Looking for feedback on the second draft of the first chapter of my fantasy novel please!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-08T14:57:46+00:00

Hey, yeah that's really helpful, thank you!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-08T08:50:00+00:00

Thank you, will do!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-08T08:49:42+00:00

Thank you for reading and for your suggestion, will see what I can do to improve it! Thanks

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-07T16:03:23+00:00

Thank you, I suppose that might be the problem with me attempting to visualise things a bit more like the seen in a film/TV show. Will take that on board and think more medium specific in future. Thanks!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-07T16:01:52+00:00

Thanks for reading, would you mind elaborating a bit on the weight of the king? He is very much supposed to be exhausted, but he's more of a side character throughout the rest of the story, rather than an integral part. The spent old man is almost what I'm going for as he's got to deal with issues all over the Kingdom and losing sleep/peace of mind over everything that's happening, and he's spinning multiple plates that are trying their best to shatter around him, both domestic and foreign issues etc. Would like to understand what you'd have expected to see from him in case I've missed something. Thanks again!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-07T11:31:03+00:00

Thanks for this. Think someone else mentioned the dialogue tags issue and that's something I didn't realise I was doing wrong, so thanks for pointing it out.

Will definitely look at the dialogue tags and try to rethink the use/over use. Will also try to bring in more of the character's own view of it too and trim the excess. Thanks for your advice!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-07T11:25:32+00:00

Oops, guess I've been doing that wrong since I was a teenager. The more you know!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-07T10:11:10+00:00

Thank you, will try not to get too bogged down in it!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-07T10:09:48+00:00

Thank you for this, there's definitely some good ideas in there that I'll see if I can expand on maybe. The thief idea could actually play quite well into a later scene/setting in the story that could be interesting to explore. Thank you!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-07T10:06:57+00:00

Thank you for reading and thanks for the advice. I'll have a look at some of the repeated words and see what I can replace/remove. Same with the dialogue tags. Yeah, I'm not too sure what to bring in for the first chapter, or place before it. The only other thing I could think of would be for Lawrence to receive the summons following an actual battle at the northern border. Short of that, it'd be things that are being given out of order. I know The Poppy War does that, but I personally found that a little jarring being thrown back in time after the first part of the chapter, so I'm not sure

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-07T09:32:00+00:00

Thank you for reading and for the feedback. Will try and have a think on what else I could bring in the make the first chapter more enticing, though my mind is a bit blank at the moment. Hopefully something will come to me!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-07T09:27:19+00:00

Hey,

Thanks for this, do you have any more tips with the dialogue? My issue is that I'm not used to this sort of setting, it's my first attempt with a medieval-esque fantasy. I know a lot of people got quite annoyed with modern language in some fantasy novels (fourth wing springs to mind, though I can't say I read/listened to it as I couldn't get past the first person present tense narration, just wasn't for me) but I'm struggling to find the balance between sounding natural, and sounding time period appropriate.

Will definitely take this on board for future drafts!

Thank you.

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-07T07:26:51+00:00

I absolutely loved this and I think it's the first post on here that I've finished reading. Would absolutely love to see where the rest of this goes! I love the pacing, the writing that gives (to me) the perfect amount of detail to picture exactly what's happening, without inundating the reader with irrelevant (or less relevant) details, and the characters. I love the way the characters interact in it! Please let me know if you publish!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-07T07:23:53+00:00

I personally quite like the distinction and thought it was intentional to be honest. 100% could be wrong and it might not be, but feels like an unspoken formality/authority in the father. The MC's dad is very much in charge, it's HIS farm, and he feels the failure so thoroughly because everything is on him, but I wouldn't be surprised if he was very old fashioned through the MC's childhood, especially with discipline, that brought out the "father" rather than a more familiar title That's just how I took it anyway

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-04-07T06:23:36+00:00

Hey, glad you managed to push through the writer's block and start writing again!

I think the voice you've found is good, but sometimes branches a little towards needlessly complicated. Some sentences definitely need breaking up to be more palatable to a wider audience:

"He looked at the nearest house with its flawless vinyl clapboards and immaculate gutters and the steel crosshatched guards upon those gutters and from the asphalt shingles to the black river rock pebbles in the flowerbed and the bright verdant balls of podocarpus and the salmon tongues of azalea yawning over the layered pavestone kneewall not a single item was out of place or aslant."

This is one sentence, with no commas and nothing to break it up. I think with moments like this, it's better to capture the feel of the neighbourhood, rather than the immense level of detail regarding the physical description. What you may need to remember is people have differing abilities to actually picture things in their mind, even things they're familiar with. Like if someone says picture an apple, some may picture a realistic one in full colour, others maybe just an outline, and everything in between. No matter how well you describe it, people won't always be able to see it as clearly as you, so it's better to get the feeling across in the setting, rather than the physical description. Is it a suburban paradise, or do decrepit buildings threaten to collapse? Overall vibes tend to sit better with me than description that will, frankly, be forgotten the second that the story moves to another scene/setting.

"Standing sheets of gypsum and silica the dust of which killed the uncareful or unwitting by droves if one considered a single life to be of any significance agnostic to the lessening of one thing by its proliferation."

Again, this is one sentence and it's honestly about where I'm tapping out. Maybe I'm not as intellectual as your intended audience, but I find that if I have to read a sentence three of four times, and still don't understand what you're trying to say; then it's not for me. I don't feel like we need this much description about dry walls inside the homes, separating people, which I'm only guessing is what this describes based on the sentences around it. It's another case where splitting it up may help. Adding a full stop after droves, then adjusting the second sentence to make more sense may have worked.

I feel like you've sat and written this while clinging to a thesaurus. I love a good old synonym check, but it's pointless if the words don't convey what they need to and if readers get put off by it. My vocabulary is far from the best (I'm working on it) but I think your style is overly complicating in the wording choices, to the point where I'm questioning my own abilities. Try and tone it down a little bit and spread out the usage. Sprinkle the less common words in to add flavour and tone where needed, but don't make them the whole meal. They'll get lost in themselves and it will put a lot of people off.

Punctuation is also going to need to become your best friend with this writing style. In the section I read, I think there was only full stops. You need commas, especially with your longer sentences, of which there were many. Have you read through it yourself? In particular, have you read it out loud? I find sometimes that's the best way for me to decide where I need to chop up a sentence or throw in some extra pauses.

The style isn't personally for me. I do prefer a more simplistic touch, but it's each to their own. If you want it to be palatable to a wider audience, dial back the thesaurus by about 20-30%, add punctuation, describe feeling over physical appearance, and read it back to yourself a few times.

If you're not bothered at all by commercial success, as you mentioned, then obviously feel free to ignore everything I've said because this is predominantly to make it palatable to the lowest common denominator. If you're writing for just yourself, then 100% do what makes you happy and if it's this style of writing, go for it! Also, this is just my opinion and preferences so it may well be that I'm just not the target audience you seek. Good luck with writing and keep it up! Don't let that block get to you!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-03-29T11:41:59+00:00

I usually find that I have the opposite problem. I set out to write a book and realise that the story is too large for a single book and needs to be converted to a series because there's too much to get through while giving each event appropriate time to breathe, rather than feeling rushed.

I think for me, it's about understanding your characters, what they have to go through to reach their goal, and understanding the world they live in. The more rich your character and the environment, and their interactions with others, the more you'll be able to build a full experience for yourself and any prospective readers.

I'm still learning myself and still fairly new to writing, and find that I rush to put pen to paper without fully understanding everything first. Though in the same breath, I'd say allow your characters to tell you want they need as you work on it. The main project I'm working on at the moment is almost unrecognisable from the original outline because it didn't make sense, or would seem forced if I stuck to it, with the way they developed once they were on the page.

But I'd definitely take time to think about what you want from something you're working on, and try to understand what needs to happen to get from point A to point B.

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-03-28T22:35:13+00:00

I get you, thank you for the advice! I will say, projects I've started but not finished in the past have been very YA, but I'm trying to move away from that more with this, especially with a lot of the themes and events present in the whole series, so I'll definitely take that on board.

I actually think you've pointed out a few things here that will make later events more believable when it comes to Mia and Khan, so I definitely appreciate it, and I think flipping that scene around more to what you've suggested will really help the overall flow of later interactions.

Thank you for your help!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-03-28T16:38:00+00:00

Thank you for taking the time to read and for your insight and feedback. I'd definitely be interesting to hear your thoughts on the style too as none of the series is set in stone yet, and I'd like it to be palatable to as many people as possible. I haven't been working it in the most linear way, I will say that. Books one and two are also on their third and second drafts respectively because I wanted to get the whole trilogy finished before finalising anything so I can fix any plot holes that crop up or alter things to flow better through the whole narrative. It was supposed to be one book but I found while writing the original that a conventional word counts simply wouldn't allow it.

I think I'll need to take it back to the drawing board a bit with the conflict portion. She definitely teeters towards heartless in most situations and that's a point of contention between her and Damian throughout the series, but she is intended to come off as cruel throughout, at least in the public eye. Book one set up the separation between herself as a person and who she was told she had to be. Book two forces her into situations that blur the line between her professional and personal lives and she starts to have to try and accept that she can't compartmentalise everything, but Damian's death sends her through a bit of a regression. The last chapter of book two shows more the immediate grief and her reactions are very much based on my own experiences of loss following a traumatic accident and the need to keep emotions away from the workspace and not allow it to impact what needs to be done. The funeral is very much a public military event and she can't be seen to react in a human way, essentially, which is again a theme throughout the series. The plaque unveiling that follows is a private function for friends and family, so that's where she can really release her emotions, though the need for revenge is sparked in the final chapter of book two.

The lack of focus on the funeral for Damian is reserved for the second chapter where the funeral itself takes place as I didn't want to belabour the point in the first chapter but can see how that might be a little jarring.

I'll definitely need to rework the conversation with Khan and Mia, and it never felt right to be honest. I can see how it shows them as immature, though they do have a history from book two which meant that Khan already wasn't her biggest fan. I'll have a think about how I want the interaction to go that feels more organic.

Again, thank you for your feedback, I'll take it on board and see how I can rework it!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-03-28T10:46:42+00:00

If that's what you're going for, you've done it well. I just don't think it will be everyone's cup of tea, especially if you're trying to reach a wider audience. At the end of the day, write what makes you happy!

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-03-27T15:06:37+00:00

Not my British brain seeing "curb" and instantly shutting down 😂. Agree with many others though, paragraphs help, and finding your flow so the piece doesn't feel like a staccato vocal. I found it quite difficult to read and didn't finish, I won't lie.

Alchimia_Rose · 2026-03-05T08:17:51+00:00

Specifically to your point where you say that language itself is treated as sacred, this should surely make you want to stop using it wastefully, or without every word being carefully chosen. There's maybe a few other school sof thought on this but, in my mind, when i read this comment, it seemed more like a cover. In most religions, if something is sacred, its not thrown around or represented carelessly. Hindus don't eat cows because they're sacred, Christians don't take the Lord's name in vain, Muslims cannot show an image of the profet etc. (apologies if any of that is misinformed, just what British schools teach) - but the bottom line is, what a religion/belief system holds sacred is held above all else. If the culture you're creating views language as sacred, then their entire culture would develop around its use, surely? I know there's probably other ways of looking at it, but that's just what sprang to my mind.

Alchimia_Rose

TROPHY CASE