English AOS: Creative Writing

[kauac]

Hi...
I've finally bit the bullet and am submitting my creative writing piece for marking. I'm hoping that it is close to being ready to use in practice questions.

It was initially written in media res structure, however, since thoroughly giving it a make-over, I put it back into chronological order for clarity's sake. I intend to put it back into media res after I have perfected the content.

Any feedback will be greatly appreciated!
Thanks, Katie 

[jamonwindeyer]

If anyone deserves some feedback, it's our MotM

- Really like your introduction, paints a great picture and establishes mood. Be careful of using techniques for the sake of using techniques - Alliteration/sibilance is a powerful tool to accentuate key aspects of a sentence when used naturally, but it needs to fit. Some of yours seem a little out of place
- Make sure dialogue sits on its own line! As soon as you open a line of dialogue, break to a new line. Also on dialogue, make sure it seems natural. You rely on it heavily and you do a really good job with it, but you can keep honing the exchange between the pilots. Try adding some nuance to make them seem like separate characters. Use swear words - I guarantee a pilot in that scenario would be dropping F-bombs. Describe the tone of delivery too!
Alright, so I've broken here because I think mechanically your piece is really solid. What I'm struggling with is the plot - I'm having real trouble piecing together the aspects of the story, I feel I'm halfway there but that I'm missing something - I've read it a few times and just can't quite click it. I get that Khaled has found the crash site and that we've got some themes of biological experimentation going on; perhaps you've omitted details purposefully for the purposes of brevity. That's cool! I'd give you two challenges:

1- What Discovery concept are you pushing here? It is clear that a Discovery has occurred but your concept will need to be multi-faceted, and probably show the impact on the individual in some way. Do you think you are doing this effectively right now?

2- How will you adjust this story to respond to different stimuli? Plot specific stories are really tough as soon as they throw you a specific opener, or a specific setting, or a specific conceptual framework!

I think overall, what you are doing has too many plot elements to be properly conceptually developed. Put simply, too much happening, too much to try and explain, and that's holding you back from getting the audience properly invested in the story, and from properly developing a concept.

I think it is the plot, at least, because from what I can read you are a good writer who can paint a great picture!! I just think that rather than trying to paint a small picture really well, you've bitten off a complex story and plot elements, and it's sucking up a lot of your space.

Anyway - I think you need to work on the clarity of your plot. I'd love for anyone else reading this to chime in and let us know what you think - Because it's also possible I've just missed something, which can definitely happen with creatives. Be comfortable though, mechanically the piece is strong, which means anything you write in an exam is probably going to score well

[kauac]

If anyone deserves some feedback, it's our MotM

- Really like your introduction, paints a great picture and establishes mood. Be careful of using techniques for the sake of using techniques - Alliteration/sibilance is a powerful tool to accentuate key aspects of a sentence when used naturally, but it needs to fit. Some of yours seem a little out of place
- Make sure dialogue sits on its own line! As soon as you open a line of dialogue, break to a new line. Also on dialogue, make sure it seems natural. You rely on it heavily and you do a really good job with it, but you can keep honing the exchange between the pilots. Try adding some nuance to make them seem like separate characters. Use swear words - I guarantee a pilot in that scenario would be dropping F-bombs. Describe the tone of delivery too!
Alright, so I've broken here because I think mechanically your piece is really solid. What I'm struggling with is the plot - I'm having real trouble piecing together the aspects of the story, I feel I'm halfway there but that I'm missing something - I've read it a few times and just can't quite click it. I get that Khaled has found the crash site and that we've got some themes of biological experimentation going on; perhaps you've omitted details purposefully for the purposes of brevity. That's cool! I'd give you two challenges:

1- What Discovery concept are you pushing here? It is clear that a Discovery has occurred but your concept will need to be multi-faceted, and probably show the impact on the individual in some way. Do you think you are doing this effectively right now?

2- How will you adjust this story to respond to different stimuli? Plot specific stories are really tough as soon as they throw you a specific opener, or a specific setting, or a specific conceptual framework!

I think overall, what you are doing has too many plot elements to be properly conceptually developed. Put simply, too much happening, too much to try and explain, and that's holding you back from getting the audience properly invested in the story, and from properly developing a concept.

I think it is the plot, at least, because from what I can read you are a good writer who can paint a great picture!! I just think that rather than trying to paint a small picture really well, you've bitten off a complex story and plot elements, and it's sucking up a lot of your space.

Anyway - I think you need to work on the clarity of your plot. I'd love for anyone else reading this to chime in and let us know what you think - Because it's also possible I've just missed something, which can definitely happen with creatives. Be comfortable though, mechanically the piece is strong, which means anything you write in an exam is probably going to score well

Thanks so much Jamon! 

My original concept for the story was that the people in the experiment were never introduced to the concept of hearing, and thus, never learnt to vocally speak. As in, they CAN still physically hear, but don't understand what it is (hence Khaled's headaches).

Because I was very strict on "show not tell", I tried to indirectly show the shift after they discovered they could hear, through lots of onomatopoeia/ verbal imagery. However, I know that at the start, it is not very clear that they 'cannot hear' (due to my ambiguous attempt at a dystopia haha).

Does anyone have any suggestions on how this concept can be represented more clearly at the start or through-out?

[jamonwindeyer]

Thanks so much Jamon! 

My original concept for the story was that the people in the experiment were never introduced to the concept of hearing, and thus, never learnt to vocally speak. As in, they CAN still physically hear, but don't understand what it is (hence Khaled's headaches).

Because I was very strict on "show not tell", I tried to indirectly show the shift after they discovered they could hear, through lots of onomatopoeia/ verbal imagery. However, I know that at the start, it is not very clear that they 'cannot hear' (due to my ambiguous attempt at a dystopia haha).

Does anyone have any suggestions on how this concept can be represented more clearly at the start or through-out?

Riiiiight, okay cool. Understanding that gives me a whole new perspective - Cool concept!!

For something like this that is quite an intricate and essential plot detail, you can just tell it. In a creative way - Maybe an advertising video for the experiment playing for shareholders at the beginning? Though you might need to bend the story a bit for that.

Whatever you come up with, that additional contextualisation would help loads. The "show not tell" mantra is trying to reduce reliance on sentences like, "She discovered her own power." Ergh, nothing worse. Instead, we want, "She stood tall, her shoulders once shrugged now resolute and firm." But this sort of stuff, plot details, sometimes we need that.

Best example ever: "You're a wizard Harry." That's a tell - But imagine if we spent 7 books (or 8 movies) without actually being told that explicitly?