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Reading excuses -2022-10-24 -FlowerGirl -To be named -Ch's 3.5-4.5


FlowerGirl

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Here's chapters 3.5-4.5. Some of the character interactions feel slightly off, so I'm not sure if that's just me or if it's something I need to fix, but I'd love to hear your opinion.

Just in general I'd like to know how the plot is developing and if there's anything confusing or anything important I've overlooked (Plot related or otherwise.)

All feedback is appreciated. I can't wait to hear what you all think!

 
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This submission was interesting. At first I thought that the reeducation center was not all that bad since they gave J her own room and what was basically her own personal minder. As it progressed it made a little more sense as to why they seemed so lax, since they rely so much on the threat of pain from the G. Still, their security so far does seem pretty lax and it doesn't seem like they would be able to handle a full-scale riot all that well. 

As for characters, a lot were introduced in this chapter but barely any time was spent with any given one. C just seemed like your run-of-the-mill prison guard, and N and F just felt like standard archetypes from what little we saw of them. 

I thought "Lord of Sparkles" was an amusing nickname but it also seems like you would get in even more trouble for using such an embarrassing name to refer to the leader of the place. 

I think that this is probably the best submission so far and made the most sense plot wise, so good job! 

 

Opening the doc now

Pg 1 So remembering last submission, my immediate impression is that this is brought on by whatever device they strapped to her

“to join the gifted’s” remove apostrophe

“pupil’s dilate” nice image. Very cinematic

“dilated as well, they’re getting up” new sentence between “well” and “they’re” as well as between “door” and “somehow”

“fizzes inside me” end sentence after “me”

Again, lots of run-on sentences. I won’t point all of them out, but they are very prevalent.

“crashes through” Nice! Get ‘im!

Pg 2

“strands of hair” ouch

“not like I can get reported” This is a nice window into how J thinks, which is to say, not very wise

Pg 3

“pinkie promise” this makes me think that Ja works with children a lot.

“laws against that” it didn’t seem like he was using his powers, but obviously just the fact that there is a law against something doesn’t mean that everyone will obey. I would be interested to see how they would deal with a G who does use their power to control people, if that is even possible. Anyway that’s a long way of saying that I can see what J means here.

“monitor your reactions” So the hallucinations are caused by her powers and not the machine? And she needs the wires to monitor, rather than using mind reading? Either I’m confused on what these guys’ powerset is, or their deliberately deceitful

Pg 4

“Privacy freaks” still don’t know what these are

“the man who became T” The should be capitalized

“Woman” Women?

Ah, okay so theres a little bit on what a pf is

“piece of gum” ewww

“already don’t like her” understandable imo

“hair, hopefully I get to shower” Here’s just another example of the run on sentences I mentioned earlier. “hopefully” should be the start of a new sentence.

Pg 6

“strongly advise against wandering” If they don’t want her to wander, then they shouldn’t give her the key to her own room imo. They also didn’t expressly forbid her. Maybe they don’t want it to feel like a prison, but considering they are dealing with people they consider to be emotionally unstable and perhaps even dangerous, then they are being incredibly lax.

“silhouettes” good image

Pg 7

“not white thing” not-white thing, I think

Pg 8

I’m inclined to think that C leaving in the middle of the lesson is a sort of test to test J’s patience

“I can get you out” Yeah, it’s definitely a test

Pg 9 oof fell right into their clutches

Pg 11

“overripe blackberries” I’m not sure how to envision shimmering black hair, and blackberries have an odd, lumpy shape to them that seems more reminiscent of an insect’s eyes. I’m not really sure in what way his eyes are supposed to be like blackberries.

Pg 12

Okay, so this seems to confirm that they do have some powers, at least, unless they just electrocuted J. Still, this is more in-line with what I was expecting from reeducation

“that’s why they’ve never” this is repeated from before, a little redundant.

Pg 14

“cookie’s” this has happened multiple times throughout the text. There is no need to use an apostrophe when talking about multiple objects. So it should just be “cookies”

“Get this,” this is smart, from the perspective of whoever is in charge. Keeping the cities ignorant of each other lessens the threat of revolt.

“got together” I don’t think you’d need to get together to figure this out. I think simple rumor and word of mouth would make it apparent within the first couple of days of the first TP ever arriving, and the idea would pass on from there.

“Lord of” lol. Seems like it’s pretty obvious who they would be talking about anyway, though

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3 hours ago, FlowerGirl said:

Thanks for the feedback, I'm definitely planning to touch up on where to use periods versus commas, so hopefully that helps with future submissions.

Np! I'm in no way an expert in this field and I make mistakes in my own writing as well, so take what I say with a grain of salt. That being said, I think the main thing you're running into is that you are trying to conjoin multiple independent clauses without conjunctions. When a phrase can stand alone as its own sentence, it needs to be conjoined with other phrases using a conjunction such as "and, but, for, so" etc. You have a tendency to simply conjoin them with a comma

However, I thought I noticed less of them in this chapter than in previous ones, so there's that!

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Overall, I think the MC's personality is good, but she doesn't have a  solid direction yet. Most everyone has been reacting so far instead of proacting, and I'm not sure what people's goals are. What do the gifteds want? What does the MC want (past a gifted not to take her sister). I'm not really fearful for the MC staying in this place because there's no objective expect "reform behavior." Even just a threat about how they're going to keep her here for years and she'll never see her family again will start to give the MC a directive.

Notes while reading:

pg 1: the more I read this the more I just think the MC has an issue with her sister leaving home, not that she's with a Gifted.

pg 2: " I don’t really care, Jade is using mind powers on me."
--Is she? We haven't seen any sign of it.

pg 3: "I just didn’t want any boy to take away my sister"
--ok, well at least she admits it...

pg 6: I'm not quite sure what they were testing her on in the second test, and we don't get a lot of information about it. I'd have liked something a little more solid in this chapter.

pg 8: "“I can get you out of this place"
--I'm assuming this is all a test...

pg 11: I'm still missing a big part of why the gifted are punishing people for...random things. Do they have something they're trying to do?

pg 12: "The gifted’s wouldn’t want word of their flaws spreading to the city."
--I'm not sure what's surprising about this. They're acting just as autocratic rulers usually do.

pg 18: Again, I'm not getting a whole lot of tension here because I don't know any reasons for why they're doing things to the MC. There hasn't been anything really unique about the gifteds yet to give us a goal for the story.

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Right now, I think the main thing you have going for you is your worldbuilding, because I can definitely see it developing. But right now, the YA, Giver-esque tropes are working against the story. Setting up a dystopian setting like this one automatically cues us in that the G (I think that ought to be capitalized, by the by) are the bad guys, so when the MC finally manages to figure that out for herself, there's a temptation to say, "Well, duh."

Not only that, but her muted reactions to everything that's happening to her—lotta eye-rolling and eyebrow-raising—even after being tortured is undermining any tension you're trying to set up. She doesn't seem to think that much of what's happening to her, why should we? So far, her strongest reaction to anything is that she's upset that her sister likes boys. I would definitely recommend imagining yourself in this setting, and if you experienced the same things that the MC did, how would you feel? Incorporate that into the story to humanize her. 

Also, I would recommend making new paragraphs when you shift the focus to a new character or have another character start speaking. Otherwise, it gets confusing.

I made line edits to this one, so if you want a PDF, lemme know. Notes below:

Pg. 1:

'They get up and moving towards the door, somehow I know they're leaving too.'—I mean, why else would they use the door?

'...my hand crashes through his with a crunch...'—Through his hand? That's a helluva punch. But then her fists connects with A's face. So her hand destroys his, then she clocks him? And it's the same punch? I know it's a dream, but goddamn. 

Pg. 2:

"What. Did. You. Do. To. Me?"—Punctuating for emphasis like this is usually best used for conveying that a character is really pissed off, not groggy. I would punctuate this normally and keep "I say slowly." That'll get the info across. 

"I'm not letting you control me, you can't just manipulate me with your powers, not like A manipulated my sister."—I can't imagine a person saying something like this. If you want to make the MC sound defiant, I'd reconsider this dialogue. 

Pg. 3:

'A part of me wants to yell at J, and tell her that A was definitely using his powers to manipulate my sister.'—But she just did this. Minus the yelling.

'I know that's not it.'—Not it? Not it how? 

Pg. 4:

'Everyone in this crowd makes me frustrated...'—Already said that she's frustrated. 

'It's not fair to the rest of us who have to actually try.'—Already said this too. 

'The tornado rises in the distance, hungry, ready to devour.'—This is the former tornado enthusiast in me speaking; I think you can do more to sell just how pants-shittingly scary tornadoes are (let's see how the site censors that).

'It slides down my cheek...'—I'm not sure that's how gum works.

Pg. 5:  

'A shimmer-haired...'—What would that look like? 

'I shouldn't be judging her yet, but I already don't like her.'—Uh, why not? C hasn’t said or done anything that would make them unlikable. C literally only has four details about her thus far. Hardly enough to make a judgment call. (Side note, there are multiple instances in this chapter where people purse their lips. I'd cut down on that.)

Pg. 6

I think that overall, you could have a stronger end to this chapter. How’s the MC feeling? Exhausted? Scared? This moment would be better served as an instance for reflection.

Pg. 7:

I think that a silver marker would be very difficult to see on a whiteboard. Also, how is the text C writes bold if there's no other text? If it's the only text, it's just text. 

Pg. 8

'The g man glances around.'—Why? They're in a room, aren't they?

'...hope starts to take root.'—I'd rephrase this. It's kinda corny.

'Maybe this man can help me escape the compound and get back to my family.'—I don't think this needs to be said directly. We can figure it out. 

Overall, this 'escape' doesn't have a lot of emotion or detail behind it. We're told that the MC is sprinting, but that's it. Are her lungs burning? Is she terrified? Is she imagining what the outside world will taste like after captivity?

Pg. 9

"Why don't you open the door and find out."—In hindsight, this probably ought to have tipped her off that she was being tricked. 

'I roll my eyes...'—Again, undercutting the tension.

Why does the g who tricked her vanish? He was in on it, so why does he need to pull a Batman? 

"If it's needless to say that I failed, why did you tell me I failed? Seems a bit contradictory to me."—This seems like too muted of a reaction to being tricked after being given hope of escape. 

Pg. 10

'I roll my eyes, but raise my wrist.'—You'd think that the eye-rolling would lead to another reprimand.

"But why?"—She literally just told you why. 

Pg. 11

'Maybe this is where I have to clean toilets.'—It's pretty obvious that she's about to be tortured. 

Pg. 12

'The man snaps his hands into fists.'—How do hands 'snap' into fists?

'I can't see anything, all I can feel is pain.'—I would add some more sensory detail about the torture. Otherwise, we're very detached from it. 

'I don't think I'm standing anymore. I writhe on the floor...'—You can probably take out the bit about her standing, since you give us the answer next sentence. 

'I hurry to my feet, hurrying to obey lest he subject me to the agony again.'—Cut out one 'hurry'. Also, this comes across as a bit too formal.

The MC's realization about the gifted feels very awkward. And again, considering the authoritarian, dystopian setting allows us to draw these conclusions ourselves, it makes the MC seem kind of dim when it takes her this long to figure things out. 

Pg. 13

'As time goes on...'—I would specify how long she was in there for. 

Pg. 14

'There shouldn't even be this many Triported here...'—Why not?

'...most of the Triported look around my age, give or take five years.'—Already mentioned that they look young. 

'...there's at least fifty. This doesn't make sense.'—Again, why not?

Pg. 15

'...I can see their ribs through their pale blue T-shirts.'—The shirts would have to be either extremely tight or practically transparent for her to see that.

Pg. 17

I hope that R's title is meant to be these kids' way of taking the piss out of R. If not, I'd seriously reconsider coming up with a new name for the dude, because 'The Lord of S' isn't exactly an intimidating moniker.  

'She's the only T that looks a day over twenty.'—This implies that she looks twenty. 
 
'C' smile annoys me.' That seems like a pretty trivial emotion to be having right now, seeing as how C just had her tortured. 
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After chapter 3, I feel like the main character's reactions were not what I was expecting. I did expect her to get angry, but then it just fizzled. She got made for a moment and then just seemed pliant and content to go along with everything with little other thoughts or reaction. So far she has been one of the few characters that isn't meek and compliant, so seeing her so easily go along with everything didn't quite sit right with me. 

In Ch. 4, the compliance and plain acceptance continues. I was a little happy to see her try to escape, but she also went along with the stranger really easily and didn't stop to think it might be a trick, which it was. It seemed almost too obvious to me that it was going to be a trick. I kind of wanted more emotion and reaction throughout this chapter since up to this point, the character has been very full of emotion. I feel like there was less of it in these chapters than the others. The lacking reactions wouldn't bother me so much if that was how the character always was. This chapter just didn't quite seem consistent, character-wise, with the rest of the book. 

I'm curious to see where this is going though and am looking forward to reading more. 

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7 hours ago, JWerner said:

Not only that, but her muted reactions to everything that's happening to her—lotta eye-rolling and eyebrow-raising—even after being tortured is undermining any tension you're trying to set up. She doesn't seem to think that much of what's happening to her, why should we? So far, her strongest reaction to anything is that she's upset that her sister likes boys. I would definitely recommend imagining yourself in this setting, and if you experienced the same things that the MC did, how would you feel? Incorporate that into the story to humanize her. 

Also, I would recommend making new paragraphs when you shift the focus to a new character or have another character start speaking. Otherwise, it gets confusing.

I made line edits to this one, so if you want a PDF, lemme know. Notes below:

Pg. 1:

'They get up and moving towards the door, somehow I know they're leaving too.'—I mean, why else would they use the door?

'...my hand crashes through his with a crunch...'—Through his hand? That's a helluva punch. But then her fists connects with A's face. So her hand destroys his, then she clocks him? And it's the same punch? I know it's a dream, but goddamn. 

Pg. 2:

"What. Did. You. Do. To. Me?"—Punctuating for emphasis like this is usually best used for conveying that a character is really pissed off, not groggy. I would punctuate this normally and keep "I say slowly." That'll get the info across. 

"I'm not letting you control me, you can't just manipulate me with your powers, not like A manipulated my sister."—I can't imagine a person saying something like this. If you want to make the MC sound defiant, I'd reconsider this dialogue. 

Pg. 3:

'A part of me wants to yell at J, and tell her that A was definitely using his powers to manipulate my sister.'—But she just did this. Minus the yelling.

'I know that's not it.'—Not it? Not it how? 

Pg. 4:

'Everyone in this crowd makes me frustrated...'—Already said that she's frustrated. 

'It's not fair to the rest of us who have to actually try.'—Already said this too. 

'The tornado rises in the distance, hungry, ready to devour.'—This is the former tornado enthusiast in me speaking; I think you can do more to sell just how pants-shittingly scary tornadoes are (let's see how the site censors that).

'It slides down my cheek...'—I'm not sure that's how gum works.

Pg. 5:  

'A shimmer-haired...'—What would that look like? 

'I shouldn't be judging her yet, but I already don't like her.'—Uh, why not? C hasn’t said or done anything that would make them unlikable. C literally only has four details about her thus far. Hardly enough to make a judgment call. (Side note, there are multiple instances in this chapter where people purse their lips. I'd cut down on that.)

Pg. 6

I think that overall, you could have a stronger end to this chapter. How’s the MC feeling? Exhausted? Scared? This moment would be better served as an instance for reflection.

Pg. 7:

I think that a silver marker would be very difficult to see on a whiteboard. Also, how is the text C writes bold if there's no other text? If it's the only text, it's just text. 

Pg. 8

'The g man glances around.'—Why? They're in a room, aren't they?

'...hope starts to take root.'—I'd rephrase this. It's kinda corny.

'Maybe this man can help me escape the compound and get back to my family.'—I don't think this needs to be said directly. We can figure it out. 

Overall, this 'escape' doesn't have a lot of emotion or detail behind it. We're told that the MC is sprinting, but that's it. Are her lungs burning? Is she terrified? Is she imagining what the outside world will taste like after captivity?

Pg. 9

"Why don't you open the door and find out."—In hindsight, this probably ought to have tipped her off that she was being tricked. 

'I roll my eyes...'—Again, undercutting the tension.

Why does the g who tricked her vanish? He was in on it, so why does he need to pull a Batman? 

"If it's needless to say that I failed, why did you tell me I failed? Seems a bit contradictory to me."—This seems like too muted of a reaction to being tricked after being given hope of escape. 

Pg. 10

'I roll my eyes, but raise my wrist.'—You'd think that the eye-rolling would lead to another reprimand.

"But why?"—She literally just told you why. 

Pg. 11

'Maybe this is where I have to clean toilets.'—It's pretty obvious that she's about to be tortured. 

Pg. 12

'The man snaps his hands into fists.'—How do hands 'snap' into fists?

'I can't see anything, all I can feel is pain.'—I would add some more sensory detail about the torture. Otherwise, we're very detached from it. 

'I don't think I'm standing anymore. I writhe on the floor...'—You can probably take out the bit about her standing, since you give us the answer next sentence. 

'I hurry to my feet, hurrying to obey lest he subject me to the agony again.'—Cut out one 'hurry'. Also, this comes across as a bit too formal.

The MC's realization about the gifted feels very awkward. And again, considering the authoritarian, dystopian setting allows us to draw these conclusions ourselves, it makes the MC seem kind of dim when it takes her this long to figure things out. 

Pg. 13

'As time goes on...'—I would specify how long she was in there for. 

Pg. 14

'There shouldn't even be this many Triported here...'—Why not?

'...most of the Triported look around my age, give or take five years.'—Already mentioned that they look young. 

'...there's at least fifty. This doesn't make sense.'—Again, why not?

Pg. 15

'...I can see their ribs through their pale blue T-shirts.'—The shirts would have to be either extremely tight or practically transparent for her to see that.

Pg. 17

I hope that R's title is meant to be these kids' way of taking the piss out of R. If not, I'd seriously reconsider coming up with a new name for the dude, because 'The Lord of S' isn't exactly an intimidating moniker.  

'She's the only T that looks a day over twenty.'—This implies that she looks twenty. 
 
'C' smile annoys me.' That seems like a pretty trivial emotion to be having right now, seeing as how C just had her tortured. 

Thanks for the feedback! I could tell I had some character issues, but couldn't tell what they were. Now I realize that J just isn't reacting properly to things, I'll definitely be fixing that.  

I'd love the PDF of the line edits, if you don't mind sending that.

1 hour ago, shatteredsmooth said:

After chapter 3, I feel like the main character's reactions were not what I was expecting. I did expect her to get angry, but then it just fizzled. She got made for a moment and then just seemed pliant and content to go along with everything with little other thoughts or reaction. So far she has been one of the few characters that isn't meek and compliant, so seeing her so easily go along with everything didn't quite sit right with me. 

In Ch. 4, the compliance and plain acceptance continues. I was a little happy to see her try to escape, but she also went along with the stranger really easily and didn't stop to think it might be a trick, which it was. It seemed almost too obvious to me that it was going to be a trick. I kind of wanted more emotion and reaction throughout this chapter since up to this point, the character has been very full of emotion. I feel like there was less of it in these chapters than the others. The lacking reactions wouldn't bother me so much if that was how the character always was. This chapter just didn't quite seem consistent, character-wise, with the rest of the book. 

I'm curious to see where this is going though and am looking forward to reading more. 

Thanks for the feedback! I'm definitely realizing there's a lot of issues with J. Thanks for reading, and I'm glad you're looking forward to reading more! 

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