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[Devin]

Here is the link:  www.devinowens.net  All thoughts on the web design and content are welcome

The preview!:

     DisAbled Oddities is the story of a seriously ill college student, Holly Blumenthal, just trying to keep her life together while struggling with the school administration when she finds that she can see the supernatural hidden amongst everyday life. Even the fae aren't sure if her perception is a result of her illness itself or another cause entirely. Holly soon discovers what is secret even to the general community of fae, that adherents of a radical faerie philosophy may have found a way to solve what they see as the curse of their attachment to the human world. As events move on apace Holly's gift of perception and her ability to go where fae are bound not to tread draws everyone's interest, and she must decide what to do for her new friends in the hidden world while trying to keep a mundane and unsympathetic college administration from throwing her out of school because of her illness.

     At its core, this is a tale of the difficulties of being young and very sick, as well as the unique perspectives that come from disability. It is a story that will be recognizable to anyone who has struggled with charting a path based on ideals in a harshly impractical world.

[bjlong]

I had enough time to read through the first chapter, so here's a quick critique.

First off, your opening paragraph is dull. This will lose our attention very quickly. Let me say that it's not unsalvageable, but the first sentence should have grabbed me. And then the paragraph after that should have slapped me with some story. Instead, I got... grass.

Here's a crappy, terse re-write of the first sentence.

"I knew it was going to be a bad day by the way my gaze was drawn toward the grass as it kissed the wind in twitterpated waves, welcoming my eyes off the path to its gloriously restful-looking tufts."

Becomes

"It was a bad day already--I couldn't stop looking at the grass. I was just so tired, you know, ..."

Secondly, you've got a minor infestation of purple prose. Purple prose is overly florid, so that we lose sense of what the characters are feeling, and what the feeling of the passage is. It's phrases like "the ongoing feeling of their threatened rebellion," "to allay the weight of the mammoth chemistry book," "I was having seriously difficulty toward the end of the night adding together the numbers on two six-sided dice" and more that really bog down the story.

Instead, say something shorter like "their constant protests" "to lighten the massive chemistry book" "I had trouble adding three and four." Basically, without removing any events, reduce your wordcount by at least a hundred.

Finally, you need to consider what sort of effect you want to have on the reader. Right now it's like Eeyore saying "Ho hum. I'm tired. I should get back to my dorm and take some pills or something." And that's boring--we'll just flip to a different book with explosions or something. Perhaps a better way to do this would be have moments of intense panic or somesuch, so that we care if she gets back to the dorm.

Also, this has the feel of a semi-personal story. I'd reccomend taking it off the internets for now, finishing a draft and then a revision, then post it, especially if it is somewhat personal.

Closing thoughts: First chapter had some basic mistakes, but had pretty good writing. The main problems are getting us to care about the dilemma, and pacing, but they can be cleaned up.

[Devin]

Thank you.  A few tweaks added; verbs need to be shifted earlier in a few sentences still, but it should be a little easier.

It's funny, I wouldn't ever have expected someone to categorize forms of prose by color.  Neat.

As far as personal-ness, that's part of what motivates the public nature of the project, with there being a lack of understanding for lives of the young and disabled.  I'm willing to see how it goes.