|
|
|
Comment |
Sorted by
Date Written |
David: (Reply to this comment)
by macresarf1
Frankly, your writing here is laborious, and your dialogue sometimes goes on and on without advancing the story or plot.
Your use of the subjunctive stops the reader, right from the start. Take the first sentence: Better to state that the heroine had a romance with old books than that she "would often have." In other words, go through your story, changing subjunctive and imperfect verb constructions, wherever possible to past tense, active voice.
For example: "Now Alice would have wanted to pray herself that her students would use such an old-fashioned tactic as renting a video."
Possible revision: "Alice prayed herself that her students rent a lurid video."
Try knocking out as many adverbs and stale adjectives as you can. A strong verb eliminates the need for most adverbs. Strong nouns save multiple adjectives. But one vivid adjective electrifies a noun.
I estimate that using the above methods, then trimming, integrating dialogue, could zap thousands of words from your story, making it much more compelling in the process.
It's hard to go back into a story you've put so much time on, but the only good writing is rewriting.
I'd like to see the revision.
Alex
|
Sep 25 '08
10:55 am PDT
|
|
|
|
