"Exploits of Alex Drake"

[vagabond_michael]

I've received a few pieces of feedback privately about my running series already, but I figured a thread wouldn't hurt in the least.


http://www.literotica.com/s/exploits-of-alex-drake-ch-01

http://www.literotica.com/s/exploits-of-alex-drake-ch-02



Chapter three is awaiting approval as of this writing.

 

[CWatson]

Hmm.

Okay, your first problem is your prose. It can be lumpy. You use a lot of attached / dependent / associated clauses, and they're kind of graceless. You might be better served with just shortening your sentences.

Second:

He had no conscience about this, as he knew that royalty in most countries was quite prudish and deserved to be looted.

I'm sorry, and this makes him a good guy how? Robin Hood is a classic example of what D&D players call "Chaotic Good"--someone who does bad things for good reasons. Your man Alex does bad things just because he feels like it. We have a word for such a man: "sociopath."

Alex stood at about six feet two inches tall, weight just under 200 pounds

You get a partial handwave because you're writing a fantasy, but for the record, men of this size and height would have been very rare in a medieval- or even a Renaissance-era setting. Height and weight are highly dependent on nutrition and general health... both of which were pretty bad during those ages.

he had brought one big pouch, which Alex had advised him not to do, as it would be much louder and tougher to get out of the stronghold.

That's good logic, but how come Andan can put a guard to sleep but can't cast a Spell of Silence on his sack?

The other soldiers will begin their rounds in roughly three to four minutes." Alex said

That period should be a comma. You've done this a lot so far.

"Andan, if you do not stop, we are going to be discovered, and these men will take you somewhere that even I cannot save you from!"

What the hell kind of place is Ki-Rynn that there's no such thing as contractions? If you actually want your characters to sound formal and from an earlier time, please actually do the research on older sentence structures, vocabulary and spelling--as opposed to just pretending apostrophes don't exist.

Alex spoke to himself as he darted into the thick forest, the moonlight covering the area.

How'd he get out of the castle? How'd he get out of the town? If Andan was caught in the "royal treasury," then we're talking a serious fortification here--not a wooden hall and earthen palisades, but actual curtain walls of stone, turrets with guards, a central keep or holdfast (where the gold is stored--if it is; this king has no idea of finances if he's just keeping all his money under his mattress like this), maybe even a moat and a drawbridge. And a city around it, since the capitol of a kingdom is always a center of trade. How did Alex bypass these things? Why did he?, when the city would prove a convenient place to stash his horse? Surely there's a brothel somewhere whose owner is willing to look the other way for a cut of the loot.

According to the teachings, Celeste only showed herself for a few reasons, the most prominent of these reasons were to charge someone with a quest, to scorn someone who attempted to destroy her name and teachings, or to reward a faithful follower.

The second comma should be a colon or something.

a look of lust engrained into her eyes

"ingrained".

The deity then produced a piece of paper out of thin air that contained a list, which she slipped inside his trenchcoat.

Truly a goddess, then!--considering paper didn't become easy to make until the 15th century. Before then, parchment--made of animal skin--was much more common.

The goddess had now reached into his trousers and was jerking on his hard cock

Speaking only for myself, I would find it uncomfortable to have someone yank my cock around like that. I know you are referring to the act of "jerking off", but 1) "jerking" is not an equivalent term, and 2) "jerking off" has only meant masturbation since just before 1900, which I'm fairly sure your story's culture hasn't arrived at yet.

it was now in the wee hours of the morning, though still before sunrise in Shi'Lor, which was notorious for having shortened days due to the location in the world that it was in.

In that case, shouldn't our intrepid Alex have some sort of cold-weather clothing to protect himself with? Short days are associated with winter on planets with seasons.

kicking him into gear quickly

That's an automotive simile. You can't use it in an age of horses.

He slowed his horse down and dismounted at the stable at the outskirts of town, kicking a couple of extra gold coins to the young boy who took him from him

How precisely has Alex survived this long if he's handing out hundred-dollar bills to stableboys? Silver was a princely sum back then; gold was a knight's ransom, if not a king's.

"...Go to Ereschel, human."

Seriously? Seriously? A plot trinket just got handed over? Buddy, if I hadn't hit "Back" by now, this would seal it. You just killed any illusion that Alex will actually be challenged by his quest, or will have to work at it. The stars are in such ridiculous alignment that, from the looks of things, Alex has a straight stroll to the end of his list and whatever godly pussy--excuse me, "prize"--your goddess of attraction plans to give him. I mean, I understand the lure of escapism--characters surmounting major challenges and overcoming major difficulties. But you just declared that there will be no surmounting or overcoming. And at that point, I don't care how much normal mounting and coming there's going to be. I'm out.

Here's the thing, Mr. Vagabond. Strangers are having sex right now. Do you care? Neither do I. Of course, I probably have at least one friend somewhere who is also having sex right now, and I do care about that... but I care because they are my friends, not because they are having sex. So your job, as an author, is to create characters who are not strangers, who are friends. So that, when they have sex, I care. And you're not going to be able to do that if Alex never has to lift a finger to have sex with ten hot women. That's not what life is like--for you, for me, for anyone.

That's it for part one. I will do part two as a separate post.

 

[CWatson]

Okay. Starting Part Two, I see that your character's plot trinket hasn't availed him any. Well, good, but that won't bring back any of the readers who have already jumped ship.

"Fridj natha traveler. Usstan hass'l dos nau jivviim!"

Why does the drow language not have its own word for "traveler"?

The sword that was pointed at him was large, bulky, but could easily cut him in half if necessary.

Maybe if Alex stood still. This description is pure video-game physics and hints that you have little-to-no understanding of how real swords work.

She pulled the sword away from him and holstered it on her back.

Holsters are for handguns, which don't exist at your technology level.

She sported one of the largest pairs of breasts he had ever seen, quite honestly, and her choice of armor did very little to hide them as all they did was wrap underneath them and cover up enough to cover her nipples. The bottom half was much of the same deal, with a leather thong being held by two strong straps around her very slender waist. Her thighs were fully exposed, except for two more leather straps, one of which sported a very large hunting blade. Besides the gloves and large shoulder pieces that she wore, the rest of her body was exposed, and it was a beautiful sight to him.

Once again, video-game physics.

First: if she's a warrior, she's not buxom. There's a reason that women with "slim" and "athletic" builds tend to be B-cups or smaller: it's because exercise depletes the body's fat stores. And tits are 90% fat. Either this drow of yours doesn't stick to military discipline (and is going to get a severe chewing-out by her superior) or the drow military is a joke and they've already been conquered. What else would you expect of a species whose "military" sits around not exercising and eating enough that their soldiers put on 20 extra pounds?

Second: for armor to be effective, it needs to cover the body parts it is trying to protect. What she's wearing protects nothing. So either she's really really good with that 10-kilogram sword of hers (she's not; the weapon is too unwieldy) or she's never fought anyone who tried to do more than hack off her arms at the shoulder. Or she's not a soldier, and just lying to Alex. Or, the drow military is a joke and they've already been conquered. What else do you expect of a species whose entire army can be cut in half at the waist by a clever wizard who has figured out how to make razor-sharp planes of air?

Third: a female soldier? Fantasy likes to do the thing where women join the army, mostly to get buxom, scantily-clad adventurers into the party, but this is contrary to biological fact. A culture that sends its women to fight is a culture that is extinct, because after the army was annihilated in battle (an inevitability in any culture), that culture suddenly found itself missing a whole bunch of wombs and was unable to repopulate at the same rate their opponents were. Women are more valuable to the war effort as baby-makers than sword-wielders. Either that or the drow military is a joke and they've already been conquered. What else would you expect of a species whose military is made up of unborn babies?--the ones that will never be born because their mothers were too busy dying of sword-through-uterus to get knocked up?


And lastly, as an overall concern: why are you capitalizing "Drow" but not "Human" or "Wood Elf"? You should have consistent capitalization for race names.