My First Story- Would Like Feedback/Criticism

My first story that I have written with the intent for anyone to actually read it.
I would like some comments and criticisms on it so I can improve for the next chapter.

http://www.literotica.com/s/the-coward-and-the-wolf-ch-01

Just some info on what works well
What doesn't?
Does it have too much internal monologue?
Is the dialogue OK?
Etc.

Just some general feedback so I can improve my writing.

Thanks

It suffers from every category of problem I know of. So select one category and start correcting. I begin with verbs because good verbs fix 1/2 your problems. Then remove words that do nothing to illuminate WHO WHAT WHEN WHERE HOW and WHY. Last, description is the decoration on the cake, and modesty works best.

I didn't have time to read the whole thing (got a story of my own to get on with), but some intended-as-constructive criticism on the beginning:

The first chapter focuses on the wolf people, as well as introducing our protagonist, antagonist and the first love interest. It primarily shows off their motivations and personalities and sets up the skeleton of the internal mythology of the world. It also contains a good deal of non-consensual sex, some light SM, a little POV swapping and a great deal of non-human action.

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It's very important to understand theory and technique, and it's good that you have a clear idea of what you intend to do with this chapter - it certainly beats wandering around trying to figure out what you meant to say. But it's generally a bad idea to draw readers' attention to it at the start of a story. You want them immersed the action, empathising with your character, not thinking about your literary technique. I don't know any reader who thinks "oh boy, I can't wait for the POV swap coming up!" Flagging for non-consensual sex and S&M is a good idea since some people really don't care to be surprised by that, but the rest of this could be deleted.

Steven Smith had a problem. A problem that was suspended at a guess about 3 inches above his right eye and maybe half an inch to the left, it also seemed to him to look remarkably like the tip of a spear. Although with the sun in his eyes, it was difficult to confirm the legitimacy of this unlikely claim.

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For my tastes this is overwritten. It feels as if you're aiming for "comically facetious" here, a la PG Wodehouse, but that style is hard to pull off, especially in an action sequence.

If it were me, I'd keep it simple:

"Steven Smith squinted into the sun. Could that really be the tip of a spear just in front of his face? It seemed unlikely."

Reading a bit further in, I think you could easily cut down the word count by 50-75% without hurting the story or losing any of the plot.

The twenty one year old data entry clerk sighed internally.

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Providing character exposition in this form feels heavy-handed; it's one of the things that Renowned Author Dan Brown gets mocked for, and it works against the light-and-witty style that I think you're aiming for.

It's especially a problem here, because the rest of this intro is trying to establish that he's disoriented. Somebody who's dazed and confused is not going to be thinking "well I'm a twenty-one-year-old data entry clerk". Save that info until later on, you don't really need it yet.

The fact that Steve's eyes had not yet become accustomed to their return to the world of daylight was forcing Steve to keep blinking in an attempt to avoid more obnoxious red streaks being seared across his retina.

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Again, much too wordy. That's 38 words you've just used to convey something that could have been said comfortably in seven:

"Steve blinked, still dazzled by the sunlight."

His mind quickly dismissed the object as unlikely to be a spear. Steve's mind immediately began seeking out an alternative

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Thinking back, his subconscious mind sifted his through his accumulated knowledge.

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You keep telling us what "Steve's mind" is doing. It starts to feel as if "Steve's mind" is an independent entity. Steve's mind was thinking, his eyes were trying to look around, his fingers were playing the piano, his stomach was writing a sonnet, his legs had gone to Ibiza without him...

Steve subtly used his eyes to look down

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Well, what else was he going to use for that purpose?

The facial features of his assailant were still obscured by the sun high in the sky behind them...
The only bright side to his new position relative to his attacker, was that he could now begin make out their facial features without the sun in his eyes.

He reopened his eyes.

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#1: never write "facial features" when "face" will do, and definitely don't do it twice.
#2: how is it that he begins to make out their face BEFORE reopening his eyes?

Much to his surprise, he found this was not the case, as he immediately felt a dull thud followed instantly by an intense pain in his stomach. A feeling that corresponded to being stomped on by someone's heel, eliciting a wheezy exhalation of air from him and a command of his full attention to his current circumstances.

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"Something struck Steve hard in the stomach. He gasped in pain and surprise."

And so on. I'm not saying that shorter is always best, but the style of writing should match the mood you're trying to convey, and when somebody's just been kicked in the stomach that usually means short and punchy.

I think Bramblethorn hit much of what I would say.

If I had just stumbled upon this, I would have read a few graphs and likely clicked away, because although I think I get the kind of humorous tone you're going for, you take too long to get to everything.

My first reaction was that there are too many adjectives. To go along again with Bramble, I'm not saying you should cut every one of them, but you could lose a lot and the story wouldn't suffer. Every noun does not need a descriptor.

You take three long paragraphs to get to one idea: there is a spear pointed at Steve. Even then, you're not quite there, and you go into another five or six graphs about what happened to him a few years ago. The story is already dragging and it's only just begun.

I would agree that putting in a disclaimer of non-con, BDSM, or whatever is not usually in nonhuman isn't a bad idea, but you don't need to go into all of this regarding what the story is about or what you're aiming for in this chapter. Let the reader read the story and find out what it's about. If you haven't met your goals, the reader will know it without you having stated the goals ahead of time.

Now, you did write well enough -- your sentences are indeed sentences, spelling is good, punctuation, etc. I did notice one spot where you should have hyphenated your adjective, when you describe Steve as a "twenty one year old clerk." It should be "twenty-one-year-old clerk." Also the "3" in the first graph should be spelled out.

I didn't read far enough to see if you had similar errors later, sorry. Partly I don't have time to read six screen pages, but also, I was already kind of bored, sorry to say.

But keep writing; no one gets better by not writing.

NEVER NEVER say "the fact that" Strunk and white cites it specifically as bad form. Eliminate almost every 'just' . Next get rid of all the trash sit (up) woke (up) urned hishead (around). Check that all pronouns refer to the proper noun. e.g. A San Francisco police detective was shot today by the prepretrator in his stomach.

Nexy go for redunces. He ran quickly, etc

Then look for worthless words and phrases. Edit this sentence. He opened the car door and got out and shut the door before going up the back steps and into the house where she awaited with a smoking gun in her hand and a smile onher face.

blue muffin, you need to activate your messages. Go to the top of this screen and click on 'user cp' then click 'accept messages'. That way critique of you writting does not become public knowledge.

For starters, your writing gives you away immediately as a newbie, Your sentences are so timid it is as though you are afraid to wrte what you mean. In the first sentence you qualify everything: 'at a guess', about 3", 'maybe', 'seemed'. Then you tell us about a spear, and tell your reader (even though you told us), it is "unlikely" that any of it is true. Are we not to trust you?

Never ever say 'the fact that'

" becoming accustomed to the return to the world of daylight was forcing steve to . . . " his eyes had difficulty adjustng to the brightness.

You are suffering from the syndrome forced on all American English students by teachers who assign work by words or pages. This is okay for Journalism class where the idea is to write less, but in English Composition students are made to feel that more is better. In my classroom, students panicked when I gave an assignment because I would never tell them how much to write. My advice: write as little as possible to say what you want.

I have some suggestions. Read your sentences aloud. Do you gasp for breath before you are through? TOO LONG! Do you stumble when reading your own writing aloud? Too confusing.

Try as an exercise, writting short crisp meaningful sentences . "Fear tightened his scrotum."

"Unbelievaby, a spear tip was inches from his eye."

Get a copy of, "Strunk and White, The Elements of Style" and a good thesaurus in dictionary form. Get a volunteer editor who is willing to help you, work with you as a mentor;

Most of all, if you want to write well, read the best. Find a Fitzgerald story, for example, and forget about reding it, examine the way he composes sentences. Long or short, they are clear and concise.

And then: write write write !