01-08-2020, 11:46 PM
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Hi Alex,
happy to discuss 'extraneous detail'.
How about I start with this point.
How about I start with this point.
You ask the question 'why did he wake up alone in the forest?' - I asked myself the same thing, and having read and re-read you piece I don't know the answer. And I should. Over 1000 words, and no explanation as to how he came to be in the forest, alone and injured - but I know the names of prophets, deities, other children, a mountain range (how would Ell know its name?) though not who Almeroc is, some other child's mother, but not Ell's. You mention a city, Thenosia, but not why Ell choose to head away from there. Was he from there, were his friends? No idea, except that it is north of his position. A detail of no narrative value whatsoever.
You ask 'what forest did he wake up in?' - Again, I don't know, I can't find the name anywhere in the text.
These were two question you identified as important. But the answers aren't in the piece. Until they are, I'd say pretty much everything is extraneous. Whether you add them later in the story doesn't matter,no-one is going to care by then (assuming they read that far).
Consider, if the piece begins
You ask 'what forest did he wake up in?' - Again, I don't know, I can't find the name anywhere in the text.
These were two question you identified as important. But the answers aren't in the piece. Until they are, I'd say pretty much everything is extraneous. Whether you add them later in the story doesn't matter,no-one is going to care by then (assuming they read that far).
Consider, if the piece begins
Seven year old Ell woke up in the [name] forest, alone.
you achieve an immediacy of scene setting that you don't with the current, 'poetic', opening.
But if you don't then start explaining how he came to be there, you're not telling a story (you are, I think, trying to paint a picture).
He's got a bump on his head, but doesn't wonder how it got there? ('He fell on a stone' isn't an answer to this question. Does Ell know he fell on a stone? Why did he fall? Was he pushed, chased, what? His leg hurts, but he doesn't wonder why? Incidentally, I don't think 'dazed' is the right word to use in this context. Fuzzy, sluggish?)
His head hurt, he remembered falling, the pain, but he couldn't remember why he fell. His knee felt angry and he saw he'd torn his trousers, the skin beneath was bloody black and starting to scab. He thought he must have been running, and fallen. Had someone been chasing him? And where was Myge? He struggled to get to his feet, holding on to the aulper tree as he did so. Whichever way he looked, all he could see was the forest. He felt himself start to cry.
As to 'how does he feel about being alone in the forest?' There's a lot of telling, rather than showing - more on the 'how he feels about being alone' than on 'how he feels about being (alone) in the forest, which I take to be two different things. And since I don't know much about his circumstances before he woke up I don't attribute much significance to either.
One last point. Can you tell me who you think the intended audience is? Children, YA, adult? It would help to know.
As to 'how does he feel about being alone in the forest?' There's a lot of telling, rather than showing - more on the 'how he feels about being alone' than on 'how he feels about being (alone) in the forest, which I take to be two different things. And since I don't know much about his circumstances before he woke up I don't attribute much significance to either.
One last point. Can you tell me who you think the intended audience is? Children, YA, adult? It would help to know.
Best, Knot
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