Do you like to read fantasy/science fiction/paranormal etc.?

[Welcome Back Apathy]

If so, I may request your help with something that's been going on in my life for a long time.

 

When I was in seventh grade, I wrote a short story. The basic plot was fantastic; the writing was...excellent for a seventh grader, let's put it that way. I thought, "You know what? The plot of this is great, but it would do much better as a full-fledged novel! As a short story, it sounds so rushed anyway!"

 

I wrote some. The computer crashed; I did not back up the file.

 

I re-wrote. I forgot about it. The computer crashed, again with no backup.

 

This continued to happen over the next...eleven years. I don't feel bad about losing my work, because every time I had to write it over again, it had evolved into something better. I didn't really lose much each time anyway, because I never got very far in it. I wrote without strategy, picking and choosing scenes without an overarching plan.

 

Last September, I started over with a vengeance. I storyboarded the whole thing first so I knew how it happened from beginning to end. I planned every scene. I wrote every scene. I mean it when I say "every scene"--every single one of the chapters I planned is written. 61,000 words later, 177 pages (when written in normal book size, not 8.5x11) down, it is written. It is backed up, furthermore.

 

But boy, is it unpublishable.

 

My writing is lacking mainly in two areas: description and emotion. Oh, and scientific rigor, but I can fix that. Some chapters are far too short when it doesn't make sense for them to be short. Occasional brevity is good, but this is too far. And my characters are not deeply developed in the writing, despite the fact that I know all of their flaws and strengths like the back of my hand. (Incidentally, the back of my hand has two moles, one dark freckle, and some rather unsightly scars.) Sometimes, I fret that my characters are annoyingly perfect--they all are highly intelligent and capable people, and their flaws are not developed.

 

 

********

And now to the point.

I can't do it. I wrote it. I can't read it. I already know what happens; I already see things in my characters that may not be visible to a new reader. I can't edit it.

 

Help.

 

If you are interested in helping me see what I need to edit, you can respond here or drop me a private message. You can be anywhere between specific to general; I just can't do it myself. I will e-mail you the blurb (the bit that I would put on the back of the book plus the first three chapters. Help me out on those. Then once those are good, I can go on to the next three chapters.

 

I will only enlist the help of a few people, though, so if this gets popular, I may *gasp* turn some of you down. Actually, maybe I'll ask one person at a time, fix, send to the next person for feedback, fix...we'll see what happens.

 

Things in the book: magic and murder. Science--the magic is based on science. There is a magic university, sort of, except it's not solely for magic; that's just one thing to study, and it's still a secret from the non-magic students. Things that are NOT in the book: romance. Seriously. No romance whatsoever. So if you prefer Twilight over Harry Potter, this book will not be for you. If you liked The Rook, you might like this. If you liked Harry Potter, you might like this.

 

All right, ready GO!

[cleomiele]

I'd love to help you out if I can :) This is probably one of my favorite genres of literature and I'm always up for trying to give some helpful criticism. I know what you mean about not being able to see what to change/improve because you know the plot and characters too well.

Maybe in the process you'll inspire me to start writing again as well! :P

[Xepha]

I used to write. That was back when I had a public (a.k.a. a best friend, plus a couple friends online who volunteered to read what I was writing.) And I was handwriting most of the time... in notebooks. I still have all of them actually. My first story, I've finished it and it's kinda long (over a hundred pages in Word.) Drama novel kind of thing, with really twisted relationships between the characters. It makes me laugh when I think about it now. Then I started on a science fiction / fantasy story that I never finished. The universe was really interesting but the plot was lacking of originality.

 

Anyway, I love these genres and I'm willing to read and make a few suggestions. I've read friends' stories before and given them comments, so I know the drill. I understand it's hard for you to go back and edit the story with your own eyes.