I will try to make my paragraphs even shorter, and I will use simpler words in my title. Those are the things I needed to know, and I appreciate it.
Yes, Driphoney, that is what it was for, but I got no response (other than the spammer), I thought it got lost in the shuffle...
Jenny, the only thing that she confused about (I thought) was the title. I don't see where the story itself was convoluted. It wasn't difficult to understand, nor was it complicated.
On the screen there weren't any paragraphs longer than seven lines. So I don't think that "wall of words" applies. I used a word in the title that I shouldn't have, because I didn't know that a tryst was a secret meeting, but merely read the definition as a meeting between two lovers.
Thank you both for your feedback
Yes, Driphoney, that is what it was for, but I got no response (other than the spammer), I thought it got lost in the shuffle...
Jenny, the only thing that she confused about (I thought) was the title. I don't see where the story itself was convoluted. It wasn't difficult to understand, nor was it complicated.
On the screen there weren't any paragraphs longer than seven lines. So I don't think that "wall of words" applies. I used a word in the title that I shouldn't have, because I didn't know that a tryst was a secret meeting, but merely read the definition as a meeting between two lovers.
Thank you both for your feedback
His large paragraphs didn't jump out at me. For me, while it's nice when they're smaller and more readable on the screen, it's a more minor issue.
You can always just bump your thread to the top if you fear it's getting lost. No need to start a new one. Also keeps you from looking needy and vulnerable. It gets a bit rough around here, if you hadn't noticed.
As for how long the lines are, I don't know if you're on a PC or Mac, or what resizing will do on a PC, but I can change the image size on Lit pages and that either increases or decreases the paragraph length. How or if this works on PC's I don't know, but I imagine there's a standard size. You and your editor (consider firing) might want to take a look on a standard PC. However, on the standard, unexpanded screen on my little laptop, very few lines were less than 10 lines long. Frankly, I wasn't that bothered by it, I try to stay at 10 lines and under, myself.
A tryst is an appointment, a pre-arranged meeting.
I limited my comment to my confusion over the first paragraph. I figured one unexpected negative comment was more than enough for a first story from a new guy trying hard to do it right. I would suggest being really nice around these parts and seeing if you can attract another editor. Depends on how tough you are ... or you might want to take on CWatson's recommendation and just write for a while, enjoy it and learn some things on your own. I probably should have done that. I question everything now, to the point of being frozen stiff with self-doubts. Not a good place to be for something that should be enjoyable.
By the way, you can fix your title. Just submit an edit with the change. Perhaps Homecoming, or A Lover Returns, that sort of thing. Titles befuddle me.
And I will add this FYI, second person stories don't go over here very well. I think some voters just hate them on general principles, but in your case, an issue might be that you're talking directly to your wife and even use your name, which you post in your siggy line, not to mention the author name of Sgt. Wiklund, so it feels very 'true story', whether it is or not. That in itself can be a huge turn-off to some. Back to your second person choice, I have trouble putting myself in the place of your wife. Male readers--which I'd be willing to bet, constitute a huge part of the readership--might even have a harder time, and you have essentially written a stroker. That really pushes the desire of the reader to put themselves in the role of one of the characters. I have a green E on a second person story. I am never going to crawl up to a red H on it.
There you go, more feedback than I intended.
), read the top twenty or so of the Top Lists. Read real books, too, and also read the Writer's Resources here. There are so many good ones, so many good ideas, and usually written in a friendly non-threatening manner. If you go through some of the feedback requests here, you'll probably see some of the links I've provided. Another thing to do is read through the Story Discussion Forum discussions, and participate. You'll learn by scrutinizing what you like and dislike about other's writing. I especially recommend that you dig way back to much older stories that writers posted for critique, as some of them are by some really good writers.I did what you're doing, too, in the beginning, now I try (when I remember) to go through and just keep paragraphs at about 5 standard doc lines. My kind editors pick up what I miss.
I'm a novice hack writer, so I'd prefer that instead of reading mine (though I sure could use more 5's!
God, I'm so full of advice today, I'm even sick of myself.
