07.20.2014 - manaheim - Redemption's Edge - Ch3 (L)

[manaheim]

I'm donning my thick skin. Have at me.

 

Thanks for reading, folks.

[Endurant Archivist]

As a continuation of Ch. 2, this chapter was consistent. Paul stayed in character, their conversation was solid, lots of good back and forth. Big plus for wording things so I could tell that Paul or Candace was speaking, without their name attached. That's hard to do.

 

Setting wise, it flows well, not much has changed. I was a bit confused by her wings moment, when she lifts off the ground in the room. Mentally, I had trouble seeing what was going on and "where" she was. I didn't think the room was that big, like she should have hit her head on the ceiling. 

 

My "Big Problems" (Thanks to WaD videos) involve this contract. And I don't mean religiously. The contract seems to need more explanation, because of how morally ambiguous it makes Paul–and by association–God seem. It doesn't help me that Candace accepts that she will kill people, but on a relatively "petty" (meaning small beans) scale. Paul isn't saying, "I need you to bring down a drug lord cartel or a cult worshipper or something. Now, granted, this whole conversation could be weighed down in "who do you kill?" but I feel like a reasonable argument could be made for Paul to use a better example. Something more black and white and less ambiguous then a drunken husband (sigh...writing this out is difficult, I know there are plenty of people who see more merit in a man like that dying then I do personally.) 

 

So, as a reader, I was left wondering how God would order a woman–bound for hell, with one shot at redemption–to kill little evils, not big. It seems...like overkill. Sort of like a legit ninja coming to steal my nephews cookies.

 

Hope this helps.

Edited July 22, 2014 by Endurant Archivist

[Mandamon]

Aha--I see Endurant figured out the problem I had with the Contract.  Also ties in to what I was saying about not knowing Candace's crimes.  Other notes are below:

 

I like the scene where Candace tries out her wings.  It gives a bit of humor to the situation and we see her panicked for once, even though she gets it under control quickly.  I didn't have too much problem with the space.  I knew she was in a small room, but I didn't get the impression she lifted off from the ground.

 

Pg 1, Paul gets out of his chair and sits on the desk

Pg 3, Paul leans back in his chair.  You don't say that he sat back down.

 

I said this last time, but I still don't believe in Candace's punishment based solely on her stealing religious artifacts.  She's already said she won't kill, and that's usually the biggest bump on the path to being condemned to eternal hellfire.  You haven't given me enough evidence to understand why she is so heavily condemned, or why she in particular is being chosen for this job rather than someone more...Hellish.

 

Pg 10: Wait, the Contract has only been around 1500 years?  I'm wondering what event triggered it.

 

I started to lose interest when Paul started talking details about the deal, around page 12.  I think you're telling here more than showing.

 

Pg 17: was Paul considered a monk?

 

 

This felt a little too long for a chapter.  I was ready to get on with the job about halfway through.  Also something still nags at me about the whole situation with Candance and the Contract, but I'm not sure what.  Maybe that her actions are railroaded with no real explanation behind it.  (Endurant's explanation is much better than mine).

 

Generally, though, I'm still interested and want to see what her first job is like.

[Robinski]

I was fine with this chapter in principle. Some detailed comments below. I see what Mandamon’s saying about the length. I was okay with the chapter lengthwise as a standalone read but, reading back-to-back instead of weekly, it’s really two chapters spent in heaven setting up the main premise – which I agree I might start to get fidgety about. This said there are a lot of ideas for the reader to get his/her round, and the dialogue is entertaining enough to carry me through the individual chapters fine, so why not one after the other?

 

I become more concerned about Paul’s tone when I start to extrapolate. Does he talk to Simon that way? How does he speak to God, assuming he does? Or Gabriel? I think the reader needs to be able to respect Paul as having morale authority over Candace (Endurant notes a similar thought), and for that reason, maybe his shtick goes a bit far here and there.

 

I'm very intrigued to read more, I'm not overly concerned about events to date, taking them as fantasy of course, but then I'm good at suspending disbelief – perhaps too good sometimes. This said, I think there is a limit to how fast and loose it’s advisable to play with the background material in terms of how many people will fail to connect or be lost along the way.

 

The Wiki reference (below) brought another question to mind – one that might be answered as we read on – but I begin to wonder what role faith will play in the story. Candace seems to have been presented with a no-brainer, do what you’re told and you’ll get in. The more I think about the weighty concepts behind the story, the more I hope that there will be some examination of such things. Maybe it’s all a test of her faith in some way – not to do what she’s told, but what she thinks is right.

 

Next chapter a new one for everyone, excellent!!

 

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Page 1 - The reference to rubble vs. continuity, didn't Paul sweep all the stuff off his desk?

Page 8 - A comment from pedantry corner. They certainly don't make first pressings of classic vinyl anymore, by definition, but any disk can be re-pressed (as opposed to repressed!) from a master. Many bands are still or have restarted issuing new albums or former releases as vinyl records – often in heavyweight vinyl (180g) – because the collectors market has never gone away, and is now growing again. (I work in a music shop on weekends). My point is, Paul's statement is not correct or, rather, is not as precise as it could be.

Page 9 - The gauche archangels line made me laugh out loud, in my back garden, don’t think anyone heard.

Page 9 - Some readers will not get the point of the Ferrari vs. Porsche reference.

Page 13 - wooden staff?

Page 14 – By this point, I'm thinking back trying to remember how much Candace swore in thought or in deed in the first chapter. To me it's doesn't connect that she would swear any more in the afterlife than she would on Earth, in fact I would have thought she should swear less now – I know she’s shocked and all.

Page 14 - Paul's swear bothered me. I guess he did it to shock Candace but, firstly, I thought there were other moments in the conversation when she was less in control of herself.

 

Secondly (and my real point), I'm not sure I have a grasp of where Paul’s boundaries are. This sent me to the internet <sigh> and the wiki page for Paul the apostle. Now – I’ll say right here that I am the last person who should be putting forward any kind of analysis of biblical references, and I know you’ve been very clear that it’s a fantasy, but it seems to me that a lot of readers will know some of this stuff or go look it out. Apparently, according to Wiki, one of Paul’s ideas was that ‘salvation is based on faith and not works of the law’. I wouldn’t have mentioned this at all, since I'm prepared to accept something as a fantasy, but I struck me that this is diametrically opposed to the notion that your Paul is presenting to Candace.

 

Page 17 - Something about you referring to Paul as a monk sticks in my mind. Is he a monk, really? I see Mandamon mentioned this too.
 

Page 18 - I feel as if the end of the chapter could have more impact. There are various points during it when there are reveals which are effective, but somehow I was expecting a bigger punch line right at the end.
 

[manaheim]

Thanks for the feedback, guys. Super helpful and insightful as always.

 

A question for you, though...

 

The contract.... Candace's crimes... etc. There is an awwwwwwwwwwwful lot of information there, and I've been trying very hard to glance off of it initially because you've already had QUITE a bit of info rammed into your gullets.  More of these things DOES get explained as we carry on in the book, but from right about now on, it turns pretty significantly to more action and far far less explanation.

 

So... I guess I'm just scratching my head over balancing between more info-dumping and trying to keep folks from being bored?  Would love some thoughts.

 

[minor spoilers in the next paragraph...]

 

Endurant... I appreciate your perspective and hope you'll keep giving me feedback, but I don't think your reaction is likely to change much here. I'm taking religious characters and basically casting them in roles where they very matter-of-factly go about their day, fingering the bad guys to get whacked, and forcing some poor girl to do it. It's sort of one of the fundamental elements of the story, and totally intentional. I don't know what you do for work, but I'm basically playing with the ways big corporations operate... and then draping that over Christianity. I guess the only thing I could suggest is to ask yourself what your reaction would be if Paul were an HR manager in a corporation that was in the middle of layoffs... or possibly a federal agent of a secret government branch that assassinates serial killers who cannot be proven guilty.... because those are essentially what I'm riffing off of.

 

 

 

Thanks again everyone!

[manaheim]

Oh... Roibinski...

 

On the vinyl points... lol. Fair enough.

 

On Paul and his boundaries. You basically said it. It's fantasy. He does absolutely have some boundaries and there is a magic system surrounding all the characters in the novel, but yes... his boundaries are not entirely clear, and my working assumption is they don't need to be, only because he's never the one solving any problems.  He's Gandalf... only he does actually have some limits.

 

(now please erase the image of Paul as Gandalf from your mind)

[andyk]

Playing some catchup here now I've found a bit of spare time.

 

My first two points echo things people have already said:

This is nicely written.

It seems too long for what it is - an awful lot of set-up. You've tried to break that up through the characters arguing, which is a good idea. But that never seemed to substantially shift either of their viewpoints or the relationship between them, so that nothing really moved during the scene.

 

My biggest issue here is that I increasingly dislike the saint and everything he stands for. Even as an atheist, I'm happy to buy into the idea that God is real and good for the duration of a story. This God and his minion though seem inconsistent, and not subtly so. They're claiming to represent a higher good, but are then bullying a woman into killing other people. They're happy for her to turn other people into killers, but they're not happy to take public responsibility for it. They claim to value free will while completely trampling over it. If you're setting them up to become the villains of the piece and for Candace to rebel against them then fair enough, but that's not the impression I'm getting. The fact that she's accepting what they're bullying her into makes me see her as a victim or worse yet as complicit in what they're doing. And again, that wouldn't be a problem if it had seemed like a story with that kind of tone from the start, or shown her buying into a different value system, but if that's there then it's not coming across to me.

 

As I said at the start, I think the writing is good, it flows very nicely. But I'm still struggling with the content.

[manaheim]

Thanks, Andy. Taking the time to catch up like this was really nice of you.