kais

Check! Thank you @Mandamon and @Robinski. I'll go forth and edit

And you are a lovely person for it. Thank you. No, that's why there are scabs. Scabs often make my skin not flex right. I assume that isn't just me? They didn't actually kiss. Just brushed lips and such. LOL. Story of all my writing. Thank you! Built up how? There's plenty of hints in earlier chapters that S's view of the world isn't the same as everyone else's. Do those need to be more apparent maybe? I've gone back and forth on dialogue versus internal monologue with this and can't quite find the right balance. I'll keep playing around. Thank you! That's okay! I don't know that it needs to be. Everyone seems in agreement with this, but I may keep it just because it's cute. This is brought out more in earlier chapters now. Hmm.... trying to think on how best to achieve this. I've put in a lot more about it in this draft, and haven't subbed some of the chapters that it is in now. Looks like I need more blatant call outs to alchemy? I was trying to use S as an unreliable narrator, but maybe it's just not working. History and tradition, really. I mean, the real world effects of the Industrial Revolution included loss of a huge swath of craft knowledge that we can't recover because of guild secrets. Some processes are completely lost to time. I don't know if we need them, but I suppose for those whose lives revolved around them, it was pretty upsetting. I guess I'm relying a lot on reader empathy for traditional handwork in this piece, which is problematic. Yup. But outside of Sam pushing S into the lake, I'm unsure how to get S back into it. I agree. I've been over it so many times though I just can't figure out how to fix it On and off, potentially. It was the daydreaming I really wanted to get across. (also I maybe pretended to be a Power Ranger in my backyard even up through high school...) I've edited this for clarity Thank you!

So much so that we have a counter! Alas, it is now reset to zero (but it's not just you. It reset previous just last week. Almost every newbie fridges in their first sub. @TKWade can tell you stories). Best part of the knowledge is now you know, and you can fix it! If you can't figure out how to make a female character an actual character, it's best not to write one at all. Suzie doesn't even pass the Sexy Lamp Test, which is the lowest bar for judging female characters in a work. My suggestion would be to remove this sexy lamp altogether and replace it with a dog. Dogs are lovable. Dogs engender devotion from their owners. Dogs don't mind being plot devices, especially if you give them a treat after. Women do mind being plot devices, and that Suzie could be effortlessly swapped with a dog in this narrative should also give an indication of how troubling this type of representation is. Go forth and edit! You can do this!

I don't know if I have adequately explained it. I didn't sub one of the redone chapters where S and Sam meet, so you're missing that part. I think it's 'defined but still nebulous', but I don't know if it lands well enough. I'll probably need to do another straight read through and see. I was trying to spin it as him being a jerk, but if both you and @Mandamon are tripping over it, it probably just needs to come out. I've cleaned this line up. I need cis het male help here. What would you do? Lesbians (loosely, very loosely), but also your sister? @Mandamon @Robinski @TKWade @rdpulfer help! I've changed up S's personality a little, so I think this is in line. I've moved from 'pathological fear' to 'consistently suppressed childhood interest and fear of maternal retribution' Yes. Yes she is. BWAHAHAHA Thank you! No worries! Will clean The 'mushroom' shaped ones do actually spin together sometimes, especially when the grow in clumps. Is this me being too nerdy? I'd say it's 50% voice, and 50% needs cleanup. One of the things I was trying to do with TWD was to not write in such a sterile manner (my major comment from agents when subbing AFD was that it lacked strong voice). So S, being a proto-scientist, got dialogue and 'voice' much more akin to how we write and talk in the sciences. I'm trying to strike a balance now between the inherent awkwardness of it, and the need to keep an actual voice in the narrative (which, I have been told by recent agents in rejection letters, is actually there this time!). Meaning, basically, the awkward phasing is mostly on purpose, but needs to be scaled back. Nope. He's always been a he From my last round with my editor, I think we settled on (for the A series, anyway), that Royal Daughter would be in caps, but the royal daughter would not. No soldiers this time, at all. I did away with them. It's just M and S, and their Sam tagalong. Apologies, I've been skipping around with the new chapters and forgot to mention that I changed S's backstory on this. Is it weird that in my mind, it has about the amount of one of those alcohol-filled chocolates? Can do. Thank you for the help!

Easy enough to do. Thank you for the feedback! Well heck, I'm on a roll. And yeah, frozen snot is gross! This is my fault. I forgot to mention that I changed a fair bit of the earlier chapters. S now has an interest in magic, which has been repeatedly and resoundingly squashed by the mother. This was supposed to show some growth in S, in breaking from Mother's stranglehold. I probably need to bring that out more if it isn't landing, even without the backstory. Good call, and good opportunity to put in a little more guild backstory Yes, because it's a magical fantasy land No, and I'm debating deleting it entirely, since I removed the whole lake scene anyway. Although maybe it should stay, since I want to do more with the lake in the next book. Unsure. I'm conflicted. Because he's more of a jerk in this version? I need help. I don't know how straight men would react in this situation. True. I was hoping to walk the line between 'does S just not want to make decisions' or 'is A's presence so imposing that S can't make decisions?' Thank you for the detailed feedback, as always, @Mandamon!

Welcome welcome, and congrats on your first sub! Overall The emotion is there, and the voice is there, I'm just a little lost on plot and purpose. What is the purpose of the narrative? Where is it supposed to go? It's a good look at PTSD, but it doesn't seem to have an arc. And reading through above comments... Suzie is dead? Wait, where is that mentioned? I skimmed back up and the only indicator is that she doesn't wake, but that just seems more like 'why is this woman suddenly such a hardcore sleeper' than anything. Also...not a fan of this trope. Like, really and truly, her being dead and his sole motivation makes me not like this piece. Women are not vehicles to push empathy for male characters. See women in refrigerator's trope. Your questions Is the fantasy element in this story too weak to justify having a plot based around it? The plot of this story revolves around the whole death avoidance number thing, but I didn't want to give that mechanic any focus, so I blamed it on the Devil. Is it enough? Fantasy? This reads more just like a story about PTSD. I don't see any fantasy elements to it, mention of devil or no. Suzie is dead at the end of the story. Did you figure that out before I mentioned it? Nope, and I greatly dislike it. See above comment. Did you notice the clues? (Suzie doesn't wake up from his shouting, despite John being certain that she'll wake up if he closes the door too quickly.) (“Hell, you could've probably woken the dead with your damnation shrieking.” “You're exaggerating, right?”) (I need to check myself out in the mirror to see how much damage I did.) I did notice, as you can see below, but to mean that means less that she is dead and more that something is going on. If not, how much clearer should I make it? I usually operate under the creed of “Always respect your reader. Pandering is cheap,” but right now I'm afraid it's much too vague after showing it to a few of my friends (who are not at all huge fans of reading). I'd suggest having the neighbor make a comment like 'you just haven't slept well since your wife died' or something like that. But what I really suggest is not having her be dead, or if she must be dead, not using her as the focal point upon which the MCs every emotion and action is based. Women are not disposable plot devices. John is “destined to die” when he tries to commit suicide, but is “saved” when he thinks about Suzie. After outright telling you that Suzie is dead and that his number increased by +1 *insert finger guns here* would you have made that conclusion yourself? Wait, she dies mid-piece? So it wasn't just a memory at the beginning? Gah, I'm too confused. It's worse fridging if she dies mid-piece. I still would not have made that connection, I don't think Again if so, how much clearer should I make it? Solve all three problems I have by making it a more obvious divine intervention, making it more fantastical, giving more clues that someone died, and making it obvious that he was saved, all in one go? Solve all three problems by not putting Suzie in a refrigerator. I'd rather see him try to work through his PTSD. If you want this to be a fantasy, I think you'll need to up the fantasy elements substantially. They're too subtle right now. It's a good start, but could use edits. Keep at it! As I go - you've got redundancy issues in the first page. Try reading your work out loud to yourself. That'll help you catch them - page six: he lives on the 7th floor but he's only ever taken the elevators once before? Like, even if you like to take stairs, there are still plenty of reasons to take the elevator, groceries being a top contender - numbers should be written out (so twenty-three, not 23) - page 11: so... if he has survived death 23 times, the guy in the park is 24. Shouldn't that break the momentum here? Shouldn't he be happy, or at least relived? - page 13: shouldn't Suzie be hearing these screams? - wait, so the college student across the hall woke up, but not Suzie?? - and he's...he's in the apartment? How? Why? I'm so confused - end: still super confused as to how Suzie has not woken up

Overall Oooh, this is much improved. I really enjoyed it! Tension and pacing were great. A little quibble at the end, but I think it's mostly there. Nice work! Re: the kickstarter - are there going to be more of these shorts, or is it just this one? As I go - props right off that bat for using a traditional female name for a male character. Love - I'd connect more with Rey's desire to be back home (and better understand how much he hates the manual labor he currently has), if you gave a bit more detail on what some of those tasks back home involved. Right now they're abstract enough that they don't really drive empathy - the 'we have a rodent problem' line is excellent - page three: They were numerous, as if this was where they originated. What is the 'they' referring to in this sentence? Unclear - page five: pace is going well. I am engaged - page five: It was taller than him, a covered in a mass of interconnected <-- 'a' should be deleted, I think - page eight: this was a lot more physics than I was expecting - page 13: yup, pacing is definitely much better this time. I'm super invested - page 15: LOL at 'more feathers than a Kirian'! - page 16: ooh, it's getting bigger! Tension! - ending: hmm. Almost. I feel like the story of the mentor having battled the same creature is missing a little punch. Like, it was Kheena's escaped pet or something. It's so close, just, the punch doesn't land quite right.

I'd particularly like help on: A) is the interlude too long and if so, suggestions on where to cut B.) Is S's motivation for leaving alchemy behind understandable, relatable, and reasonable? Do you feel S's pain? Please be brutally honest, because this chapter has to work, or the rest of the book doesn't. Thank you, as always!

ASD LIVES! Preorder is up, release date is (finally) stable, and I've got a book launch to plan. It's available through all the various other country Amazons (Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.de, etc), for those outside the US who simply must own Lesbians in Space, volume II. Just search under the title name. I also started hardcore querying TWD. I'd forgotten how nerve wracking that whole process is.

In for Monday!

Eeep, was it mine?

LOL! @Mandamon and I are apparently shouting in tandem from the (virtual) corner. "PUT IT IN YOUR POCKET, DOOFUS! YOUR POCKET!"

@TKWade it might be a gender thing, too. I'm AFAB, and having been raised within that social structure, things spying on me or paying me too much attention when I am in shorter clothes is freaky as all get out. That part of the story, I thought, was spot on with female perspective.

Since I've already read this once, I'm just going to read it through entirely, and give you a breakdown of my thoughts after. Things that stood out Why did he put the amulet on the table? Isn't it contraband or something? If the rune is the contraband and not the amulet, that should be made clear earlier. And how did they notice the ruin if it was hidden? I don't understand enough about how priests work for this to make sense, so it seems just like author convenience right now. I still don't really understand the Warren thing, and I while I care a bit more for our lead now that he has some depth, the stakes aren't high (and therefore the ending not satisfying) because I don't know much about the world yet. I think expanding the dialogue between MC and our mysterious woman might actually help, and would be a good place for more backstory. I do think the trims you made to the end are better, and the bit more on character building helped. You have a reasonable scaffold, at this point, of a chapter, and what needs to happen now is stretching and filling in. Nice work!

Overall The premise itself is interesting. The characters... yes, inconsistent and very sexist, bordering on misogyny. Telling a woman (or anyone, really), that you have to live with one person spying on you to prevent a lot of people spying on you, especially when it is coming from a partner, is just not okay (unless you've built up the partner to be a jerk, in which case, it would be in character). Marlene could be a much deeper character, and I think you would get that from showing how she reacts to the drones instead of telling. I'll disagree with this and say that it would freak me out, too. I'd probably react the same way. Yes, this. I also wanted more information on the whys. As I go - page two: if you're going to mention it is a wedding present in dialogue, then you don't need it as narration - page three: why is this drone so large? If it needs to be strapped down like that, it doesn't seem like any modern drone I am aware of - page four: wooden portal? Like, portal to another world? Or did you just mean 'door'? - page five: so the new drones do everything an apple watch does. Why drone instead of watch? Is this an AU? - end of page six, 'neighbors' is misspelled - page 11: 'the pictures made her feel violated' is more telling than showing. I want to feel her anger, and her vulnerability, not just get a single line about it. Like, I'd be mad as heck and also feel sort of naked. Would she go put on long pants and an oversized shirt? Would she cross her legs? Her arms? Show us! - page 13: holy rape apologist line. Tracy can get punched any time - page sixteen: Joe, if he was a decent human being, would allow Marlene to threaten Nat properly, or follow up on her threat, not change the topic. Marlene's lack of ability to set up a computer, have a job (apparently), her willingness to let people consistently talk down to her or over her, seems at odds with the initial set up of a strong willed farm woman. Character inconsistency here. Is she a retiring housewife with a 'traditional' husband (haha, if such a thing exists), or is she the farm woman who can hold her own? - page 22: "Maybe that's the price we pay." What? Seriously? No. Retiring housewife or not, Marlene deserves privacy and self autonomy and Joe has just swept both of those away in a single sentence. This is my angry face. - I don't understand the ending. What did Arnie do? Just terrorize everyone into keeping their drones to themselves? I was sort of hoping Arnie would eat the smaller drones or something akin

S for a kissing scene. And this sub is long, so apologies. If you don't have time to read it I totally understand. If I broke it in half, I was afraid the emotional tension wouldn't carry. Looking for if S and Sam's interactions are believable, and if the emotional impact of the chapter is stronger now that we've had the interludes.

Heh. Easy enough to fix. Ah yes, I've moved things around a lot. Now S learns about the amulets first from Rah, and a discussion is included of them in a number of earlier interludes. Basically I've gone through and laid down a 'magic' layer of story since the last go through. Sorry for the confusion! One of these days I swear I will stop making this mistake... It's an artifact of a past edit. Urp. Sorry. Thank you! This is now heavily seeded in prior chapters, but not enough for the reader to know know, because we are constrained by S's knowledge. Hopefully it pulls together better later. So I've done two things with M and S in these last two edits. First, I've changed M to more antagonistic early on (still being upset about S's sudden departure as children), and S has been given a great deal more agency in earlier areas. I'm trying to set up a theme where S is quite competent when alone, but crippled in the presence of mother and M (because S is terrible at interpersonal relationships). So, we'll see how this goes as the book progresses. Marginally. I'm trying to (and probably failing) seed in that the characters around S know something that S clearly does not. I need it to be apparent to the reader that S is lacking key information. I don't know how well I am managing, however. It's supposed to be more of 'everyone knows things except S'. Maybe it needs to be integrated better? Yes. I've clarified it with @industrialistDragon's help Vomit is really acidic, and the finishes that were present in the 1700s were not great, but this was more about A being an overbearing arse than anything else. Hopefully that comes across? Thank you @Mandamon, for slogging through again. Congrats on the fully funding of your kickstarter! Do we get cool enamel pins now?? Let me tell you what, those things sell like crazy at cons! Thank you! I like that part a lot, too. I'm trying to better seed in that S is sort of...preoccupied a lot of the time. Very in their own head. Chalk it up to hyperbole? Thank you for the feedback!

Ah, but ignore them with increasing disdain! Well, that's the plan, anyway. Yup. Will try to fix this. Thank you! Wonderful! Then they're working perfectly. I'm please with how much richer they make the story. Thank you for the comments! Agreed. I just deleted it. Yeah, it's implied that Sam won't stop asking until S answers 'properly', cause Sam knows full well who S is. This one leads right into a chapter where adult Sam is introduced, so I think that gets cleared up. Thank you for the thorough feedback!

Jeeze, how did this get away from me? I know we had this convo in chat, but for those in the peanut gallery wondering, this was like, every slumber party I had from maybe eight through twelve Hrm. I need to find a way to integrate them better, because this is following basic slumber party protocol in which strange body comparisons is then followed by consuming too much caffeine and telling spooky, sometimes (often) dirty stories. Then falling asleep giggling. Thank you @industrialistDragon! Yup, that's okay. The mother interludes build together. Thank you for the comments!! They're separate chapter-ettes, occurring about every three chapters, to help fill in the world. Based upon the last two weeks of feedback, they seem to be working rather well, so I finished them off this last week. Hopefully they deal with the info dump problems. I have come to the conclusion that this particular section of text has to go somewhere. I can try to integrate it here better through dialogue inserts, but that will make the interlude longer. Argh. I just don't know. It does replace the glacier thing though. These are 'builder' interludes, so they're not meant to have the same bite as the others. Let me know how you feel after a few more? I edited to clear this up. Thank you for reading (again)!

In for next week pending space

Overall I was very interested in the story premise, and I love the interaction of Alice and Dad. The end, however, fell flat for me, and I think the tech is dated. Good bones here though, and I think it could clean up very well! As an aside, I had no issue with the data cubes, but then again, I work in biology... Does the story work? Yes, I think so, but it needs edits, as noted above and below Does the theme work? I... have mixed feelings about this. Sort of? Maybe if the end was clearer As I go - page two: one day be programming a city, maybe? - I know zip about cars, but should super tech car be shifting gears? - okay, I know automated cars and traffic jams are not things that go together. - page four: max speed control already is in place in most semis. Seems dated here - page four: "We need you to fix Chicago traffic" is a great line! - page nine: why would toll roads decrease with automation? Can't the automation just go through the toll road? - I really love the interplay of Alice and her dad. It is definitely carrying the story - page 14: I think the big reveal of how Alice deals with the tech patch is muddled. It doesn't feel like a big thing, or any thing, really. I think the relevance and even the tech itself needs to be brought out more -

Welcome back! Holy wah, @TKWade! Your writing has improved in bounds since your last submission! This piece was engaging, the pacing good, and I enjoyed the story. Nicely done! Only a few minor quibbles below. Character buy in Well I don't much care for our MC, but I'm engaged enough in the world to keep reading, certainly. I have feeling he's going to be a berserker type, and I don't do berserker type, but if there are neat supporting characters, I'm cool. Story and character consistency Seemed alright? It's only first chapter, so not much to go on here. YES. I'm hanging my hopes on her being the lead secondary character, or another POV character. I agree with this as well. The specialness comes from nowhere. More foreshadowing! Truth. We meet again, lackluster description! Yuppers. And taking parts of a marginalized culture and using it in your western centric fantasy will not go over well with readers. As I go - 'beautiful' isn't a great descriptor, just FYI. As the genie says in Aladdin: "Pick a feature." - you've got some pretty heavy redundancy in these first few pages. I suggest reading your text out loud to yourself. That usually helps me catch these things - I giggled on page three. Nice burn! - katanas in western medieval fantasy is pretty appropriative, and also, katanas are not great swords. I'm sure @industrialistDragon already hit on this, though, so I'll defer to her links - page five: 'worked his way inside figure'? What does that mean? - and I... don't really have any more comments. I was engaged!

For a new writer, yes. You use them so heavily that you need to cut back first, then sprinkle them in once you get used to not using them. For fantasy authors, I read Anne Bishop, Lynne Flewellig, Anne McCaffery, and Seanen McGuire most frequently, with others sprinkled in as they come out. In YA fantasy, I adore Garth Nix.

Skipping around a bit now, here is a completely reworked chapter 9, 10, and one additional interlude. Here I just want to make sure their fleeing the village works. Pick apart as you will. I know the interlude is long, however I am unsure what to cut.

Pro tip - the elevator pitch 'lesbians in space', when describing your book, ensures it will sell out in hours. HOURS. What in the world am I going to do with the last day at this con?