I have quite a few … not problems, as such, but … I find I’m unsure of how to use certain grammar techniques, sometimes.

There are, of course, quite a few things on the Internet to help, but I’ve found (to my surprise) the thing that’s helped the most has been a podcast called “Grammar Girl’s Guide to Grammar” — in which she covers just about everything in a small weekly chunk, and listeners can send in queries, etc.

Some of them are no-brainers, but most are things that you’d be surprised how many people (myself included) get wrong on a day-to-day process. “Grammar Myths” are covered, too — for example, it is actually OK to split infinitives (”to boldly go”, is now allowed, rather than just “to go”) … although she does mention that so many people still think it’s wrong, that you probably shouldn’t use it anyway!

I’m not one for pimping things, but it is actually a good 5 mins well spent

Best,

I quite liked it — particularly with the refinements. Were I in charge of page-turning though, there are a few nitpicking things that I might have held against you. Most things have been covered by the others, but…

on its tarp cover-the only other comfort sharing his night vigil

When reading, it can be slightly confusing (if you’re dumb like me, and I’d imagine some people are) to read what I’ve bold-ed. I think it’s better when using dashes (forget the proper name) to separate thoughts, to do a double dash, which the computer automatically turns into a — … It’s easier to read, and doesn’t give the editor a headache! That’s the last thing you want!

Leave a gap between the words and do a — basically, is my advice

Re-reading your 13-liner, I realised that my other nitpick was me mis-reading! Good work. Hope I’ve helped a little and haven’t been too annoying.

~Chris

I also think the part about the tents being arranged in military order is a good detail to keep, because it says something about the nature of the camp.

Beth, it’s so hard to cut the visual, but I see what you are saying. I left that description of the mountains in to see what you all would say. You are right about it being too wordy. Is all much tighter now. Cheers all!

I wonder if you could get some sort of hook into the first line as well.

I still think the tension is diluted from too much description sandwiched in. And this is coming from someone who likes description and writes a fair amount of it herself. But the thing is, it needs paring down here. “Faintly luminescent mountains drew a chaotic horizon in the distance” is wonderful and I’d keep that, but “despite the starlight dampened by low-hanging clouds” is wordy and completely unnecessary besides, since we already know it’s cloudy (after all, it’s snowing). And it causes the reader to imagine starlight, then have to mentally erase it from the image you’re painting.

Also, this is the kind of opening that works great in a movie, but books aren’t movies; the written story has different requirements. One of those is reader involvement, and this impersonal, omniscient approach is death to that. For this reader, anyway.

Seaboe

Another challenge: How does one swear in an alien language? After all, I DID say “he swore.� My aliens see soft words as irritating…thus…’chaad!’ instead of ch..it! or f..ck! Notice the harder sounding endings of OUR swear words. Are readers ethnocentric? Ah. So they are. What to do? What to do?

I’ve decided on omniscient POV. And actually, I am not in the mind of my protagonist until next scene! Maybe am making this harder than needs to be. I don’t want to be in the guard’s mind. I just want to show what’s going on before my protagonist shows up. So, here is a revision, which probably has a whole other host of problems.

The flames hissed and sputtered as snowflakes drifted into the fire from out of the black night. The guard winced, his breath adding rime to the edge of his furred hood. Swearing, he reluctantly spun away, his steps crunching noisily in the snow towards the cliff edge.

Faintly luminescent mountains drew a chaotic horizon in the distance, despite the starlight dampened by low-hanging clouds as the guard wrestled his zipper open and sighed, a stream of steaming urine drilling miniature canyons at his feet. “Ahh!� he groaned in relief while glancing down into the canyon below. He stepped back nervously and threw a glance behind him, where dozens of tents arranged in military order lay quiescent. The guard shoved his privates back into his pants and turned back to his post, his footfalls fading into the distance.

Just below the cliff edge, a dozen bodies flattened tightly against a wall of ice-encrusted rock.

Try opening with the main character. Get us into his or her head. Show him or her faced with an apparently unsolvable dilemma. That’s always a good place to start.

Sorry I called you Chad! I am grateful I didn’t call ‘Chaad’ because apparently that is a swear word in some cultures.

Adam