Dungeon Slave

[snuffalupicus]

Hey guys,

I started writing my first and only sex themed series on literotica more than five years ago and from being reminded about it by feedback sent to my email I finally wrote a second chapter. I really like writing the series, but I'm a bit hard to motivate myself sometimes and if I had some constructive criticism to work with I think it would go along way to getting me into writing the third chapter sooner than five years from now.

Here are the links to the chapters Dungeon Slave Ch.1 Dungeon Slave Ch.2

Some people have been only reading the first chapter which I wrote five years ago and not going onto the second chapter I just wrote. If you think you are only going to want to read one chapter please read the second, since I'm more interested in where to go from there, and reactions to that.

Any suggestions or other comments would be greatly appreciated.

thanks everyone for your time-

 

[Ketchup101]

Its a bit evil isn't it?

 

[snuffalupicus]

Sure, I suppose it is, but it's supposed to be a fantasy, it's just trying to be a somewhat realistic fantasy, (campy fantasies don't really do it for me sorry) I mean when people do role playing at home or watch porn stars do it often they're suggesting scenarios that would be disgusting if it were real, but as a fantasy it still turns you on because you know no ones really suffering because of it. Like an S&M sex scenario where someone's calling the other person a piece of garbage and has them bound and forced to be subservient, if this was a real scene and the person being "forced" to be subservient really were being forced it would be horrible. The only difference between that and what I've written is my sets and lines are a little more believable.

 

[ellynei]

I read chapter 1 and began on chapter 2.

Chapter 1 is quite fascinating.

Chapter 2 seems to be too. I have a personal grudge against present tense, (which chapter 2 is in) but you do use it very well so I managed to push myself past that (personal) inhibition, for a while.

The paragraphs are too large for online reading though, and I have already spent some hours at the monitor today so had to give up before the end. My focus was starting to fail me, and focus is needed to read your chapter 2. Especially so since in this chapter you deter significantly from common dialogue style.

This diversion from style is so consistent that I came to believe it is a conscious choice on your part.

With 'diversion from style' I am primarily referring to the:

He says,

"This n that n lots of interesting stuff." She looks at him and says,

"Even more interesting stuff." He listens and nods and says,

"Yeah, whatever."

dialogue style.



I'm not sure why you are doing this instead of the usual:

He says, "This n that n lots of interesting stuff."

She looks at him and says, "Even more interesting stuff."

He listens and nods and says, "Yeah, whatever."


Whatever the reasons, it's not doing it for me, (it might be doing it for somebody else.) I just wanted to make you aware that even though the reader swiftly understands the style, it has a toll on focus. (Focus which in my personal opinion is better spent on the content of the dialogue and the ramifications of the whole thing.)


partial quote:

I really like writing the series, but I'm a bit hard to motivate myself sometimes and if I had some constructive criticism to work with I think it would go along way to getting me into writing the third chapter sooner than five years from now.

I am also writing a dark non-con series, where I aim to retain a feeling of reality. I also wanted to post chapters on it regularly, but found that writing that storyline required a very specific mood. A priori, I know the basic storyline, but the details of the story -- the feel of the story -- it will not come on demand. So (preferably patiently) I have to wait, between writing chapters, for the mood to return.

(Three months between ch. 1 and ch. 2, five months between ch. 2 and 3... Who knows how long before ch. 4?)

It might be the same for you.

If it is, then stop fretting Warn your readers that chapters will be far apart and focus on your other stories while you wait for the darkness to return.

(I am from your developed style, good language, sense of believability, etc. very much assuming there are other stories even though this lit ID has only that storyline. Of course the way you phrased this feedback request indicated it too )

Cheers.

 

[snuffalupicus]

Chapter one I actually did write five years ago (didn't use hyperbole there lol) so if chapters one and two seem to have some dramatic changes in style (for good or bad) that's partly why.

I like present tense in these sort of sex stories as I want to bring the reader into the scene as much as possible. Past tense seems already to be a reproduction of what happened, whereas with present tense I suppose I'm hoping to give it more of a live reporting feel to it.

Whenever I'm really getting off to something I think of it as happening now, not having happened before. It does have less of a traditional writing feel though, I can understand the comfort one has with a particular writing style. When you're comfortable with it you don't even notice it and the story takes over, whereas a different style stands out and interferes with that oftentimes.

Sorry about the chapter lengths, I do tend to stuff them full. I was trying to break it up as much as I could, as much as seemed proper to do, I'll try to keep the paragraphs shorter next time.

The dialogue style is intentional, though I suppose I could have started new paragraphs with the preceding descriptions, I actually wasn't sure what the right format on that was. I always had the sens that when a new person is speaking you start the next paragraph with the quotes of what theyre saying, but starting with the preceding description seems better actually now that you point it out.

I'll have to read some of your stuff since we share so much in our style and subject preferences. I don't often enough find non consent stories that I really like, most are just so campy.

If I can come out with my chapters as fast as you do I'll be quite happy, once again when I said five years it wasn't hyperbole lol. (I expect a few months to several at most from now on until I'm satisfied with this series being concluded)

These are actually the only sex themed stories I've written. I have tried my hand at writing other things before, a screenplay, a novel, science fiction, fantasy, plenty of essays at school, ect.

Thanks a lot for the notes, and chatting me up. I'm sure my next chapter will be much better for it.

regards,
Snuffalupicus

 

[ellynei]

Storytelling transcends space and time.

When I read, watch tv, or listen to a story, I just want to be pulled in, in and away.

When I write, I don't create a masterpiece, I just try to build a portal for the reader to step through and straight into my imagination.


Past tense is easier to read, hence it is easier to make the words disappear when reading past tense.


Sitting at my computer I glance at my cup, then turn my eyes to the screen again. Already now the act of looking at the cup is in the past. I looked at the cup, now I'm looking at the screen.

The present is all that is, but yet it is an illusion, an infinitesmal uncapturable fraction of a moment.

Even the smallest thought, by the time you reach the end of it, the beginning of it is in the past.

The past is so much more tangible, it isn't there, it is gone, but it was. It was what it was and cannot be something else, so much easier to grasp and hold.


Maybe I've had too much beer, and should log off now.

 

[snuffalupicus]

It's good commentary on why past tense is better than present, or why its generally objectively more appropriate.

In the end though, I think it just has to do with the culture of writing that has favored past tense for so long, we've grown up on it and lived reading in that style so it feels natural to us and present tense doesn't.

Literature descends from oral storytelling, where the author or teller was telling of something that had by the nature of the story happened at some earlier time, about the gods, a heroic tale, or whatever else was of interest that had happened before or was being presented as having happened.

Actually I wonder if oral storytellers ever really admitted to their audiences that their stories were sometimes made up or exaggerated. If they didn't they would be less likely I think to experiment with tenses for it's other uses.

It's really about asking yourself what you want to accomplish with your story, do you want the process to show, is it critical that the reader be comfortable or is there value in trying a new process even if or because it challenges the reader?

I tend to be an experimenter and expresser more than I am a perfectionist, in writing this can be difficult to reconcile for me, as some tendencies of mine don't necessarily have synergy with my goals.

If I were doing artsy poetry stuff that approach would have a lot of appropriate value. In a narrative story aimed at an audience who you want to get off on your work it may be less appealing. I'll have to think about that one, though I think the other issues you mentioned were worse offenses, this one I'm not sold on yet, but I am considering it.

regards,
Snuffalupicus

 

[The_Fractal_King]

Hey guys,

I started writing my first and only sex themed series on literotica more than five years ago and from being reminded about it by feedback sent to my email I finally wrote a second chapter. I really like writing the series, but I'm a bit hard to motivate myself sometimes and if I had some constructive criticism to work with I think it would go along way to getting me into writing the third chapter sooner than five years from now.

Here are the links to the chapters Dungeon Slave Ch.1 Dungeon Slave Ch.2

Any suggestions or other comments would be greatly appreciated.

thanks everyone for your time-

"It was so cold that I had goose bumps. I noticed that my hair had been cut short. I was in a basement, dangling from the ceiling in a netted leather harness. Looking down, I was about thirty feet up and hung almost ten feet from the ceiling. The room was a cube; forty feet at each angle. The only illuminations were thick blue neon lights that lined every corner."

There is no way she could possibly know that. She can't see her hair and no one can do the trigonometry needed to know exactly how big a room is while bound, gagged, barely awake and going into panic. Most people can't do that sort of math in their head at all. Explaining how big a room "feels" or "seems" is much more evocative and infinitely more believable.

The style you chose for the story is very difficult (but fascinating) and I'm not going to fault you for Denise talking like she's . . . er, writing an erotic rape fantasy story rather than someone who had a horrible experience and is recounting it for an FBI investigator. Still, when a person is giving a long monologue it's grammatically proper to begin each paragraph with a quotation mark.

I despised the attacker too much to find the story particularly erotic. Billy nonetheless seems to be a slightly more complex character (due to the fact that he avoids lying) than the others who are "victim" and "FBI dude" in traditional and unfortunately flat roles. I haven't read the second half, however.

 

[snuffalupicus]

I've grown my hair fairly long before, and when it's cut short I can feel the change of weight and pull on my head, also she hadn't noticed any particular scalp wear holding it up and generally a put up hairdo will pull at the scalp and be noticeable to.

As far as the distances go I probably should have used "about" "seemed like" type statements, but I hoped that these would be inferred by the reader, or assume that she figured it out later from some other verifying source and was using that later known additional detail in an earlier part of her description.

I can understand not getting into it because it's not your taste of characters, that's all for the individual.

I didn't think the FBI guy was particularly a flat character, he showed fairly complex and strange personal reactions and interpretations of the villain and what he does, and of the victim.

The victim character I wanted to be fairly generic since I wanted to give the audience the sense that This could happen to anybody or even them, since in the end it's not a fantasy about raping, it's a fantasy about being raped, and so the reader is encouraged to pretend they are the one giving the deposition, she however does not remain a flat character in the second chapter.

The quotation mark thing may be correct, but I think it was fairly easy for the reader to understand.

thanks for the feedback,

regards,
Snuffalupicus

 

[ellynei]

The FBI dude's inner demons made for the beginning of an interesting storyline, which it would be fascinating to see unfold in later chapters. Doing his job, seemingly every piece of it by the book while heavily loaded with ulterior motives.

The woman's dazed detachment and somewhat clinical description of events does rather fit with a possible behaviour of a person whose mind hasn't truly caught up with having been rescued from such horror. (At least it fits my imagination of it.)

 

[snuffalupicus]

Glad that you were reading the characters similar to what I was trying to convey. Thanks for the positive appraisal.

Chapter two throws a spin on things, and #3 I'm working on as it's outlined should really get things steeping in character intrigue and absolute depravity.