane. It feels too rehearsed—too much information too smoothly told in a tense situation.
The other main issue I had is the number of typos. Just in the first few paragraphs:
“and reach” should be “and reached”
“grandmothers small cottage” should be “grandmother’s small cottage”
“Come along now Rane” should have a comma after “now”
“a female voice whisper in her ear” should be “whispered”
“clothing was foreign, he wore” should be a semi-colon instead of a comma after “foreign”
Definitely consider reading through looking specifically for these kinds of errors; it really distracted me from an otherwise well-told story.
Other than that, I thought this was a well setup fantasy and I’m curious as to where you take it.

FCCG

Lisa,

We all have different critique styles. Most people point out what they loved a bout a piece. I point out where I stumble or what I didn't understand because I find that to be most useful a writer can get from a reader.

I like epistolary works. I usually don't read the pitch, but stopped midway through the first chapter to read yours. I was looking for insight as to whether these were 18th century americans, Druids, or some an unknown civilization on another planet. I like the voice in the letter, but couldn't decide if they were a CHILDREN OF THE CORN type religious sect or magical beings. I was thinking the latter until the phrase - "All is well that ends well." Which as you know is most famous for being the title of a Shakespearean play but was a 16th century proverb prior to that. So I settled on sometime post 17th century in our known world. But then there was more fantasy and I thought it unlikely these characters knew Shakespeare.


The wise ones signs - maybe possessive --> one's, if it's a proper name you might consider capitalizing it.



"She smelt like the sea." This line made me stop. It seemed more like something the author wanted to tell than something the writer of the journal entries could possibly know, at least from the image I got. I pictured them all standing in a ring with the two girls in the center at least 5-7 feet away. Given my presumed distance and the fact that there were two of them, If there was a sea smell, could he smell it? How did he know which of the two it was coming from?"

Best of luck,
hope there is something helpful in my ramblings.

Bill

Hi, Lisa!

Here I am for your thorough critique. Please forgive any weird typing errors, I’m on a keyboard I’m not used to, so I have to adapt to it and fix errors a lot more frequently.

Short Pitch:

I felt this is a little weak – I’m not sure if it is too ambiguous or if it just doesn’t have a hook appeal for me, but I’d consider making a set of 5 or 10 different short pitches and try to find one with a bit more ‘bang!’

Long Pitch:

This isn’t an immediate enough pitch for me. The use of ‘The first story’, for example, takes away from the sense of intimacy with the pitch. I feel like you could cut away the first paragraph, keep the second as the long pitch, and discard the rest. I don’t think the last paragraph is really necessary. You can show that to us in the book without losing the appeal factor that a pitch is supposed to contain. Pretend this is the blurb on the back of a book and write it accordingly. Most good back-of-book blurbs don’t include anything that isn’t about the characters directly. Just my general opinion, of course!

The Beginning:

I’m someone who dislikes prologues. The immediate start into a journal entry put my hackles up, to be honest. I also feel like something here should be italics, but I’m not certain if it is all of the entries of what. There is something about the basic formatting that is bothering me but I don’t know what the ‘correct’ way to do this might be.

In the first entry, there are tense shifts between present and past tense. ‘Sun forsaken’ place sounds really odd to me. In the subsequent sentence, I realize it is quite literal, but it was a stumbling point to me. Potential typo here: “The sounds I heard we’re (were) Philippe and Oliver returning.”

At the end of this section, I am torn on it; it is a much better way of exposition than some. The idea of using a journal isn’t new, but it works well. However, this is just my opinion, but I almost wonder if it might work better if the characters discover pieces of this journal through their travels and piece together what happened in the past as a way to do clever exposition directly in the story instead of as a prologue of sorts? I’ve never been a fan of prologues, and while some of the information is interesting, the connection to this character is a remote thing. There are a lot of ways you could use these entries later in the book, be it as a keepsake, or someone leaving clues behind for the characters to follow – something to make it a tangible part of the book rather than just a journal.

Alternatively, if you wanted to go through with the journal route, do it similar to how Robin Hobb’s does it – she is one of the few prologues that I actually enjoy reading, as it is the character stating that he is copying down his experience to a journal on purpose, and giving us a few insights on his character long after the events have ended. David Eddings also does something similar in that the characters coerce Belgarath into writing his experiences down, and eventually the same with Polgara.

Summoned:

First thing that jumped out at me is I think that you could use some variances to your chapter starts. A lot of She, Rane, and The sentence starts. I think you’ll be able to add a lot more depth (and setting and atmosphere) if you vary it up. Feel free to email my address listed on my bio if you want me to do a mock paragraph or two to show you some examples.

I liked the mini-action sequence where she realizes she is captured by strangers and makes a run for it. Good flight or fight response mechanism, and fit the situation well.

That said, you slip into info-dump territory when the guy is trying to explain what happened. I have a few basic problems with this as a reader. First, there are no language difficulties between the two, and no explanation of how they overcome it. There isn’t really an accent issue to deal with. Take a look at the United States, just as an example of accents. Ask a Texan to talk with a New Englander. Confusion abounds as people try to understand what they’re saying, and it is still American English! I think you need to smooth this out and add communication difficulties between the characters.

Not only will this cause conflict, you can avoid the information dump, and you will be forced to show us this new world through Rane’s eyes as she tries to overcome the problems. Perhaps you can use magic as a solution to the language barriers later, but from the start, I’d make it as much of a stranger in a strange land as possible. As a reader, I’d rather be confused where she is, how she got there – and be left asking questions – then have it directly explained to me in the beginning of the first real chapter.

I do like how she berates herself for just going along with it, though.

That said, the names of the characters are throwing me off a bit. In a way, I like how simplistic the names are, but at the same time, your modern girl has a weird name and the weird people have normal names. It is just enough backwards that I noticed it. Peter and Philippe are also easy to get mixed up since they have similar sounding names, just an observation.

As for plot, I quite like the concept, and I like how you (for the most part) jump right in and get to telling the story. This is good. I think that the execution could use a little work, but this is a solid basic start for this.

When Ashley is whining, (Err, I think it is Ashley whining) it isn’t really clear who is whining, but I didn’t think it was Rane. You may want to replace the “she” with the name of the appropriate female for the sake of clarity.

As for the hook: I feel there is definitely potential here, the action and the tension is sound, the general concept very good. A little work in execution, and I think you’ll be well on your way there in terms of having a good, solid first chapter hook.

As something minor of note; it felt like you’re using a very simple sentence structure, avoiding commas whenever absolutely possible. Is this on purpose?

Chapter 2:

I really like the paragraph after the dream sequence: the descriptions, I felt, were spot on and did an excellent job of setting the mood.

Nitpick: Casual waive (wave)

Note about soreness from a saddle: It wouldn’t be the third day she’d be having problems. She isn’t accustomed to riding. The first morning after, her muscles would be beyond stiff, even if the actual sores hadn’t developed yet. The second day would be even worse. The muscle aches from riding are intense, too. It goes from stomach, legs, thighs, back, and even arms. Neck can get stiff too. Abdomen can be really tight feeling as well.

Horseback riding is a full body sport and the first time you do serious riding (or for longer than just a 2 hour trail ride, at a travelling trot) you’re going to *hurt*.

I really like how the characters see magical auras in this world, and that their colors are related to their basic personalities, I think this is a nice touch and gives more of a sense that magic is a living thing.

Nitpick: “Your (you’re) not my lord!” Rane replied evenly. Next paragraph, you have oliver instead of Oliver :)

This chapter in general needs gone over with a fine-toothed comb. There are a lot of lower-cased that should be upper case, as well as cases of missing punctuation. It didn’t bother me too much, but most of this stuff should be a quick edit. If you read it out loud, you’ll probably pick up on all of the errors as they will likely make you stumble while trying to read them.

General commentary: Like the first chapter, I like the concept of where this story is going, but I think it just needs a bit more hip-hip-hurrah to get it to the next level. Experiment with sentence structure and pacing, and otherwise don’t be afraid to test the waters. Sometimes it felt like you were trying to stay on the ‘right’ side of safe and didn’t get very dangerous in terms of word usage and grammar. I think the story would benefit if you go ahead and get muddy and fix it up in edits rather than staying as simple and safe as you’re currently doing. That said, the frame work is in place, and I do feel that this story does have promise. I’d like to see a little more time taken with some of the scenes, and a little more of Rane’s emotions brought out to the forefront. I like the continuation of the conflict between Rane and Ashley at the end of Chapter 2.

I’m going to watchlist this book in hopes I can come around to read more of it in the future :)

~RJ

Hi Lisa,

Reread chapters 1 and 2! I must confess - I don't remember the opening well enough to know *exactly* what was changed, but I get the idea that you're explaining things a lot earlier and more clearly, which is nice because it allows the reader to get a better idea of what's going on. I feel like the story really starts in Chapter 2, with Rane waking up in a panic. The Journal of Henry is nice and serves as a good way to introduce the guys, but since the rest of the story is all told from Rane's perspective, I wonder if it's really necessary? Rane needs to be introduced to everyone anyway, and since we're seeing the story through her eyes, you could just allow the reader to learn everything as she does. Anyway, just my two cents!

Cheers,
M.

Chapter 4

What keeps striking me as I read these chapters is that your ability to write casual conversation is actually very good. However you keep opting not to write out dialog, and instead assume its results. Really I'm sure you could show me how Ashely is feeling without ever telling me once, however Ashley doesn't have very many speaking parts, even though she is a major player in events.

Really what's often bugging me is how often Ashley is brought up, but how little she does PERIOD. I'm aware that Rane is basically our Goku, the rediculously strong hero who's power is somehow masked and everyone expects results from someone else. Good plot thread, however to keep me from predicting it you might want to consider showing me more of Ashley, the one who is SUPPOSED to have all the potential. (Kinda like she's our Vegeta I suppose.) I really don't see much of Ashley doing anything and I'm actually having a hard time understanding why everyone is so dead set on her being the prophesied one when she never does anything. I can see why no one suspects Rane of being powerful, but where is their assurance that Ashley is such a big deal?

On chapter 3

What is carrying this story for me is actually the side characters like Peter and Phillip as we actually SEE their interactions with each other and the main characters. I know that Peter and Rane are falling in love, but notice you have not ONCE stated such in these three chapters. I made the connection just watching their actions. I can see Phillip and Peter are good friends, the best I'm sure, however I don't remember at all being told that. (Maybe it is stated, but it doesn't need to be.)

Also your mythology is very interesting, ripe with vast possibility. This really does seem like a story that is worth the effort to polish, though I do think it needs a lot of polish.


You're biggest problem here is with the concept of "show don't tell". You say that Ashley and Rane are at each other's throats, (or at least Ashley has serious resentment issues) but I see very few scenes of them interacting. You don't describe the magic nets very well, just saying what they do. Finally you don't say much about the attackers riding in (except a few action scenes, which are very brief and hard to follow) or Rane coming to the rescue (you just summarize that she does).

Here's a trick. Pretend that you as the narrator are incapable of telling me anything, at all, unless you're in first person, and even then you can only tell me the emotions of the narrator. Instead I have to learn everything from watching the characters and their world in how they interact, what they think and what they say. This is the reason a lot of people abandon third person writing for first person, as actually first person makes it easier to limit your narration to only what a character can know.

If you're a little unpracticed at writing in scene (and I KNOW you can do it, I wrote with you in the forums and you did it pretty well), maybe you should try writing a few smaller stories. Post them on deviantart or something and see if you can get folks to take a look. (Also critters offers reviews of short stories. Invite me to look at them if you do post some short stories on DA. I'd be glad to help.)

On chapter 2

Prologue
First sentence needs restructuring.

“Eyes broke free” (sounds painful).


Actual chapter:
I think that since magic is mentioned so prevalently at this point, it should be established by being USED before this. Again, Rane is accepting a lot based on nothing it seems.

Ashley not adjusting is referenced, but we never SEE her not adjusting.

It would be interesting to SEE more of how the light orbs were created, seeing as they were the first bit of magic mentioned actually occuring.

What kind of bear trap was in the picture?

Describe the actions of the characters, don’t just sum up. In other words you need to be more generous in your descriptions and allow us to see fights as they play out, even minor ones. Essentially I’m saying your chapters may be long, but not nearly long enough. Keep in mind the term, “show, don’t tell”. Essentially it means, don’t tell us that a sword fight took place, tell us each action that took place, every failed parry and lost footing. It makes for a more exciting read. I’m sure that sounds like you’ll be drawing out some of the preliminary fights and magic shows a little, but hey, it’s not like that kind of thing is unheard of right? Ever seen Bleach or Naruto? (Okay, so don’t give every hand gesture a freaking back story, but you get the idea right?)

Why did this system make me post twice?

I'm actually picking this story back up again as I had to pause for a while to pay closer attention to another one.

In any case, this is pretty good. I like how you're able to make characterizations for each of the characters, making them all feel like people, not just adventurer tropes. Also I do believe Rane doesn't want to admit it of course, but I'm betting she and Peter get together at some point, which is kinda cool to watch.

A few things on the first chapter. First, if Rane is significantly young, or any other character is, it might be a good idea to either give an exact age or a ball park figure. Right now for all we know "young" could mean between 12 and 25, which of course varies the dynamics wildly. (Though given their actions it seems reasonable to rule out grade school ages.)

A few quick questions the narrative didn't answer very well.

Did they or did they not have magic?
At the beginning in the journal, it says they "quested forth with out magic" (btw, "without" is one word) and then it immediately describes magic spreading out from them over the land.

What was the creature in the journal?
I was actually confused by what the magic of the travelers did. Did it become a creature or a plant or had there already been a creature there? If there already was a creature, it wasn't described before.

Rane seems very accepting and what is Ashley’s reaction?
Rane is never shown any proof of anything, and is rather quick to accept that she is in a new world of magic. Maybe it would be good to have her see something convincing. Also, I know she's not the lead character, but a little glimpse at Ashley's reaction to all this would have been interesting. Right now she seems like she totally accepts and wants to be where she is, save for her childish whining. If that is so, why is that?

Hi Lisa,

Read Autho Chapter 7! I'm jumping into the middle here (or, I guess, the end), so I got a little confused about who was who, but overall, I think it's quite decent. The strongest parts, in my opinion, were Rane's speech to the crowd (great job showing both her strength and her insecurity) and the description of the dragons (they sound fantastic!). The battle itself seemed exciting, but it was a little hard to follow. I don't think it was too long, but what was happening and where got somewhat confusing. I think it would help to break up your paragraphs and add a bit more detail to each individual action the characters make. This would make it easier to visualize what's going on, and help the reader keep track of what's where (you've got a lot happening!). The story itself seems like a great, climactic way to end what I'm sure is an epic adventure.

Cheers,
M.
Astral Sea: The Pandora Project

Hi Lisa,
I dropped in to read Autho Chapter 6 because I wanted to see more of Alise :-) She really is a great character - cocky and assured, likable and memorable. She enters the scene like a whirlwind, and I think you do a good job of portraying the narrator's astonishment. You also do a good job of describing the actions that are taking place - it's clear what's going on even though you don't go into too much detail (which is good because it keep story moving forward). The content is all quite good, but I think your descriptions could use some polishing - maybe try varying the sentence structure (right now, for example, the second to last paragraph feels a big clipped). I also noticed that this seems to be a fantasy that uses a more old-fashioned version of English, and yet Alise says "yeah, yeah" like one would in 2012. Not sure if this anachronism is intentional, but I thought I'd point it out.

Anyway, seems like you've got a fun story here, and I wish you the best of luck with it!

Cheers,
M.
Astral Sea: The Pandora Project

I really like your story. Its so fun...I just want to keep reading and reading. I cant wait until everyone realizes Ashley isnt the queen--or at least thats what I think so far.
Here are a few typo's I found:
"The spring weather is still cool..." "was" still cool. You want to stay in the same tense.
"Not to close comrades, our deer might take flight again." (too)
"...with the promised that..." (promise)---first chapter.

Rane and Ashley have just been ripped from their own world...wouldn't they be a little more...freaked out? ---just a thought.

Otherwise a very fine start to a novel. I love the idea, and your writing is very good. Great job!

Kerrin Krainis
Wings

Hi Lisa,
here for our reading swap, thanks for your comment on Mr Unusually's Circus of Dreams.

If you want a few more readers and reviewers, you could join the YARG reading group thread on the forum. Message me if you want more info.

I think you've got a great story here, Lisa, I cannot fault your ideas or the age appropriateness (the language and subject matter are well pitched for YA) but I felt some of the prose lacked a bit of zing! It's almost there, but not quite.

You could start by making the pitches a bit more powerful. Think cinema trailer and you'll get the style, but not too many questions or it makes the reader feel interrogated. Remember your short pitch is all people see of the book when they look through the rankings pages, so it really needs to pack a punch.

Also your first line needs to grab the reader by the lapels a little more. As a YA writer you're competing with facebook, and Playstation as much as with the next book on the bookstore table. So use the first line to make it impossible for the reader to put the book down. Pull out all the stops!

I read the first two chapters and thought very carefully about why the prose wasn't leaping off the page for me. I think in Chp1 the first person narrative doesn't help, there's not much dialogue and the 'voice' has a lulling rhythm to it because you tend to repeat similar sentence structures often. In Chp2 the prose was more alive because of the dialogue, but in places the same sentence constructions kept coming up. Make sure that you write varied sentence lengths, that will help. The more variety the better.

This is super harsh, and I can see you've got a great story to tell and generally write with power and poetry, just need a bit more oomph. But if you disagree, that's fine, it's just an opinion. I'm not an expert.
5 stars from me.
All the best,
Sharda.

i simply agree with the comments below. interesting premise, engaging enough, but a bit confusing. might need a backstory or description of some of the minor characters....
j

Hello. ^^

Interesting choice starting the story in the Journal of Henry and then switching to the actual story. I do like it.
It keeps the reader informed as to what happened before and introduces some of the characters beforehand, helping to keep them straight.

Journal of Henry:
Good starting sentence.
In these sentences you say sun twice: “yet the sun shone well and we were comfortable”
And “All ran smoothly until we reached this sun forsaken place”.
It doesn’t feel like purposeful repetition so it comes off as a bit awkward that they’re only separated by one sentence.

Chapter One:
“She pulled her hand free of the blanket and gingerly rubbed the back of her head.”
“Her hand scraped the rough ground beneath her as she reached for her head”.
These two sentences are basically saying the exact same thing. Consider cutting one of them.

This is a great description: “The moment her scream ended she was moving”
Great job conveying the action.

“Not to close comrades, our deer might take fight again.”
To should be Too. I think fight may be a typo, unless it’s a play on the saying.

I found it a bit unbelievable that Rane would sit through that story, as well as the fact that that whole story needed to be told right then and there. To me the best way to explain would be, “we were trying to get our princess and then we accidently got you.”
Does the reader need to know all this right now? It’s a bit dull.


Alright here’s this: “Rane thought about this story. Wait …so does that make me?”
This is her thoughts, right? But they’re not italics. Later on you put her thoughts in italics. It doesn’t really matter if you put the thoughts in italics or not, but you’ve got to chose one and stick with it.


I like how with the dialog you can see the difference between how Rane talks and all the other people talk. It’s a nice touch.

Ashley is an interesting character. There seems a lot to be going on with her and you hint at it well.

Rane seems very relaxed to me. That could be a part of her character, but she’s not worried at all about her life at home or that these people might not be who they say they are.

I love this line: “I was thinking about…what’s a bronze shell?”

Be careful about explaining the dialog. For example: ““Are you warm enough?” He asked concerned.”
It’s obvious that he’s concerned, the reader doesn’t need to be told that he is.

“The boots were still to large”
To should be too.

I love the scene where Peter is stiff because Rane is clinging on to him. It’s a good one.

“Probably thinks I’m going to play Ashley’s little game for him. She can have him I just want to go home!”
How does Rane know this? I haven’t seen any evidence that Ashley has been trying to do anything with Peter until later.

“There is a the ruins!”
I think there’s a little typo here.


I’m not sure I like seeing all Rane’s thoughts. Maybe try showing how Rane is feeling instead.
Like when she’s describing Ashley’s many complaints say show Rane’s expressions and how they interact.

Overall I think this has a lot of potential. There’s a good story here and the characters are interesting and different enough from each other.

Lisa, I've read the first three chapters so far. You have a strong start in using Henry as a narrator, chronicling the journey and I was prepared for, and found it easy to, switch to Rane's POV in the following chapters. There was only one thing that didn't sit well and perhaps I'm not reading it properly, but I wondered how Henry could be in the middle of the hubbub, only have a scrap of paper yet have the opportunity to write out the events of Ashley and Rane's arrival. In that scene Henry speaks of starting at the beginning to give a proper explanation and then Peter repeats that idea when he tells the history to Rane.

Few things I noted as I read:
'our deer might take fight again' - wondered if you meant fight or if it should have been flight/fright?

Seems to be something missing, ' In the_year of her reign Alise was sent...'

'with the promised that when the time was right...' - promise

'to hear him tell it were bound for failure,' we're

Some good, growing tension and sense of unease in chapter two, with the unrelenting fog and the desire to get to the Inn. Then the ambush and the rescue by Rane show she has a capability that no-one, including herself, understand.

Ashley is not a character that I, as a reader, warm to. She seems vain and selfish.

I think you have a strong idea here for a fantasy plot and I'd be interested to keep reading to see what Rane's role in this world will be.

Lisa,

About three weeks ago, I read your prologue and first chapter and commented. Today, I came back for a re-read of the opening, and this time I was hooked. I've now read all of the chapters you have posted. This is really, really good. If you post more chapters, please let me know and I'll read them.

Highly starred.

Susan/Greenleaf (Chameleon)

Hi. This is BHG crit. A little shorter than normal, so sorry for that.

Short Pitch: Like this. Succinct.

Long Pitch: A little wordy, maybe make a couple of paragraphs.


Chapter One – is it ‘the wise one’s signs…..’ or ‘the wise ones’ signs’ ? minor point, but I did wonder.

It should be ‘wreaking’ havoc, rather than ‘wrecking’ in paragraph two.

‘Over heard’ is one word.
‘The sounds I heard we’re Phillipe….’ – should be ‘were’ Phillipe….

One thing that I found a slight disadvantage was not knowing anything about Peter, Henry or Oliver. Since it is fantasy, I wasn’t sure whether my minds-eye should be imagining children, young people, or adults, or even human beings. I guess this isn’t vital, but in order to enter the story it would have been nice to have some idea.

I loved the voice of the diary writer. It was very individual and somehow very realistic. I could almost hear him. I did wonder about the odd word, though. He speaks very formally and correctly, but then we have things like ‘was almost a let down..’ Let down sounded somehow too modern with the rest of his speech pattern.

Maybe a *** or something to separate the diary entries in time would be good. I was reading them as just a new paragraph, but clearly some time had passed.

When we got to chapter one, the voice changed and we were with Rane. The following passage I found to be almost all very short simple sentences, especially in the paragraph ‘Rane dodged through the trees…’ and a lot of them started with ‘She..’ which could become a little jarring.

‘differed to Peter…’ – do you mean deferred? In that he gave way to him? Or differed in that he looked different?

Chapter Two.

‘She dreamed of the ocean the water was choppy…’ do you need a semi-colon after ocean?

There’s a change of font and size here, is there a reason? It happens a few times

Chapter three

Missing ‘ - ‘As soon as Ranes up…. (Rane’s up)
Missing ‘ ‘Peters attitude was cold….’ Should be ‘Peter’s attitude..’
Missing capital letter in the dialogue near the end – ‘not truly, but some….’
Missing gap ‘Alot of unknowns.’

Good dialogue here – believable and to the point and good for showing character and the difference between the various people.
Have read all of it now, and I enjoyed the read. I have pointed out some typos etc. but you can ignore what you like, and the same with any comments.

I think this is a good story – a bit of an edit needed, but that is true with most of us, but on the whole a well developed story and an interesting plot. Characters are well drawn, there is some conflict and interest to pull the reader along, and altogether, a promising and enjoyable read. Will be glad to read anymore when posted.
Cariad.

THE HEIR Brutal honesty group review
This is a good beginning: a strange trip into a forest to rejuvenate an heir. You might put some stars or something between paragraphs that show the descriptions were written at different times just to make that clear, but otherwise, okay. A small thing odd: the narrator makes a point no one should wander out of sight, yet he takes off for the glade and just leaves a note behind for others to follow who are clearly out of his sight.
Chapter 1. Your reader meets a lot of characters here, but okay. I like the way they interact with each other. The way Rane was innocently drawn into the mixture is interesting. The explanation of illusion in this chapter seems long, tho. Is there a way to break that up with some action? (Think of this as a movie; how will Brad Pitt ever memorize that long stream of dialogue?) Small things: “hair fell into his green eyes” (it fell across his green eyes; otherwise, that would hurt a lot). “Not to close comrades” should be “not too close, comrades”.
Chapter 2. Rane learns to swordfight. This chapter is written well but except for showing Ashley is becoming jealous, does it move the story forward? I’m anxious to get into the meat of the story.
Chapter 3. This chapter has an interesting scene when everyone is captured – but then everything seems to be all right again. And (for me) it wasn’t clear what happened. Afterward, no one seems upset; just getting on with business as usual. I think you need to read this chapter through as if you’ve never read it before and see if it would be clear to your reader who is seeing it for the first time. Small thing: “they must know were (we’re?) trained fighters . . .”
I’m stopping here as I think I have a good feel for the story. The fantasy world is well fleshed out; feels real. Rane is a good main character because she’s being introduced to this new world the same as the reader. I think you’ll find a fantasy audience waiting for this; just be clear you explain enough as you go a reader can understand everything that is happening.

Hi Lisa,
You asked me to critique your book with a really objective eye, and to give you honest and hopefully helpful feedback. Here is my review of your prologue and first chapter:
Your writing is very good, however, I was confused about the prologue written as a journal entry instead of as a scene. I thought maybe it was something that happened long ago. Then, when I got to chapter one and realized it was a continuation of the prologue (only in a different font) but I wrote up some comments:
My first suggestion is to make the prologue part of the first chapter. Write it, then skip a couple lines and put an asterisks in the center, then start the new scene that begins from Rane’s viewpoint.
Next, I would start the opening with the action that is in the third paragraph of the prologue. You can add in the back story info later. A literary agent once told me to sprinkle in back story like breadcrumbs instead of giving an info dump.
In the prologue, you are telling the story in exposition instead of showing. If you want to really engage the reader and hook them, you should write the opening as a full scene. You could show the group reaching the glade—describe it for us in your journal-writer’s view and with the their reactions, sights, sounds, smells. Make it as vivid as you can.
Right now, we’re hearing about what is happening, but we aren’t really seeing it. We aren’t part of it. By turning it into a real scene, you’ll pull the reader into the forest.
When you get to the first chapter, you’ve got full scenes with dialogue. Much more engaging.
Some of your paragraphs, the ones giving back story are really long. These are your info dumps. If you can break them up and sprinkle in the information, that’s great. If you can’t, then maybe you can break the paragraphs into shorter segments by finding a place where you can divide into two or three smaller paragraphs, one right after the other.
You have some punctuation errors (at least as an American sees it, this may be a regional difference). What I’m talking about here is in regard to dialogue. An example, “Ashley is the heir.” Peter added. “she registered the magic. Somehow we erred. We were meddling with magic beyond our own understanding. You were pulled in by our spell.”
I would say it should read this way: “Ashley is the heir.” Peter added, “She registered the magic. Somehow we erred. We were meddling with magic beyond our own spell.”
Also, I don’t think you need italics for thoughts, but a lot of writers use them. I guess it’s a personal preference.
I’ve also been cautioned when it comes to phrases like: She snorted mentally. I’ve written things like that and have been told it’s not really possible. I know what you meant, but maybe you can just stay: Yeah, right. He probably thinks I’m going to play Ashley’s little game for him. She can have him. I just want to go home!
I hope this helps, Lisa. I’ll try to read more and give more feedback if you want it.
Susan/Greenleaf (Chameleon)

This is a BHCG review...I read it how I 'see' it...:-)
Plot – The first part - it took me some moments to realise I was reading a diary extract. I went to Chapter One, this is where the real story begins...nice jump into action, then some dialogue between characters, and some kind of info dump explanation...
Pacing – starts well, then gets bogged down in that info dump 'monologue'...
Characters/Characterization - I like the characters, Rane is so far as I could see, believable, some of the others are a bit fluffy, to be honest, I didn't get that far...
Point of View/Voice - good, strong, all good things going on here, 3rd person POV, excellent
Style – genre determined, fits the bill, there's a story in here waiting to be told.
Sentence level – the first few paragraphs felt like a tennis match between descriptions, some variation would help here.
Dialogue - believeable, on the whole, difficult where fantasy is concerned. One little strange thing .."not too close comrades, our deer might take 'fight' again...." - isn't that flight? Only a typo, nothing to worry about.
Originality - well, maybe original, in its genre, not too sure, in my amateuristic opinion
Publishability - why not? There's a good story here, good characters, well-written.
Good luck with it .-)
DJC

Hi Lisa. This is a Brutal Honesty critique. Of course this is just my humble opinion, but it's what I would do if I were writing this: I think there's a good story in here, hidden beneath some craft problems that I'd sort out. The first paragraph starts off quite hazy on tenses: has taxed us... began easily ... is still cool... sun shone well. I would just chop it off entirely and start with "Peter leads us well, (you could slip in "undeterred by the thick fog" here)...

I'd break information into more paragraphs when warranted. Many of your thoughts run right into new ones without benefit of a paragraph, which would help sort them out.

I would drop "before we will turn back without" because that seems to say the writer already knows they will fail. Since this is his diary, he would not. It also kills any suspense about whether they will succeed or not. I'd try something like: "...vowed two more days of searching. To return without him would be a blow to our struggling city."

I'd make "somehow we missed..." a separate paragraph.

I'd put dates on diary entries. That makes it a lot easier to know if we're talking an hour later, a day later, etc.

The entry "The day we planned to return is upon us" sounds like it's daybreak. But then you write "tonight we found the creek." This leaves me confused about when he's writing this entry. Perhaps you could jump right to "It's been just a few hours now since Oliver found the creek."

upstream and downstream are spelled like this.

At one point you've got we're when you mean were.

New paragraph for "Time has almost covered up..."

add a comma after Avaken.

waited (instead of waiting) for dawn

Peter (cut: raised his hands and) drew back his hood. (Using his hands is implied, unless he's using some strange alternative.)

our magic (cut: period. add: comma) each man...

fed of(supposed to be off) our magic

new paragraph: Standing upon the carved...

Strange material and strange patterns (strange is a very vague term. Can you be specific?) (add: period) (Next sentence is backwards. First the breeze kicks up, then her hair. So write it that way: A think breeze kicked up and her golden tresses danced about her face.

new paragraph: The other girl... in a gray baggy material (more likely she's dressed in something MADE of a gray baggy material. So what is she in. A sack? A pant suit? And I'd work from the top down to keep our internal eye from bouncing around. I.e.: The other girl's hair was short, brown and wet. She wore a baggy grey smock and loose trousers to match. Her feet were bare."

(Cut: the brown haired girl. Since you're already talking about her, this only confuses the reader into thinking we're talking about another. Just say "she" stared.

new paragraph: We still have no knowledge

I'm sure there's a fine story in here, but I'd clean this up to make it easier to discover. I really hope this is helpful, and apologize if it's too cold. If you want more of this brutal kind of feedback I'm happy to do it, but would need the text in word format to mark up. (todschneider@hotmail.com)

Lisa,

I read up to some point into the second chapter, where I felt the YA genre catching up with me. :)

I -contrary to other comments you got- think that the transition from the letter to the narration worked just fine. You have an interesting voice, which could get polished by tightening the pace of your narration. You get caught up in details, such as "who does what while someone else is doing something else, on whom the effect of something was a major thingy". You can read your text sentence by sentence and ask yourself whether that information or the other is relevant/necessary for the story to carry on.

Sometimes us writers think that by offering many details to the reader, we set up the scene better. Any description of action should be to the point -in my humble opinion. Descriptions of settings is a matter of circumstance, but in your case descriptions of action is what you should tend to. Keep the ones that matter and trim the resr. (an example in your first chapter would be that it felt too long from when they found Rane in the woods to the next interesting point, which was the riding back home with Peter and the demeanor of Ashley at that point.)

In this I will add -one not being far from the other as a comment- that there are a lot of short sentences. Short sentences are used to add emphasis, to hit a reader with something important. You use them really often just to offer information. One solution would be to read through your text and highlight these short sentences and then try to merge them with others before or after. The other solution -as already suggested- would be to reconsider their use on the whole. See if these short sentences add something useful and follow my advice above.

Other than that I think for the YA genre you have a prolific plot. The characters are strangely drawn to each other by mystifying connections and this makes the reader wonder. I believe if you take the time to tighten things up significantly, it would be a great read for YAs.

Good luck with it :)

Yannis

Lisa,

I just finished with chapter 1 of The Heir and am really enjoying it so far! You've got a really good premise here and a style that I think YA audiences will really enjoy. You have a great knack for conversation building as well and I think my favorite part of chapter 1 was when you introduced us to Illusien itself. What a wonderful story! I'll be back soon to read more, have added The Heir to my watchlist and have rated it six out of six stars. Thanks so much for the enjoyable read!

Have a wonderful day!

- Scott, The Ark of Humanity

P.s. If you get the chance to check out The Ark of Humanity I'd love to hear what you think of it!

This is a promising voice. I am glad that you trust it. To me, the connection between "from the journal of Henry" and the first chapter is not clear - but that might come later? I like it when there is something for me to do as a reader - but not TOO complicated, if you see what i mean - do not let me hang too long and wonder :-)
You have written as in a flow, am i right? it works - but it also allows for some places where you miss words and are out of context. Please read it through carefully and correct these glitches.
I find that already now, just after this first chapter, I would read the book if it laid on my table.
Best of luck, Lisa!
Leelah Saachi "When fear comes home to Love" -

This is an amazing premise for a story and you write YA fantasy so very well. I was only able to get to three chapters tonight but I look forward to getting to the rest. :)

One helpful hint that has helped me ( and I'ms till working on actually lol) is to reduce your adverbs-ly words. I was told it loses the "punch" of your sentence. And I "reluctantly"( lol) agree. :)

You are a talented writer with a great mind for creating a fantastical world that is easy to get lost in. Good job!! :) I'll be back to read more of your wonderful book a soon as I can.


Blessings and best wishes,
Laura A. Diaz
"They Call Me Blanca"