Remember that Memnarch was made from the Mirari, which was a part of Karn. My belief was always that Memnarch had access to all of Karn's knowledge, including information about Urza's experiments in artifice. Memnarch, not being a planeswalker - or a magician, really - thus turned to artifice for his answers.
The soul traps were simply artifacts that Memnarch created or altered from Karn's probes. They were designed for planar travel and retrieval. Just as Weatherlight could travel the planes without a planeswalker aboard, so could the soul traps.
Once there, they lured beings indiscriminately from the area into the trap, which then transported them back to Mirrodin. Recall one of Glissa's early flares, where she sees herself (but not really herself) as a regular elf (no metal) being pulled toward a distant light. That was a racial memory of the soul trap taking her people.
So, artifice. That was my rationale, at least. I cannot say if that is official canon, because it was left pretty vague within the actual books.
I think this may also be a result of the poor quality of most of the MTG books. Ravnica has been nice, Kamigawa was awesome, and I've heard good things about Invasion block. But the Odyssey, Onslaught, and Mirridion cycle books don't seem to be too well regarded from what I've see (and I read most of the Odyssey book without liking it much). And the pre-Invasion stuff (other than maybe Nemesis) doesn't seem too well regarded either for the most part.
Well, you're certainly entitled to your opinion. Although I think it would carry more weight if you had actually read all the books you claim to be of poor quality.
However, I think the real reason lies elsewhere. For one thing, the main set books (which were the ones you mentioned in your post) actually sell quite well. Marketing from the sets plus the availability of fat packs insures excellent sales for these books.
It was the off-set books that failed to garner a large enough readership. And by and large, these books were quite popular with the avid fans of Magic novels. The Ice Age trilogy and McGough's Legends trilogy are thought by many fans on these boards to be among the best Magic books out there.
My belief is that it is simply the nature of the game that ended up hurting the Magic line. D&D is all about creating a world in your head and playing in that world. This draws a certain type of people who are not only avid gamers, but avid readers as well. Magic, even though it started out that way, turned into a different kind of game with a different kind of player. Magic is about the rules on the cards and making combos. A lot of players don't really care about the flavor of the game. The Pro Tour, especially, brought many players into the game who fall into this category.
So, the main set novels sell well because they are linked directly to the cards that are being marketed, but the idea -- the concept -- of reading more about these worlds that we are playing in, just doesn't translate to the majority of Magic players like it did with D&D books.
This is just my opinion, and obviously, everyone on this board and thread are avid readers of books and Magic books, as well as the game. It's just unfortunate that there aren't more of us out there.
There was a time when there were 6 books published a year.
Does that mean that there were more Magic readers then, or it was precisely planned to print so many books in one year without looking on selling stats?
I can't speak with any certainty as I was not a part of the decision-making process, but my guess is that the line was expanded to six books in the hopes that the audience from the main set books would translate to the non main-set books. When that didn't happen, the non main-set books were cancelled.
It takes time to evaluate whether or not a book line is successful. You can't just go by immediate sales. For one thing, a new book line needs time to develop an audience. I would assume that the secondary Magic line was given a few years to develop to a certain level of readership. When that didn't happen, they were pulled.
If you loved a certain plane (Ravnica, lets say) and you wished to write a book about it without a commission, just getting income from the sales of the book, would Wizards let you, or do they keep a fairly tight leash on when they want to expand the canon, and who does it?
Since all the novels that WotC publishes for Magic are related to the sets, we pretty much write in the setting they tell us to. Back when they were doing some non-set-related novels, I suppose it could have been possible to submit a proposal for a story set in one of the older settings, but with only three books per year tied to the releases, that's just not going to happen.
I think it was always the hope (of both WotC and the authors) that the Magic book line would take off like some of the D&D lines. That players would be hungry for more and more stories set in their favorite Magic planes. That just never happened. The readers of the Magic storyline are avid, but unfortunately too small a population to warrant more books per year.
Because Will visited us again (:cool2: ) I'll try to ask again.
Maybe you Will know who created Ur-Golems...
(open link for more details of question and my poit of view)
Thanks in advance.
Sorry. I don't know the answer. The Ur-Golems didn't figure into the storyline, so had no occassion to discuss them with the Continuity folk. My guess would be that Karn created them. I believe I remember something about Bosh having been created by Karn and then re-programmed by Memnarch. But I don't recall where that memory comes from.
If you don't want to answer the pay wage question, I understand, but would you say it is a reasonable means to support yourself and a family? My cousin is an excellent fantasy writer/artist and I constantly recommend him to apply to the Magic Creative team.
Let me answer this question for Cory with a common joke told on the SF convention circuit. (I think I may have told this earlier in the thread)
Question: What the difference between an SF (or fantasy) writer and a pepperoni pizza?
Answer: The pepperoni pizza can feed a family of four.
It't not just Magic authors who can't support themselves and their families on their writing income. It's the majority of SF authors in the field. Probably only 5 percent of all professionally published authors, in fact, can actually make a living at writing fiction.
Hey, I know this doesn't really have anything to do with the MtG storyline, but I will be in Baltimore twice next month for conventions.
The first trip is to the Games Workshop annual Gamesday on May 13, where I will be the Star Author. My new Kal Jerico novel will be in sale and I will be signing, reading, and answering questions. Check out:
My second trip is for Balticon, a large, annual SF convention, featuring Neil Gaiman as Guest of Honor this year. It is held over Memorial Day Weekend, and I will be hosting a book launch for my Kal Jerico novel, Cardinal Crimson, during the convention. You can get more info at:
Enemy Within asked where he should try to publish his contest story, and It thought I would create a new thread to discuss this topic so everyone will get a chance to see it.
The first thing you need to do after finishing a story is take a break from that story for at least a week, two or three if you can. Then, read through it again and edit, re-write, re-do those parts that don't work. If you have someone you trust (who knows something about good writing) who can read it for you, that can help. but remember, one person's opinion (even a professional) isn't the entire readership. only change those things you really think need to be changed. If, however, you get several people who all say the same thing (This part doesn't work. I was confused here. Etc.) then you seriously need to look at those parts and consider revising.
Now, the reason I said put the story away for a week is because you know the story better than anyone and you will tend to read right over misspelled or missing words because you know what's supposed to be there. Also, a little distance helps break the bond you have with the story. Helps you get away from the "It's my baby and I'll never change a word" mentality. Sometimes, parts of your story have to get cut out to make the rest of the story better. You're more likely to see these and be willing to cut them after you have taken some time away.
Okay, next. Sending it out. Before you send it to anyone, you have some homework to do. It's obvious that Realms of Fantasy won't take a Science Fiction story, but I'm sure a lot of writers send their SF stories there. Read a copy of the magazine you want to send to. Get a copy of their writer's guidelines and read those, too. You need to send your story to the market that is most likely to publish it. If you have a vampire story, send it to the vampire markets. If you have a hard SF story, send it to Analog or Asimovs. If you're not sure what they publish, read a few copies. Editors will tend to pick the same type of stories every month. I will probably never send a story to F&SF magazine because they seem to prefer very literary fiction right now, and I like to write adventure stories.
So, reasearch. Where you ask? The internet is a great place to start. A couple of my favorite sites for finding markets are:
There are others. You can also go to the library and take a look at the Writer's Market book. Find the most recent copy you can. They come out every year. Inside you will find listings of book and magazine publishers in various genres. The listings have contact names and addresses, pay rates, submission guidelines, etc.
The first sale is the hardest. I would recommend sending the top of the line markets first and then working your way down. A few publishing credits in small press anthlogies or even PAYING online markets will go a long way to help you get those better markets later, but why not try there first and see if you can make it. Once you have an editor who likes your stuff, it's much easier to get those next stories published. But that first one may take a long time. It will take a few months for them to get back to you.
But, before you send it out, make sure it is as perfect as you possibly can. In this day of spellcheckers, a misspelled word in a manuscript is a dreadful sin (especially when you're looking for your first sale). But don't rely on the spellchecker completely. It can't tell you if you used the right "to" or "there." So read it carefully and make sure you don't have any typos.
Editors get a lot of submissions and they aren't looking for reasons to keep them and publish them. They are looking for reasons to move on to the next story in the pile. don't give them that reason.
One last thing - simultaneous submissions. This is where you learn about the waiting game. You should only send your story to one publisher at a time. Unless the Writer's Market or their own submission guidelines state that they acceept simultaneous submissions, you should never send your story to more than one publisher. Even then, let them know in the cover letter that you are sending it to other people.
When you get it back with a rejection letter, send the story out right away to the next publisher on your researched list. Don't let it sit on your desk and don't revise it and send it back. They rejected it. they don't want to see that story again. Send them another one instead and send that one on to somebody else. Like I said, editors pick those stories that interest them. A lot of the time, it's just a matter of finding the right editor who likes your style.
That's all for now. If I remember any other tips, I will post them. Feel free to ask me questions in this thread about the business side of writing. I will try to answer them as promptly as I can.
you've got a pretty good story here. I was worried about halfway through that it was going to be a cliched, play-poker-for-your-soul story. You took it in a different direction though, which I was glad to see. Still, this is a story about selling your soul to the devil and other than seeking a way into heaven, the main character wasn't really searching for anything, so you lost some points on creativity there. It was a little too much Oh God, You Devil for me (a fine movie, but it's been done).
I liked the flow of the story, and the ambiguity of the gatekeepers to heaven and hell at the beginning and end of the story really worked for me. Having the devil keep interrupting him in his dream sequences was a nice touch and good way to move the story along. It kep the scenes from running too long and worked perfectly with your theme of punishing the main character for all eternity.
The biggest problems I had with the story were that we don't learn why "Billy" deserved his punishment (other than that he was a lawyer and used his faith as a badge instead of truly believing). I'd like to find him more despicable and worthy of the fate he has in store for him. He did seem to live a decent life and took care of his wife and kids. So why does he deserve such a punishment for all eternity?
Secondly, the ending gets way too preachy for my taste. Like the Death's Embrace story, I think you missed the appropriate ending to your story by about two paragraphs. I think shuffle up and deal is a much stronger ending point. You've already made the point that you then belabor in the last paragraph. By being more explicit and pounding the point home, it actually loses its power (and turns off anyone who might actually need the lesson).
Actually, I don't mind the going one more line and having the "So, tell me your story." as the ending. This would make the reader assume that we all must face the devil's test in order to get into heaven, which would be a fun and creative take on the old story.
This is just my opinion, but remember that the two most important parts of any story are the beginning and end. The beginning draws the reader into the story and a bad beginning will turn off readers before they even get a chance to find out if the story is any good. The ending is the part the reader will remember the most after finishing the story. A lot of how much a reader likes the story is tied up into the ending. A powerful ending will make even a mediocre story memorable. A bad ending will surely kill a even a great story.
I loved this story. It's fun and literate at the same time. The names of your characters and the places are wonderfully chosen. I dinged the flow/structure because the basic storyline was just that - basic. It was all pretty cliched moving the character from place to place just to find the next clue. It read a little too much like a fairy tale. I would have liked to see the story be a little more creative in this respect.
I also would have liked to see you do more with the twin relationship between Queen Prose and Lady Death. This would give the ending more power and make it more than a simple "punch-line" ending.
Your style is nearly flawless. As I mentioned, I liked the names and the whimsical feel. But also, your words were used to their best effect throughout most of the story. I didn't notice any spots that needed a lot of tightening.
I don't know that this story is publishable as is, though. Whimsical stories like this are hard to place. I could not, off the top of my head, give you any idea where to send this story. But, it does show that you know how to write. I think if you put your mind to creating a more serious story (or another whimsical story with just a little more substance than a simple "quest through three trials" you will create something publishable in no time.
for the most part, I enjoyed this story, even though I'm a little too old to really get into the whole teen angst thing anymore. I think the structure of the story (showing us what Taylor saw in his dream state first and then showing us what Shae saw in the real world later) made for a much more interesting read than just a simple "Oh my god, she doesn't love me so I'm going to kill myself story." Without that interesting structure, I would not have liked this story nearly as much.
From a mechanics standpoint, you're basically sound, but my main concern is your use of cliches. June sky morning, glowing like a beacon, I knew with all my heart, etc. You can do better. Make your own metaphors. Create your own turns of phrase. That's where cliches come from. And sure, they work because they were creative once. But you don't need to take the easy route, and your writing will be better for it.
Lastly, on style. I might have given you a higher score, but I really hated the ending. It was too cliche again. I would have liked to see Shae grow and learn from the experience instead of taking the easy way out and committing suicide. Perhaps the teen angst at this point in the story just got too much for me. And no, I don't think every story needs a happy ending, but Shae didn't seem the type to commit suicide and to have her do it over Taylor's death seemed wrong.
I think the ending of Taylor's story, when he says nothing can stop us now, is much more powerful and poignant. He sees it as a victory and yet we all know that he died a pointless death, killing himself over a teenage crush. That says something. That's irony for the sake of thematic power. Killing Shae in a pointless suicide afterward actually detracts from the power of that earlier, much better ending.
This is a good story. I was worried that it was going to be another classic grim reaper story, which would have earned you a lower score in creativity as this was a pretty obvious way to have an interesting dead character, but you took it in a different direction and used the archetypipcal Death story and use it to tell a wonderful story about an interesting character.
It is a tad overwritten in spots, and the melodrama gets pretty thick. Watch the use of overly flowery sentences full of adjectives. You should never need more than one or two adjectives in any sentence and no more than three or four per paragraph. Any more than that and the powerful words (verbs and nouns) start to get lost in the clutter.
You also over-explained things at times. you need to know when to leave a scene. once the point has been made, move on. If you belabor the point, your reader will lose interest (and start to feel like they're be talked down to). In particular, after we've already seen Gargoyle's past through his visions, you have the Manager (need a better name for him) re-tell the entire story, only adding a few items here and there. This slows the whole story down and detracts from the power of Gargoyle's revelations about himself. I would suggest re-writing this scene and cuting a lot of the re-told story. We already know what happened. Let the Manager give his thoughts and spin without telling the whole story again.
With a little work, I think this story could be submitted to a paying market. Good luck with it.
Will
The only structure problem I really had was Gargoyle says at one point that he'd never reazlized he could send himself through the portal, but you had him earlier wanting to do just that. A minor quibble, but it shouted at me that hey, maybe he should have figured it out earlier.
This is a pretty good story and overall, it's well written. I would say you rely on sentences begun with dependent clauses a little too much (see your opening sentence for an example), but other than that the story is well written. If you don't understand why this is a problem, simply take a look at how much stronger that opening sentence becmes if you just switch the two clauses. That way we start with the character instead of what's affecting him. There were also a few misspelled words and a little too much passive tense. Other than that the mechanics and flow were fine.
The biggest problem I had with this story was in Creativity. There's simply nothing new here. She's dead and searching for vengeance instead of moving on. He's the stereotypical death, helping her get through her tough time. And the story itself comes straight from the headlines of the paper. If you had given us some sort of twist in her story or developed the character of death a little more or simply told us a story that we hadn't heard on the 24-hours news stations to death last year, this would be a first-rate story nearly ready for publication.
So, keep writing, and just try to delve a little deeper into your subjects in the future.
You have the basis of a good story here. You just need to work on a few things. First, I got lost in your story more than once. In particular, there seems to be a chunk missing between the first post and the second post. It is a dramatic shift in time with no transition whatsoever.
Second, I had a hard time "seeing" the action or the characters. Spend a little time setting the scene and show us what's going on around the characters. Part of the problem with the characters is that there are too many for a short story. It's tough to use that many characters in a short piece and give each one a personality and background and make the readers care about them. What happens is that none of the characters really pop and we the readers end up not knowing which one is which most of the time.
And your characters seems to change personality from moment to moment. Tristan seems like a good person at first and even jokes with his team, but then we find out that they all hate him. The female seems to play along with his flirtation, but then we find out she doesn't enjoy it all. These personality changes make it even harder to get to know the entire cast of the story.
On mechanics, your grammar is essentially sound, but stories need to be active (especially adventure stories), so go through your story and find all the times you use any form of the verb "to be" (was, were, is, isn't, had been, etc). These should almost always be replaced with more active, stronger verbs. Secondly, as with most amateur writing I see, your sentences need tightening (I found this in just about all of the entries). They get away from you sometimes.
One trick is to read your story out loud. If you find yourself out of breath in the middle of a sentence, you probably need to shorten it, add a comma, or break it up. the other problem, though is sentences that just try to do too much. "He opened the door, moved into the room, pulled out a chair, sat down, ordered breakfast, and looked around for his friend." these are separate actions that take some time to happen. So let them take time in your story to happen and don't try to push them all together into one sentence.
As far as Creativity, I thought they way you handled the dead character was interesting, but I think you could have done a little more with it. It was tough to see what really happened to Tristan in the beginning. Why he had to take on all of the enemies by himself (weren't there easier ways for him to die?). Some of this comes back to character development, but the the descriptions also need work because I just didn't see what was going on most of the time.
Also, you spend a fair amount of time with tristan alive before killing him, and the rules did state that the character should be dead at the beginning of the story. Beyond the rules, I do think the story is better if you start with Tristan's death and the transferrance than the rather meaningless build up to his death. It's much mroe dramatic and almost immediately makes the reader feel for the character.
And the story itself was pretty straight-forward sword and sorcery fair. It almost felt like a D&D session written up as a story. There wasn't much beyond the artifice that was terribly original.
I do think you have some talent here. You just need to work on showing instead of telling and tightening your prose. both of those will come with time and practice.
This is what I like to call a "punch-line" story. The entire story is written to deliver the ending line, which is either ironic or prophetic, or just plain funny. As this type of story, Worst Day Ever works pretty well. I like the build up to the final death scene and the story flows pretty well from beginning to end.
The mechanics are decent. There are a few misspelled words and some sentences that don't flow as well as they could. But overall it is well written.
As for Creativity and Style, I think you could have done more with both the concept and the execution. A "this is how I died" story told from a ghost didn't really expand the concept of a story told from the perspective of someone who's dead at the beginning. Plus, the character isn't truly looking for anything (besides the bar of soap at the end).
And, I never truly cared about the character. The story is just him telling us what happened and how bad his day was. And believe me, readers hate whiny characters (Gerrard anyone?). So, as far as style, I would have liked more character deveolopment, so we truly cared when he finally died.
Sure, this is a short short (or flash fiction), but the rules still apply. Make us care for the character's situation or all you have is the joke at the end.
The soul traps were simply artifacts that Memnarch created or altered from Karn's probes. They were designed for planar travel and retrieval. Just as Weatherlight could travel the planes without a planeswalker aboard, so could the soul traps.
Once there, they lured beings indiscriminately from the area into the trap, which then transported them back to Mirrodin. Recall one of Glissa's early flares, where she sees herself (but not really herself) as a regular elf (no metal) being pulled toward a distant light. That was a racial memory of the soul trap taking her people.
So, artifice. That was my rationale, at least. I cannot say if that is official canon, because it was left pretty vague within the actual books.
Will
Well, you're certainly entitled to your opinion. Although I think it would carry more weight if you had actually read all the books you claim to be of poor quality.
However, I think the real reason lies elsewhere. For one thing, the main set books (which were the ones you mentioned in your post) actually sell quite well. Marketing from the sets plus the availability of fat packs insures excellent sales for these books.
It was the off-set books that failed to garner a large enough readership. And by and large, these books were quite popular with the avid fans of Magic novels. The Ice Age trilogy and McGough's Legends trilogy are thought by many fans on these boards to be among the best Magic books out there.
My belief is that it is simply the nature of the game that ended up hurting the Magic line. D&D is all about creating a world in your head and playing in that world. This draws a certain type of people who are not only avid gamers, but avid readers as well. Magic, even though it started out that way, turned into a different kind of game with a different kind of player. Magic is about the rules on the cards and making combos. A lot of players don't really care about the flavor of the game. The Pro Tour, especially, brought many players into the game who fall into this category.
So, the main set novels sell well because they are linked directly to the cards that are being marketed, but the idea -- the concept -- of reading more about these worlds that we are playing in, just doesn't translate to the majority of Magic players like it did with D&D books.
This is just my opinion, and obviously, everyone on this board and thread are avid readers of books and Magic books, as well as the game. It's just unfortunate that there aren't more of us out there.
Will
I can't speak with any certainty as I was not a part of the decision-making process, but my guess is that the line was expanded to six books in the hopes that the audience from the main set books would translate to the non main-set books. When that didn't happen, the non main-set books were cancelled.
It takes time to evaluate whether or not a book line is successful. You can't just go by immediate sales. For one thing, a new book line needs time to develop an audience. I would assume that the secondary Magic line was given a few years to develop to a certain level of readership. When that didn't happen, they were pulled.
Will
Since all the novels that WotC publishes for Magic are related to the sets, we pretty much write in the setting they tell us to. Back when they were doing some non-set-related novels, I suppose it could have been possible to submit a proposal for a story set in one of the older settings, but with only three books per year tied to the releases, that's just not going to happen.
I think it was always the hope (of both WotC and the authors) that the Magic book line would take off like some of the D&D lines. That players would be hungry for more and more stories set in their favorite Magic planes. That just never happened. The readers of the Magic storyline are avid, but unfortunately too small a population to warrant more books per year.
Will
Sorry. I don't know the answer. The Ur-Golems didn't figure into the storyline, so had no occassion to discuss them with the Continuity folk. My guess would be that Karn created them. I believe I remember something about Bosh having been created by Karn and then re-programmed by Memnarch. But I don't recall where that memory comes from.
Sorry I can't be more help.
Will
Let me answer this question for Cory with a common joke told on the SF convention circuit. (I think I may have told this earlier in the thread)
Question: What the difference between an SF (or fantasy) writer and a pepperoni pizza?
Answer: The pepperoni pizza can feed a family of four.
It't not just Magic authors who can't support themselves and their families on their writing income. It's the majority of SF authors in the field. Probably only 5 percent of all professionally published authors, in fact, can actually make a living at writing fiction.
Will
The first trip is to the Games Workshop annual Gamesday on May 13, where I will be the Star Author. My new Kal Jerico novel will be in sale and I will be signing, reading, and answering questions. Check out:
http://gamesday.us.games-workshop.com/GamesDay2006/Baltimore_2006/Baltimore_2006_home.htm
For more info.
My second trip is for Balticon, a large, annual SF convention, featuring Neil Gaiman as Guest of Honor this year. It is held over Memorial Day Weekend, and I will be hosting a book launch for my Kal Jerico novel, Cardinal Crimson, during the convention. You can get more info at:
www.balticon.org
Hope to see some of you at one of these events.
Will
The first thing you need to do after finishing a story is take a break from that story for at least a week, two or three if you can. Then, read through it again and edit, re-write, re-do those parts that don't work. If you have someone you trust (who knows something about good writing) who can read it for you, that can help. but remember, one person's opinion (even a professional) isn't the entire readership. only change those things you really think need to be changed. If, however, you get several people who all say the same thing (This part doesn't work. I was confused here. Etc.) then you seriously need to look at those parts and consider revising.
Now, the reason I said put the story away for a week is because you know the story better than anyone and you will tend to read right over misspelled or missing words because you know what's supposed to be there. Also, a little distance helps break the bond you have with the story. Helps you get away from the "It's my baby and I'll never change a word" mentality. Sometimes, parts of your story have to get cut out to make the rest of the story better. You're more likely to see these and be willing to cut them after you have taken some time away.
Okay, next. Sending it out. Before you send it to anyone, you have some homework to do. It's obvious that Realms of Fantasy won't take a Science Fiction story, but I'm sure a lot of writers send their SF stories there. Read a copy of the magazine you want to send to. Get a copy of their writer's guidelines and read those, too. You need to send your story to the market that is most likely to publish it. If you have a vampire story, send it to the vampire markets. If you have a hard SF story, send it to Analog or Asimovs. If you're not sure what they publish, read a few copies. Editors will tend to pick the same type of stories every month. I will probably never send a story to F&SF magazine because they seem to prefer very literary fiction right now, and I like to write adventure stories.
So, reasearch. Where you ask? The internet is a great place to start. A couple of my favorite sites for finding markets are:
http://www.ralan.com/
and
http://gilaqueen.us/
There are others. You can also go to the library and take a look at the Writer's Market book. Find the most recent copy you can. They come out every year. Inside you will find listings of book and magazine publishers in various genres. The listings have contact names and addresses, pay rates, submission guidelines, etc.
The first sale is the hardest. I would recommend sending the top of the line markets first and then working your way down. A few publishing credits in small press anthlogies or even PAYING online markets will go a long way to help you get those better markets later, but why not try there first and see if you can make it. Once you have an editor who likes your stuff, it's much easier to get those next stories published. But that first one may take a long time. It will take a few months for them to get back to you.
But, before you send it out, make sure it is as perfect as you possibly can. In this day of spellcheckers, a misspelled word in a manuscript is a dreadful sin (especially when you're looking for your first sale). But don't rely on the spellchecker completely. It can't tell you if you used the right "to" or "there." So read it carefully and make sure you don't have any typos.
Editors get a lot of submissions and they aren't looking for reasons to keep them and publish them. They are looking for reasons to move on to the next story in the pile. don't give them that reason.
One last thing - simultaneous submissions. This is where you learn about the waiting game. You should only send your story to one publisher at a time. Unless the Writer's Market or their own submission guidelines state that they acceept simultaneous submissions, you should never send your story to more than one publisher. Even then, let them know in the cover letter that you are sending it to other people.
When you get it back with a rejection letter, send the story out right away to the next publisher on your researched list. Don't let it sit on your desk and don't revise it and send it back. They rejected it. they don't want to see that story again. Send them another one instead and send that one on to somebody else. Like I said, editors pick those stories that interest them. A lot of the time, it's just a matter of finding the right editor who likes your style.
That's all for now. If I remember any other tips, I will post them. Feel free to ask me questions in this thread about the business side of writing. I will try to answer them as promptly as I can.
Will
I liked the flow of the story, and the ambiguity of the gatekeepers to heaven and hell at the beginning and end of the story really worked for me. Having the devil keep interrupting him in his dream sequences was a nice touch and good way to move the story along. It kep the scenes from running too long and worked perfectly with your theme of punishing the main character for all eternity.
The biggest problems I had with the story were that we don't learn why "Billy" deserved his punishment (other than that he was a lawyer and used his faith as a badge instead of truly believing). I'd like to find him more despicable and worthy of the fate he has in store for him. He did seem to live a decent life and took care of his wife and kids. So why does he deserve such a punishment for all eternity?
Secondly, the ending gets way too preachy for my taste. Like the Death's Embrace story, I think you missed the appropriate ending to your story by about two paragraphs. I think shuffle up and deal is a much stronger ending point. You've already made the point that you then belabor in the last paragraph. By being more explicit and pounding the point home, it actually loses its power (and turns off anyone who might actually need the lesson).
Actually, I don't mind the going one more line and having the "So, tell me your story." as the ending. This would make the reader assume that we all must face the devil's test in order to get into heaven, which would be a fun and creative take on the old story.
This is just my opinion, but remember that the two most important parts of any story are the beginning and end. The beginning draws the reader into the story and a bad beginning will turn off readers before they even get a chance to find out if the story is any good. The ending is the part the reader will remember the most after finishing the story. A lot of how much a reader likes the story is tied up into the ending. A powerful ending will make even a mediocre story memorable. A bad ending will surely kill a even a great story.
Good luck with your writing.
Will
I also would have liked to see you do more with the twin relationship between Queen Prose and Lady Death. This would give the ending more power and make it more than a simple "punch-line" ending.
Your style is nearly flawless. As I mentioned, I liked the names and the whimsical feel. But also, your words were used to their best effect throughout most of the story. I didn't notice any spots that needed a lot of tightening.
I don't know that this story is publishable as is, though. Whimsical stories like this are hard to place. I could not, off the top of my head, give you any idea where to send this story. But, it does show that you know how to write. I think if you put your mind to creating a more serious story (or another whimsical story with just a little more substance than a simple "quest through three trials" you will create something publishable in no time.
Good luck with your writing.
Will
From a mechanics standpoint, you're basically sound, but my main concern is your use of cliches. June sky morning, glowing like a beacon, I knew with all my heart, etc. You can do better. Make your own metaphors. Create your own turns of phrase. That's where cliches come from. And sure, they work because they were creative once. But you don't need to take the easy route, and your writing will be better for it.
Lastly, on style. I might have given you a higher score, but I really hated the ending. It was too cliche again. I would have liked to see Shae grow and learn from the experience instead of taking the easy way out and committing suicide. Perhaps the teen angst at this point in the story just got too much for me. And no, I don't think every story needs a happy ending, but Shae didn't seem the type to commit suicide and to have her do it over Taylor's death seemed wrong.
I think the ending of Taylor's story, when he says nothing can stop us now, is much more powerful and poignant. He sees it as a victory and yet we all know that he died a pointless death, killing himself over a teenage crush. That says something. That's irony for the sake of thematic power. Killing Shae in a pointless suicide afterward actually detracts from the power of that earlier, much better ending.
I hope this helps in your future writing.
Will
It is a tad overwritten in spots, and the melodrama gets pretty thick. Watch the use of overly flowery sentences full of adjectives. You should never need more than one or two adjectives in any sentence and no more than three or four per paragraph. Any more than that and the powerful words (verbs and nouns) start to get lost in the clutter.
You also over-explained things at times. you need to know when to leave a scene. once the point has been made, move on. If you belabor the point, your reader will lose interest (and start to feel like they're be talked down to). In particular, after we've already seen Gargoyle's past through his visions, you have the Manager (need a better name for him) re-tell the entire story, only adding a few items here and there. This slows the whole story down and detracts from the power of Gargoyle's revelations about himself. I would suggest re-writing this scene and cuting a lot of the re-told story. We already know what happened. Let the Manager give his thoughts and spin without telling the whole story again.
With a little work, I think this story could be submitted to a paying market. Good luck with it.
Will
The only structure problem I really had was Gargoyle says at one point that he'd never reazlized he could send himself through the portal, but you had him earlier wanting to do just that. A minor quibble, but it shouted at me that hey, maybe he should have figured it out earlier.
The biggest problem I had with this story was in Creativity. There's simply nothing new here. She's dead and searching for vengeance instead of moving on. He's the stereotypical death, helping her get through her tough time. And the story itself comes straight from the headlines of the paper. If you had given us some sort of twist in her story or developed the character of death a little more or simply told us a story that we hadn't heard on the 24-hours news stations to death last year, this would be a first-rate story nearly ready for publication.
So, keep writing, and just try to delve a little deeper into your subjects in the future.
Will
Second, I had a hard time "seeing" the action or the characters. Spend a little time setting the scene and show us what's going on around the characters. Part of the problem with the characters is that there are too many for a short story. It's tough to use that many characters in a short piece and give each one a personality and background and make the readers care about them. What happens is that none of the characters really pop and we the readers end up not knowing which one is which most of the time.
And your characters seems to change personality from moment to moment. Tristan seems like a good person at first and even jokes with his team, but then we find out that they all hate him. The female seems to play along with his flirtation, but then we find out she doesn't enjoy it all. These personality changes make it even harder to get to know the entire cast of the story.
On mechanics, your grammar is essentially sound, but stories need to be active (especially adventure stories), so go through your story and find all the times you use any form of the verb "to be" (was, were, is, isn't, had been, etc). These should almost always be replaced with more active, stronger verbs. Secondly, as with most amateur writing I see, your sentences need tightening (I found this in just about all of the entries). They get away from you sometimes.
One trick is to read your story out loud. If you find yourself out of breath in the middle of a sentence, you probably need to shorten it, add a comma, or break it up. the other problem, though is sentences that just try to do too much. "He opened the door, moved into the room, pulled out a chair, sat down, ordered breakfast, and looked around for his friend." these are separate actions that take some time to happen. So let them take time in your story to happen and don't try to push them all together into one sentence.
As far as Creativity, I thought they way you handled the dead character was interesting, but I think you could have done a little more with it. It was tough to see what really happened to Tristan in the beginning. Why he had to take on all of the enemies by himself (weren't there easier ways for him to die?). Some of this comes back to character development, but the the descriptions also need work because I just didn't see what was going on most of the time.
Also, you spend a fair amount of time with tristan alive before killing him, and the rules did state that the character should be dead at the beginning of the story. Beyond the rules, I do think the story is better if you start with Tristan's death and the transferrance than the rather meaningless build up to his death. It's much mroe dramatic and almost immediately makes the reader feel for the character.
And the story itself was pretty straight-forward sword and sorcery fair. It almost felt like a D&D session written up as a story. There wasn't much beyond the artifice that was terribly original.
I do think you have some talent here. You just need to work on showing instead of telling and tightening your prose. both of those will come with time and practice.
Hope some of this helps.
Will
The mechanics are decent. There are a few misspelled words and some sentences that don't flow as well as they could. But overall it is well written.
As for Creativity and Style, I think you could have done more with both the concept and the execution. A "this is how I died" story told from a ghost didn't really expand the concept of a story told from the perspective of someone who's dead at the beginning. Plus, the character isn't truly looking for anything (besides the bar of soap at the end).
And, I never truly cared about the character. The story is just him telling us what happened and how bad his day was. And believe me, readers hate whiny characters (Gerrard anyone?). So, as far as style, I would have liked more character deveolopment, so we truly cared when he finally died.
Sure, this is a short short (or flash fiction), but the rules still apply. Make us care for the character's situation or all you have is the joke at the end.
Will