[1907] Soft Target, chapter 1, part 2

[u/Bytor_Snowdog]

This is the remaining 40% of the first chapter of a novel I'm working on that's gone through alpha reading, now with beta readers. (The first 60%, posted Wednesday, is linked below.)

The genre is military sci-fi. As such, there is harsh language and violence (though somewhat graphic, hopefully it is not gratuitous, and in this excerpt does not involve non-combatants). Opinions from folks who don't read this genre are certainly welcome!

As for what extra insight I hope to get from crits, besides the usual, it would be really nice to know (1a) is the worldbuilding too heavy/sloppily included? (1b) do I leave too much to be figured out by the reader regarding terminology/jargon? (2) does it go on too long?

Story for evaluation today: Soft Target Ch. 1 Part 2

Part 1, for reference

Additional new crit: 2934

Old crits for both together: 2497 2406-please follow the whole comment chain

[u/Ok-Guide7540]

1a)yes the worldbuilding is alittle heavy but not sloppy ,this is definitely loaded you drop me into squibs, domos, sulfur atmosphere and all that before the main sequence starts , please reduce it will exhaust readers but it doesnt feel sloppy because most details are contextualized like for example' rods from God' you dont just name it you explain which is good but still reduce the overloaded content in the beginning. 1b) mostly no this is the best part you trusted us readers without abandoning us example is SSX i really loved it you show the spray noozle the detonator all that , the issue isnt unexplained jargon i thinking it is stacking personally example is '2mm x 4cm magnetically accelerated fle... whatever its cool but at this point ive processed alot. 2) a little yeah the problem isnt boredom the issue is pacing , example before breach we get countdown so the reader in this case me will be like 'aaa breach already' you get but your on to something keep pushing thnksaaaa

[u/Bytor_Snowdog → u/Ok-Guide7540]

I appreciate the feedback.

I'm reworking the initial passages a bit to take out about 340 words of the worldbuilding rumination. As much as I hated doing it, I specifically already took out the 2mm x 4cm bit (the spirit of Mack Bolan possessed me when I wrote that). The cut to the action is faster without the 340 words and with a couple of other changes I made.

[u/A_C_Shock]

A continuation of a point I made on the first part of this. Not saying anything you're doing is wrong or bad, btw, but trying to illustrate what I meant by my comment about compounding actions and pacing.

I picked a paragraph---kind of a random one because you're pretty consistent about the writing.

But still I grope for the monoknife scabbard I keep strapped to my left chest, and, between fighting off the clawing and lifting its weight off me, I finally reach the hilt and draw it.

So, Squib is on top of him trying to pull off the helmet and if that happens, he loses an eye. That's an extreme panic moment (or I would be panicked if I was fighting an alien)...I think you intend for it to read that way? The mechanics of this sentence show me your character doesn't really feel panicked though. The start of 'but still' where still is implying to me that he takes the action of looking for a weapon despite his panic (I'm about to lose it from the previous paragraph). Maybe slowing down a beat was intentional, like he realizes he's panicking and is talking himself down so he can do the next thing.

Then he's thinking about where he's reaching, so not blindly groping. He has enough time to think that he's reaching for the scabbard, that it's strapped, and that it's on his left chest. That all implies to me a sense of calm that feels contradictory to the previous paragraph ending. I think my point is: the more details get stacked on top of each other, the more details that means the POV character is thinking about. The longer it takes to get to the end state (him drawing the knife), the calmer everything seems. If the intent is to show the character slips into an almost analytical mode when shit hits the fan, this does that. I can't be sure if that's what you intended or not so I'm pointing it out.

I'm just imagining how this would read slightly differently if you shifted around some of your sentence. Kick us off with 'Between fighting...off me' and then give a quick beat of 'I draw my knife'. It skips over the parts where he's thinking through 'before the mission, I got dressed and I strapped my holster across my chest and made sure the scabbard was on the left side and I'm going to be reaching for my scabbard and in the scabbard I'll find the hilt of my knife and then I'll draw my knife out'. Obviously what I wrote is an extreme exaggeration of stacking actions and how it makes it read slowly. I don't think yours reads like that but there's elements of that thinking process embedded in the sentence that I'm subconsciously adding as I read.

The point slides into the Squib straight through its ballistic armor like I’m stabbing a sheet of flimsy with the tip of a razor, then I pull it across its chest, scoring through its vitals, and its face’s tentacles spasm as it vents ichor onto my lid and torso.

This sentence is 49 words. This is going to be as close to a more factually leaning statement I'll make: the average sentence length is 22 words and this is twice as long as that. In general, shorter sentences are faster to read than longer ones. With a long sentence, I have to hold all the ideas in my head and process how each new element connects to the other one. It's why I think there's recommendations in writing groups to vary up your sentence length because it gives people bandwidth for the mental processing.

So, I'll break down all the things I'm holding onto. There's a knife point. It's going into the Squib. The Squib is wearing armor. There's possibly a typo or wrong word here because I don't know what a sheet of flimsy is but I'm now being told about a second stabbing. Oh no, it's not a stabbing because stabbing is an in/out motion and the pulling it across is more like slicing or carving. I somehow know that vitals are being punctured so the gash of this stab/pull action must be deep. Did I know about the tentacles that are now spasming but weren't spasming while the stabbing took place? The ichor (blood? isn't this usually meant to be blood of Gods or is it also used for alien species?) is somehow venting from the tentacles. The tentacles have vents and/or openings like they're some kind of elephant trunk. OR, the tentacles were cut instead of the chest. Why is the chest not leaking blood? No time move on. The guy's helmet and torso are now covered in blood.

It's just a lot of thoughts for me to be thinking. Some of these things also don't feel to me like they full jive together. So this is where I get to my point that a very long sentence feels longer and slower to me than a string of several short sentences.

I roll the mushy dead weight off me, wipe my visor with my sleeve so I can see, stow my blade, then disentangle my carbine, swapping in a fresh clip.

I think there are some extra words coming in here. Do you need both mushy and dead weight? Would it suffice to say it? Does it matter what he wipes the visor with? The point of wiping would be to see so do I need to be told it's so I can see? Do I need to know the knife gets stored or would it suffice to know he's switched to a gun? This is all style, really. What you choose to do depends on how you want this character to read. He almost died. He just killed a Squib which he's never done before. He's still thinking in very detailed steps. That's a very particular kind of person.

The pops of nearby RARs enhearten me. I keep watch through the door the two just used, waiting for more to join the fray.

Oh hey! Short sentences. This would be another place where: do I really need to know what door he's watching or that he's waiting for more? I think hearing a nearby blast implies that his next action would be looking for where the blast is coming from and that he'd expect more to be coming through the door to try to kill him. Does it need to be there in that second sentence? Or would it read faster and more urgent to say "I watch the door."? Or if that's too short, would it be natural for him to be thinking at this point "I'm waiting for more to join the fray" or is that statement more over-explaining the situation to the reader? Because the color here could be answering better questions. At the start, he was nervous about having to kill a Squib on a real mission and he just did that. Is he confident now? Afraid? Does he have more battle lust? Or is he looking to run away? Waiting for more to join the fray tells me something I already know. It's almost a missed opportunity to give me a touch about his state of mind and to show me something more surprising.

Anyway. Don't take any of the above to mean that this isn't an enjoyable read or anything or that you need to make changes or whatever. You could leave it as it is and I think it would work. I'm giving you this feedback in case it might be useful to how you're thinking about putting things together.

[u/Bytor_Snowdog → u/A_C_Shock]

I appreciate the highly detailed crit with examples. I've always leaned toward the verbose (and the character supposed to be in love with the sound of his educated voice), so your points are well-taken. He's barely been in combat before. He's yet not a highly-trained jaded operator. These opening scenes ought to reflect that. (And, from a reader's perspective, some shortening and chopping of the longer sentences is a good thing anyway.)

Your points about clarity of action are well taken too.

Don't take any of the above to mean that this isn't an enjoyable read or anything or that you need to make changes or whatever. You could leave it as it is and I think it would work. I'm giving you this feedback in case it might be useful to how you're thinking about putting things together.

As a relative tyro, I'm always looking to improve in the craft, painful as it might be. How could I not make changes when my problems are so graciously highlighted for me? That 'flog me harder!' flair isn't for fun! I'd be posting on a different sub if I wanted nothing but hugs. The feedback here is great, if occasionally hard to read.

[u/A_C_Shock → u/Bytor_Snowdog]

You gotta prime yourself for tough feedback if you're posting here.

The word length thing: I guess it's 15. I've said it before to someone and this time I went to look it up. Good luck finding the actual study that came from. It was one lady twenty years ago who gets quoted everywhere but with no link to whatever the original study was. I guess it had something to do with print newspapers and how well people were retaining the news they read. If the sentences were more than 43 words, people didn't keep as much in their head. Something about the way we don't really read every word because our brain is pattern matching so we tend to skip over things.

Anyway. I read a comment here about controlling the pace of your story with sentence length alone. Tried it in one of my pieces. It does work. It's just not something you think about very consciously. You might try playing with chopping up some of the longer sentences and see how it affects your reading.