10/17/16 - Zay Wolfe - Onto White Elephants - 4569 [V*, S*

[Zay Wolfe]

V* Nothing gratuitous, but a character does try to hurt someone

S* Nothing gratuitous, but a character does try to sex someone

 

In this short story I'm trying to focus more on dialog and being more concise. I'm not sure if I'm going too scarce with the descriptions, but I like the ambiguity because of nature of the story and it's dream-like quality.

 

I haven't checked grammar much, but I can fix that with a few more passes. I'm more interested in just how effective the story is. 

 

Is it interesting? 

Is the future it paints thought provoking? 

What kind of questions do you think the story asks?

 

And anything else relating to the story and structure. 

 

I really appreciate this, I can't wait to check out the other stories.

 

[edit] Changing the lesson question to a more appropriate one.

Edited October 18, 2016 by Zay Wolfe

[kais]

Welcome to RE!

Overall

I...

.

This piece made me very uncomfortable for a menagerie of reasons that I don't know if I can fully explain. Let's start with what I liked. I liked the sort of Matrix in space idea. That was appealing. I liked the idea of the therapist dreamscape. That's a good way to deal with emotions in a safe place.

I'm going to see if I can break down the areas that troubled me into distinct groups.

Gender

If David's gender changes to female, then you describe the character as female. Not male-turned female, or anything akin. This is akin to referring to a transgendered person as 'this is Sally who used to be Johnny', instead of just 'this is Sally'. It's... hurtful is too gentle of a word. It grates. In polite society we refer to people by the gender they identify with. You have chosen to have David identify as female for a few paragraphs in this narrative and as such, David should be referred to as a woman during this time. Not doing so sends a message to readers that you do not want to send.

The Wife 

Strife-inducing from her first introduction, and later the apparent cause of all David's ills. I... there isn't enough backstory on either of the husband or wife to properly deduce what is going on, but I want you to know what it seems like from reading. It reads like David is whining. Like he is a man who hasn't learned how to time manage and thinks the world is unfair because his wife (ex-wife, yes?) demands he watch the kids so she can work. He dreams of running away from his responsibilities into space (where, conceivably, his wife and children could not follow). He reads like a whiney man-child. 

This type of character may not have been your intent. I understand that. But it is important to understand how your character reads across a broad demographic of people. Male readers may find a great deal to empathize with in David, but I suspect your MC will grate (most? some?) female and nonbinary readers in a very aggressive way. 

Consent (please note that this manuscript requires a full 'S' rating for sexual assault and attempted rape)

The AI attempts to rape David, and so he chokes her to death. On the surface this is a reasonable reaction--I would try to kill something raping me as well. But in the context of the greater piece, where the AI is formed from David's experiences  and reactive to his memories, this reads more as allegory/metaphor. David feels out of control with his wife. He feels his wife takes from him, pushes him into a role of subservience, forces him to do things he doesn't want to do. He wants to regain control and does so in a very aggressive way.

This scene, in particular, cemented David's character for me as a current/future abuser. He feels he has no control with his wife (whom he shouldn't need to control to begin with) and/or his children, wants more time for himself (you don't get time for yourself when you have kids. That's how parenthood works), and has bottled up his emotions so that they are now moving to violence (against his children, already, and perhaps soon against his wife). 

David as a Character (please note that this submission requires a full 'V' rating)

I have no empathy for this character as he is described in the text. None. I think he needs psychological help, yes, but from the context of the piece, if I were to meet him on the street and had this level of knowledge of him, we would have an altercation. A loud one. 

 

With all that said, edits make the manuscript! You've got a neat world presented, and editing makes one a better writer. Keep at it!

 

As I go

- your opening line needs more kick. As a general rule, the first and last sentence of the chapter should be strong and make the reader unable to put the book down. This is especially true of the opening line of a book.

- 'one large black dune the length of infinity' doesn't actually tell me much. I'd prefer more specific descriptors. You are a little heavy on the adjective/adverb front though, just FYI.

- page 1: David's life crisis here isn't very compelling to me at this stage. He's emotionally adrift in a desert. I need a hook to keep reading, and I haven't seen one yet.

- page three has tense change issues

- 'the man who is now a woman' - just say 'the woman. 

- end of page three: GAH with the 'woman who was once a man'. PLEASE do not do this. If she's now a woman, she's now a woman. Leave the man part out. The trans and nonbinary communities are begging you here.

- page five: ooohkay so protag has some pretty serious issues. I'd suggest starting the narrative at "Yesterday, I murdered my son". Cut the rest above. This line is where the story starts and it's a good hook.

- page five: 'the woman who was David'. No. Just 'David'.

- page seven starts to meander again. It's hard not to skim.

- page nine: "for when nature still ruled over man". Did it not also rule over woman?

- page nine: mention of wife... broken glass... fridge sensors tingling.... (ETA: WHEW. No realization on this front at least)

- page 11: The AI said he needed a friend, then became...a mother? A lover? I'm confused.

- page 14: I'm interested in this external and internal world and keep wanting to be immersed in it, but the strange sexualization of the AI keeps turning me off

- page 14: consent!!!  Man says no, AI. 

- page 15: and now violence.... 

[neongrey]

p.1

So if you're going for a dreamlike quality, you're using far too meany simple declarative sentences. You're just straight-up telling us these things and you're relying on the fact that they're not particularly ordinary to carry you. You're giving us clear facts. Facts aren't great for creating atmosphere in general, but they're basically the opposite of dreamlike.

Three-quarters of your very first page is entirely undescribed, un-attributed dialogue, from characters we are entirely unfamiliar with. How are we the reader intended to discern who is saying what?

And again, the dialogue is very grounded and mundane; you're also falling back on cliche right from the get-go ('i can't help you unless you tell me everything', the entirety of the 'it just feels so fake' line, etc). No actual sense of mystery is created by this, especially with you giving nothing to make us interested in why we would want to know what's going on.

p.2

As above. Mystery and interest are not created by saying point-blank 'I know something you don't' and leaving it at that, which is basically what's going on here. At this point you should be asking yourself: what have I done to make the reader care about what is going on here?

p.3

So. 'Man who is now a woman' is pretty gross. If he's a woman now, he's a woman now. If he remains a man through the change in form, he's a man. If he doesn't know what a change like that means for him, that's fine too. 'Man who is now a woman' is not.

Especially if you're trying to go for a dreamlike atmosphere. Dreams fixate in the moment, and they aren't concerned with durational nonsense. But there's basically no way to create dreamlike through unattributed dialogue.

p.4

I assume we're intended to be shocked or at least interested by this point? You're giving me nothing at all here. This isn't a story, it's a script, and even a script has stage directions.

p.5

Again, you're falling hard on cliche. I assume the 'crying for myself' bit is supposed to have weight. But it's a pretty hackneyed line.

p.6

Honestly, the bit about the dune is the first time I've felt like there might actually be something interesting going on here.

You also do need a specific grammar pass. This isn't a great format for that sort of thing but I'm seeing a lot of minor errors throughout.

p.8

The descriptive paragraph at the start of this leans a little on passive voice ('begins to appear', eg) but is decent. If the rest of the work were more like this, you'd be more on target, I think.

Gwent, however is the name of a highly popular minigame (to the point of receiving its own spinoff) in an extremely famous video game. I suggest going with something else.

It's unfortunate to go back to the script after that, though.

p.9

'Nature ruled over man'? What is this, the fifties?

You've got tense issues in the final paragraph; you waffle between past and present. Also some passive voice problems here.

p.10

This one's probably the least effective description thus far; stacking adjectives too high in too rapid succession makes for a very awkward sort of phrasing.

I feel like you're trying to create thought about the nature of reality here but you're hamstringing yourself with the complete lack of... anything. 

p.11-12

So now we get description? Please consider what this says about where your story's priorities lie. If nothing else, it comes off to me like everything prior to this was filler and this scene is the one you wanted to write.

p.13

And now we're back to the script format. You've got a couple more hooks here, a few things that carry interest like the artist, but it's really too little too late by this point.

p.14-15

...

Why do you feel a depiction of sexual assault is necessary to the story you need to tell? Why do you feel that that is neither gratuitous nor worthy of unique warning?

And this is stopped by him strangling her to death and this is... okay somehow? because she's an ai and it's not real or something? and he's carrying about his day?

p.16-17

The description here is in a completely different style from all of the description previously and it's not in a way that is particularly to its credit. Where you do finally provide dialogue narration, you're using odd said-bookisms (cries) and inappropriate appendations (said squealing), eg. Your grammar's falling apart around here.

This is a really immature conversation as well. Again, you're falling into every possible cliche of the negative depiction of the ex-wife/girlfriend character. The actual content of the conversation has a very high school writing sort of feel to it. I don't feel a real understanding of the sort of ways people behave to one another after a long-term relationship has fallen apart. If I encountered this in a published book, I would think that whomever wrote this was angry at an ex when they did so.

p.18

eh.

Edited October 18, 2016 by neongrey

[Zay Wolfe]

I think it's important now to try to illustrate my intent with the story because it's clear that I'm not writing it effectively enough. I noticed that as technology progresses people are more getting internalized. They're focusing more on themselves and on these little devices that they constantly look at. People are also getting used to instant gratification, getting food near instantly and having all kinds of entertainment at the push of a button. So effectively I'm just projecting these ideas onward into the future to an extreme level. 

This is the future where people no longer deal with the outside world. They live in little digital worlds of their own design within implants in their brains. Food, sex, entertainment, and AI companions are all available instantly with a thought leading to most being used to instant gratification. In this digital world people also have no consequences for their bad behavior, they can delete certain memories from themselves or their children or just recluse more inwardly into their own digital worlds like the MC. Thus there's an epidemic where no one really matures beyond a high school level and everyone is focused only on themselves because the world enables that behavior. 

In the beginning I'm trying to establish the two main characters and show the MC's nature of being whiney and used to having his way. The AI though not a very good therapists tries to establish the power relationship by asserting herself over him. The violent act with his child is also to establish the fact that this world is lacking of consequences, though the main character shows his potential for growth by his desire to embrace his guilt over the act by not deleting his memory too.

The next part till the end is the AI trying to break his accepted constructs over his past and himself. She largely effective in this and does manage to reach him in a way. The end is the failure of the AI. I have experience programming AI's and deep neural networks. AI's are limited by us making them. She effectively has a bug because the programmer has prioritized that users must leave in a peaceful state over what they need. AI's also don't have morals, except when explicitly defined by us. They're creations of pure logic, so while her definition of violence and rape might include acts between humans-to-humans, it doesn't include acts between software-to-humans. The message here is that we may succeed in nearly making utopia through software but we may never reach it because of our own flaws.

This is also very probable. AI libraries are becoming freely available and anyone right now from an expert to a teenager can now create their own artificial intelligences without any limits. I can see a future where a therapy bot is created by a competent programmer with some knowledge of psychology but with no actual expertise in either. 

I wanted him to end their relationship violently because it mirrors what he did to his child but in a new context where that violence is more appropriate as an act of defense from a flawed piece of software (with no real gender in the typical sense and merely a computer) trying to assert its own directives over the health of their client. 

At the end, I wanted him to give the elephants to his children to show that he views them differently and maybe plans to use what he learned to better help them as they grow. Then to wonder about a future with a meaningful career, showing that despite the AI's terrible flaws, she reached him in a small way. (edit: by the way, I didn't intend for this to be a further neglect of his parenthood. In my mind his children can still see him even if his physical body is in space. It might take longer for them to transfer to his brain though. It's was him finding purpose for himself.)

This has confirmed for me that this should not be a commercial story, or a fun story. It's a warning of what the future may hold where instant gratification is the norm and we continue to look inward instead of outward. Also a bit about the unlimited use of AI where anyone can create a 'therapist' AI and brand it as such without the regulations or certification.

I would love any suggestions to better make these ideas clearer.

 

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Gender

I can see how this is an issue. I used those kind identifiers because I didn't want to confuse the reader. I originally began to refer to him as a woman but I found it very confusing trying to tell who was speaking after that. Maybe I can make it more clear just by using names, though I never give the woman a name. If you have any suggestions here I'd love to here them.

Note: He doesn't actually have a gender change, just his face changes to a woman's. The face changes are more a representation of his emotional state. He changes to a child face as he has an outburst and into an older woman's face when he calms down and becomes more in tune with his emotions and forthcoming about them and what happened. I realized I could make it clearer by having his face change when he becomes violent. Maybe this means I should be more clear that just the face changes.

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The Wife 

 

I wouldn't say it's his wife that causes his ills in my mind. It's a world without consequences where you can just delete memories of bad things you do. The whiney is an aspect of this, they come from a world again without consequences and where every desire can be found instantly with a thought. Which is why both him and his wife have a low maturity level.  Which is also why their arguments are very childish.

I also tried to show how self-focused he is by not giving his children names, as if they're background characters in his mind. The fact that he rejects his responsibilities as a parent, (the mother too) also represents this. Something he doesn't really overcome at the end. (I feel like him overcoming everything at the end would hurt the message that this society is broken to its core values)

Quote

I have no empathy for this character as he is described in the text. None. I think he needs psychological help, yes, but from the context of the piece, if I were to meet him on the street and had this level of knowledge of him, we would have an altercation. A loud one. 

That's a very apt response to his character. Which was meant to communicate the message that this could be the norm in this kind of future. There are no consequences, even for physical abusers, which is why it provokes such a strong distaste. That was my point, how would you feel in a world where this kind of behavior is the norm? Again this is a future to serve as a warning.

I feel like I hit all the emotional points I wanted to and this makes me very happy. The society it paints is broken in part because of the utopia. But I think where I failed was the message. You get all the emotional feelings of disgust and aversion to who these people are and act without any of the context of why you should be feeling these things. I would love to hear any suggestions on how to make it more clear

Edited October 18, 2016 by Zay Wolfe

[neongrey]

The thing is, those kinds of points have been made about technology basically as long as we have written records for. This has been said about newspapers, about novels, about telephones, about postal mail. I don't think you're bringing anything new to the table on the subject with this story, in large part beacause you avoid actually doing anything other than presenting blank dialogue, but especially not with how you have it basically culminating in a sexual assault that you didn't warn anyone was coming.

You owe us an apology, at the very least, for that. This is a hill I'm willing to die on here. You should feel ashamed of yourself for doing that.

Edited October 19, 2016 by neongrey

[Zay Wolfe]

1 hour ago, neongrey said:

The thing is, those kinds of points have been made about technology basically as long as we have written records for. This has been said about newspapers, about novels, about telephones, about postal mail. I don't think you're bringing anything new to the table on the subject with this story, in large part beacause you avoid actually doing anything other than presenting blank dialogue, but especially not with how you have it basically culminating in a sexual assault that you didn't warn anyone was coming.

You owe us an apology, at the very least, for that. This is a hill I'm willing to die on here. You should feel ashamed of yourself for doing that.

You're right. I think I was biased because of my knowledge of software. I see the AI as a collection of algorithms, there is no ill intent because of an AI is innocent to a fault. I guess that made the act less than it was in my mind. This is only the second story I've ever written and the first time I've ever showed anyone my writing. I love writing because of the ability to push boundaries and explore subjects never explored because they're taboo or against customs. I guess I did explore something never explored, that even with great intentions, a robot could try to rape someone. But I went too far.

I apologize. If people want, I'll remove myself from the group.

Edited October 19, 2016 by Zay Wolfe

[kais]

@Zay Wolfe we very much want you to stay! Crits can seem personal at first, but we are all just trying to help one another be better writers. There were some problematic places in your story, but there are problematic places in all our stories. We must persevere! 

You'll find, especially if you start subbing, that the menagerie of voices on this forum are almost perfect mimics of the feedback you get from agents. Part of being a writer is learning how to take te criticism, integrate it, and make your story stronger. 

You have it in you! Become a solid part of our community, embrace those edits, keep writing!

[Zay Wolfe]

1 minute ago, kaisa said:

@Zay Wolfe we very much want you to stay! Crits can seem personal at first, but we are all just trying to help one another be better writers. There were some problematic places in your story, but there are problematic places in all our stories. We must persevere! 

You'll find, especially if you start subbing, that the menagerie of voices on this forum are almost perfect mimics of the feedback you get from agents. Part of being a writer is learning how to take te criticism, integrate it, and make your story stronger. 

You have it in you! Become a solid part of our community, embrace those edits, keep writing!

I can take criticism to my work, but this is different. I feel personally ashamed that I've offended people with my writing. It wasn't my intent. It's my fault for not warning anyone appropriately and for writing it in the first place. I can take writing a bad story, but I can't take harming anyone. I'll try to keep writing but I'll definitely be more mindful of other people's sensibilities and my own biases. I'm so sorry everyone.

[kais]

Let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater. After you explained your intent with the story, the writing made a lot of sense, overall. If it is meant as a criticism of this particular type of person, the sub does a good job. I think the area that needs work is making sure that the reader understands it is meant to showcase the inherent issues it portrays as negative, instead of its current appearance, which reads as a guy working through his issues in a not very great way.

The sexual assault scene doesn't really fit with everything else. Could you clarify what you were trying to show with it? Maybe we can brainstorm another way for the same emotional movement under different circumstance. 

There are some neat areas of this story that I think you could tease forward. Your writing, generally, is solid, and the story arcs well for the most part. I think this story is well worth saving and editing. I do appreciate the apology, although honestly, aside from the not-labeled sexual assault, your sub wasn't really any more biased than most new subs we get here (not that this excuses bias, but we are all products of our societies and cultures). It's sort of running joke at this point. I want to make little badges for our siggys that read something like 'I survived my first posting on RE and learned how to keep women out of refrigerators'. 

[Zay Wolfe]

@kaisa Thanks for the response. I guess I was blindsided by the strong emotional reaction. Needless to say I'll make sure to better tag my writing for violence and sexual content haha. I'm so happy I could clear up that this story is a criticism of this behavior and a society that allows it to persist and get buried under the rug. I also feel like that's something we're struggling with now in society. Victims get blamed and people find a way to explain away horrible behavior. I'd say I just wanted to shine a light that if nothing is done about this then technology could cause these things to get worse and easier to hide from.

My idea with the sexual assault is that since the AI and the society the AI was birthed from is broken, it should mirror that hidden imperfection as a product of imperfect creators. I knew from the start that I wanted the AI to do well but ultimately fail David in a big way. My idea was that the creator has mistakenly prioritized a peaceful state at the end of a session above the client's wellbeing and what they really need for healing. To a computer, sexual release might seem like an obvious choice to release dopamine and accomplish this. 

The main character reacts violently because he feels betrayed by the act after opening himself up, and having shown himself to be violent in the past and out of control, continues the same behavior in an over the top way. This also partly stems from the fact that he feels the need to overpower those weaker than him because in his normal life he feels powerless.

[edit]

Also, I wanted to add that from the start I wanted David to react violently to that failure because of his dangerous and low mental maturity and I liked that it would mirror what he did with his son. I think I went too heavy handed with it though, maybe if the AI fails him in a less extreme way it could be better. I just figured that the AI would have to fail him in a huge gigantic way to provoke that kind of response and it still make sense.

Edited October 19, 2016 by Zay Wolfe

[neongrey]

As far as it goes, for my part, you know, the biggest reason to put things around a group like this is so you can find this sort of issue. I ended up throwing out nearly fifty thousand words because extensive structural issues became clear. 

My absolute strongest objection here was the lack of appropriate content warning-- if it had been signposted appropriately, I'd certainly still question the necessity of handling the scene that way, but it wouldn't have blindsided me as it did. And obviously, you don't want to surprise people with that sort of thing.

[kais]

29 minutes ago, Zay Wolfe said:

Also, I wanted to add that from the start I wanted David to react violently to that failure because of his dangerous and low mental maturity and I liked that it would mirror what he did with his son. I think I went too heavy handed with it though,

Hmm. Maybe not too heavy handed, just lacking context I think. There needs to be some grounding early on that tells the reader the intent of the piece. Maybe... maybe David has been assigned the AI therapist sessions because it's a condition of his divorce that he get some help? Maybe he can make a statement that is obvious to the reader (maybe over-the-top obvious), like 'his ex wife said he needed to grow up and stop acting like an entitled boy, but what did she know about being mature? She was always dumping the kids on him to go do errands or clean houses or whatever it was she did when he was off work. What kind of mother did that?'

That'd be a 'woah, okay,' moment for the reader. Next thing to work on would be the assault scene. Your paragraph explanation is actually what needs to really be said. You could made have a little exposition from the AI about how she's programmed to (exactly what you wrote above). Although really, trying to give him a massage would work just as well, although his strangling of the AI would be less warranted then... hmm. That area might need more thought.

Then the ending needs a tie up that's a little more solid. Maybe one of the boys could make some comment about how his mom finally got to quit her third job because she got a raise at the maid service, and David could have just a smidgen of breakthrough about what that means? Part of my issue with the piece is that it doesn't seem to have a resolution. David never really learns to not be a man-child, and is still thinking of running away at the end. Could he instead maybe... consider trying to start over with his wife and kids in space? That would show some growth for sure. 

Some of the best advice I ever got when drafting was that you can make evil or incompetent or whatever characters, but you shouldn't make wholly unlikeable characters. In order for people to want to read your story, they have to be able to empathize, even a little bit, with a POV character, or be invested in them somehow. I don't empathize with David but I do want to see him either get a slap or grow. If you can deliver either of those, and show to the reader that those are possibilities, you will certainly keep the reader.

I hope that was helpful! 

Edited October 19, 2016 by kaisa

[Zay Wolfe]

1 hour ago, kaisa said:

Some of the best advice I ever got when drafting was that you can make evil or incompetent or whatever characters, but you shouldn't make wholly unlikeable characters. In order for people to want to read your story, they have to be able to empathize, even a little bit, with a POV character, or be invested in them somehow. I don't empathize with David but I do want to see him either get a slap or grow. If you can deliver either of those, and show to the reader that those are possibilities, you will certainly keep the reader.

That seems obvious now haha. What if I establish him as a victim first in some way? Also I could give him a bit more of a drive to better himself, at least he would have some good quality then.

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Then the ending needs a tie up that's a little more solid. Maybe one of the boys could make some comment about how his mom finally got to quit her third job because she got a raise at the maid service, and David could have just a smidgen of breakthrough about what that means? Part of my issue with the piece is that it doesn't seem to have a resolution. David never really learns to not be a man-child, and is still thinking of running away at the end. Could he instead maybe... consider trying to start over with his wife and kids in space? That would show some growth for sure. 

I wonder if it was a mistake to make his growth the finding of meaningful work. My thought was that for the first session the AI would try to tackle the most easy to fix thing. Trying to fix his lack of meaning by giving him meaningful work. Now that I think about it, I don't think it serves the story well enough. Maybe if I have the AI focus on the relationships with his wife and children the growth would be stronger and make more sense. Because the main issue that sticks in people's minds is how sick the relationship is with his wife and children. But I'm conflicted a bit because the purpose of the story is a criticism of this behavior and I feel like if he heals completely it just excuses him. Which would defeat the purpose in my mind. Maybe I'm wrong though.

I'd like him to heal in a way for there to be some kind of closure. But also if he just feels better about everything in the end then he doesn't get the consequences he deserves for his actions. It excuses the horrible things he did. It's tough one.

[edit] What if he does get the consequences? What if the child abuse is reported because the AI is required to report criminal behavior. But then I'm also conflicted because then society is the hero... 

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That'd be a 'woah, okay,' moment for the reader. Next thing to work on would be the assault scene. Your paragraph explanation is actually what needs to really be said. You could made have a little exposition from the AI about how she's programmed to (exactly what you wrote above). Although really, trying to give him a massage would work just as well, although his strangling of the AI would be less warranted then... hmm. That area might need more thought.

Yeah it's a difficult part. I'm kind of at a loss to find away to explain it that wouldn't feel like I'm hitting the reader over the head or that fits in a way that doesn't effect the flow. I think I need to let the story sit for a while. Maybe after half a year or so I can come back to it with different ideas. 

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I hope that was helpful! 

Thanks, this has been! 

And I want to apologize again to others and @neongrey. I'm a bit shaken. I didn't expect to get that reaction. It hurts me that I betrayed your trust, it wasn't intended. But it's a good shaken, it's a learning experience and know I'll do better to warn you in advance better.

Edited October 19, 2016 by Zay Wolfe

[neongrey]

I do appreciate that.

Edited October 19, 2016 by neongrey

[Mandamon]

Welcome to Reading Excuses!  We should start calling this "the wringer..."

So @kaisa and @neongrey have covered this pretty well. I was also sort of blindsided by the rape scene (and this is coming from the male white
privileged point of view) but I think you've already gotten a bunch of feedback on that.

Overall, I liked the first half of this and the worldbuilding, but the second half dragged and started to lose the point.  At first it's a good piece of Sci-fi therapy, exploring ways future tech can be used to help emotional problems.  But hen the therapist herself betrays the patient, which to me breaks the promise of how the story starts. Why would she do that? There is some glimmer of hope at the end, but the man and his problems are still very unresolved.  I wouldn't trust him with those children.

I agree with kaisa that David is very whiny and doesn't have a lot of redeeming qualities.  If you're looking at your characters and their likability, one of my favorite tools is the character sliders from Writing Excuses: Proactivity, Competency, and Sympathy.  Right now David  is failing on all three (maybe he has some proactivity if he booked the therapy himself).  If you can move him up on at least one of the sliders, readers can find more to connect with.

Notes while reading:
pg 1: I lost the thread of the dialogue with no tags.  Not sure which one is talking.

pg 4 :""Yesterday, I . . . murdered my son."
"You did what!"
"He's okay! I just took him close to it but it’s all the same, I guess."'
--"He's ok" doesn't really follow "murdered"

pg 5: "He's just 1's and 0's. He doesn't even have a suit yet.""
--so this is all digital?  Still mostly confused on the setting

pg 7: "It’s the woman who brakes it."
--breaks?

pg 7: "Because I scare myself. If I don't remember it, then I might do it again."
--Cool line.

pg 10: “So, there is more freak show to see?”

--Yeah-but things are made from him.  I don't think he would call it a freak show.

pg 14: “Feed it, David,” she says again as she rubs her nose against his neck.
--I don't know why the therapist is so overtly sexual.  It's very offputting.

pg 15: Nope.  Not a fan of the rape scene.

pg 17: "Mr. Man"
--weird

pg 17: The woman seems very shallow and one dimensional. I'd like to see some sort of personality, at least, and more than a whiny child-reaction from David.

[rdpulfer]

- I like the opening paragraph. 

- i do think you are going too scarce with the description, especially since there's no tags in the dialogue. It feels very bare in the first page, but I do think it makes it feel a bit surreal too at the same time.

- It's very weird without any descriptions. I'd like to know what the characters are doing - especially since their body language can give us hints about how they are feeling.

- It's an interesting start, but it's very confusing what's happening the whole time. I thought he was in some kind of therapy session, only to find it was literally all in his head. It's all all a little too vague.

- I also agree with Mandamon the women at the end was very shallow and annoying. 

- I think there's still room for improvement though. I really think it's just a matter of figuring out what details resonate and adds them into the story. 

[Zay Wolfe]

Sorry I haven't been able to get on the last few days. Me and my wife just had our second baby and you know what having a newborn can be like. I want to thank everyone for their input, it's been very constructive for me!

I just wanted to ask one thing. Did anyone catch the double meaning of the story's title? I tried to hint at my intent with it. 

I also tried to reinforce it by literally having them ride on white elephants and tying it together by him passing the white elephants onto his children. I thought it would be cool symbolism for the purpose of the story.

Edited October 21, 2016 by Zay Wolfe

[Mandamon]

3 hours ago, Zay Wolfe said:

I just wanted to ask one thing. Did anyone catch the double meaning of the story's title? I tried to hint at my intent with it. 

As in, a white elephant gift?  I got it, but seemed like him passing them on to his children was kind of hinting at a rocky future for them.

[neongrey]

Honestly, I think the issue with using the elephants as a symbol of growth or meaning or change is that David doesn't actually display any meaningful growth or change through the story. He starts as a violent, petulant manchild, and ends as a violent, petulant manchild. It's fairly transparent symbolism if that's what you want, but as it is, I don't think it works. Maybe if it were relating to him continuing a cycle of abuse with them, but I don't think that fits the rest of what you've got going on here and tbh the cycle-of-abuse narrative has laaaargely been discredited but still stigmatizes abused people.

[Zay Wolfe]

5 hours ago, Mandamon said:

As in, a white elephant gift?  I got it, but seemed like him passing them on to his children was kind of hinting at a rocky future for them.

 

6 minutes ago, neongrey said:

Honestly, I think the issue with using the elephants as a symbol of growth or meaning or change is that David doesn't actually display any meaningful growth or change through the story. He starts as a violent, petulant manchild, and ends as a violent, petulant manchild. It's fairly transparent symbolism if that's what you want, but as it is, I don't think it works. Maybe if it were relating to him continuing a cycle of abuse with them, but I don't think that fits the rest of what you've got going on here and tbh the cycle-of-abuse narrative has laaaargely been discredited but still stigmatizes abused people.

It's interesting to see the individual interpretations. They're not mine, but that doesn't matter. I feel like stories are ultimately owned by the readers because each story becomes original to the reader as seen through our uniquely warped lenses of perception that we unknowingly build through our lives. 

The idea of the white elephants is ultimately what inspired me to write the story. I wonder if the symbolism could be made clearer by calling it "On to White Elephants" instead of "Onto White Elephants".

[Hobbit]

Hello Zay Wolfe!  Welcome to the forum, and congrats on the new baby!

This discussion is already well underway, but I'll add what I wrote before reading everyone else's comments.  Just note that I kind of cheated in terms of the sexual assault scene - I saw the post about getting a new tag for sexual assault, and assumed I would find such a scene here.  So it didn't catch me by surprise.  I'm not a fan of reading any such scenes regardless of their purpose, so I mostly skimmed over it.

My first reactions, as answers to your questions:

Is it interesting? Definitely.  It's a fascinating world, and that kept me engaged throughout.  I wasn't very connected with the characters, but I didn't really need to be to be interested.

Is the future it paints thought provoking? It certainly is thought provoking.  My impression is that the future is a place where people have digital memories, and digital existences, while still also existing in the real world, aided by suits (not sure what these are exactly). I think you focused on the part of it that I would be most interested in - how does having all this stimulation, all this augmentation, affect a person’s ability to feel natural emotions?

What do you think is the lesson of the story?  The lesson I took from this story is that you have to seek out meaningful experiences if you want your life to remain meaningful.  Passively ingesting the world does not provide meaning, and eventually dulls the senses.  And experiences must be real to be meaningful.  If they can be erased, or if they are in a false reality, they lose their ability to enrich our lives, and we lose our ability to learn from them.

 

So after reading all the comments, I see that @kaisa and @neongrey have spelled out what made me uncomfortable with the piece, even though I couldn't really articulate it myself.  Enough said there.  (Thanks to you both for being so articulate.  You've certainly gotten a lot of practice at it with all us newbies...)

I'll pull out a few comments in particular.

On October 18, 2016 at 5:02 PM, neongrey said:

you're also falling back on cliche right from the get-go ('i can't help you unless you tell me everything', the entirety of the 'it just feels so fake' line, etc).

I also felt like the dialogue was cliche.  I took this as either something to be improved in a later edit, or a tonal choice, trying to make it sound more like a lesson.  I see part of your intent is to have the characters be intentionally immature because of their world.  My reaction to learning this is mixed.  I agree that a world with no consequences can certainly encourage an immature mindset.  But don't confuse "immature" with "simple."  No one's emotions, no matter their age or experience, are simple, and I as a reader would find this story much less interesting if I was made to imagine these characters as simple.

On October 18, 2016 at 9:32 PM, Zay Wolfe said:

I can take criticism to my work, but this is different. I feel personally ashamed that I've offended people with my writing. It wasn't my intent.

I felt the exact same way when I first (and second) submitted to this group.  It sounds like you've learned well and recovered gracefully.  Keep writing!  We all mess this up.  Writing is powerful, and it's awesome to be a part of a group that holds us so accountable to its effects.

14 hours ago, Zay Wolfe said:

Did anyone catch the double meaning of the story's title?

Haha, nope.  I think it works well as a title without any idea of its double meaning, though!

[Robinski]

Hello Zay, and welcome to Reading Excuses. I’m always pleased to read new writers on this forum. The anticipation of ‘hearing’ a new voice is really quite exciting. Not saying that it is always a rose garden as it turns out, of course    Anyway, onwards and upwards... detailed comments first then summation at the end.

• “the length of infinity” – I'm no Stephen Hawking, but I reckon that infinity doesn’t have a length, as such, also, the next statement seems contradictory, when it implies that the dune does have ends. This said, striking image at the start. You've got my attention – “waves of frozen tar,” cool.
• “No, not at all.” – I think you’re missing a comma here and there, but then I own shares in commas, so I get 0.01 cents every time anyone uses one.
• Top of Page 2 – I'm really rather interested in what is going on here. Some kind of therapy, apparently, it’s an interesting idea for a story.
• “It’s the woman who breaks it.” – typo
• The therapist, for wont of a better word, makes the point about painful memories taking  precedence, but the man had already made this point really, when he explained why he did not wipe his own memory. Seems to make her explaining this redundant.

After the point above, I got kind of swept up in following the story through and stopped commenting on details.

Okay then. Well, there was some good imagery, interesting and somewhat surreal visuals quite nicely done, I though. I found your style easy to read, pretty engaging. In the end, the content / plot left me a bit cold. It’s never really explained what is going on. Is he a tiny man in a large robot’s head, or is his existence as his own psyche an illusion? A metaphor for a man trapped in this new form of existence? In the end, I don’t really know, and I'm not sure how much I care, as there isn’t a lot to sympathise with in either of the main characters.

On the whole, I'm glad you submitted this, and glad I read it. I will be interested to read your future submissions too, expecting some good, clean narrative and challenging ideas.

<R>

p.s. Congrats on your new arrival. I guess we'll see another submission from you in about 2019?