"The Ocean Sings for the Sky" by armani_g_keegan

Overall:

I really enjoyed the world you created with this story! I loved how you personified the sky while describing its actions against the Nightingales. The phrasing in the prologue felt genuine to the phrasing in myths. Pairing the conflict of the stars with the sailors was interesting with how much this event would cripple their navigation, and I really like stories that get right into the conflict like you do here.

There were a couple of little details I thought were interesting, such as the name of "Nightingales" for the dark-skinned bird women, and how dark-skin was an indication of royalty. The world felt lived in, rather than existing to serve the characters. This felt especially true towards the end of chapter one with how the characters react regarding the map to Bawei and how they talk about the "Fall of the Nightingales" event; you can tell exactly what this culture thinks of this event just from the dialogue and actions. 

Specifics:

Focus: Exposition and Pacing

There was an overarching issue of the focus of scenes not aligning with the descriptions. For example, the first sentence of the first chapter, "But the land of Thoka has always been blessed with good harvest," is a great in medias res usage, as it starts the scene immediately with a conflict (the harvest is no longer doing well), as well as immediately getting the reader into the moment of the story. 

However, before the scene is able to be developed, the description of the men of Thoka interrupts the flow and hijacks the focus away from the fledgling start of a scene, and as a result, distances the readers from the story rather than draws them in. The exposition here is also disconnected from what the scene was set up as, which adds to the feeling of detachment. 

This issue is something that continues throughout the story. It's not that the descriptions aren't good, as, on their own, I found them very interesting, it's that they do not build on the scene that is happening. This causes them to feel awkward and jarring. 

When you're writing exposition, the most important thing to remember is that the exposition must serve the scene you're writing. When you're creating a fantasy world like you are here, you do need to have more exposition to assist with the world building, but you can get a lot of milage by leaving some things unsaid. For example, the scene in Chapter 4 with Ames and Myricie worked really well by keeping the focus on the two characters, and any descriptions that were given added to the scene and kept the tension building. Don't be afraid to trust your readers and make them think to engage with your story. 

Pacing wise, the pacing for the chapters was pretty good. The plot kept moving at a decent pace without moving too fast and losing me. The only issues I noticed were related to the above issue with exposition, as the explanations would take away from the pacing of the scene, which made the plot feel muddy and disjointed. 

Improvements:

Characters:

While I was reading, the characters themselves felt underdeveloped, especially Ames. The world itself is there, but the inhabitance didn't feel like real people quite yet. 

To improve here, I would recommend the following:

     · Cut any exposition that does not directly build on the scene and focus on the characters themselves. This is because it's easier to care about a character than backstory/world-building, and focusing on the characters will help us care about the world they live in. 

    · Focus on figuring out who these characters are. What motivates them to do the things they do, and what are they willing to do to get it? 

A quick and easy way to get to the heart of a character is to answer these two questions:

1) Here is a thing [character] wants:

2) Here is a thing [character] fears:

These do not strictly have to be serious answers, as they could be something like "he fears people watching him eat" or "he feared cats lying on his face and smothering him while he slept"; as long as they help you figure out what makes this character tick is all that matters. 

The next step is figuring out why they have these desires/fears. For example, the character who fears people watching him eat maybe a local celebrity who is constantly in the public eye. 

This information doesn't need to be directly told to the readers, but you want to thoroughly understand how your characters work in order to understand how they'll behave when things are thrown at them. For example, a minor character in Persistent Silence, Thomas Waggoner, answers were "Here is something he wanted: for the nightmares to stop. Here was something he feared: that he deserved them." This is never explicitely mentioned in the story itself, but the last answer greatly influenced how I protrayed him throughout the story.

Ideally, you want their desires to directly tie in with the core conflict of the story, and let the characters shape the plot as much as the plot shapes them. 

Plot:

The story was sort of there, but there were a few moments where the events felt underdeveloped. This got better with chapter 3/4, and after chapter 6, the story felt more realized than it did for the earlier chapters. I think this is also related to the exposition upfront, as there's a lot of things to keep track of that the story itself gets lost in the details and world building of what's being set up. 

To improve here, I would recommend the following:

     · Take a step back from the chapters themselves and outline what happens in each chapter. I find bullet pointing everything that has to be established in a given scene for the reader to understand what's happening. 

For example, you might have something like:

Prologue:

        · Establishes: 

                    → Myricie and the nightingales

                    → How the Fall of the Nightingales came to happen

                    → the effects of the event (they lost their wings, etc)

It's really easy to not see the forest for the trees when you're writing since you're in the thick of the story, so taking a step back and figuring out the beats of each chapter can really help identify what information is needed in a given scene as well as what things need to be beefed up.  

       · Strengthen the first two chapters.

The first two chapters really lost me as far as establishing who the main characters were and what kick started the story. I think focusing on your characters here will really help, as defining their motivation will help propel the journey across the sea, as well as clearly defining how this event is inciting the events of the plot.

I think slowing down in these chapters and allowing the scenes to play out will really help improve, as the end of Chapter 1 where they decide to sail was a lot stronger than the beginning of the chapter. 

Closing Thoughts:

I really liked this story, and I think you have something really interesting here. I do think it needs some more work with the bones of the story still, but that's what drafts are for. Definitely keep at it!