5/22/23 - Ace of Hearts - Bond of Wildflowers v2 sub 14, 2092 words (VG)

[Ace of Hearts Misting]

Tagged for mentions of violence and gore.

 

Hi everyone! I want to give anyone interested a chance to catch up, but I also don't want to go multiple weeks between subs and have people forget everything so I'm opting for a shorter sub. Thanks!

[Mandamon Midnight Essence]

This had some good movement to it, and we learn some interesting things about B. I like W's little revelation. That's something I like in general about this book: people don't wallow in their errors forever. They make decisions and realize how they can change.

I'm still getting a little mixed up on characters, now everyone's in play. Especially with who is who's child and how the three (four?) factions relate to each other. Having a little more setup earlier in the book would help.

I can feel things wrapping up, though! How many more submissions do you estimate?

Notes while reading

pg 1: "makes them sound closer to a plea than a threat"
--Why desperation? She seems to be fine with murder. Is there a reason she won't do it to W?

pg 2: "But I can’t let myself get stuck on that"
--Again, B flat out murdered someone, and they seem to be glossing over it.

pg 2: "Sure, she killed F in cold blood"
--not really a "sure" kind of statement...

pg 3: “Then let me help you escape your father.”
--okay, slightly confused on genealogy here, likely WRS.
B is sibling to N and H, but by a different father? She's A.J.'s daughter, yes? but why did their mother shack up with him?

pg 5: "put on that ridiculous outfit and style himself as a colonial explorer"
--definitely need more background on A and the organization here. I'm getting a little lost with the details.

pg 7: “Good thing I made it in time.”
--could be a stronger end to the chapter. He was just there, right? So he probably wasn't too far away when W was freed. Maybe something like, "Good think I didn't go far?"

[Ace of Hearts Misting]

On 5/25/2023 at 4:32 PM, Mandamon said:

This had some good movement to it, and we learn some interesting things about B. I like W's little revelation. That's something I like in general about this book: people don't wallow in their errors forever. They make decisions and realize how they can change.

I'm still getting a little mixed up on characters, now everyone's in play. Especially with who is who's child and how the three (four?) factions relate to each other. Having a little more setup earlier in the book would help.

I can feel things wrapping up, though! How many more submissions do you estimate?

Thanks for your comments! I have a feeling there's going to be more confusion with the characters in the next couple of subs since there's a lot of characters turning on each other pretty quickly. I'll take a step back and reassess once I'm through submitting the whole thing.

There's 15k words left, so probably 4-5 subs. Which was more than I was expecting based on how far we are, so there could potentially be room to cut down.

[Silk Svrakiss]

In addition to my LBLs below, going to heartily echo pretty much everything Mandamon said. 

Comments! 

“And the betrayed expression wasn’t the worst part… He never did believe…” Oof, this hurts. Nice character realization here.

“A new series of images in my mind…” This on the other hand felt a bit abrupt. I really like where W arrived but wonder if we need to spent a little more time getting there, both in the scene and possibly in general (foreshadowing/buildup).

I’m enjoying the interplay between B and W here. That said, I’m not sure I’m fully swallowing the idea of her having torn loyalties this way – she hasn’t been super fleshed out so far, so its hard to understand why she’s wavering in loyalty now (even if she always was). It might help to remind us somewhere in the scene that she has an attachment to A, or is opposing J because she’s fey herself, or something, to help contextualize why she’s doing this?  

P5 “It’s unnerving how human his smile looks.” This makes me realize I have no idea whether J is actually human or not.

Edit from the next page: Well I guess he is human. I do enjoy the juxtaposition of human/monster here.

P6 “It’s the Aeg who’s responsible for all this.” Is that true, though? Still don’t quite understand MA’s relationship to all this.

Hmm… I like that W recovers some of her agency in this chapter. However, the one thing she tries fails, and it seems like she’s basically given up again when A shows up with the solution to her problem. Can we have her working on something else that feels active, rather than passive, when A shows up? Or re-frame B’s actions a bit so it’s clear they’re the result of W convincing her to do something differently? Or something?

Overall: not much to add that isn’t in my LBLs. Seems like things are coming to a head nicely. At this point I think a lot of the work to support these chapters will really be in the revisions for chapters leading up to this, to give you a little more foreshadowing and buildup.