The Way Of The Warrior (chapter 1) by Martin Ottmar

Word Count: 5200 words | Critique type preference: Online

Content warnings:

Animal cruelty or death, Blood, Combat, Death/Dying, Violence (gratuitous / extreme)

Author Notes:

This is the prologue and first chapter of a 120k words epic fantasy novel that is the first installment of a planned series.

Apart from being eager to hear all and any feedback you have, I’d like to add a few questions of mine in case you can share thoughts on them:

• What promises did I make to you as reader?
• Is the geography described in the prologue clear without a map?
• Are the characters relatable?
• Would you be tempted to read on?
• Have you read or seen anything similar recently that I should be aware of?

Notes to organisers:

As I’m based in Germany, I unfortunately can’t make it to in-person critiques – therefore online critique only. My first submission to critique – I’m excited and scared 😉
Do let me know if there are any issues with the file/text formatting when loading in Word – I write natively in LibreOffice and can’t check the quality of .docx output.

Submitted: 2 March 2026

Last updated: 11 June 2026 at 13:20

Author Email: wr*********@**************rn.com