Feedback please.

[literalwife]

First story posted and would love a critique. Feedback especially from authors would be appreciated.

http://www.literotica.com/s/the-banquet-4

 

[sr71plt]

If you want people to look up the story, you need to provide a link to the story. Few will go researching for it.

 

[literalwife]

Link now provided.

 

[CWatson]

Well, first off: your command of English is impeccable. I only found two misspellings (a "t he" and a "revel" instead of "reveal", both on the second page). Plus, you have no grammar gaffes and almost no misplaced punctuation. This level of technical is very impressive out here.

Your first problem is an over-use of adverbs. Lay off them, for your father's sake. Some of those adjectives could go too, frankly.

The second, and larger, problem is the ratio of sex to set-up. You have over a page (well, a Lit-page) of scene-description and setting, followed by a brief and rather unsatisfying fuck. Reading it, I get the feeling that you're uncomfortable writing about sex; the whole rest of the story is done in "showing" while the sex is largely "telling". Obviously, there's nothing wrong with that; sex is a personal topic, and not everybody is an exhibitionist. Having said that, all sex writers have to be exhibitionists. If you don't feel comfortable writing about sex, fine... but then, don't write about sex.

Another matter: Elsabeth's motivations and characterization. You set her up as someone of grace and breeding... and then she gives up her virtue to a stranger on the spur of the moment. That seems out-of-character for me. I want to know more about what she's thinking and what drove this decision. (Aside from, "It's a porn story, somebody has to have sex". If that was truly your logic, you could've spent some time with other characters getting some. Who's fucking that servant girl?)

Lastly, the dialogue. People like to romanticize the feudal ages--not to mention the Renaissance and just about any other historical era--and one of the ways they do that is by hewing to the idea that everyone spoke in these flowery, excessively formal phrases. This is simply untrue. Yes, they might have used different words ("Oe!, cumme ye my prytt flow'r, give me your body-eth!") and with different grammatical structure, but people spoke back then the same way they spoke today: casually, carelessly, flippantly, insofar as the structure of their language allowed it. It may sound formal to us, because the language has drifted over the intervening centuries, but it wasn't to them. Now obviously Bannor has an excuse because he's trying to court this lovely girl, but once he's got her cornered at the stables there's no real reason he'd keep being poetic, any more than any man would. Long story short, you're trying too hard--you, The Author--and it shows.

But yeah. Don't be discouraged. These are very technical, very high-level critiques, and suited to your abilities. I can't count how many times I've had to explain what an adverb is to some careless idiot who thinks that just using the word "cock" enough times will make his story comprehensible. You're way beyond that. You have a long and distinguished career at this site ahead of you. So enjoy.

 

[literalwife]

Thanks for the honest evaluation Dawson.

 

[vqfarrold]

You have a good vocabulary and good descriptive powers. I found the heroine engaging. There is no plot and the ending is limp, but on the other hand the story is short so I read it to the end without giving up. The ending hints at a sequel, so maybe you would like to turn it into a series. Series generally score better on Literotica than one-off stories, suggesting that readers prefer them. As guide to writing well in this genre (historical romance I assume) you may like to take what you think is best by way of style and plotting from published (commercial) examples, or from what you think is the best in this category on Lit., but without allowing it to submerge your own particular style and preferences. I don't think the sex is underdone, particularly for this genre. Happy writing.