It's worth noting that I critique whole batches of chapters on a monthly basis for my top teir patrons.
I gave doing this up about 6 months ago, but I missed it and asked for some new, unpublished page 1s so that I would be critiquing work where the author had the opportunity to change things if they agreed with any of my comments.
Today I'm feeling too ropey to write my own stuff, so I'm casting an eye over one of the page 1s that came in last month.
(My standard disclaimer)
It's very hard to separate one's tastes from a technical critique. There are page 1s from popular books with which I would find multiple faults. I didn't, for example, like page 1 of Terry Goodkind's Wizard's First Rule (I didn't pursue the rest of the book). But that book has 150,000+ ratings on Goodreads, a great average score of 4.12 and Goodkind is a #1 NYT bestseller. His first page clearly did a great job for many people.
I'm not always right *hushed gasp*. You will likely be able to find a successful and highly respected author who will tell you the opposite to practically every bit of advice I give. Possibly not the same author in each case though.
The art of receiving criticism is to take what's useful to you and discard the rest. You need sufficient confidence in your own vision/voice such that whilst criticism may cause you to adjust course you're not about to do a U-turn for anyone. If you act on every bit of advice you'll get crit-burn, your story will be pulled in different directions by different people. It will stop being yours and turn into some Frankenstein's monster that nobody will ever want to read.
Additionally - don't get hurt or look for revenge. The person critiquing you is almost always trying to help you (it's true in some groups there will be the occasional person who is jealous/mean/misguided but that's the exception, not the rule). That person has put in effort on your behalf. If they don't like your prose it's not personal - they didn't just slap your baby.
I've flicked through some of the pages looking for one where I have something to say - something that hopefully is useful to the author and to anyone else reading the post.
This one is from Rebecca Styles and an upcoming book called Chain of Bones.
****
I've posted the unadulterated page first then again with comments inset and at the end.
Like a
malicious donkey, the door ‘hee’d’ open and ‘hawed’ closed with
every crest and dip of the Par.
Vyardin
wiped her face on a nearby shirt and sighed at the useless wedge of paper she’d
shoved under the door, watching as it slid back and forth in the dip of the
wooden boards. She hated fixing things, it never went right.
Vy scanned
the shelves of rolled and folded maps, some hand drawn by herself across two
decades, others by hands as equally calloused, generations before her time
aboard. A stack of reports from surveyors and logbooks of journeys mixed with
ledgers and tallies, were pushed far to the back of the shelves, whilst newer
documents and trinkets and knives from faraway places, sat in easy sight and
reach. There was a thick leather folder containing letters of proposed
contracts, sponsorships for further expeditions -from whence the current wedge
of paper had been taken- but none of it was recent. Probably because it had
been five very long years since setting foot in the dirt of civilization. She
doubt any of those factors would even recall the proposals they’d sent.
She yawned
against the heat and lack of sleep, nothing seemed a suitable wedge. Not even
the actual wedge.
Again she
had to wipe her sweating forehead, then dipped a pen into the ink bottle and
hovered over the chart she had been working on. If she sold all the new maps,
there would be enough money to return home. Be with her children. But the cabin
and the Par was her home too. Its smell of papers and leather mingled with the
sea, decking oils, wax for the sails and, she crinkled her nose, a lot of
unwashed men.
Three
children she had conceived in the bed she no longer shared. Children she had
promised to return to, believing she would only be away a year.
Her sadness
ground to a halt and anger began to flood through her as the door laughed
again. It laughed because no one had fixed it properly. No one had fixed it
because it needed new parts and there was no money for new things because Captain
Raysh had spent all their coin ‘upgrading’ the Par. This, apparently,
did not include doors and hinges, nor a million other things on board the ship.
Her ship. Her ship and her money.
Not that anyone else much cared about either point. She’d sell the maps and
figure things out from there.
Vy took a steadying breath and set pen to
paper only to find the ink had dried in the immense heat. She stabbed the pen
into its crib and reached for the string-wrapped graphite stick, to continue
marking their progress, forcing herself to stay focused.
“Mid
knuckle joint.”
Vy scowled
at the random interruption, tried to ignore the conversation seeping down to
her cabin, just as she tried to ignore the wretched door. Dragging the shirt
down her face to her now dripping neck and chest, and flinging it aside, she
moved to the other end of the large map table and lifted the jug -empty- and
thumped it back down. What she wouldn’t give for some ice-cold fruit juice
instead of warm water, which seemed to just go straight through her. She hoped
their next port had supplies enough for them. Somehow, and with a shudder, she
doubted it.
Staring
down at the chart, Vy dragged her finger along their route until it crossed a
line and the listed fathom count dropped suddenly. That would be tomorrow. They
had run too far already.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Like a
malicious donkey, the door ‘hee’d’ open and ‘hawed’ closed with
every crest and dip of the Par.
The
hee and haw almost do the job – certainly if it meowed we wouldn’t need “like a
cat”.
“Like
a donkey” feels insufficient on its own though and the author has sensed this
and added “malicious”. I’m not sure “malicious” works. I would probably lose
the donkey entirely, or lean into it and called it “persistently annoying” or
some such.
On
first reading I got a bit further in believing she was in a type of carriage
called a Par. But that was almost entirely my fault. Still, there is very
little that says “ship” or “ocean” for quite a while.
Vyardin
wiped her face on a nearby shirt and sighed at the useless wedge of paper she’d
shoved under the door, watching as it slid back and forth in the dip of the wooden boards. She hated fixing things, it never went
right.
Vy scanned
the shelves of rolled and folded maps, some hand drawn by herself across two
decades, others by hands as equally calloused, generations before her time
aboard. A stack of reports from surveyors and logbooks of journeys mixed with
ledgers and tallies, were pushed far to the back of the shelves, whilst newer
documents and trinkets and knives from faraway places, sat in easy sight and
reach. There was a thick leather folder containing letters of proposed
contracts, sponsorships for further expeditions -from whence the current wedge
of paper had been taken- but none of it was recent.
All of this
is good description. It’s good on the “word” level, and it brings our PoV in
too which is good. That element could be pushed a bit more, but it’s not
essential.
What is
perhaps less good is that these 10 lines of describing things in a room are
occupying vital real estate on page 1 where we might be hoping for questions,
tension, action, and dialogue. Maybe not all four, but certainly two or three.
Probably
because it had been five very long years since setting foot in the dirt of
civilization. She doubted any of those factors would even recall the proposals
they’d sent.
This is the
first thing that really sets up an interesting situation with possible tension
and questions. Before that we have a woman at a desk being annoyed by a door.
She yawned
against the heat and lack of sleep, nothing seemed a suitable wedge. Not even
the actual wedge.
I know she
has said she’s not good at fixing things. But map making is a precise and scientific
undertaking, and she’s clearly good at it. Wedging a door is so simple that I
am having trouble believing that she can’t achieve it. Paper is great for wedging
a door. The disbelief damages the story.
Again she
had to wipe her sweating forehead, then dipped a pen into the ink bottle and
hovered over the chart she had been working on. If she sold all the new maps,
there would be enough money to return home. Be with her children. But the cabin
and the Par was her home too. Its smell of papers and leather mingled with the
sea, decking oils, wax for the sails and, she crinkled her nose, a lot of
unwashed men.
OK, so now we
have the very definite ship setting. That could have been made idiot-proof in
the first few lines with a single word about waves or sails.
Three
children she had conceived in the bed she no longer shared. Children she had
promised to return to, believing she would only be away a year.
So the
tension and the questions are strengthened – why did she stay away so long,
what will she return to?
Her sadness
ground to a halt and anger began to flood through her as the door laughed
again. It laughed because no one had fixed it properly. No one had fixed it
because it needed new parts and there was no money for new things because Captain
Raysh had spent all their coin ‘upgrading’ the Par. This, apparently,
did not include doors and hinges, nor a million other things on board the ship.
Her ship. Her ship and her money.
Not that anyone else much cared about either point. She’d sell the maps and
figure things out from there.
Seems odd
that she has no say on the spending of her money. It makes me question if she
is a prisoner or being exploited/abused. But we see on page 2 that this is not
the case and she’s ordering the crew around.
Again – the
non-closing door feels like a non-problem. I imagine that most sailors are in
part handymen (handypersons) good at improvising with a knife, tar, rope,
sailcloth etc.
Vy took a steadying breath and set pen to
paper only to find the ink had dried in the immense heat. She stabbed the pen
into its crib and reached for the string-wrapped graphite stick, to continue
marking their progress, forcing herself to stay focused.
“Mid
knuckle joint.”
The first
spoken words. They are intriguing as well as confusing.
Vy scowled
at the random interruption, tried to ignore the conversation seeping down to her cabin, just
as she tried to ignore the wretched door. Dragging the shirt down her face to her now dripping neck and chest,
and flinging it aside, she moved to the other end of the large map table and
lifted the jug -empty- and thumped it back down. What she wouldn’t give for
some ice-cold fruit juice instead of warm water, which seemed to just go
straight through her. She hoped their next port had supplies enough for them.
Somehow, and with a shudder, she doubted it.
This is
good scene-setting in terms of it being hot and uncomfortable (although after 5
years at sea she might have grown tolerant of such things). But, again, it does
use quite a few lines to tell us she’s hot, at a time when first page of the
book could be working harder on convincing us to turn to the second page.
Staring
down at the chart, Vy dragged
her finger along their route until it crossed a line and the listed fathom
count dropped suddenly. That would be tomorrow. They had run too far already.
And at the
end of page one I can recognize that the writing is good – which might be
enough to make me turn the page on its own. But unfortunately it will likely
have to do the job on its own as there are no strong hooks.
The page 1
does do a good job of introducing the setting, and there is the question of the
long-delayed return. If a reader likes those ideas – they will carry on. If a
reader is less sure, then they need to be sold harder on the good stuff to
come.
A second
page was included where we see our MC tell off some of the crew who were
gambling over cutting off each other’s finger. And then we end with a, “WHAT’S
THAT BEHIND YOU?” gambit, which carries a degree of page-turniness, though will
have to back it up sharpish or lose the reader’s trust.
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