\"Writing.Com
*Magnify*
SPONSORED LINKS
BY ONLINE AUTHORS
Printed from https://writing.com/main/profile/reviews/fpoppelaars
Review Requests: OFF
4 Public Reviews Given
7 Total Reviews Given
Public Reviews
1
1
Review of The Novelist  Open in new Window.
Review by Frank Poppelaars Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (4.0)
Dear Sisco,

I don't usually like rhyming poetry, but I did like this one. It reads well, and it spoke to me because, as a writer, I recognise a lot of things I do myself. Especially writing all your thoughts down (well, as many as possible!) before you go to bed, and sitting alone, without any disturbances whatsoever, sound very familiar to me.

There are a number of lines I particularly liked, though I won't mention them all. Somehow, I especially liked "give them vocations" and "my work of fiction is now so alive". I also liked how the poem (the novelist's life) is an endless cycle, beginning anew each day.

I did find a few things I thought could be changed. I have to make clear that I'm not an accomplished poet of any sort, and I don't read too much poetry myself. Moreover, my knowledge of rhyme scheme conventions has faded. However, I felt the pace of the poem was diminished by "despicable" in "A dastardly villain hatches a despicable plan". I thought perhaps a better alternative would be "evil", as it is so much shorter. Also, in the line starting with "Aristotle" I feel the "a", however short, is one syllable too many here, and should perhaps be removed.

On a minor note, "readers hook" should be "reader's hook". Also, I wasn't too fond of the full stops at the end of each line, especially in the middle of sentences (e.g. "..middle and end. For a story..") but that's just my personal preference.

The reason I've given 4 stars and no more is mainly because I don't generally like rhyming poetry. I always feel the poet limits him/herself too much by trying to finds words that fit the rhyme, and therefore not writing from his heart as much as from a rhyming dictionary (or at least within the confines of the rhyme). Note that this is again my personal preference, and has nothing to do with the quality of your poem, but it did cause me to like it less than I would like non-rhyming poetry.

Keep up the good work! :)

Frank
2
2
Review by Frank Poppelaars Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (3.0)
I started reading this piece because you claimed to be thirteen, and I was curious to see a thirteen-year-old write. For your age, I think your writing is good. Maybe very good. If you keep working on your writing, your writing could be very promising. When I was younger I wanted to write also, but I hardly ever did, and didn't share my stories with more than a handful of friends or family. Just sitting down and writing, going for it, is a very good thing to do. Seeking advice from other writers to actively improve your writing skill is even more so.

I've only read the first two paragraphs (not counting the first sentence), because the huge blocks of text didn't appeal to me. Other than "then" needing to be changed into "than" in the second paragraph, though, the first paragraphs were largely fine.

I think you should definitely give the blocks of text a more readable structure. In most stories on this website, or in books, you can see how you are supposed to write dialogue, and copy that structure. But on this website people seem to dislike long paragraphs even less. They generally don't start new paragraphs with an indentation but use an extra white space (enter), even in dialogue. You can see what I mean in my story "Falling Apart".

If you make your paragraphs shorter and extract your dialogue from the huge blocks of text, please send me a message, if you will, and I will read the rest of it. If you make your writing more readable, and continue to apply yourself, I can see your work becoming very good.

Keep at it! :)

Cheers,

Frank
2 Reviews · *Magnify*
Page of 1 · 25 per page   < >
Printed from https://writing.com/main/profile/reviews/fpoppelaars