Well everyone seems to be posting there novels. So I figured what the heck I''d post a link to the one I''ve been working on. Zodiac part I For those interested its a cyberpunk story, and I''ve written the first 2 chapters thus far. So any feedback would be helpful. ----------------------------------------------------- Writer, Programer, Cook, I''m a Jack of all Trades Current Design project Chaos Factor Design Document

I liked it; it was a promising if traditional start in the cyberpunk genre. It left me with a few comments/questions, though.

1) It seemed to me that the assumption of the hacker''s persona by the MC was rather faciley handled. Don''t they believe in account passwords in the future? Maybe it was stored as a cookie on Jackal''s machine, though I''d think a renowned hacker would be more security conscious.

2) I think more explanation needs to be given for why the MC is willing to handle such obviously hot merchandise, especially when you mentioned he doesn''t know that much about computers. Maybe he''s always dreamed of becoming a hacker, or perhaps the Undernet itself holds a kind of fascination for him.

3) Sorry to say it, but your description of the MC''s first two jobs makes him sound like a script kiddie (actually it makes all the crackers sound like script kiddies). Maybe this was your intent; he''s just starting out, doesn''t really know what he''s doing and is just playing at the serious occupation of the persona he''s adopted. It would be rather rewarding for him to eventually grow into the role on his own by actually learning some real coding skills.

4) Julia totally comes across as a sort of deus ex machina exposition lady. Why is she being so nice to this helpless n00b? Does she have some kind of hidden agenda, what? If the MC needs that hacking information for plot reasons, he could get it from some other source, like begging or stealing some hacker ed-soft.

5) William Gibson, Neal Stephenson, Tad Williams and probably a bunch of others have all wrestled with trying to justify the sense of the visual metaphors they imagine for their virtual universes, and I''ve never felt like I''ve quite been sold on any of them. I have similar issues with the Undernet, particularly the "junk data" lying around Bin Town. I don''t see how unintentional (and undesirable) entities like that could have visual representations that somebody had to go to some kind of effort to concoct.


Your excerpt is obviously unedited, and that''s OK. When you do go over it again though, here are a couple of things to look for:

1) Most urgently, you need to pick and consistently hold to a single tense. You''re mainly grounded in the past tense (which is all right by me; I''m not too partial to the present tense conceit), but sometimes you veer into the present for a sentence or two.

2) In a similar vein, you occasionally use second person pronouns (eg: "I logged out and the bright lights of the UnderNet where replaced by the dimly lit view of your apartment.")

3) You systematically use "where" for "were", "defiantly" for "definitely" and "manors" for "manners". All good things to fix that a spell check won''t help with.

4) Generally speaking, you need more internal punctuation. Used wisely (and not too often), semicolons will greatly improve the flow of your writing. Also, you use almost no commas! They are most definitely your friend.

Good luck with your writing!

thanks for the feedback I appreciate it and in response to your questions.

1)The idea was that the account was stored on some server off in the undernet, that account is then be linked exlusivly to a piece of hardware in the latus system. All the authoritizion would be handled at a hardware level. Also its fair to assume that a portable latus system is a signficantly rare, valuable and personal commidity and not something a hacker is willing to lend to a friend.

2)hmm, I thought I answered the question when he decided to buy it, but maybe more explenation is needed. The MC sees the latus as their once in a lifetime oppertunity, its the MC big break and chance to improve their qualitiy of life. Addmittly you don''t know much about the MC yet, however that was intentional. I wanted to have the reader learn about the character based on there actions and response to the events of the MC life and not on a breif discription at the start of the book.

3)Yes that was intentional, After all they where the main characters first two jobs it only make sense that the MC would be an amature. It was my intent to have the character''s abilites to develop and improve greatly during the course of the novel as part of the overal plot, and character development.

4)For now Julia is just a seemingly help stranger. Her true motivations and identiy won''t be revealed to much later in the book.

5)Well the junk data is just that pieces of junk data. With a vast network like the internet you have trillions of bytes of data being sent back and forth between computers every second. Sometimes that data gets corrupted or damaged enroute and the recieving computer simply rejects it and new copy is sent. The rejected data is the Junk Data it gathers in matinence node in the undernet until it can be safely deleted. The Junk datas physical form is based on what the data was. If it was a part of picture your dog, the junk might data be a half of a mishapen dogs ear for example.

6)yes, that is a bit of a problem that mainly comes from the fact I orignally wrote in the 2nd person present tense and then decided to switch to 1st person past tense during my first edit.

7)see 6

8)Yes that is another unfortunate problem I have espically since the spell and grammer checker don''t pick them up. I think the main reason for that is the fact that I know what its suppose to say and my brain automatically fixs thoughs errors.

9)I have problems with commas, some times I have a tendcy to create run on sentences, and using them so I''ve over compinsated by trying to eliminate them whenever I see them.

thanks again for your responses

-----------------------------------------------------
Writer, Programer, Cook, I''m a Jack of all Trades
Current Design project
Chaos Factor Design Document

Ouchie... is there any way you could make the text a less violent blue? White might be better... I want to read it over for you but it''s making my eyes hurt too much.

I know I violated the rule of light on dark but I thought it made the next stand out more then black on white. But I understant it might make it difficult to read for some. So I added links to black and white versions on top each page. That should make it easier to read.

-----------------------------------------------------
Writer, Programer, Cook, I'm a Jack of all Trades
Current Design project
Chaos Factor Design Document



[edited by - TechnoGoth on March 5, 2004 1:38:43 PM]

Thanks for the black and white versions, they were a lot more comfortable to read. About the story itself... hmm. Well, I generally like virtual reality stories, they're just something about their archetypal and metaphoric nature that appeals to me. My favorite VR writers would probably be Pat Cadigan and Rudy Rucker, and then of course Tad Williams is cool. A guy named James C. Bassett also wrote a cool VR book called _Living Real_ which is particularly cool because the main character is essentially a computer game designer. Anyway I thought your description of what the VR world is like was pretty cool, especially the symbolic objects like the armbands.

Your main character, though, I was a little puzzled/distressed by. Does he have no caution? If I came into the possession of a dead man's stolen computer, the first thing I would want to do would be to make myself a new user ID and make sure I couldn't be connected to the Jackal identity. It's dangerous to try to play at being a pro if you're really a noob, but your main character doesn't seem to consider this. He doesn't worry about jail, or getting caught, he doesn't even think much about why he wants to take the risk of becoming a hacker, and this is something I feel I really need to know to start understanding and sympathizing with him as a character. What are his motivations, other than having a new toy to play with and a desire to be kool?

[edited by - sunandshadow on March 7, 2004 8:32:27 PM]

Just a thought on point of view. IMO there is a very big difference between different types of novels. While a first person point of view is perfectly suited for a comedic or very emotional main character (who goes on for pages and pages about his/her feelings), action novels tend to benefit from a third person perspective.