Hi Ayn

I’ve had a look at your story so far. I believe this is a first draft. Normally, an editor would not see a text at such an early point in its journey. However, I am delighted to give you a few comments and pointers which you might find helpful. Please bear in mind, though, that these are only suggestions. You, as the writer, have the final say!

General comments I like your plot so far. It’s exciting and you’ve established Nex’s vulnerability so that the reader has something to sympathise with and root for. Also, this ‘virus’ is interesting. However, I find the arch-president’s world clichéd (very ‘last decadent days of Rome’) and I hope you will be creating some interesting shades of grey for this part of the story.

Do you want to differentiate telepathic communication in some way? e.g. italics?

Avoid overuse of ‘…’ Technically, this indicates a trail-off of speech/thought. It can be used in prose but is often used incorrectly, so do ask yourself whether a full stop would suffice.

Use what is called an em-dash to indicate interrupted speech, i.e. —(e.g. see page 6 where one should be used where the arch-president interrupts his wife.‘Isn’t it the anniversary of— )(If you are using Word, this is in Symbol/Special Characters.)

I like the ‘scene setting’ e.g. ‘Beyond the walls of the metropolis, in the waste lands…’ I think this works well (and the … is fine here!)

It is a bit early to do a copy edit (i.e. a mark-up of the manuscript for grammar/spelling etc). However, I’ve gone through as I normally would so you can see what’s involved. Consequently, as this is a first draft, there is lots of red! Don’t let that bother you, as normally you would have worked on the manuscript for longer and would have had a more ‘proof level’ copy ready. From my experience, there were chunks were the writing needed an overhaul, but also chunks where it really flowed and was good. These are both symptomatic of the first draft, where the writer is ‘doing the groundwork’, some aspects coming easier than others.

In that light, I hope you find my mark-up useful, but I am sure you would have been doing some re-writing regardless, so some of the details I’ve suggested will become redundant anyway.

Comments on specific points

My strongest impression is that the story really took off at the bottom of page 2. It was at this point that the writing suddenly took on a lot more immediacy. Up until then, I felt the reader had been kept at a distance as a result of the language, which sometimes lacked pace. e.g. the opening paragraph could draw the reader in more:

‘The soldier stalked from room to room, his face static, his finger resting easily on a trigger which required only the slightest pressure to extinguish life. Before

him, leading the way through the deserted apartment block, a woman walked, clad in a worn combat jumpsuit. Occasionally she would stop.’

What I have suggested here is the removal of ‘brooding’ (which is a ‘tell’ rather than a ‘show’ – let the character’s actions suggest his mood) and moved ‘deserted apartment block’ to a point where it didn’t slow down the pace.

I have suggested using Nex’s name earlier to establish who this character is (which also helps to avoid confusion with names later).

‘upon a single gesture’ – it was unclear to me what you meant here. His gesture? Her gesture? I think probably you mean ‘upon her single gesture’.

Para 5 – minds or brains? Deceased or corpses? If you are trying to establish the horror and graphic brutality of this scene I’d stick with ‘corpses’. (‘Deceased’ is more of a police term and dispassionate.)

Para 7 – again, this seemed distant, drawing the reader out. Consider:

‘Do you enjoy this?’ [Good, by the way! Suggests conflict/tension between Nex and the medium.]

The medium’s words resounded in his mind, drawing his attention away from the carnage. He turned to regard her.

‘There hasn’t been a single case of the virus in years,’ she added.Nex glanced back at the destruction and the blood-red sky, then spat on the

ground, hoisted his rifle across his shoulders and slowly turned to follow the rest of the mercenaries.

He left the medium’s question unanswered.’

Directly after this paragraph you seem to have a narrative break, where Nex catches up with the troops a few miles away and what seems like some time later. Do you want to consider placing an asterisk or narrative break before this para?

Bottom of page 2 is very good! We feel his alarm. As I said above, I feel this is where your writing starts to come alive.

Page 4 – ‘Can’t be a relation of mine!’ Boland scoffed. ‘Beast hasn’t got my good looks and charm!’ He laughed.

Who laughed? Boland or Nex? The position of ‘He laughed’ suggests Boland, but because your very next paragraph is straight with Tairrie, recognising the act for what it was – false – this actually suggests it was Nex who laughed. If that’s the case, ‘Nex laughed’ should be set on a line by itself.

If it’s not the case, then Tairrie’s observation is a bit of a non-sequitur and you need to solve it by giving her something to comment on, e.g.

‘Can’t be a relation of mine!’ Boland scoffed. ‘Beast hasn’t got my good looks and charm!’ He laughed, Nex joining in with a loud guffaw.

This then flows on to Tairrie’s observation, which though in the main is okay, kind of contradicts itself, in that if he’s acting normally, why would she notice a change in his behaviour, such as spitting less? Perhaps it’s more the case that Nex’s way to deal with being on edge is in fact to over-compensate, to become more of the Commander his men expect, louder, more secure – in effect, larger than life. Perhaps this is the act he has perfected from the years of lies.

On to the metropolis…

‘The housekeeper … an elite’s career’. This sounds very much like a first attempt at getting all the writer’s thoughts down on the page, rather than being in the mind of the arch-president-general. Suggest something more along the lines of:

‘The housekeeper would have to be eliminated, of course, in the name of national security. It was a shame, but she could easily be replaced. He still wondered at the poor’s mistaken belief that somehow, through their willing – or even unwilling – sexual self-degradation, their lives would be elevated, when in fact it practically guaranteed their doom. No risk of a scandal could ever mark an elite’s career.’

He can comment on other aspects later. It just seemed a bit too crammed in all at once, to me.

Page 7 – ‘I can do the math.’Very American, and also very dated if this story is set somewhere in the near/far future? Could he simply say ‘I know how many people live there!’ which would also establish we are talking about people and how uncaring he is of that fact.

Well, Ayn, you have certainly got the beginnings of an exciting story. You now need to rewrite this opening section for flow, but I would advise don’t spend too much time on it. Move ahead with the story, carry on developing character and plot. Some writers edit as they go; others prefer to write chunks and then edit; others will write the entire manuscript and then edit. Some writers work with a detailed outline, others with only a sketchy one, some with none at all. And I have heard some writers say they start off with an outline and end up not following it! Everyone is different. The main thing is to keep writing.

Good luck with the rest of it!