A Dancing Bear

Yes! Another fantastic piece of writing that breeds the paradoxical feelings in me of fluttering joy and crushing envy that I didn't write it first. Your pace, wit, use of language and sense of humour are all absolutely perfect. The part about orienteering, cress, kabuki theatre etc was so ludicrously spot-on I wondered how long it took for you to come up with the ideal list of 'Things People are Vaguely Aware Of'. This is great writing. I actually gasped when she sat on his lap. I think that the best thing about what I've read is the excitement that there's plenty more to come. Excellent job. Shelved without question.

Hilarious, man. An Undeniable Classic. Hmm, wow. Is this a conscious retelling of 'Lucky Jim', one of my favorite books ever? If so you are paying a sky-high-quality homage to that great work, and I am beyond impressed. I particularly *adore* socioliterology (with a small 's'--scorching!) and the eviction of the bedenimmed Dylan-quoters ... I mean. This is very, very good stuff.

I'm going to have to disagree with Tiercel, here. Your poetic licentiousness totally sends me. I LOVE how rape suspects have ponytails. Yay. He's right, however, on the cutting thing. You're going to be asked to cut this, probably by a third; from what I understand, 100,000 words is the maximum a regular publisher will want to print. From the standpoint of getting serious consideration from a conventional publisher, I think it would be a good idea to cut it yourself rather than hand it over to others. Do I think it would be a good idea to cut it? I have read only three chapters so it would be presumptuous of me to say; I will say, though, that when the (excellent) dialogue started to really crank up in Ch. 3, I found the flow of the writing to be much smoother. The jokes are tremendous and it's worth being patient when you're going to be arriving at such wonders as "off-buff" in a long, dense paragraph, but the breaking-up of these ruminative passages with dialogue gives the whole work additional bounce and narrative drive. So yeah, I will hazard a guess that you can cut this profitably, and wind up with a leaner, faster machine.

I won't be able to finish 'A Dancing Bear' for some weeks but I will most definitely be back. Really brilliant work, Mr. Free; I am happy to back this and recommend it on the forums. Thank you for a very enjoyable read--Maria.

Get this, loads. Great, great stuff. Dunno's right: grabs you by the bollocks, or goolies, or testicles! The laughter is of the deep down, rumbling in your chest kind, that bursts forth in spurts, like from a pressure cooker.

Keep it up, man. You must. You will. You're a writer, right?

James

Wow! This is so full of wit and cutting humour. Cool and totally off the wall. I love it when you can just fall into a book and forget about critiquing and jsut enjoy it for what it is. You drag us in by the bollocks. A comedy for the age of terror! Excellent work my friend!

I've been reading this non-stop since this morning. I started yesterday evening and finished the first three chapters. Now I'm up to chapter twelve, the beggining is hilarious. Hilarious. I love this book.

I love your sense of humour, the wonderful characters, and the plot. Great attention to detail and a well thought out story. Happy to back. Eunice - The Temple Dancer.

I have this on my shelf at home and often pick it up to browse. It's a bloody fantastic piece of writing.

I love, I love Literary Fiction. The Best. Backed.

Hey, only read the first couple of chapters so far, but think this is one of the best written and easiest to get into books I've come across on here. Looking forward to reading the rest. Cheers.

Dear Dave.

We couldn't f-----g care less what those demented tw-ts say about your book, they are just jealous. We hope your book makes it to the bookshelves and libraries along with many other good books on this site,

So we are backing it, cos we enjoyed the read, so there!


Eleanor and Sharkey.

The effects of lust on our lives. Another one bites the dust just because of a intriguing curve of a young breast. What won't we do for some touch. Other readers may have commented on your writing needing a heavy edit, but I like the extra detail. It adds a little more to the setting and the interactions between Fenton, the Maoists, and the little lady with whom Mr. Bland (great name) is infatuated. I want to read more, so you're shelved.

The effects of lust on our lives. Another one bites the dust just because of a intriguing curve of a young breast. What won't we do for some touch. Other readers may have commented on your writing needing a heavy edit, but I like the extra detail. It adds a little more to the setting and the interactions between Fenton, the Maoists, and the little lady with whom Mr. Bland (great name) is infatuated. I want to read more, so you're shelved.

I agree this needs a lot of trimming, but it's still worthy of shelf space. Your writing has such a hip, earthy feel to it I found myself absorbed.

David, I read your perfectly reasonable rebuttal of Pierre Van Rooyen's nonsensical review and agreed with every word you said. As the author of a commercially unpublishable book myself (for reasons of length and genre) I support your stance 100%. A book is -- and should be -- exactly as the author wants it. For your integrity, you have my wholehearted support. However, you have put it up here for public criticism and cannot complain if people shy rotten tomatoes at it.

As I say, I read your rebuttal first, was amused and intrigued by your pitch, liked the premise (different, and promising fun), was impressed by your cherry-picked comments, and started the book in a positive frame of mind.

This was quickly dispelled when I read the first sentence. ' "You lunatics", FB pretended to think.' What do you mean -- 'pretended'? He has 'pretended' nothing. He's thought it. There it is, in black and white, in the form of interior monologue. So what was he actually thinking, then, when he was pretending (to himself) that he was thinking "You lunatics"?

Then we have your obsession with the expression "fiery glance". Fenton gives a a fiery glance in para 1, and TWO fiery glances in para 3. Perhaps there is some deep significance to this but I regret to say that it has sailed over my head and gone splat ! against the wall.

Through the university window (clearly sited in Adverb City, USA), Fenton can see snow-like clouds of pollen and muses on this "freak of meteorology". This has nothing to do with the weather. It may be a freak of flora, but it certainly isn't a freak of meteorology.

The unnamed girl is sitting "at the far end of the table". In fact, as we learn a little later, this is two tables pushed together. Yet, when she takes a bite out of an apple, Fenton -- who, with 20/20 vision like that, could find gainful employment as a fighter pilot -- can see it leaves "a clean white crater in which tiny bubbles of juice mingle with her spit". Not long after this I decided to cut my losses and leave shortly after the unnamed girl left the room.

Now, I'm perfectly willing to concede that this might be a first-rate parody (I didn't read far enough to decide that for myself) and that what I assume is self-indulgent writing is satire. Maybe even the triple "fiery glances" have some significance which has escaped me. And, as I say, I accept that this is how you want the book to be, and I'm OK with that. That's your unassailable right. But I have to tell you, I can't see the majority of book-browsers (I understand it's already published) reading much further than ' "You lunatics", FB pretended to think.'

David, I really wanted to enjoy this book. And it's clear that many people on this site (and those who have purchased it) have liked it. But I didn't. I couldn't even give it a fair crack of the whip. Since my criticism is what you are within your rights to regard as a "drive-by review", and therefore of no value to you, I will delete this Comment if you would like me to. Let me know.

One final thing: As I imagine you quite naturally want your book to be enjoyed by as many people as possible and (again, quite naturally) have no wish to compromise editorially, I'm afraid you are in a cleft stick of your own splitting. For the sake of the story, won't you bend a little?

Richard Maitland

Hi David.
You have just sold another copy of your book. The first chapter was so good I just had to order it from Amazon, as it would be a shame to waste reading the rest on a screen. How the hell it is only ranked 925 is a complete mystery. I thought mine was bad enough at 369.
How many boks have you sold on Amazon. I have managed 6 !!! Not being known, and the price is a bit offputting I guess. Very best of luck with this mate. They just don't come much better.
Try Crisis in Isis for one that gets laughs on every page if you have not already done so. Eric

I like the level of detail that you manage in your writing. It keeps the reader grounded in reality even when the characters find themselves in the oddest situations! This is a bold story.
I found a couple of the adverbs slightly distracting "fierily" and "boredly" - I've never come across them before, and I wasn't sure how someone could look at his watch "fierily." Apart from that, there is very little that I can criticise. A little editing should result in a polished manuscript.

Just read chapter three and have the words 'this should be damn well published' cemented onto my cranium. This is fantastic. Pamela is exactly like a character I was hoping to write. You got there first you bastard. The legend of Neville Aggot was done excellently as well- both an eerie ballad to a murdering psychopath, and a brilliant satire on the way society treats such people. I absolutely loved it all. My only suggestion is to trim down the bits where Fenton is trying to avoid Pamela in the lecture hall. It could be shaved right down and be much funnier...if that's even possible.

No, it isn’t severely overwritten. And no, I’m not going to pare it down by 34%, or by 19.6%, or by 1%. I’ve been living with this book for a long time, and I’m far better acquainted with its strengths and weaknesses than someone who’s speed-read the first three paragraphs in order to leave a boilerplate drive-by comment. One reason I stopped playing the preposterous authonomy game is that I’m sick of having people read and comment on my book for the worst possible reason – i.e. because they have to. From now on, my book is here only for that select group of readers who actually like it as it is, and generally get the point of it, and might even - Lord forbid! - want to read it all the way through. There still seem to be a few eccentric people like that around here, if the comments are any guide at all.

But if you don’t like what you see, please feel free to dismiss the whole thing from your mind and move on. I don’t give reciprocal reads or anything like that, so there really is no point in lingering here if you’re not enjoying yourself. No book is for everyone. My book is even less for everyone than most are. In fact, can I float a radical notion – a notion that the more hard-headed number-crunchers on this site might well consider pretentious? My book is made up of words. Its language is its essence. Removing 34% of it wouldn’t be a paring-down at all – it’d be removing a third of what it is. And I have no intention of changing it into something I never wanted it to be in order to chase the vain dream of pleasing some adverb-hating publisher or agent. I’m not out to please people like that, or second-guess their dubious taste in literature. If that means the book never ends up getting published at all, I’m starting to find that I don’t really care. Publication per se is not a goal worth throwing that much away for. Shane Warne is a published writer. So is The Rock. I'm not about to lop away a third of my novel just on the off chance that I might one day get to join their lofty ranks.

So let me be clear: My goal is to get as many of the right sort of people as possible to read my book: my book, as written by me, quite carefully and over a long period of time, in the hope of entertaining the kind of reader who likes that kind of book. Having the book on this site is one way of achieving that. Getting it published would be a better way, but I’m not holding my breath on that one. And look carefully at what I said there. I said getting *it* published. Not getting *me* published. *It.* My book. There’s a difference. If you can’t see it, then I’m almost certainly not the writer for you. Or maybe you - as I might put it if I were as ragingly presumptuous as a few of my drive-by critics - are not the reader for me.

Dear David,


This is severely overwritten. You are going to have to pare it down by 34%.

I put you on my bookshelf but maybe I shouldn’t have.

If you don’t want the notes that follow, message me and I shall remove them. Go well with your work.

Over the past five months I have spent three hundred hours providing page-long critiques but can no longer keep up with the volume.

So I’m trying another way of passing on information.

I will attempt to do better than critique your work by indicating how you might judge it yourself. Rather along the lines of give a man a fish, feed him for a day. Teach him how to fish, feed him for life. You may or may not agree with everything and I admit I do not always stick to these thoughts either.

What I have set out below are guide-lines based on what I myself have learnt from being published.

The pitch is critically important as among the book-lists which editors scan, your pitch stands alone with no support from the synopsis. I write the synopsis first, because a key sentence there is usually appropriate for the pitch.

A synopsis is not a dust-jacket advertisement. Aimed at a professional editor, it is a no-nonsense summary of what happens in the novel, including how the novel ends. Don’t leave the editor dangling and don’t ask her questions. Tell her.

Somerset Maugham said, ‘There are three rules for writing a successful novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.’

Correct. There are no rules for creativity. Think of Richard Bach’s Jonathon Livingstone Seagull. So way out, so creative it was rejected over a hundred times. Then it became a best seller.

There is one criterion though……. entertainment. Our writing must entertain from the very first sentence. There is no other reason for story-telling whether around a camp fire or in print..

I have struggled nine years to write three novels. Each written three times. One published, one lying fallow, Fig Tree currently in the process of being rewritten for the fifth time. Two literary agents requested the full manuscript but threw it back at me for narrative story telling. So I am rewriting, converting narrative to dialogue.

Based on what has happened to me, these are my thoughts on what editors want from us…………….


Plunge directly into the story. Do not set the scene or back-story first. When we go to a play and the curtain rises, we don’t see stage hands putting the props in place. The stage is already set. Likewise our opening paragraphs to the reader, the actors should immediately get on with it.

I have found that our opening chapter isn’t necessarily the first one we write. It might only occur to us when the novel is completed.

Let our characters drive the story-telling via dialogue, interplay and direct action. It’s stupid (although I am guilty of this) to have a stage set and silent characters frozen, while an off-stage narrator bores the audience with what is supposed to be happening on the stage.

Write minimal words because research shows that our readers’ brains race ahead of our words, visualizing the scene themselves, anticipating how our sentences end…… four times faster than they are reading. They become bored and frustrated by our overwriting, over description, unnecessary information. (I have been hauled over the coals for this.)

Write tight, sparse, lean, stark, bare bones. Adjectives and adverbs are for people who need a crutch to support their unimaginative nouns and verbs. As far as possible, always seek the appropriate noun and verb.

(Read John Steinbeck’s field notes Journal of a Novel which he jotted down while he was writing East of Eden. He edited out as many adjectives and adverbs as possible, finding the appropriate noun or verb instead.)

And yet, in my rewrite I am horrified to find superfluous words, adjectives, adverbs and general waffling which I am getting rid of. I am embarrassed at my own work.

My vocabulary is poor, so I use Roget’s Thesaurus which is a treasure. A real work-horse and a delight to use. It’s a companion that provides thousands of alternative words. Appropriate nouns and verbs are there for the picking.

Don’t write your scenes. Live them. Experience them. Meditate. Daydream yourself into them Watch what is happening. Listen to what the characters are saying. Smell the sweat or the aroma or whatever. Touch what the characters are touching. What do you feel? Taste the bile, the coffee, or the skin of the lover.

All communication is made through our five senses. I wear earmuffs when I write, to help me leave this world, experience the emotions and the senses and disappear into another universe which is the scene I’m trying to paint.

Are we stirring the emotions of the reader? Feeling is critically important. This can be achieved through good dialogue. Speak your dialogue aloud to hear what it sounds like. Is it natural? Do people really speak like that? Is it too formal? In the real world, we often don’t speak complete sentences. So dialogue can be truncated too to make it more natural.

In my opinion a novel must generate its own momentum, so readers experience it rather than read it. This can be achieved by dreaming it, experiencing it, living it, rather than writing it.

To avoid clumsiness I edit out the past participle ‘had’. I change ‘he had done it’ to ‘he did it’ It seems to make the action more immediate and more relevant.

I also dump words ending in ‘-ly’……. seemingly, clearly, obviously. actually, strangely, finally, eventually………. and all the others. Somehow they weaken our writing and make it vague.

And I am finding that much of the dialogue reads better if the ‘he said, she said’ is deleted.

Taking words out of our sentences and taking sentences out of long narrative paragraphs, in my opinion, is the secret to better writing. I can easily cut my stuff between 20% and 50%.

I learnt this when a literary agent demanded I delete 40,000 words from my first novel of 120,000 words. I was shocked but I cut it back to 80,000 words and the novel was published.

Fig Tree has already shed 16,000 words and I am currently rewriting it for the fifth time, changing the dialogue, cutting the narrative and tightening the writing as much as possible. I might dump another 6,000 words.

You may be interested in The Video Inside Our Heads, which is part of a confession I made about my idiocies in attempting to write. See, ‘How I Wrote and Sold My First Novel’ in Forum’s Writing section. It’s quite insane and you’ll probably laugh at me but it did work and I suppose that’s what matters..

I trust this is better than a critique and provides a bit of food for thought..


Kind regards,



Pierre Van Rooyen.

Dear David,


This is severely overwritten. You are going to have to pare it down by 34%.

I put you on my bookshelf but maybe I shouldn’t have.

If you don’t want the notes that follow, message me and I shall remove them. Go well with your work.

Over the past five months I have spent three hundred hours providing page-long critiques but can no longer keep up with the volume.

So I’m trying another way of passing on information.

I will attempt to do better than critique your work by indicating how you might judge it yourself. Rather along the lines of give a man a fish, feed him for a day. Teach him how to fish, feed him for life. You may or may not agree with everything and I admit I do not always stick to these thoughts either.

What I have set out below are guide-lines based on what I myself have learnt from being published.

The pitch is critically important as among the book-lists which editors scan, your pitch stands alone with no support from the synopsis. I write the synopsis first, because a key sentence there is usually appropriate for the pitch.

A synopsis is not a dust-jacket advertisement. Aimed at a professional editor, it is a no-nonsense summary of what happens in the novel, including how the novel ends. Don’t leave the editor dangling and don’t ask her questions. Tell her.

Somerset Maugham said, ‘There are three rules for writing a successful novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.’

Correct. There are no rules for creativity. Think of Richard Bach’s Jonathon Livingstone Seagull. So way out, so creative it was rejected over a hundred times. Then it became a best seller.

There is one criterion though……. entertainment. Our writing must entertain from the very first sentence. There is no other reason for story-telling whether around a camp fire or in print..

I have struggled nine years to write three novels. Each written three times. One published, one lying fallow, Fig Tree currently in the process of being rewritten for the fifth time. Two literary agents requested the full manuscript but threw it back at me for narrative story telling. So I am rewriting, converting narrative to dialogue.

Based on what has happened to me, these are my thoughts on what editors want from us…………….


Plunge directly into the story. Do not set the scene or back-story first. When we go to a play and the curtain rises, we don’t see stage hands putting the props in place. The stage is already set. Likewise our opening paragraphs to the reader, the actors should immediately get on with it.

I have found that our opening chapter isn’t necessarily the first one we write. It might only occur to us when the novel is completed.

Let our characters drive the story-telling via dialogue, interplay and direct action. It’s stupid (although I am guilty of this) to have a stage set and silent characters frozen, while an off-stage narrator bores the audience with what is supposed to be happening on the stage.

Write minimal words because research shows that our readers’ brains race ahead of our words, visualizing the scene themselves, anticipating how our sentences end…… four times faster than they are reading. They become bored and frustrated by our overwriting, over description, unnecessary information. (I have been hauled over the coals for this.)

Write tight, sparse, lean, stark, bare bones. Adjectives and adverbs are for people who need a crutch to support their unimaginative nouns and verbs. As far as possible, always seek the appropriate noun and verb.

(Read John Steinbeck’s field notes Journal of a Novel which he jotted down while he was writing East of Eden. He edited out as many adjectives and adverbs as possible, finding the appropriate noun or verb instead.)

And yet, in my rewrite I am horrified to find superfluous words, adjectives, adverbs and general waffling which I am getting rid of. I am embarrassed at my own work.

My vocabulary is poor, so I use Roget’s Thesaurus which is a treasure. A real work-horse and a delight to use. It’s a companion that provides thousands of alternative words. Appropriate nouns and verbs are there for the picking.

Don’t write your scenes. Live them. Experience them. Meditate. Daydream yourself into them Watch what is happening. Listen to what the characters are saying. Smell the sweat or the aroma or whatever. Touch what the characters are touching. What do you feel? Taste the bile, the coffee, or the skin of the lover.

All communication is made through our five senses. I wear earmuffs when I write, to help me leave this world, experience the emotions and the senses and disappear into another universe which is the scene I’m trying to paint.

Are we stirring the emotions of the reader? Feeling is critically important. This can be achieved through good dialogue. Speak your dialogue aloud to hear what it sounds like. Is it natural? Do people really speak like that? Is it too formal? In the real world, we often don’t speak complete sentences. So dialogue can be truncated too to make it more natural.

In my opinion a novel must generate its own momentum, so readers experience it rather than read it. This can be achieved by dreaming it, experiencing it, living it, rather than writing it.

To avoid clumsiness I edit out the past participle ‘had’. I change ‘he had done it’ to ‘he did it’ It seems to make the action more immediate and more relevant.

I also dump words ending in ‘-ly’……. seemingly, clearly, obviously. actually, strangely, finally, eventually………. and all the others. Somehow they weaken our writing and make it vague.

And I am finding that much of the dialogue reads better if the ‘he said, she said’ is deleted.

Taking words out of our sentences and taking sentences out of long narrative paragraphs, in my opinion, is the secret to better writing. I can easily cut my stuff between 20% and 50%.

I learnt this when a literary agent demanded I delete 40,000 words from my first novel of 120,000 words. I was shocked but I cut it back to 80,000 words and the novel was published.

Fig Tree has already shed 16,000 words and I am currently rewriting it for the fifth time, changing the dialogue, cutting the narrative and tightening the writing as much as possible. I might dump another 6,000 words.

You may be interested in The Video Inside Our Heads, which is part of a confession I made about my idiocies in attempting to write. See, ‘How I Wrote and Sold My First Novel’ in Forum’s Writing section. It’s quite insane and you’ll probably laugh at me but it did work and I suppose that’s what matters..

I trust this is better than a critique and provides a bit of food for thought..


Kind regards,



Pierre Van Rooyen.

A very original piece of humorous writing. Some neat satire and observation told with great polish.

Dear David. Fenton is quite the romantic, considering every detail of his pursued love. You capture details of which one is aware but does not consider. Fenton appreciates every moment and gesture of the girl, right down to her salavia on her apple. You season your writing with humor, such as Fenton's wandering mind shifting to his colon. Gus is a charismatic character and a delicious mix to the scenario. Your descriptions of meaty palms and thighs over thighs and bubbling apples is extraordinary. Shelved. Good luck. Janet Marie

Everyone’s right to rave about your book. Clever, funny and twisted.

Yes! Another fantastic piece of writing that breeds the paradoxical feelings in me of fluttering joy and crushing envy that I didn't write it first. Your pace, wit, use of language and sense of humour are all absolutely perfect. The part about orienteering, cress, kabuki theatre etc was so ludicrously spot-on I wondered how long it took for you to come up with the ideal list of 'Things People are Vaguely Aware Of'. This is great writing. I actually gasped when she sat on his lap. I think that the best thing about what I've read is the excitement that there's plenty more to come. Excellent job. Shelved without question.

Busy today, so this is flying visit. Very interesting premise. It is a very enticing idea: how far would you go to get the girl? My only criticism is that you tend to overdo the modifiers. My view is that this dilutes rather than increases the impact. I wonder how savage this tale would be without the humour? I'll back you.

Hi David,

I was reading your pitch and I have a question. What is a wet boy? Am I completely dense because I don't know?

Thanks for the question, Wannabe. A lot of people are querying this phrase -- I've decided I'm going to change it soon, because I can't go on having people puzzling over my pitch. But anyway, it's a slang term for an assassin -- i.e. someone who engages in "wet work." I picked it up from the kind of tough guy novels (James Ellroy etc) that my book is a kind of twisted homage to.

DANCING BEAR (David Free)
There's a great story building with well imagined characters and settings.
Perhaps fewer adverbs would improve its readability and leave it seeming less like "writing."
That might also achieve a minimal requirement of 25% reduction in word count.
Backed.
mch

David, I'm three chapters in and totally hooked. Your writing is fluid, witty, inventive, well-paced and pretty much flawless.

Shelved, of course, probably for a long time. I look forward to reading much more of this marvel.

There is an element of overdescription going on. Sooner or later, you're going to have to have a serious cull. Grab yourself by the balls and give yourself a good talking to. A slap wouldn't go amiss, either. This is worth doing, because you have a wonderful turn of phrase that is currently being buried in prose.

I snorted, I chuckled, I laughed. I back.

Get this, loads. Great, great stuff. Dunno's right: grabs you by the bollocks, or goolies, or testicles! The laughter is of the deep down, rumbling in your chest kind, that bursts forth in spurts, like from a pressure cooker.

Keep it up, man. You must. You will. You're a writer, right?

James

this is really polished writing. I loved your descriptions of...everything. This is great work. Shelved

Jen (Awake From the Life Dream)

Wow! This is so full of wit and cutting humour. Cool and totally off the wall. I love it when you can just fall into a book and forget about critiquing and jsut enjoy it for what it is. You drag us in by the bollocks. A comedy for the age of terror! Excellent work my friend!

Hilarious, man. An Undeniable Classic. Hmm, wow. Is this a conscious retelling of 'Lucky Jim', one of my favorite books ever? If so you are paying a sky-high-quality homage to that great work, and I am beyond impressed. I particularly *adore* socioliterology (with a small 's'--scorching!) and the eviction of the bedenimmed Dylan-quoters ... I mean. This is very, very good stuff.

I'm going to have to disagree with Tiercel, here. Your poetic licentiousness totally sends me. I LOVE how rape suspects have ponytails. Yay. He's right, however, on the cutting thing. You're going to be asked to cut this, probably by a third; from what I understand, 100,000 words is the maximum a regular publisher will want to print. From the standpoint of getting serious consideration from a conventional publisher, I think it would be a good idea to cut it yourself rather than hand it over to others. Do I think it would be a good idea to cut it? I have read only three chapters so it would be presumptuous of me to say; I will say, though, that when the (excellent) dialogue started to really crank up in Ch. 3, I found the flow of the writing to be much smoother. The jokes are tremendous and it's worth being patient when you're going to be arriving at such wonders as "off-buff" in a long, dense paragraph, but the breaking-up of these ruminative passages with dialogue gives the whole work additional bounce and narrative drive. So yeah, I will hazard a guess that you can cut this profitably, and wind up with a leaner, faster machine.

I won't be able to finish 'A Dancing Bear' for some weeks but I will most definitely be back. Really brilliant work, Mr. Free; I am happy to back this and recommend it on the forums. Thank you for a very enjoyable read--Maria.

This is one of the few genuinely funny things I have read here. Sorry I haven't time to read more.

You did make me laugh with this, especially the stuff about Fenton's stomach. The characterisation of the young male painfully obsessed with objectification of the young female was very good.

On the downside you employ some rather bizarre expressions.

"rich-inner-lived"

"staring boredly"

"he febrilely noted"

"pony tailed like a rape suspect"

which I found a bit weird. Also what the hell is a "terrorist wet boy"? Maybe this is just a Pom thing.

I'm shelving this because it is actually funny, and that seemed to be all that mattered. You could consider some reworking and pruning to make it leaner, but you would appear to have a gift for the pace and tone of comic writing which few possess.

The only slight reservation you might encounter is the thought that to a lot of people terrorism is not considered a topic for comedy. Humourless bastards!

Best wishes,

Chris

hi David
Heh, it's * so * many years since I was a Uni student, but this really appealed to me (only one chapter in, admittedly). If I were you I'd shorten some of those paragraphs, but that's just a personal observation. I chortled through this and will stick it on my shelf for a little while. I'll also come read more of it. No terrible typos etc, and I liked the 'feel' of the story.
Regards, all the best with this

Well, I had a quick look at this, so that I don't miss its rise up the charts.
A little bit of editing getting rid of the rare stale or tangled line will work wonders for this hilarious tale - bringing back vivid memories to me of university days, with my own 'The Dozen Stooges: Maoists' to deal with - and my own longing and desire.
Peppered with brilliant lines such as "fellatio and death..."... and "Maoism is still alive near the..."
Will comment more when I've read more, but easily shelved for now.

Love it! This is a subject close to my heart, and I will definitely be back for more.

I made you some notes! Only a couple.

Your first sentence is great - I'd take out the fiery glance as his watch, personally - it turns it into too much of a "first sentence" cliche'. But without it, the sentence is super! Ah, but I see you need it for the (very good) following jokes. Well, maybe just take out the "while" and you'll be alright.

In the "her chair was angled" sentence, I'd take out the "was" in all of the following items. I recommend this on account of the fact that I think it would make the sentence better flowing, and hence funnier.

Doing the "University of ----" thing is not something I've seen in a while...have you really thought about this choice? Placing the story somewhere specific is less limiting, I think, and more just helpful, giving a frame of reference to your readers.

Check on the sentence "If Fenton's gaze" - I think your grammar gets confused somewhere along the way.

David,

In chpt. 1 starting at "To all those morons and continuing down into the next three paragraphs you have three quotation marks, instead of two but that's a minor mistake any copywriter will catch; I got to chapter 5 and can tell you that it reads very fast, good pace, great characters, believable and you end the chapters with just enough tension to keep me turning the pages. I put it on my shelf brother and if you get a chance to read any of mine, I'd be interested also in your comments.

Peace,

Keith G.

i really like the style of the writing. the dialogue is engaging and the characters incisive and believable. on my watchlist and heading shelfwards at pace...good luck...

You will probably be told to introduce the plot earlier etc. But personally, I like to be led into the tale and be carried along. The characters are solid and I care where the plot is going. The humour is natural and fits perfectly. I like this, on my shelf. Patrick Barrett (Shakespeares Cuthbert)

I like Fenton. Your character building is quite pallatable. Easy going narrative, very boyish with wonderful boyish insights. He is becoming very interesting. Will read 3 tomorrow, if laundry allows.