CSI Fan Fiction Critique Group.

Just popping in for a quick minute while the family is all asleep, and I noticed Leni's OC and one of mine go to the same high school. Wonder if they know each other? :lol:

Welcome back, CalleighD! Always good to see you again

And congrats to Adorelo, new Mod on the block!! Don't let all your new power go to you head

 

I'll tell her to look out for him! You never know, they might appear in a fic together sometime!! :thumbsup:

Leni

 

Lol. I think that it's awesome that you both have your kids in the same school. Even if it IS fictional. You ought to let them have cameos in each other's pieces. . That would be fun.

Anyway... I have some things going on today soooo that means that it might be a while before I update the FCG. It WILL be done though. Promise.

 

I'm horrendusly late with this, and I can only apologise again and again :alienblush: There's tons of new houses being built right beside us and the cable guys keep messing up the internet cables when they're laying new ones for the new houses (if anyone wants to kick their butts for me I'd greatly appreciate it:thumbsup

Anyway onto this week's thingy, this is a character I thought up way before I even started writing fanfiction, when I was planning to write during season 4 of Miami (I never got round to it lol) so I've just expanded on that.

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Full name: Addison Louise Parker

Nickname: Addie

DOB: 2/5/74

Fandom: CSI: Miami

Role on the show: Natalia’s best friend and roommate from college

Education: Masters degree in biochemistry and genetics from University of Miami (’92)

Interests: Painting, long walks, salsa dancing

Complete family tree: http://www.myheritage.com/FP/family-tree.php?s=27246202

Favourite music: Anything apart from hip-hop.

Favourite movie: An Officer and a Gentleman

Favourite colour: Red

Mini Bio: Long dark brown hair and blue eyes. 5’5”, slim build. Grew up in Miami with her parents and her younger sister Jody-Anne. Was a gymnast in school until she tore a ligament in her knee which stopped her from competing. Met Natalia in college and they quickly became best friends. Her father died in a car crash in 1991. She and Natalia shared an apartment after finishing college, until Addie met her future husband Drew and Natalia moved in with Nick. A year after she and Drew (a computer software specialist) married, they moved to Vermont, when he got transferred and she got a job working in a private DNA testing firm. and her lost her mother to cancer in 2001. Her sister Jody joined the Navy at 18 (a decision Addie didn’t initially support, but the two have since reconciled their differences). She never really settled in Vermont (and lost touch with Natalia soon after moving there), missing the sunshine and atmosphere of Miami and didn’t make any good friends. Her marriage to Drew has deteriorated over the years to the point where he has become violent and abusive towards her. With no family in the country (her sister is stationed in Bahrain) Addie manages to find Natalia with the help of some old college friends.

Intro Fic:

Addison blinked in the early morning sunshine as she pulled on her sunglasses. She was getting closer to home. Her real home. She could sense it, smell it as she rolled down the window. She caught the bruise on her eye in the rear view mirror and shuddered as she thought about what she had left behind.

The big house, expensive clothes, Drew.
She glanced over to the passenger seat where there was a piece of paper with a scribbled address on it. She turned right onto the street indicated on the paper. Pulling up outside the house she sighed, pulled out again and headed straight on, away from the house.

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3 hours of driving later she finally decided on staying in a motel. The ‘5 star inn’ looked anything but 5 star, but she decided it would do for the time being. As she picked up the single suitcase from the backseat, she allowed herself to feel a tiny bit of relief. She felt safer than she had done in months. Still there were some precautions she felt she had to take.

“Laura Baker,” she answered the owner when he asked her for her name, and she paid in cash. No doubt he’d be tracking her credit cards as soon as he realized she was gone. He’d be back from his business trip to California in a few hours.

“Hey, Lady,” the balding owner said, waving the key in her face, breaking her concentration.

“Sorry,” she apologized, taking the key and shaking her head. The owner had gone back to reading his newspaper but she found the room number on the back of the key.

13. Typical. She thought, making her way down the shabby corridor to her room. Pushing the door open, she almost walked back out again. It smelt musty and damp. Forcing herself in she was glad to find it wasn't as bad as it appeared, and the bathroom was at least clean.

The shower gave out a nice spray of reasonably hot water and just for the 10 minutes she spent under it, the stress of driving for almost 24 hours melted away, the fading bruises were covered by the soap bubbles and she took comfort in the fact that she was over 1500 miles away from him.

She dried off quickly after her shower and laid down on the bed, which was far from comfortable but provided somewhere for her to rest. Falling asleep easily for the first time in a long time she settled into a light but restful sleep.

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It was 7pm by the time she woke up, and it seemed like everything really seemed to hit her then. She was overwhelmed with emotion at what she had done, and started to doubt her actions. He would probably guess she'd come back home, and if he really wanted to find her, she knew he would.

She forced back tears that were threatening to fall and got dressed, taking extra care to cover the bruise on her eye with make-up and went out to her car again.

Driving back to the same address that she'd stopped at earlier in the morning she noticed there was now a car parked on the drive. She parked on the road, taking note of what a nice neighbourhood it was, then walked up to the front door.

Kocking apprehensively, she took a step back as she saw a figure move behind it to open it. The tall woman in the doorway looked at her for a second, then her mouth broke into a smile.

"Addie!" the woman said excitedly, hugging her right there on the doorstep, "Is that you? Oh my god, come in."

Addie smiled a genuine smile as she greeted her friend, "Hey Nat, it's been too long hasn't it?"

"Too long is an understatement Addie, why donlt you sit down and I'll make us some coffee okay, no milk 2 sugars?" Natalia asked, knowiong she was right anyway.

"Yeah," Addie smiled back, settling herself down on the sofa Natalia had pointed at.

Looking around, she noticed that Natalia was a lot tidier now than she had been when she was younger but her taste in decor was completely the same. She spotted a small collection of photo's on the far wall and was pleasantly surpised to see one of herself and Nat, taken about 13 years ago while they had been on Spring Break.

"There you go," Natalia smiled, placing a steaming cup of coffe on the table in front of her and sitting down on the other end of the sofa.

"I can't believe you're here," Natalia smiled and shook her head, "What are you doing down this far south anyway? Not that I'm not glad to see you,"

Addie reached for the mug of coffee and held it, feeling the warmth radiate through her hands. Best just to come straight out with it, she thought to herself.

"I um, I left Drew," she almost whispered, not making eye contact with Natalia.

Reaching for her friends hand, Natalia gave it a small squeeze, "Oh Addie," she said softly.

Addie felt the tears well up in her eyes again and there was nothing she could do to stop them from falling as Natalia held her hand.

"I drove all day, and all night," she sniffed, fighting to get her words out between sobs, "And I'm s-sorry to just barge in on you like this, but I had n-nowhere else to g-go," the last of her resolve broke down and she started sobbing, gripping the coffee mug so tight the hot liquid looked like it was going to spill.

Prising the coffee mucg from her friends hands, Natalia placed it on the table, before wrapping an arm around her friend in an attempt to offer her some comfort.

"It's okay Addie," she soothed as she held the sobbing woman in her arms, "It's all gonna be alright."

They sat like that until Addie's sobs subsided, "Feel better?" she asked her friend, and felt the nod on her shoulder, "What we really need is ice cream right?" Natalia said, and Addie couldn't help but laugh, no matter how bad the situation was, Nat could always make her laugh.

"It might take more than just cream," Addie attempted to joke back, but her smile dropped as she saw a horrified look on Natalia's face.

"What?" she asked worridly, "What is it?"

Natalia said nothing, instead just reached up to Addie's face. Her tears had streaked the make-up she had so carefully applied and the angry bruise was starting to show through. She flinched as Natalia's thumb ran over the tender area and she looked away.

"He hit you didn't he?" Natalia asked with a sad look on her face.

Addie closed her eyes in response and nodded slowly, chastising herself for thinking she could keep a secret from Natalia.

"How many times?" Nat asked softly, holding onto both of Addie's hands.

"I can't remember," Addie admitted.

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Thanks for making last week a success! I really loved reading all of your mini fics and new characters. That was a LOT of fun!


CSI Critique Fanfiction #27:CSI: Miami; "I wish..." By: MaryMagdalen

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TQ: When you are writing stories that incorporate song lyrics how do you choose? Why? Where do you find them? How do you know they are just right?

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Thanks guys! Sorry this is kinda late.

Please have all critiques in by saturday.

The new featured fic will be up on Sunday, June 1, 2008.

 

*Dances* Yay! I get to post the first critique

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But I've just had a thought - I think I can speak for everyone when I say that last week's OC project was fun; everyone went out of their way to include so much detail! So do you think we should maybe do something with the mini fics? Like pick one to be critiqued next week? It's just a suggestion though
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TQ: When you are writing stories that incorporate song lyrics how do you choose? Why? Where do you find them? How do you know they are just right?

I actually try not to insert song lyrics in my stories - maybe because I *really* dislike songfics. I've yet to read a good one so if anyone wants to prove me wrong, feel free! (And when I say that, I'm not considering marymagdalen's fic as as songfic. It had a song in there yes, but it was used to enhance the story... and I don't know. It read more like just a story to me...)

However I have done it once and it was because it was part of an element that I had to include. How did I choose it? I scanned down my itunes library and it was the first song that I glanced at. Why? Because I really didn't want to scroll down the entire list - I have over 5,000 songs! How did I know that it was the right song? Well I didn't, but the fact that I managed to fit it in there without making it seem too forced (I hope!) told me that it definetly wasn't the wrong song.


Okay, Likes:

Well, I thought the song slotted in there perfectly. And the lyrics that you inserted where you did really helped to capture the tenderness of the situation and the scene. I'm not usually a fan of using lyrics in fics, but given the right circumstance and providing that the writer uses them properly, I think they can be a great way of enhancing emotion. And I think you did that, so good job.

The 1st person was great too - I tend to find that not many people can write this tense well and I know that I definitely prefer the 3rd person, but you did a good job with it and I think the situation lends itself perfectly for this tense. So good choice and well done for doing it well.

Another thing I liked was that it read like one giant thought trail... which it was. You really captured what H must have been thinking and caught brilliantly the path that his mind would have taken him throughout that scene.

Characterisation of H was good, too, I found. The way he masked his own pain and felt guilty because he allowed himself to feel it... you showed his uncertainty and his love.

I loved the last three lines as well. It was very beautifully done.

Not so good things:

Uhhhmmm.... does the fact that it wasn't an EC fic count? No seriously, I don't think there was anything that I didn't like.

One thing that I could say though is to do with the way that you write dialogue. Now I have the same problem - a Brit surrounded predominately by Americans. Which I have no problem about, I hasten to add, but sometimes we have slightly different grammar and spelling rules. And I'm willing to bet that someone is going to flag you up on some of the things here.

As for me? I'm finding myself using a bit of both. As far as I'm aware, we've always been told to capitalise any form of speech, like you've done here:

Now I've had a couple of conversations with LLK about this and her view is that you don't put a capitol letter in the middle of a sentence - my view is that it's someone speaking. But I've slipped into doing this now, maybe because I think she has a point and when I write, I try to do it as though someone was speaking; try to make the punctuation capture how the chracter would have spoken it. And I think the capitol throws this off a bit - but that could just be me.

And I'm also a fan of authors taking liberties as well, like here:

It's where you've placed a full stop there instead of a comma. It makes what H said seem final and absolute; just as it was.

Basically:

Great job. I liked it. And that's saying something because I was never so keen on the whole HM scenario. I thought it was always a bit forced but the way you've written this, made it seem almost like the most natural thing in the world.

 

I'm so sorry I haven't entered the OC challenge, but I'll try to critique this fic if I find enough time to read it and write something down properly. Unfortunately, real life sometimes comes in the way (especially if you have only a month left till the end of the school).

 

Hi folks!

Thanks for your kind critiques so far - I'll respond to them all at the end of the week, if that's OK (saves me rambling and repeating myself).

Are Zelda and I the only ones having to delete all those annoying formatting tags when pasting something from Word? I have a solution of sorts.

Cut and paste your text into Notepad, then cut and paste it from there into your post. You'll still have to check through it and put back underscores, bold, italics, etc, but it's a darn sight quicker and easier than finding and deleting all the tags. :thumbsup:

If it's not a problem, just ignore this, but I hope it helps someone!

Leni

 

*apologies in advance for incorrect spelling/punctuation - I be sleepy*

TQ: When you are writing stories that incorporate song lyrics how do you choose? Why? Where do you find them? How do you know they are just right?

The lyrics come first, if I use them at all. Often, a song will inspire me to write a fic, or a chapter, but won’t get included in the actual story. I always listen to my iPod at night in bed, and that’s normally when inspiration strikes. Listening to a song, an idea will come to me so, of course, I have to get up and scribble it down before I forget it. That’s why I never sleep, Haha.

I’ve never written a song fic, and I know I never will. The reason is simple, it’s rare to find a full song that fits in with the meaning of the fic. Often, I’ll find one or two lines that fit and inspire me but the rest of the song has no relevance. Currently, I’m working on a couple of ideas which will start with the lines that fit (much like a quote at the beginning of a book).

Music’s my life and I can honestly say I’ve never written a fic that hasn’t been inspired in some way by a song; be that the words, or the melody. That’s not to say I don’t come up with the ideas myself, but when I’m listening, little ‘movies’ will play in the forefront of my mind with the characters doing really random stuff, the things just…fall together.

[/ramble]

Critique:

I’ve stopped writing in first person, but my horizons are broad when it comes to reading. I liked it in this case, it made the emotions very prevalent. It wouldn’t have worked as well if you’d have done it in third person, second could have worked, but the song then wouldn’t have flowed very well.

I never write Horatio, simply because A) I don’t like him and B) I can’t get his character down. You can, clearly. I empathized with him in this moment, and that says a lot considering I dislike him.

It’s one of the few times the song in it’s entirety worked. I think there were only a couple of moments I was reminded it was a song. Fir the most part, it all fitted.

The ending was poignant and, I felt, sounded like part of the song. In that sense, you really integrated the song into the prose. I liked that.

Lol at the debate over capitalization.

In my opinion, the sentence should read:

“Without hesitation I answered you, “of course I’m coming with you.” ”

[There should also be a comma after ‘hesitation’]

Because it’s a full sentence, the ‘of course I’m coming with you’ part does not stand alone in this case. It reads the same as if you’d written it the other way round:

“ “Of course I’m coming with you,” I answered without hesitation. ”

In that case, the ‘Of’ would need to be capitalized, as it’s the start of the sentence.

ETA: Me and kazalene have been talking, and we've decided it'd read better if you lost the first you in this case :lol:. Yes, I know we're dorks.

In some places, you flick about tenses: ‘answered’ and ‘I feel’. But for the most part, you were pretty consistent.

Overall, you did great. I really enjoyed reading it. Thanks for sharing

 

Ahh! My family is on their way back home, and I have a few more minutes before I head off to work this evening, so I got a chance to critique earlier in the week this time :thumbsup: And, for what it's worth, I liked Kaz's idea about the mini-fics. We should totally do something with them, and critiquing at least on of them makes sense, don't you think?

TQ: When you are writing stories that incorporate song lyrics how do you choose? Why? Where do you find them? How do you know they are just right?

I, like Jodie, am inspired by music, and so many, many of my fics were written because a certain song triggered an idea in my mind. [In fact, if you look carefully at most of my body of work (and all of the more recent stuff), the story titles and, in a lot of cases, chapter titles are the lyrics or title of a song.] I’m not sure how the process works, exactly—all I know is that I’ll hear a song, and something strikes me just right. From there an image, a series of events, a voice, something develops in my head and I have to sit down at the computer and pour it all out into Word.

And I second the notion that it is rare to find a song that has the right sentiment for an entire piece. I, myself, have written exactly 2 songfics: one didn’t use the entire song (though I meant it to—it just got too long, and I limited it to just the first verse), and one that is down the road in a series I’m writing, and so hasn’t been published anywhere yet. In both cases, I was struck by the fact that the song was perfect all the way through, and, even though I resisted, I ended up writing both fics in large part because of it.



Critique

Things to work on:
In this section, I got nothin’! The others have covered your few grammar errors (which, I’m embarrassed to say, I didn’t notice! ), and I can’t find anything else to suggest to you for improvement. So, on to the next section…

Things that were good:
I’m a big fan of songfics when they’re done well, and this one should be held up as an example of exactly how to do it for anyone who wants to try. The placement of the lyrics within the story is excellent—what’s going on in the song matches up with what’s going on in the story so that they compliment each other well. And I adore the way you crawled inside Horatio’s head and made sense out of a scene that didn’t seem to contain much feeling for me on the show. It’s been increasingly hard for me to understand H as CSI:M progresses, but this piece bring some humanity back to his character and helps me understand him better. He’s not Super H with the Sunglasses of Justice here. He’s just a guy, a cop who is used to protecting people, feeling very vulnerable and kind of helpless because he can’t do anything to save someone he loves. Very well done!


And btw, marymagdalen, the copy-into-notepad-thing worked like a charm! It was much easier than taking out all those stupid editting tags :thumbsup: We might have to discuss the OC-kids-cameo thing, too. How fun would that be?

EDIT: Now that I've gotten a chance to go back and read the other critiques, I know why I didn't notice the grammar "errors". To me, they weren't errors! The of in of course should absolutely be capitalized because it's the first word that is being spoken, regardless of its placement in the overall sentence. At least, that's how I've always been taught. Either way, the debate continues!

 

I think it's a great idea - we'll have to work on it!

And glad the "Word > Notepad > Post" thing helped.

Leni

 

Looks like it isn't simply a British/American divide... do different American states have different grammar rules too?

I think I'm a fan of both ways. If the capitol throws off the flow then I won't put it in but here, because it's in the first person, I think it should be capitalised; to separate the thought from the speech. I really need to stop obsessing over this now!

And also, after reading the other critiques, I've changed my mind. I am classing this fic as a songfic and you have proved me wrong... it was a songfic that I liked. I guess they do exist

EDIT: I know, I know, I really am obsessed about this but I want to put this debate to rest once and for all. So I asked my dad (he's a language lecturer/professor/whatever at the local university and specialises in several languages) and he's come up with some good points about what to do in certain situations. (I'm sorry if I say something that you already know, it's just to clear some things up.)

If we take Jodie's suggestion first:

Without hesitation, I answered you, "of course..."

This should be capitalised because as I said, it separates the thought from the speech. Perhaps what would be better would be:

Without hesitation, I answered you; "Of course..."

What this does is makes the separation absolutely clear whilst showing the link at the same time. It still works even if you were to drop the you, as both Jodie and I suggested, and the "of course" should still be capitalised.

And even that comma after hesitation is a little iffy. At first glance it acts almost like parenthesis and also is at odds with the point of the sentence; "without hesitation"

What happens if this wasn't written in the first person, but in the third?

Without any hestiation he answered, "Of course I will."

Same rule applies; it's thought/narration to dialogue.

The only time that you shouldn't capitalise speech is in this instance (this is a made up example):

"I think," he paused, "that you should..."

Because the "he paused" acts like parenthesis, separating the two parts of the speech.

I've no doubt someone is going to disagree with this *cough* Jodie *cough* but that's my two cents

 

AUGH! Too busy this week to critique and I feel so bad! I've been doing so much, and I've been running around like mad. I promise I'll review if I have more time next week! Sorry, Leni! I feel terrible!

Amanda

 

Snap. I still have to do my critique too, don't I?

Well, I'll get it done. No worries about that one.

Also. I wanted to discuss something with you guys. I've been thinking about it and I have mentioned it before. How do you feel about moving? I think we could use our own space. I'm working on getting a site up and running as a beta site for us to try out. I am having trouble with the graphics though.

IF you do or don't want to move, let me know. I want everyone who is a part of this to be a part of the new site, IF we move... so it's important to me that we all agree.

I just think it's time we had more room. Our own turf. So we can incorporate more members and maybe more challenges. Let me know.