my first story

[johnk75uk]

for those of you who have read my story.." A Stranger waits "..it really is my first effort, I thank everyone who has replied with encouragement and suggestions for a sequel. If you havnt read it, please do and tell me what you think.
I have some great ideas for follow ups, hope so anyway.
Please feel free to send me a personal e mail, i will answer all of them.
I took inspiration from all the writers i have read over the last six months of reading literotica.
Another thought is ....does anyone want to write a collaboration story?
I dont think its been done before.
my e mail is johnk75uk@yahoo.co.uk..........or is it @yahoo.com
I can never remember.

thanks and bye for now
jk

 

[Natural Born Eros]

John,

A tip: More of us lazy types will read your story if you provide a link. There is good guidance on how to do this on the hyper-link labelled "vB is ON" where you submitted your post. This is the link to your first story.


A Stranger Waits

I hope you don't mind me posting my thoughts publicly. That way, if I say anything critical which is wrong, ten people will jump on my back and you will quickly learn to ignore me.

I liked the plot a lot, especially the fact that this obviously horny and exciting couple are aiming for a baby. That was an unexpected twist, something that every story needs. The only problem I had with the story was its category - was this really a "loving wife" story. If so, that wasn't the impression it gave.

The thing I found hard about this story was the writing style, particularly of the dialogue. There are two major reasons for that.
1. The length of your sentences, and the number of unrelated points that you make in each sentence. This tends to confuse me, if sentences are long, I want them broken up into phrases, each phrase following logically from the next. To take a typical example.
"Her hands slick with the oil traveled up and across her tight bum cheeks, she loved how her bum looked now since all the workouts in the gym and always got admiring glances from men and sometimes women as she walked along the street. "
Too long. Too many points.
2. Punctuation, especially in and around dialogue. The almost complete lack of this makes it very difficult to follow the flow of your story and to gain the sense of what your characters are saying. People tend to speak with lots of commas, especially in the type of informal speech you are writing. There is probably a decent guide to punctuating stories in the "writers guide" section of the site, if not, this issue isn't specific to erotic writing so any good library will be able to help. Literotica also offers a volunteer editor service which would remove a lot of the wrinkles.

Don't be put off by this criticism. As I said, I thoroughly enjoyed the story and I think that by sorting out the technical glitches you will make the next one truly excellent. Also, remember that I am hardly a gnarled veteran myself, so don't take me too seriously.

Cheers,

Eros

 

[damppanties]

Hi John,

Congrats on getting your first story up there.

NBE has already done a fine job of giving a nice feedback so I will not repeat what he's already said, but comment on some things he missed out on.

Dialogue: The dialogue is put in double quotes and has some sort of a punctuation on both sides, a coma or period or question mark, apart from the double quotes.

"It's something like this," DP says.

Certain parts from your story, with my corrections follow.

"Please "she answered.

should be : "Please," she answered.


Katie whispered "dance with me carol."

should be : Katie whispered, "Dance with me Carol."


"Ohh god she tastes so good" Katie moaned to herself.

Did she maon out loud or in her thoughts, to herself? If it was in her mind, then that needs to be enclosed in single quotes. - 'Ohh God, she tastes so good,' Katie moaned to herself.

Read How To Make Characters Talk by Whispersecret. It will tell you all you need to know about using dialogue.


I'd like to see the paragraph which starts - "David was taking... - cut into at least three separate paragrpahs. It's too long. I noticed a couple later on too.


...carols hips...

I noticed this too many times in your story. When you're referring to something that belongs to someone, use an apostrophe. So, that makes it - Carol's hips.


Long, complicated sentences and stiff dialogue mentioned by NBE earlier and I agree.

Most of the things I pointed out would have been caught by an editor easily if you'd asked one to go through it before submitting it. If you'd like to do it yourself, go to the Writer's Resources area on this site. It has many helpful hints on the mistakes I pointed out and tells you how to correct them.

I enjoyed the story but would have liked it more if it had been properly edited and free of errors.

Hope this helps. Keep writing.

 

[gauchecritic]

correct me if I'm wrong...

I'm sure thousands of you will.

As I understand it DP it should be "Carols' hips" and not "Carol's hips".

"Carol's walking" or "Carol's talking" or "Carol's shagging".

"Carols' hips" or "Carols' lips" or "Carols' tits".

That is to say an apostrophe before the last letter is an indicator of contraction an apostrophe after means ownership of next word or phrase.

Gauche

 

[Natural Born Eros]

Sorry John, but as you foresaw, I'm here to correct you.

A possessive apostrophe (indicating ownership) goes before the final "s" - eg Carol's hips. The only exception is if the "s" is part of a name - eg James' pelvis. This is because it is ugly to write James's pelvis. So the possessive apostrophe follows the name, and you add an "s" if there isn't one there already.

Contractive apostrophes go wherever the missing letters would be. Examples: can't - can not, 'plane - aeroplane (although the apostrophe is redundant now, as it is in fridge and phone).

Your friendly grammatical pedant.

Eros

 

[gauchecritic]

corrected when wrong

I stand corrected, but please, call me Gauche. ( for that is what I am)

Gauche

 

[Natural Born Eros]

G

Good point. Well made. Please, accept my humblest apologies

E