Feedback appreciated

[Callicious]

As a newbie to writing I would appreciate some feedback on my first offering. I have received some, but little on the actual writing, which what I'm looking for in an effort to improve my writing capability and style. The story is not highly erotic, nor was it intended to be, as it was an exploration of thought processes, etc. of two very moral kids placed in a difficult situation.

What I'm asking for is simply, 1) did the story carry itself? 2) Where were its shortfalls? 3) How can I make it better and more readable?

I am most grateful for your time.

http://www.literotica.com/s/stranded-15

jc

 

[CWatson]

I've heard it said that you only have five paragraphs to excite The Reader and get them interested in your story before they give up and hit [Back]. That doesn't mean the first five paragraphs have to be dramatic and exciting; but it does mean that you need to establish, at least briefly, who your characters are and what the story's going to be about. But in your story, we have to wait until Chapter Three before you actually explain that Jed's being kidnapped for money.

Then you skip three months, including the first night and its panicked, claustrophobic circumstances. We don't learn much about what Jed or Elizabeth do in times of panic or crisis, when thrown into a crazy situation at gunpoint; we don't see how they adapt, only what they do when they have adapted. Characters--their personalities, their thoughts and feelings, how they react under dramatic situations--are the true gateways into any story, and you kind of gloss over all of that.

Simply put, your pacing isn't great. What's really important to this story? Those are the things that should come first and be the most vivid. A good concept--which yours is--can still be mired in sub-optimal execution, and that's basically what happened.

Thankfully, these are relatively small problems. I mean, yeah, semi-serious structural flaws, but you can--and did--write a pretty good story even with them. But for your next tale, I'd sit down and ask yourself what the absolute core concept is, and then make sure that's established early. Don't spend three-fourths of your first chapter explaining the technical details of airplanes--not when you could instead be explaining the technical details of Why This Story Is Worth Reading.

 

[sr71plt]

I've heard it said that you only have five paragraphs to excite The Reader and get them interested in your story before they give up and hit [Back]. That doesn't mean the first five paragraphs have to be dramatic and exciting; but it does mean that you need to establish, at least briefly, who your characters are and what the story's going to be about. But in your story, we have to wait until Chapter Three before you actually explain that Jed's being kidnapped for money.

I almost always think you have good insights, and you probably do in this story, but what I highlighted is a sweeping generalization often expressed that really irks me. No, you don't have to introduce your characters and reveal what the story is about in the first five paragraphs. All you really have to do is that first thing--engage your reader and keep them reading. There are many ways of doing this, and they don't all entail introducing your important characters and the dilemma right off the top. If this had to be the formula, the world's story collection would be a lot duller than it is.

All you have to do is engage your readers and make them continue to want to read.

In film, Law and Order has been doing this successfully for years and years. The L&O formula is to start with a story that isn't the story at all and slip a teaser on what the the story is really about at the end of the opening sequence. And even then, the initial mystery of a Law and Order program (and all of its spinoff series) often isn't the real mystery of the show at all--it just leads into the key case. This has been a highly successful technique for this franchise, and it works in story writing as well.

Your suggestion that this one doesn't work because you don't know a key element until chapter three is probably spot on in this case (I don't know. I'm not reading it--it goes on for 6 Lit pages), but even here, the readers of novels often don't get their "aha, that's the key element" moment until late in the book--and the book is still engaging and works for them.