Room for improvement??

[_Imagine_]

Hi all!

I've just submited my second story here on Lit and I am looking for some constructive feedback to help me improve my future stories.

I have gotten some comments which is great and I am looking for feedback to help me improve!

Like things that I could do better or did do well, increase/slow down story pace, unrealistic plot lines ect.

Here's the link :
http://www.literotica.com/stories/showstory.php?id=512064

thanks in advance for your help

p.s
I am aware that there are editors for this kind of thing, would just like to hear what the general Lit public thinks

 

[CWatson]

Okay, the absolute first thing you could do is pay attention to your technicals. You have misspellings ("smelt" is a kind of fish, not the past-perfect of "smelled"; "stationery" remains stationary, but you can only write on the former), grammar errors, miscapitalizations and punctuation problems all over the place. This is doing yourself a disservice. You're a pretty good writer--you have decent command of the language and you know how to express yourself. So leaving little errors lying around is not only distracting to The Reader, but it makes you look stupid when you're not. Would you go out in public with your shoelaces untied and your fly unzipped? In just the same way, for just the same reasons, you should never let a story out the door without taking the time to cross its T's and dot its I's.

Second off, your set-up. It doesn't seem to go anywhere. It's an excuse to get the two principal characters in a room together. Obviously, that's fine; that's how most porn works. But the big problem I had is that without reading through a couple more times and squinting really hard, I couldn't see how the case resolved. It finally occurred to me that Miss Lowe intended to sue the harrasser, not the harassee, which was my initial impression. Now, pretty clearly, that makes me an idiot too... but I'm an idiot who uses my brain to compensate for that shortcoming. Most readers will not even do that. So you could stand to make that point clearer.

Lastly, the sex itself. I feel like the exaggeration is, well, unnecessary. Cheeks bulging from semen is flatly unrealistic and, to me at least, not attractive. (Your Mileage May Vary, as sex scenes always do.) I also feel confused because the story starts with a lawsuit but ends with sex. A story needs to end with what it started with. This doesn't need to be like extensive, but it would be nice if you could at least toss in a one-liner or something about the fact that she's a lawyer and why they ended up in that room together. It would be a nice wrap-up.

Anyway, that's what I've got. And before you complain about all this, let me point out that you're still in the top 10% of writers who come here asking for help. You've done well, and your votes will reflect that. But you asked if there was room for improvement, and, well, there always is.

 

[sr71plt]

The punctuation is a mess, especially the punctuation of dialogue. I think you're lucky this passed through. I recently "fixed" a couple of stories for a writer whose submissions had been rejected on the basis of dialogue punctuation--and she was closer to the mark than this offering is. (She also had written actual stories, and you haven't.) You would do yourself a big favor to google dialogue punctuation and get that cleared up in your future writing.

And there's far more going wrong in punctuation here than the dialogue--that's just what leaps out and grabs the reader.

I assume you're not British(?) If so, "smelt" would be the preferred past of "smelled," but nothing else in your work looks British style, so I guess CWatson is right about "smelt" in this context. (Waiting for the howls of the Brits here.)

The misspelling that continually jumped out at me was "cloths," which should have been "clothes" in this context.

You completely abandon all effort at a story once the unbelievable setup swings in (and the setup is rushed and unbelievable), so I wouldn't catagorize this as a story.

For those reading to wank, it's fine otherwise. So, yes, it should do well enough in the story file.

 

[Tseeteli]

I feel like the lead-in is the wrong length.

The story you're telling is something like, "Female lawyer is suing a businessman. She wants to get laid. He fucks her to get her to drop the lawsuit." That plot is simple and fun.

The trouble for me, is that the story initially seems like it's going to go in a "man shows female lawyer that sexual harassment suits are unjustified and bad," direction.

I think the story would be stronger if the lead in were altered. One option might be to cut out the discussion of sexual harassment entirely. (Or cut it down to nearly nothing).

Since the details of the lawsuit don't really matter, you could pretty well have a paragraph of establishing the setting, and then come in at, "Miss Lowe, you are doing me a huge favor by dropping this case and I want to make that up to you now. I will do WHATEVER you ask." (Or perhaps, "you would be doing me a huge favor...") That sets the tone equally well, but would tighten up the writing.

Alternately, if you want a longer lead-in, then I'd use it to develop the characters more. Right now, the focus feels like it's on the lawsuit that we forget about as soon as the sex starts. I might spend that time on the character's emotions.

For instance, is this woman a predatory negotiator? Has she carefully manuvered the man into a corner where he has only one good option? Or, is he an attractive opportunity to indulge a fantasy about mixing work with pleasure?

If the man a nervous around lawyers? Maybe the harasser was a disreputable cousin that he was forced to hire, and he's worried that this lawsuit will end his company? Or, maybe he was the one to out-maneuver the lawyer.

Any combinations of character motivations could be fun, too. But, we'd need a bit more conflict at the beginning as they negotiate around the lawsuit.

 

[estragon]

Imagine, I did give you feedback; check the comments to your story. "Who Needs a Plot? If it's good and hot, who needs a plot? Really good hot sex." Also who needs grammar? But if you're a writer and not merely a wank-facilitator, you do well to heed the reponses to your post.

 

[ticklechambers]

I'm happy to read anyone's story if they are happy to read mine and do the same with giving feedback

http://www.literotica.com/stories/memberpage.php?uid=1198818&page=submissions

Pick a story of mine and send me a link to your own stories. If anyone is interested.