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Old 03-16-2014, 09:23 AM   #171
gmw
cacoethes scribendi
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Planting the Flag v1.2

Quote:
Originally Posted by Graham View Post
I've uploaded v1.2 of Planting the Flag.

This one feels right to me now, and I'm happy to receive line edit comments.

Graham
One or two general comments and some line edits suggestions...

Spoiler:

The change to the opening is more drastic than I thought you would do. I kind of liked the atmosphere of the earlier version, it was only the punctuation (", weightless,") that kept tripping me up. I do wonder if "that blocked" might be better as "blocking" or "obstructing", just a thought.

I'm not keen on the new second paragraph (it feels too far away from the earlier sentence about the lights, we're still working out where we are, there might be more lights). The old second paragraph perhaps wasn't perfect either. I wonder if it's needed at all?

"Maybe they could keep it out of sight?" - not sure the question mark is really needed here.

"the view through the port of the planet shining far below." - potential ambiguity here ("... the port of the planet ..."). Maybe: "... the port to the planet ..."

"“Can it be fixed?” AND-E said." - maybe "asked"

"through the window in front of him. Perfect!" - query the ending exclamation mark. (I don't have a big problem with it, but I don't think it's really necessary either.)

"hope we don’t hit it too hard!”" - another exclamation mark query.

"The Captain threw a schematic up on the screen." - I'm not keen on "threw", I'd prefer "brought". Again, just a thought.

"Perhaps it was all relative?" - query the query. It seems more like a conclusion than a question to me.

"the red line; some were" - query the semi-colon. I think a period would work here just as well.

"buck and kick - then ripped free" - maybe "buck and kick - then it ripped free" (just reads a little more smoothly to me).

"hammered down, righting itself." - not sure if this reads quite right. Possibly: "and hammered down before righting itself".

"spinning wildly, the cords twisted, rushing" - not quite smooth to me, should it be something like "spinning wildly, cords twisting and the capsule rushing" ?

"and waved, weakly at the door." - remove the comma I think.

You use commas in some places that I wouldn't in this sort of text, but only that last one noted above popped as as being actually wrong.

Last edited by gmw; 03-16-2014 at 09:26 AM. Reason: Trying to make some parts clearer.
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