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  1.  

    An internet friend of mine got his book published: http://www.amazon.com/November-J-William-English/dp/160799870X#noop

    I think it sounds rather stupid, but I want to read because I sort-of know the author. I“ve read the first pages. It’s not abyssmal, but it’s not great. I’m going to read it, of course, but I want to know what you folks make of it.

  2.  

    are you sure you’re not just VERY sneakily self-plugging yourself??

    lol.

  3.  

    Things I liked: “Puppies?” and “Her skin smelled of lavender. He detested lavender.” Nice subversion there.

    OK, to be honest, it’s interesting. It’s not perfect (I have the same semi-awkward style in my writing, which I want to correct), but on the whole it seems nice. I can’t buy it because I’m broke, but I would read it if I could, if only to see what happens.

    Question: Is Sinéad supposed to be sort of foppish? She seems rather whiney and Mary Sue-like to me, but I don’t know if that’s intentional.

  4.  

    I’m not plugging myself.

    I’m just trying to decided wether or not to read it.

  5.  

    Lol, I knew you weren’t. Just teasing you. I think you should read it—don’t let them know you’re reading it, though, because then if you don’t like it…

  6.  

    It sounds okay. I probably wouldn’t read it just based on the description. I haven’t read an exerpt or anything. It does amaze me how many writers make their protagonists writers also.

  7.  

    . It does amaze me how many writers make their protagonists writers also.

    X

    That always kind of bugs me, so I sworn never to do that. lol.

  8.  

    ^^Yeah, I don’t think I will either. I could have a supporting character who is a writer, possibly, but I the protagonist being a (usually struggling) author gets old.

    •  
      CommentAuthorPuppet
    • CommentTimeNov 29th 2009
     

    Just because its by a young author it doesn’t necessarily mean its bad…

    •  
      CommentAuthorJeni
    • CommentTimeNov 29th 2009
     

    One of the greatest SF writers, Arthur C. Clarke, wrote a terrific novel based around the protagonist being an SF writer.

    An idea can be as refreshing as you want, it’s up to you to write it that way.

    •  
      CommentAuthorArtimaeus
    • CommentTimeNov 29th 2009
     

    It does amaze me how many writers make their protagonists writers also.

    I don’t usually like it. I feel uncomfortable reading stories about writers because they are so often author avatars. Unless it’s fantastically well done, it comes across like the writer is writing the character the way he himself wants to be seen. Hence, why so many works of faux literature are about the deep, tormented writer trying to grasp the world.

    Anyway, about the story, I read the first chapter(?) and I’m not sure what to make of it. The scene begins just after Sinead’s graduation ceremony. Naturally, everyone’s really proud of themselves, and sad that they’re all leaving. Everyone is milling aimlessly, but Sinead knows who she’s looking for: her long time crush Liam, the boy with long, dark hair and enchanting eyes. She find him and walks up to him. They banter in latin. She kisses him on the cheek, at which point he says he’s uncomfortable with the PDA in front of everybody. Sinead asks if she can speak to him alone.

    At this point, without any transition, the narration switches to Liam’s perspective. He walks her off to the deserted side of the building, and once alone, she begins to feel him up. Liam freaks out, and we then witness, though his eyes, one of the most frustrating conversations of all time, where he just refuses to comprehend that the girl who kissed him and dragged him off to a lonely garden to feel him up might have romantic feelings for him.

    Long story short, Sinead breaks down in a fit of unrequited love, saying how she thought he had changed, and that she hated him, and that she loved him, how he was a selfish ass, who led on her (and every other girl at the university) for his own selfish amusement. About half way though does Liam manages to say something besides “Sin, you have to explain. I don’t understand”, and begins to insist that he only ever saw them as friends. “If you were sorry, you would marry me,” Sinead says, and storms off.

    After this conversation, I am forced to conclude either that Sinead is the most selfish, unreasonable person ever, or Liam is inhumanly clueless. I have no idea why Sinead was even introduced, since she’s clearly not the protagonist (and not all that important to the protagonist). The perspective flip was jarring, and it left us without a frame of reference.

  9.  

    Would you leave a review if you read it? :O

  10.  

    Oh wait, I take that back. I did have one character who was a writer. His name was Nikolai Andreivich, and he had a bad case of writer’s block because he couldn’t figure out how to properly write about a murder. So he kills an old guy with a hammer. And then becomes famous for his story. (I never finished writing this, though…I should.) Unfortuneately, he was a bit of a Raskolnikov rip-off….

    I would leave a review. He doesn’t know me as Inspector Karamazov.

  11.  

    Ha! .... Glad to know one of my writing friends isn’t the only one with weird sense of humor. :P

    I have a minor character whose a writer, just so that by his failed, hacked works, I could describe the popular stories in my fantasy world. He spends a week writing smoothy, only for his wife to read over it and say, “Isn’t this Harry Potter’s plot?”

  12.  

    Because I love the arts so much in general, especially music and literature, I had to make that a part of my characters’ lives in some small way at least, so one is an artist (he’s practically illiterate, but you don’t need words to draw).

  13.  

    I don’t think I’ve got a writer character.

    •  
      CommentAuthorTakuGifian
    • CommentTimeDec 3rd 2009 edited
     

    The only writer-character I have in my main WIP is a maid/handservant by the name of Ngo who writes poetry, and whose attempts at such are mocked. It’s really only a comedy-relief element. Plus I was frustrated with characters like Eragon spouting off some unedited, shallow free verse and having it declared THE BEST POEM EVAR by other characters; and with characters like Frodo and the Hobbits, and other characters in Tolkien’s works who can adlib can remember very long poems in perfectly rhymed meter without having to pause and think, or backtrack over incorrectly worded lines, at a moment’s notice, and do so too often to be realistic.YES, people a long time ago probably remembered long poems better than a lot of people do today. That doesn’t mean that every single person knew an epic poetic saga each without ever having to consult a written source or stop to think about what comes next… minstrels, troubardors, skalds and bards existed for a reason, and that reason is because they were paid by the people they entertained to do little else but memorise long epic poems all day or compose new ones, and the farmers and peasants and shepherds and farriers and cooks and stableboys and glass blowers and potters and coopers and smiths and bakers of the world didn’t have the time or energy to memorise them, because they were too busy doing their work. Plus, the minstrels were often patronised, which meant a rich noble family taught them to read and write and supported them while they composed or wrote). The number of illiterates in old-world europe would have made reading and writing a huge boon to the poets of the day, given the ability to go back over lines and remember them with absolute precision, a luxury that few people would have had…

    I would expect a noble to have memorised a few exceptional poems by heart in the right kind of society with economic and political stability, but a farmer? A cook? A homeless, wandering nobody (who wasn’t employed as a minstrel/entertainer)? Songs are separate from poetry, because they are a shared experience that follow a pattern of strong repetition and reduplication (especially the traditional sailors’ songs), rather than an attempt to memorise, say, Beowulf word-for-word.

    Anyway. Ahem. pseudo-medieval peasants like Eragon who spent most of their lives illiterate should not be able to compose incomparably beautiful epic narrative poetry in a two-day bender.

    Even if they ARE fuelled by magic mushrooms and naked tattooed elf women.

  14.  

    he couldn’t figure out how to properly write about a murder. So he kills an old guy with a hammer.

    That sounds really cool actually.

  15.  

    That sounds really cool actually.

    X

    Thankees. I may post it here if I ever finish it. It’s in need of an ending, research on St. Petersburg, and and editing.

  16.  

    @ Taku: I believe Bilbo was a poet of sorts, and he had tons of time in Rivendell to compose whatever the heck he wanted. As for the other songs/poems, I always thought they were cultural things that the Hobbits/Elves just knew from their homelands. I mean, even the blacksmith knows a few jolly songs, right?

    As for Sam composing poems, they’re not particularly awesome. They rhyme, which more than I’m capable of, and poor Sam probably needed a distraction anyway trekking up to Mordor.