User talk:WolfyDrake95/Finding Himself

I'm not sure how to say this, but I think I need to say something.

Now, I'm not sure of you're own age; but as an underage writer, this is extremely well written. I'm also under 21, and this story resonates with a part of my life. Specifically the six years I spent in California. I was out of phase with the rest of the world up there, and my few friends didn't stick around. So for me, the emotional content was presented very well.

A bit too well, perhaps, which leads me to believe that you are still experiencing some of what is presented here. I wish I could say that my writings aren't as based on my life as they are, but that would be a lie. A facade. I too am very good at facades. Put on the face of the day, show what people want to see, not what you feel; but that's a great way of building up emotions. And when you can no longer hold them back, they overflow. Hopefully when it happens you're alone, otherwise all they see is weakness. I showed a lot of weakness in California, and it caused me a lot of grief.

Now, I never really thought about suicide, it just seemed detrimental to the advancement of my life, but I have written about it. Specifically a short film script called Internal Conflict. That one wierded out my parents. They almost sent me to a psychologist for it. My writings can be pretty dark, and they are usually driven by dark experiences in my life. The only thing that got me through California was one good friend, and a firm belief that God had something better for me down the road.

Even now I'm somewhat of an escapist. I'll read about others problems, instead of fixing my own. Books, Video games, movies, and even music are all a way out of the real world. Even my writings are an escape from the desert of the real. For a few hours a night, I can do terrible things to someone else, but have it turn out alright.

If you're ever pissed about life in high school, just watch "Little Miss Sunshine," That always cheers me up.

Back to your story, I really do like it. I enjoy man vs self conflicts, so you might even think of making it into a short story, or small series. A continuation would not be unwelcome. You might even mod it to fit into a story universe. Pig and Whistle is needing some starting authors and characters.

--Concerned Reader 18:18, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm glad you enjoyed the story. I'm fourteen, so it was based on my own life, quite directly, though I don't think I'll ever run into such a person ever, and I've never bought an online spell kit. Life has convinced me that it's a cruel world out there. Yes, a facade of smiles, running away from life in the solace of a good game of Halo, yeah, that's my life. Too much work, too many projects...it feels like the world's out to get me. It's just too risky letting anyone, even my parents, know all my little depressions...so I have to get them out by the means of a story.

I'm happy to learn that it "resonates" with you. Though the story didn't come out quite right, it's great to learn that someone's been through this kind of situation as well. Thanks! And as for a sequel...well, I was considering one too. :) --Drake 11:14, 22 June 2009

I'm 18 now, but in California I was more around your age. It seems we have a lot in common. Though your writing is much better than mine was back then. Think of your life now as character development. In any good story, the characters are developed through experiences into what they will become. Most people find that character development is boring to read/watch, but I seem to enjoy it. Without a properly developed character, the people fall flat on the page, staying two dimensional. So if you want to be a fully developed, three dimensional character later in life, you'll have to sit through all this development. At 14, you're a little too young to be worrying about what to do with your life. I'm still not sure what I'm going to do with mine. College is around the corner, and I'm going into Computer Science. That leaves me with many options later in life. Most of which are in a field I'll enjoy.

As it is now, Halo isn't my favorite game universe. For me, I enjoy the story aspect of games, and Halo's story has always seemed a little lacking. My current favorites are the Half-Life series, COD4, L4D, Fallout 3, Portal, and some old point and click adventure stuff. I'm a pc gamer, so that's where most of my games live. I do recommend picking up "The Orange Box." --Concerned Reader 04:26, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Really? Halo, lacking? I beg to differ. :) I appreciate the storyline aspect of the games, but I find that Halo has a rather compelling storyline. Perhaps I'm just too big a fan. And its gameplay is awesome: a larger variety of stuff as compared to most other games. I'm more of an Xbox gamer (Xbox tends to have a larger amount of good games). In fact, I'm actually busy with a TF story set in the Halo Universe.

As for character development, yeah, it does get a little boring for most people. But what is a story when every character is just the same? That wouldn't be a story, would it? Every character has fundamental differences in personality that sets them apart from each other. I agree, character developments rock.

I've actually got this plan for my life, reflected in the story, how I plan to grab a place in some college in the US (I live in Singapore), then do Computer Science and head over to Bungie to grab a job. But now that I know what it'll take, how much money, and luck, and time is involved, suddenly it all seems like a wild dream...--Drake 13:04, 22 June 2009

It just always felt too floaty for me. The rings were supposed to have earths gravity, and yet Master Chief seems to fall much slower than 9.81m/s^2. I never really played the multi, as I didn't have Live when it came out. I grew up on pc, and like having free online. Nowadays, games tend to come out on everything at once, so I don't really feel like I'm missing anything.

Glad we agree on character development. I'm not sure if you like Anime, but if you do, or don't know if you do, look up Eureka Seven. It has some of the most well done character development I've ever seen. And sky surfing giant robots, but the characters take precedents to the action.

I'm not sure how much it is to get to the US of A, but a computer science degree, or even an engineering degree isn't hard to come by if you have the right grades. Judging by your writing, you seem to be pretty smart. Almost any college will have a comp sci or engineering program. I'm in Austin about to start at Texas A&M, without a scholarship. I'll be working my way through college. The wildest dreams are the best ones to chase after. The chase is a wild ride, and if you catch them, your set for life, doing what you love. I'm hoping to get into embedded systems. Like car computers and mobile devices. I doubt that I'll be doing anything like that soon, but I'll aim for it anyways.

ps, tell Sim Wong Hoo that I enjoy Creative's products. I can't stand Apple.--Concerned Reader 05:58, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Maybe for Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2, but Halo 3 is a pretty great game. H3 online multiplayer is amazing. I pwn noobs on a daily basis...if I'm lucky. TEAMCOM is cool, but the LIVE charge is sucky...I'm not really into Anime, but I think I might check it out someday...As for my grades, only my English and Sciences are good. I always seem to forget my Math and my Chinese sucks like hell. And yes, if I manage to catch my dreams, I am set for life, doing what I love. What I'm worried about is what happens if I don't catch my dreams. Life sucks in that way. Oh, and I looked through the script "Internal Conflict". It's awesome! I less than three ( <3 ) it.

Oh, and by the way, I don't usually meet Sim Wong Hoo on the street on a daily basis. But if I do see him, I'll be sure to pass the message. ;) --Drake 16:21, 22 June 2009

I liked the story. Well written, utterly depressing. Just the way I like 'em. And am I the only one here who has never been depressed? I've always been happy with my life. Of course, my goals haven't exactly been lofty. I'm probably going to school to become a social studies teacher, not exactly a lofty goal. And good luck getting to America. --Guvnor Of Space 13:59, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm really happy that you enjoyed the story. I lapse into depression every couple of weeks, then I can't write anything or do work or stuff. When that happens, it feels like my dreams are shattered, my life's a joke, nobody understands, the world's out to get me, and I'm all alone in a dark place. So this time, I tried to use the depression to write a story. This story's more of an expression of my life: I'm glad it came out nicely.

If you've honestly, truly enjoyed your life completely without ever feeling hopeless a single time, then you are one hell of a lucky guy. Most people experience serious depression once or twice at the very least. Congratulations, then, on managing to live a happy life. It's a rare man who can say those words. It's cool that you're aiming to be a teacher. Returning to society, that's what it is. I was never much for teaching. I got into a lot of trouble with teachers in my younger days (not that I'm very old now). I hope that when you said "good luck" it meant "I hope you succeed" and not "good luck trying and failing horribly". If it were the latter...I'd be sad. :) --Drake 22:36, 22 June 2009

Nah, that was real good luck. And when I say "never been depressed" I mean never having that hopeless feeling for more then an hour. I just try to be happy. I used to want to be a famous author. That's not going to happen. I wanted to be an engineer. I found out I hate science, but have a passion for history. So there you go. Transformation fiction is an escape for me. I like it, just like I like Science Fiction, because it can be used to express deeper feelings and ideals, or it can simply be fantastic and excting.--Guvnor Of Space 15:11, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm a fan of SF and TF too. It's like a small paradise where I can hide from reality, even if it's only for a while. A place where I can actually be me, and not the person people want me to be. In the end, everyone runs from something. But I guess the "try to be happy" method is worth a shot. Maybe my dreams will change, and I won't want to be a game developer in Bungie when I'm old enough. After all, every teen or kid on Halo wants to join Bungie too, if not for their passion then for Flaming Helmet(highly coveted piece of in-game armor that everyone doesn't have). But I do hope that I'll make it to Bungie...It's great that you guys are here to cheer me up. Thanks, you two! You guys have renewed my faith in the world...at least for now. ;)

PS I like smileys.--Drake 23:26, 22 June 2009

WIP Tag

Just a heads up, your story is still flagged as a Work In Progress. --Lloyd

Yeah, I know. Still polishing it. But I took it off already. :) --Drake

Editorial Comments/Critique

First with the good news:

This is an excellent story with a lot of good ideas.

Now on to the critique:

Once more you've fallen for the "passive trap" - you are "telling" the story rather than carrying the reader through it by showing the action. I have been there myself - you have the idea and start writing it, but in forcing the words on to the page you wind up doing it as if you are talking to the reader. This can work, but only for short stretches. Doing it for most of a story (at the end you manage to partially get away from it) makes the story hard to read for most people.

Solution: Think about each scene and write it out as if you are illustrating it using words instead of pictures.

See Keeping the Editor Happy (part of the Writer's School). You have variation in length and content of your sentences, but not in structure. More than 80% of them are "subject->verb" constructions with no flavor.

Solution: Many possible solutions - some of the best are in the Writer's School essay Keeping the Editor Happy.

Grammatical errors abound. A lot of them appear to be a common form caused by writing slower than you are thinking. (ie: 'words are missing' type errors) The rest are all problems in the dialog - a new speaker gets a new paragraph (among other things) or are all "poor separation of idea" problems, where two different ideas/chunks of text are smashed into a single paragraph because of the "can't have a single line paragraph" thought that a lot of new authors seem to have.

Solution: Properly break up the dialog so that new paragraphs happen each time the speaker changes. For the rest a solid copy-editing pass and asking "does this make sense as a single paragraph" will help. However it is sometimes better to have a third party do that pass. (no - not me - I suck so much at copy-editing that I have someone else to do all of mine)

Repetition of characters names where a pronoun inference will work. You also had this problem in your first story - and is, IMNSHO, indicative of a new author who is unsure of his/her ability to keep it clear (to the reader) which character, item or place is being referenced by a pronoun.

Solution: Re-read each paragraph separately and in related pairs. If the subject of a sentence has not changed since the previous one, use a pronoun instead. To keep from having a "pronoun overload" you can restructure the sentences to carry the same information and not repeat the name of the item or use a pronoun. (this isn't hard, but can cause problems)

Spelling, spelling, spelling! There are a number of spelling errors (some common, some not) and at least one place where you mis-spelled "Dan" as "Dam".

Solution: Copy-editing. A trick is to re-read each sentence backwards.

Finally... Lose the damned "new text added starting here" marks :) Seriously - you seem to have tried to use them to show people where the newly added text starts - but never removed the old ones. A single occurrence at the start of a newly added block of text is fine - but numerous copies strewn through the text, marking large places in that sickly green is jarring.

Solution: s/{{add|(.*)}}/\1/p -- Okay, so that's a geek joke (and not a very good one - no "non-greedy" quantifier, etc...) but it is the only solution - go through and remove the {{add}} tags.

There would be more to this - even examples - but I am rather burned out after putting in nine hours of work yesterday to de-clutter, dust, vacuum, build shelves and re-arrange my room. Hopefully what is above is enough to help you out.

--ShadowWolf 17:45, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

It's more than enough! I never really noticed all that myself, even when I reread it. Kinda strange how I need somebody to point out mistakes before I can notice any. I'll work on it right now. In the meantime, any more crit. is still welcome. Thanks for the critique! --Drake, 14:05, 28 June 2009 (+0800 GMT)

Not a problem. It takes getting a very deep separation from a work to be able to see its flaws. I have managed it only with a couple of my stories, and only then by walking away from them for a decent period. And you exhibit a great quality in your work - you understand the characters and have a mastery of making them come alive. It is also very telling that you do not fall into the "trap" of considering your stories "masterpieces" that I went into detail about in From Thesis to Synthesis a while back. Keep up the good work and... if I didn't say it before, this one will be going into the "ranked" section of the Pack at three and a half stars (when you have had a chance to address some of the critique). -- ShadowWolf 13:19, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

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"Blazing overhead was the afternoon sun, but the trees lining the path provided shelter from the heat."

Please, no Yoda-speech - you have the initial clauses of the sentence mixed up. You could try…

"Overhead the afternoon sun was blazing" or even…

"The tree-lined path provided shelter from the wild heat of the blazing afternoon sun"

This ties into the whole "No flavor" bit - this sentence does have flavor, but in playing with the word order of the sentence you've managed to make the first clause sound like it is spoken by Yoda. I'd suggest the second variation—which changes it from a compound to simple sentence—because you follow it with a compound sentence using the same conjunction.

"Dan resented the life he led. Even with each passing day, nothing would change: just the same mindless banality that he and the rest of the world spent every waking moment living in. The route home represented, to him, the mind-blowing sameness in which he lived each day. The never-ending cycle of his meaningless life: a life so filled with the pressure and stress of having to excel that the fun had been drained away, the excitement ruthlessly brushed aside by the mundanity of each passing day."

This paragraph holds so much promise! But the passive-voice used hurts it. I'd rework it more as…

"He resented the life he led, the never-changing mindless banality of the world. That was what the route home represented—A mind-blowing sameness, the unalterable mundanity of a world that pressures people from their earliest memories to do more. Like the black and white version of Kansas from the start of "The Wizard of Oz" all fun had been stripped from the world, brushed away by the stress of having to excel."

It presents the same picture, but provides more flavor and gives more of that "angry" edge the character has to the reader instead of just drowning them in the characters utter depression.

"Outside, he heard a click of a lock, then the creak of a door opening."

Until right around that sentence there is no real need to ever repeat the characters name after you first give it to the reader. In fact… Well, it might be detrimental to do so. You are, after all, looking at one single character there and the character never changes. And he is depressed, bitter and feels trapped… Basically what I'm saying is that you can get that feeling across better with only the single reference to his name up at the start. Of course even that reference is un-necessary and you could wait until his mother first speaks in the next line—losing even the revelation of his full name when he first gets the package.

And again, in the whole of the next section, you can skip mentioning the characters name. By that point it is an unwritten implication that you are going to remain focused on him until and unless you introduce a new (male) character and have that character appear in the scene. And even then you don't really have to refer to "Dan" by name until you've switched focus, however temporarily, to said character.

"Sunlight was pouring into his room when Dan woke up. Sitting up in his bed, Dan spent a moment rubbing the sleep from his eyes."

Another example of a place where you get clunky and refer to the character by name a bit too much. Try something like:

"Sunlight was pouring into his room when he woke up. Rubbing the sleep from his eyes he sat up and yawned."

This eliminates the doubled use of the name and gives some flavor and variation to the sentence structure at the same time.

But over all you've made a good effort at addressing the problems. Time to go edit the Pack and give you the credit you deserve. --ShadowWolf 13:49, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Actually, I was considering avoiding the mention of the name until, at the very least, he finds the parcel. I find that gives a nice effect on the reader by keeping him/her wondering who the character is. Your other suggestions are great! I'll look into them and make some changes. I agree that by placing the effect before the cause, in the case of that paragraph you mentioned, the sentence seems to "grab" the reader better than vice-versa. I'm not much for the Wizard of Oz, though...Still, a huge thanks for the confidence you place in me by adding me. --Drake, 08:45, 29 June 2009

Good job with the latest edits. I still think that you are using the characters name a lot more than necessary, but you are showing a skill at taking suggestions and making positive changes from them. Keep up the good work, Wolfy! -- ShadowWolf 01:03, 1 July 2009 (UTC)