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12/12/16 - In Man's Hue - Short Story - 2994 words


Tariniel

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Hey everyone!

I wrote this while taking a short break from the book I am currently working on. As such, I tried to do quite a few things that I don't believe I've ever done before, mostly as a "cleansing the palate" sort of experience. Hopefully it turned out okay :)

Any and all thoughts, corrections, and especially reactions are welcome. If I had to pinpoint something I'm specifically looking for it would be areas of confusion. With all of the switching that goes on, both in storyline and tense, I'm a little worried that readers will not be able to follow the story itself. If at any point you find yourself confused, don't hesitate to mention it. This story will probably need quite a bit of revision work, but I'm eager to get started :)

Oh, and I put in a pun at the end which I've been told is not very apparent. I wonder how many of you will catch it, if any. Still thinking on how to change that, but also on whether its necessary at all...

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I was confused through most of this, mainly trying to figure out how the two narratives fit together. The journal seems to indicate that people built some sort of robot or android, but Sadie's narrative seems post-apocalyptic.

Sadie's discovery in the middle of the strange human tissue made me think that was perhaps what made the robot invention in the journal possible. In any case, I'm wondering what the technology is and where it came from. (Edit - just realized you call it specifically "human" tissue meaning it's the same as Sadie's species?). Also, does the symmetrical construction have any bearing on the story, except that Sadie can use it to complete her map? It seems unnecessary.

So at the end, we find Sadie is evidently a member of the android species that took over, but I guess they have no memory of what they did, for some reason? And now they're creating their own artificial beings, using the unknown indestructible tissue from...?

I got the pun at the end, but not really sure what it means. "Man" and "human" etymologically may even come from the same root. In any case, have the robot/androids independently decided to call themselves human, while humans (us) already exist, or are you saying that we are the first generation of artificial beings, but have forgotten, and are now repeating the same cycle?

Interesting thought experiment, but not sure exactly where it's leading.

Also, pg 2: thoughts should be in italics
 

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- I liked the constant switching of viewpoints (is that the correct term?). I felt like this increased the pace of the story, which helped paint the picture of urgency that you tried to convey. I felt curious about knowing the end.

- At some point, the main character is banging herself against a door, and we don't get a sense that she's hurting from doing this. I mean, try doing this yourself. It really hurts, especially if the door is metal which we don't know about in this context.

- I found the writing mostly fluid, and suitable for the world you're describing, if that makes any sens.

- I may just be wrong here, but why are the halls so long and featureless. What would be the benefit of building halls like that? Wouldn't that be a waste of space? Also doors leading to other halls? Why? I don't understand, but then again I don't know much about architecture.

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Oooh, a short story! Exciting!

Overall

Similar to @Mandamon, generally, I was confused. It read like the plot to Battlestar Galactica, which is in itself a plot to several hundred scifi books. I can't tell if you're trying to put a unique twist on it, because I'm not really certain what happened. I think with some cleanup it could be a neat piece.

As I go

- Title--intentionally leaves out women? Thoughts?

- first paragraph and I'm pretty certain I'm in an episode of Battlestar Galactica

- woah, tense changes on page one!

- middle of page one: the italics areas are getting redundant by the third one, and highly tropeish

- page two: rust doesn't indicate a long time of disuse. One decent rain could do it

- end of page two: a lot of coincidences going on here. I'm finding this situation unbelievable

- the info dump at the top of page three is awfully heavy. Suggest better insertion into the scene in small bits

- the robot android things got acceptance in three months? The world can't even accept hybrid cars across the board, and its been a decade.

- top of page four: the non-italics are starting to blend together with the italics. Voice is lost. I have no idea what is happening anymore

- page five: they evolved something no one expected - individuality.... did these people not have access to the most basic science fiction book or television show?

- they called themselves humans, with a disturbing level of patriarchy, and thought about killing themselves? Or their creators? I'm so confused

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1 hour ago, Mandamon said:

Sadie's discovery in the middle of the strange human tissue made me think that was perhaps what made the robot invention in the journal possible. In any case, I'm wondering what the technology is and where it came from. (Edit - just realized you call it specifically "human" tissue meaning it's the same as Sadie's species?)

I was shooting for the classic: race builds androids, androids evolve unexpectedly, then eventually overthrow their makers. As a twist, however, I told the story from the POV of one of those androids--now the planets inhabitants--who the reader later discovers is us. I kept the original race purposely vague, but tried to get across that our "flesh" is their form of advanced technology. I wonder if I can make this clearer by adding this information into the journal excerpts...

1 hour ago, Mandamon said:

Also, does the symmetrical construction have any bearing on the story, except that Sadie can use it to complete her map? It seems unnecessary.

I should definitely tie this in.

1 hour ago, Mandamon said:

So at the end, we find Sadie is evidently a member of the android species that took over, but I guess they have no memory of what they did, for some reason?

The idea was for that to be part of their evolution. In order to live a normal life as the humans they had become, they needed to forget their past actions. (I'm pretty sure I hinted towards that fact, somewhere...) The adaptation was largely unconscious, slowly happening over the centuries that separate the two events.

1 hour ago, Mandamon said:

In any case, have the robot/androids independently decided to call themselves human, while humans (us) already exist, or are you saying that we are the first generation of artificial beings, but have forgotten, and are now repeating the same cycle?

I am going for the latter. 

22 minutes ago, king007 said:

- At some point, the main character is banging herself against a door, and we don't get a sense that she's hurting from doing this. I mean, try doing this yourself. It really hurts, especially if the door is metal which we don't know about in this context.

Not sure how I missed this... Thanks for the heads up :)

Edited by Tariniel
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6 minutes ago, kaisa said:

- top of page four: the non-italics are starting to blend together with the italics. Voice is lost. I have no idea what is happening anymore

This is what I was most afraid of... One of the major distinctions between the journal entries and Sadie's POV is the tense, which I had to forgo due to the necessity of that flashback. I can't for the life of me think of a viable way to make the transition smoother... Maybe if I transitioned mid-Sadie scene, rather than putting an entry in between, readers wouldn't be so confused when they get back into her POV only to find the tense has changed? Suggestions anyone?

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- I really like the ominous opening of the story.

- The rotting corpse remarks comes off as redundant, since it's mentioned twice that the board is horribly indecisive.

- Confused as to who Dane is in this part of the story.

- I'm really liking the pacing, along with the question - are Sadie's discoveries in the past, present or future?

- Really confused about the ending. I like what you are going for - a twist on the classic robot rebellion motif - but in the end I can't tell what exactly has happened. It might need some additional meat to develop the story a bit more. The switch between perspectives is fast-paced and works really well - I think you've got the basics down. It just needs a little more development. 

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The suspense buildup is good, up until page three. The ‘demise’ italic paragraph feels a bit out of place, and kills the buildup. It may be better suited for much latter in the story, or you might want to take it out entirely. The starting buildup gave me the impression of S being a sole survivor. I did enjoy the twist. (Mostly...)

WARNING: The following rant is from a hard sci-fi fan. The sci-fi aspect of it … it’s very Twilight Zone, but I fail to see where this x-tech came from if humans were indeed the superior race, or the potential repercussions thereof. I also have no idea how you’d build human to have the memory failsafe, I’m not sure why requiring it to be saved would be a failsafe, I’m not sure how a human mind would be saved. Also, humans can be easily controlled with a natural nutritional deficiency, like say, iodine (barring the idea that they can be genetically programed to have such.) The sense I got was that the sci-fi was just the setting for the plot, and you heavily relied on Clarke's "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." The twist is from the best of Twilight Zone,  but the science just isn't there.

“the minds of men” (page 1) – This gives a false impression that the progenitors are human.

Edited by aeromancer
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7 hours ago, aeromancer said:

I fail to see where this x-tech came from if humans were indeed the superior race, or the potential repercussions thereof. I also have no idea how you’d build human to have the memory failsafe, I’m not sure why requiring it to be saved would be a failsafe, I’m not sure how a human mind would be saved. Also, humans can be easily controlled with a natural nutritional deficiency, like say, iodine (barring the idea that they can be genetically programed to have such.)

Writing a sci-fi was one of the things I tried that is very new to me. Good to know that I at least got some things right :) As for the x-tech, the idea was the the original race built their version of 'robots,' a word which applies as it would to us. The robots were built with the capacity to adapt--so as to make them better workers--but it eventually led them to recognize their position in the world. This is what the x-tech is; their technology. Over time, however, we have evolved enough to be nearly indistinguishable from those first 'robots.' So yes, the material looks like human flesh, but it's adaptive qualities are much more advanced the ours.

The failsafe aspect was that they were dependent on their creators to prevent memory loss. This built-in quality also facilitated the evolutionary memory loss later on. A nutritional deficiency is something to think about, though...

7 hours ago, aeromancer said:

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

This was not really conscious, but I can't say I'm surprised...

7 hours ago, aeromancer said:

“the minds of men” (page 1) – This gives a false impression that the progenitors are human.

To get the pun at the end right I twisted around the actual etymological meaning of these words. Loosely, 'Man' applies to the original race, and 'Human' applies to their creations. Your point still stands, however. I'll see if there's anything I can do.

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An interesting story.  Overall I thought your pacing and tension were good.  I moved through the story quickly, and I enjoyed reading it.  It was fun to wait and see how the two plot lines would come together in the end.

After reading the comments, I realize that I misinterpreted your ending.  I thought that the original humans had ended up surviving, that Sadie and the NovaGear people were all original humans, but that they had forgotten about the androids that they had created long ago and were about to do the same thing again.  Now I realize that Sadie is one of the generation 2 androids, and they're about to make generation 3.  I like your actual meaning better than the meaning I came up with - it's a much more interesting idea.

6 hours ago, Tariniel said:

The failsafe aspect was that they were dependent on their creators to prevent memory loss. This built-in quality also facilitated the evolutionary memory loss later on.

I see that this is in there now that you mention it, but I think it needs a little more emphasis.

18 hours ago, Tariniel said:

The idea was for that to be part of their evolution. In order to live a normal life as the humans they had become, they needed to forget their past actions. (I'm pretty sure I hinted towards that fact, somewhere...) The adaptation was largely unconscious, slowly happening over the centuries that separate the two events.

So just to be clear, adaptation and evolution are two different things.  If we're talking about biological evolution, like Darwin stuff, you have to remember that stuff doesn't evolve because it "needs" to. Evolution happens by random chance:  Sometimes a creature gets really lucky and is born with a beneficial genetic mutation (and then has lots of babies), but most of the time those genetic mutations suck.  An organism never thought, "Gee, it would be great to be faster so I wasn't eaten by the scary alligators," and then ended up getting faster.  So forgetfulness can't evolve because it needs to - evolution is always, functionally, an accident.  But, I don't think this is a problem for your story because you establish that forgetfulness was part of how the gen2 androids were created.  No evolution needed. :) 

18 hours ago, kaisa said:

middle of page one: the italics areas are getting redundant by the third one, and highly tropeish

This bothered me as well.  Early on, the italic sections are very generic.  Once I realize this is someone writing a record, and someone who might be in a rush because he/she might be hunted to death at any moment, I got kind of annoyed that they spent their first few paragraphs being vague.  They got better as the story went on.

15 hours ago, rdpulfer said:

Confused as to who Dane is in this part of the story.

I agree with this as well.  I think Dane's existence ends up making Sadie feel less competent, because his only role early on is to have told her stuff that she needs to know.  When I'm first getting to know Sadie's character, that makes her seem like a newbie.

One last nit-picky thing: 

The robots were unable to adapt, and—as programming them with the ability to perform every task was impossible—the company viewed them as nearly useless.
What is NovaGear planning to use the androids for? Because there's a difference between physical adaptation and cognitive flexibility (and "adapt" could imply either one). The way the x-tech discovery is described, it sounds like their problem was one of physical adaptation, one that can be solved by having cool enough hardware.  However, here you suggest that they've been trying to solve their problem with programming, which would imply they were having more of a software problem.  And as an aside, when programming complex processes, programmers are already abandoning the idea that they can program computers to perform every task individually. There are several programming methods for machine learning already in use (like Deep Learning!) that allow computers to perform tasks that they weren't directly programmed to do.

So I ended up nerding out in my feedback twice.  Thanks for humoring me!

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So here's what I'm feeling from your overall responses: 

The plot idea, pacing and tension seem to be good, but the story itself needs more meat. The issues seem to be centered around a general confusion, which--when trying out so many new things in one story--I somewhat expected. I was wondering if you guys would be willing to get into the nitty gritty stuff, looking at it more from a writer's perspective than a reader's. What are the steps that I can take to reduce the confusion while still telling the same story?

I'm thinking removing Dane might be necessary, as he doesn't play much into the overall plot, and seems to be making Sadie seem less competent (Thanks @Hobbit + @rdpulfer!) Additionally, and likely most importantly, Sadie's 'flashback' is an obvious source of confusion. Here I have absolutely no idea how to ease the transitions, however, and can't afford to remove those scenes. Anyone?

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P.1

Your opener runs in a vein that I'm never very fond of, to wit, 'wtholding information unnaturally beyond good purpose', in this case holding onto a mysterious 'they' well beyond when it would be natural to use a descriptor. I'm thinking robots but I'm not sure if that's because scrolling down, glancing over some of the other commentary was unavoidable. Either way, you're already leading in a certain direction; you probably don't need to contort your sentences around the subject quite so much.

The first Sadie paragraph is fair bit of space given over to explaining things that are obvious to both her and the reader. 

Yeah, the interstitial paragraphs are holding out beyond all reason. There's no reason for something to be framed this way except to avoid directly stating what they're about. They're also, I'm afraid, not very interesting. These lines are pretty hackneyed; you're not bringing anything new to the table with them, and you're just retreading ground that's been done so many times before that the novelty has to be there. I'm just gonna pass over commenting on these sections unless I notice something changing. I have a suspicion that they're not actually necessary, and I know that I don't really feel like I have a need or reason to read them.

'She starts reassuring herself' is a pretty telly line, and it's being used here at the expense of actually depicting what she's doing to try to reassure herself.

So far, I'm just not very engaged with this, and I do love me a good robot apocalypse.

P.2

The way you're framing the thoughts, I mean, I have no objection to doing that in third but it feels like what you're actually wanitng to do here is first-person. But that aside, I mean, it's a short, you don't have a ton of space to work with, but for all of Sadie's reactions, her expectations, it's a lot of telling, not a lot of conveying the meaning.

I assume, at this point, that you're holding back on account of her being a key component to the aforementioned robot apocalypse.

P.3

The bit about NovaGear controlling her research is really shoehorned in. Surely there must be a better way to exposit this.

I mean underneath all the window dressing, what we've got here so far is a person-encounters-mysterious-and-creepy-location-they're-not-supposed-to-be-in story. This is three pages of six of no real plot and a lot of 'this place sure is mysterious and creepy', with only the interstitial paragraphs to do any promise that there is actually a story here. And I just don't think those interstitial paragraphs are strong enough, especially given how half of their wordcount is devoted to phrasing around being about a robot apocalypse.

P.4

Ah, yes, robot apocalypse it is.

The distancing in Sadie's POV is not, I think, helping my engagement here, but this is also the first point where you're actually getting plot happening. This could be happening on your fourth paragraph, in a short of this length. It shouldn't be on your fourth page.

I think, upon looking at the starting of the page here, that you could actually just start the story with this page, as-is, and it would probably be stronger. You cut a lot of meandering, of mystery-for-mystery's-sake, and and the distancing of POV isn't as out-of-place because we haven't already read most of it with a more moment-to-moment current-action description of what Sadie's doing.

p.5

I mean the other problem with this is that robot-apocalypse-based-on-robots-acheiving-sapience is that it's very hot lately by which I mean it's very hard to shake the just-binged-Westworld sense. True or not, I think that feeling is going to be inescapable.

p.6

And I'm honestly not sure that either reveal on this page are bringing anything new to the table either. Like I feel like you're undercutting the usage of the interstitials by outright using the first line there; readers can be thick sometimes, sure, but I think this is really not giving the reader any credit at all.

And now I see why I saw battlestar galactica mentioned as I was scroling past. And in that sense, yeah, I mean I think this actually makes a stronger bsg fanfic than it does a standalone story, if for no other reason than you can get away with that sort of thing in fanfic, whereas here we've got basically a whole story based on circuitously phrasing around describing what the narration's actually talking about. That doesn't make for a satisfying read. The fact that we've got so much of basically nothing happening that serves no purpose at all except to pace out the interstitials... nah.

I dunno. I feel like you could probably pare this down hard and it might be novel at flash length but I think at short story size this is too much hanging on the need to phrase around things.

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  • 1 month later...

Hey there, looking forward to reading something new from you. From consultation with my extensive records, I see I’ve only read one of your submission before, so I’m looking forward to reading something new. I hope there are useful comments here.

  • Talking about the memories, I’m thinking we’re talking about same kind of automaton, but regardless, the word ‘saved’ seems a bit simplistic compared say to something like ‘downloaded’, ‘backed-up’, ‘cached’, ‘uploaded’ or even ‘stored’. I just felt that, in this day and age (not knowing when the story is set, of course), that most people, certainly young ones would be likely to use a more technical or savvy term.

  • The bit about her body being a rotting corpse, I thought, was a bit rambling. I think that could be tighter. I’m not entirely clear on the conditions under which they would come looking for her, or not.

  • “Thinking will do nothing but distract her” – This is a peculiar line! It very much depends what she is thinking about, surely?

  • “…the mind of men” – Really? I feel a little like I’m back in the ‘Golden’ years of Science Fiction, when women travelling in space, very sensibly, wore bikinis and got themselves kidnapped by hideous space aliens (sigh, head shake), requiring men to come a rescue them. [It’s irony, don’t hurt me @Kaisa!!]

  • Wow, there’s a weird thing. For the second time in two days I’m going to say that the narration/epigraph interspersed with S’s perspective reminds me of Richard Burton’s narration in Jeff Wayne’s musical version of War of the Worlds. I can hear Burton’s authoritative tones imparting this highly significant information. I’m enjoying it actually, and interested to see how far it continues. And please be assured I’m not dissing it, I’m enjoying it. Search it out on U-tub, I bet it’s on there.

  • “It is impossible to predict how evolution will take its course” – There’s something off with the grammar here. I think it’s overcomplicated, which increases the scope for ‘inaccuracy’, of course. For comparison, ‘It is impossible to predict the course of evolution.’

  • “It’s been a long time since anyone has used this, she thinks.” – This thought feels really obvious. Give the reader credit for stuff like this. At best, it’s telling. I guess her thought is valid, of course she’s going to think that, I guess I would think that myself. Just because it’s obvious, doesn’t mean it doesn’t go through your head. Hmm, interesting then to consider at what point you can assume that 90% (or whatever) of your readers will make the right assumption so you can leave something out.

  • Arrgghh, no, S*die, no! Battering’s no good!! Leverage, girl, leverage is what you need. Tell her, @Mandamon.

  • What exactly is the conventional way for the door to open? Unclear here.

  • “Beyond lies another hallway”

  • I don’t understand how she can be getting an idea for the architecture, I have no clue at all!

  • I should say at this point that I am intrigued and keen to find how this plays out. I am engaged and interested. I always seem to question and find what might be faults and not say enough about the positives, I feel. So, pleasure be assured that I am engaged.

  • Nice comments about the scratch on the wall being the last trace, powerful stuff. Ouch.

  • Her other discovery? I’m confused. Have we heard about this?

  • ‘bidden their time’ vs ‘bided their time’? – I’ve never heard bidden before.

  • “her security clearance had been revoked”

  • You’ve lost me here. I had assumed that she was in the future and the narration was in the past, because of the tense, I suppose. However, it seems now that this is not the case, and we are another way around; the narration is beyond her? Now that she is in some kind of flashback, it’s like introducing a third tense.

  • Whose mind does she have time to change? Inspecific.

  • Love grandpa’s line about the world waiting till you’ve turned your back.

  • I feel like there are a couple places where the tense is wandering. ‘there were are still a couple of NoveGear employees’ (surely).

  • The timeline is confusing me now, but maybe that is the point, maybe I’m going to have a lightbulb moment at the end and yet, presently, I’m confused, rather than seeing the solution starting to emerge.

  • “She doesn’t know” – yeah, I feel like tense use is a bit inconsistent.

  • The End. I certainly felt the tension, as you had a ticking clock going towards the end, but still, I’m left more confused than anything else. I’m trying to decide if the story is much cleverer than I am or, in fact, if it is lacking a consistent through line.

The result is that I’m left with more questions than anything else, and I don’t mean deep, morale questions about what it means to be human in 2017, but questions about the plot. Who’s human at the end, and who is not? The androids call themselves human? How can the secret text be what it is, when the writer seems to be writing about things happening to S? I’m going to have to paste this up and read the other reactions to see if it’s just me.

Thanks for submitting. My brains hurts now.  ;) 

<R>

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On 13/12/2016 at 9:01 PM, neongrey said:

withholding information unnaturally beyond good purpose

Yup.

On 13/12/2016 at 2:27 AM, aeromancer said:

the science just isn't there

Yup.

On 13/12/2016 at 0:45 AM, rdpulfer said:

but in the end I can't tell what exactly has happened

Yup.

On 12/12/2016 at 9:04 PM, Mandamon said:

I was confused through most of this

Yup.

On 12/12/2016 at 9:55 PM, kaisa said:

I'm not really certain what happened

Yup.

On 13/12/2016 at 5:02 PM, Hobbit said:

I realize that Sadie is one of the generation 2 androids, and they're about to make generation 3

Umm, okay, if you say so.

I agree with the statement that the style flows nicely. Bits and pieces, usually editing stuff, but I read through without any crashes (so to speak). Still, I remain confused , and I see that I'm not alone. I think there's a good story to be had here, and maybe I'm just not smart enough to see it in its present form, but I think there is a need for... something. Clarity? I know you don't want to erect a great big signpost to the ending, but I feel like I need more help.

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