"The Open Gate" & "Freeing Truth" Reception + Musings on School + The Fate of "The Shadow Loop" + Another Original Song!

It's been a bit (uh huh) longer than I'd originally planned since I wrote my last post. Well, anyway, I promised some reception for some of my newer stuff so I have that for you now!

On good ol' ZU, general member and Writing community member Anju_Amnell started a thread in which people could ask her to read their works and then comment on them. So I did that, asking her to take a look at my April 2011 story, "The Open Gate," (released July 2011) and my September 2011 story, "Freeing Truth." Which she did. This was quite possibly the first constructive criticism I've ever gotten from anybody besides my teachers at school, which is a nice change of pace. That said, you'll see that she also liked both stories overall. First, you'll see Anju_Amnell's feedback for "The Open Gate," which was actually the second piece she looked at of the two; then, you'll see her feedback for "Freeing Truth." Here we go:

Okay, this piece seems a little more fully formed even though its older, there is less trouble spots, and if I had to give any criticisms, they'd be the same as my last, though not so frequent.

I enjoyed the imagery in this, there are some beautiful things.

Quote:

I crossed the street and walked through the open, black gate, drops of water on the iron causing it to shine.

I felt like this short story wasn't fully completed though, like the ending was rushed, or some element was forgotten. What happened to your need to contact your mother? Your feeling for anyone outside? I sort of felt as if you were trapped, but then thoughts of being trapped never really crosses the character's mind. Maybe like the character was actually in a coma, and couldn't come out so his mind was providing the only necessities it could, but again, there were no real second guessing moments. I suppose the strife of the story was missing.

You really have some solid, hard hitting imagery and writing bread crumbs that keep falling from your pockets, and I feel like the little bird pecking at the crumbs behind you, waiting to find the loaf. In other words, if you keep writing, and perfecting you art you'll improve so much that I'll expect to be reading your first novel. There's a lot of potential in your work, more than I see in most.

-Anju_Amnell, ZU Forums, 9/12/2011, here

Okay, first and foremost, I want to make it absolutely clear, that I loved this story. Its an exceptional piece of creativity, and I hope you'll continue writing and improving your craft.
I can see a few problems that might cause you to lose readers in the first half of your story however. Which is a crying SHAME. So here goes the detailed breakdown.

Quote:

privileges and permissions that would normally be granted to princes

Great use of alliteration. This is VERY strong writing.
There are many, many weak spots in the story however, such as places where you use the same word too soon, like 
Quote:

Despite the likely consequences of even laying eyes on the Light, many denizens of the kingdom travel far and attempt (rarely successfully) to sneak past the royal guards and cleverly break into the not-so-secret hidden room behind the throne room without alerting the guards.

Though this one would be a super easy fix, since you can change"alerting the guards" at the end of the sentence to, "alerting them."
(at the end, the light coming from the Light gets a little confusing as well) Radiance is a good replacement for the light coming out of the Light, though there are many equally good words.
Second point of weakness (and I have the weakness threaten me quite a bit) is using phrases or words that I really don't need. The problem with this, is that in the end, you end up sounding almost like you're stammering for something to say. If you've ever been told not to say "ummm..." in an interview, its the same concept.
Here's an example, and how you could make it stronger.
Quote:

And so, Damen had a legitimate reason for being in the royal castle during the time when he planned to swipe the Light.

Damen had a legitimate reason for being in the royal castle during the time he planned to swipe the Light.
Also, this spot doesn't make much sense, and I know it does to you, however its one of those things that you look past because you understand it best.
Quote:

his parents were determined not to spoil their son, despite his being a prince, and they deprived him of many of the privileges and permissions that would normally be granted to princes, such as huge feasts, any toy in the world…even friends—Arten’s parents decided that he should make all of his friends,

It sounds as if they decide to not allow him to have friends at all , and then decide to let him. Perhaps you meant predetermined friends?

One more thing is that as a reader, direction is hardly ever important. So whether the character is to the right, turns to the right, or heads north, doesn't really have any true meaning to us, since we have no real sense of the geography of where you are, nor does it usually matter if they imagine them to one side or the other. Its like telling someone who is in outer space, without a reference, to turn head north. 
Okay, so that is the best help I think I can give you but this is an awesome story and I think you should write something with a series of installments so that we can all keep reading, or even start a general short story thread, so that you can continually post new stories in it, without having to worry about it becoming a "necro thread". As long as you're still working on something you can keep posting it in one thread as far as the writing forums go, even if someone doesn't comment, and as long as its progressive, and not just thread bumping.

Good luck- keep writing, and maybe you'll take Holden's place as my favorite ZU writer.  

-Anju_Amnell, ZU Forums, 9/12/2011, here 

Thanks for the wonderfully constructive feedback, Anju, and I will take it to heart in the future! It is my dream to surpass Holden and take over the Writing forum (just kidding! Holden, you're awesome!). Actually, I had written this relatively long response to your feedback (also thanking you) back on the same day in the quick reply box in your thread, but something happened, and I wound up losing everything I'd written. And I was too lazy to rewrite it. So I won't rewrite it here, but I did want to let you know that I read your feedback and that I had meant to thank you that same day. So thanks again!

Story Launch: "Freeing Truth" + First Batch of Audiobooks Launches! + NEW PUBLISHING SITE: deviantART

Good news: I'm starting again on The Current next week!

In other news, one week ago, I launched my newest short story, "Freeing Truth." This was written as part of a school assignment, which was to make a creative piece (story, poem, painting, sculpture, etc.) involving the quote, "The truth shall make you free," in the light of Cory Doctorow's dystopian, modern-day 1984 novel, Little Brother, which was the "all-school read" for this past summer. The result is "Freeing Truth," my longest short story to date, at about 5.25 pages long in Word. Like "Trust Fall" before it, "Freeing Truth" is split into "chapters;" there are six in this one, as opposed to five in "Trust Fall." The story is of the fantasy genre, and involves a selfish king who holds a mysterious power in his castle. A youth then tries to steal it and learns a startling fact about the king and the kingdom. "Freeing Truth" is currently available on both the ZU Forums and Figment, and in the next few weeks, it will also be available on deviantART (more on that later).

Today marked the launch of the first batch of audio versions of my short stories! In case you never noticed the "Audiobooks" page here, it's been here for about three months with a message saying "Coming soon! (I promise!)" Well, it wasn't quite as soon as I'd hoped, but I'd say not bad! Each audiobook is read by me, unabridged. If you download the whole thing (as a ZIP file), you get some extra goodies. Unfortunately, that's not out yet, as I haven't recorded all of the audiobooks yet. The first nine have been recorded, as well as the version of "Trust Fall" with the extended second chapter, the version of the audiobook that will only be available in the ZIP file. I will also be recording "The Blind Man Who Could See" later today (UPDATE, 17:38: Done and available!), and maybe another, as well. If you enjoy books more when you can listen to them, then you'll benefit from the really dramatic (at least most of the time) audio versions of my stories! Even if you're a visual reader, you can still enjoy! Just head over to the "Audiobooks" page, and you can download (individually) the available audiobooks. (There is a small error in "Twelve Chimes" when my microphone apparently cut off for a second. No need for you to worry, as I will be fixing that--by rerecording that cut-off sentence--and re-uploading the file within the next week or so.)

The Current Update + Conceptual Dual-Release Launch + Reception on Figment

Well, the good news is that I've started the third chapter of The Current! And now that I'm into it, I should have it finished in a couple days or so. Don't worry. It will happen soon! Chapter three has also undergone a name change, in case you didn't notice it under the "Current Projects" (how fitting!) box on the right. Originally to be called "Chapter Three: The Current," for the obvious reason (if you read chapter two!) that Joe will be going down the Current in this chapter, I felt it was too simple and, since the novel's title is The Current, didn't really express what I wanted it to in regards to the chapter's content. The new chapter title is "Chapter Three: Insult to Injury," of which I will not disclose the relevance of at this point in time, due to it being a fairly major spoiler. Again, it should be up in a couple days or so.

As I mentioned in my previous post, today I have launched a dual-release of conceptual short stories that I wrote over the course of the past school year as English class assignments. The two stories, as I also mentioned before, are titled "The Blind Man Who Could See" and "The Open Gate," respectively. The former was released exclusively on Figment, and the latter was released exclusively on the Zelda Universe Forums.

"The Blind Man Who Could See," which I originally wrote last October, is a conceptual/spiritual story that sacrifices complexity in the plot and in the writing itself for an important, powerful message. Like "The Open Gate," this story is told from the view of the main character. This character is a young man who meets a blind, old man on the side of a street in London. From his conversation with the old man, his view of life is forever changed. The assignment for which this story was written was to write a short story borrowing elements, particularly the character of Vasudeva, from Hermann Hesse's classic novel, Siddhartha. It received a B+.

"The Open Gate," which I originally wrote in April, is more fantastical than its parallel release and carries less of a message. It is also significantly darker in mood. The main character stumbles upon an open gate across the street from where he is walking home, and he/she realizes that the gate is made entirely of pure gold and is studded with all kinds of gems and crystals. He/she decides to take a detour to see what lies beyond the gate, but he/she soon finds him-/herself walking down an endless road that provides for his/her every need in order to wipe the thought of turning back from his/her mind. It's a very chilling story! It received a B or a B+ (I'd need to check to remind myself).

New Upcoming Short Story Releases + NEW PAGE

This post will be more of a quickie than my usual posts. I wanted to announce that I will be releasing two never-before-released short stories that I wrote over the course of this past school year as assignments for English class. They are both of the conceptual genre, my first to be so, one being more obviously so than the other. And while they have nothing to do with each other, I'm releasing them as a paired release, one for each of my official publishing sites. Figment will be getting "The Blind Man Who Could See," the more conceptual of the two, which I wrote last October. Zelda Universe will be getting the more fantastical, less conceptual story, "The Open Gate," which is also much darker than the other story.

I will write more about each story when I release them this coming Monday, including what the original assignments were for each. Until then, you have the third chapter of The Current to look forward to!

Speaking of The Current, I have added a brand-new page to the blog! The page, appropriately titled "The Current," is where you can read a Microsoft Word-formatted document (courtesy of Google Docs and Google Docs Viewer) of The Current that is updated whenever I finish a chapter (a.k.a. the only time I will press the "Sync" button on Google Cloud Connect, you sneak-preview-hungry rascals!). Also, for those Travelers of the Many Worlds of EzloSpirit--in other words, those who are following the blog through Google Friend Connect (to follow, press the "Follow" button in the Travelers console in the right-hand column--can use an embedded gadget under the document to place a short (or long!) review of the novel and let me know what they think about the project so far and/or in general. (Constructive reviews, people, constructive reviews.)

And that's all for now! Until a day or two from now!