The Eighth God - looking for feedback

Hello everyone, this is my first time writing a story for literotica, and I'd love to hear some feedback from everyone!

It's a story set in a medieval/fantasy setting and it's going to contain all kinds of fetishes, including non-consent, incest, and all kinds of good stuff.

https://www.literotica.com/s/the-eighth-god-ch-01

The first chapter was pretty much just a small scene to set the tone and introduce a couple of characters. I'm writing the second chapter as we speak and it's going to be much longer.

Thanks!

P.S. I'm also looking for an editor who would be interested in editing my future chapters. Thanks!

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Chapter 3 is available now!

https://www.literotica.com/s/the-eighth-god-ch-03

Would love to hear more feedback on this chapter as well.

Good start.

It's a nice setup for a fantasy. The sex scene was a bit long for my taste. I sense a little palace intrigue coming up. The world building looks very promising. Very well written so far. Curious to see how the General works within the family dynamic. Also, how you do your female characters; someone stronger and more complex than a sex slave perhaps.

Thank you very much for your feedback! I was actually worried that the sex scene was a bit long before I submitted the story, so thanks for confirming that for me.

I'm really trying to make the characters and the setting of the story as fleshed out as possible, so I'm taking a few chapters to just introduce some characters before I get into the juicy bits of the story, but judging from your comment I understand that maybe the readers are eager to get into the political intrigue, so I might have to step up the pace a little.

As for the female characters, I plan on writing quite a few strong females into the story, some slaves, some not. But I am trying to make the story as realistic as possible, and obviously this is a very patriarchal, male-dominated society as most societies were back in the day. So any strong female characters would have to work within that kind of a system to gain what they want.

Thanks again for the comment!

EDIT: Chapter two is pending right now!

Chiriko said:

Hello everyone, this is my first time writing a story for literotica, and I'd love to hear some feedback from everyone!

It's a story set in a medieval/fantasy setting and it's going to contain all kinds of fetishes, including non-consent, incest, and all kinds of good stuff.

https://www.literotica.com/s/the-eighth-god-ch-01

The first chapter was pretty much just a small scene to set the tone and introduce a couple of characters. I'm writing the second chapter as we speak and it's going to be much longer.

Thanks!

P.S. I'm also looking for an editor who would be interested in editing my future chapters. Thanks!

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I'm not a SF&F reader, so I have no idea if you wrote appealed to your target audience.

You really need to work on your grammar. I know you're looking for an editor, but you have too many grammar errors to dump it all on a poor editor.

The day had been won after a glorious day of battle, the general had led the troops personally, the godless barbarians fell beneath his great glaive by the droves, like so many stalks of wheat.

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You've got three commas in that sentence when it's generally questionable to use more than one in a sentence. You change tense - should be "had fallen". "By the droves" and "like so many stalks of wheat" are redundant - you should have used just one.

One thing in your opening sentence bothered me right away. A brother to a king is a prince and "Prince" is a higher title than "General". So it should be Prince Kalman Volk who is a general, not General Kalman Volk who is a brother to the king.

His men stood around him, sitting astride his gigantic chestnut warhorse, looking up at him expectantly.

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It better be a gigantic warhorse for all his men to be sitting astride it. Is there another way of sitting on a warhorse besides astride? Side saddle? As the paragraph is all about the general, I wouldn't have a sentence in it with his men as the subject.

The Kaskarian barbarians to the west had been increasingly brazen with their raiding parties, and the King, now old and bedridden due to illness, sent his brother to the front as a show of force in order to secure the border quickly so as to avoid showing any weakness to their neighbors.

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You shouldn't have the first comma. "Now old and bedridden due to illness" should go someplace else as it has nothing to do with this sentence. Should be "had sent", not "sent". And the King sent his brother to the front as a show of force or to secure the border quickly or to avoid showing any weakness to their neighbors. Not all three in the same sentence.

A sex slave? Really? Slavery is bad, bad stuff. Sex with a slave is by definition non-consensual. Why not a woman he picked up somewhere?

Thanks for the feedback and corrections! I’ll definitely keep them in mind for the future. I will definitely work on my grammar for sure. English isn’t my first language and this is my first time writing something like this so please go easy on me!

When I’m writing details, I tend to just picture the scene in my mind and write down whatever I see. So I totally understand that the stuff about the king being old doesn’t really fit there, and I’ll make sure not to write down too many extraneous details when they don’t really belong.

I didn’t know the brother of a king is automatically a prince, I’ll keep a note of that for the future. Although it does kind of fit here since the general in my mind lived his whole life on the battlefield, and really disdains titles and all that.

Slavery is a rather central part of the story, so that’ll have to stay, I’m afraid. Obviously slavery is bad but this is fantasy, after all. And it’s not like slavery wasn’t prevalent in that kind of time period.

Thanks again for the feedback!

Chiriko said:

When I’m writing details, I tend to just picture the scene in my mind and write down whatever I see. So I totally understand that the stuff about the king being old doesn’t really fit there, and I’ll make sure not to write down too many extraneous details when they don’t really belong.

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And that's fine. But then you need to spend a lot of time editing your work, moving things to where they should belong.

Chiriko said:

I didn’t know the brother of a king is automatically a prince, I’ll keep a note of that for the future. Although it does kind of fit here since the general in my mind lived his whole life on the battlefield, and really disdains titles and all that.

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The European tradition is that a son of a king is a prince and the eldest son becomes king when the king dies. So Kalman Volk and his brother were both princes at one time, but when their father died Kalman Volk's elder brother became king. Your world can do things differently, but if you are going to do things differently then you should say how it is done.

Chiriko said:

Slavery is a rather central part of the story, so that’ll have to stay, I’m afraid. Obviously slavery is bad but this is fantasy, after all. And it’s not like slavery wasn’t prevalent in that kind of time period.

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If you're basing your story around the High Middle Ages in Western Europe, there's virtually no slavery.

Well, it's only the first chapter after all. I do plan on giving more information about the world, but only through storytelling and the eyes of the characters. I'm really only borrowing some elements from medieval Europe, most of it is going to be completely made up. I just included these elements so that readers would have some familiarity with the setting. Hopefully most readers wouldn't be experts on medieval history and be annoyed with the differences in my story haha.

I'm not even going to follow the classic line of succession for the throne, as you'll see if you keep reading. Also you're assuming that the current King claimed the throne through heredity, there's other ways he could've came into power.

As for the slavery thing, the story doesn't revolve around it but it is a huge part of the story and it will be central to the storyline, so it's gotta stay.

All of this is why I put the story into the sci-fi/fantasy section, as the story goes on I think you'll find that it won't fit into any of your preconceptions or expectations. The medieval setting is really just a small part of the overall story.

Chapter 2 is available now!

https://www.literotica.com/s/the-eighth-god-ch-02

Would love to hear more feedback on this chapter as well.

Chiriko said:

Chapter 2 is available now!

https://www.literotica.com/s/the-eighth-god-ch-02

Would love to hear more feedback on this chapter as well.

Click to expand...

Some technical bits and bobs that jumped out at me from the first few section - to get them out of the way, so I can read the story with my "grammar editor" turned off:

- you have tense shifts, e.g.:

she was coming into her middle age, and her back isn't what it used to be.

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... a slight variation of the royal banner, which boasts a golden dragon with a double pronged tail...

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- the fifth paragraph shifts entirely to present tense, whereas the first four are (mostly) past tense.

- consider your use of repetition: in the 2nd and 3rd paragraphs, count how many times you've written, "coming down the road." We get it, the carriage is coming down the road, you don't need to repeat it, or if you do, tell us more each time. Otherwise it's a bit of a waste of words. Someone pinged me for using "beautiful" eight times in almost as many paragraphs, yep, clunk, clunk, clunk. She wears beautiful things, enough already. I scrub now in edit so that when I do repeat words, it's deliberate, for effect, not accidental. Here, it's accidental, I think.

- consider not telling us everything, e.g.:

... she was coming into her middle age, and her back isn't what it used to be. As she stretched her back...

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You've given us three snips of information which need to be put together, but they're all about her poor aching back. Why not just say something like, "... she stretched her aching back, sore from too many years harvesting and sowing..." - which conjures up the same ideas, adds in the cycle of the seasons, but does so in a similar number of words. (Before others start, I'm not saying write like me, I'm saying make every phrase count, join ideas together efficiently).

- the fifth paragraph is pure info-dump, back-fill. The forward pace of the story stops, the carriage frozen in time, the horse's hoof raised high but no clop, while the narrator backs in the truck with, "This staff's important, remember this." But it's intrusive, like the reverse warning beeper on the truck. The problem is, too, the reader won't remember this detail when it's actually important, which presumably is later on, when there's intrigue in the court or cruelty in the bedroom. Right now, you've got a carriage coming down the road with all its mystery, but you've just spoiled a later surprise. I guess I'm saying reveal your detail slowly, where and when it's needed.

- And... you start up the story again, with the coach coming to a halt, the mystery of the occupant, and the cliff hanger - all nice touches (but count the "whispers" - voices on a whispering wind, so many whispers, do you need so many whispers? he whispered softly.)
EDIT: I've just recounted the whispers. It's actually not as bad as I've made out!

Okay, grammar hat off, story hat on - I'll go read the story now. But you see my points? The technical stuff matters, and is part of the writer's craft. The main thing here is uncontrolled tense shift - it happens to all of us, trust me (hi, Simon ).

I'll pop back later with any comments on the story itself when I've read on (just need to get around that bloody big truck somebody's parked across the road).

EDIT: Okay, back again.

The main issue for me is the constant tense shifting, and all of the info-dumps which keep getting in the way of the narrative. The story keeps losing its pace, its flow. Whenever you stop to tell us something, the story grinds to a halt. Then your timeframe starts to overlap when you start it up again, so the story stops and starts - to get around your truck blocking the road. It's very disjointed. For example, you give us a great description of Karen, but it's a long way into the story, and from Jacob's point of view - whereas she's actually the first character we see. For me, there was no connection with the woman in the field, because the detail, the description, was in completely the wrong place.

Also, 21st century anachronisms: zips, thigh high pantyhose, little cutie, cum (I know it seems to be the current porn spelling, but somehow it's completely wrong in a medieval flavoured piece). In fact, the sex was very 21st century porn cliche, I wasn't at all convinced, and was thrown right out of the story.

Writing an historical piece is hard work, the world-building has to feel right. This piece is a cross between pastiche Disney hardware and a porn video, and doesn't sit right for me. Which is a shame, because it could be Conan the Barbarian goes to Camelot, with dirty, gritty bits. You've got all these great, visual ideas, but your characters get lost in amongst it all, they're a bit cartoony, two dimensional.

You sign yourself Karen, you've called your heroine Karen, so from that I take it you're writing yourself into this world. So where are you, this 21st century Karen who wants to be the plaything of cruel Jacob? Write yourself like you want to be there, and I'll believe you. You're painting the pictures outside, but where's the woman inside? Maybe, just maybe, see what happens if you wrote it first person, like it's you in that field...

Thanks a lot for the feedback! This is the exact sort of thing I'm looking for. I've gotten some of the same advice from others, and I'll definitely work on my grammar for the future, especially when it comes to the tense shifts.

electricblue66 said:

- consider your use of repetition: in the 2nd and 3rd paragraphs, count how many times you've written, "coming down the road." We get it, the carriage is coming down the road, you don't need to repeat it, or if you do, tell us more each time. Otherwise it's a bit of a waste of words. Someone pinged me for using "beautiful" eight times in almost as many paragraphs, yep, clunk, clunk, clunk. She wears beautiful things, enough already. I scrub now in edit so that when I do repeat words, it's deliberate, for effect, not accidental. Here, it's accidental, I think.

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Yeah someone else pointed this out to me as well. I do tend to conjure up an image of the scenario in my head and just put everything I see down in writing. I'll be sure to condense my descriptions and minimize repetition.

- consider not telling us everything, e.g.:

You've given us three snips of information which need to be put together, but they're all about her poor aching back. Why not just say something like, "... she stretched her aching back, sore from too many years harvesting and sowing..." - which conjures up the same ideas, adds in the cycle of the seasons, but does so in a similar number of words. (Before others start, I'm not saying write like me, I'm saying make every phrase count, join ideas together efficiently).

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I think is one of my bad habits. I read over the chapters again and I seem to repeat those kinds of descriptions to serve as segues. I'll keep this in mind.

- the fifth paragraph is pure info-dump, back-fill. The forward pace of the story stops, the carriage frozen in time, the horse's hoof raised high but no clop, while the narrator backs in the truck with, "This staff's important, remember this." But it's intrusive, like the reverse warning beeper on the truck. The problem is, too, the reader won't remember this detail when it's actually important, which presumably is later on, when there's intrigue in the court or cruelty in the bedroom. Right now, you've got a carriage coming down the road with all its mystery, but you've just spoiled a later surprise. I guess I'm saying reveal your detail slowly, where and when it's needed.

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I think I understand what you mean. Now that I read this part over again, this paragraph does seem a little out of place and should belong in the Prince Jacob section of the chapter. I wanted to let the readers have a sense of worry for Karen, and understand why she'd be anxious and fearful, but I think I probably could have just said Karen was anxious, and left the "why" a mystery until the Prince Jacob section.

Thanks a lot once again for the feedback. It really was a valuable comment for me. And I'd love to hear more once you finish reading!

EDIT: I've just read the rest of your comment. I did worry about the anachronisms. I did try and minimize them but it really is quite hard writing about stuff like lingerie and whatnot. There really isn't much out there as reference. I really didn't intend for readers to make direct parallels between this world and history. I included some bits to indicate that this is a magical world and was hoping that readers would forgive some of the stuff like thigh-highs (I didn't intend to include the zip part, that was an accident that I missed). I do, however, really regret using "cutie"...

I also seem to have misled you into thinking Karen is a main character. She's just a part of this chapter and might not even be in the story later on. This chapter's primary purpose was to describe what an asshole Prince Jacob is. There's going to be quite a bit more content about Prince Jacob and the twins in the future, so hopefully you won't think that they're two-dimensional later on, but Karen probably won't make much of an appearance.

Thanks a lot again!

EDIT 2: Oh and I really did make a decision early on to not write in first person. I plan to have many characters in this story with no single one being the "main" character. I hope my writing in the future will be good enough that readers will be able to read into what some of the most important characters are like through their actions.

Chiriko said:

Thanks a lot once again for the feedback. It really was a valuable comment for me. And I'd love to hear more once you finish reading!

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See my edit - our posts crossed in the mail.

electricblue66 said:

See my edit - our posts crossed in the mail.

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haha yeah I edited my post as well. Thanks!

Chiriko said:

I also seem to have misled you into thinking Karen is a main character. She's just a part of this chapter and might not even be in the story later on. This chapter's primary purpose was to describe what an asshole Prince Jacob is. There's going to be quite a bit more content about Prince Jacob and the twins in the future, so hopefully you won't think that they're two-dimensional later on, but Karen probably won't make much of an appearance.

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Ah, I see. This chapter's got a bit of a problem then, if you start out with someone who's going to disappear later on. Most readers will do what I did, start seeing the first character as an important one, and see the story from their point of view. If she's not really important, the narrative perspective is wonky, right from the start.

It gets down to, who is the story about, who do I identify with, who am I cheering for? Am I meant to side with Jacob, if it's not about Karen? You've got a house with no foundations, if you're not careful.

electricblue66 said:

Ah, I see. This chapter's got a bit of a problem then, if you start out with someone who's going to disappear later on. Most readers will do what I did, start seeing the first character as an important one, and see the story from their point of view. If she's not really important, the narrative perspective is wonky, right from the start.

It gets down to, who is the story about, who do I identify with, who am I cheering for? Am I meant to side with Jacob, if it's not about Karen? You've got a house with no foundations, if you're not careful.

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Yeah, I think it would have been ideal to put 5-6 chapters' worth of content into one big chapter so readers would be able to get more context in one sitting. But as a first time writer, the idea was to put out a couple of short chapters first so I can get some feedback to improve my writing later on. My hope is that when I get up to around chapter 5-6, readers would have either followed it from chapter one or new readers would go back and read from chapter 1, and everything put together would make more sense.

Starting from the next chapter, there will be some obvious protagonist-type characters that the readers could root for. I do think that introducing the characters in the order that I have makes the most sense once I put out more chapters.

I will definitely take everything you've said to heart. I agree with pretty much everything you've pointed out. Although I am a bit worried about the way I write out sex scenes. I definitely did not mean to make them cartoony and 21st century porn-esque as you've stated. But I also don't want to compromise on the kinks that I enjoy. I want to be able to incorporate the kinks into a serious, dramatic fantasy storyline, but I'm not sure how I should go about doing that.

Chiriko said:

But I also don't want to compromise on the kinks that I enjoy. I want to be able to incorporate the kinks into a serious, dramatic fantasy storyline, but I'm not sure how I should go about doing that.

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I get that completely.

Maybe (and this is pretty much what I've done) you wind back to some less ambitious, more intimate pieces (2 - 3 Lit pages, approx 7,000 - 10,000 words) which will: a) explore your kinks without the added complexity of too much plot; and b) allow you to better/faster learn your technical skills and find your natural style. Once you've done that "apprenticeship", then embark on your much bigger thing.

We see this a lot in the Feedback Forum, writers with ambitions exceeding their current abilities - learn small before you think big. You'll be far more in control when you then attempt something really ambitious. For example, I'd written 55 pieces (including a long 23 chapter shaggy dog story) before starting what I call "my stupid big thing" - which is pre-medieval, hence my interest in your story - which will be about 110,000 words when done. I've been writing it for over a year, which is why my output this last year has been low - I've disciplined myself to finishing it before publishing the first part. That way, no pressure to finish, and I can assure readers that they will be reading a complete work.

Good luck .

Thanks a lot for the advice.

Chiriko said:

Yeah, I think it would have been ideal to put 5-6 chapters' worth of content into one big chapter so readers would be able to get more context in one sitting. But as a first time writer, the idea was to put out a couple of short chapters first so I can get some feedback to improve my writing later on. My hope is that when I get up to around chapter 5-6, readers would have either followed it from chapter one or new readers would go back and read from chapter 1, and everything put together would make more sense.

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I can't imagine people starting your series with chapter 6 and then deciding to go back to read chapters 1-5 (but again I'm not a SF&F reader). What I've seen with chapter stories is that the only readers who read chapter 2 are the readers who liked chapter 1. And the only people who read Chapter 6 are then ones who read chapters 1-5 and feel like they want to keep reading your story. I get that you want feedback to help you improve your writing skills, but know there are downsides to doing that.