Soooooooooooo, I'm trying to write something, and as ever i don't like anything i write. So i thought that i would try to throw the little i have here to find out what my friendly nuffians think about it. It's only beginning so far, nowhere near the thing i would like to write about, but i would like to know if my style, grammar and other stuff is correct. Spoiler What does it mean to be human, I chuckled to myself as i woke up beaten and battered. My clothes filled with tears both old and new, grimly reminding me the dark life i am leading. Is there a place for me here? I wonder while slowly getting up hissing from the pain that such movement caused to me. "The world sure is unfair " I whisper to myself as I stumble slowly through the dirty alley I woke up in. With pain as bread and misery as butter of my everyday life I struggled through last 15 years of my life. Doing my best to hold on to my life, to my humanity. But what is humanity but a collection of souls each trying to one up each other, to improve one's own standing through suffering of those below you. I was continuing my deep contemplations and recollections of my past as I slowly arrived in the corner of the town I was calling my home. The little piece of heaven hidden in sewers of the town. I slowly built this place up in secret, trying to avoid the destruction that would inevitably happen to it if it was found out by any of the groups in the town. The guilds would raze this place due to rule forbidding entry to sewers. Adventurers and other rogues would ransack my place trying to find any valuables. And the street rats would destroy it just to make fun of the weird kid that likes to be alone. It wouldn't be the first time it would happen. I had other homes before. I finally arrive to my place. the walkways going through the sewer tunnels on both sides of the dirty waterflow connects here in half cycle. The sewage flow starts here by arriving through the hole in the roof. People throw out a lot of stuff. Sometimes other street rats, manage to pick some of them, but more often than not, things get splashed down to the sewers in rain. It was this simple reality that allowed my place to sprang up and become my own little goldmine. It's funny that noone ever realized the number of things you can make from trash I laugh to myself as I work on starting up a fire from pieces of old chair I fished up week ago. I pick up a broken dagger and remove the hilt to get a bigger piece of iron from the under the wood. I take the scrap iron and put half of it in the fire. Above the hilt I put an old beaten pot filled with water While waiting for the iron to heat up I prepare small mittens I made from few pieces of scrap leather I got while dismantling torn armours that got stuck in the small net I set up next to my home. I also picked up few rags that I disinfected by boiling and started to dress up some of my smaller wounds. When I finished, the iron was nicely heated up and the pot I put down after it went to boil was cooled. I was dreading the next step, but I knew it was necessary. I picked the iron up with my mittens and started cauterizing the wounds that were still bleeding. The pain was horrible, but I was already used to it. After cleaning my wounds I could barely stay conscious, but I somehow managed to clean the wounds up afterwards with the boiled water and clean rags. Completely tired, I somehow managed to get into my bedroll, and there I fell into deep sleep.
If you don't like what you write. Why do you even write that? What exactly do you not like? The story or the way you write? If it's the story... Think about it before writing. If it the style - try copying someone you like to read. P.s. Some sentences are overly long. Like this one: "While waiting for the iron to heat up I prepare small mittens I made from few pieces of scrap leather I got while dismantling torn armours that got stuck in the small net I set up next to my home."
Ye stuff like that, I have problems expressing things i want in a way that wouldn't feel too artifficial, stuffed or hard to read. They feel hard to read in my head, so i wanted to see what would others think about them.
Talking about the story, he wakes up, does something and goes to sleep... I might have been more surprised if he woke up, killed something and went to sleep
Let's add a plot twist. He wakes up, goes somewhere. Sees scary bloody man. Kills him. Turns around covered in blood. Gets killed by his doppelganger from another dimension.
Ofcourse I would continue, It's only 550 words, but I have tendency to always get stuck in the first things i write and can't continue without nitpicking and editing my beginning to infinity, therefore never continuing
I do similar worse stuff. I always let them sleep to make it end ... I rarely am satisfied because it's so bad that I suckkkk
I already started to write something about 4 times, never got past a page This time i atleast decided to share it before i give up.
Hmm, my background is more on scientific writing, but I think the main thing to pay attention to would be the flow and the themes of the paragraphs. Flow is, in my opinion, a way of phrasing things in a way that doesn't have unnatural breaks (commas and periods are basically pauses in the text). Also, sometimes it's better to split sentences into several smaller ones (connected f.ex. via commas) instead of cramming it all in a single large one. I think you'd find better reference on this by googling about "writing flow and cohesion". The theme of paragraphs is to select one thing you want the reader to understand and be clear about in that paragraph... and focus on that one. Then, when you connect the themes of paragraphs in a flowing stream of text, it becomes easier for the reader to get the main gist of it. Again, probably something you can find out more about by googling. Lastly, I'll just mention that maybe you could benefit from first minimizing the core of each of the paragraphs to as small and succinct form as possible, and then add adjectives. That would make it clearer to you what you're actually saying, and you could make adjustments where necessary. Personally, I find reading my own text aloud and evaluating it for myself whether it feels natural or not... that's also something to try. But now it's time for me to go to sleep... good luck.
Anyway, here's an excerpt from something I wrote one evening when I got some inspiration, but basically abandoned it afterwards. Feel free to use it as something to get ideas from, though first I'll say that it's probably not a perfect model. It was supposed to be the start of a story about a OP psychic pink bovine who has problems finding a mate. Wind rustled the leaves fallen on the small path. It was already the third day since mother and father had decided to take me along for a trip with their guild mates. Although our party, as my travelling companions call us, has also other members with children, like aunt Marcela and uncle Dexter, it seems I'm the only child here. I think that old man Graham said it was because I'm the only one with my whole family attending... Come to think of it, I've never met my grandparents or other relatives... "Father, why don't I have any grandparents or cousins?" "Hmm? Oh, I guess I haven't really told you. Adie, it's not that you don't have any. It's just that they're far, far away, so we can't visit them." I wonder why father looks a bit troubled while saying that... mother also seems to have a bit dark expression. Oh well, maybe it's just been so long that they miss them. I guess I would too, if mother and father had to go for a long trip and I'd have to wait for them. I don't really have any feelings about the lack of grandparents or cousins, though... I guess because I've never even met them. Maybe I'm a bad girl for not feeling sad about it... Ah, I hear some shouting ahead. "Yo! I think I found the cave! Gather up quickly!" It seems Shander has found the cave where father and mother wanted to go. "Hmh?" I think I saw something pink flash by in the thickets... "Mother, I think I saw something pink in the thickets. Do you think it's a rabbit?" "Silly girl, there's no pink rabbits." Mother smiled. "It was probably just the wind; after all, we have amulets of warding, so no creature can approach us. Also, our prey this time would've felled at least a few trees if it had appeared." "I see." I suppose that's true, we've travelled for a long time in this nameless wilderness and we haven't seen anything... maybe I just saw wrong. I would've liked to have a pet, though. It's sometimes lonely to wait alone at the inn when mother and father go for business. Anyway, let's hurry to the cave; maybe there's some pretty cave flowers like that one time in that spooky hallway near the golden plains. Even the old shopkeeper lady said that the flower looked pretty on my hair. "Hehe..." "Wait up!" father yelled and tugged my sleeve. "What, father? I want to go pick cave flowers..." "Adie, this time isn't like the Golden Plains Labyrinth. Your mother and father can't guarantee your safety, so please be good and follow behind us, ok?" "Ok... but let's go picking some cave flowers on the way back, then. Promise?" I'm a big girl, I can be lenient enough this time. But skies help me, if I can't get any flowers from the caves! After all, mother is a big girl and she always gets what she wants too. 'It's a woman's birthright!', like she always says. "Of course, Adie dear! It's a woman's birthright to be pampered by men, after all!" Mother gives a beaming smile while father seems to have a bit difficult expression. Well, tough luck, father, it's your fault for having been born a man! We advance carefully into the cave with our steps echoing from the walls. Oh, there's a pretty shining cave flower with sparkling red leaves and sharp, dark green leaves! Maybe I'll pick that one on our way back... Anyway, although the adults seem to be moving slowly, it's relatively easy to walk in the dim light of the light green cave moss and red cave flowers. Hmh? There seems to be some sort of low regularly ascending and descending low sound... is it a snore? "Father, is someone snoring?" "Shhh, Adie. Please keep quiet for a bit." Father gestured me to move slower and keep quiet. Oh? Maybe they're 'bushing' something again... let's move like usual, then. Let's calm down and silence my breath... still the heartbeat... stop thinking, just observe... move slowly without making any ripples on the puddles. The cave seems to open up into a larger cavern and the lights have a glint of gold too. It's completely silent, expect that low snoring and almost inaudible clanks from the armor of some of the adults. Hm? Do I hear some steps behind me? No good, my heart is starting to beat faster again... still... quiet... still... quiet. Good, I don't hear anything behind me either... maybe it was just my imagination. There seems to be a big lizard in the middle of the room... it's at least 30 fathers long and 4 mothers high with granite gray scales. That must be the adults' prey... I think I'll wait near the entrance here, so I don't get in their way. It has terribly long teeth, a slithering tongue and one Adie long needle-like talons. Yup, better stay right here. The adults are slowly circling around the lizard. *snap!* Hey! What is that uncle doing! Did he just trip? Mother and father seem angry and rightly so! Dexter is really like some clumsy and clueless reptile! Wait, the lizard! ... oh, it seems to be still asleep though the tone of its snoring seems to have changed very slightly. The adults seem to have calmed down too and continue circling around it. Father and mother lift their large axes near the neck of the lizard and wait for the others. Aunt Marcela seems to be preparing to read something from one of her scrolls... ... and that's where I left it. Hope it helps. Edit: Oh yeah, what I did when I wrote that one, is that I imagined myself as the little girl and tried to think about how she would perceive things from a child's perspective. Hence, I chose words and measurement units that a child who has had no math before might use. Also, the flow I built by using the perception of the child. Think about what you'd see yourself and what you'd yourself pay attention to, and then write about those. The more you pay attention to something, the more you write about it. And vice versa. In other words, imagine and live the scenario.