Class Assignment: Want to Read It? It's Interesting!

[BeansBrother]

So I was rereading Ender's Shadow for the... 7 gagillionth time... and I thought that I would be able to write OSC and get him to read my assignment which I thought he might like....

I read through the FAQs on his website, and I was depressed... I wanted someone to read my story! It's rather good, I think.

So I decided I will post it here, for all to enjoy and comment on.

NOTE: IT IS COPYRIGHTED (OR MAYBE IT ISN'T.... BUT IF YOU STEAL IT, YOU WILL NEVER KNOW IF YOU GET SUED), SO YOU MAY GET SUED IF YOU STEAL IT.

Well, the story is on the next post. And also note it is the unedited version, or maybe it is edited. I don't know, I just couldn't find the complete version my computer.

Also, I am fourteen, so give me a break about what I do not know about the real world yet.

Anyway, after that long digression... here it goes!

[BeansBrother]

The Smith Effect

Left, then right, then left again. He swerved, dodging tactical anti-matter missiles. Three hours into the Battle of Xelrin, Private First Class Nathan Carno fired off one, then two short laser pulses, causing a Meta starfighter to erupt into a brilliant nova of red, yellow, and green. The planet of Xelrin, overhanging the battle, supported the Marines, launching fighters every couple of minutes. The forces of the Meta, however, had limited reinforcements with a total amount of fighters just a little more than the humans of Xelrin, but with reinforcements coming quickly, these so called weak-flesh-bags would outnumber the nightmare-inspiring Meta. He swerved again, right, up, then right again, once more dodging a tactical anti-matter missile.
A voice came into his LADAR-sent radio. “Nathan,” and it crackled, “I… your help! ‘Ve been… t! T…s is Smith, hel… me!” Two and a half seconds later, a bright yellow explosion blasted into view directly to Nathan’s right. His name was Jacob Smith, a twenty-three year old from New Jersey, blasted away by a heartless, alien creature. Nathan grieved. He knew Jacob from his childhood – from when he was but five years old. The yellow and red explosion replayed over and over in his mind, causing him to go deeper into depression every time. Smith… gone... he thought.
The battle of Xelrin dragged on, hour after treacherous hour. Carno killed about another dozen Meta starfighters, all of them ending in the same way Smith did. He tried to get back at them, even tried to kill every one of them, but after battling without thought for eight and a half hours, another voice yelled at him through his radio, “Listen up, scallywags! The battle is done, I want you down here at Port X1 at 0300 hours! Dis…missed!” An hour and a half, Carno thought. An hour and a half until he had to be down at Port X1. Enough time to ponder his thoughts.
Time passed, and Nathan pondered his childhood memories with his now-late friend Jacob. He remembered when he and his buddy egged their first house on Halloween; he remembered when he and his buddy went on their first double dates. He remembered when he and his friend got their first hover-cars. He remembered when he and his friend first signed up for the Marines. He remembered that time well, and how it spelled his friend’s doom. An hour and ten minutes ticked by, and hour and twenty minutes ticked by, and his fighter was still on autopilot, taking him to Xelrin at a steady pace. He finally landed at X1, and it was 0308. He was eight minutes late from his required landing time.
Carno put on his fatigues, and ran towards the space hall, where the meeting was to take place. As soon as Nathan attempted to casually walk into the room, Captain Nushaw yelled at him. “Where have you been, marine?! You are late! Late! Nine minutes late! Get in line with the others!” So Nathan did just that. He walked into the ranks of about seventy marines, and found his alphabetical place in the line. Nushaw continued his rudely interrupted speech to Nathan and his fellow Marines. “Today, November 19th, 3012, the Marines of Xelrin fought off and defeated all of the Meta. We have had many losses. Most of you, probably all of you, have lost a friend, a partner, or a family member in this battle, but the loss of these lives will not be in vain! We will defeat the Meta! Oo-rah!”
And the Marines shouted back in reply, “Oo-rah!” The captain dismissed the marines to go to their barracks, to eat and sleep, something the Marines felt like they had not done in centuries. The time was 0330, and it was time for these fatigued marines to sleep through the night, having accomplished many things in their waking hours.
~-------------------------~
Nathan woke in the middle of the night, after about thirty minutes of sleep. There were two others awake in his barracks, but these two, Kalbowski and Stein, were known to be insomniacs.
Nathan had a horrible dream, in which the Meta did not retreat in fear of being destroyed, but retreated so that they could earn the advantage of surprise, one thing that, if the Marines did not know what was happening, they surely would have.
~-------------------------~
The alarm sounded at 0700 hours. The Marines were already up and running, while getting dressed, at 0702. At 0704, all the Marines were already standing at attention in the space hall. Captain Nushaw was waiting for them, seeming to have expected it. Then Nathan figured it out. What he had was not a dream, but a sub-conscience tactical thought process in which he imagined what could be happening. So Nathan asked permission to inform the group of what was happening, but Nushaw shut him down promptly.
Although Nathan was the only one who knew how to counter what he thought the Meta were trying to pull, he was not allowed to speak, at all.
Once again, he attempted to speak. Before Captain Nushaw could even tell him to close his pie hole, Nathan was already telling both the Captain and his fellow Marines what he thinks, and probably knows, is happening. Also, he formed a battle strategy to counter this risky, yet very effective, offensive maneuver. His plans were simple. He said that they should send an equal amount of fighters to each quarter of the world. The first to the north-western, the second to the north-eastern, the third to the south-western, and the third to the south-eastern. Nathan also added in some other plans of action for specified divisions, giving each good enough plans to fight off the offending Meta. Finally, after he finished his plan, Nushaw stammered, “You go stand in li…. Wait a minute. That plan’s genius! Where did you get it, Marine? Off the net?”
Nathan, just as shocked as Nushaw was by his brilliant plans, said to the Captain, “No… no sir. I made them up. At least I think I did….” At that, he scratched his head, and went back into line with the other Marines.
Nushaw began to inform the battle-ready Marines of what was happening, which he learned via satellite, when Nushaw realized that all he was doing was restating the situation that Carno had already described. Once he figured this out, he stated with an anxious overtone, “We go by the plans of Private First Class Carno. Now go to your fighters! Dismissed!” Once all of the other Marines had started to jog off to their starfighters, Nushaw asked Nathan if he could stay. Before Nathan could interrupt, the captain told him that he does not have to, and is ordered not to, participate in fight. Nushaw also told Nathan that Nathan should follow the captain, so that the higher-up brass can interview him and ask him some questions. He was questioning whether or not he should disobey the orders to stay and help defend the world of Xelrin with his military friends, but he realized that the brass would just as easily send him to the front lines to be killed for not obeying orders; so he followed.
~-------------------------~
Nathan took the hover car with an overwhelmed Nushaw to the HQ of Xelrin, in a small military compound called XelMarineHQ, where he could meet with the higher-ups and discuss the brilliance of his strategy. Either that, or court martial him and send him for trial at the closest human-held planet, Tratsengrad, and jail him for the rest of the Meta wars, which could possibly be his whole life. Already in a state of depression from these thoughts, he trudged on the half-mile walk between the HQ and the closest hover car facility.
Once inside, he thought he had gone back in time, to the times when the Marines were created, 1775. He saw panels saying, “Semper Fi!” or “The Continental Marines!” and other historic phrases dating back to the 18th century. There was a single desk in this main room, and he assumed that it was a secretary’s desk. Once he saw the name on the hovering hologram sitting in the middle of the desk, he realized that the man behind the desk was a second lieutenant, a ridiculously high rank for just being a secretary. It seemed to him that this was a pretty important place.
He walked through the only door, which was heavily guarded by men, one with a handheld laser, and the other behind a .50 caliber heavy plasma turret. Once again, he thought that this place was more important that it should be. Nushaw left him at this point, and he was alone with his boots and his thoughts, walking through a long hallway towards the door that had on it the words “General.” And that was the only door in this hallway, and because he was directed in this direction, he assumed he was going to see one of the most important officials in this part of the Xelrin system. He walked into a spartan room, containing only a desk and a small LADAR-sent telecommunications device.
~-------------------------~
His name was General Silnge. He had been in the military for years, was happy with his position, and was likely to stay in the military for the rest of his days. He looked up from his desk, obviously looking at a hidden television displaying tactical information lying in a nook in the middle of his desk facing upwards. Then he saw Carno.
Silnge had never even spoke with a Private First Class since his days as a Second Lieutenant in the Marines, let alone have one walk into his private office. He was surprised by this intrusion, even though he had this meeting already planned out in his highly strategic mind. After about thirty seconds, the general invited Carno to sit down in front of his desk on the only other chair in the room.
“Your plan is brilliant,” the general said, hitting right at what Carno was thinking. “It’s surprising that even one who did not attend tactics school could muster up a strategy like that, let alone predict an alien mind. I hope you were not lying to your captain when you said you made it up. Were you lying, PFC Carno?”
“No I was not, sir!” Nathan shouted.
“No need for the formalities, son. Just answer my questions straight and you will be out of here in no time.”
“Sorry.”
“Now I have one more question for you. Do you want to get promoted to First Lieutenant?”
“Sir, do I get time to think this over?” replied Carno.
“Yes. I want you here with your answer by this time tomorrow.” At that, Carno got up from his chair and started to walk out the Victorian building. The car came to pick him up to take him back to the barracks where he would think about this important decision he has to make by this time tomorrow.
~-------------------------~
He got back to the barracks, lay down on his bunk, and started to think. Stewart, Urden, and Kalbowski, all of his friends from the Corps, were in that one squadron with him. Could he possibly leave them to go sit in a large decorated office with a pay grade of O2 and give people like his friends orders? he wondered. He had no clue as to which way he should go. And Smith. What about his friend Smith who had died the day before in a fiery explosion caused by the Meta? Could he really dishonor him by leaving their squadron on the day after his best friend died, to become part of the brass?
He thought, I am not even that smart, anyway! I barely maintained a C+ in high school! Maybe I heard someone speaking of the plan while I was asleep, and subconsciously thought I made it up by myself. Yeah, that’s probably it. No way do I deserve to get that high of a rank. But in the back of his mind, he knew he had made it up. He knew he was just making all of these excuses up so he did not have to have what he always feared: responsibility.
He realized that he just could not abandon all of his friends like that, though. He knew that he would fight, and possibly even risk his life instead of becoming part of the brass. He had made up his mind. He was going to stay with his squadron, whether they liked it or not.
~-------------------------~
The next day, he was called into the office in which he was the day before. Once he sat down, he immediately said, “Sir, I have made up my mind. I want to stay with my squadron.”
Silnge replied, “I was afraid you would say that. It would have been very useful for the people of the American Union to have you commanding our soldiers. But, if you must.” At that, a plan was already forming in the cunning general’s mind. His plan would be put into action, he decided, in the next two days. Nathan Carno left the office, and drove back to his barracks where he could sleep a little bit more.
About thirty minutes after he got back to his barracks, most of the Marines were just returning to their barracks, after having completely wiped out the Meta, thanks to Carno’s plan. Kalbowski came over to him, sitting on the bunk across from him, and fired up a conversation. “Why weren’t you at the battle today? We could have used you, man! Seriously!” But Nathan did not want to talk about it. He just said that he was sick, and left it at that, but his friend was more persistent than he thought. He said, “It was when you interrupted Nushaw, wasn’t it? They gonna court martial you?” Once again, Nathan shook his head and lay down on his bed, trying to imagine what it would be like bossing his best friends around. But he had already decided that he will not do it.
They ate, they slept, they ate a bit more, and by that time, all of the Marines were just doing what they always do when they have free time. Gamble. The game they were playing involved who was going to become the new squadron leader, because their old one had been killed in the Second Battle of Xelrin. Two bet US$300 on the new leader being Stein. Another two bet $550 on Veron. And four people bet $250 on Kalbowski. But the very next day, all eight got their money back because they were all wrong. Private Class Nathan Carno had been promoted to Gunnery Sergeant, and was now their commanding officer.
~-------------------------~
Over the course of the next couple weeks at Xelrin, they all fell back into their normal duties, having regular scouting missions in the outskirts of the Xelrin system. Over the course of the next eight months, however, things started to change. Two people got a pay grade and rank promotion, and one person was steadily promoted every other week or so. And this person even got promoted past the enlisted force, and into the brass. His name was Nathan Carno.
It happened slowly at first, only promoting him maybe once a month, and Carno did not even notice a change. It seemed that he just fit right in perfectly with every promotion. Then, when the promotions started to pick up pace, he noticed some changes. And he could not do anything about it. Before long, he was forced to abandon his friends and his squadron to sit at a desk all day. And he thought he would be able to stop this from happening. But it seemed he was too late. He could not change what he had already gone through, and now he was stuck in a rank he did not even want.
There were sometimes skirmishes between the scattered Meta forces that had escaped the now famous battle “Carno’s Great Defense.” And Nathan then realized that he was enjoying this power. But he did not want to enjoy it. He wanted to hate it for all of its worth. And, damn it, he wanted to be with his friends. And he wanted to avenge his best childhood friend, Jacob Smith!
~-------------------------~
But, a remarkable thing occurred the day after he got promoted to Second Lieutenant. In one of the scouting missions, one of the ships stumbled upon a broken starfighter. It seemed it was left over from the Battle of Xelrin. So they brought it down to Xelrin, because it was of human make, and they wanted to investigate it.
Once the fighter was brought down, a crew came in to identify the broken body inside the fighter… on the uniform, it said, “Smith, Jacob.” Smith’s body had been recovered, and a funeral was to be held for him, a representation for all of the lives lost during the two treacherous battles of Xelrin.
~-------------------------~
The funeral was held the following Wednesday. All of the Marines of Xelrin and some of Smith’s family members, living on Xelrin, came to the funeral. A priest of Smith’s religion visited, and gave the eulogy. At the end of the funeral, once everyone had left, Carno stayed an extra minute at the burial site. “Good bye, dear friend.” His last words to his dead friend’s unhearing ears.

[Syphon the Sun]

(Note: I'm sure I'll read the story in the next few days, when things slow down.)

I don't really have time to read it right, now, but I wanted to mention the fact that everything you put on paper (or your screen) is copyrighted. But, you should also note that by posting it online, you're effectively using up your first publication rights.

[BeansBrother]

Really? Well, I don't think anyone here is mean enough to steal it. Afterall, it was just a school assignment, but.... I WILL SUE!

Afterall, I come from a Jewish family, and as everyone knows, all Jews are good lawyers!

(Sorry, had to make that joke, but I am allowed to because I am Jewish.)

[Syphon the Sun]

I'm fairly sure that members aren't trolling the site, just waiting for amateur stories to steal.

[powerfulcheese04]

I haven't read the story yet... and I might... or I might just read my biochem book some more (my goodness, I'm a SUPER HUGE NERD... I still surprise myself sometimes.)

But... I highly doubt any members are planning to steal a 14 year old's fiction. I mean, I'm definitely impressed that you're writing... but, the people here that are thinking about writing/like writing stories are probably a bit better just because they've been practicing for longer.

[BeansBrother]

You misunderstood me

The only reason I said that is because I am paranoid. That's all

[Syphon the Sun]

I wouldn't be too sure about that, Kimmie, if Ollie is lurking around here... After all, he loves to steal from teenagers, be it stories or milk money.

[BeansBrother]

Lol....

[Jayelle]

What kind of feedback are you looking for here? Just a "Good/Bad job" kinda thing, or some advice on editing/making it better? No advice at all?

If I was grading it, I would be mentioning your comma splices...

[BonitoDeMadrid]

Wonderful story.

It's getting late, so I'm too tired to write a lot about how good it is. But it's a very good story, IMO.

[Young Val]

(Note: I'm sure I'll read the story in the next few days, when things slow down.)

I don't really have time to read it right, now, but I wanted to mention the fact that everything you put on paper (or your screen) is copyrighted. But, you should also note that by posting it online, you're effectively using up your first publication rights.

Not entirely true.

[Syphon the Sun]

You're right, Kelly, but it's a pretty valid generalization, as far as it goes. By posting it online, the chances of a magazine buying it drop quite a bit. And, even if they do buy it, you're most likely only going to sell the reprint rights. Is that the way it always works? Of course not. Webzines are more likely to pay the full rate, or buy it at all, than their print counterparts after it has been posted online. But, by and large, posting something you intend to sell doesn't generally help you make more off the sale. In most cases, it hurts more than it helps.

[Young Val]

Yes and no.

I know it seems like I'm being nit-picky, but I'm really not. (Also, one of my three job titles at WH is "subsidiary rights associate" and I have to teach tutorials on subrights to our internship program once a month--so this is firmly rooted in my repertoire and a pretty common misconception).

There's no such thing as "First Publication Rights." At all. There's all sorts of other rights, but no "first pub."

The closest anything could come to that is First Serial rights, which refers to an excerpt of a book that is being published in a magazine PRIOR to the book's publication. Which is not what we're dealing with here.

If an author posts a story online in a personal blog or on a forum such as this, the rights are still with the author. No rights have been granted, optioned, or assigned. Therefore, the author is still free to sell these rights to any willing publication.

You have a slight point when you say that some publications are not interested in stories that have appeared elsewhere. Oftentimes, though, if your story has only been posted by you and the rights have not been granted to another publication (magazine and online publication rights generally revert back to the author after the period of one year--at which point the author can then sell rights to that story again) magazines will simply request that you take down the post if they wish to publish your story. Indeed, if you want to submit your story, you can take down any public posts you may have made beforehand. So long as you never granted rights to anyone, they are available for sale.

The only time a publisher may be dissuaded in such an instance is if the author's post in a blog or forum generated high traffic and therefore already exhausted the market for potential readership. I can safely say that, although our members are active and beloved, PWEB does not generate enough traffic to threaten the audiences of magazines or literary online publications.

It other words--for the most part, people are scared stiff of putting work online for the wrong reasons. You have more to fear from plagiarists than you do from rejection from publications (based on the issue alone).

[Syphon the Sun]

I'm not quite sure I buy that, Kelly.

Publishers buy first use rights all the time, whether they're specific (first electronic use) or as general as "first use" (ever).

And, maybe I'm off base, but I thought that serial rights were bought for more than just excerpts. I was under the impression that, by and large, magazines almost exclusively bought serial rights. Short stories, poems, excerpts, nonfiction articles, etc. Like I said, I may be way off base, here. But, that was my understanding.

And the key part in your response is in the following phrasing: "the author is still free to sell these rights to any willing publication." I've seen the numbers a few places, but a quick google landed me with the following percentages from Writing.com: only half of print media would consider buying something that appeared online first (such as on a personal website), with half of them unwilling to purchase anything other than the reprint rights.

Like I said, sure, you might sell a story that you posted online first. Hell, you might even get the normal rate for it. But, the chances of it hurting your sale more than helping it is much, much higher.

[powerfulcheese04]

I would totally 100% take Kelly's word on this... since, you know, this is what she does for a living. She thinks about and works on this stuff every single day.

And, you both are talking about this from different perspectives. Kelly is talking purely legally what the rights are and Michael is talking more anecdotally. Which, honestly, grants Kelly's claims significantly more weight. (Also, I would trust someone who works in the publishing industry over "Writing.com" pretty much any day.)

[Young Val]

You can't sell reprint rights to something that you haven't already sold rights for. It's impossible. If the rights have never been sold, you can't RE-sell them. Reprint rights can only be sold (in ANY subrights category) once the print rights (in ANY subrights category) have ALREADY been sold.

A print magazine is unlikely to want to buy rights to a story that an online publication has previously published, true. But a post on a low-traffic personal blog has no bearing on this. The rights have never been sold, and the only way the VALUE of the story is lowered (which is what you are implying) is if a significant amount of the potential readership has already been exposed to it. Hence, low-traffic sites such as most personal blogs, etc, do NOT jeopardize this.

Trust me. Not only have I sold my own stories to magazines (both print and online) that I have already posted in my own personal blog, but I've done so for our clients as well. This, of course, is completely different if the story is posted on a high-traffic site--but I addressed that already.

You are correct in your definition of serial rights. I was talking about "First Serial" rights in my previous post, which are exactly what I described. First (and Second--which are serial rights sold to publish an excerpt in a magazine AFTER the book has published--which thus makes them less valuable than First serial rights) are the only rights with the word "first" in them. There's no such thing as "first publication" rights. No first print rights, no first audio rights, no first anything. There's just no such thing. You can sell rights on an exclusive basis, or a non-exclusive basis. But there's simply no such thing as "first rights." It's not a matter of terminology, either, and I'm not being nit-picky. It's very tactile. It's what--exactly--you are buying the rights to, and for how long.

You are under the impression that publishers are going to be unwilling to publishing a piece that has appeared ANYWHERE online, and that's just not the case. The value lies in the potential readership. If the entire potential audience has already read the piece because it's posted on an incredibly famous website that everyone reads regularly, then yes, the value goes down, or is non-existent.

But posting on a personal blog or low-traffic site has no bearing on the VALUE of the work--there's still a very large readership to attract. Thus, such postings would not deter a publisher from purchasing a work they were serious about.

[Syphon the Sun]

*shrugs* All I know is what the articles I've read have said.

I was under the impression that the reason they'll buy the story's reprint rights is because they recognize the online publication (again, yes, even on a personal website or blog) as using the first print rights.

It's true that you obviously have more experience with the publishing industry than I do, but I'm not quite sure I buy the idea that you can't sell reprint rights if you didn't sell the first print rights. It has nothing to do with whether or not you've sold the rights and everything to do with whether or not you've used the rights.

So, while you can sit there and tell us what your experience has told us, I can cite editor after editor that simply disagree. If they want to consider publishing a story online as using certain rights, they have the legal right to do so, as long as they can make a case that the rights were already used (regardless of if they're sold, given away, whathaveyou). Are all editors going to agree? No. I never really tried saying that. What I am saying is that posting something online is more likely to hurt your chances of making a sale than help them.

Regardless of whether or not the actual value of a story has been lowered, the editors and writers that always pop up in those interviews and polls seem to say the same thing: your chances drop. Whether or not that's how it should work, or if it's fair, is another issue entirely. You've had great success is selling work that has appeared online first. Really, that's great. I won't slight you for that. But, that doesn't change the fact that the editors really are suggesting against publishing online, even in your personal website.

And I was talking about first serial rights, too. I was under the impression that magazines tended to buy FNASRs for more than just that. I'm fairly certain of it, actually, but whatever. As far as "first rights" not existing, call me crazy, but I know I've seen it on the guidelines for more than one literary magazine and elsewhere.

I think my main problem is coming from the fact that, while everything you've said is absolutely true for the publication of books, it pretty much contradicts everything I've seen about magazines.

[Young Val]

It has nothing to do with whether or not you've sold the rights and everything to do with whether or not you've used the rights.

True. But you haven't used the rights if you simply put a story on your blog. Regardless of whether or not editors are interested in taking my short-story if I've posted it on Live-journal or not--I haven't used (OR sold) any rights by doing so. Not on a low-traffic blog. Of course if you go to an editor and say "I posted this short story on my blog last week--wanna publish it for me?" the answer you're most likely going to receive is a resounding "NO." It would be deeply dumb to do this. And as I mentioned before, if you DO post a story in your blog, and do plan to submit it, then you should probably take it down first.

There are MANY reasons not to post your work online. I haven't posted any of my work online in five years, and probably never will again. Nor do I recommend it. However, to imply that a story won't be accepted for publication because it debuted on pweb is just completely untrue.

Self-publishing is different, but again, that's not the issue.


And yes, there are slight differences between magazine and book publishing, but I'm not so unfamiliar with magazine publishing as you might think.

FNASRs

I have no idea what this refers to. First something something serial rights?

Serial rights and First Serial rights refer to entirely different things.

First Serial Rights (with a capital F) refers to the right to publish an excerpt of a book/story prior to that book/story's publication. Serial rights refer to publishing a work in a serial--be it a newspaper, a magazine, whatever--be it ALL of the story or part.

"First use" is not a right. You can't sell "first use." Editors may specify that they won't buy anything that has been previously published, but they're not buying the right to publish it "first." They are buying the right to publish it. Once a work has been published and the rights have reverted to the author, it can be published again--and those are reprint rights. Perhaps it sounds the same, but legally it's clear. While editors might want first dibs, and can ensure that they only take work that has never appeared in the hands or on the screens of anyone other than the writers and themselves, should that be the completely archaic way they choose to conduct business, then by all means, they can do that. But you can't legally buy anything called "first use" or "first rights." At most when you sign a contract (IF you sign a contract--which magazines almost never have you do) you can sign that the work has never appeared in any other publication.

As for claiming they won't touch anything that's been online before--it's a scare tactic. And yes, it's common sense. Protect yourself and your intellectual property--absolutely. Again, I'm not advising that everyone start posting their short stories (if they even have an intent to try to publish). But what I AM saying is that--regardless of what editors and writers may interview about in articles--legally, as well as PRACTICALLY and certainly realistically, posting your work on a low-traffic website will not effect your chances of being published in a magazine. (The key word, kids, is low-traffic).

Other than that--I've exhausted the subject.

[BeansBrother]

What kind of feedback are you looking for here? Just a "Good/Bad job" kinda thing, or some advice on editing/making it better? No advice at all?

If I was grading it, I would be mentioning your comma splices...

#1: Well, thanks for being the first to reading it

#2: Yeah, now that I look back on it, I see a bunch of comma errors. It's just in my 9th grade English class, we didn't start stepping up on fixing commas until after I wrote the story.

#3: And not relating to you, Jayelle, but z0mg! There have been a lot of posts here.

[BeansBrother]

Wonderful story.

It's getting late, so I'm too tired to write a lot about how good it is. But it's a very good story, IMO.

Thanks mate.

[Slim]

I read it when you first posted it. But I don't really have much to say. No offense, but I found it to be really boring. It's probably just because I'm not really fond of war stories in the first place. I don't feel anything for the characters. What happens? Some guy fights in a battle that appears to take place in space and some guy dies. He has an idea so people want him promoted, but he wants to stay where he's at. So he gets a smaller promotion. Anyway, not to put your story down or anything, but that was the general impression I got.

Back when I was on the Young Writer's Forum at Hatrack, I seem to remember them warning us to not post stories we actually plan on publishing due to loosing first publishing rights.

But legality aside, I would say it's pretty much common sense that its not a great idea to put something on the web you plan on publishing. Makes sense to me anyway.

[BeansBrother]

I'm not planning on publishing, actually. Well, this story, at least. I just wanted to see what you guys thought, because I figured no other people would take me seriously with my other writings, and you guys don't know me personally, so you may take me seriously.

Like I said, this was the unedited version, so I think there is a little bit of the story that is not included in this one that is in the "good" version.