Shrike76

I'm usually not a fan of the dream opening (especially when it's VERY DRAMATIC until the moment where HA, IT WAS A DREAM ALL ALONG), but having Hellas state that it was a dream while it was happening made it better. Also, it revealed a bit of his backstory, though I would have liked a bit more in the way of specifics. The parade of dead students' parents was odd. Especially given that Hellas summoned them. There must be some of them who are bitter, did none of them refuse the invite? On page five. Hellas couldn't move anything more than his neck, but later the same day he'd out the door? Even with the assistance of the glaive - no. Elohim... I like that he's flawed, but he seems very deeply flawed here and I'm not sure how things keep running smoothly. I know there are places in the world where MASSIVE propaganda machines make people think their leaders are infallible, but those leaders keep that veil of infallibility by making sure nobody questions them the way Hellas does here. It feels like everything should have fallen completely apart long ago. ADDENDUM: Reading others comments and your response above, I think the new way you plan to address Elohim is pretty good. Definitely better than the complete failure of a person method. The armour: It's an interesting premise, the mask for Hellas to use when he and Lucifer are working to the same end, but I cannot accept Hellas going along with it unless I know what it is he and Lucifer will be doing together. I think this has to be absolutely clear going in, especially when entering into a bargain with the Devil himself. I'd need to at least have an idea here of what their approach is going to be to replacing Elohim (and with whom, because Hellas' main concern is going to be the people currently under Elohim's protection). Leaving aside the issues above, I found this to be a much stronger submission than the previous one. In general, I know why Hellas is doing what he's doing, and I can buy into most of it. Proof of point, I was engrossed enough that I didn't notice any grammatical errors, so well done

I had to go back and peek. I hadn't realized that there were chapter breaks around the stories, I thought we were only 2 chapters in with this submission.

P2 - "rubbing my head" - If he hit something, it would be better to mention it earlier. It's not the sort of thing he wound have missed. P3 - The two paragraphs starting with "Shush you." had a lot of problems for me. The phrasing felt out of character for the narrator (the pumping and thumping, the feet bound in whispers), the line "That's all I could feel now" felt like the wrong tense, wiping feet clean of some substance using the same rag used to put the substance on in the first place. P4 - "feeling out of my knowing" - This reads oddly to me. P6 - "not many come calling" - not that many come calling? P7 - "In the Truest stories" - I don't think truest should be capitalized P10 - Same with "People Stories", if you aren't going to do it for "fairy tales". Maybe italics if you want emphasis. P12 - "Why do you fed" - feed P17 - Did the boy leave while still wearing the socks? I'm glad the narrator immediately noted Trahaearn's odd change in behaviour after pulling him through the window, because I noticed it and it would have bothered me to see it go unremarked. Although, bu the end of this chapter, I don't feel like there was ever an explanation as to why the behaviour shifted in the first place The ending of the tale of Woefun and the Gnome didn't feel satisfactory at all, and again I'm glad to see the narrator remarking on that fact. It makes me feel like there's more to each story than is contained within them, and hopefully we'll get to see how some of them tie together. (Hopefully there will be something tying all these loose tales together). I liked the ending to this chapter. It's obvious that things are changing, and not just in the relationship between the son and his father. I'm definitely hooked and looking forward to seeing where this story goes. I'm also still very much enjoying the writing style of this. For your questions: I like the established characters well enough. The boy is a curious boy, the father is a stern man but clearly cares for his son as well. Trahaearn... You built him up to be such a terrifying figure that I was a bit disappointed to see it melt away so quickly, but this new Trahaearn doesn't seem like such a bad bloke at the moment. Suspicions. Obviously there's a lot more to Trahaearn than meets the eye, and his asking how well the boy knows his father means that there's more to the father as well, though that could be anything from storytelling to magic to something fae. I wasn't a fan of the action, so the most memorable bit for me was the discussion about the nature of a story, or of an ending to a story, and how faeries differ in that regard (and in their nature) from people.

First time... Is this the first story you've ever written?

I laughed so hard reading this I scared the cat. And then I went to Youtube to look up Tuba Fails and I was not disappointed in the least. There's a 7 Tuba Player Pileup.

P2 - "a bead as stiff" - beard P5 - Connor's rage here feels a little exaggerated. Is all of this because of Gerri? He was so casual going into this, and he's supposed to be a mercenary, surely it would have crossed his mind that someone might die in the endeavour of making other people dead? Is this the first time he's known the (near) death of a close friend or comrade? It doesn't feel probable. P6 - "scarred by fire or Donn't lightning" - Donn's P7 - A lot of confusion here for me. I don't know who Black Owain is, or why he was fighting the others at first. The I reread it a couple of times and realized that there was more than one group of men, and they weren't friends (although some were dressed the same?). I couldn't find a good reason why Hakon's men wouldn't already be armed. P8 - If Gwydion's going to explode a ship, why the Broken Blade? And why now? that seems like something he could have done in the water to Hakon's ship instead of simply summoning a fog? P8 - "to try rush past" - missing a word P8 - "but it disorder the foemen's" - disordered? P8 - "Connot himself was hard pressed" - Connor P9 - "his men would be worsted" - Are the men being made into fabric? P9 - Hakon's men staying on the beach because they'd never pledged themselves for such a battle, made me wonder why they fought in the first place. P11 - "The horn screamed eagle" - I have no idea what this is trying to convey, in order to make Connor's steel sword shatter One thing I would have liked to see, during the storm Gwydion summoned, was the reaction of Hakon's crew to that tune, and to Donn's. Is this sort of spell-singing so common that nobody's either impressed or terrified? All we get is that they're hard-pressed to hold a course. How common this magic is is something you haven't covered much elsewhere, and this would have been a nice place to show us a bit of how the world is built. Connor finishing Gwydion is a satisfying end to the fight, but not at all a satisfying end to the story for me. There are a lot of unresolved elements, so many questions I feel could and definitely should be answered before wrapping this up, including but not limited to: - This sweet sound, is it a lingering spell that affects Connor permanently? And I don't remember Gwydion singing a single thing, he always played an instrument to cast his spells if memory serves. Also, this is the first time I can remember Connor giving a rat's behind about Gwydion's methods and motivations, or his (or anyone's) music, so I don't know why he'd be so broken up about it. - What happened to Gerri? - What happens to the horn now? - What about Emer, not that Connor knocked her down and out, how does their relationship change? - How do Donn and Connor see each other now that they've seen each other at their best. Is there at least a little respect, or even friendship after all of this? - Does Connor get paid, and with what? And does he go back home? - Do Hakon and his men get paid? I was really hoping for a denouement to wrap up all, or at least some of the loose ends, and I was disappointed that the story ended the way it did, although I thoroughly enjoyed the rest of it. You had me engaged right up until the end, I just needed the song to fade out rather than be cut off abruptly. Some character's motivations (I think I mentioned all the times those hit me oddly) could be cleared up, but in general I like the characters in the tale, I like the magic system (though its limitations aren't clear to me), and I like your writing style very much. I look forward to reading more of your work.

I recently finished reading Feed by Mira Grant and really enjoyed it. Currently reading The Causal Angel by Hannu Rajaniemi.

Nice. Okay, so what I was missing was some of the worldbuilding that went into the other, longer story. I like what you have though. And given that worldbuilding I'm starting to see how some of those questions I have might be answered. I'm definitely looking forward to the next part of this.

Okay, that makes more sense. And explains why they're described as technologically arrogant, maybe, because they're trying to do things with tech that others might think should be done through magic alone?

Okay, so then what I'm failing to understand is how the different races have managed to gather so far. You mentioned simply getting to the moon once so a portal can be opened permanently, but if nobody's left their planets, how have the species of the different planets managed to meet on other planets before this point? Like, Origon isn't native to this planet, Methium, so how did he get to be here if his species isn't native to here? I'd assume the answer might be magic, but then that begs the question: Why bother with the risk of rockets? Like you said in the story, any single note changes the symphony, I can see Origon adding his song to the chorus, as it were. What you say here makes sense, it was just the confusing term of light that led me astray. I know in the previous submission Origon created an effect and then withdrew his investment, maybe reword that to play it up so that this section makes more sense (the place where he invested his light/song is too far away too fast for him to pull out from)

Like I said, music is a constant, especially in a low-tech setting without any other entertainment. Music is easy to do, relatively speaking, and many simple instruments like drums or flutes are cheap and easy to make, so it's normal that it would be one of the first things people do to keep themselves from getting bored. Or even singing, if nobody wants to actually grab a musical instrument. I don't know what the reason is why nobody's musically-inclined, or if we learn it later, but the fact that you mention it in-story makes it remarkable. If the boy narrator has never known anyone else to play an instrument, then it should be normal to him that nobody does so and he shouldn't comment on it, and so it should also be seen as exceedingly strange that the Trahaearn does play an instrument. Everyone seems to enjoy the music, you say so, but nobody attempts to imitate it or hum along to the tune. I suspect there's a very good reason why nobody plays, it's just that the way that you presented it makes it sound strange in the wrong way. Probably, when I've read the rest of the story, I'll have a better idea of what you were trying to achieve and can provide more useful comments.

Is the magic a one-shot thing based on the creation of the wound, or does the scar bear a permanent magic like a rune? I don't know that that necessarily makes it less troublesome, bit one shifts the focus a little bit away from the act of cutting itself.

Nope! Copyrighted, trademarked, and patented! At any rate, I'd like to amend my comments above. Robinski is well aware that I have a failing as a critiquer. When I'm reading, and I enjoy it, I keep reading (sounds normal), but when something takes me out of the story (a typo, a badly-worded sentence, a logic or contunuity error) I note it down because I'm already out of the story anyways. The result is that I often have a lot of negative comments and very few positive ones at the end, and it feels to me, upon re-reading my response above, that I came down harder than I would have liked on this particular submission. So I'd like to add: Things I like about this story so far. - Hellas is interesting as a conflicted character. He has a past and an attitude, he's extremely competent in some things (military tactics), somewhat competent in others (his casting) and less so in others (following rules, not being an chull to people). His motivations are cloudy, which I think needs to be addressed, but I think the character himself is fine. - The setting. I like the Heaven besieged by hellspawn and with many technological advances that we see here. I'd like to see more of how it actually works. - The White Faces: All things aside about the how and the why, whether it's a sparring partner or an army, pulling a being out of thin air and giving it a measure of sentience is a neat trick. - The Angels: I've always been a fan. From myths and stories to my well-worn Dictionary of Angels, I like seeing them represented here. If anything, I'd like to see more of their individual strengths, characteristics, and abilities played up as defining elements. Raziel, in this submission, is especially intriguing.

P1 - "The first time members of the ten species are traveling in space!" - I'm still confused how much space travel exists. Or was this meant to indicate that the other nine species had already accomplished the feat? I would have thought the Methiemum would have been among the first (you described them as technologically arrogant, and mighty traders, so I figured they'd be more advanced in space travel), but I don't know a lot about the other species' specialties yet. P1 - "a handsbreath" - handsbreadth P3 - "The tempo was a military drummer having a seizure" - This didn't work for me. I'd expect no tempo at all from someone seizing. P4 - "Origon felt his invested light ripped away from him" - I don't know what this means. In the rest of this there was nothing specific that put me off, but in general I felt like Origon was noticing too much of what was around him in the capsule. Getting off the ground, he hadn't heard anyone speaking to him for five and a half hours, but ere he notices retching, and a chair being tossed about, but I got the impression that what he was doing to land the capsule required more concentration than what he had done to lift off. Reading the comments above, I see that Robinski mentioned the light thing, but your explanation of it as a sort of essence didn't come across at all. Might I suggest something like Song, or Voice, or some similar expression of sound, rather than light, which I agree doesn't seem to relate to the magic system. I'm not sure why they would even have used light as a word for this essence, unless you can show us him seeing the brightness of his soul essence, and then him using it (converting it, I guess) to create or affect the Symphonies. Regardless of what you call it, seeing a measure of how he uses that source to power his abilities would be a fine thing. For your questions. - I don't remember being bored at all. There was nothing I glossed over because I found it overly long. - What confused me was the magic system, or the cost in light to affect the changes, as noted above. I'm not sure why the changes he's effecting here are permanent compared to other ones, and I'm not entirely clear why the universe would resist change after a change had already been effected. Is it just a function that the places where he's effecting change are gone so fast that he can't withdraw his investment, as you put it? And that itself confuses me, because I'm not sure how you create change, withdraw your investment, and then have the change remain in place. Also the role of the different species and the current extent of space exploration. - The low tech / high-tech differences are still odd, close to straining belief, but since I don't have a picture of the whole civilization so far I can take it with a grain of salt and assume that it's good. If I see a technology (or lack of it) that doesn't fit with the rest then I'll flag it. - The setting is cool. The magic system is cool. The species have potential to be cool but we haven't seen a lot of their differences and specialties yet. What I'm most invested in to keep me reading, in order - 1) Does Origon have enough juice left to open the portal home? (I'm assuming he survives the crash). 2) Why was the capsule so poorly engineered, as described by Origon. 3) Who tried to sabotage the mission by assassinating Tejus and why. Staying tuned for the next instalment where hopefully I get some or all of those answers

Hello, and welcome to Reading Excuses. It's always nice to see new words and faces. I'll start by saying that I enjoyed the tone of this. It's less literary and more the tone of having someone sit you down to relate a tale, and it works perfectly for this sort of story. The general writing is also clean with a good flow. Well done on that note. P1 - "Partly for the goods and partly for Papa's time away from home." I felt this line was unnecessary and took something away from the previous one. Addendum: Later you mention the father comes back with a tale each time, that seems payment enough for the hour spent. P2 - "not another person of musical inclination" - This stretches the imagination. the world I've seen so far seems very low-tech, and in a low tech world, people will play music for entertainment, even if they suck at it. It's one of those human constants. P2 - It also stretches belief that the sound carries so far, but you mention that Trahaern is selective about the days he plays so I assume you're up to something with that. P5 - "trees which seemed bulge" - to bulge P6 - The narrator's approach to the house was odd, and not well explained. His breakdown with the nettle felt a little extreme. Unless there's a reason for that too? And then his singing as he approached the house, while he was trying to sneak, also was wrong. If this is really an oddness, I'd like for the character to remark it as well. P9-10 - The sun sitting perched on a tree is a lovely visual. P12 - "Though you area a slow" - are a P13 - "stung him distinctly where it has been" - had P16 - "I am undone." said the potions man. - should be a comma inside the "" P18 - "his every muscle was taught" - taut P18 - I liked the individual descriptions you used of Trahaearn, but felt it was long at three paragraphs. I thought the section with the swan and the potions man fell a little flat at the end. It sounded like it was building up to a conclusion, but if there was a moral or something at the end then it was lost on me. Is there supposed to be a continuation to this tale afterwards? I also thought that it ran a touch long. If you're looking to do some word count tightening, I think this is a good place to start, cutting out some of the descriptions could give it more of a fairy-tale feel. Overall, this story worked for me, and I'm very much looking forward to the next submission. I'm guessing some of my questions will be answered there.

On Chapter Five: I'm going to start by saying that I strongly disliked this chapter, but I think you should keep it. It does need to be expounded upon, however. My biggest problem with the chapter is that I have no idea why Hellas is doing any of what he's doing. He doesn't do anything with a purpose and he seems to be wandering through your story triggering cutscenes and looking for random encounters. - The thing with making the White Face is cool, to a point, but was it just to make a sparring partner or is there more to it than that? I get that the council thing was boring, but it's not like he left with any specific intent, he just disappeared and started making these White Faces appear. - Then he starts wandering about the void, but again without any sort of purpose, and so he bumps into Raziel's spirit, and then he tells him that he wanted a way to bring the dead back to life (not something you telegraphed, this is a big problem), and then saying that he went there looking for people to help him (except that he didn't, he just ambled there). - Raziel saying he'll help is okay, but saying Hellas opened his eyes to what needed to be done is a stretch. Hellas said maybe one sentence, then Raziel info-dumped some Lucifer stuff. It didn't seem like it was too difficult to convince him (he basically convinced himself), and it doesn't seem like bringing a dead Angel back is a difficult thing to do, but I'd have thought it should be. So I'll say that the things that show up in Chapter 5 have a lot of potential, but they're not interesting to me because they don't appear to have any meaning or purpose within the story so far. Chapter 6: P8 - "Hellas had volunteered to take a lesson in combat theory" - I wondered what he had left to learn, but he's the one giving the lesson. This should be cleared up. At this point I think the reader needs more information on your magic system, specifically it's potency, its limits, and its costs. I had a hard time believing that Hellas could go from struggling to make one good White Face to making 100 of them. Is there a cost to his working this kind of magic because there doesn't seem to be a difference to him between making just one and making an army. And once summoned, why not send them against the hellspawn, instead he banishes them and then makes 150 more. If it's so easy why not make 15,000 against the hellspawn? The only thing that really seemed to tire him out was splitting the ground, but I couldn't say I have any idea why that would be the case. I enjoyed the first couple of submissions, but this one started to fall apart on me because of the reasons mentioned above. I don't think this submission had the same sense of direction that the previous ones had, and I don't really have any sense of where the story's going from here. I will keep reading because I am curious to see where you do take it. I definitely like your writing voice, I just think it's unfocused here.

Looking above, all of the spelling issues I found have already been noted so I won't go over them again. "I will listen for his music on the wind" - I really liked this line. I thought it helped bring the magic system to life. Conversely, I thought it obvious, having stated this, that the reverse would be true and Donn would later be heard by Gwydion. It makes me wonder why Donn would be so casual about using his voice in the hall. I'd have thought he would have known that Gwydion would be listening for him. This story really works for me so far. I think your pacing is spot on, and I feel like Connor is really coming into his own. Although Donn continues to act like a bit of an idiot here (the above-mentioned singing, again bowing so quickly to Connor after somewhat failing in his command). The action in the hall was excellent, and the description as the other spell came into the hall was great. I'm curious to know how the counter-songs work, given that Connor can't do the actual singing? I'm curious what it is that allows someone to break a spell unless they also have magic to cast it in the first place. I hope we get to find out. If anything fell flat for me in this submission, it was Emer's interrogation of the singer, and his presence there in the first place. Her appearing to attempt to seduce him felt off, especially after Connor's beating of the man, and it didn't feel necessary to getting the information out of him. I'm not sure why, it just felt off.

I'm late, but I'm trying to do some catching up this week. I enjoyed the premise of this for the most part, but scanning up I can see that others already mentioned some of the same issues I had. It was, at times, a bit of a tough read. Information Overload: You have a few things here that require a lot of info-dumping, mainly the species and the magic system, and I think having both of them detailed up front makes it very hard to retain anything. I can see why you have to be clear about the magic system, otherwise its ability to send a rocket to the moon later is hard to swallow, which means I think you need to back off a little bit on the species. Specifically looking back at the first paragraph, it made no sense to me when I was reading it the first time, but looking back on it now that I'm at the end I can see what you were trying to describe. One thing that isn't clear is if each species has its own world (it seems like they do, because Methiem is a planet, and it seems like Methiemum is a species although I don't think you outright say it) and if they do then it makes me wonder how come they've managed to mix it up and have a presence on multiple planets but they haven't been to their own moon yet? Guns: This didn't bother me much. People create technology where there is a need, and it doesn't surprise me that in a world with real magic, that the development of other weapons might fall by the wayside in a way which didn't happen here on Earth. It also doesn't surprise me that magic-assisted space travel would arrive before firearms. All you have to do is state that this is the way it is and come up with a reasonable reason why it should be so, and I'm good to go. For your questions, I'll say I wasn't bored, but I was confused by the many details of the races and worlds. I think the entire premise is pretty cool, but where I feel I need more information in order for everything to make sense is why they need magic in the first place for this rocket launch. Is the fuel they have incapable of reaching the moon on its own, and if so why? And what does the magic add that simply controlling the burn of fuel wouldn't be able to achieve. It's too early for me to judge all the elements in this story. I'm intrigued by the world you've built and I want to read more, but I haven't completely bought into it yet. I'm hopeful though, it's got all the elements of being the sort of story I want to enjoy

I intended the story to be more of a slow burn. There's no action, and so it's basically reduced to being a character piece, with a magic system for frosting. That being said, there's been a lot of comments about the pace at the beginning, so I'll take a look into it. I don't remember consciously making everyone nameless when I wrote the first draft (it's typical for me, I won't put names in until I feel forced to by the narrative, because I tend to choose names I dislike later and end up renaming people anyways), but I remember I didn't feel like anyone needed to have a name until Dianna was mentioned. Everyone else was addressed using their honorific and I never changed it because it didn't seem to me that proper names were missing. But I thought that if Dianna was just "my girlfriend" then it would have been harder for me to communicate that she existed in the past, and so she needed to be more explicitly defined. As for Dianna herself, I'll keep your comments in mind. I think she was there for me more to show the character's age at the time, and the passage of time in general, I didn't intend for her to play a big part as a lost love or anything, except maybe as a personal reminder to the character of the passage of time. Thanks for the response! I appreciate this. It'll help me a lot as I take this to a rewrite, hopefully soon.

I didn't have an issue with this in Waifs and Strays for a few reasons. First is because by and large people are giving up extraneous stuff like hair or nail clippings for minor effects. Second, the two times you show us people giving up more there was no joy in it at all. You emphasized the sacrifice, and the suffering, and the need to do the thing. There was desperation and never any sense that people would be doing it if they had any other choice. Lastly, and probably most importantly, I didn't have an issue because I've never been a self-harmer, nor have I ever been close to someone who was, so it didn't have any deeper emotional resonance with me. If you really want to know if your work hits too close to home on glorifying self-harm, you probably need to ask for the opinion of someone who suffered through it, or who has watched somebody go through it.

P1 - "He spat the black power" - powder P3 - "Your Mark has grown aster" - faster P7 - "its being run by idiots" - it's P16 - "I’m glad we had had you here" - had On page 4, when Hellas is describing how the eighteenth sphere remained out of his reach, is where I felt information was missing regarding what the sphere actually is. Before that, in the discussion between master and pupil, it was okay, but here with Hellas reflecting upon the thing itself, I feel like the reader should know whatever Hellas knows about it. I see your note about the repeating flashback, but I think there's still some overlap with the first flashback scene, which bothers me more or less as much as the first time you repeated it. I'm not sure if Hellas' blackout has been mentioned before now, but if it has then I missed it. I'm a little surprised to hear about it, and I don't know why it wouldn't have been brought up earlier. I'm not sure why Hellas has holes in his memory. I very much liked the descriptions of the battle scene itself, but there was a lot of information up front about the different types of foes they were facing. I glossed over most of it because I knew there was no way I was going to remember all of that. Maybe consider shortening those descriptions to a single line, or at most two, and expounding on it later when the added information would be necessary. The action was great though, and so was the way Hellas took command of the battle. I also liked seeing him crack a little and down some liquid courage, though I'm surprised nobody else noticed him doing it, or that he wasn't especially careful about it. One thing that did fall a little flat, is that Hellas seems to be THE military strategist in heaven, but we don't see enough if it here for my taste. He very easily leads his armies to victory, but I would have liked to see a little more of the thought processes, or the information processing, that leads him to order the armies the way he does. This may take some research into more in-depth military tactics, but I didn't see him do anything that I thought anyone else wouldn't have been able to do. Seeing exactly what it is, besides gut instincts, that led him to leave armies behind, and to anticipate what his enemy would do and why, would have breathed a lot more life into the scene.

There's a difference between ritual scarring, often as a rite of passage, and self-harm, which is what Eisenheim was mentioning above. It's definitely a tough line, and sometimes it's hard to see that line if you aren't someone who's been affected by it, or close to someone who's been affected by it. I don't have either experience, so I don't know that I have any useful suggestions to make, especially without knowing the greater context of the magic system. If it's, as in Gargoyle's system above, a ritualized community thing you could research cultures which practice it and see how it's performed and viewed. If it's more of a personal thing then you might run into issues such as you initially mentioned. I don't know if you want to go into more detail of the system here as a discussion. If you prefer, feel free to message me directly.

You definitely don't need pages and pages of worldbuilding, as that would definitely slow things down, and in general I find sprinkling in information is the way to go. I just suggest that the nature of this particular story, taking place in a location readers already think they know well, means you have to be a bit more liberal with the sprinkling early on. It's not that anything offended me, it's just that it's very different from the heaven I would have pictured, so every time you drop something high technology or cultural that I wouldn't expect in heaven (like courts and jails and bright propaganda billboards and farmers) then I have to revise what I think I know and it kicks me slightly out of the story. It'll probably happen less often as time goes on, I just think you can mitigate some of it by front-loading a few details about the world. Like, show us the general shape up front so we see it more closely resembles out world than heaven in many ways, and then the little details later are less jarring when they hit. In cinematic or graphic novel terms, I think what I would have needed was an establishing shot. One or two detailed paragraphs, after we've met Hellas, giving me a big-picture look at Heaven that tells me in general what kind of place it is and who lives there. Once that's done all the little details become interesting rather than perplexing.

Sure, I'll see if I can get you my email address.

P1: "...the Devourer: suck the will to live from those who oppose him." - I can't tell what this is. It seems like an oath, but I'd think it would be against those who support him? Or is this just supposed to describe the Devourer? P2: The section with the giant billboards: Why do angels need propaganda at all? And if they're angels, why would Hellas resent it? I'd like more information here than just Hells dismissing it as blatant propaganda. P3: "created in the likeness Elohim," - this sentence needs some help P3: "spread widehis face" - needs a space P5: I don't know if the repeat of a portion of the first flashback was intentional but I strongly dislike it. P6: "covered in millions of esoteric, glowing symbols" - Does the narrator know what the symbols mean? If so then they're not esoteric and I'd like to know more about them, even if it's a very brief descriptor of their purpose. P6: "away from abomination and and examined" - away from the abomination and examined... P6: When Scrios gasped I was surprised, I'd originally thought by your description that everyone was dead. P8: I feel cheated in the courtroom scene, not knowing exactly what Hellas did or why he did it. I found it very weak. P11: "His glowing wings shone brighter, cracking and snapping" - This sounds like they're breaking apart P12: Why is wraithfire a stupid name for magic? P12: "Rather than reacting with nervousness, " - This is unnecessary and can be cut completely. P14: Hellas knew about the tallest tree being Scrios' home, but he still needed a guide to find it? P16: Third from last paragraph, a little too much tear rolling. One mention would be enough A few suggestions: I'm having a hard time visualizing this world. There are very high tech things, and then there are bales of hay in the jail that he was brought to in handcuffs made of pure energy. Clearer side descriptions about this world's technology, economy and social structure would be helpful. If you were building your own world, you could get away with less but unless you're handing this to a reader whose never heard of Heaven or Angels, they're going to have preconceived notions so you need to do a lot of work up front in the very early chapters to explicitly tell us how this world differs from everything else we think we already know. You have, in a few places, hidden things from us which Hellas knows, while Hellas is the narrator, in order to reveal them later as a surprise. This feels weak, and I'd rather know those things up front because then there's more of an emotional impact. Like his drinking, it was mentioned in passing, but then it becomes important when Scrios says it but by then I don't care as much about it. Ditto his motivations for breaking the rules. He knows what they are and he has strong convictions, but we have no idea what it is. If you reveal it all later, it loses its punch. Aside from that, you have the makings of a good story here. I'm interested in what's going to happen, as long as it's presented when it should be and not hidden from me in a weak attempt to create suspense. Hellas is interesting but he could be more so if we knew what he knows, the world is interesting (if a little weakly described so far), and the other characters and background are as well. And I say "the makings of a good story" because right now you're falling a little short for my tastes. By the end of chapter 2, I still don't know what the story is. I know Hellas was punished, but he's been punished before and it didn't seem like a big deal. Certainly he doesn't seem to care, and so neither do I. If this is supposed to be a story of redemption, then I should know by now what it is he feels he needs to be redeemed for. I feel that sounds like harsh criticism, but I don't want to pull my punches either. If it comes across as severe, it's because I really do think this is a story I want to like, and I want to help you get it there