Pornocles first story, inviting feedback.

[Pornocles]

http://www.literotica.com/s/carols-christmas-1 (erotic coupling- old link)
edit: http://www.literotica.com/s/carols-christmas-redux (new link)

Hi all. I've had this story in my head for a couple of years now and decided to write and post it, finally. It's Christmas themed and i wanted it up on the eve, which provided the impetus to finish.

I've got a bunch of other ideas that i'd really like to put up too but may not be able to find the time to write them. If this story is well recieved i'll obviously be more motivated.

Not sure i've anything else to add just now. If you'd like to know about my othe rideas, just ask.

Thank you for any feedback, either in the thread or on the story.

 

[chocolatecookie3]

Hi, I'm giving you feedback because I'll want feedback when my stories post. First, you have a lot of run on sentences. You should try to break up the sentences more. Second, you switch tenses from past to present. I personally only use past tense, but you should be consistent the whole story. There are some spelling and grammar errors. The story itself is great! Carol is believable. The scene with Santa is hilarious and sexy. Lots of great descriptions. I say write more!

 

[Pornocles]

Thanks Cookie. Link me when you 'publish' and i'll review you too.

Sounds like i should do a proper proof read, edit and repost.

Were the errors coming more often towards the end, or atleast second half of the story? I rushed a bit and used the Charlse Bukowski writing method to meet my dead line. By which i mean i stayed up till 3am to finish it. I was more interested in calling it done than a proof read by then.

I'll have to pay close attention to the tenses. I think i started in present tense but started flip flopping between them. I general i would go with past but it depends on the story style and ganre.

Are the run on sentences understandable? I fixed several as i went, obviously not enough.

 

[chocolatecookie3]

The run on sentences are understandable. Just look where you are using commas and consider starting a new sentence. Not every comma, just ones where you are moving to a different action. The para starting "The house was chilly" is where the tense changes. I don't think there are more errors at the end, at least not noticeably. If you want, I can highlight them and send a file.

 

[Pornocles]

I just spent a few hours editing. It went to make everything past tense but it seemed that there might have been more in present tense than past, maybe i should have gone the other way.

I broke a bunch of looooong sentences into shorter ones too. And fixed a bunch of typos.

 

[CWatson]

I was more interested in calling it done than a proof read by then.

Under such circumstances, the best thing you can do is sit on it overnight, or even for a couple of days, before pulling it up again for an editing pass. This not only lets you exult in the sensation of having finished a story, this not only lets you rest your brain for a little while, but when you come back, you'll have some distance and can see the story as The Reader would see it--which helps in noticing typos, run-ons, tense changes and such. Editing is more easily done when you can call the story 'finished' and close the cover on it for a while.

 

[RuzieD]

I felt there were points of "over detail." It had this real time feel to it in which every small action of the MC is written out in present tense. There are times to go into detail, and times to summarize.

Also, I kind feel like I want to know more about the break up prior to the MC getting herself off. I want to feel what the break up feels like to her, before masturbation time.

So how did she find out about this break up? Was it phone call? Did she see it coming? How did he explain himself?

 

[Pornocles]

Thanks CWatson. The reason i didn't sit on it to edit was because i wanted it up on xmas eve. It was just for the timing, set on xmas eve as it is. I don't have any other ideas which would be 'time sensitive' like that, so they can sit for an edit.

I've also half finished a second edit to put it all properly in present tense and fix typos.


Thanks RuzieD. Yeah, there is higher detail than a lot of stories. I was trying to present it as an fairly indepth view of her evening, kind of like if a camera was following her. In which case we'd want to see her taking her clothes off.

The reason for the break up wasn't relevant to the story so it wasn't elaborated. It was a set up for Santa lovin'.

She got a phone call from Derek, it's in the first page, near the beginning. If you feel like you want to know more about call then i guess that's good. The MC is interesting enough to want to know more about. But you probably wont get to find out.

I could have gone into a long internal dialogue, detailing more of the circumstances but it wasn't really in my mind when i wrote it. Maybe i'll add a bit more before i post the edited version. Don't hold your breath though, i want to move on to other ideas.

 

[RuzieD]

Yeah, there is higher detail than a lot of stories. I was trying to present it as an fairly indepth view of her evening, kind of like if a camera was following her.

Have you ever seen the director's cut of a movie? When you watch the director's cut, you get everything the director saw. Many of these things are cut from the final release of the film because they poorly effect the pace of the film, they're dull, they're redundant, etc. Alfred Hitchcock said that story telling was life with the boring parts cut out. Right now, there are some boring details in the story.

In which case we'd want to see her taking her clothes off.

I think I'd be more invested in the character if I knew about the importance of the relationship to her, why it ended, and how it is affecting her.

 

[Pornocles]

OK, so you don't like the story. That's fine.

 

[Pornocles]

I'm just about to repost the story, but with better editing and i realised that the italics weren't carried over.

How do i tag the text to put italics in?

Is it:
or:<i> </i>
or something else?

(I'm using the 'put you text in here' box on the submissions page.)

Thanks again.

 

[PennLady]

I'm just about to repost the story, but with better editing and i realised that the italics weren't carried over.

How do i tag the text to put italics in?

Is it:
or:<i> </i>
or something else?

(I'm using the 'put you text in here' box on the submissions page.)

Thanks again.

You need to use the <i> and </i> tags when using the submissions box. You will see the italics when you click the "Preview" button so that you can preview the story before submitting it.

 

[Pornocles]

Thanks PennLady. Done.

(So the square brackets don't even show...)

 

[armistead]

Nice story but still too many typos in it. They were enough to detract.

 

[Pornocles]

Armistead, you read the story linked in the first post. That's the original with shitty editing. I submitted the new version yesterday and it's still pending. I'll post a link to the new version when it goes live.

Interestingly the story is still scoring 4.19. I wonder if the good version will do better or if no one will read it because they've already read the first... ?

 

[armistead]

Oops, sorry, clumsy of me.

I do wonder about the affects on readership levels on a published and edited story.

 

[PennLady]

Thanks PennLady. Done.

(So the square brackets don't even show...)

The square brackets that you can use on the forums for formatting are VB code. Not sure what the VB stands for. I know of Visual Basic, but not sure if that's in use here. Anyway, if you were to submit a story that had square brackets, I believe they'd just show up like any other text.

So, square brackets in the forums for formatting, but regular angular brackets -- greater and less than signs -- in the stories.

 

[Derroreaper]

The VB is from vBulletin which is the forum software app they use here. It can be called BB code, UB code, VB code, the generic is BB code

 

[PennLady]

The VB is from vBulletin which is the forum software app they use here. It can be called BB code, UB code, VB code, the generic is BB code

Thanks. I knew it probably wasn't visual basic. See, a little knowledge can mess you up.

 

[Pornocles]

Armistead, here's the link to the edited version: http://www.literotica.com/s/carols-christmas-redux

But, stupidly, i think i might have misspelled clitoris as clitorus.

If we're talking about about <> tags, anyone know how to get accented letters?

 

[CallMeBambi]

Armistead, here's the link to the edited version: http://www.literotica.com/s/carols-christmas-redux

But, stupidly, i think i might have misspelled clitoris as clitorus.

If we're talking about about <> tags, anyone know how to get accented letters?

In order to get accented letters you have to know the proper entity code for whatever character you're looking to use. I'm not terribly knowledgeable about it, but if you do a quick Google search for "how to use entity codes in html" you can probably find a solid explanation in under thirty seconds.