What grabs me in a story and forces me to keep reading? Yes - all of the above. But it's the scent of good writing that brings it all together. Good writing alone - a way with words and the forming of interesting sentences - can grab me, even if it seems like it isn't or might not be going somewhere. Because if the writing itself is good, there's a good chance that where it's going will be a good read.
When I first started with Carpe Diem, I'd also started with Asaro's Skolian series. You guys put together fascinating sentences and dialog, and I had to have more. More, more, more! I lost interest in the setting, characters, and writing, and never finished her series ...
I'd keep a scrapbook of critiques like that just to read when I was down and needed a good laugh ;)
And keys - I have 2 vehicles and have a tendency to leave things like keys in unpredictable places. So I have 4 sets of keys (actually I also have a key hidden under each vehicle which I only had to use once) - one set for each vehicle, one set for all vehicles on my main going-out keyring, and one set for all vehicles on my working-around-the-house keyring. It's rare I'm locked out of a vehicle after having provided all those keys, but, as mentioned above, it did happen once, at 2 am in Parachute, CO when I locked both sets of keys in the truck at a gas station when I went in to pay for the gas. Even knowing where that hidden key was, it still took me half an hour to tease it out where I could actually grasp it. But I did get it, unlocked the truck and all was saved!
As a wise someone once told me, "Redundancy, redundancy, redundancy!" ;)
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When I first started with Carpe Diem, I'd also started with Asaro's Skolian series. You guys put together fascinating sentences and dialog, and I had to have more. More, more, more! I lost interest in the setting, characters, and writing, and never finished her series ...
I'd keep a scrapbook of critiques like that just to read when I was down and needed a good laugh ;)
And keys - I have 2 vehicles and have a tendency to leave things like keys in unpredictable places. So I have 4 sets of keys (actually I also have a key hidden under each vehicle which I only had to use once) - one set for each vehicle, one set for all vehicles on my main going-out keyring, and one set for all vehicles on my working-around-the-house keyring. It's rare I'm locked out of a vehicle after having provided all those keys, but, as mentioned above, it did happen once, at 2 am in Parachute, CO when I locked both sets of keys in the truck at a gas station when I went in to pay for the gas. Even knowing where that hidden key was, it still took me half an hour to tease it out where I could actually grasp it. But I did get it, unlocked the truck and all was saved!
As a wise someone once told me, "Redundancy, redundancy, redundancy!" ;)