2010-04-10

rainwaterspark: Image of Altaïr overlooking Acre from Assassin's Creed (assassin's creed overlook)
2010-04-10 03:27 pm
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Inkpop.com

It's a website created by the publisher HarperCollins for teens to post their novels and rate others' novels. The top five most highly rated will be read by a HarperCollins editor and *may* have a chance of publication.

The premise sounds rather exciting, but my fear that even the most "highly rated" stories aren't necessarily good...is true.

I was looking at the number one story, which from its summary already sounds like your generic fantasy adventure, and I have a few comments:

1) The dreaded "epic" prologue, detailing how the world was created, yadayada. Get on with the story already!

2) The even more dreaded purple prose. I think this author could fight with Paolini for the title of most purply writer. Example: "His clean-cut face projected an aura of heaven. His hair looked like whiskers, and his eyes shone like onyx. A contagious smile played at his lips."

No wait, it gets worse--the author goes on to describe the dude's jewelry and also describes some old guy's hair as "snowy silkworms."

And sword practice: "Even though it nearly tore his body apart, Kevin executed all techniques with precision and power, appearing like a tornado of steel."

3) Oh yeah, and the name of the antagonist, the king of demons? It's Demono. No lie.

...Uh, I don't think I can take this any longer. Excuse me while I go laugh my head off.