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20140127 - andyk - Fire in the Blood ch.5 (V)


andyk

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More of my Roman story, as I try to motivate myself to work through initial edits. Looking forward to your feedback as I start to explore other parts of the city.

 

Previously:

Varus, a veteran of the Roman legions, was scarred by priestly magic during a battle in Gaul. He now hears voices in his head, not least from the torc that was a souvenir of that battle.

Varus has come to Rome to serve in the household of Gaius Cadmius Murena, a senator and general whose life Varus saved. Murena has a young wife, Livia, and a grown up daughter from his previous marriage, Cadmia. Livia has been taken away by her brother, Murena's political opponent Livius Dama.

Cadmia recently used religious magic to fight off an attack by a magically disguised satyr. 

 

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There was a lot to like about this chapter, especially the first scene. In fact, I didn't see anything worthy of a negative remark through pages 1-5 except a typo on p. 4 where you misspelled know. I was interested the whole way through. I liked the banter between Cadmia and Varus as she was testing him about where to find philosophers. I actually liked almost all interactions between Varus and her. It was the parts where Varus was on his own, or inside his own head that I thought a bit problematic.

 

I felt that Varus tended to be overly emotional about a lot of things (within his own head) and in some places it seemed to border on insanity. I assume that was the torc trying to make him angry or something, but here are a few passages I found his psychoticness a bit odd.

 

p.3 It was such an unexpected moment that it softened Varus's heart and he felt some of the warmth that relaxed Murena's stiff posture.

Then the same guy on p.6 is thinking this about the same girl:

The smile on her face was so smug, he'd have wiped it off any man with his fist. But he kept his hand still, for all that his fingers clenched and the low, soothing voice from the torc urged him to lash out.

It seems like he is barely in control of himself and he might lash out at her. Again, this might be the whole torc thing, but if so I think you should put the sentence about the torc urging him in front of his thoughts about beating the smile off her face.

Then on p.11 he really does almost strike her, and I didn't see any reference to the torc here. 

'Enough! How dare she speak of general Murena in this way?' Varus didn't know he had raised his hand until she shrank back. He slumped away from her, suddenly filled with shame.

Then on p. 14 he wants to kill a priest and even thinks about killing the whole crowd of people including women.

His breath grew ragged as he fought to suppress the red mist, not to punch this vicious old man with his jagged words and his frail bones...

Every shout jabbed at Varus like a spear to his soul. He wanted to punch the woman now too. To trample his abusers in the mud. To give in and show them his strength, turning their taunting to terror.

And finally on p. 16 dude is so emotional over a smell that he almost cries.

The place smelt somehow of childhood and Varus almost welled up with tears at such pleasure after the chaos of the streets.

Anyway, I just wanted to bring this stuff to your attention in case you weren't intentionally trying to make him so emo. Because I see the guy as a beastly soldier, and I just cant see him taking stuff so emotionally, at least not to the extreme where jeers are spears to his soul.

 

Okay onto some smaller stuff:

On p.6 beginning the sentence with Round here everyone looked so hostile was strange to me. Maybe because it sounds kind of redneck to my american ear to hear people say round here, and not around here. But it caught my attention enough for me to ask if Varus would talk that way to himself.

 

On p. 7 when Cadmia gets rejected she just brushes it off and goes to the next door. We see her get frustrated later, but I don't think Cadmia would do that. It seems like she would be pissed or bitch to Varus about it or something. At least be slightly frustrated, and then later you could have her built up to the point of snapping.

 

On p. 10 Varus threw coins at Nurya's feet. Why didn't he hand it to her? That seems pretty disrespectful to me. 

 

On p. 11 Varus starts looking for this tavern, and I feel like the time reference is off. He is supposed to return in an hour to pick up Cadmia but he has been "stomping the streets" and ended up in another part of town because it is dirty and full of graffiti and stuff. Then he kills some dudes, fights with a priest, contemplates massacring a crowd, and after that it takes him an hour to return. I figured him to be gone about 3 hours. I don't know if that is right, but I thought you might want to reference it when he comes to pick Cadmia up by saying sorry he's so late or something. Then if she didn't even notice, you could have her reply with something talking about how much she enjoyed her new tutor.

 

On p. 13 I don't know why you didn't say anything about the fight. It was just literal blind rage and over. I also thought it strange that a trained soldier wouldn't instinctively draw his sword to fight them, and instead went all beast mode on them. I thought this might be another torc thing, making him into a barbarian, but if it was I didn't catch any of the references to it.

 

p. 14 jeers of appreciation. I don't think you can jeer appreciatively. I think you might need a different word than jeer. 

 

During that same scene the priest seemed to make the crowd turn on him very easily, and I don't know why. Did he have magic that could work the crowd like the soothers in mistborn? If it was magic, a reference would be needed. If it wasn't magic, some other explanation would be needed.

 

On p. 17 when he return to cadmia no one seems to notice he is covered in blood. That should be something they noticed, especially since he was very late in returning. Instead Cadmia just smiles and they go home like he had been waiting outside on the doorstep the whole time.

 

I hope that wasn't too much stuff. Like I said all the Cadmia scenes were good, I think that torc references and toning down a little bit of Varus's emotional responses (unless you are wanting to have that as a part of his character) would help. 

Edited by The Goat
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Another good chapter this one, lots going on, certainly conflict and character development. No obvious leaps and bounds in the plot, but I don’t mind that. I'm looking forward to next Monday already.

 

Goat makes some good comments that I've overlooked below. Especially the blood on Varus when he rejoins the ladies, that's a biggy, but also him throwing the coins to her. My detailed comments follow;

 

Cracking opening paragraph – beautifully encapsulates (and confirms) my impressions of Cadmia, almost like throwing down a challenge to the reader, this girl’s a real pill; I dare you to like her – excellent.

 

And then the second paragraph introduces the subtle tones of the relationship between this particular father and daughter – super stuff. If anything, I'm enjoying that relationship so much that I think I care a little bit less about Varus with each scene involving Cadmia and Murena. I'm over simplifying of course. We need Varus as the centre of the brute force side of things, the point of conflict, and it seems that supernatural(?) goings on are brewing behind his forehead. I can almost feel the pressure inside him building slowly towards a big blowout.

 

Excellent first page – really pushes things forward and makes me keep reading, hungry for more.

 

A style point comes to mind at the end of the page. ‘I am sorry.’ and ‘I will be fine.’ sound rather stilted and formal between father and daughter. I’ve toiled over this myself from time to time. I always used to resist using contractions in pseudo historical settings, but would people really speak that way, especially in family setting?  ...and yet Murena addressing Varus on the next page sounds okay. ... and then a couple of contractions that somehow feel more natural.

 

Varus raises several good questions here. Why would Murena give this task to him? I can only think it is because he doesn’t want to leave the house. Cadmia says she will pick, and I'm wondering why her father didn’t give her that authority from the start – or rather tell Varus to approve or veto her choice, but give Cadmia the lead.

 

‘...softened Varus's heart...’ little bit cheesy for me, and I love a bit of Stilton.

 

Murena’s last line feels rather expositional.

 

‘...fierce gaze...’ Ouch! She really has a chip on her shoulder over Varus, I wonder if there’s danger of stressing it too heavily, especially here, where it jarred with me a little that she does not know where she’s going – although now I see that she’s playing him – nice one.

 

‘...not enough gods...’ LOL, think maybe you lost part of the orthodox readership there.

 

This is a nice exchange, but Varus’ reaction feels rather juvenile (his thoughts of pride and satisfaction), getting puffed up when he guesses the answer to a riddle from a girl – perhaps that’s just the effect she has on him, he certainly isn’t great at rising above it.

 

I'm not sure about the characterisation of the tutors who reject Cadmia as ‘ignorant’. Surely, by definition, they are not ignorant, but prejudiced, not the same thing of course. I know it’s Varus’ characterisation, and I suppose he’s uneducated, so probably wouldn’t think in those terms, it just stuck out a bit for me.

 

Part of me questioned Varus thinking of the risk to Cadmia in staying outdoors, but leaving her with an unknown woman who they have just met. I suppose he is relying on his judgement of character.

 

Personally, I think ‘stomped’ sounds like something a child would do.

 

I am by no means a scholar of things Roman, but the description of the stinking alley is at odds with my expectations of Rome. A little reading on Wikipedia indicates that I have probably fallen for some latent Roman ‘propaganda’, but I imagined the famous Roman drainage systems would help manage scenes like the one you describe at the foot of Page 11. I think I was wrong, and you did imply that he is in a sleazy part of the city.

 

Minor point, I see you use Hades’ (possessive), but also Varus’s as possessive. I'm never sure if they are equally acceptable, the two occurring close to each other just caught my eye at this point.

 

It seems very unlikely to me that, in all of Rome, Varus would run into the same priest again, not only that but bump into him in the same way as before, and a crowd gather again. This said – you handle the encounter well, the outer conflict with the priest and Varus’ inner conflict. Maybe there is hidden significance to the priest’s recurring presence, but without being party to that, the situation felt rather implausible. Still, it gives a good sense of Varus’ struggle for control.

Edited by Robinski
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The Goat and Robinski have covered most of the points, so I won't repeat.  I liked this chapter a lot.  It's always fun to play two characters off each other, and this one was no exception.  You do a good job of bringing out Cadmia's naivete of what others think of her in contrast with her strength of will.  Varus also gets to shine in proving his worth to Cadmia.

 

one thing:

pg 10 : 'Enough! How dare she speak of general Murena in this way?' 

-I don't think this is supposed to be in quotes 

 

While I liked your description of the red mist and what Vaus feels, this part felt sudden.  You've hinted before at the wall of red mist and Varus trying to control it, but never this blatantly.  Maybe if you had more of this sort of description earlier, like in the original confrontation with the priest, it wouldn't feel like a sudden change in how Varus (and the torc) works.

 

A second for The Goat's observation skills!  I missed that Cadmia would see the blood as well.  I also thought throwing the coins was strange, but thought it was the action of a higher-class functionary to a lower-class person.

I didn't have as much problem with Varus' mood swings, as I was pinning it on the Torc.  I also didn't have any problem with Cadmia's reaction to getting rejected by the first few tutors.

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