Want negative and positive feedback!

[Guest]

I wrote my first story for Literotica (Nurse Naughty, under erotic couplings) and while I love that people are voting, I want to know specifically what they like and dislike. For instance, if my story loses steam somewhere, I wanna know where. If I did a good job describing, where was that? I plan on writing many more stories but I want to improve greatly on what I started with... which I happened to write in an hour, while I was waiting for someone to call. Id appreciate some pointers on my story, Nurse Naughty, please!!!

 

[_Lynn_]

We're a lazy bunch here, so put a link to your story in your sig.

 

[Kikori]

http://www.literotica.com/stories/showstory.php?id=445526

By the way, Lynn, nice new avatar. ^_^

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

First things first. This note to the readers in the beginning - I wouldn't have done that. Just the reference to your tits is enough to get you hogged by half the pervs on Lit.

Next, you could have used an editor. You have several kinds of errors.
First -

Right away, after shift report, I went in to greet all of my team.

I believe this is a logic error. You are greeting your team, but talking about your patients. Isn't your team the other hospital staff working there? I had to learn this too.

Second-

knew Thomas was going to be an interesting assignment the second I got the report from his previous nurse.

You've left out a word. Again, I'm guilty of this too.

In the same paragraph are two more things we try to avoid. First, the paragraph is 12 lines long. That makes it hard to read. Try and keep your paragraphs down to 7 or 8 screen lines.

Second you are discribing Thomas. He's 26, piercings and all that. You will find it much more interesting to work those into the story rather than blurting them out. I like to do it in dialogue. This adds interest and helps to flesh out your characters - let us find out who they are so we can hate, empathise or create some other feeling toward them.

Your dialogue is just wrong. You've done it like you are writing a play, not a fictional story.

Here's a for instance. Yours-

ME: Hello, I'm Jae. I'm going to be your nurse this evening... can I call you Thomas? (yes) Well, Thomas, if it's alright, I'm going to do a quick head to toe assessment now.

(The last nurse didn't say anything about how... attractive Thomas was. He was about 6'4'', broad shouldered and naked from the waist up. He was firm—that much I could SEE—but not ripped. Dark hair trailed from his umbilicus to his waistband, where it disappeared underneath gray sweatpants. He also had a small amount of darkly colored hair across his pecks, not furry--but just enough. He had defined 'cut lines' that made my mouth water... he wore his hair a couple inches long and naturally jet black. The fact that both nipples were pierced and he had ears full of metal too wasn't lost on me. A large colorful mural decorated his arms, but I couldn't make out the pattern from the door. )

THOMAS: Well, it's alright if I can do an assessment on you, too.

I would have done this like this -

"Hi. I'm Jae. I'm going to be your nurse this evening. Can I call you Thomas? Well, Thomas, if it's alright, I'm going to do a quick head to toe assessment now."

"Well, it's alright if I can do an assessment on you, too," he replied.

Reading Thomas' chart I couls see he was about 6'4'', broad shouldered and had blown his knee in a motorcycle accident. With luck and no spikes in temperature he would be ready to go home tomorrow."

Looking at Thomas ... you can fill this part in.


Do you see the difference? Grammaticly correct for fiction writing and more interesting.

You also used an elypsis. This is not the right place to use that. They are used mostly in dialogue to indicate an incomplet thought. Like "I love the way you pull my hair when you..."

Those are a good many of the negatives. Thre are positives too. You tell a pretty good story as far as you went. This is what we call a "Stroker". It's not really a story, but a scene from a longer story. A story has a beginning where the characters are introduced and the reader gets to know them, a middle where most of the action and the screwing occurs then and ending where something occurs to the protagonist. Was Jae better off in the end? Did she learn something? Or was this just a hot fuck and good bye?

There are thousands of Strokers here on Lit. So what you've done is not really bad. Actually, reworked for grammar and edit this story would do quite well here among the wankers who make up most of the readers. But I would like you to grow a bit on your next effort and expand beyond what you've done here.

Generally, I think you can learn to write well. It takes time and effort. And it takes a few stories to get the hang of it. Keep writing. I look forward to your next story.

Edited to add You should go to the writer's resource forum. There is a really good article there about dialogue titled How to make you characters really talk. or something close to that. It's good and will walk you through dialogue.

 

[Guest]

Hey, thanks a ton. I didnt realize it but I used a lil too much jargon. Nurses, here at least, refer to their patients as their 'team'. We also rarely use 'the' in conjunction with 'report' so i probably ought to find an editor so I come out as more reader friendly. Thank you a lot, Ill try to keep this all in mind next time. PS, I just might be a Stroker kind of girl.

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

Hey, thanks a ton. I didnt realize it but I used a lil too much jargon. Nurses, here at least, refer to their patients as their 'team'. We also rarely use 'the' in conjunction with 'report' so i probably ought to find an editor so I come out as more reader friendly. Thank you a lot, Ill try to keep this all in mind next time. PS, I just might be a Stroker kind of girl.

There's nothing wrong with strokers.

If I might make a suggestion, write your story then read it out loud. You'll hear some of the words you leave out. I most always find them that way. Also, except in dialogue I don't write the way I speak - no contractions and grammaticly correct. In dialogue most anything goes. I've done venacular a number of times. For instance All Horror's Eve is done in the venacular I was used too as a child then again in Northern Ireland.

 

[_Lynn_]

I wrote my first story for Literotica (Nurse Naughty, under erotic couplings) and while I love that people are voting, I want to know specifically what they like and dislike. For instance, if my story loses steam somewhere, I wanna know where. If I did a good job describing, where was that? I plan on writing many more stories but I want to improve greatly on what I started with... which I happened to write in an hour, while I was waiting for someone to call. Id appreciate some pointers on my story, Nurse Naughty, please!!!

Your way of presenting this piece is way off. I struggled through a bit, but I can see many readers clicking out of it right away.

Jenny is right about losing the introduction. Readers want fantasy, fiction. I agree with her point on dialogue too. If you're in doubt of the best way to do it, do some reading here yourself. Taking the extra time is worth it.

Strokers are fine. And when presented in the correct manner, the scores will reflect that.

Yes, you would benefit a great deal from the help of a good editor. Incorrect spelling, improper grammar, and missing punctuation turn readers away.

There's not much I can add to the tips you already have from Jenny.

Good luck.

http://www.literotica.com/stories/showstory.php?id=445526

By the way, Lynn, nice new avatar. ^_^

Thanks, Kikori.

 

[elfin_odalisque]

I agree with Lynn and Jenny so I’ll try not to repeat what they said. You asked about structure and pacing so I’ll stick to that.

Relegate the intro to your bio page. It is a barrier that will make many readers turn off. If you want to be a sexy, young female nurse let it come out in your story. This is fiction and we don’t expect characters or events to be real.

Although first person is perfectly good, it is difficult, and you fall into one of the most common traps: talking to the reader, as you do throughout, makes it a kind of anecdote and puts us out of the action. The ‘I’ stuff has to be sensory; ‘I saw’, ‘I felt’, ‘I smelled’, not the ‘let me tell you’ approach.

Your pacing is good and bad. You start with a hook and then waffle until you get to Tom. You write;

The minute I stepped on the floor that night I knew it would be an all out marathon of meds, dressing changes, IV fluids, charting and call lights. Our census was more than up—we were a packed house. Thank flu season for that. The minute you open the door to our unit, your hearing is assaulted by all of the bed alarms, monitor bells, call lights and IV pumps sounding off, competing for our limited staff's attention.

Right away, after shift report, I went in to greet all of my team. "Hello, I'm Jae. I'm going to take over your nursing care for the remainder of the evening. If you should need anything, let me know and I'll do my best to take care of it. Here is your call light, and now I'm going to do a quick head-to-toe assessment."

All of my patients replied with a similar response, "Hi, Jae, what time until dinner? (my next pain med, my dressing change, my MRI.... You can fill in the blank)"

All of them, save one, I should say. I knew Thomas was going to be an interesting assignment the second I got report from his previous nurse.

I would abridge to;

The minute I stepped out of the ladies’ room and on to the floor that night I knew it would be an all out marathon of meds, dressing changes, IV fluids, charting and call lights. The minute I opened the door, my hearing was assaulted by the cacophony of bed alarms, monitor bells, call lights and IV pumps.

Right away, after shift report, I went in to greet my patients who replied with simple responses like, "Hi, Jae, what time until dinner?"

All of them save one. From his nurse’s report, I just felt Thomas was going to be an interesting assignment the second I got report from his previous nurse.

You have to be brutal in fiction writing – I have been criticized for waffling often enough – and strip clutter from your prose. I’ve cut 28 lines to 8 – readers get bored easily – and please tell me what I have lost in the story. “Female nurse arrives on shift in busy hospital and one guy stands out”.

Just a point: apart from the criticism you write screenplay dialogue and must write story dialogue, you should avoid brackets and numbers (they should be in words) – unless things like years or 7/11.

I think you get your scene meeting Thomas is completely wrong. Jae has to be stunned, bowled over by Thomas and you need to show us that. If you just said that the nurse had described his injuries and age, you are free to show how amazed Jae is when she sees the tattoos and piercings. It is an easier way to describe how excited she gets and builds tension.

The same goes throughout. You describe too much and don’t play the emotion or the tension enough as it rises and falls. In the shower, although you keep to first person, really you write in third as you don’t concentrate on Jae’s thoughts enough.

You have a good story idea, now you need an editor.

 

[_Lynn_]

I would abridge to;

The minute I stepped out of the ladies’ room and on to the floor that night I knew it would be an all out marathon of meds, dressing changes, IV fluids, charting and call lights. The minute I opened the door, my hearing was assaulted by the cacophony of bed alarms, monitor bells, call lights and IV pumps.

As a suggestion, I wouldn't begin both sentences the same way. The repetition is a bit dull to me.

 

[Guest]

Thanks!

Just wanted to say I appreciate ur critiques... and yes, I need an editor. The only problem is I do this all from my cell phone, an OLD cell phone, at that, lol. It just might take me along time to do all the editing.

 

[elfin_odalisque]

As a suggestion, I wouldn't begin both sentences the same way. The repetition is a bit dull to me.

You're too polite; it's awful. Was just rushing. Knuckles suitably rapped.

 

[_Lynn_]

You're too polite; it's awful. Was just rushing. Knuckles suitably rapped.

*chuckle*

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

Oooooo... Cat Fight

I love you two girls

 

[elfin_odalisque]

Oooooo... Cat Fight

I love you two girls

Doh! Youz just jealous.