Critique #37 — Cory Rodabaugh #2
Kevin Andrew Murphy July 18th, 2006
Mathias crouched in the heart of a cornfield. The corn towered over him as he waited for Jarvis to come down a path of trampled corn.  The fifteen-year-old pulled back a few loose strands into his messy blond ponytail. His pointed ears held his hair back poorly and his green eyes represented his mother’s heritage. His father, the local archery shop owner and corn farmer, was busy in the barn tending to the storm goblins. These goblins controlled the rain in Newcastle. The storm goblins decided to be mischievous and thought a drought was good for Newcastle.
Mathias saw a flicker of motion in the corner of his eye. He spun to his left and saw nothing but his hair. He readjusted his ponytail and he looked to his left again and saw his prey. While slowly crawling forward, Mathias grabbed his bow off his back and nocked one of his arrows. These arrows were special because they were padded. Jarvis was right in the middle of a clearing in the cornfield. Mathias slowly crept forward.
CRACK! Mathias cursed when he stepped on a cornstalk. He ducked just as his prey, Jarvis, turned around. Jarvis, a short and muscular dwarf, looked right at the spot Mathias was just at a few seconds ago. Jarvis dove into a patch of cornstalks and scurried over to a new clearing. Mathias stood up and pulled the bowstring back. He let go and the arrow flew from his string.
Cory,
This revision is much better than the previous, but still has troubles.
One carried over from before: While you can take a bow off your back while you’re crawling and carry it in one hand, it takes both hands to nock an arrow, so how do you keep crawling? When in doubt about any action you’re trying to describe, act it out. Some things are physically impossible.
You need to learn to pare down your descriptions to the essential details and leave out the redundant stuff. For example, look at the first two sentences:
See how much easier it flows with the exact same information just by paring the redundancy:
See?
Anyway, while finding out that Mathias is an elf and Jarvis is a dwarf is okay–though it does set us into post-Tolkien D&D territory–the reader doesn’t care about two boys playing their games. There’s no hook in that.
However, there’s a big hook in dad’s negotiation with the drought-causing Storm Goblins. That made me immediately cock my head in interest, because for a farmer, nothing could be more important than rain.
Of course, there’s also a problem here in that if there’s a drought, where has all this corn come from? Does dad have separate deal with the goblins so only his farm gets rain?
What would be far more dramatic is if Mathias and Jarvis, on the drought-stricken farm, decide to listen in on dad’s negotiations with the goblins. That’s where the risk is, that’s where the stakes are, and consequently that’s what the reader wants to hear about.
Having the kids get captured by the goblins would be interesting too.
I like this better–though agree it could be compressed–but I was tripped up by a ponytail so massive and swishy that a guy can’t turn his head? I’ve had long hair all my life, and my ponytail has never been so active it blocks my view when I just turn my head–it still stays right behind me. (Now, sitting on it, or having it get under my elbows, that’s a different matter.)
Also, if he’s crawling though corn, isn’t there an almighty loud crackling sound? I’ve walked through corn fields, and there is a very loud CRUNCH CRUNCH CRACKLE as you try to get past super stiff stalks and drying leaves.
First we see
then we see
I’m confused. How long is his hair? How far down the queue of hair is the ponytail holder? (I could see if he’s got massive hair — a la Farrah Fawcett’s old ‘do, and the holder is half way down his back — then the loosely gathered hair around his head could whip in front of his face, but …) Why am I caring more about his hair than what he’s doing?
Think about what the purpose of this section is for — Is it to introduce Mathias? Is it to show that elf and dwarf children can be friends and play together? Is it to hint at the need to placate the storm goblins in order to keep the crop from perishing? Focus the details (whether it’s the hair slipping out from the ponytail, or the attempt to crawl quietly through dead/dying stalks of corn, etc) to needed to serve the purpose of that section, rather than minute details on everything. The scattershot approach of the details (focus on his hair, then his eyes then on the hunt) is distracting and leaves me wondering what’s important/what do I (as a reader) need to remember/care about ?
Then, addingto what Sherwood said ….
especially if there’s a drought, walking through a cornfield isn’t going to be quiet, nor is there a place to hide. Corn (if you really mean maize, as “corn” in Europe means any grain*) needs a lot of water to grow and will be stunted, brown, and crackily (is that a word?
without it.
*as a tangent to this, where is your story located (pseudoEurope, pseudo upstate New York, etc?) “Newcastle” implies an English speaking place, but not necessarily England, and therefore impacts what crop the farmer would be growing, what are the normal weather patterns for that time of year, etc. You don’t put all of that into your first 13 lines, but it will affect/impact your word/sentence/pacing choices.
I’m also much more intrigued by the storm goblins, though
I’m not sure what “tending” means here. Does it mean “negotiations”, as Kevin thought? Does it mean feeding them (like a farmer tends cattle or goats)? Does it mean worshiping them (as a priest would tend the altars of their god)?
Again, spend some thought about what the purpose the introduction is supposed to serve for the reader and focus the writing around that.
If this guy is crouching down and then turning his head, he’s going to give himself serious whiplash if he jerks his head hard enough to even get eighties Big Hair in front of his face, esp in a ponytail.
Also, if he’s fiddling with his ponytail, he’s going t be sitting up, and his arms will be up, elbows poking toward the sky, so won’t his target see him?