Crit Request: Beneath Thirty-three Skies

Crit Request: Beneath Thirty-three Skies

SardineCan_1347 27 Jul 2026 15:16

Hello Wanderers,

This is my second time trying to post my writings, and I know that there are probably a lot of problems in it, so any help/critiques will be very appreciated. It is a story inspired by the works in the Wanderers’ Library, and about the story of a person’s journey in the world of the dead.

This is a work that I’ve been working on for a long time but didn’t got the time to finish until recently. It was originally written in Chinese, but I figured that I would like to rewrite it in English to improve its organizations (since I’m not very satisfied on its organization) and seek more suggestions. Therefore, although I’ve tried my best in translation, there might still be some weird grammar/sentence organizations because of the different logics between languages, and some of the references might be lost/incorrectly translated. Any suggestions on these issues are very needed, and in the main time I will try my best to improve on them too.

I’m also very worried that the story is too much of a telling versus showing, and/or being too unorganized and expressive. Another issue is that I want to keep the identity of the main character vague, so I used “the person” and “the traveller” to indicate the character, but not sure if I should just use one or another, keep both, or use yet another form of indications.

And yet another question, is it possible to code the page so that when you click on one of the sentences, that the rest of the work appears/disappears?

Here is the sandbox page:
http://wanderers-sandbox-2.wikidot.com/collab:beneath-thirty-three-skies

So sorry for such a long post, and a sincere thank you to everyone!

Last edited on 14 Sep 2026 08:51 by SardineCan_1347 Show more

Re: Crit Request: Beneath Thirty-three Skies

UncannyClown 12 Aug 2026 07:30

to answer your questions:

1. i don't think it's a problem that the story tells a lot of its philosophy directly. the worldbuilding is captivating, and the prose is evocative, which gives the piece a lot of room to talk at me about the ideas it's dealing with. besides, they're awfully big ideas — i think some telling is necessary to get through it all in a timely fashion.

2. i don't think that this piece has an organization or "expressiveness" (i'm not quite sure what you mean by that) problem. i did find it difficult to follow, but i think that a grammar and punctuation problem, rather than a problem with how the narrative is constructed on a macro level.

3. i didn't really notice the various ways the protagonist was referred to throughout the text. you could fiddle with it if you are so inclined, but i don't think there's a problem there as it currently is.

overall, i think this is a very strong draft. as i said before, i find the worldbuilding and prose to be in great shape, and the narrative reckons with some large philosophical questions in a way i find intriguing. the main thing that gets in the way is the grammar and punctuation, which is especially unfortunate because the piece is dealing with some abstract ideas that would be a little difficult to follow even with perfect spag. if you can, i would suggest finding someone who can give this a thorough grammar check; i lack the energy to do this for you myself, unfortunately. if that can be done, i think this would be in excellent shape.

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poet

Re: Crit Request: Beneath Thirty-three Skies

SardineCan_1347 14 Sep 2026 08:51

Hi, thank you so much for your thoughtful advices! So sorry for putting you through that draft, it wasn't until I started to edit the grammars that I noticed how bad it was. I do now have an edited version under my best efforts with a lot of page organization upgrades! Please have a look if you'd like, but of course, no pressure on anything. Again, thank you very much for being willing to look through the very rough draft!

Link to new draft: http://wanderers-sandbox-2.wikidot.com/collab:beneath-thirty-three-skies