The Children of Lux (Action/Adventure novel)

You'd think so, huh? The development is slow, very slow, to the point where I'm contemplating giving up entirely on this story.



You just can't let me be me my typical depressive and moody self can you? And you better not say ANYTHING about me! [size=10]Stupid Chloe...[/h]

The Prologue

The beginning needs a better hook. I also have a problem with “sat” used in the first sentence. I would’ve started it like this:



Spice thy sentences up with variety: use participial phrases, infinitives, subordinate clauses, etc. As for the last sentence for paragraph 1:



Remove “she sounded worried…”; it’s redundant. Then remove “with her heart breaking…”; the dialogue that the priestess uses already conveys this.



Use a stronger verb to convey her pain so that thou aren’t telling it but rather showing it.



Please don’t take this as an offense, but I’m going to go grammarian on this because it incessantly irks me. The past tense verb of “lie” is “lay” while its past participle is “lain”. I love words and dislike their obsolescence.

Thou need to do more showing than telling.

I'll make another post for the other chapters when I get to them.

I appreciate you going through this but it's redundant at this point. I've now accepted that no way I look at this changes the fact it's just awful. Feel free to go through it and point out its issues if you wish, but I probably won't even consider altering it at this point.

As for the grammatical points you've made: I can't help it, my school was shit at teaching us proper grammar. They just expected us to know how to use English seeing as we were English and they never attempted to help with my lack of understanding. So in short: I couldn't care less if you have an issue with the grammar in it, I've done my best, if you wish to sit down and list the errors and try to teach me how to do better than be my guest. It'll be more than my school ever did.

As for the use of verbs used to describe emotions, my writing style is more focused on the description of characters and their body language than how they speak. To me, it should be easy to discern what they said anyway and its intent, so I see no point in going back and altering it. Your issue, not mine.

Sorry if I've come off as inhospitable and like a moaning bitch but the last few days haven't been my best. Plus looking at all the criticisms people have been giving it make me want to kill myself. Again, I apologise, feel free to stay here and read further but it won't effect me so much.

Get that defeatist crap out of here! If thou believe it to be a pile of crap, take that manure and grow roses from it!



Then what of improvement? I'm critiquing so that thou can improve.



I have looked at a few comments and couldn't find anything harsh. They are commenting to help thee improve. I think thou're taking it the wrong way. Please don't kill thyself.

Man, this is getting painful to watch. I guess I wasn't as lucky as I was with AoA. People are criticizing purely to help making this series better and that's how you respond to them? Man, how happy for me just to get some reader base, not to mention critical readers I can discuss things with. Talk about being ungrateful.

And yes, by the way, as far as I've read, it wasn't an action/adventure series, just a gallery of sweet nothings interspersed with some actionish elements. Thought I'd give it more chance when I feel less lazy, but not when the author herself is unable to love the work.

Easier said than done. Especially when you have no motivation to continue.





I understand and appreciate it, but it's clear to me in order to make it better it would take far too much work and according to some I may need to sacrifice part of the way I write.





I never said what people were saying was harsh, I'm saying that the amount criticisms made me realise how terrible it is. Obviously there are better people than me who should be writing stories. It's nice they want to help but (by no fault of their own) it had ended up discouraging me. Plus I over exagerate, I wouldn't kill myself over something as trivial as this.

It's not the criticisms they give or the people giving them so much as how the amount of criticisms make me feel it's terrible. I would never stop just because someone gave me a criticism, I know nothing can ever be perfect to everyone. I love that people would take time out of their schedules to come and offer support, truly I do.

But I can't help it if I no-longer have any motivation. I won't continue something I don't love, what's the point in that? I take offence to the word 'Ungrateful', I am very grateful but in no way am I obliged to continue writing just because you have left some feedback.

I don't pick on grammatical errors that often. I pick on how content is presented instead. However, I will make an exception here because the information presented is a bit inaccurate.

'Lay' is an transitive verb and its intransitive form is 'lie'. Unlike Japanese, English has very few verbs with transitive and intransitive forms. (d, if you are reading this: you are studying Japanese aren't you? Discerning the difference between 開く and 開ける is enough to throw me into a state of despair. I hope that does not happen to you)

Transitive verbs are used to indicate that the subject is performing an action on an object. I (Subject) laid (transitive verb) a corpse (object) on the table.

Intransitive verbs are used to indicate that the subject is performing the verb itself. There is no object here. The zombie (subject) lied lay on the table.

Past tense: The armoured man lied in the coffin, preparing himself to sleep.
Past participle: The armoured man had lain in the coffin for the past hour.

Source: http://web.ku.edu/~edit/lie.html



That said, I have a bone to pick with Xenon about ize/ise and Queen's English...

I will get to your story soon hopefully, Logophile. Don't worry, I won't be picking on grammar if I were to do that.

Wait did thou just say lie is the intransitive form of lay... that's not how it works. They are two different verbs that are commonly mixed up. Lay is transitive, yes; lie is transitive, yes. But in no way is lie a form of lay. I know about transitivity already; thou don't need to educate me. Finally, lie and lay:

http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/lie
http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/lay

There are two verbs that always get mixed up: lie and lay.

Lie (present tense/bare infinitive)
Lay (past tense)
Lying (present participle)
Lain (past participle)

Lay (present tense/bare infinitive)
Laid (past tense and past participle)
Laying (present participle)

Also, if thou read thy link that thou posted, thou'll see that it substantiates what I'm saying.



Thank you thee, still haven't got a hang of that.

I'd say it doesn't matter how crappy you think the story is or how crappy it might actually be, you should finish it. Getting to the end is a good skill to have in writing. Besides, no one gets better by stopping halfway through.

I can understand that, usually I do get to the end of what I write (Not to brag, but I do have a novel that exceeds 200,000 words, which I think shows I stick to stuff generally) but I'm finding it hard to motivate myself. I may finish it but I wouldn't expect anything in the near to mid-term future.

Plus, it isn't the novel itself that has me so demotivated. I got some bad news that has effectively ruined my plans for life. I'm not in a good place to continue right now.

well just dropping by to give some tips which really helped me:

I guess you're pretty much unmotivated because you set too high of standards with little to no room of freely expressing your ideas.

Though, you can think of taking a rest for a few months and focus on writing simple things that you like instead.

It you're not writing things you love, I think not much good will come, so just change to writing things you love and hopefully the love will spread to many things.

Just take it easy and don't push yourself too hard, just enjoy life mang =D

Perfectly understandable. Do what you gotta do. I'll continue to read what you have posted, but I'll stop replying with criticisms if you don't want them.

High standards are what I work by, I'm afraid that probably won't ever change.

The idea I can't express my ideas is...err...half right. It's right because I've dug myself into a hole (Plot wise) that I can't get out of. It's wrong in the sense that once I get to a certain point everything would be fine (but that would take too long and recent circumstance have left me in a dark place).

I'm grateful for your support though! I'll probably go back to writing what I enjoy (I've already started listing ideas for a sequel to another novel). As for pushing myself, I'll try, but as I said: recent circumstances have made my life not so great, but I'll try to enjoy life.

Regardless, thank you again :D

No, no! Please keep commenting! I'm not good with dealing with issues as well as pressure and I think you can see that from the comments. This all stemmed from my mood upon learning...something terrible about myself (Nothing fatal, don't worry). It's just grammatical errors I don't want people pointing out since I can't change that when I'm writing future Chapters (Fuck English schools, if they had taken time to teach me maybe that wouldn't be such an issue). If it were something like "You have used the verb X too many times, try changing it up with the verb Y for example..." then that would be fine. But if it's "You've misused a comma in this sentence..." I'll ending up breaking something.

Thanks for your continuation of reading anyway d, it means a lot.

My poor Danni, It'll be fine! I'll be with you every step of the way! I may even help with the writing :D

I stand corrected. (I read that line of Yuri's to mean that the God of Light was led to the coffin.)

I still maintain that lay and lie are pretty much transitive and intransitive forms of each other. You are not going to deny that there are similarities between them in meaning aren't you?

To make things more confusing, the word 'lied' which I wrongly used is the past tense of (telling a) lie, it seems.

Disclaimer: Neither DatYuriThough nor I use American English though what you said still applies for UK English.

Chapter 1

Although I read this yesterday, I never got around to writing a post.

The first three sentences can be compressed. Power is used twice.



I can see why the other gods didn't want to help.

The second paragraph is a complete tense shift from the previous paragraph. Past tense->present tense, but it then switches back from present tense to past tense. So, it is very possible to be a statement of fact. I have seen this in a short story from my college literature book; it was in a relative clause and confused the hell out of me, still does, really.

Others have commented about the exposition in the first chapter. Personally, I think this should be expressed in the prologue because it's pointless if the information is going to be gained shortly thereafter; if this were in a later chapter as revelation, however, then I would be perfectly fine with it. I don't think all of the exposition should be in the prologue, but things pertaining to the God of Light, four pillars, beast of chaos, etc. This would also serve to give a clearer picture right off the bat. There is another possibility of introducing these things little by little, like bread crumbs.

So how do Magika come about? I get the God of Light bequeathed humans powers, but it seems to be through the four pillars, which I don't think Olsen has found yet. Or are the pillars just catalysts?



And



How do they have magical powers if those are passed or given through one of the four pillars, which I'm assuming that one of each is found in each nation.

I am very interested in the lineage of light, and their papal feel, this war with the Beast of Chaos, which seemed to have an inexplicable end, maybe a little information on the other gods and their interactions, and the "Unification War".



As I thought, magic powers are inheritable.



I know light is a major driving force in thy work, but just calling it "land of light" is a corny to me. There's a jump between the paragraphs. Thou jump back from talking about God of Light giving the four pillars and then decide to talk about two paragraphs later, and it reads awkwardly because thou were just talking about the kingdoms, and if thou transfer it a few paragraphs, the following paragraph about Despra reads a lot more smoothly.



I would suggested rewriting the ending part the sentence because asked is used twice and could be removed.



Is he being rhetorical or is he using rhetoric? If the latter, I suggest mere in place of more. If the former, just use rhetorical.



See this is a perfect example of showing and not telling. Thou have strong verbs, "hopped" and "snatched"; snatched illustrates his insolence and impatience while his dialogue reinforces, alongside the verb "passed", his disposition on the grub job.

Remove the sentence after "WHAAAT?"







How did the dress look elegant? Telling us it looks elegant gives us nothing. Remove both uses of elegant in here and describe the dress and her curves in more detail so that the readers themselves will think it is elegant without thee needing to state so.



Just say warned; sounded feels out of place here.



BURN!



I don't think alcohol is that quick to take effect.







Again, I don't think that alcohol works that quickly.



Again, the dialogue illustrates that she is displeased.



Remove these.



I don't like him waving. A different action that seems a little less silly would be more appropriate like him stepping forward with outstretched arms.







Have Cerice whisper; although it might not convey scared and confused, but it does convey doubt (quandary?).



Final note: There are comma splices and awkward sentences.

The story has potential, but needs a little work here and there.

I'll answer some questions that you have based on content.

Firstly, such elements as the Beast of Chaos, Four Pillars, ect. are explained in breadcrumbs later on. I was just trying to give you a good idea about them before I went into some long-winded explanation without any context.

As for Magikas and their powers: The 'Original' Magikas had their powers given to them by The Lord of Light so they could serve him in battle. Some Magikas passed on their powers by reproducing, giving their offspring the same powers (Note: These type of Magikas are known as 'Pure Magikas). The Pillars of Light also give off powers since they act as catalysts by giving off magical energy that is trapped in the Earth. Regular humans then contract magical powers through a irradiated-like process.

As for Cerice getting drunk so quickly: Suspension of disbelief. Or if that doesn't satisfy you, I've never had any alcohol at all (And plan on never having any, I don't drink poison) so I have no idea how quickly/easily it is for someone to get drunk. And if that isn't enough: The alcohol in this world in fast acting/its effects quickly wear off.

If I can't write a book where a gorgeous blonde gets drunk after one swig of alcohol, then I don't want to live in that world!

Okay, so whether or not my life has been sorted out or not I've decided to post a little update as to what has happened.

So recently I got bad medical news that has deterred me from writing more of The Children of Lux and I wanted to explain why I've lost the motivation to continue writing. You'll need some context of my life first to understand why this has been such a big issue for me. As I'm sure you'll know I like Yuri because I'm a Lesbian (You should have seen some comments left by my Girlfriend) but despite that the thing I've always wanted to have a child of my own and I've been doing research over ways I could have one (such as IVF). The only issue is I always wanted to be pregnant since I always wanted it to be my child (and that has always been a non-negotiable point of my dream). So I booked an appointment with a local physician to discuss the possibilities of how I could go through with this and my physician said it would be best just to see if I was fertile. She said it would be fine since the odds were in my favour given how both of my parents were fertile and general statistics suggested I would be fine. As it turns out I'm completely infertile. This killed my dream of ever being a mother, adopting wasn't an option since I wanted it to be mine. This killed a lot of my motivation as a result and sent me into a depressive spiral of which I haven't really been able to exit so far. I'm not so proud of this story so far (based off the amount of criticisms, not the criticisms themselves. Some people didn't gather that from what I've said and have acted in an unsympathetic way, calling me ungrateful despite the fact if you looked back I always thanked everyone for their feedback and even continued to ask people for feedback even after these events) and that was a reason for why I didn't want to continue but it won't stop me. What may stop me is the crippling depression, however, I am moving passed it so hopefully I'll start up again soon.

Anyway, I hope you stick with the story if you have been reading it, keep giving feedback and I apologise if I acted in a rude manner to any of you. I'm sorry, truly I am for acting in a way I shouldn't have, but it hasn't been a good couple of weeks for me.

I'm also sorry that I'm posting this as my problems shouldn't have to involve any of you but I needed to in order to explain my actions and apologise. So hopefully the next chapter may be here soon, depending on how quickly I move passed this.