Captain Reynard the Idealistic Knight
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Captain Reynard the Idealistic Knight
The relationship between author, fiction, and reader is like a symbolic contract. The author provides a narrative to the reader. Readers know the narrative is "fictional," but they are willing to be bound by the "lie" to achieve a sense of experience.
Reading fiction means allowing the lie to "hypnotize" you. So, you can experience the "truth" of the sense of experience the author has crafted through narrative.
Love, loss and regret are emotional fictional themes.
Narrating a child's first POV is one of the most difficult challenges in writting. Why?
Because you need to "lower your intelligence" to the child's level. You can't use literary prose to narrate characters, worldbuilding, and plot.
You need to lower your language to be simple and imaginative, appropriate to a child's psychological development. So, the POV feels authentically child's voice.
I want to write a tribute chapter inspired by your style—especially the single-mom theme. In this chapter, Avaris will be a single mother raising Arin and Lysa. My main character, Ilyas, will be shown as dead (this will be a non-canon chapter). I’m also thinking of mentioning your name in the author’s note.
Is it okay if I do this?
I knew that you'd be the first or atleast one of the first few to reply to that poll.
Which is worse getting a low rating or getting no rating at all?
Pray for world peace...
When you write a narrative, you tend to write "what happened this chapter?"
When you edit a chapter, you tend to read, analyze, refine and rewrite, "how do the scenes in this chapter provide a good reading experience for the reader?"
It makes sense why Pain was considered the peak arc.
Instead of positioning Pain as a foreign enemy... the author instead made Pain Jiraya's student, a victim of war, and a senior (to Naruto). The conflict isn't just epic and ideological, but also intimate and emotional.
Readers may disagree, but they can't deny that his wounds are real. That's why I consider Pain as a gold standard for main antagonists.
There are 4 types of feedback for fiction:
(1) Content feedback (analysis of characters, worldbuilding, plot and conflict).
(2) Storytelling feedback (analysis of POV, pacing, hook, etc).
(3) Engagement feedback (packaging, release, and promotion).
(4) Language feedback (prose, grammar and spelling).
Comparing my narrative quality of the early chapters with the latest ones and concluding that there was a significant gap... making me happy and tearful.
Happy because I saw progress in my narrative. Tearful because I needed more editing.
If 4 factors could converge in a story:
I'm pretty sure... a work would explode quickly and start a new trend.
Unfortunately, 4 factors rarely align. Most works only fulfill 1 or 2 factors at a time.
It's why masterpieces often become hidden gems. While, other works can quickly go viral.
I love reading poetic prose with personification, as atmospheres such as:
Silence speaks louder than screams...
Mist carry the breath of changing eras...
The sun peeks through the leaves...
The moon bears witness between you and me...
Blood never lies...
You are like these random helpful messages that are usually appear on loading screens~.
POV isn't just about I, you, we, they, he/she, it... but POV is the reader's lens to enter (perceive) the story.
If you're writing a limited third POV, narrate it like you're writing how a character experiences the life in their world... and use that lens consistently.
You give good foodbacks. Er, feedbacks.
One of the artistic strengths of a work of fiction is its ability to simulate the lives of characters in a (fictional) world in the reader's perception, not just in the author's memory. You can feel the characters' breath without having to be them.
When a reader reads a story, there are three times running simultaneously:
- Real time, the time that takes place in the real world.
- Narrative time, the time the reader perceives while reading the narrative.
- Fictional time, the time that takes place in the story world.
Don't treat your world as a static object that's observed. Make it alive, like an organism, interacting with your characters.
Let the air breathe, a cold gust making the skin creep. Let the door rattle, the wood creak making the ears ring. Let the lamp greet, the light glow making the pupils smaller.
This way, your world will feel alive (in your reader's perception), not just a backdrop. -
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