Okay, since I have the time (for one text, so I choose the first).
Overall, I wasn't sold on the story, but neither was I driven off. The thing is: I have trouble following the descriptions - my eyes glaze over as I read them. Too many words around too little focus. It's supposed to evoke setting but - to me - it lacks a center of gravity. Especially the first paragraph.
Line-by-line:
The place stank.
A decent start. Syntax suggests that "the place" is familiar, and "stank" is information. But "the place" is insufficiently defined for new readers (unless the place is named in the title - which I happen to know is not), so it adds another point of interest. What place?
This is a standard method to start a short story. I bet everyone of us has used it at least once, and many of us have it set as a default attention grabber.
A queer mingled stench that only the ice-buried cabins of an antarctic camp know, compounded of reeking human sweat, and the heavy fish-oil stench of melted seal blubber.
The first thing we notice is that we have a rather long noun phrase. Not a sentence, not even a clause (well, we do have a clause, but it's embedded in the phrase...). The author picks up the verb "stank" and transforms it into the noun "stench" and then piles on modifiers (adjectives, participles, clauses). This tactic works on the revulsion of "stench". (Imagine: "The place smelled. An mingled odour of..."). Other words compound the evaluation of the smell: "queer mingled" (instead of "mingled") [why isn't there a comma between queer and mingled; he put them everywhere else in the same sort of context], "reeking human sweat" (instead of plain "human sweat"), etc.
But not all the modifiers enhance the smell. Some work with the beginning "the place", especially the that-clause. The first concrete hint we get is the [object]-[participle] construction "ice-buried". At that point we go: "Aha! Ice". "Antarctic camp" follows straight behind this. There's the alternative method of stretching out the tension of What Place? You add "ice" now, and give more and more hints, until the reader draws the inevitable conclusion. The text in question doesn't do this. The story suggests it might be wanting to do this, but then gives away the setting right off the bat.
And here's my first quibble with this text. The setup in sentence 1 works. The second sentence (well, phrase, really, but...) tries to follow the same line. It's all about the stench, but we get in the place sideways. But it's not exactly subtle. We get an entire clause about ice-buried cabins of antarctic camps. This is somewhat weak. It wouldn't matter much, but the "place-mystery"
does make the opening more complicated, and the complication, being resolved too early, doesn't really pay off. I'm wondering why we didn't get something like this for a first:
***The cabin stank. Only the ice-buried cabins of an antarctic camp could stink like that. Odours from... mingled... blah, blah, blah....***
If you're giving away the place straight-away anyway, why not right off the bat, so we know immediately where we are? The sense of setting would be enhanced. We'd have an "aha: that's what antarctic camps smell like" experience rather than a: "where the hell are we and why does it smell like this" experience. To repeat, I'm not saying that former is more worthy than the letter; but I
am saying that these first two lines are the former masquerading as the letter - making the first two lines harder to read than necessary.
There is also the side-effect - to me - of linking "ice-buried" to the smell: this makes me wonder about ventilation and how often they clean the ducts and whether there shouldn't be a smell of bacteria involved if they don't often enough, or a smell of chemicals if they do. That is: I go off on a tangent, while it's clear that the author wishes to focus on tangible, organic smells ("dogs, machines and cooking").
At that point I'm beginning to be wary of the text. Nothing big, nothing that can't be saved.
There are other things: what am I supposed to make of "fish oil stench of melting seal blubber". After quite a bit of thinking I think that "fish oil" might be involved somehow in the melting of seal blubber, but my first reaction was "seal don't smell like fish" (actually my first reaction was to misread the "of" as an "and" of sorts...).
I also think the "stench" is over-emphasised, with all the enhancers. I wouldn't miss the "reeking" before "human sweat" much. I do see that it has emphatic function, though.
An overtone of liniment combated the musty smell of sweat-and-snow-drenched furs.
A much better blend of setting-introduction and smell. The text is finding its groove.
The acrid odour of burnt cooking fat , and the animal, not-unpleasant smell of dogs, diluted by time, hung in the air.
So now I'm back to "cooking" and "fat", "fish oil" and "melting seal blubber". Are we talking about the same things here and there? Is the "seal blubber" used for cooking? For greasing stuff? Applied to boots? All of the above? Why did we have a detour via liniment and fur? Hunting? I'm unsure. Again, I'm wondering if I just don't get it (being profoundly unfamiliar with antarctic camps), or if the text simply doesn't have an easy-to-follow flow of ideas. (Add to that, that the dogs have fur, too... At that point I'm no longer in the text - I'm trying to find my bearings.)
As a side-note: for the first time, the stench-hook is deluted: "not-unpleasant smell of dogs". Unfortunately, the smell is "diluted by time" (which suggests that dog were here, but aren't now); so I'm having trouble imagining how I'm supposed to separate a faint smell from the mingled mass described as stench. Do I need a dual nose? The smell is nice in isolation, but add it to the mix... The primary effect of the line on me was that it hatched a suspicion that the narrator is fond of dogs (hence they don't stink).
Lingering odours of machine oil contrasted sharply with the taint of harness dressing and leather.
Yet another component: "machine oil". Dogs are revisited through harness dressing. What puzzles me here is that this sentence starts a new paragraph. Considering the follow-up "Yet" contrasts with the entire first paragraph, too, I think this sentence should conclude the former paragraph. (A paragraph that could be re-written, ordering the ideas with a bit more discipline; but that may well just be my preference.) Otherwise, I have nothing to say about the sentence.
Yet somehow, through all that reek of human beings and the associates -- dogs, machines and cooking -- came another taint.
This line should start off paragraph 2, I think. It summarises the first paragraph concisely and then adds
another scent. Apparantly, something that doesn't fit.
The only problem I have in this one is the word "taint". A "taint" is a contaminant of some sorts; so since the smell is alien, it taints what you expect. So far so good; but it's described as "another taint". It isn't another "taint". It's more like another scent, which taints the usual mixture.
Other than that, I really like this sentence.
Side-note: Notice how the usage of "human beings" foreshadows the theme of the novella? The author could have used the simple "men".
It was a queer, neck-ruffling thing, a faintest suggestion of an odour alien among the smells of industry and life.
This is where the question of point of few becomes apparant to me. We're starting out from a cosy, living room perspective. The narrator and his readers are looking at the place and trying not to breathe too hard. But at that point, we're supposed to be used to the smell. See? That's what these sort of places smell like. Yeah, it stinks, but you'll get used to it. Aren't we feeling at home already? But wait! What's this?
It's not a "stench". It's an alien smell. It's unnerving. What is it?
But since the impression of the narrator I got in the previous paragraph was one that's as far from antarctic camps as I am (might be untrue), the shift towards familiarity doesn't quite work for me. I think the problem I'm having is that the "stinking" hook is at odds with desired effect. If you'd ask a camp inmate, they'd probably agree that it stinks, but they wouldn't usually think of it much (perhaps, when they come in from outside - if their noses aren't frozen shut...). I feel the opening hook is an injoke for outsiders - but the unfamiliarity of the alien scent nieeds an insider's nose. For me, either an overtly lecturing narrator or a PoV-character would have worked better - I suspect - than the current opening.
And it was a life smell.
Something living (or recently living) in an antarctic camp that doesn't belong there. Yay! Now we're talking!
But it came from the thing that lay bound with cord and tarpaulin on the table, dripping slowly, methodically onto the heavy planks, dark and gaunt under the unshielded glare of the electric light.
Eery image. I don't suppose it should be dripping onto the floor? Notice how we're going from generic description to a dramatic, cinematic one? (You can almost use this as camera directions - including lighting.)
I'm not sure what the "But" accomplishes, though. I think that the "But" should indicate that you wouldn't expect a "life smell" from the thing under the tarpaulin. It doesn't have that effect for me.
In summary, I think it's the rambling tone that keeps throwing me off. The imagery does work for me, but the flow of ideas is too erratic. I can't tell whether we're getting too much or too little information, at times. As I'm a slow, methodical reader (almost everyone around me reads quicklier than I do), this sort of erratic association game throws me off. If you're reading this in a rush, I suppose, it should work well enough.
