<!--QuoteBegin-Kerotan+Jun 21 2005, 11:05 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Kerotan @ Jun 21 2005, 11:05 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->In english we have to right a storie, Were very restirceted on stuff which sucks... We have to have only 5 paragraths and only 2 characters, kinda obvious what its about, please give me ides on how to improve it and tell me if its good or bad, Dont lie!! --------------------------------------- “ A gun to hire… That is what I am, a merciless killer paid to do hits, Many times had I done this but this was different… This was personal.” I lay waiting in the forest my rifle set up, and a cigarette in my mouth. I was wearing a long dark cloak covering my face, a open case lay nearby so I could quickly detach my gun and put it in my case for a quick getaway.
“The “Safe house”… Safe they say but not this time, info on its location has slipped into my hands.” The house was as normal as any house, but guards were surrounding it under any shelter they could find to hide from the heavy rain and the thunder striking every now and then like a constant beating drum. Nearby animals could be heard shuffling through the undergrowth around me, the forest I lay in was confined in darkness silent except from the animals, but then the sounds of a car could be heard travelling down the road, I looked down my scope and aimed at the car.
A nice sleek black car drove down the muddy road, driving through puddles ruing the shiny blackness, dark tinted windows prevented seeing my target but through the front window I could see two FBI agents in the seats. “This is going to make it hard” I said to myself knowing the glass would be bullet prove, while observering the car I never noticed it had pulled up in front of the house.
A door opened and a man with a long black umbrella got out, he left the door open and another man got out more fidgety then the other, My target, He waited under the umbrella while the other two agents got out, then they started to walk to the door. I aimed my rifle at my target waiting for the right moment, “boom” a lightning bolt struck and my target was on the floor, his soul ripped out of his lifeless body.
Before the bullet even hit my target my gun was packed away and the bullet shell in my pocket, I walked to my bike and drove off, The roaring engine silenced in the distance.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd--> <span style='font-size:14pt;line-height:100%'><span style='color:green'>Punctuation:</span></span>
Reread your writing and pay attention to your use of commas, capital letters, speech marks and suspension points.
Suspension points (...) are used to tell the reader that a considerable period of time has elapsed, do you really want to use them in the first line of the first paragraph?
Capital letters are only used for proper nouns (Harry, Birmingham) and text that follows a question mark, exclamation mark or full stop. There are some instances where you lead with a capital letter after a comma; this needs changing.
Commas are used in many circumstances but their main use is to separate different parts of a sentence to make it easier to read ('<span style='color:white'>I lay waiting in the forest, my rifle set up and a cigarette in my mouth.</span>'). They are also used in the pacing of the sentence, although this is a more stylised and personal usage; one that might be scrutinised by an English teacher for being incorrect (commas before 'and', etc.). Furthermore when two adjectives are used to describe a noun and they appear one after the other in the sentence, they should be separated by a comma ('<span style='color:white'>a long, dark cloak</span>').
Speech marks are used for direct speech (or arguably for internal dialogue), whereas apostrophes are used for reported speech. This means that if one of your characters is talking at the same time that this part of the story is set, you use speech marks. If a character is, for example, remembering some words that another has said to him in the past, you use apostrophes as this would be reported speech. Finally if a character is talking or thinking to himself ('<span style='color:white'>“This is going to make it hard” I said to myself</span>') you should use speech marks, as you have done.
<span style='font-size:14pt;line-height:100%'><span style='color:green'>Comments on General Style</span></span>
From what I can see you could get away with making your paragraphs a bit longer in general, and even combining some paragraphs and adding in an extra one or two to lengthen the story.
Paragraphs can be as long as you want, but generally you will begin a new paragraph when you begin to describe a different aspect of the story. This could be due to change of time setting, focus changing from one character to another, change of physical setting, etc..
Remember that length of a paragraph and the sentence structure within can greatly affect the way the reader interprets the section of text. If you have a paragraph where a character is waiting a long time for something, or you are describing a long journey, you can use long words, long sentences and therefore a longer paragraph to transfer this experience to the reader. Conversely, if you have a short fight scene full of swift punches and dodging, you can make the dialogue full of short insults or quips to keep the action moving to and fro. Short sentences full of short words might characterise this sequence, with a short paragraph for a quick bout and a longer paragraph for an epic battle.
Repeating words within a sentence always seems clumsy, as the English language has a vast array of vocabulary you can use to say the same thing twice without repetition. Due to this fact, however, repetition is used in English literature to <i>emphasise</i> an element (character, emotion, place -it could really be anything that is important to the theme of the story). I assume that in the sections: '<span style='color:white'>an open case lay nearby so I could quickly detach my gun and put it in my case</span>', '<span style='color:white'>The house was as normal as any house</span>', '<span style='color:white'>then the sounds of a car could be heard travelling down the road, I looked down my scope and aimed at the car</span>' and '<span style='color:white'>A door opened and a man with a long black umbrella got out, he left the door open</span>' were all written on the fly. Nevertheless it pays dividends to re-read your work for unintentional repetition, clumsy grammar or spelling; some find this easier to do by re-reading it backwards so that they can concentrate on the wording without skimming over what you already know.
If we break your paragraphs down we can make a resume of the story, and you might be able to see where you can merge paragraphs together to elaborate on the story:
<span style='color:orange'>Paragraph 1:</span> Character introduced, assassin is briefly emotially and physically described. Immediate surroundings briefly described, although the reader is still in the dark as to where the assassin is (a bridge, an airport?).
<span style='color:orange'>Paragraph 2:</span> Setting described in reasonable detail. Assassin gets himself into a 'ready' position.
<span style='color:orange'>Paragraph 3:</span> Description of target and his entourage (the people with him). Car approaches.
<span style='color:orange'>Paragraph 4:</span> More description of the FBI agents. The kill.
<span style='color:orange'>Paragraph 5:</span> One sentence paragraph that paints the assassin as being used to his job.
I'd probably say that all of the paragraphs can be expanded by at least a couple of sentences. My main suggestion would be to merge paragraphs 4 and 5 and include a new paragraph that describes the relation to the target a bit more. One option is to have this new paragraph preceding the kill, so that the reader knows why it is personal and why it might be so difficult to pull the trigger. Another is to have it as the final paragraph, having already described the emotional upheaval involved in shooting this guy down in the previous paragraph but having not explained why, so that you can describe his emotional reaction to the kill and shed some light on the identity and connection to the assassin of the target as a final 'denouement' (tying-up/conclusion).
You can write a lot more in this paragraph and the first sentence is incredibly important because it is designed to engage the reader, to get them interested enough to read on. This would be a good enough line to start the story apart from the fact that it's a non-sequator (a statement which contradicts itself or doesn't fulfil its meaning). You say that this time it's personal, yet at the end of the story the character just walks away, with seemingly no personal interest whatsoever. It's perfectly OK to leave the reader asking questions, especially at the end of a short story, but you should not contradict yourself and confuse the reader.
You need to include some more information about the specifics of where the assassin is. His choice of vantage point will help the reader understand more about his character; is he professionally hidden or has he had to take up a slightly comprimised position because of the amount of guards. How well hidden is he? Is he in a rainforest, a dense, woodland forest or a rocky mountainous forest? Is he disguised or just hidden? How has he infiltrated this place if there are so many guards?
Cloaks don't generally cover your face. If you are to have us believe that his cloak is covering his face then it would be better to describe how, for example: 'wearing a long, dark cloak thrown over his shoulder to cover his face'. Confusing the reader with lack of information detracts from their reading experience.
BadMouthIt ceases to be exclusive when you can have a custom member titlJoin Date: 2004-05-21Member: 28815Members
The story is way too rushed. At the start, u stated that the kill was going o be personal but u never elaborated why. A lot of things are left dangling like who are these people and why is the guy going to a safe house.
I would also like to know how old are you and what type of education system yuo are in so I can give more comments.
GCSE puts him (Edit: or her) between 14 and 16, you can see what stage of English education it is from the list below:
8 - 11 Primary school
12 - 16 Secondary school, of which ages 14-16 undertake their GCSEs, three years of study of usually nine or ten subjects, culminating in a set of exams that if passed will give you a qualification called a General Certificate of Secondary Education.
Up until 16 years of age formal education is required by law in the UK.
Ok thanks for helping me <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin-fix.gif' /><!--endemo--> I will start editing it soon.
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> The story is way too rushed. At the start, u stated that the kill was going o be personal but u never elaborated why. A lot of things are left dangling like who are these people and why is the guy going to a safe house.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The reason for this is cause were very limmited on what i can do... <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/sad-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad-fix.gif' /><!--endemo--> if i wasnt so limtted i would go much further into the storie and say why and stuff. (Dont ask me to here though cause i dont even know why <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->)
we have been set this <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo--> has to be a storie about an assasin
To write a good story, you must be in the story. Feel the breeze, smell the air, hear the rustling of the leaves. See your characters run past you, see bullets fly over your head. Immense yourself in your story, believe in your story, let your story control you, and not you control your story.
Example - You are in the rain. Feel the water splatter onto your face, let the thunder get on your nerves, let the lighting blind you for a moment, let the coldness take over you.
You are going to shoot the person. Have you done it before? How will you feel? Can you fail your mission? Do you even want to shoot him? Do you know him? The sense of adrenline in your blood before the intense and precise moment as you pull the trigger. Time seems to stop, and suddenly there is a burst of blood as your target falls. What do you feel, seeing as you have just taken a life?
You have vivid imagination, and good descriptive skills. But refrain from words like "nice" too much. Nice has many meanings to it. Is it nice as in a feeling? Nice as in texture? Nice as in an action?
Do not rush, do not make the mistake of rushing. Patience is a virtue, and time is but a passage you must endure. Control your time, and not let time control you.
Comments
---------------------------------------
“ A gun to hire… That is what I am, a merciless killer paid to do hits, Many times had I done this but this was different… This was personal.”
I lay waiting in the forest my rifle set up, and a cigarette in my mouth. I was wearing a long dark cloak covering my face, a open case lay nearby so I could quickly detach my gun and put it in my case for a quick getaway.
“The “Safe house”… Safe they say but not this time, info on its location has slipped into my hands.” The house was as normal as any house, but guards were surrounding it under any shelter they could find to hide from the heavy rain and the thunder striking every now and then like a constant beating drum. Nearby animals could be heard shuffling through the undergrowth around me, the forest I lay in was confined in darkness silent except from the animals, but then the sounds of a car could be heard travelling down the road, I looked down my scope and aimed at the car.
A nice sleek black car drove down the muddy road, driving through puddles ruing the shiny blackness, dark tinted windows prevented seeing my target but through the front window I could see two FBI agents in the seats. “This is going to make it hard” I said to myself knowing the glass would be bullet prove, while observering the car I never noticed it had pulled up in front of the house.
A door opened and a man with a long black umbrella got out, he left the door open and another man got out more fidgety then the other, My target, He waited under the umbrella while the other two agents got out, then they started to walk to the door. I aimed my rifle at my target waiting for the right moment, “boom” a lightning bolt struck and my target was on the floor, his soul ripped out of his lifeless body.
Before the bullet even hit my target my gun was packed away and the bullet shell in my pocket, I walked to my bike and drove off, The roaring engine silenced in the distance.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<span style='font-size:14pt;line-height:100%'><span style='color:green'>Punctuation:</span></span>
Reread your writing and pay attention to your use of commas, capital letters, speech marks and suspension points.
Suspension points (...) are used to tell the reader that a considerable period of time has elapsed, do you really want to use them in the first line of the first paragraph?
Capital letters are only used for proper nouns (Harry, Birmingham) and text that follows a question mark, exclamation mark or full stop. There are some instances where you lead with a capital letter after a comma; this needs changing.
Commas are used in many circumstances but their main use is to separate different parts of a sentence to make it easier to read ('<span style='color:white'>I lay waiting in the forest, my rifle set up and a cigarette in my mouth.</span>'). They are also used in the pacing of the sentence, although this is a more stylised and personal usage; one that might be scrutinised by an English teacher for being incorrect (commas before 'and', etc.). Furthermore when two adjectives are used to describe a noun and they appear one after the other in the sentence, they should be separated by a comma ('<span style='color:white'>a long, dark cloak</span>').
Speech marks are used for direct speech (or arguably for internal dialogue), whereas apostrophes are used for reported speech. This means that if one of your characters is talking at the same time that this part of the story is set, you use speech marks. If a character is, for example, remembering some words that another has said to him in the past, you use apostrophes as this would be reported speech. Finally if a character is talking or thinking to himself ('<span style='color:white'>“This is going to make it hard” I said to myself</span>') you should use speech marks, as you have done.
<span style='font-size:14pt;line-height:100%'><span style='color:green'>Comments on General Style</span></span>
From what I can see you could get away with making your paragraphs a bit longer in general, and even combining some paragraphs and adding in an extra one or two to lengthen the story.
Paragraphs can be as long as you want, but generally you will begin a new paragraph when you begin to describe a different aspect of the story. This could be due to change of time setting, focus changing from one character to another, change of physical setting, etc..
Remember that length of a paragraph and the sentence structure within can greatly affect the way the reader interprets the section of text. If you have a paragraph where a character is waiting a long time for something, or you are describing a long journey, you can use long words, long sentences and therefore a longer paragraph to transfer this experience to the reader. Conversely, if you have a short fight scene full of swift punches and dodging, you can make the dialogue full of short insults or quips to keep the action moving to and fro. Short sentences full of short words might characterise this sequence, with a short paragraph for a quick bout and a longer paragraph for an epic battle.
Repeating words within a sentence always seems clumsy, as the English language has a vast array of vocabulary you can use to say the same thing twice without repetition. Due to this fact, however, repetition is used in English literature to <i>emphasise</i> an element (character, emotion, place -it could really be anything that is important to the theme of the story). I assume that in the sections: '<span style='color:white'>an open case lay nearby so I could quickly detach my gun and put it in my case</span>', '<span style='color:white'>The house was as normal as any house</span>', '<span style='color:white'>then the sounds of a car could be heard travelling down the road, I looked down my scope and aimed at the car</span>' and '<span style='color:white'>A door opened and a man with a long black umbrella got out, he left the door open</span>' were all written on the fly. Nevertheless it pays dividends to re-read your work for unintentional repetition, clumsy grammar or spelling; some find this easier to do by re-reading it backwards so that they can concentrate on the wording without skimming over what you already know.
<span style='font-size:14pt;line-height:100%'><span style='color:green'>Paragraph Overview</span></span>
If we break your paragraphs down we can make a resume of the story, and you might be able to see where you can merge paragraphs together to elaborate on the story:
<span style='color:orange'>Paragraph 1:</span> Character introduced, assassin is briefly emotially and physically described. Immediate surroundings briefly described, although the reader is still in the dark as to where the assassin is (a bridge, an airport?).
<span style='color:orange'>Paragraph 2:</span> Setting described in reasonable detail. Assassin gets himself into a 'ready' position.
<span style='color:orange'>Paragraph 3:</span> Description of target and his entourage (the people with him). Car approaches.
<span style='color:orange'>Paragraph 4:</span> More description of the FBI agents. The kill.
<span style='color:orange'>Paragraph 5:</span> One sentence paragraph that paints the assassin as being used to his job.
I'd probably say that all of the paragraphs can be expanded by at least a couple of sentences. My main suggestion would be to merge paragraphs 4 and 5 and include a new paragraph that describes the relation to the target a bit more. One option is to have this new paragraph preceding the kill, so that the reader knows why it is personal and why it might be so difficult to pull the trigger. Another is to have it as the final paragraph, having already described the emotional upheaval involved in shooting this guy down in the previous paragraph but having not explained why, so that you can describe his emotional reaction to the kill and shed some light on the identity and connection to the assassin of the target as a final 'denouement' (tying-up/conclusion).
<span style='font-size:14pt;line-height:100%'><span style='color:green'>Paragraph 1: Content</span></span>
You can write a lot more in this paragraph and the first sentence is incredibly important because it is designed to engage the reader, to get them interested enough to read on. This would be a good enough line to start the story apart from the fact that it's a non-sequator (a statement which contradicts itself or doesn't fulfil its meaning). You say that this time it's personal, yet at the end of the story the character just walks away, with seemingly no personal interest whatsoever. It's perfectly OK to leave the reader asking questions, especially at the end of a short story, but you should not contradict yourself and confuse the reader.
You need to include some more information about the specifics of where the assassin is. His choice of vantage point will help the reader understand more about his character; is he professionally hidden or has he had to take up a slightly comprimised position because of the amount of guards. How well hidden is he? Is he in a rainforest, a dense, woodland forest or a rocky mountainous forest? Is he disguised or just hidden? How has he infiltrated this place if there are so many guards?
Cloaks don't generally cover your face. If you are to have us believe that his cloak is covering his face then it would be better to describe how, for example: 'wearing a long, dark cloak thrown over his shoulder to cover his face'. Confusing the reader with lack of information detracts from their reading experience.
---
I'll write more when I have more time.
I would also like to know how old are you and what type of education system yuo are in so I can give more comments.
8 - 11 Primary school
12 - 16 Secondary school, of which ages 14-16 undertake their GCSEs, three years of study of usually nine or ten subjects, culminating in a set of exams that if passed will give you a qualification called a General Certificate of Secondary Education.
Up until 16 years of age formal education is required by law in the UK.
I will start editing it soon.
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> The story is way too rushed. At the start, u stated that the kill was going o be personal but u never elaborated why. A lot of things are left dangling like who are these people and why is the guy going to a safe house.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The reason for this is cause were very limmited on what i can do... <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/sad-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad-fix.gif' /><!--endemo--> if i wasnt so limtted i would go much further into the storie and say why and stuff. (Dont ask me to here though cause i dont even know why <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->)
has to be a storie about an assasin
To write a good story, you must be in the story. Feel the breeze, smell the air, hear the rustling of the leaves. See your characters run past you, see bullets fly over your head. Immense yourself in your story, believe in your story, let your story control you, and not you control your story.
Example - You are in the rain. Feel the water splatter onto your face, let the thunder get on your nerves, let the lighting blind you for a moment, let the coldness take over you.
You are going to shoot the person. Have you done it before? How will you feel? Can you fail your mission? Do you even want to shoot him? Do you know him? The sense of adrenline in your blood before the intense and precise moment as you pull the trigger. Time seems to stop, and suddenly there is a burst of blood as your target falls. What do you feel, seeing as you have just taken a life?
You have vivid imagination, and good descriptive skills. But refrain from words like "nice" too much. Nice has many meanings to it. Is it nice as in a feeling? Nice as in texture? Nice as in an action?
Do not rush, do not make the mistake of rushing. Patience is a virtue, and time is but a passage you must endure. Control your time, and not let time control you.
Hope this helps.
I also updated my original post.