Reading Excuses- July 8th- edonil- The Paladin Heist Part 1 (LV)

[edonil]

So, little bit of explanation is needed here. This started as the beginning of a short story/novella, and has evolved into a full novel, which of course this won't be the beginning of. Stupid muse. This section isn't complete quite yet, but wanted to see what people thought of it before I continued on. Hope you guys like it!

[jParker]

Where to begin...

 

On the plus side, I think this has really cool potential. I'd love to read the story once it's done; hell, I'd probably buy it. Cool plot, decent characters, plenty of room for twists. You haven't really limited yourself the way some sci-fi writers do by creating a fixed time or hard-tech without sufficient research. All in all, incredibly promising.

 

But that name has got to go. I thought I was jumping into a Mistborn knockoff, not a VR heist. Paladin has too many fantasy connotations for it to be viable as a final title (if you want it to sell well). Also, I'm not entirely sure it would work as a novel without major additions in subplots; I could see it being reasonably concluded (without a bunch of padding) in under 100 pages; in under 20, you managed to introduce all the characters and get a solid bite into Act 2 (using a 5 Act structure).

 

On a personal note, your paragraphs are pretty long for my taste; I found it easy to zone out and start skimming. Once that starts happening, you've lost your reader. Honestly, a solid editing pass--refining sentences and paragraphs, eliminating the chaff--could fix most of my qualms. 

 

I look forward to the next installment.

 

Oh and if the ending twist is they get double-crossed by the client, I'm so rage-quitting.

[Carcinios]

Really enjoyed reading this. The pacing was excellent, dialogue easy on the ears which can be a serious problem in some texts. The Action was well set up and fairly gripping.

 

Two things frustrated me.

1. I got mixed up during the action of who was doing what. Initially each character had a well defined role in the heist but it seemed to quickly descend into a firefight where those roles got lost. This was particularly the case with Duchess who I had assumed would be in charge of essentially deploying programmes to defend the group. However she was then shown blasting away with a shotgun which felt a little jarring. (maybe I was not reading carefully enough)

 

2. The other more significant issue was with VR translating into real life. This is kind of related to the other point as I felt you missed an opprtunity with the combat scenes. Predominantly the fighting was with firearms leaving me wondering what the point of having it be in a virtual environment was. Also the 'if you die in the computer you die for real' idea has been done to death and I feel that with the skill you showed in writing that passage you could aim for something more ambitious. With the kind of body upgrades you display you could do worse things to people than kill them. The recent news story about the master key to all Android devices got me thinking about this.

(sorry for being vague: there are so many possibilities with technology even at todays level)

 

Hope that is helpful

[Mandamon]

I liked this a lot better than the last one you posted.  A few comments, similar to those above.

 

first, I just read your summary again.  Why is this not the beginning?  I thought it worked just fine.  Depending on where you take the story, this could be a short story, or progress into a larger novel (but it would obviously be about more than the heist).  I don't need any more introduction to the characters than what is shown here.

 

At the beginning, you have a really good startup and then again fall into description for a few paragraphs, taking away the tension.  Kate's in a club, waiting for some contact, and then you go into a description of ink and music.  I don't need to know that yet.  Or at least, only devote one sentence to it, then get back to the action.  I'm not quite hooked yet.

After that, the story keeps flowing well and this doesn't happen again.

 

pg 9: Why did they have to get into the basement to hook into the VR?  Not that it's unreasonable--they're probably into the building intranet, but there's no description as to why.

 

pg 14: Why do the programs dissapear when they're shot?  Do the guns disrupt them somehow?

 

Overall, I liked this.  The characters were good, and had a good dialogue with each other.  The action was constant enough to keep me interested, and there was enough new thought on the older themes of VR and a heist to keep me interested.  There were a few plot elements about the translation of VR to real life I didn't completely believe, as Carcinios says, but they could be fixed with a sentence or two of  explanation.  I didn't get too mixed up with who was doing what, but it certainly could be clearer.

 

So I think you've got a good short story or novella here.  My only warning would be if you wanted to put this into a novel format, you need to make sure you have enough other plots going and don't let this concise heist bloat up into something else.

[TracerTK]

Just finished reading the story and am really impressed. I had to keep reading because well there wasn't really any boring parts that I stumbled upon. The story flowed well and certain parts didn't drag on like they do in some books I've read. 

 

The only real issue I had with it was the fight scenes. I got confused a lot of times when the AI's came out, and a block rose to give them some type of cover. The next thing I knew was that they were now in some building and Duchess has a broken arm now. I was totally lost with how quickly that transitioned.

 

Other than that it was a very well put together read and I look forward to the next parts.

[akoebel]

Once I got past the fact that this wasn't going to be a fantasy heist (a bit of a disappointment here), I got into the story very easily : it's engaging, funny and intriguing.

 

I read it assuming it was a short story. As it was, I found that the bar scene could be removed and that you had too many characters. After reading your introduction telling it was now a novel, those two issues don't matter as much.

 

The pacing might be a bit slow at first, but it gets better once we're out of the bar. The banter characteristic of heist stories is well rendered.

 

As the others said, I got a bit confused about what each member's job was. I'm accustomed to the usual heist roles (roper, fixer, inside man, ...) and I couldn't quite find my marks (no pun intended) while they were in their hideout and once the job started, those roles got even less clear.

 

I also had trouble understanding what the issue was with the VR : isn't gravity an illusion here? Why shooting disables the robots? Why not bring with you a virtual missile launcher instead of poor rifles? I think most of these could be fixed by some explanation.

 

I have one question about how Kate joined the job. Grifters are a small community where everyone knows everyone else and where a new person has to work very hard to earn the respect of a particular team. Even if the team knew Kate by her reputation, I find it hard to believe they would invite her on a big score without having worked with her before. You have to trust your companions for a big job and adding a new member is going to be a source of conflict. If you did this on purpose : great.

 

I liked the story very much, so keep it coming!

[edonil]

Thanks everyone for the kind words and the critiques! (honestly, a bit more for the critiques ) This was really an odd experiment all around, but I'm glad that it got started. Sorry for the bait and switch on the title, I've always been terrible with those and couldn't come up with anything better.

Looks like I've got a good amount of work to do on this before continuing on, which is a good thing. A couple of you brought up the point of missed potential in the action scene...and reading over it, I definitely agree. Gonna be revisiting all that before I move on, and we'll see how that goes. (as an aside, anyone know if it's considered bad form to resubmit something once it's been edited?)

Thanks once again all of you, you've given me a lot of inspiration and things to think about on how to improve this. Plus a few questions I need to figure out how to answer, too!

[TracerTK]

I'm curious as well about the topic of resubmitting updated work. I think if I were to read an updated version of any story I would probably end up skimming it instead of engrossing myself in the story. It may be better to resubmit parts that were changed instead of the who story but again I'm not sure what's best in this scenario.

[Robinski]

I enjoyed reading this, and I'm assuming there is more to come, although the file isn’t titled as Part 1 of X (I see now that the post is). At the end, I found myself wondering about the programmable ink, which seemed like a neat idea with more to be revealed about its function, but hasn’t appeared again – yet. I felt as if that was going to be a plot point, and maybe it is! I think it’s a Chekhov’s guns situation, as WE would tell us.

 

The mains issues for me were the lack of description of the city (just a little bit here and there, instead of quiet area, noisy area, etc.; lack of description of the room, team and mission at the briefing, to the point of it being confusing; the seemingly low threat level; Kate’s motivations, and her ease of taking charge.

 

As an engineer, I’ve got a tendency to line edit, so forgive me if some of the detailed comments below sound pedantic, but I think they are still worth considering.

 

Looking forward to the next instalment, although as some have mentioned, it would need more character development / time spent in their heads (or Kate’s anyway) and detailed set-up to work at novel length.

 

More please!

 

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Firstly the title, ‘Heist’ made me nervous, I'm not big into ‘capers’ (I like the little pickle, not so much the story form), but putting it with ‘Paladin’ intrigued me.

 

I don’t think you need ‘suggestive’ when you’ve already described the body suit as skin-tight, my imagination is already at work (cough), I think that comes under Show Don’t Tell. Also, surely blending in and drawing attention are polar opposites? But if everyone stands out then no-one does?

 

‘Evelyn surprised her by kissing the back of her hand...’ I'm intrigued here, I'm wondering if it foreshadowing, if the ink’s programmable, has the kiss disrupted the tattoo’s function in some way? Then I'm starting to realise I don’t know enough about programmable ink at this point. Perhaps another clue is needed to hint (without detailed exposition) at how powerful the technology is, or what is does exactly?

 

‘...the busy district of the city.’ Which district is it? Is it the only busy district? ‘...to a more quiet part of the city.’ How do we know it’s quieter (I'm no English Major, but ‘more quiet’ didn’t sound right to me, like more good) until they get there? I'm not sure about the p.o.v. there.

 

...in a well traveled part of the city...’ I'm having a problem with this now. Other than the police vehicles, there is no mention of what the street looks like and whether there are any people around. I presume it’s night, but I'm having trouble picturing the scene, I’ve got something in my head, but there aren’t many visual cues to tell me if I'm close. I think using one word to describe generic parts of the city must be telling not showing, and I'm rebelling against that as I read it.

 

‘...gripped the handle of her flechette pistol tightly...’ That would be pretty obvious to anyone looking at her, surely, somehow doesn’t seem very stealthy or subtle.

 

‘...followed the girl into a well lit room...’ Is it right off the street? My impression is we have a lighted room full of people in a closed cafe. I'm thinking the light must be visible from the street if they’re in the first room and this might arouse suspicion unless there was a pretext set up - a private party or dinner? Or perhaps they are in back? But I don’t think that’s clear.

 

I don’t know how old the man is, I'm picturing someone older than all of them, but only because he is clearly the one with authority.

In the section about the codeword, the dialogue sounds a bit expositional to me.

 

‘Kate walked into the room at the back of the cafe...’ I think there’s a disconnect now, is this the same room? They didn’t seem to walk through to the back before, and yet the ‘boss’ man is still here, and I don’t know how many people there are in the room or how they are arranged, what they’re doing, etc.

 

‘Must be some expensive drone to justify our hiring price’ I would have thought military research would be hundreds of millions at least, as it is in our world, so surely their price must be easily justified. Also, I think ‘hiring price’ would be ‘fee’.

 

‘Xykon whistled...’ he seems to be surprised and amazed by everything, I'm starting to think he’s not much of a specialist.

 

‘...tossing disks to each team member...’ seems a bit archaic, and a source of evidence for those investigating.

 

‘...felony charges...’ If they are stealing military state secrets, would that not be treason?

 

‘“Well, boys and girls and kiddies of all ages, we are in!’ then goes to ‘...that's how much time you've got to get in and out...’ At this point, I don’t really know what’s happening. They seem to have broken in somewhere, but then they are not in yet. I get that they are going into a Virtual Reality situation, but why do they have to break into a building to do that? I think it could be clearer how their mission is going to work physically, they did not discuss that at the initial meeting.

 

‘...carefully rolling her onto her back...’ The process and the fact that she needs someone else to hook her up, seems a bit clumsy for cutting edge modern tech. That said, I'm reminded of Cronenberg’s biotech from eXistenz, which worked in pretty much the same way.

 

‘...let you bleed out here until you wake up.’ Is that the worst that can happen? Suddenly threat level has been dialled way down.

 

Kate’s sudden outburst seems out of character. She has been totally in control up to now. Somehow, it’s not foreshadowed. We don’t really know what her motivation is for doing the job. Is it just money? Maybe at the end of the para, if we knew she needed the money for her brother’s vital operation (for example), it would explain why she would let her control slip, unless she has a problem with her temper, which could also be explained, maybe it has got her in trouble in the past, maybe she was cashiered from her unit - or is she really just frustrated with Arrogance?

 

‘...stuck here until the lot of you wake up...’ Again, the stakes don’t seem that high.

 

‘“Better than I've got. Any problems with Specs taking over, Duchess?”’ Steel doesn’t convince me as a leader, he seems to relinquish control immediately that the plan hits a bump, without any tension between him and Kate. Same with Duchess, even though there seemed to be a moment when there was some tension between her and Kate, she’s all sweetness and light at this point.

 

‘damnation Paladin, AI's aren't supposed to let people get hurt in here...’ But we heard earlier that Paladins were banned for being deadly so this should not come as a surprise to them, surely.

 

‘...that had suddenly appeared out of the floor.’ If the AI can change the environment to suit its programmes, can it not just drop all the buildings to leave them totally exposed?

 

‘This was certainly not how she wanted to go.’ But from earlier the worst that would happen is that she would wake up?

 

‘...as gravity asserted itself,...’ Why does this happen? Seems convenient

 

‘...making sure we knew to design stuff to bounce.’ Is she a designer? I didn’t get that sense before.

 

‘...firing his grappling hook past the manhole cover in the wall...’ I'm disoriented now, I thought gravity had reasserted itself?

Edited July 14, 2013 by Robinski

[andyk]

I thought this got off to a really good start, with dialogue, description, thoughts and action well balanced and an interesting setting. And then that faded away.

 

You soon seemed to lean heavily on the dialogue. After the initial section there wasn't much description or indication of what was going on in Kate's head, almost everything instead coming out through what people said. This had a few effects.

 

Firstly, I found myself quite confused about what was going on. The characters didn't explain a lot about how the heist would work, how the VR worked and what people's roles were in it all. This is fine in itself, as presumably they knew it already, but it made everything unnecessarily cryptic. I think something's needed to make this clearer to the reader, as without understanding the rules of the setting - how the VR works, what the plan is, what's at stake - it's harder to follow the plot and feel tension around whether it's working.

 

I had trouble picturing the team members, as several of them were introduced without any physical description at all, and the locations, for example what the city's like. All it needed was one or two distinctive features each time - a character with a twitch or a scruffy coat, the presence of neon lights or dripping pipes. But something.

 

And the reliance on dialogue made some of the conversations a bit clunky for my tastes. It took me a while to figure out what was wrong, but the things characters said often didn't seem convincing as speech, and I think a big part of this was because you were using that dialogue for exposition. An example would be Arrogance talking about why the Paladins were scrapped. Why would he explain so much in those circumstances? You could get a lot of this across just by showing characters' emotional reactions, or dialogue that implies rather than directly states (or sometimes repeats) information on a subject.

 

That said, I like the team dynamic you've started building, with the conflicts between team members. And I think your use of a lot short, snappy paragraphs is good for this sort of story where you want to keep the pace up.