Where did I drop the ball?

[kromen]

New story went up, but the feedback is strange. It was my first attempt at writing from a woman's p.o.v and I knew it wouldn't have been an instant hit, but "Dont care, not even a lil bit" doesn't help me out. Will somebody take the time to tell me where I fucked up or am I just being paranoid? It the fourth story in my sig line, Thug Passion. Thanks

 

[CWatson]

I think part of the problem is that the story feels like it doesn't go anywhere.

First off is the way you characterize Candice's internal dialogue. It's straight reporting--telling instead of showing. This makes it harder to empathize with her. It's hard to get into her head and connect to her when she's so objective and matter-of-fact about herself. And, to be honest, she doesn't feel like a woman. (As a bearer of Y-chromosomes, I would hardly know for certain. But that was my feeling on the matter.)

Second is the African-American angle. Is that supposed to amount to something? If you just wanted the characters to be black, no consequence or meaning, that's fine, and in fact I applaud you for it; I think it's great when we have stories in which race doesn't matter. But in that case, I feel like you drew too much attention to the fact that she's black. If, on the other hand, it was supposed to be a big deal--that he is and that she is, which is possibly more pertinent than the class difference between them--then why didn't you draw some conclusion out of it?

(Now, one must keep in mind that I'm about as white as you can get for being a yellow-skinned, slanty-eyed chink, and that furthermore I live in the Silicon Valley, where you see lesbians kiss in public but not too many black people. In other words, my cultural perceptions are probably not "average" in comparison to, oh, anywhere, and I am certainly not your intended audience. But that, again, was my feeling on the matter.)

And third: what again was Candice's point in this tryst? What was she hoping to achieve with it? Now, I may have missed that part, because I skip sex scenes--but, in my experience, people don't generally put critical information like that in sex scenes.

So. It's a good story. I definitely like it. But it doesn't feel like it goes anywhere, because Candice does not seem to have achieved anything meaningful by the end.

Hope this helps. ^_^;;

 

[kromen]

I think part of the problem is that the story feels like it doesn't go anywhere.

First off is the way you characterize Candice's internal dialogue. It's straight reporting--telling instead of showing. This makes it harder to empathize with her. It's hard to get into her head and connect to her when she's so objective and matter-of-fact about herself. And, to be honest, she doesn't feel like a woman. (As a bearer of Y-chromosomes, I would hardly know for certain. But that was my feeling on the matter.)

Second is the African-American angle. Is that supposed to amount to something? If you just wanted the characters to be black, no consequence or meaning, that's fine, and in fact I applaud you for it; I think it's great when we have stories in which race doesn't matter. But in that case, I feel like you drew too much attention to the fact that she's black. If, on the other hand, it was supposed to be a big deal--that he is and that she is, which is possibly more pertinent than the class difference between them--then why didn't you draw some conclusion out of it?

(Now, one must keep in mind that I'm about as white as you can get for being a yellow-skinned, slanty-eyed chink, and that furthermore I live in the Silicon Valley, where you see lesbians kiss in public but not too many black people. In other words, my cultural perceptions are probably not "average" in comparison to, oh, anywhere, and I am certainly not your intended audience. But that, again, was my feeling on the matter.)

And third: what again was Candice's point in this tryst? What was she hoping to achieve with it? Now, I may have missed that part, because I skip sex scenes--but, in my experience, people don't generally put critical information like that in sex scenes.

So. It's a good story. I definitely like it. But it doesn't feel like it goes anywhere, because Candice does not seem to have achieved anything meaningful by the end.

Hope this helps. ^_^;;

I see your point. I based it off a fantasy of a friend. I wanted to describe a woman who wanted to be with someone who wasn't hellbent on getting over; just getting by. Who else plays street ball on a weekday when everyone is working?
Making me characters black was just a notion. If Candice were white, I would have been sifting through piles of troll shit to find a real comment. I didn't mean to exclude any readers by doing that.
As far as me telling it from the point of a woman, I know I need a lot of work in that area. I think I sat on this story way too long, kept editing it to death. Thanks for the real honest criticism; I take it to heart.

 

[elfin_odalisque]

No, you haven't got the nuance of the female POV, sure, you externalize too much but that's not my problem with the story.

There is no-one to like, hope they find their hero, care about - in short. The writing is good and tense, but superficial when you come to characters. I kept asking myself 'why?' and I don't think you explained.

I guess there's a load more in your head about what makes these characters tick but you don't let us in to the circle and they come across a bit 2D.

We have to empathize and you tend a bit to shut us readers out of the emotions.

That said, I like your writing style. Just explore feelings a bit more.

 

[Shwenn]

I can give you some very specific advice. I'm just going to do the first bit of the story for you. I don't see much of this here but this is the sort of petty, line by line criticism you'd get in a real writing group.

Biggest problem is this: Create your characters. You don't know who this woman is. You don't know her well. That is crystal clear to me when I read this and most new fiction writers.

You should know at least ten times more about any character than you ever reveal to us. It should be a hundred times more if you are writing from that character's perspective.

"...I've traveled the vast reaches of our nation and stretched out to the corners of Asia and Europe.

I was becoming well respected in the upper echelon of Atlanta society, dined with the mayor and his wife on numerous occasions..."

This is a show don't tell sort of situation, here. Maybe have her describe her office, a picture of herself with the mayor and trinkets from her travels. When she tells me she has dined with the Mayor and travelled the world and how wonderful her many suitors are, I dislike her. The whole thing is more than a little cloying.

"First it was the reverberations of a car stereo, pounding out the latest misogynistic track from whichever hip-hop artist was hot at the time. The vocals were unintelligible...."

This is the sort of thing that makes me want to stop reading. If the lyrics were unintelligible, how does she know it's misogynistic? Wouldn't it be better if you took out both sentences and gave us a lyric? Let us decide if it's misogynistic. It shouldn't be hard to force us into that conclusion.

"after finally removing my restraining jacket"

This makes it sound as though the purpose of the jacket is to restrain.

"For some people, it's the glass pipe or the brown bottle."

These are not the vices a high class woman would immediately think of. She would think cocain or perscription pills. The bottles she would think of would be clear, or green or blue.

"fingering myself to teeth grinding orgasms thinking about a conjugal visit with that fine African gangster, that I developed acute carpal tunnel."

If she were masturbating enough to give herself carpel tunnel, she'd lose her job. I prefer masturbating with my fingers and I do it a lot. I wanted to scoff at this line. It's far too hyperbolic.

"He was a 6'9" dark chocolate wet dream..."

We don't have wet dreams. We can orgasm in our sleep but you don't wake up with a lot of evidence that it happened. This is something a man would write.

 

[kromen]

points well taken....

however, my character was a lawyer with a less than stellar childhood defined by the incident with her first "boyfriend" so she would know about brown bottles and glass pipes. It's my fault for not digging deeper to give readers understanding.
I borrowed the "carpal tunnel" line from a female friend as she likes to joke alot. I meant it as jest. As far as the music, i took on the assumptions of many people whenever they hear rap music. Most don't care whether it's "A tribe called quest" or "Soldier Boy", it's all loud and obtrusive and degrades women.
I am taking what you said seriously and plan to apply them the next time I try to write from the perspective of a woman. Thanks