Herr Mullen Reveiws at Random.

[Herr Mullen]

Tonight, a new author called "Pokedigipimp". I'm looking at his first chapter in his Sorrow And Joy series.

[quote=He]The sun shined down on the green plain, split in two by a dusty road; wandering from horizon to horizon. Two figures, one dressed in a dirty smock; no more than a few rags sewn together with coarse threads, was definitely a man. Walking calmly with a large, broad bladed, light blue sword strapped to his back with a long strip of leather; the hilt decorated with several large crystals. The other figure will make one rub their eyes in disbelief; it was tall, with yellow fur that covered it

[Wisemon]

That's a very thorough review. From now on, I'll let you have the reviewing gigs. I'm relatively lazy.

[Herr Mullen]

That's a very thorough review. From now on, I'll let you have the reviewing gigs. I'm relatively lazy.

Oh, no, don't do that. I like your briefness: it doesn't give away any of the plot. Reading my reveiws, you can practicly tell the entire story outside of the narrative.

[Herr Mullen]

I say! Enoch!

I read the first of this guy's stories on the DHZ: I must say, as soon as I read the first chaper, I was following this chap's progress. Someone tell him he has a fan. Anyway, when Reboot came along, and we were intoduced to Graham, I was a little aprehencive. Oooh, original characters: risky! However, it doesn't seem to have had a negative impact on the story. So, I'm reveiwing "Concience", which can be found here.

We left our heros thusly: Koushiro caught Daisuke and Takeru in the act, and Chris had just entered the Digital World.

For some reason, this Aurimon reminds me of Calumon: it's that slightly timid, rather naive approach he takes to Chris fainting. Besides, I think the voice suits him. This action-based fight-scene opening lacks, however, in a device called "tension": it's quite immediately "Oh, dear, something bad's happening over there, here comes whatever it is." Although the story works with this a little bit, with a shiver, and Aurimon's raising panic, it could have been a lot more drawn out. We could have seen Aurimon become more and more nervious, and more and more paniced over several paragraphs, whilst discriptions on the movement of tree and birds could have brought us some real build up.

Or, the fight scene could have been put off. There could have been some partner interaction between then to warrent this line: ""You... you're fighting... for me?"" That would have a greater impact if he had put of the fight scene, and gone into some dialogue, where Chris is apprencive and catious of this new world and unfamilier animals. Aurimon could have been trying to gain his trust, Chris could have been unwilling to place it in him, and there'd be a bit of dramatic build up.

As it is, this fight scene leads us to a "Later that Night" point. These two are very fast, aren't they? They only met each other today, and they're already having mad, passionate sex. This seems to counter the naive persona I thought Aurimon had in place at the begining. But all this caution that both he and Chris disply could make for an awkward romance, if it's played right.

This villian isn't so bad. I do like the issues he has with the codes: baddies should always have a weak point. However, in his paragaph, the wonderful trend of new paragraphs for new speakers isn't followed. Tisk, tisk: proofreading! Ah, well, we all miss something. The politics Graham's using is very clever. Most people overlook that sort of thing.

The final passage reveals, gasp, Koushiro has a thing for Tai. This series, enjoyable as it may be, has what many Yaoi and Yuri writers fall into; Statistical Improbability. One in ten are homosexual, that's been a constant figure throughtout history, but in many fictions, including Van's "Cody's a Whore" and my own "Rather Camp", there is an overload of them. Sure, one gay coupling, great. Two, bit of a stretch, but fine. But when every single guy in the thing is gay, that's usually too far. It doesn't affect my enjoyment, but it does stretch credibility.

I prefered the first two chapers, but I know how hard it is to write a series, especially using original characters. You have all these ideas you want to put in all at once, but you can't: you have to write tons before you can get to the points you really want to say.

Enoch is a great Yaoi writer, and if he can keep himself under control, he could be a very good author. He shouldn't be afraid to draw things out, and shouldn't shy away from poetic devices like metaohor

[Master Grim]

Why didn't I notice this place sooner?

BTW; thanks for the review. I'll give a thought to rewriting the opening bit (That WAS my first ever lemon...)

I'm up to chapter 7 now... ( :oops: )

Almost forgot... I tried to make the story flow as much as possible yet I could not avoid the tense switching (I always do that! )

[Master Grim]

One last thing... You find out more of Rennie's past in the next few chapters; in chapter 2 she tells Dan of a terrible period of her life...

But, the real reason for this post... I've finished chapter 7 with some tweeks and am sending in... now!

[Herr Mullen]

(not trying to spoil it or anything, but... RENNIE DIES!!! :shock: OMFG did I just say that out loud?)

You may be an all-rgiht writer, who could do very well, but that is as funny as a third degree burn.

If you're telling the truth, shame on you for spoiling your own reader's enjoyment. If you are joking, that's quite poor.

[Herr Mullen]

I am so very, very fortunate in that since reveiwing I have had not one fiction I've found painful to read. In fact, some, like the following, have been an absolute pleasure. Randir's first work, Phoenix.

Randir is not a native English speaker: in his notes, he says that he is "sloppy". Never have I read such an outragious statement: the only mistake was a missing comma from "...the world's biggest city known as Tokyo". Other than that one, tiny slip up, this story is fantastic, although I had issues with the form. It needs indents: left block is business etiquette. I was actually quite ready not to read this fiction, as I'm always receptive to Tamers, as I still think of them as being too innocent in the series to warrent lemons about them (although this isn't actually a lemon), but also because the form didn't grab me. However, as soon as I read the first line, I knew I was in for a treat.

Let's look at this introduction.

This is a literary masterpeice. The style expressed here is unbelieveable. The acknowledgement that you are a reader at the very start immediately establishes a great narrative. The narrator's voice is too often neglected by the writers I've seen. He is usually streightjacketed into discribing, when, inside, he has a marvelous talent to really make the reader feel welcome, just by talking to him every now and then. In this story, he doesn't integect in every paragraph, as I have been convicted with, on occasion, but restrains himself to the opening, allowing us to focus on this brillient characterisation that follows.

Ruki and Renamon are entirely in character. Everything here is very much them: the dialogue, the action, and the relationship. Even their dialects are nailed so they won't escape the reader's notice. Dialect is important: when you keep the character's voice and vocabulary the same, that's when you have reached characterisation perfection. Everyone will recognise characters by their speach. If we can't do that, then that's a hinderance, indeed.

The break-line that seperates the first and second passages, I don't really think is nessesary. Especially when later in the story, it comes to mean "Perspective Switch". It's a much better way to do it than "(Renamon's POV)" which always annoys me. We should be able to tell exactly who's point of veiw we are reading from the way it's written, as we can here. Randir is better at English creative writing than most first-language English speakers I've met.

The ending ends on the same wonderful narrative as it began. The world turns.

Ladies and Gentlemen: this is the first fiction to deserve the "Herr Mullen Hurrah!", the reward I give for a fiction that makes me very, very happy.

Hurrah!

Now, whoever is reading this reveiw, go and read this story.

[Herr Mullen]

Gather around: Uncle Mullen is going to reveiw you a story by the fire.

Our story is written by Shadow Six-Thousand, Six-Hundred And Ninety-One. It is entitled "Reunion Of Good Friends", of the "Glad To Live Another Day" series. It's the first chaper of the series, and the title does not actually appear on the page. No matter, though.

This is a strange way to open the very first sentence of the story: "Now let's get started". It's followed by a colon, good, but that's followed by capial, which is bad. There a few capital hiccoughs which could be solved through a bit of proofreading. Also, the Digimon are refered to by names, however they lack the capital. Their names may be the same as their species, but they are supposed to be capitalised, none the less. For some reason, new speakers do not have new paragraphs. However, there is a great metaphor about magnafying glasses that made me smile.

Sadly, it turns out the opening paragraph has nothing to do with the story at all. The gathering of food could have been a point for dialogue, for discussion of the mysterious towers rather than the narrator popping up and saying "By the way; they're here because there are mysterious towers!" The "pleasent journey" could have been elaborated on: why was it pleasent? What did Tai and Davis think of it: did they take the time to admire the scenery, to look at what they had saved and appreciate the beuty of life, having nearly died so many times themselves?

Oh, goodness. A fight scene. It's all very brief, isn't it? There are no adjectives, aside from colour. The shining metaphors have fanished, as if they have been hidden by clouds of thoughtlessness. Tences switch, as well. Not very good, is it? Shadow Six-Thousand, Six-Hundred And Ninety-One needs more practice. He also needs to expand on points (or she does; I don't know), as everything just seems to be a section of sentences strung together with very dull twine. I once read a book where the main character, Milo, had to eat his words whilst dining with the King of Dictionopolis. He said "Thank you for letting me dine with you," or something, and it didn't taste very nice. I'd imagine this sorty would taste duller than that. The wrong sort of "site" is used, as well: it should be "sight."

This is the lemon scene. It is grey, breif, and makes very little sense. Veemon's suprised at being hugged, so he kisses Agumon? And then they have sex for no reason? Not even a basic internal struggle? That's what most guy authors writing yaoi do. Some coming-to-terms thing. These characters need motives! Obvious ones, as well. There is no discription of sensation or of what it felt like. That's what people are going to want to know: reading stimutales the imagination. Conjour the feeling and sesations in your readers: make them know what the characters feel.

This story needs lots of work. If Shadow Six-Thousand, Six-Hundred And Ninety-One is writing a series, then I'd advise him (or her) to re-write this first, as all series usually lead back to their beginings in some way.

[Herr Mullen]

Welcome to the thread. Let's begin again. D.V. Eighty-Five. I chose to reveiw a single, and I was in the mood for yaoi. Unfortunatly, this means that I had to choose an incest fiction. Two Brothers. I'm just not an incest kind of guy, you see.

I like the disclaimer. I do like well written disclaimers. But the title isn't seperated from the main body of the story.

Okay, we're given the time. That's fine. We're given what's happened, okay. But the dialogue isn't in character. It's clipped and base. We aren't given any insight into how they're feeling except "I still feel so depressed," which is a line from TK. The issue here is that there's no narrative voice. The poor fellow's been taken and locked in a room with a man with lots of scarves and a flashy screwdriver.

However, he seems to have broken free to tell us that Matt wants to have sex with TK not out of the traditional TK Matt motivation of "brotherly love", but because he's a minor. There we are: any of the children you saw Matt with in the series two epilogue, if you use D.V. Eighty-Five's character development from this story, have all been molestered and abused. For some, strange reason, that just doesn't gel with me.

Oh, great. Matt goes shopping. This bares no relivance to the story, but it does show that Matt is loaded. Really, a Playstation 2 (were those even around in 1999/2000?), some games and clothes? Lucky boy.

"It's now or never". I've just gotten to the part that's going make me feelk rather ill, I daresay.

"Sight", not "site".

Well, he's got Matt's feelings displayed before the reader, but weather the reader likes it or not is another story.

And a sleep fetish is included as well.

He's got TK's feelings as well.

Neither have properly manifested sensations.

Very brief sex scene. Not that I'm complaining.

I'm so glad clear thinking is getting through to Matt. Maybe there's hope for the epilogue, yet.

...Nope, never mind. And Gabumon's that sort of a guy, as well. Brillient, TK'll be so screwed up (further) after all this.

There's explaination as to "why it's okay!" as opposed to any actual discription. Bad sex scene, bad.

Strange ending. I rather like the TK and Kari thing happening (it's just a good narrative device), but Matt and Sora have a poor admittance to their feelings.

Someone free that poor narrator, before he starts thinking that it's "quartner past naught o'clock".