Timewaster's Guide Archive

I somehow missed the prologue... don't have it in my inbox, so coming at this chapter without that, I think it worked and worked well.  There were intriguing bits of background and the couple is endearingly awkward.

I really liked the Feeder section.  Particularly the part- "it is glorious and it is delicious and it is gone" although to get the best effect, I think you should put a period between "gone" and "I have eaten it all."  You managed to capture ravenousness perfectly, and I now want to see more of this character.  And I kinda wonder what would happen if Feeder ever came across a pair of Polaesi...

For the record, I didn't think the chainmail skirt was particularly weird.  Given the setting and your previous explanation that no one knew what a shri would be before it manifested, it made sense for the others to provide replacement clothing that was 'durable.'  Although I'd probably pick leather instead of chainmail- I hear it tends to pull hairs and pinch and as a skirt that might be... awkward.  But apparently you've already changed it, so nevermind.

I agree with ryos and RC that you do have a lot of redundancy in this chapter.  I get the feeling that the reason your characters are being so precise with their dialogue, at least as concerns the bodies, is because they're making some sort of attempt at being... professional?  Thorough?  The kind of thing you see in crime shows- where they clinically discuss what happened, even if the characters can see for themselves exactly what happened.  The thing is, you're also telling us what they're going to be telling each other, before they tell each other.  Why not just let them proceed with their investigation and we'll learn as we go?

You can do a lot more with Awrtek's character, and I'm sure you will as the story progresses.  At least his vocation is clear-cut.  One thing, though- the first time you refer to him as the God of Mercy, it threw me out of the story as I tried to figure out if the POV changed, or if Awrtek *was* the God of Mercy. 

Tyrus is confusing, and you do nothing to make him less so.  You describe his appearance as if it means anything to the reader.  He left his sword behind- well, ok, but we already know that blades aren't allowed in the city limits from chapter 1, so why would that be such a big deal? 

The Glabn- is that the species name? is visually confusing.  I'm not quite sure what you're going for here.  It certainly sounds intimidating, so Tyrus at least gets points for standing up to it.  Also, these Syndicates- are they synonymous with the Cult of Lunus?  You imply that they are, but never come out and say so.  If they are, I would assume that they are already as "united" as they're going to get, all being a part of one cult.

You do need to take the time to go through and really organize your scenes- right now they're really chaotic and it's hard to get a good picture of anything.  And you keep misusing homonyms.  In particular "Veiled Boarders".  Is that a person who pays rent in a building and goes veiled?  From context, probably not.  Is it a sort of veiled pirate who boards ships?  Again, probably not.  I gather you are talking about borders between countries, or dimensions, or maybe even states of existence, but please be more clear.

But obviously you grabbed my attention enough to make me complain about all this stuff, so good job!  Keep at it and worry about proof-reading when you've got the story down!

Ok, you've got a good beginning here- it just needs a little more order.  It feels like you've been world-building all this and it's so cool, and you want to show us everything at once.. with the result that it's a mishmash of a lot of neat stuff that properly described would be awesome but all together in bits and pieces is confusing.  That goes for character descriptions, motivation, and scenery.

That said- don't trash it!  On your next draft, simply go through and take the time to expand on all the little bits, maybe see if you can move some around so there's not quite so much exposition (in the expanded draft- there's not too much exposition here).

I'm not quite clear on exactly how many variations there are on "human" form and how they got that way (and exactly what is required for citizenship).  Maybe take a bit of time to explain the radioactive disaster or whatever that made it possible for humans to breed with other things and how humans basically bred themselves out of existence.  Or something.

We-ell... I guess we can allow it... this time.

Thanks!

Hello from the depths of your memory!  Yes, I'm still around, no, I haven't been reading anyone's submissions, and yes, I will eventually get around to critiquing all of them.  They are still in my in-box (I sometimes go through, download them all and shunt them to their own separate folder).

Anyway, the past... however long it's been, I've been reworking my first nano novel.  Got that straightened out, so hopefully I will begin submitting chapters of it sometime in September. 

If you'll still have me, that is.  *makes bambi eyes*

Ok, here we go!  I didn't actually receive your prologue, so at least one of my questions may have already been answered.  (I'd love to read it though, if you feel like sending it directly: tinik2343 @hotmail.com- no space, that's just to keep it from becoming a link )

So the trees.  Are they, or are they not, carnivorous?  Because you're descriptions definitely point in that direction.  I was surprised to find two young people plunging headlong into a swamp apparently dominated by carnivorous trees without even thinking about it.  Let me show you what I mean:

Elsewhere, the trees grew sterile and colorless except for the blood-red sap glistening on their white bark like ruby tears. But the Weepers bred in Esculiar’s ashes thrived with parasitic life. Under moonlight’s frost, they raised blushing purple blossoms that licked the air with rancid black tongues, each smelling as rich as rot. The rasp of their petals scraping open at night sounded like snakes crawling over fractured bone.
Perhaps because they recognized the scent of her blood, the smell of a descendent of the Mad King whose body had fed their very first ancestor’s roots, the Weeper trees thrummed like plucked harp-strings as Rachell aehl-Darenn passed.

You see?  I fully expected to next read about how 'the trees unwound eager tendrils of vine toward their rightful prey', or something.  It's very rich imagery, but they don't sound like trees.

Moving on.  Personally I don't have a problem with the by-play between Mel and Rachell, except the previously mentioned awkwardness of her declaring that she's not going to kiss him.  Either cut the line entirely, or have him make a smart remark about it; "Who said anything about kissing?" for instance.

I think the scene progresses nicely from fairly carefree to dire portent.  Your elvs have an understated threat to them which I think you should definitely play up.  I don't care either way about the name you choose to call them. "The Twilight People" is a little long for their enemies and frenemies to use, though.  You should come up with a nickname, or simply have them referred to by nationality or region of dwelling.  Canadians are Canadian because they live in Canada, and etc.

Regarding your explanation- this needs to come across in your story, right at the very beginning.  Remember, we can't see your characters except how you describe them and what you tell us about them.  At the moment, I see very little difference between Lomari and straight humans because you haven't described much, if any.  The elvs, on the other hand, are nicely alien.  When you talked about how there would always be an unexpected knuckle, I immediately thought that aversion was something the elvs knew about and played on- very nicely done!

Overall, some nice characterization for Rachelle.  She clearly wants to be just another girl, but she isn't and can't be, and that internal conflict comes across well.  I'm not getting a good sense of external conflict though, other than the tension between the elvs and lomari, maybe because I haven't read the prologue.

LTU, I can't open the submission.  It's .docx.  Can you send it to me as a plain .doc please?

Well, aside from some repetitiveness, I thought it was fairly well done.

The scene in the entrance hall was a bit confusing for me.  The way you wrote it made me think Quinn passed the door leading outside and went toward another hallway- which made me think of magic doorways that take you impossibly far distances.  It really wasn't until after Khyus looked back toward the castle that it hit me that they had just left it, i.e. opened the entryway doors.  Instead I thought that where they had spent the night was sort of an intermediate point- simply a place that Quinn knew would have the right magic doors to take him where he wanted to go.   So yeah.  Could probably make that simpler.

Quinn loses a lot of his mystique and danger in this chapter.  I know you've got Khyus wondering and worrying about that at the end, but still- need to work on keeping up the tension.

The way you describe your magic system, while slightly interesting, really seems more like a cop-out than anything else.  "It works, and no one knows why, and no one who can do it can tell anyone how it works, or why."  Really?   It's a little better once you add the qualifier that trying to do magic someone else's way ends in horrible death, but still.

And after making such a big deal about action/re-action in the magic (which is cool, I will admit, and lends an element of danger), you don't take the time to describe any of the after-effects of his tests- unless throwing his 'mentor' half a mile is one of them, but you said that was an accident, not a reaction from something else.  Overall, I'd think they'd at least warn each other since they can apparently tell what the magic itself will do ahead of time.  Surprisingly, it takes a lot less time to yell "giant fireball!" than you'd think.

None of this is to say I didn't like it.  I'm not completely convinced, but I'm not saying I couldn't be.