Part of my novel.... good or bad?

[neveralone]

The dragon ripled her shining blue scales in frusteration. Can't you just get it right? Her rider rolled her eyes and sighed, "I'm sorry, Aisyen! This is harder for me than it is for you!" Whatever, just hurry up and get on, Aevean. Finnaly, after what seemed like the hunderedth try,Aevean swung herself onto her dragon. This was the girl's first day as a real Dragon Rider, she had spent the last three years in training. Now that she was thirteen, it was her time.
The land of Aldea had been at war with the land of Corcrest for over ten years. Each country had begun training Dragon riders at the age of ten, who were to fight when they reached the age of thirteen. Now Aevean and her dragon, Aisyen, were off to the battlefields.
Aevean kicked gently with her heels into Aisyen's sides. Immediatly, the dragon shot into the air. Her four legs were tucked in close to her white belly, and her tail was straight out for balance. Aevean loved the sound of wings beating against the wind, and closed her eyes to savor the moment. Opening them again, she looked down to see her village, Raicall, passing quickly by under her. She was finnaly free.


Remember: This is a rough draft... so no matter what, it's going to be bad.

[ashildr]

My mom's an aspiring author as well, and she's trained me well in the ways of the pen, so while I may not be a professional editor (yet XD) I do know alot of the tricks of the trade.

So, first off, I am in love with the name corcrest! Names may not be important, but in a fantasy book, they'll make or break you, espescially if it's the name of a country or place. Corcrest sounds very original, and very belivable!

That being said, I do think you have too many A names. I realize it's sometimes hard to replace the name of a main character, but this problem has to be nipped in the bud, before you grow too attached. Aiysen and Aevean and Aldea, that is too many soft A names. Maybe one was a hard A sound, but still. Readers will get confused too easily if too many character start with the same letter. If I were you, I'd change at least one of them.

For a rough draft, this is actually pretty good! First off, I absolutly applaud you for your stick-to-it-tivness! Not many writers can even get past the brainstorming phase, to even write down a few paragraphs, you've already come farther than hundreds of aspiring authors! Secondly, while some of your descriptions were slightly bogged down with a few irrelevant details, for the most part, your descriptions were good. You showed, not told, which is what professional authors will tell you is best. But here's a bit of advice: Showing and not telling is good, but it WILL get boreing. Think of some of the best fantasy writers out there: Phil Pullman, J.K. Rowling, C.S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolken, to name a few; if you read their stories, you'll find that because their inventing a completely new word, out of their imaginations, they HAVE to do some telling. There's just no way around it.

Now don't get me wrong, i don't think you should start 'teling' straight off, and definately not in these paragraphes here, but I'm just warning you of what's to come. Also another warning, or maybe just a suggestion, depending on how you write this story, it wil go one of two ways. One, you write it constraining (for the most part) to the laws of this world. You try to make it sound like it really could happen, like it could be realistic (some what). Two, you completely abandon all rules of this world, completely abandon everything you know about geography, and completely abandon everything you know about people.

If you write in the style of One, you will get a nice enough book, that maybe has about a 75% chance of getting published. If you write in the style of Two though, you will have an exciting, new book, that has a higher chance of being published, just because it's something no-one has read before! Just remember; anyone can write about what's already there, but it takes a real genius to invent something new. I'm not saying One is bad, but publishers are looking for Two writers. Think about The Golden Compass; it's fantastic and exciting because we're taken on a tour of something completely new and unseen! That's what publishers want, and that's what readers want to read.

Lastly, just to give you a little trick of the trade, whenever you're writing fantasy, after you've written a few paragraphs (or maybe even a whole chapter, if the chapter's short enough) read it outloud to yourself. That will work out any kinks in flow or mistakes in grammer, and give you a feel of what the reader will be reading.

I hope this isn't too much! Like I said, I'm used to editing my friends works, and this is just about along the lines of what I tell them ^_^

[neveralone]

Thank you! I personally thought that there were too many A's as well, after I read through it again (>_<). It motivates me when someone seems to like my work. Though I'm only up to around 10,000 words, I think it's going well. I really hope to get it published someday.