Blurb
In Gardian, the stars decide everything — and the Scorpio-born are feared most of all. When ancient prophecies awaken, seventeen-year-old Aria discovers forbidden power and is thrust into a conflict she never wanted. As enemies close in, she must uncover the truth behind the zodiac-ruled unions before destiny claims her for good.
Original (First 500)
Someone had re-written the history of Conviction Woods, the cursed forest I called home. Despite all the texts describing Conviction Woods as eternally inhabitable, there were hundreds of wartime artifacts scattered amongst the forest's grounds. The records had been altered to hide the truth of Gardian's last war, a truth that allowed the Woods to protect those mysteriously meant to survive beyond its boundaries.
I lingered on the edge of the farthest northern reach of Conviction Woods. Before me stood a crumbled and dilapidated stone arch, old runic etched across its surface, worn away by the structure returning to the earth. A few fallen stones lay scattered across the surrounding ground, freezing into the dirt as ancient remnants conjoined with snow and soil. Beyond the arch's gaping mouth laid Assiduous's barren territory.
Assiduous's barren territory, and its occupants who didn't want me meandering on their land. It was too late for me to trace the rest of the runic on the arch. I'd only recorded the lower carvings, my arms too short to reach the tallest stones. I let my eyes linger on the writing to try to memorize the patterns. The clock ticked as enemies neared, and while my feet drew me away from the arch, my mind bent around the writing.
The arch's inscriptions must've been centuries old. I'd never, in any of my studies, seen a combination of Union languages on an artifact. Mixing two Union languages was almost unfathomable to modern-day society; besides our common tongue, Gardian prioritized the separation of the four Unions -- Conviction, Assisuous, Autarchic, Societal -- in their own societies and territories. Even more intriguing, the arch dated back to a war where Conviction and Assiduous were enemies; a combination of the two languages was further proof that Gardian's recorded history was wrong.
I had spent months scouring over records, libraries, and books to pinpoint the location of the arch as soon as I spotted it mentioned in a 300-year-old document. My research eventually revealed that the arch was placed in Assidian territory on the edges of the Woods at the border, though that could've spanned hundreds of miles from the eastern part of the Hub, Gardian's shared centralized city, to the coastline of the continent. To trace the steps of ancient battles to the coordinates of the arch was a tedious process requiring my nose to be stuck in at least two dozen scrolls within the past couple of months.
Deciphering the runic on the arch was my next step to decoding the true history of Conviction Woods, and the moment I finally found it, an Assidian border patrol just had to be there -- of course.
There was no doubt about it. The two of them had spotted me. I'd stepped past the 10-foot-wide path into Assidian territory where the arch stood, and they were headed straight toward me.
I backed up to Conviction Woods, safely passing beyond the aura of protection set on the trees.
Someone had re-written the history of Conviction Woods, the cursed forest I called home. Despite all the texts describing Conviction Woods as eternally inhabitable, there were hundreds of wartime artifacts scattered amongst the forest's grounds. The records had been altered to hide the truth of Gardian's last war, a truth that allowed the Woods to protect those mysteriously meant to survive beyond its boundaries.
I lingered on the edge of the farthest northern reach of Conviction Woods. Before me stood a crumbled and dilapidated stone arch, old runic etched across its surface, worn away by the structure returning to the earth. A few fallen stones lay scattered across the surrounding ground, freezing into the dirt as ancient remnants conjoined with snow and soil. Beyond the arch's gaping mouth laid Assiduous's barren territory.
Assiduous's barren territory, and its occupants who didn't want me meandering on their land. It was too late for me to trace the rest of the runic on the arch. I'd only recorded the lower carvings, my arms too short to reach the tallest stones. I let my eyes linger on the writing to try to memorize the patterns. The clock ticked as enemies neared, and while my feet drew me away from the arch, my mind bent around the writing.
The arch's inscriptions must've been centuries old. I'd never, in any of my studies, seen a combination of Union languages on an artifact. Mixing two Union languages was almost unfathomable to modern-day society; besides our common tongue, Gardian prioritized the separation of the four Unions -- Conviction, Assisuous, Autarchic, Societal -- in their own societies and territories. Even more intriguing, the arch dated back to a war where Conviction and Assiduous were enemies; a combination of the two languages was further proof that Gardian's recorded history was wrong.
I had spent months scouring over records, libraries, and books to pinpoint the location of the arch as soon as I spotted it mentioned in a 300-year-old document. My research eventually revealed that the arch was placed in Assidian territory on the edges of the Woods at the border, though that could've spanned hundreds of miles from the eastern part of the Hub, Gardian's shared centralized city, to the coastline of the continent. To trace the steps of ancient battles to the coordinates of the arch was a tedious process requiring my nose to be stuck in at least two dozen scrolls within the past couple of months.
Deciphering the runic on the arch was my next step to decoding the true history of Conviction Woods, and the moment I finally found it, an Assidian border patrol just had to be there -- of course.
There was no doubt about it. The two of them had spotted me. I'd stepped past the 10-foot-wide path into Assidian territory where the arch stood, and they were headed straight toward me.
I backed up to Conviction Woods, safely passing beyond the aura of protection set on the trees.
My Edit
Before me stood the crumbled, dilapidated stone arch, runes etched across its surface. Had they been carved any less deeply—or had another decade passed—the inscriptions would have vanished entirely. Fallen stones lay scattered across the ground, freezing into the dirt and snow.
It was technically only ten steps into Assidian territory, but if I was caught here, I’d be killed. That said, this far out, the guards weren’t especially vigilant. When they'd come around, once every four hours, their laughter drifted from beneath their face guards, loud and careless. It almost made them seem human.
Three days ago, I had started with charcoal rubbings; that should have given me the most accurate record. But the carvings were too worn, the impressions too soft. With half a day gone, I'd had nothing but smudged ghosts on parchment. With the ink in my bottle frozen solid, I'd switched to graphite, copying each rune by hand.
The longer I stayed here, the more likely I was to get complacent and forget to keep an eye out for the guards, or get too cold to concentrate and miss a detail that would ruin the translation. But I also knew I'd make more mistakes if I rushed.
Snow and frost building up on the runes, and the changing shadows as each day progressed didn't help. Sometimes, it felt like the runes themselves were changing, in protest against being recorded.
I was checking my work -- again -- when a shout split the silence. My head snapped up. Two guards were running toward me. I shoved the parchment and graphite into my satchel and tried to stand and run at the same time. Muscles frozen from the cold made me clumsy as I fled.
Just as I made it into the woods, I stumbled over a tree root, dropping my satchel. Graphite and parchment tumbled across the snow.
I lie there, sprawled at the base of the tree that had tripped me. The guards came to a stop at the edge of the forest. But they couldn't see me. The aura of protection around Conviction Woods was supposed to kill anyone who crossed its boundaries. I didn't know why I was safe within it, but I was grateful even as I cursed my foolishness. Now that I'd been spotted, the archway would be guarded more carefully. Would I even be able to complete copying the runes?
(Original word count: ~498 → Edited: ~400)
Before me stood the crumbled, dilapidated stone arch, runes etched across its surface. Had they been carved any less deeply—or had another decade passed—the inscriptions would have vanished entirely. Fallen stones lay scattered across the ground, freezing into the dirt and snow.
It was technically only ten steps into Assidian territory, but if I was caught here, I’d be killed. That said, this far out, the guards weren’t especially vigilant. When they'd come around, once every four hours, their laughter drifted from beneath their face guards, loud and careless. It almost made them seem human.
Three days ago, I had started with charcoal rubbings; that should have given me the most accurate record. But the carvings were too worn, the impressions too soft. With half a day gone, I'd had nothing but smudged ghosts on parchment. With the ink in my bottle frozen solid, I'd switched to graphite, copying each rune by hand.
The longer I stayed here, the more likely I was to get complacent and forget to keep an eye out for the guards, or get too cold to concentrate and miss a detail that would ruin the translation. But I also knew I'd make more mistakes if I rushed.
Snow and frost building up on the runes, and the changing shadows as each day progressed didn't help. Sometimes, it felt like the runes themselves were changing, in protest against being recorded.
I was checking my work -- again -- when a shout split the silence. My head snapped up. Two guards were running toward me. I shoved the parchment and graphite into my satchel and tried to stand and run at the same time. Muscles frozen from the cold made me clumsy as I fled.
Just as I made it into the woods, I stumbled over a tree root, dropping my satchel. Graphite and parchment tumbled across the snow.
I lie there, sprawled at the base of the tree that had tripped me. The guards came to a stop at the edge of the forest. But they couldn't see me. The aura of protection around Conviction Woods was supposed to kill anyone who crossed its boundaries. I didn't know why I was safe within it, but I was grateful even as I cursed my foolishness. Now that I'd been spotted, the archway would be guarded more carefully. Would I even be able to complete copying the runes?
(Original word count: ~498 → Edited: ~400)
Critique
The thing that intrigued me about this story was the controversy over the author, so I didn't find this story organically. Still a fantasy story about a teenage girl and prophecies sounds right up my ally, so I wanted to check it out.Setting
We have two settings, side-by-side, an ancient, crumbling arch covered in runes set in enemy territory, and a magical forest. These are both great settings, but the way the original blurb introduces them is a bit confusing. In my edit, I introduce the Assidian arches first, because that's where the action of the scene takes place, and I wait until the end of the excerpt to introduce Conviction Woods.Before me stood a crumbled and dilapidated stone arch, old runic etched across its surface, worn away by the structure returning to the earth. A few fallen stones lay scattered across the surrounding ground, freezing into the dirt as ancient remnants conjoined with snow and soil. Beyond the arch's gaping mouth laid Assiduous's barren territory.
Characterization
Characterization is about the contradictions that people are made up of. Like, surly but gentle, funny but mean, charming but stingy, that sort of thing. And only two characteristics, even opposing ones, will still make the character feel only two dimensional, but that's fine for an intro. As we get to know the characters, we can explore all of the facets of their personalities, but lets start with at least two.
In the original excerpt, there are zero characteristics of our main character. If we wanted to stretch, we could say they are studious, but we have no sense of if the narrating character is bragging about how much studying they've done, or complaining. If they were doing either, that would make the character more interesting.
Actually, I'm being unfair. We have this passage: Deciphering the runic on the arch was my next step to decoding the true history of Conviction Woods, and the moment I finally found it, an Assidian border patrol just had to be there -- of course. This is is a nice bit of ironic inner dialogue, but it comes toward the end of the 500 words, so it's basically drowned in infodump. I didn't keep it in my version because I feel like it undercuts the drama of the situation. If the narrating character is scared enough to run at sight of the guards, then they're too busy for snarky inner narration. The exception would be if this was the character's voice throughout, but it's not. The exposition to this point is pretty straightforward, with a slight bent toward poetry when describing the setting.
As for the guards, they do have distinct personalities, but not until after the first 500 words. Like with most novels by first-time authors, most of the first 500 words could be deleted or distilled down to a sentence or two, as the story gets a lot more flavor once the characters start interacting with each other. But we're dissecting the first 500 words, so here we are.
In my version, I added this paragraph:
It was technically only ten steps into Assidian territory, but if I was caught here, I’d be killed. That said, this far out, the guards weren’t especially vigilant. When they'd come around, once every four hours, their laughter drifted from beneath their face guards, loud and careless. It almost made them seem human.
This is pretty bare bones characterization, but what we get is someone who is willing to risk their life, and who thinks of the Assidians as less than human. I have no idea if this is true to the actual story because we get this vague wording about being on Assidian territory ("its occupants...didn't want me meandering on their land") and absolutely nothing about the guards, not even a short description.
Conflict/Tension
We have hints that what the narrating character is doing is important, like the amount of research they've done, a war that was covered up, and ancient arches with mysterious runes that need to be translated. But the tension is undercut with words like "lingered" and "meandering" and also with the suggestion that the character isn't even trying to get the full imprint of the arch runes -- like, they're only getting impressions of the ones they can reach.
In my version, I have the attempt at rubbing not work with the excuse that the etchings are so old that the rubbings aren't really showing up, but mostly because I didn't want to have to address the idea that the character wasn't even going to try to copy down the ones they couldn't reach -- just memorize them. Also, there's a sense that they don't have time to copy them down, but no reason why. Like, the woods are ten steps away, so the character can disappear and come back any time guards aren't present, so why is the character just trying to memorize them? Is the "ticking clock" referring to a different deadline, maybe a prophecy-related one?
Final Thoughts
For me, the only sin that an excerpt of the first 500 words of novel that can't be forgiven is a lack of conflict/tension. We always have time to fill in a sketched out setting and characterization, but stakes need to be clear. They don't always have to be life or death, but they have to feel important to the character. The biggest failure of the first 500 words of this story is that the author is trying to hint at urgency but continually undercuts herself by spending too much time on lore and using vague language to hint at danger.
That said, none of the sins in this excerpt are unfixable. Honestly, if we started the story at the end of this first 500 words, the next 500 wouldn't be perfect, but they'd be a lot more interesting way to start a story. Also, none of the sins of this writing is unexpected or unusual in a first-time author. Some of the other critiques on this blog are of excerpts from the second 500 words, for that reason.
Starting a story like this is like the author popping in to promise that this is going to be an interesting story, but not wanting to spoil anything. It's the move that a lot of insecure authors do (I have to fight the urge myself), but it's not one that should make it to publication if you have a good editor.
From my understanding, Audra Winter had hyped up her novel on TikTok, talking about how she'd been working on it for ten years. People who don't know anything about writing would naturally assume that the writing after that amount of time would be amazing. Someone like me, who has been working on certain stories for three times longer than that, know better.
To be fair to Audra, I don't think she was trying to trick people into thinking her writing was better than it was. I think that she was genuinely excited about her book and thought that her writing was excellent. She knew her world and her characters so well that she didn't understand that the translation from her brain to the written word wasn't happening as smoothly as she thought.
Editing is a different skill from writing. And yes, good writers can also edit their books, but generally only after having had really good editors work on their first several books -- or, at least, the author having studied editing separately from writing.
I'd bet that there's an excellent story buried in a lot of direction-less writing, and I'm glad that she seems to have a good editor helping her dig it out. And, actually, seeing that Audra is trying to fix the story says a lot about her sincerity. A lot of people who get criticism about their writing will just decide that the critics are just jealous and double down on how good their writing is.
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