First workshop

[Anne Marie]

The mallet was the only sound in the otherwise quiet workshop. The rise and fall of the wooden hammer contrasted against the noise of heavy rainfall striking the cobblestones outside. Where I stood in the front room, watching the craftsman finish my commissioned piece, the light from the burning candles threw the artisan’s shadow into a twisting monstrosity on the back wall. A trick from the multiple light sources or, far more likely, the witching sight showed me the true measure of the frail man hunched over his work.

“It’s almost done,” his dry voice rasped, stirring the fine wood shavings across the work table. With a gnarled hand he beckons me over to view his handiwork. “To your specifications, I believe?”

He passed the puppet into my hands, its ball-jointed limbs clattering like dried bones. I held the toy doll carefully, my eyes roving over the well-carved limbs and slender body. I inhaled sharply when I saw the curve of the face. “It should be more sharply defined,” I snapped. “Here and here.” The chin and cheekbones; they did not measure true to my memory.

“Begging your pardon, but I worked this piece to the exact details you provided.” The craftsman took the notes he had carefully worked from and thrust them into my face. “Whatever you see, it’s in your mind. I’ve worked my trade for years. Never once has anyone complained about the skill of my artistry.”

“I am not just anyone,” I growled in return, knocking his arm aside. He smelled of Death, a side-effect to his trade. His gargoyle of a shadow curled back on itself when I looked up, then stilled to what is should affect itself to be.

“Payment,” he hissed, his moss-coloured eyes alight at the prospect of money.

“Indeed,” I replied, carefully placing the puppet back down. Its glass eyes, the amber of the irises a faithful translation from the actual model, gazed blankly at the dark ceiling. The rain drummed harder on the roof, a quickening rhythm where all noise was lost under it. I sifted through my drawstring purse for the necessary coins.

“I admit to being curious about this commission,” the old man mused, readily accepting the silver pieces. Inquisitiveness, like his age, got the better of him. Wrinkles marred his face and age spots blemished his skin. Unlike the puppet, alabaster white. Pristine. Utterly perfect. “What is this for?”

I grinned wickedly, picking up the puppet once more. “What do you know of soul transference?”

[Nomad]

Kellen Rhymes!

With Smellen! As in: Kellen smellen bad!

Thanks AM.

The opening is very deliberate, borrowed from another would be author. Anybody care to provide who that might be?

As to brightly blazing, the alliteration it provides, I like. Its a bit like coals glowing sullenly, just a little adjverb to describe the verb bettter. The fire is blazing, it is doing so brightly. This is the purpose of adverbs.

I missed shadows, the other 2 were the ones I was refering to.

Person's it is indeed.

[Nomad]

The mallet was the only sound in the otherwise quiet workshop. The rise and fall of the wooden hammer contrasted against the noise of heavy rainfall striking the cobblestones outside. Where I stood in the front room, watching the craftsman finish my commissioned piece, the light from the burning candles threw the artisan’s shadow into a twisting monstrosity on the back wall. A trick from the multiple light sources or, far more likely, the witching sight showed me the true measure of the frail man hunched over his work.

“It’s almost done,” his dry voice rasped, stirring the fine wood shavings across the work table. With a gnarled hand he beckons me over to view his handiwork. “To your specifications, I believe?”

He passes the puppet into my hands, its ball-jointed limbs clattering like dried bones. I hold the toy doll carefully, my eyes roving over the well-carved limbs and slender body. I inhale sharply when I look at the curve of the face. “It should be more sharply defined,” I snap. “Here and here.” The chin and cheekbones; they did not measure true to my memory.

“Begging your pardon, but I worked this piece to the exact details you provided.” The craftsman took the notes he had carefully worked from and thrust them into my face. “Whatever you see, it’s in your mind. I’ve worked my trade for years. Never once has anyone complained about the skill of my artistry.”

“I am not just anyone,” I growl in return, knocking his arm aside. He smells of Death, a side-effect to his trade. His gargoyle of a shadow curls back on itself when I quickly look up, then stills to what is should affect itself to be.

“Payment,” he snaps, his moss-coloured eyes alight at the prospect of money.

“Indeed,” I reply, carefully placing the puppet back down. Its glass eyes, the amber of the irises a faithful translation from the actual model, gazed blankly at the dark ceiling. The rain drummed harder on the roof, a quickening rhythm where all noise was lost under it. I sifted through my drawstring purse for the necessary coins.

“I admit to being curious about this commission,” the old man mused, readily accepting the silver pieces. Inquisitiveness, like his age, has gotten the better of him. Wrinkles marr his face and age spots blemish his skin. Unlike the puppet, alabaster white. Pristine. Utterly perfect. “What is this for?”

I grin wickedly, picking up the puppet once more. “What do you know of soul transference?”

the first and most obvious issue is the passing between past and present tense. Bad form. Choose a tense and stick with it. Blue = present Red = past. You change in the middle of sentences!

[Anne Marie]

I'll get to editing those tenses. :)

[Nomad]

Once you do, I'll do a proper crit.

If you like Puppet totems, check out Malifaux and Puppet Wars by Weird games. They have great fluff and are fabulous models, although I know you aren't into that side of things. Tor Relics are good too.

[Nomad]

Just to illustrate how widespread the problem of commas and "and" is, I picked up Game of Thrones today and read one page in before I found this horrible paragraph:-

The first time he had been sent beyond, all the old stories had come rushing back, and his bowels had turned to water. He had laughed about it afterward. He was a veteran of a hundred rangings by now, and the endless dark wilderness that the southron called the haunted forest had no more terrors for him.

This is so bad it is not even close to funny. Consider this:-
The first time he had been sent beyond, all the old stories had come rushing back, and his bowels had turned to water.
Sentence : The first time he had been sent beyond and his bowels had turned to water.
Insertion:- all the old stories had come rushing back to him.

Obviously the "sentence" is so poorly structured it is not in fact a sentence but a dependent clause.

This is why COMMA and APOSTROPHE usage HAS TO BE UNDERSTOOD AND PRACTICED. It is no good knowing something should be done without knowing the reasons.

This guy is a best selling author with a big publisher with supposedly professional editors.

It should read:-

The first time he had been sent beyond, all the old stories had come rushing back and his bowels had turned to water. He had laughed about it afterward. He was a veteran of a hundred rangings by now and the endless dark wilderness that the southron called the haunted forest had no more terrors for him.

It would be even better if he wasn't trying to be fancy and hadn't compounded the sentence badly.

All the old stories had come rushing back the first time he had been sent beyond and his bowels had turned to water. He had laughed about it afterward. He was a veteran of a hundred rangings by now, and the endless dark wilderness that the southron called the haunted forest had no more terrors for him.


There is hope for us all, yet!

[Farskit]

You may be overreacting here Nomad. It's not grammatically incorrect to use a comma "before" and or "but". In some situations, it's considered an 'error of style' of sorts, at least in classical literature, but that's just a rule of writing style people can follow or break.

In some situations, it's even grammatically correct to actually put a comma there, such as at the end of a list when a confusion needs to be avoided. It's also correct to use ", but" and ", and" when introducing an independant clause.

At any rate: http://bartleby.com/141/ is instructional reading (chapter II, part 4)

[Nomad]

Never is it correct to use a conjunction to introduce an independent clause. It is like beginning a sentence with a conjunction. The comma "counts as" an an. And, just like Independent "counts as Marbo" Grot in your army, there can be only one! If you use a comma, you are saying I have removed an "and". to write ", and" is to write "and and." It is like an apostrophe but, instead of just removing a letter, you are removing a conjunction. You would never, ever write isn't "isno't", would you? Comes to exactly the same thing. Apart from anything else, as I have already pointed out twice about this issue, it destroys the sentence structure and makes it garbage.

Another reason not to do it is that it changes a sentence from passive to active, thus changing the way the words are constructed. Consider the following:-
The dog jumped over the creek and narrowly avoided falling in.
The dog jumped over the creek, narrowly avoiding falling in.

If we write it:- The dog jumped over the creek, and narrowly avoided (or should this be (ing???) falling in. --- This is WRONG.

At the end of a list is also wrong:-
Incorrect:- I have an apple, an orange, and a banana.
Correct:- I have an apple, an orange and a banana.

In short, Farskit, there is NEVER a reason, beyond not understanding WHY the language has been structured as it is, to use a comma before and. Once you have a high level of the reasons WHY the language is structured how it is, it makes alot of sense and it becomes like adding 2 + 2 to come up with 7. Maths has accepted rules, so does grammar.

Without being in anyway anti-American, it is there that alot of these problems are rooted. Ultimately, being a country made up primarily of immigrants from places other than England, English was a second (or 3rd, 4th, 5th) etc language and it became severely bastardised in from, pronunciation and spelling.


I don't understand this example from your link:-
He saw us coming, and unaware that we had learned of his treachery, greeted us with a smile.

Let's pull it apart.
Sentence:- He saw us coming and greeted us with a smile.
Dependent Insertion:- unaware that we had learned of his treachery

Thus the correct place to put the comma is dictated by the first sentence and what makes sense.
He saw us coming and ,[place insertion here], greeted us with a smile.
Ipso facto:-
He saw us coming and, unaware that we had learned of his treachery, greeted us with a smile.

To structure it like in this example it becomes:
He saw us coming, and unaware that we had learned of his treachery, greeted us with a smile.
Sentence:- He saw us coming greeted us with a smile.
Dependent Clause:- and unaware that we had learned of his treachery

This is clearly wrong. I NOTE THAT THE GUIDE YOU LINK TO IS AMERICAN AND THAT THEIR CONVENTIONS ARE OFTEN INCORRECT USAGE IN ENGLISH. Stick to them in American English.

[Tallarn]

lol fiction fight I can say with absolute certainty I never thought I would say that!

I guess a fiction argument is better than another flame fest over global warming. That being said, do keep it civil guys; please?

[Flailing-Axes]

...Now, I know I don't really have enough clout to throw my weight around between fiction giants such as you two, but if I might tentatively put across a few points?

Here in England, Nomad is right, you cannot put a comma before and, but you can place commas before words like 'But.' This is because there are two different types of conjunction - coordinating and subordinating conjuctions. 'And' is a coordinating conjunction, it is used to connect two main clauses (sentences, or independent clauses in America I think.) This creates a compund sentence. 'But' is a subordinating conjunction, and can be used initiate a subordinating clause (dependent, or the bit that you need a sentence with in order to make sense of it.) This creates a complex sentence. EDIT: Nomad is right that neither should really ever be used to start a main/independent clause, the exceptions being in speech.

But you need to be carfeful how you explain it, because it's not as simple as treating a comma like a second and. The only instance where you can use a comma or and in the place of one another is in a list, for all other instances a semi-colon has to be used instead of and or in the place of a fullstop, it too can only be used to link two main clauses or sentences. Commas are used to link a main and subordinate clause (and various other things)

I think it's sort of odd that you'd choose only to use British English when the rules of American English are just as valid, even if they are different. Also, not certain of this, but I believe it's perfectly fine to start sentences with sub-ordnating conjunctions like "But," so long as they're used inside a depenent clause. And should never be used to start a sentence. And you should never use a preposition to end a sentence with. (giggle if you understood)