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Post by Kessie on Apr 21, 2012 9:43:41 GMT -5
Brian: I have an art blog at netraptor.org/blog. It's been a bit slow since my tablet bit the dust, though.
Warning about Dresden: There's sex scenes. After his girlfriend leaves in book 3 there's not as much, but the vampires do things to their victims. But that's typical for anything having to do with vampires, and they're the baddest of bad guys.
Aside from that, his characterization is really good. I think Ted Dekker needs to take some lessons from Jim Butcher. (When Thomas Hunter cried through the entire book of Green, I was finished.)
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brianc
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Post by brianc on Apr 22, 2012 8:23:43 GMT -5
Good to know. Maybe my wife and I will skip over those scenes, because that'll be just a little too weird to read out loud to her (or to read at all, for that matter). I've been told my writing is like Ted Dekker, but that's strictly writing style, not plot lines. I read the beginning of House, and I can see the similarities, but I'm sure he's much better than I am. If Peretti's goal was to get a person closer to God with This Present Darkness, then he did an excellent job--I wanted to slit my throat after the first chapter, which would have gotten me close to God REAL quickly. lol The continuous, unnecessary description of the carnival drove me nuts. The writing in House was a lot better, but I'm not that far into the book and I'm not yet hooked. I don't like the characters so far, either. I think one of the pages I ran across was your art page. I wasn't sure if it was your page or your husband's page or both. Either way, the art is great. I wish I could paint. I tried it once in high school with acrylics. I painted an unusual landscape scene, and I somehow won the painting portion of the art contest with it. I still think I just got lucky, because I'm not a very good painter at all. Pencil drawings are my thing. I just started drawing again for the first time in probably 14 years a couple of weeks ago. It seems that talent doesn't go away. I thought I'd be bad at it for a while, but I guess it comes back very easily. Now, if I were any good at creating images from my head rather than having to look at something to draw it, I'd be good to go with the scenery from my book. I figure I'll have to get some different pictures of different places and kind of splice them together in my drawings to construct images of the underground city in my book. It'll be fun to put the images down on paper. - Brian
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Post by Kessie on Apr 22, 2012 12:39:10 GMT -5
I used to teach art class to 5-10 year olds, and I noticed something about artists. A person can have no extra talent, but if they're willing to work and work at it, they'll eventually be as good or better than the people with natural talent. Hard work trumps innate talent every time. :-)
I haven't read Present Darkness in years, so I don't remember how good (or bad) Peretti's writing style. I don't have anything against Dekker's style. I've read thrillers and that's just the style--streamlined, short sentences, short chapters. If you write that way, then I'll be extremely interested to see your work someday.
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Post by j2starshine on Apr 22, 2012 22:11:15 GMT -5
Little late, but welcome! :-)
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brianc
Junior Member
Posts: 78
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Post by brianc on Apr 23, 2012 7:13:27 GMT -5
Little late, but welcome! :-) Thanks for the welcome.
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brianc
Junior Member
Posts: 78
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Post by brianc on Apr 23, 2012 7:28:44 GMT -5
I used to teach art class to 5-10 year olds, and I noticed something about artists. A person can have no extra talent, but if they're willing to work and work at it, they'll eventually be as good or better than the people with natural talent. Hard work trumps innate talent every time. :-) I think I had a little natural talent and a lot of practice. I used to draw in church, and eventually in classes at school and sometimes at home. I didn't like drawing cartoon characters, and never really did it, but I taught one class to a group of young kids at a local arts & crafts store in the area. I'm sure you were a lot better at it than I was. I agree with the hard work over natural talent theory. Hmmmm... I actually go a little mad if I read a book with really short sentences, unless it's well written. Writing style is everything. If a writer knows what they're doing, they can make just about anything work. What kills the flow for me is when a person puts periods where there clearly needs to be a commas. I like a good flow to sentences. If they're too short, they feel choppy to me, like traffic--stop & start, stop and start. In my own writing, I try to make my sentences long enough to convey ideas well, but not too long so that they're run-ons. Run-ons drive me nutty too. I like a good balanced flow. I like Dekker's writing flow since it's similar to mine. However, I can't say if I'm streamlined yet. That's one major reason I came here and AnomSandbox--I need help cutting down things. At least, I think I do. I'm beginning to see possible weaknesses in my storyline structure. It's possible that the romantic storyline is enough to carry the reader till the real conflict and climax begin, but I'm not sure. Only readers can tell me that. It is a love story, after all, but it just happens to get to a point where a lot of action, adventure and mystery come into play, as well. I'm hoping when people critique it, they're brutally honest so I can rework the storyline if necessary, which will help me learn to structure stories a little better. I like brutal honesty with this type of thing so I can make improvements. It's like drawing--just have to my tiny bit of natural talent and keep doing it more and more till I get good at it. As for short chapters, I've actually started cutting my chapters down now. They average around 10 pages per chapter. I'm 300 pages in and somewhere at the beginning of Chapter 27. I did that so my wife could edit chapters quicker. lol I felt bad that she was sitting up for hours at night working on one chapter. It will take me a LOT of time to read other people's stories at the Sandbox. I read no quicker than an average person, and I am very slow at critiquing since I tend to get very detailed in my considerations. I think it may be a bad thing for me to spend much time on critiquing, because I get so detailed and it drains my creativity. I need to do it at the right point in the day, I guess, after writing.
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Post by j2starshine on Apr 23, 2012 8:03:23 GMT -5
I didn't have time last night to respond properly and with kids who knows if I'll have time now :-) fortunately they are still asleep.
Don't worry about your speed at the sandbox. We all have full plates. I got a 3 & 1 year old...so no worries, I'd rather you keep your priorities and balance than try to finish all of our submissions in a "timely" manner.
Art, I hadn't thought of it before and I have actually read somewhere in one of my craft books or something that writers' input on book covers etc was frowned upon because they didn't consider writer's artistic... which I've been finding not true. I know quite a few who are both. I've always drawn and in the last couple of years started painting. I've got a few pieces up on FB at MaZoa Art. I'm thinking of linking to my blog. One of the favorite things I love to draw are maps of my world. Even before I was writing and had an idea of fantasy world-building, I was drawing maps. Fun stuff. I'm actually getting back into pencil drawings and exploring other methods of artsy stuff with the hopes of being able to bring some extra money in. I love making stuff for people, so we shall see what comes out of that.
Happy writing, drawing, etc! See you around the Sandbox
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Post by Kessie on Apr 23, 2012 11:32:47 GMT -5
Brian: For your 300 pages, do you need line-crits, or just broad commentary on how the story goes? Because if you just need basic feedback, I can load your story on my ipod and nibble away at it when I have time. Line edits take more time, because I have to read it while sitting at the compy, with my brain locked into Editing Mode.
J2: Yes! Post artwork on your blog! I suggest keeping it small and low-quality, though, to prevent theft. I post mine generally about 500x500 px in GIF format. Great for sketches.
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Post by j2starshine on Apr 23, 2012 20:38:05 GMT -5
Thanks Kessie, I will do that. Makes me want to go upload my mermaid pic right now ... patience...all in good time. :-) I'm also going to try to scan my sketches and mess with it in photo shop like you had said in one of your teaching posts. Do you think stuff posted on FB is safe from being lifted? my guess, no.
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brianc
Junior Member
Posts: 78
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Post by brianc on Apr 24, 2012 7:47:45 GMT -5
I didn't have time last night to respond properly and with kids who knows if I'll have time now :-) fortunately they are still asleep. Don't worry about your speed at the sandbox. We all have full plates. I got a 3 & 1 year old...so no worries, I'd rather you keep your priorities and balance than try to finish all of our submissions in a "timely" manner. Art, I hadn't thought of it before and I have actually read somewhere in one of my craft books or something that writers' input on book covers etc was frowned upon because they didn't consider writer's artistic... which I've been finding not true. I know quite a few who are both. I've always drawn and in the last couple of years started painting. I've got a few pieces up on FB at MaZoa Art. I'm thinking of linking to my blog. One of the favorite things I love to draw are maps of my world. Even before I was writing and had an idea of fantasy world-building, I was drawing maps. Fun stuff. I'm actually getting back into pencil drawings and exploring other methods of artsy stuff with the hopes of being able to bring some extra money in. I love making stuff for people, so we shall see what comes out of that. Happy writing, drawing, etc! See you around the Sandbox Cool! Thanks for the info! For now, I need broad commentary on how the story goes and what info dumps need to be taken out. I can work the information in later if it's important, but in a more interesting way. The thing with the absence of money in the one city was to kind of mimic the world's idea that there is some utopian soceity that is perfect, which is kind of how I want the city to appear at first. I considered having the real underlying issues come out later, but I'm not sure it will matter to the reader, so I probably won't make it a big part of the story. I'll show the contrast between the underground city and the mountain city, eventually. It's a trilogy, so I have a lot of time to play with this concept and decide whether to throw that out or not, I guess. Input will be my determining factor. What was the book you suggested for weaving themes into stories? I will grab a copy of that and see if I can get some good ideas from it. Thanks! - Brian
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