The fault in the plot

 

After reading a ‘Fault in our Stars’ there was a wide flooding of donations to help bring teenage cancer suffers to Amsterdam to live out their dreams of young love and fulfill their desires for culture and art. Two by two they stood with oxygen tanks, IV’s and wheelchairs. It was bitter sweet for their parents and the donors. They were sending children off to enjoy the last holiday of their lives. After a week away the teenagers came back rather different. They were more relaxed and smiled. Those that had struggled to keep food down were far hungrier and ate their meals with great success. Even the shy and quiet group members were now confident and vocal. It seemed to be a miracle for all those involved. The teenagers would meet up on a weekly bases and a new support came into existence. It was all too good to be true.

Let us consider the following: a group of hormonal teenagers on the brink of death, are dropped into the sex capital of Europe with open access to marijuana and drugs. How the fuck are they not coming back stoned and shagged out their brains. Where is the scene in that book where the pair eat a plate of hash brownies, turn the oxygen tank into a bong and take it in turns getting lap dances in the red light district? It so realistic until you realise that gaping black hole in the story.

Taking back the crown- a review

A fellow blogger by the name misskzebra (To be a magician) recently completed a short story entitled ‘ Taking back the crown’ as a practice run for her upcoming NaNoWriMo ( it’s like writing a novel in under a month, about 1500 words a day for 30 days.) She released it in parts over several weeks until its full completion. She is now looking for CONSTRUCTIVE criticisms and general feedback on her work. Writing a review is a bit difficult, simply because of there about three ways to read TBTB. I sat and read through the whole thing in one shot (about 50 minutes) while others read it as snap bites over many weeks and some treated each chapter as a story in itself. With this in mind, I would encourage everyone to read ‘Taking back the crown’ in the style they prefer and get the most out of it. This review is based off the one sitting read.

What is it about? Well there’s a clue in the title, Sonya is from a royal family of powerful magic users that goes into hiding after some party crashers pretty much ruin the place and succeed in a coup against the family. She ends up seeking asylum with a group of isolated magic users away from the political chaos where she can learn to control her powers. Her mentor, Seta, becomes a pillar of strength in her life and slowly she becomes torn between regaining her rightful place on the throne and having a life with Seta in absurdity.
Hopefully that didn’t give too much away and there’s a lot more to it, but let’s move onto the review.

The story follows a strong course and doesn’t try to pull any punches. It is enjoyable without trying to create twists and turns to throw the reader off, which is refreshing way to absorb the story (seriously if people keep building up twists and they fall flat, the whole thing pointless. If a story can’t stand alone without the twist, it’s a terrible story.) While misskzebra was disappointed with her ending, I felt it tied up well and made for a clean cut story. The main issue is the pace of the story. Due to the nature of how it was released, each individual part flows well, but fails to join together as a full piece until much later on. Fight scenes are very cut and dry while some character development never gets fully embedded. I will say Sonya is written very well and has many different depths, but beyond Seta most characters never grow to have an individual tone or voice. The narrative is good and I do feel a unique voice is the narration when I read the pieces. While settings and scenes are not explored in detail, that personally not a big issue for me as I’m more character focused and like to make my own backdrop in my head. The language is consistent and some real nice expressions though I didn’t like ‘Plasma’ as a description in a fantasy novel. Plasma is usually blood or another state of matter so I feel it leans towards the SCI-FI side of things (If Sonya was throwing magic ball of blood that would make this story a lot more graphic on second reading.)

At its best TBTC is a casual read that you can enjoy without being sucked into trying to remember hundreds characters, new terminology and complex world. When read in single parts you can fill in the gaps in between chapters with a little bit of imagination and without having to flick back and ask a hundred questions. A great read for those want a holiday read or only have five or ten minutes to themselves. At its worse TBTC is a fantasy story that has a rushed pace that skips over the romantic relationship and tension of Sonya’s life. Events will spontaneously occur and die within sentences apart without any long foundation.

Overall I enjoyed the read and taking into account 1) It was written under pressure and a short time limit 2) It’s actually a spin off from another work I’ve never read 3) It was just a practice run, I tip my hat off to misskzebra. When you read this I got two requests: stop being so hard on yourself (trust me there is a long list of trolls and bitter people who’ll do it for you) and when you’ve finished this ‘novel in a month challenge’ I’d like to read something you’ve worked on at a gentler pace.

If you want to read this story, click on the link below or search for misskzebra to see other works.http://misskzebra.wordpress.com/2013/06/07/taking-back-the-crown-part-one/

Outcasts- my first novel

So I wrote a novel a few years back and placed it on Amazon to download as an E-book. Please give it a read and help support my future projects (mainly the front cover for my next book.)