2012 06 25 - Jack the Halls - Touching Metal - Chapter 01

[Jack the Halls]

Hey guys,

This is the first chapter of my current novel tentatively entitled Touching Metal. Now, if you all would be so kind as to tear it apart for me, I'd be much obliged!

[Mandamon]

Hmmm...I seem to be the first...I'll leap right in.

Sci Fi is a nice change. Your prose seems very professional.

As sometimes happens in this sort of future colony Sci-Fi, I was still a little confused as to where they were by the end of the chapter. Bethany hasn't touched the ground, so I guess they were in a space station of some sort? It seemed like there was gravity, so I wouldn't think ground would be terribly strange to her.

Page 3/7: The Drugs/food notation was sort of strange. Is it one or the other? Why are they thought of as drugs?

Page 8: The target's new friend has shown up for 12 days in a row, yet the S.O.M. and his wife don't seem very familiar with her. I would think they might have noticed her before.

Page 10: How does he know what the in-stream card says when he's looking somewhere else? "Flashed" makes me think it's visual, but he seems to be sending messages while it's still in a pocket.

The chapter as a whole was enticing, and setup enough questions that I want to read more and find out what's going on. However, there is a pretty steep learning curve for the setting. Reminds me of Charles Stross, in that you can tell it's a Sci-Fi future, but things are strange enough that's it hard to relate our civilization to this one. But it's almost as if you are taking that type of story and purposefully obscuring the setting. You might want to consider answering a few more questions to take a little bit of the slope out of the curve, though I may need to read some more before I come to a strong feeling on that one.

[Shivertongue]

I didn't get this one. Would you be able to send it again?

[cjhuitt]

As already mentioned by Mandamon, this has a steep learning curve. It wasn't too bad to get into as a sci-fi story, but even right from the beginning you mention "The S.O.M." without any sort of clue what an S.O.M. is, or why a gold star is desirable (I mean, we all know you want to get a gold star, from way back in pre-school, so this works, it's just a note on how quickly the concepts come).

I did like the idea from the beginning that he wanted to kill his wife, or at least divorce her, but that he couldn't due to contingency planning.

After the first paragraph, however, I started to enjoy the story just a little less. I think part of it was because Bethany (the wife, although we don't get her name for a little bit) is in fact a little boring in how she prattles on, and that kind of detracts from the story. It is good that you only give bits and pieces, but you could probably help this a little by using her conversation as a jumping-off point for more of the main POV character's ideas and reminisces. Or, perhaps cut a bit of the words from the scene.

Another idea that might help is to bring forward a little more the fact that he's observing one of the food vendors, and that he wants to kill her to finish her mission, but that he's been given a wait command, and it frustrates him even more. Especially if there's a chance he slips and almost reveals himself to his new wife.

One of the things I thought was missing to the beginning, although it may be hard to work it in with what I just said about trimming a bit, is the scenery. We know they're not on earth, because the young ones don't remember it, but we don't know much more than it's a station, and they're in a carnival. What kind of carnival? How does it take advantage of it's setting, besides being pushed up against sky-high towers? Why not have it on top of one of the towers? How heavy is the gravity? What does the sky look like? This is one chance to shine on the setting and make me like the story. I tend to think that sci-fi stories can have a lot of fun with setting, postulating advances in building materials and what-not, not to mention locations, and still having the ability to describe them somewhat technically instead of waving hands and saying it's magic. I'd use it to advantage here, especially since all the main POV is doing is observing anyway.

So, questions: The phantom voice had me intrigued, plus the idea that it wasn't his memories he was having. It made me wonder which part is the assassin, and which part the extra bit, and how it all ties together. The bit about the teenage food cart vendor was moderately intriguing, and made me wonder if he is going to be killed, or not. Also, the friend, which made me have a sneaking suspicion that the "friend" is the one sending the messages to the POV about whether to proceed with the assassination or not. Idle speculation, of course, but on the off chance that was your big reveal much later in the book, I get to say I thought of it all the way back here.

Oh, the phantom voice: letters appearing on the page of his mind like a typewriter? How old is this guy? Even now, typewriters are rather antique, and not many people would first think of a typewriter to describe the appearance of letters on a page. Honestly, I wonder how many would think of closed-captioning, which might be closer to what he's experiencing anyway, letters superimposed over the rest of the scene.

The thing about the drugs/food had me confused, and not in a good way at first. In fact, I was almost convinced it must have been a typo, until it was repeated over and over again. I think that needs to be clearer that it is food with a different word from the get-go, or something. It kind of itched at my mind the whole time.

I thought the idea to keep the other pickpockets away was a neat one, but I'm not convinced that he (did we ever get a name?) would not be able to keep himself from filing a report, or even from having stuff broadcast all over the station/world/galaxy/whatever. I would think he could come up with a way to manage it without the rigamarole, but he might consider this easier than another option.

I also thought the idea of having food rated for skill levels was kind of interesting. That's a neat bit of color, whether or not it plays further into the story.

Finally, I will note that there is a decent chunk of telling in here instead of showing. It wasn't overboard, but it was enough that I noticed it and was mildly irritated about it from time to time. The two particular examples I recall were at the very beginning, when it was told that he was always very much aware of his surroundings, and near the end of this section, where something different happened, which "put him on edge." In both these situations, I'd like something in action form to either back it up or, if you really want to have fun, show that what he was thinking about himself was in fact not what was going on.

[Jack the Halls]

Thanks for the feedback, guys! I feel like this chapter will be much better when I go back through and make the necessary changes. Also, I feel like my next chapter is better because of it as well. Hopefully, we can get some more back and forth going once we get to the later chapters, but for now, suffice it to say that you've been very helpful. Thanks again!

[TheSadDragon]

Hello,

Sorry for the late feedback, been a bit of a hectic week ^^;

First of all I have to agree with what has been said above: The story is well written. The pacing might be a bit on the slow side but its a good slow where the story takes some time to build things up rather than feeling drawn out. Speaking of the build up that is another plus. You never give too much information that it feels like a info dump but just enough to give us an idea of the world and how things look.

There were two things that puzzled me, the first being what S.O.M. stands for and the other being drugs vs food.

There were also a few sentences that confused me a bit:

-Page 4-

Everybody hated tourists. They made easy marks. They were ignored.

-Page 5-

He narrowed his eyes, a reflex that even the urchin wouldn't notice unless he was a man who knew when he looked into the eyes of a killer. The urchin saw something in the S.O.M.'s stare. The urchin's own eyes widened slightly, and he stood up a straighter.

Both of these feels like the contradict themselves.

Tourists are ignored but they make easy marks which would indicate that they are not ignored. They are also hated which also indicates that people notices them in a negative way. Wouldn't a local stand out less and thus not be noticed?

As for the second quote you start off by saying how the urchin wouldn't notice the narrowing of his eyes and than in the next sentence he does notice something. While the text indicates that the urchin might not have noticed the true nature of the narrowing it kind of reads like he does at least partially understand. Now this is nothing bad but it felt a bit strange having them back to back.

There was also one line im not sure added anything to the story, though I dont know what you know so ill leave that one to you

-Page 5-

That direction, because it was where the Big Name Brand drug stands were, teemed with people.

Finally i have to add that this one is a strange beast -- it is well written, its scifi but at the same time I never really feel engaged. I think this is mostly due to me really not liking the POV character. He feels cold and without any traits that makes me being able to sympathise with him. Most of this comes from how he treats Bethany without any guild or remorse what so ever and also that we don't really get a good reason for why he needs to use her -- it's also implied that she isn't the first one he has used like this. Now I have read stories where the main character -- assuming this is the main character -- isn't perhaps the most socially competent person around. In those stories the main character usually have at least some redeeming quality that lets us root for them or a side kick that serves that purpose. It is quite possible we will get either of those as the story goes along but I feel that opening the story without either can risk putting people off.

Despite all this I'm looking forward to seeing how S.O.M.'s character develops.

-TSD

[Asmodemon]

I don’t have much to add to what’s already been said. I didn’t mind the S.O.M.’s character, he’s not likeable, but he’s professional and that works for me. That said, most of this chapter is sitting in place observing a target, without any indication of why the kid’s a target. And nothing happens except for mindless prattle and sequences that are just plain info-dumps. I won’t go so far as to call it boring, but something needs to happen soon.

S.O.M: Like the others have said, I have no idea what a S.O.M is and nowhere in the chapter do we find out what the letters stand for. It’s fine to use S.O.M., but it should be after you’ve at least written out the acronym once before you start using it. As it is not knowing didn’t make me curious so much as it made me annoyed.

Information: You give a lot of background information in the form of info-dumps at a junction in the story where I don’t care yet about how this future galaxy works. Contrarily you don’t give a lot about the place where the S.O.M actually is, what his surroundings look like.

Tension: Being in the perspective of the S.O.M. on a mission I keep expecting things to happen, but things don’t and yet with every scene break or so I start to feel anticipation. That’s good, but this kind of bait and switch won’t work for long.

Scene breaks: You have a number of scene breaks in the chapter, but they seem superfluous. When one happens I expect things to change in some significant matter, but they don’t. Everything stays the same, the POV, the location, and the sense of time. I don’t think you need those.

Drugs: Interesting thing for regular food to be labelled as drugs in the future.

Conclusion: You may have the seeds of a good story here, but you need to cut some of the weeds (info-dump, slowness) first.