Abbie Eaton
I am a 23 year old English writer living in Staffordshire, UK. I enjoy spending time with my horses and both reading and writing fantasy. After becoming lost in the worlds of my favourite books such as Sarah J Maas' A Court of Thorns and Roses, and Jennifer L Armentrout's From Blood And Ash, i decided to write the story i always wanted to read. A story about love, magic, and finding a place in the world.
Award Category
Dragonhart
My Submission
Comments
Great set up for the story,…
Great set up for the story, character introductions, worldbuilding, and descriptions. I want to read more!
Fantastic start
Wow. Loved these first few pages. Great characters and world building. Loved how you made the reader feel her rage and anger. Definitely want to read more.
Good characterization and sense of time and place
I like Arla's sense of spiciness and combative nature, there is clear characterization in this. Dragons and deceased or otherwise troubled parents are a little troped out for fantasy, so I would maybe suggest leading with the training session, with what is more specific to Arla and her/your world and connections.
Lovely sense of familiarity and history between Arla and Perry in the dialogue between them, such as Perry's, “Quite. I don’t know many ladies who would run a man through with a sword just because he threatened to steal her horse.”
I also like that Arla's voice (and language) are earthy, as swords and sorcery type fantasy can easily get into wafty, lyrical language (but if you read Chaucer and other early writing, their vocabularies were filthy!). So I liked 'Arla knew it was stupid. The gods didn’t exist––how could they when the world was going to shit?' Good blending of the lofty and the down-to-earth.
Good use of more complex tenses such as past perfect, and the style overall was generally good. A little more ornate which fits a time of monarchs, swords, and roasted pheasants.