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The Shadow Walker - Jacob Carl Novak
#1
I started working on this story about a year and a half ago. I've got a really good outline with a solid story. It is an obvious knock-off, but with far more character, direction and a good conclusion, more than what this story is based on.

It's my first serious attempt at a fictional story, I have the first chapter completed and am well into the second chapter. I have chapter one on line and will put up a new one about each month.

I just wanted some input on things like style, if keeps the reader's interest and makes you want to continue reading. Here is the preface below with a link to the first chapter.


Quote:Preface

    Jacob Carl Novak, investigative journalist, is following a dark path in a quest to find solid evidence that supports his late uncle's unpublished files. Jake loves his uncle's stories and wants desperately to provide a logical conclusion to the unexplained cases. He is interested in facts in his reports, pursues a story where ever it may go and is a rather scruple less character that will do anything to investigate a story he's interested in. Jake will leave his old life behind and come to understand that not every case he investigates has a verifiable explanation. He is joined by a number of interesting characters in his quest for the truth that leads into the deepest darkness.

http://freeholdgv.com/BPPublishing/epres...Index.html

My thanks to anyone who may happen to read it.
#2
(07-11-2022, 03:47 AM)Michigan Swamp Buck Wrote: I started working on this story about a year and a half ago. I've got a really good outline with a solid story. It is an obvious knock-off, but with far more character, direction and a good conclusion, more than what this story is based on.

It's my first serious attempt at a fictional story, I have the first chapter completed and am well into the second chapter. I have chapter one on line and will put up a new one about each month.

I just wanted some input on things like style, if keeps the reader's interest and makes you want to continue reading. Here is the preface below with a link to the first chapter.


Quote:Preface

    Jacob Carl Novak, investigative journalist, is following a dark path in a quest to find solid evidence that supports his late uncle's unpublished files. Jake loves his uncle's stories and wants desperately to provide a logical conclusion to the unexplained cases. He is interested in facts in his reports, pursues a story where ever it may go and is a rather scruple less character that will do anything to investigate a story he's interested in. Jake will leave his old life behind and come to understand that not every case he investigates has a verifiable explanation. He is joined by a number of interesting characters in his quest for the truth that leads into the deepest darkness.

http://freeholdgv.com/BPPublishing/epres...Index.html

My thanks to anyone who may happen to read it.

Just out of curiosity, Is his uncle Carl's last name Kolchak? Was Carl's editor named Tony Vincenzo?

The only suggestion I would make so far is to move from the present tense to the past tense. it makes it sound less like a review and more like a novel if you do that.

Otherwise, sounds good!



.
Diogenes was eating bread and lentils for supper. He was seen by the philosopher Aristippus, who lived comfortably by flattering the king.

Said Aristippus, ‘If you would learn to be subservient to the king you would not have to live on lentils.’ Said Diogenes, ‘Learn to live on lentils and you will not have to be subservient to the king.’


#3
"...He is interested in facts in his reports..."  It may enhance the character for you occasionally do get him bogged-down
with trivia, useless gossip and dead-ends outside of his usual atmosphere. It fleshes him out to show the reader Jacob
he is just like us and has fallibilities.
minusculethumbsup
Edith Head Gives Good Wardrobe. 
#4
(07-11-2022, 05:19 AM)Ninurta Wrote:
(07-11-2022, 03:47 AM)Michigan Swamp Buck Wrote: I started working on this story about a year and a half ago. I've got a really good outline with a solid story. It is an obvious knock-off, but with far more character, direction and a good conclusion, more than what this story is based on.

It's my first serious attempt at a fictional story, I have the first chapter completed and am well into the second chapter. I have chapter one on line and will put up a new one about each month.

I just wanted some input on things like style, if keeps the reader's interest and makes you want to continue reading. Here is the preface below with a link to the first chapter.


Quote:Preface

    Jacob Carl Novak, investigative journalist, is following a dark path in a quest to find solid evidence that supports his late uncle's unpublished files. Jake loves his uncle's stories and wants desperately to provide a logical conclusion to the unexplained cases. He is interested in facts in his reports, pursues a story where ever it may go and is a rather scruple less character that will do anything to investigate a story he's interested in. Jake will leave his old life behind and come to understand that not every case he investigates has a verifiable explanation. He is joined by a number of interesting characters in his quest for the truth that leads into the deepest darkness.

http://freeholdgv.com/BPPublishing/epres...Index.html

My thanks to anyone who may happen to read it.

Just out of curiosity, Is his uncle Carl's last name Kolchak? Was Carl's editor named Tony Vincenzo?

The only suggestion I would make so far is to move from the present tense to the past tense. it makes it sound less like a review and more like a novel if you do that.

Otherwise, sounds good!

Absolutely, this is a knock-off of a sequel  that never happened. The original Kolchak was a fairly shallow character that fell into his stories more less. I want Jacob to be far more complex and driven. As the story progresses, the reader will find that Jake is not looking for monsters and then trying to destroy them, he is just reporting the story and trying to supply provable facts. The editor will be unknown until the end of the story when Jake finally meets him in person.

The past tense and present tense is an issue I had a hard time with. Is that the preface you are referring to, or the whole story in general? My intention is that the story is happening as you read it, so I used present tense though out. There are times past tense is necessary, like when someone is remembering something.

Also, I stick with first person (correction, 3rd person narrative). This is Jake's life and the story is through his eyes. I don't even want to get into what is going on when Jake isn't witnessing it. I want the reader to almost be Jake, that way when Jake has to figure something out or something surprises him, it surprises the reader. I also want to be heavy on Jake's personality and have it color everything with his suspicions and paranoia.

I haven't gotten into mood too much yet. I begin to bring more mood into the story when Jake gets to the family cabin. Action will happen once Jake gets his assignments, and I've have some great story ideas for those. Each chapter and assignment will build upon the next chapter and lead to the ending.

Overall, would you say that the first chapter draws the reader into continued reading? That there is enough interest building to keep the reader wanting more? There is a lot to consider when trying to create a good story.

Thanks for your reply.
#5
(07-11-2022, 10:32 AM)BIAD Wrote: "...He is interested in facts in his reports..."  It may enhance the character for you occasionally do get him bogged-down
with trivia, useless gossip and dead-ends outside of his usual atmosphere. It fleshes him out to show the reader Jacob
he is just like us and has fallibilities.
minusculethumbsup

Most certainly, we can't have him gain ground without a struggle. Also, Jake is seriously flawed in a number of ways, but he wouldn't be so focused on his mission to validate his late uncle's work if he was just a normal guy. Dead ends will cause some good tension with Jake by re-enforcing his rational mind until the unexplained happens and he can't resolve that with the evidence. In fact, his first encounter with the paranormal is a dead end that supports his skepticism. It will take a particularly strange event to get him to begin to believe that some things are beyond reasonable explanation.

I want to get into my other character's personalities and the way they influence Jake as well. That could be tough if I'm only using Jake's perspective to flesh those characters out. However, though their actions and words, I should be able to get the reader to see what those characters are all about. Spoiler, not many of those characters are making it past one chapter. That will be tricky as well, to build up a character, make them interesting and then kill them off.
#6
My apologies. I have to confess, I'd been drinking a bit last night when I read it, and failed to realize that I had only read the intro and first page - I didn't realize there was more when I thought "Well. Short first chapter".

I'm going back to re-read it, the whole thing this time, and will keep your comments and explanation in mind when I do.

Then I'll be back with any comments I may have.

-----

I've always had trouble with "person". I've always thought first person ran as "I picked up the hammer and nailed the coffin lid down with some vehemence" and third person ran as "Walter picked up the hammer and nailed the coffin lid down with some vehemence", and have never been sure just what second person was, maybe "He picked up the hammer and nailed the coffin lid down with some vehemence."

Another thing I've never gotten down pat is diagramming a sentence. I don't know the intricacies of what the different sorts of words are called, nor the rules of how they are used. I've been reading since I was 3 years old (started by reading road signs on the roads - we traveled a lot), and learned to write by reading what other folks had written. As a result of that, I more or less internalized sentence structure without ever learning what the parts are called or what the rules are for stringing them together.

Because of that, my comments may be something less than entirely helpful.

.
Diogenes was eating bread and lentils for supper. He was seen by the philosopher Aristippus, who lived comfortably by flattering the king.

Said Aristippus, ‘If you would learn to be subservient to the king you would not have to live on lentils.’ Said Diogenes, ‘Learn to live on lentils and you will not have to be subservient to the king.’


#7
(07-11-2022, 05:06 PM)Ninurta Wrote: My apologies. I have to confess, I'd been drinking a bit last night when I read it, and failed to realize that I had only read the intro and first page - I didn't realize there was more when I thought "Well. Short first chapter".

I'm going back to re-read it, the whole thing this time, and will keep your comments and explanation in mind when I do.

Then I'll be back with any comments I may have.

-----

I've always had trouble with "person". I've always thought first person ran as "I picked up the hammer and nailed the coffin lid down with some vehemence" and third person ran as "Walter picked up the hammer and nailed the coffin lid down with some vehemence", and have never been sure just what second person was, maybe "He picked up the hammer and nailed the coffin lid down with some vehemence."

Another thing I've never gotten down pat is diagramming a sentence. I don't know the intricacies of what the different sorts of words are called, nor the rules of how they are used. I've been reading since I was 3 years old (started by reading road signs on the roads - we traveled a lot), and learned to write by reading what other folks had written. As a result of that, I more or less internalized sentence structure without ever learning what the parts are called or what the rules are for stringing them together.

Because of that, my comments may be something less than entirely helpful.

I did poorly with English classes, but some things were drilled into me. You are helpful, you caused me to, once again, read through the whole first chapter and make even more corrections. The thing is, since I wrote it, I expect and read it the way I thought I wrote it, until I find silly misspellings after the one millionth time I've re-read it. Plus keeping the story in present tense is really difficult for me. I'm used to telling a story after the fact, not in the now as it is happening as I'm trying to do here.

First, second and third person is tricky, maybe I'm using the wrong terms here.

Quote:first person

noun
  1. The grammatical category of forms that designate a speaker or writer referring to himself or herself. Examples of forms in the first person include English pronouns such as I and we and verb forms such as Spanish hablo “I speak.”
  2. A discourse or literary style in which the narrator recounts his or her own experiences or impressions using such forms.
  3. A perspective in a video or computer game that shows only what a character would see.
Quote:Third Person Narrative. A third-person narrative is a story told using the pronouns "he," "she," "it," or "they" or using nouns. In other words, the story is not told from a personal perspective. A third-person narrative contrasts with a first-person narrative, which is a story told from a personal perspective using the pronoun "I" (and sometimes "we").

Looks like I'm using a 3rd person narrative.
#8
Ok, I re-read it, the whole thing this time. I do believe it has enough buildup and intrigue to keep the reader coming back for more There seem to be some technical issues that I can't quite put my finger on, but those are just technical issues that can be ironed out - it's why writers have proof-readers, after all. They check for spelling, grammar, and sentence flow while the author provides the story line, details, and flesh-out.

I have a personal friend who is a professional author, Franklin Horton, We met when we both worked at a radio station, and then we attended Virginia Intermont College together for a bit, before I got kicked out of there. he went on to study at yet another college, Virginia Commonwealth University I think, but am not sure, and the entire time his educational focus was on writing.

Franklin has written several series, mostly post-apocalyptic in nature, and to this day he still employs proofreaders before releasing his novels. He has one at the proof reader right now as a matter of fact, book 10 I believe in his "Borrowed World" series. So even the professionals make use of proof readers so that they can concentrate on creative flow.

You definitely have the "hook", the story line to draw the reader in and keep them coming with this tale. Maybe it could stand a little polish, but that doesn't detract from the story line at all.

I've read all of Franlkin's books in about 3 of his series - "The Borrowed World", "The Mad Mick", and "The Way of Dan". One thing I have noticed over time in those series is that the more he writes, the better his flow becomes. Practice makes perfect, even for the educated and polished, so keep on writing regardless of critics! Let the technical folks handle the technical details - as the author, your main job is to provide the story line and the hooks, the twists and the turns. Everything else is just technical details.

.
Diogenes was eating bread and lentils for supper. He was seen by the philosopher Aristippus, who lived comfortably by flattering the king.

Said Aristippus, ‘If you would learn to be subservient to the king you would not have to live on lentils.’ Said Diogenes, ‘Learn to live on lentils and you will not have to be subservient to the king.’


#9
(07-11-2022, 06:20 PM)Ninurta Wrote: Ok, I re-read it, the whole thing this time. I do believe it has enough buildup and intrigue to keep the reader coming back for more There seem to be some technical issues that I can't quite put my finger on, but those are just technical issues that can be ironed out - it's why writers have proof-readers, after all. They check for spelling, grammar, and sentence flow while the author provides the story line, details, and flesh-out.

I have a personal friend who is a professional author, Franklin Horton, We met when we both worked at a radio station, and then we attended Virginia Intermont College together for a bit, before I got kicked out of there. he went on to study at yet another college, Virginia Commonwealth University I think, but am not sure, and the entire time his educational focus was on writing.

Franklin has written several series, mostly post-apocalyptic in nature, and to this day he still employs proofreaders before releasing his novels. He has one at the proof reader right now as a matter of fact, book 10 I believe in his "Borrowed World" series. So even the professionals make use of proof readers so that they can concentrate on creative flow.

You definitely have the "hook", the story line to draw the reader in and keep them coming with this tale. Maybe it could stand a little polish, but that doesn't detract from the story line at all.

I've read all of Franlkin's books in about 3 of his series - "The Borrowed World", "The Mad Mick", and "The Way of Dan". One thing I have noticed over time in those series is that the more he writes, the better his flow becomes. Practice makes perfect, even for the educated and polished, so keep on writing regardless of critics! Let the technical folks handle the technical details - as the author, your main job is to provide the story line and the hooks, the twists and the turns. Everything else is just technical details.

.

Thanks, and glad that the web address worked. I found out just now that I needed to change the file name where the story is located otherwise Firefox was the only browser that would find and display it for me.

Here is the new address (I fixed it in the first post as well).

http://freeholdgv.com/BPPublishing/epres...Index.html

Also, I was wondering about the page formatting, if that works well as a page by page book format.
#10
(07-11-2022, 05:31 PM)Michigan Swamp Buck Wrote: I did poorly with English classes, but some things were drilled into me. You are helpful, you caused me to, once again, read through the whole first chapter and make even more corrections. The thing is, since I wrote it, I expect and read it the way I thought I wrote it, until I find silly misspellings after the one millionth time I've re-read it. Plus keeping the story in present tense is really difficult for me. I'm used to telling a story after the fact, not in the now as it is happening as I'm trying to do here.

"After the fact" is the most natural way of telling a story, and the one most often used by story tellers since time immemorial. Breaking that habit is tough, as it seems to be more or less ingrained in the human psyche, and so requires a lot of conscious effort to overcome.

That e-book I put together about the alien signal hoax years ago was a monumental labor of love, but the way I went about it was exhausting. To this day, I have still never read the entire thing back through. I spent about 10 hours a day, 7 days a week, for two months straight doing the research and writing it, and at the end of that time I didn't even want to look at it any more. It's only recently, like the past few days, that I have even considered trying to read it through. Reviews are generally pretty positive on it, and based on recent research, it has found itself into dark corners of the internet I never suspected that it would. People actually seem to have benefited from it, and that gives me all the satisfaction I need to justify the herculean effort that went into it.

My advice from that experience is to not immerse yourself so deeply into the writing that you wear yourself out with it. It should be fun, and creative, and that comes only as it comes - forcing it would be a mistake.

As another example, I took a single "creative writing" class under Robert Gingrich when I was studying physics and astronomy at the University of North Carolina. One of the assignments for that class was to write a story with the theme of "home". so I wrote "Warpaint" and turned it in. When Gingrich graded it, I got an "A", but with the comment of "horrifying". Since I originally wrote it, that short story has gone through over 30 revisions in almost as many years.

Some stories are NEVER completely finished and polished to our satisfaction, and that is something the author has to wrestle with on his own.

.
Diogenes was eating bread and lentils for supper. He was seen by the philosopher Aristippus, who lived comfortably by flattering the king.

Said Aristippus, ‘If you would learn to be subservient to the king you would not have to live on lentils.’ Said Diogenes, ‘Learn to live on lentils and you will not have to be subservient to the king.’


#11
Ah yes, the creative methods one can use and the burn out of writing. The muse must tickle and tease me to get me going. I've found that listening to music and drinking beer late at night is a pretty good motivator. Also, once you get going, the story begins to write itself and the characters take on a life of their own.

Most of this story is based on my research into myths, urban legends and conspiracy theories, but much of it is also based on personal experience. The music I find most inspiring is late 80s to 90s alternative rock with some old off the wall classics mixed in. When I get into some of the next chapters this may become apparent.

I must admit that the dark subject matter I've been exploring has had it's effects on my personal life. Just the other night I was having nightmares while talking in my sleep and sleep walking. I was apparently very upset and fighting with something. These things very rarely happen to me.
#12
(07-11-2022, 06:54 PM)Michigan Swamp Buck Wrote: Ah yes, the creative methods one can use and the burn out of writing. The muse must tickle and tease me to get me going. I've found that listening to music and drinking beer late at night is a pretty good motivator. Also, once you get going, the story begins to write itself and the characters take on a life of their own.

Most of this story is based on my research into myths, urban legends and conspiracy theories, but much of it is also based on personal experience. The music I find most inspiring is late 80s to 90s alternative rock with some old off the wall classics mixed in. When I get into some of the next chapters this may become apparent.

I must admit that the dark subject matter I've been exploring has had it's effects on my personal life. Just the other night I was having nightmares while talking in my sleep and sleep walking. I was apparently very upset and fighting with something. These things very rarely happen to me.

Personal experience is the wellspring for many a tale. Folks often write about what they are most familiar with.  In Franklin's case, two of those 3 series are set in the same "universe", which coincidentally enough happens to be located right here in this area. Most of his characters are inspired by folks he knows. I was his inspiration for the "Hugh" character in the Borrowed World series.

He recently did a crossover between the two series, and in that crossover Hugh seems to be on the verge of developing a relationship with a truly scary woman from the other series. I got curious about that, and asked Franklin if he was planning on swapping Hugh back and forth between the series, due to the reception of his crossover novel and the fact that Hugh was developing an interest in a character from the other series, but his reply indicated that the crossover work was such a tremendous pain in the ass that he might never do another crossover installment.

I understand how the research can take a toll. I recently stumbled across an old legend from this general area regarding "feral people", also known as "wild men", "wild hillbillies" and sometimes just "hillbillies" in certain areas. Think "Wrong Turn" or "The Hills Have Eyes", but less civilized. Some folks say that some families went feral during the Depression, and others claim they are the remnants of Civil War deserters. In any event, they're pretty damned scary folks who mostly go naked, live in caves and rock shelters, don't mind the occasional bout of cannibalism, and who sometimes actively hunt people.

After absorbing all that information, for several days I could not walk past an open window without getting the willies even though I was indoors.

.
Diogenes was eating bread and lentils for supper. He was seen by the philosopher Aristippus, who lived comfortably by flattering the king.

Said Aristippus, ‘If you would learn to be subservient to the king you would not have to live on lentils.’ Said Diogenes, ‘Learn to live on lentils and you will not have to be subservient to the king.’


#13
I haven't looked into "feral people" before, however, it appears that there are many reports of feral children living in the wild with animals. They seem to be found mostly with wolves or feral dogs, but have been found with bears and monkeys as well.

People can go feral, but they are individuals that go missing at an early age, from a few years old to around 9 years old. Most are caught before they have matured to adulthood, or are seen for awhile and never caught. All the believable reports I've read have them running on all fours and eatting only raw foods they catch or forage for.

It is apparent that based on these stories that people can become entirely wild and survive into adulthood. They have no language and act like the animals that adopted them.

https://mysteriousuniverse.org/2016/10/w...al-humans/

It reminds me of a western movie I have called "Bone Tomahawk". Man is that movie a trip.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bone_Tomahawk


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