29 July 2013 - Carcinios - The Twelfth Pulse

[Carcinios]

The first half of the prelude to my high fantasy series. Maybe planned as part of a large collection of shorts based in that world. enjoy.

[jParker]

I must admit, I have been waiting to see one of your submissions for quite some time. 

 

Geology

• On the one hand, I feel like it has potential to be some truly epic stuff. I envision something out of The Last Airbender and incredible fight scenes.
• However, as it stands, it is super rough. I hadn't the slightest clue how it worked, which seems to violate Sanderson's Law. Once you get the rules of which pulse does what, how the bracelets interact with innate ability and then--most importantly--get that on paper, it can get going.
• Also, prima facie, I was rather confused why a Geologist would be involved in biology and climatology. And now that I've fully read the work, I'm still confused. Some explanation is much needed.
• A personal note: I almost gagged when I saw the word "Lithomantic". Perhaps it's this site's connection with Sanderson (and thereby, Mistborn), but I was very near to checking out. "Oh great, another copycat," I thought. And if you're keen on keeping the name, that's a line you're going to have to be very careful with.

Names

• To be honest, a lot of the names were off-putting. Luther's hybrid Greek-English combination in tandem with a rush of the unfamiliar at the beginning and I was tempted to walk away from what felt like an info dump (e.g. the weather, the religion, the culture, etc.)

Odds and Ends

• The punctuation was definitely a nuisance. Where you didn't miss it altogether, I felt as though you could have used it better, swapping a comma here, an en-dash there. 
• I mentioned this before, but the recurring thought as I read this was: How is this not a Sanderson knock-off? And that's something you should come to terms with. The magic system, the setting, the characters, they've all been done previously by Sanderson and he did them better (considering he's a best-seller and you, presumably, are not). What makes your work stand apart? Hold that in mind as you continue to write.

​

I realize that it seems like I've criticized the balls off your story and I almost feel I should apologize. Almost. But it's because I really want to see this become all that it is meant to be; I'd hate for it to end up on the cutting room floor because someone feared to be ruthless. 

 

And truly, I am looking forward to the next installment.

[Carcinios]

Thanks for the response. All very much appreciated.

Geology/ Lithomancy - I've been toying with it for a while which of the two names to call the magic system. with regards to the 'mancy' Sanderson certainly isn't the first to have used that naming device (Geomancy, Necromancy, Pyromancy) are all fairly well established in folk lore but given your instinctive reaction to it I am leaning much more towards referring to it as Geology.

Getting it on Paper - this is basicly the experiment here. I was trying to find a way of introducting Geology without giving a massive info dump as to how it worked. Clearly this attempt failed but I will continue trying.

Sandersonism - I can understand why you might feel that the magic system was derivative from Sanderson. It was built to answer the question 'what would the world look like if rocks contained raw magical power?' and then I used the Second Law to answer a number of questions about it as I was making it but I hope that if I can work out to show it, it will not resemble the mistborn powers (certainly it gives access to a very different set of abilities). I was slightly surpised that you felt the setting and characters were also similar to Sanderson's work. Was that just a general impression or was there a specific book that it reminded you of?

 

Again thanks for the feedback. This is the first time anyone has read some of my work who doesn't already know what's going on so it is a really great perspective to have on things.

Edited July 29, 2013 by Carcinios

[jParker]

The setting reminded me of Elantris--I wish I could say why. It also has connotations of Star Trek (the Prime Directive) as well as Kipling.

 

The character of Luther felt like a generic fantasy protagonist, while Crillon felt like a less sympathetic Gaz. Gana, on the other hand, reminded me of Demoux in the latter Mistborn novels and Marcos of a Terrisman in TFE. 

 

Regarding the Geology/Lithomancy, I realize that the term has been well-established and that certainly is a significant part of my gut-loathing. Cut-and-paste fantasy has been using similar magic naming for what seems like forever; I'm of the opinion that almost every piece of that genre ought to be discarded or satired. That's me--feel free to do as you like.

[Ria Raen]

Ok so here are my thoughts as I found them:

 

Part 1: I appreciate you are setting the scene and there is always so much information to impart but it did feel like an information dump and I found myself having to push through a lot of 'telling' before I reached something that got me involved in the story. Saying that you did have some quirky observations that helped that push, in particular

"Luther had spent a good week trying to understand this strange dance but it remained a mystery. He had even tried sitting on a pedestal himself as an experiment, ending up bemusing rather than offending the Irnans. "

this tickled me greatly.

I did feel that his observations whilst walking up the sloping street of Toth could maybe be moved or condensed as again its half a page of telling that didn't really help move the story along I would use that extra space to maybe elaborate more on the pulses. 

The story really grabbed me as the dialogue started, I divulged more about your character in this conversation than I had in the previous 4 pages of introduction. 

 

Part 2:

What a difference! I felt like your writing/style just suddenly became more comfortable and you easily combined descriptive narrative with action. The whole scene just flowed better. But I am a little confused about this pulsing! "That was one of the light pairings" I have no idea what this means, if you don't intend to clarify what this means soon (before I read so much more of the story I forget) then its really a redundant statement. 

aha now I see your previous observation with the slapping was to contrast their anger in this moment. Nice.

 

and we are back to all this pulsing business, and bracelets, and a ninth pulse, and, and, and I have no idea!

 

Very intriguing ending, I particularly enjoyed the dialogue between teacher and student and all the hints at future problems in the story because of this moment.

 

I really enjoyed part 2, it felt like a well balanced story. The only snags where the gaps of information regarding the pulses. It is hard to imagine a scene and play it in your mind (which is how I read) when you don't understand the mechanics of it. I have taken magic systems on faith before but that is normally when it is a basic concept, but you have hinted at a much larger system that really needs some explaining. Perhaps a prologue to this effect.

 

Part 1 felt very rusty to me, quite broken. More like chunks of description that standing alone hold up very well but there are too many of them all together. 

 

But I look forward to reading more!

[Mandamon]

The others covered some of what I saw. There were two main issues: 1) the magic system and 2) punctuation.

Magic System:

I'm pretty forgiving on the knock-off aspect, so I'm not as concerned that this smells of Sanderson. If you can do a good job with it, I'll read it. It has to be a part of the story, but not the defining part. Sanderson's books have interesting magic systems, but the books are about the characters.

However, like the others, I was still very confused by how Lithomancy worked at the end of part 2. I gather there are resonances, and it has something to do with rocks, but there seemed to be no obvious tradeoff to Luther channeling the energy. You may have it all planned out, but it didn't come across in your writing. Sanderson has talked about this in W.E. episodes, especially in how it influenced his writing of the first Mistborn book. He showed the magic with no explanation at first, then only explained it in the 6th chapter, because it was complicated. Even better is if you can show us how the magic works as it is applied.

Punctuation:

Yes, this is a rough draft, but there needs to be a basic level of accuracy even the first time around. The lack thereof made it very hard to read. Mostly, the problem was with commas. You have many sentences that need commas to be parsed correctly. If they're missing, the reader can't understand what you said, and you get lots of run-on sentences.

For example:

"If the sprint directly up a mountain had been insanity it had at least achieved one very

important feat." -> insanity, it

pg9: 'Are you insane?' Crillon called to her 'to die for the stones.'

-needs punctuation. I'm not sure whether the last phrase is speech or Luther paraphrasing something.

pg 10: 'You know that the power to make the air heavy was one of the talents of the Aragi?' Gana said her eyes shining with tears.

--"said, her"

All speech needs to have punctuation after it. (pg 6: "'We have Lords' Marcos said with a trace of exasperation.") If there is a dialogue tag, it ends with ," ?" or !" You never end with a period. If there is no dialogue tag, you can end with a period.

Story Structure Comments:

The beginning does not have a very exciting hook. You start off by talking about the weather. Then the first 2 pages have a lot of backstory, and not a lot of action. Then there is a page of infodump about the Toth. We only learn on page 4 that Luther's here to feel the pulse. It's the first direct action we know about. Then there's another infodump about pulses.

I think of lot of this can be cut out or moved to later. Start with Luther feeling the pulse, or even with the argument about desecrating the burial sites. Information about the island can come later. In fact, if you just have Luther use Lithomancy the first time without any explanation about pulses (a la Mistborn), I'd accept it easier. Then you can fill us in later about how the magic works. Get our attention with it, then when we're hooked, give the background and facts.

pg 11: "Crillon had almost got them killed and then completely overlooked the fact that Luther had saved him"

--the reader already knows this. You've shown and now you're telling us again.

Overall, I think the story has promise. There are hints of an Atlantean culture, rock-based magic of some sort, and conflicts between nobility and islanders. I'd like too see more to get a feel for where you're going with it.

Edited July 30, 2013 by Mandamon

[Robinski]

I enjoyed this very much. I like the way that the opening paragraphs have a travelogue style. So often stories start with some kind of combat situation, frequently during wartime, but this is quite different. There is still conflict, but it seems more subtle, an underlying tension between neighbouring societies at a political level. From there we move on to the more personal conflicts between the academics and the native population (and each other!), but it’s more thoughtful than martial combat, and it seems to go directly to the heart of the story. I know others have said ‘info dump’, but I don’t agree. The first couple of pages or so put me in mind of Jack Vance, who was the first author I read that made me want to write.

 

Some of my points are mentioned by others, so apologies for repetition, but maybe with a different slant. I have various lesser grammatical comments (noted below) my main issue however is that Lithomancy is really quite reminiscent of Alomancy. I know you’ve responded on that, but I think it’s a valid point, especially taken with the fact that there are a defined number of Lithomantic pulses, and a mysterious additional one that no-one knows about. Also, the use of Lithomancy (although I appreciate you are still developing) has a similar 'feel' to that of Alomancy.

 

Can all geologists use the power of Lithomancy, or have the latent ability, and it’s only Crillon’s prohibition that prevented Marcos or him from opening the tomb? Also, there is mention of Luther being the only one with training in oration because he is a noble. I know it’s not directly related to the Lithomancy, but it did strike another chord that resonated with the occurrence of Alomantic ability in the Mistborn books.

 

A – You use several terms such as ‘tent like’, which made the reading disjointed, rather than writing them as ‘tent-like’, which I think they should be.

 

B – Some words were capitalised when I don’t think they should be, like ‘Emperors’ (page 3) when not referring to any specifically named emperors, and ‘Scribe’ (page 5).

 

C – There are some instances of word repetition close together, which I think sounds awkward when reading. (e.g. mid Page 3 ‘along’; mid Page 8 ‘now’; Page 10 para 2 ‘plates’ and ‘huge’; mid Page 11 ‘just’).

 

D – There is reference to Crillon staying home (Page 4), and yet we find later that he is out on the mountain. When I read Page 4, my impression was that he had remained back in Atlantis and had sent his juniors out on the field expedition to do all the work.

 

E – Near the end of Page 5, I was confused between the ‘answer’ and ‘question’ in the discussion between Gana and Luther.

 

F – On Page 8, I'm not sure what Luther is aligning to the second pulse, is it his thoughts, his heartbeat, some inner force?

 

G – There are various places where I think it would be better to have commas between different parts of sentences where it is natural to pause, for example, ‘It was unsurprisingly an ordered affair.’ versus, ‘It was, unsurprisingly, an ordered affair.’

 

Overall, I really enjoyed your writing. We learn a lot about the back story, the political situation and the characters without anything that I would call an info dump. There was good tension throughout most of Parts 1 and 2, and good personal conflicts, without a blow being struck, and this is despite there being no war involved and no military personnel.

 

I'm not sure whether I'm reading a novel or part of a novella or short story, but I hope it’s a novel, since I'm looking forward to reading more, my only hesitation is over how similar Lithomancy and Alomancy might be.

[Carcinios]

Thanks to everyone who commented. It has given me a lot of food for thought.

 

Just to clarify:

This piece is not a novel (sorry Robinski) but it is set in the same world and featuring characters who all appear in the novel I am planning and working on at the moment. I felt that I needed practice writing in the world, as well as fleshing out the backstory to some of the characters. So no, this piece won't go on much longer but that is by no means the end of the plot that is being started here. I have a couple of these shorts kicking around in my head so I might do some more of them or I might start putting up bits of the main. Not sure at the moment

 

 

Can all geologists use the power of Lithomancy, or have the latent ability, and it’s only Crillon’s prohibition that prevented Marcos or him from opening the tomb? Also, there is mention of Luther being the only one with training in oration because he is a noble. I know it’s not directly related to the Lithomancy, but it did strike another chord that resonated with the occurrence of Alomantic ability in the Mistborn books.

 

 

The idea I was attempting to convey was that Crillon had not spent the time getting to know the local customs and therefore would not see the difference between using Geology and breaking in by more conventional means. Luther's greater understanding allowed him to resolve the situation.

Edited July 31, 2013 by Carcinios