6/22/2015 - Mystic's Haven Ch. 3 Part 1 (4402) - Mr. Wednesday

[Mr. Wednesday he/him]

Chapter 1

 

After attending the funeral of her beloved psychiatrist, Julia opens up to her husband about the tragedies in her past in more detail than ever before. She shows him the journal that Dr. Foster gave her after her parents were killed, which contains a series of drawings. The drawings all focus on a single theme: the circus she attended the night of the murders. She also tells her husband for the first time that her birth name is not actually Julia, but Molly, and that she started going by her middle name after losing her parents. After the conversation with her husband, Julia pays a small personal tribute to Dr. Foster’s memory by dedicating her unfinished cello concerto to him.

 

Chapter 2

 

Four years after the death of her mentor, Julia’s life has changed significantly. Whether this is due to his death or whether something else has happened is unclear, but she has become a ghost of her former self. She has lost her job and all of her private music students, and she and Christopher have drifted apart entirely. Her only solace has been her fascination with the boy next door, Jeffrey, who is being abused by his alcoholic mother. Julia forms a silent kinship with the boy as she watches him from the other side of the garden fence. She hasn’t been able to summon the courage to come to his aid yet, however, and can only sit by and watch as his mother berates and humiliates him.

[Mandamon he/him]

Once again, your writing draws me in and keeps me reading.  I'm not sure if it's just this chapter, or if it's intentional, but in reading this submission especially, it was hard to even stop reading, because one paragraph and thought led into the next, despite me having no idea what was going on for the first half.  It's a big jump away from the first two chapters in setting and description, but not in overall tone.

 

The two old men talking about the acrobats is a bit maid-and-butler, but still plausible.  I'm not sure how long ago this happened.

 

After reading, I'm still very confused as to what is going on.  That's not to say I would stop reading at this point, but there's no mention of how Mary got here (and why she's now Mary instead of Julia), or even any real acknowledgement from her that's she's somewhere else.  The whole thing feels like a dream, but I'm not sure it is.

 

At any rate, I'm interested to read more and see what happens in the Mystic's Haven.  I also like that the title has been referenced, as it gives a little bit of an anchor to what the story will be about.

[Mr. Wednesday he/him]

Thanks Mandamon! Yeah, I knew this chapter would be disorienting after the previous two. I'm really hoping that it's a side-effect of the serial format rather than a major problem with the writing. My alpha readers who got the whole book were definitely scratching their head for the first several chapters, wondering if Molly's time in Mystic's Haven was a dream or a flashback, but they all said that they were invested enough in both stories that their confusion wasn't a major deal-breaker. Each of their comments essentially boiled down to "I have no idea how these two stories are connected, but I really like reading both of them so I guess I'll just wait and figure it out." With this format, I supposed that's the best I can hope for. Anyway, thanks again!

[Robinski he/him]

Once again, I enjoyed your story. It flows well and is enjoyable to read, however I’ve commented below about wordiness, which tripped me up on some occasions. I know this section is not about page-turning action, and I was conscious of reading with my writer hat on, rather than purely as a member of the audience. Still, I think I would find it more (even) more satisfying to read if it was less wordy in places.

 

Apart from that overarching point, everything else I have commented on was detail. Little things that tripped me up were the context of scaffold; the use of flash in photography and the amount of storage space in the back seat of a Model T Ford (which I highly doubt!!).

 

Good job. Nice to have you back submitting, I hope there is more to come.

 

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Page 2 – “It peeked above the grass in a grayish pout, vigilant and greedy looking yet with an undeniable air of laziness about it.” I had to read this description several times and I'm still not quite sure what to take from it.

 

Page 2 – suggest deleting “actually” from the next sentence, it’s redundant. I also don’t know what “It happened to be” adds to the next sentence. Why not “it was”?

 

Page 3 – suggest “the music trailed off into the open air” It’s obviously open air, stating it seems redundant.

 

Page 3 – To me, and I'm no expert, an organ grinder works one of those organs where the handle is turned (ground?) to make the machine play a preset song. Stereotypically, there is a monkey sitting on top of the organ, hence the popular expression! I’ve never heard the term organ grinder applied to someone playing an accordion.

 

Page 3 – “After a brief and entirely unnecessary argument with herself about what to say next, Molly asked the only question there was to ask:” I didn’t see the point of this sentence. If there is only one thing to say, what is her argument about? It implies there was another option, but it’s not mentioned.

 

Page 3 – How does she know it’s afternoon?

 

Page 4 – “an act the two had choreographed and given performed many times before” Not sure given fits in that form. Do you give and act?

 

Page 4 – “more of a clown than a madman” Why madman, has he done anything to suggest that? Her comparison came out of left field for me.

 

Page 5 – “she would’ve liked” I always take issue with a non-specific narrative using contraction, to me, it makes that narrative sound like a person, but there is no narrator identified in this story.

 

Page 5 – You mention accordion and also squeeze-box. I picture an accordion as the large instrument with the full keyboard and set of buttons on either side, whereas I always thought a squeeze box was the small instrument big enough for each size to be covered by a hand span – maybe my preconception is wrong, but in my mind the two terms are exclusive.

 

Page 5 – I’m not sure I would associate laziness with deliberation. To me, they do not sit together. I don’t seen one following from the other.

 

Page 5 – Is Molly a girl? Is that her characterisation of herself, or is she inhabiting some younger version of herself in this ‘dream’ scenario? I thought this was unclear, but I’ve thinking of her as a woman.

 

Page 6 – “Goker stood up slowly, bracing his hands against his knees to push himself up like an old man and grunting slightly in a pleasurable and relaxed sort of way.” To me, the style is sometimes rather wordy. I feel, some sentences contain unnecessary words that don’t add much if anything to the context or the description, but slow down the reading, for example, the above.

 

Page 6 – “to stalk off in the opposite direction of (to?) the cove” I'm not clear if they are going to the cove or away from it. Why not just say “away from (or towards) the cove”?

 

Page 6 – “her legs shaky and unsteady beneath her” Why do you need two words that essentially mean the same thing? Part of the reason I mention this (again in relation to wordiness) is that I do it myself, but I’ve become quite conscious of it lately. I think someone here or in my writing group called me on it. Anyway, the more I think about, I feel my process was, I'm not sure which word is better so I’ll use both, that must be twice as good, right? But I'm coming to a realisation that oftentimes, it just slows down the reader and does not give twice the benefit.

 

Page 7 – “Molly frowned slightly, as though she were being asked to tackle a series of intricate calculations” This sentence made me smile.

 

Page 8 – I know it’s a dream, but I doubt that the back seat in a Model T could accommodate the volume of goods that you describe.

 

Page 8 – I only get the meaning of the word clamouring from its context. It’s not a word I associate with movement. ‘Careering’ or ‘careening’ seem more appropriate in that context.

 

Page 8 – I think this is the first mention of there being fields. That puts a different slant on the countryside and the context. And you then say that she glimpses the first sign of civilisation, but I would take issue with that if they’ve been walking and then driving through fields all this time.

 

Page 8 – A scaffold is a platform and support structure of metal rods and bars, and it would support the canvas, but your description seems to say that the scaffold is the canvas.

 

Page 8 – “images adorning the outside of the wall” I presume she wouldn’t be able to see images on the inside of the wall.

 

Page 8 – “Where are we?” Molly’s question seems completely redundant and rather dense. Does she not believe the sign? It seems obvious where they are. “Is this…a circus?” Really?

 

Page 9 – How is the town lopsided?

 

Page 9 – I'm wondering what the people look like. The houses are described, but not the people, which I would have thought would attract Molly’s attention just as much if not more than the buildings.

 

Page 9 – Where is the monkey when Goker gets out of the car and goes into the house?

 

Page 10 – I'm sorry to harp on about this, but when I encounter a sentence like this, it makes me stop and think about it. It’s probably because I'm reading as a writer and not as a reader, which I guess is my bad! Anyway, sorry but... “When she stepped inside she was not surprised to find that The Firebreather appeared to be some sort of pub.” (20 words) What I'm droning on about is that I feel when reading that I'm treading water to get to the meat of the sentence. I can’t help feeling that this sentence means “Once inside, Molly saw that The Firebreather was a pub.” (10 words)

 

Her not being surprised doesn’t seem relevant, it could imply a judgement about Goker or her impression before entering, but there’s no mention of those points before she enters. Also, what different sort of pub might it be and what is the relevance of that? In the original version of the sentence, almost every term and clause is watered down and made vaguer.

 

I don’t know much about photography in its early days, but even then, I doubt that a photographer would use flash to photograph a circus tent. You certainly would not now, the dissipation of the light before it reaches the distance involved in taking a picture of something as large as a circus tent would render the flash useless, probably even at night, but I didn’t get any sense that the picture was taken at night. I would be reasonable to say “frozen by the camera’s shutter”. (I didn’t get the moniker of Captain Pedant for nothing.) I guess you could invoke artistic licence, but I would imagine all the photographers would be shouting ‘No!’

 

Page 11 – How big are the photos behind the bar? I got the impression that Molly was some distance away, and yet she can make out this kind of details in the photos?

 

Page 11 – I like the conversation between the two old men. Up to now, the chapter has been very much a description of everything thought Molly’s eyes, with little opportunity for the reader to make deductions or imagine what is happening, but this conversation gives us something to chew on.

 

Page 12 – This part of the conversation verges towards maid-and-butler. Have the two men never had this conversation before? It feels a little like it only happens for Molly’s (and therefore the reader’s) benefit. Maybe I'm overreacting.

 

Page 13 – So far, it hasn’t entered my head, but with the mention of her staying in the town I'm wondering why Molly isn’t recalling that she has a whole life somewhere else. But it’s a dream (presumably), so it doesn’t really bother me, just a passing thought.

 

Page 14 – I don’t think you need to restate the facts of acrobats dying and the man at the bar himself. We’ve just read that a page before and haven’t forgotten. It feels like spoon-feeding. I would suggest letting the reader remember that information and go straight to Molly’s interpretation of her new-found knowledge.

Edited June 25, 2015 by Robinski

[Robinski he/him]

I'm interested to see that Mandamon also tagged the maid-and-butler thing - and that his reaction too was of it being borderline. That's some nice consistency of critiquing - just goes to show that Reading Excuses is a well-oiled* machine!!

 

One thing did confuse me though - who's Mary?   ; o )

 

 

(*Reading Excuses neither condones nor decries the consumption of alcohol. Please drink responsibly.)

[Mandamon he/him]

I'm interested to see that Mandamon also tagged the maid-and-butler thing - and that his reaction too was of it being borderline. That's some nice consistency of critiquing - just goes to show that Reading Excuses is a well-oiled* machine!!

 

One thing did confuse me though - who's Mary?   ; o )

 

 

(*Reading Excuses neither condones nor decries the consumption of alcohol. Please drink responsibly.)

Lol.  Glad we are in accordance once again!

 

And my brain must have been confusing "M"-names when I wrote that...

[Mr. Wednesday he/him]

Thanks guys! I have one question for the both of you…if you had read the first three chapters in succession, as opposed to reading them almost two months apart, would Molly's age at the beginning of chapter 3 have been more clear? In chapter one Julia essentially says that Molly ceased to exist at the age of 16, so I was hoping that when the reader saw her name that they would picture her as a teenager. If not, then I suppose I'll have to figure out a way to mention it at some point in chapter 3. 

 

I was hoping to get away with the maid and butler dialogue in this scene since it's something of a dream world, and therefore their conversation really is happening entirely for Molly's benefit and not just the reader's, but I'll probably still have to tweak it to make it less obvious.

 

Also, the organ grinder thing was a nice catch. I kind of jumbled the two ideas together without realizing! "Squeezebox" is a colloquial term for an accordion, however, so at least I haven't completely put my musical roots to shame on that one.

[Mandamon he/him]

I wasn't sure on the age when I read it.  I remembered the previous chapter fairly well, but I was thinking that this was happening in Julia's present, but she was using her original name in the dream.  I'd say if this is a flashback, you might need some clarifiers, especially with the big logic leap from chapter 2 to 3.

[Robinski he/him]

On the age thing, I'm not convinced I would have got that at the start of Chapter 3, maybe, maybe not. This said, I don't think it would be all that hard to slip in a coule of low key references that subtly imply her age.

On the maid-and-butler thing, that's an interesting idea with the dream world thing. You could actually smash the rule to pieces and have the two old guys almost hamming it up, going to outrageous heights of maid-and-butlery just to convey the information to Molly. "That's true, Bert. Jeez, if I was new in town I wouldn't know that." "Yeah, Ernie, and you also wouldn't know that the guy was totally to blame because of that thing he should have done, but he didn't."!!

Dunno, maybe that wouldn't fit with the style you're going for.