Calling Dr_Mabeuse...

[BooMerengue]

I've been reading your comments for some time now and I like what you say and how you say it.

I have 3 stories posted here...



Callies Rest
An Old Lady Remembers
Beginnings

These are more like chapters of what is now turning into a smallish historical romance.

The only feedback I get is on Callie's Rest, which also won HotBed's Halloween Contest.

But I'd like some real critiquing done before I go much further. I have 4 more chapters I haven't posted as yet, and may not.

Can you help me out? I'd be grateful for your time, and interested in what you have to say.

Thanks,
Boo

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Well, that’s very sweet of you to ask, and I’ll give it a go, but I can hardly read them all right now. I looked at “Carruther’s Hotel” since it was the first in line, and it being nice, sexy BDSM, it’s a subject somewhat close to my heart.

Overall, it's a very decent story. You seem to be a fine writer, and you pulled it off well. If you’re looking for some good, in-depth critiquing, you might consider submitting your story to the Story Discussion Circle where there are some fine reviewers, like RainbowSkin, HiddenSelf, Pure, Rumple, Colleen, to name a few. They could give you a more complete run down. I'll just tell you my impressions here.

You chose a difficult task, because you're telling this story from a difficult point of view. The story involves a girl who’s tied, blind-folded, whipped and teased to orgasm, and the story’s told from her point of view so we never stray very far from what she’s feeling and thinking. Because she’s blindfolded, and because she’s tied up and so can’t really do anything, all we get are what she feels, hears, and thinks, and so you're forced to make an erotic scene out of only those elements. We miss out on what she looks like, and in fact the whole visual dimension is lost. We don’t see him raising the whip, we don’t see the gleam in his eye, we don’t see her writhing in the rope or the red marks on her body or the way she trembles with desire, none of that stuff. That’s why I say you’ve chosen a difficult task.

I know why you’re doing it this way. You’re presenting the scene from her point of view in order to play upon the erotic fear and excitement that goes with being in her position, blindfolded and helpless, and it is a very erotic situation. But this puts us way into her head, and to pull this off, you really have to be able to describe what she feels and experiences so vividly that we can experience it ourselves, in a way that tells us the exact story of what’s going on, and I think that’s the story has trouble.

An erotic whipping is more than just hitting someone with a whip, of course. You do have him vary the force of the blows, but the whipping still comes off as kind of vague and haphazard. He hits her here, he hits her there; hard, not so hard. He smacks her around, and she stands there wondering what the hell is going on. There’s a lot more he could do. There’s stuff he could do that would tell her (and us) just what he’s feeling as he whips her. He can caress her with the whip, he can tease her, his growing excitement could come across in the speed and the strength he uses, where and how he uses it. I would imagine he even stops occasionally and just kisses and caresses her, plays with her. In short, the whipping can tell us a whole story of a seduction, of her initial shock, growing arousal, her resistance, final surrender and orgasm. You can do that if you can imagine each phase and what she feels, how she reacts.

The sexiest thing in porn, in my opinion anyhow, is the interplay between the characters: the give and take, the struggle for control, mastery and surrender. Even though this story is about the girl, she’s not much of a presence. She doesn’t react very much to what he’s doing, even when he first ties her up. She doesn’t protest, doesn’t ask him what’s going on, she just lets him do things to her. The main emotions I picked up on from her were confusion, then desire. There was no outrage or anger at what he was doing, no attempt to resist what he was doing—more important—no attempt to resist what she was feeling. I would have expected her to struggle with her feelings a lot more. After all, it must really be a shock to find yourself responding to being whipped.

Maybe there was more of this in there than I picked up on. In fiction, statements that tell you how a character is feeling just don’t have the impact that their actions do, and it’s always better to have them express their feelings through their actions. Like I say, she can’t do much given the position she’s in, but even so I’d expect her to flinch away from the whip at first, tug at her bonds, cry out, bite her lip, etc. etc., all those little things that show us what she’s feeling.

I’ve got to admit that I was confused too. Were those really his hands or were they the hands of another man? How did their touch differ from his so she could tell? Was there really an animal loose in the room at the end? There seemed to be. (I’ll admit that that’s the first time I’ve ever heard of someone biting a woman behind the knee. I really thought it was an animal at first.)

Incidentally, I don’t think it’s even necessary to explain how she came to be in the position she’s in. Maybe a few words, but I wouldn’t go back to the party where they met. It’s not that it’s bad this way, but knowing their history kind of takes some of the mystery out of it.

But these are just my opinions. On the whole, I think it’s a very good little story, and I’ll try to read more later.

---dr.M.

 

[BooMerengue]

I'm laughing so hard I can hardly type! I repeat- "I like what you say and how you say it!"

I never reread a story once I finish it. And if it takes more than an hour I rarely finish it. But I'll have to go reread this... I really don't think there was an animal in the room! roflmao!!!!!

I saw this whipping (right word?) on HBO Real Sex and I thought it was pretty hot stuff. I decided to do a similar scene and made up the plot as I went along. I pulled the name Carruthers Hotel out of the air.

After I finished it, the Hotel itself gave me ideas. Lots of weird things could happen in the same Hotel. Hence Callie's Rest was born. The plot was more exciting than the erotica. And the idea for the book was born from the success of this story. Beginnings became the first chapter, and An Old Lady Remembers the prologue.

I included Carruthers so you would know where the story took place. I guess I should have explained. Sorry.

( laughing harder now!) This coming April Fools Day I will have been celibate 16 yrs. And I have to tell you. Understand that this is no reflection on anyone's preferences. If a man was ever to hit me even in the most loving way I would rip his throat out on the spot! My TOTAL independance is far more important to me than an orgasm.

However....!!! Now you have me thinking and I agree with every point you made. I'm not gonna mess with Carruthers. It's done. But I AM going to write another similar story remembering all your points. (minus the animal; some lines are NOT meant to be crossed- reeally roflmao now!)

Thank you so much for responding. I'm going right now to the story discussion circle. But I think I'll leave Carruthers off the list and put them in a different order. And I will dedicate my 'other' story to you!

Thanks a lot- please keep reading!

Boo

 

[dr_mabeuse]

If this is just a first draft, then that would explain a lot of the problems, and if you're going to post to the Story Discussion Circle, you really should mention that the story is a first draft. Otherwise we'll assume that the story is the finished product and the reviews will be based on that assumption.

Everyone had their own way of writing, but few authors submit first drafts for publication without at least reading them through. Critiques take some time and effort, and reviewers like to think they're dealing with the author's best effort. They'll review drafts too, but the way one approaches a draft and the way one approaches the critquing of a finished story are quite different. We tend to put as much effort into the review as we feel the author has put into the story.

FYI

---dr.M.

 

[BooMerengue]

dr_M... I DO put effort into my writing. It's thought out a long time before I put pen to paper, so to speak. I test and read aloud as I write and correct mistakes as I go. It's only partly about getting bored easily; it's more about having VERY little free time to write. When I said what I did about the time spent it was not arrogance. It's a fact of life for this writer. I hope I haven't offended. Angeline pulls her hair out over the same thing in my poetry. But I wouldn't waste my time if I had no respect about what I was doing. I would just go do something else.

You said I seemed to be a fine writer. The points you said needed work were due to lack of knowledge of my subject rather than lack of skill, I think. Please don't stop reading.

Thanks,

Boo