HBO Fan Fiction

[hboff]

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Deployment
Posted by Unknown (Unknown)
19 March 2009, 12:04 am

http://halosn.bungie.org/fanfic/?story=0319090004341.html

[Phædrus]

You've got the heart, man, and you've got a lot of promise, but you need a bit of work.


First off, the mundane stuff: GPS (Grammar, Punctuation, Spelling). You were pretty good with your GPS, relatively speaking, but there were dozens of minor errors all throughout this story. You seem to get tripped up about homophones; words that sound the same but are spelled different and have different meanings. "There" and "their," "hear" and "here," things like that. It's a minor mistake, but it's enough to knock someone out of the flow.
You also seem to have trouble with quotation marks. Always, always, always, always capitalize after quotation marks.

Incorrect:
"Blah blah blah," Alice said, "blah blah blah." She got up. "blah blah."
Correct:
"Blah blah blah," Alice said, "Blah blah blah." She got up. "Blah blah."

It's minor, but again it can knock someone out of the flow.
Finally, you had a little bit of trouble with apostrophe placement.
Incorrect:
Stevens' stole Sallys friends shoes, so Sallys platoons' leader took Steven's.
Correct:
Stevens stole Sally's friends' shoes, so Sally's platoon's leader took Stevens'.



Now that we have that boring stuff out of the way, on to description.
I'm willing to bet that when you were writing this you had a picture in your mind, a picture of the scene you were writing about. Well, you didn't really show it to us. All we know when your characters are sitting on the roof of the hangar (sounds like fun) is that it's hot. That's it. What type of hot? Hot and dry like a desert? Or hot and muggy like DC in August? Or hot and steamy like the jungle? What can they see? Is it a small base, with the trees visible beyond the fence (is there a fence?)? Or is it huge, with fuel tanks and hangars stretching to the horizon? Or is it small, but surrounded by city? There's all these things that would bring us more into the story, bring us into the world you're describing, but you're just giving us a blank slate.

As for plot, it's too early to tell, but it seems to be alright so far. Same for characters. Just don't fall for the trope of giving us pure action too soon into the story. A little action is okay, but too much and it just gets boring.

Anyway, not great, but you're definitely showing promise.

[xxForceReconxx]

Thanks for the advice.

It's actually harder than I thought to write something good. I literally have a billion ideas (of what happened, is happening, and what will happen) and I want to get to the good parts as fast as I can.

[Phædrus]

No problem, and I understand exactly. You just have to learn to pick and choose: what's good, what can I write, what can I write well, and what can I finish?

By the way, Azrael gave you the honorable mention (aka 3rd place) in this week's Fan Fiction Pick of the Week: http://hboff.bungie.org/viewtopic.php?t=5900
Congrats. It's not often that a first timer makes it into the pick unless it's a bad week, which this most assuredly wasn't.

[kr1]

Not too bad for a first stab. Phae's right, GPS and description's where you need the most work. I can't really say anything on that he didn't already.

Now, for your Black Hawk Down stuff. It seems a bit of a stretch the Nightstalkers are still around 400+ years in the future. Because it's the Nightstalkers, though, I can see them watching Black Hawk Down. It's their unit, after all. Delta and the Rangers I don't really picture being around anyore, since we've got the ODSTs to cover at the very least the same job as Rangers, and some of the same as Delta. And all the units that served at Mogadishu existing 400 years in the future and serving together again stretches belief a bit. If this is gonna be Black Hawk Down in Halo, just make sure to keep it different enough that those of us that have read or seen Black Hawk Down don't lose interest.

Anyways, good to see a new face around, and congrats on the honorable mention.
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[xxForceReconxx]

I was worried about making this too much like BHD, but I wanted to add a few elements from the book/movie. But about the ODSTs, I thought about putting them in but realized half way into writing this that they drop from the Navy ships making them Marines, not the Army of the future I was going for.

In the Halo games/books I thought the ODSTs were the most bad-ass fighting force there is, so they are going to get a mention or two.

[kr1]

Ah, alright. I wasn't thinking an Army/Marine difference there, and now that I mention it, you did make the distinction there. Using Delta makes a bit more sense, then.
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[XMixMasterX]

[SYSTEM]