kais

So the mods operate as more of a touchstone, sort of grounding base, instead of a punitive force? I can get behind that.

Anyone want to party with me here in the lounge? Have discussions? Trade secrets of picking up women in cafe's ala @Robinski's Quirk? Seriously though - let's talk.

Are you referring to the binary discussions? If so, I think that was critique thread specific. That's why I made that pronoun thread, but it hasn't been much utilized. We could move the whole shebang to the lounge. Would that work for everyone? Apologies for @Ghando43 for hijacking the critique thread here.

Which reminds me. @spieles when this thing goes to print, you can expect my slash fiction to be 100% Oz/Dion

Looking forward to this! Overall I didn't enjoy this as much as your first character sketches, but I still really liked it. More detailed comments below, and some LBLs. Seriously though, can we have more Quirk picking up women in cafes? Please? Thoughts on Grimes: Hmm. I found this section choppy, and I didn't connect with the character. I think part of the issue was that I know Moth from your last submission, and I really liked her, so getting only bits and pieces now is frustrating. She comes across as a caricature here, and I will admit that makes me sad. Thoughts on Quirk: Not as tight as the first round. The pre drop I had a hard time with, per comments below. Post drop I loved. Can we get a vignette where he just picks up women in cafes? I would pay money for that, hands down. Thoughts on Moth: Not much to say here, as I can't get a good sense from the outline. Suspicion (pre drop) contrasting with ice cream (post drop), has potential as you navigate this awkward stage of young womanhood with Moth that I would be interested to read, if done well As I go - the first two sentences of the first paragraph really grab me. Like, WOW grab me. Then the rest of the paragraph confuses me. I don't understand what you are talking about. - Also confused about the transport quip (something that still occupied scientists, apparently). What is this referencing? - 'crazy train station' is showing, not telling. Describe some craziness! - page two and Grime's throat tightens as he smiles as Moth. Unsure how I am supposed to be feeling about him now. Is he that kind of sketchy? It's a good descriptor, so just wanting you to know where it sends my head. - Next paragraph clears that up. Misses his daughter. Check. Not a creeper then. - Some type of transition is needed between the girl adopting him paragraph, and the Italian policeman cliche paragraph. - page three, paragraph with 'the train rolled in'. Twice now Moth has been described as 'impatient'. Might want to show this instead of tell the second time around - page 5: hehehe 'colon of a whale' - 'tight and hot" and now I'm laughing out loud - page 5, and the discussion of hips, balls, and seats: Quirk is different here, from the first sub. This text comes off more coarse than your last. Before I had the image of almost a dandy. Certainly suave. Here we get more salt of the earth with some culture. One isn't inherently better than the other, but I do find them conflicting. - page 6: 'she wore black beautifully': YES. +1 to imagery - Confused about scientists calculating the length of her skirt. Does that mean it is short? I mean, I'm a scientist, and I like women, so I'm trying desperately to figure this phrase out, because skirt calculation is something I could get behind. - page 6: Quirk's plumage comment puts us back on the dandy route. - Loving the banter between Quirk and the woman. Solid.

I guess my question then is, did it need to be reported, or just discussed? Tone is super important. You'll get no argument from me there. You and I both agree that the critique was valid, including the reasoning. Delivery was ... not our usual format. I'd argue for 'strong' instead of 'poor', but I see your viewpoint. In instances like these, instead of reporting, could we not open a dialogue for discussion? When people have strong feelings, especially over marginalization, far more progress can be made by engaging all parties than to simply have an administrator waggle a (digital) finger.

@Kurkistan I'd like to have a dialogue about this assessment, if possible. I do agree that some areas were over the top, but to report the post and/or call it insulting delegitimizes the points that @neongrey, and I myself, were trying to bring up. If the chapter (and I realize you haven't read it), killed its only two black characters at the end to advance a white male story, no one would have thought twice about neongrey's critique. I understand that sexism and misogyny are so prevalent in literature that it can be easy to sweep calls of 'foul' under the rug to protect feelings of those who do not realize what it is they are doing (and indeed, I do not think @Ghando43 was being purposefully malicious). However, I did call these issues out in Ghando's first run through, and they persisted into this next round. A stronger message was perhaps needed. As a group, I would hope that we could all agree that women deserve an equal place at the table with men (as do non binaries, but that is not this conversation). When a group, especially a marginalized group, is further marginalized or a writer perpetuates a very well know, previously highlighted derogatory stance, it is our right (and really should be our duty, but not all of us are comfortable engaging to nenogrey's extent online) to highlight the problem. In cases like this, above, to chastise neongrey for her aggressive wording is acceptable only if does not thereby delegitimize her (very rightful) anger. There is a line to walk, here, as with anything, and as someone who exists in multiple marginalized communities, I want people here to understand that posts like neongrey's should be discussed, not thrown out with the bathwater. There is a problem with the story told, it should be discussed in terms of treatment of women, and it is neongrey's right to express her anger. It is not her right to attack people directly, so yes, some of her wording could have been softer, but that doesn't mean that the rest of the forum should ignore her very relevant comments, nor the greater issues presented.

Probably because I've read the whole thing, and this is my second time through. It's not that I love Dion the character, it's that I love what he brings to Oz. In the narrative I read, Oz came alive every time Dion was around. Dialogue flowed. Everything was crisper. I was engaged with the story line, really actively engaged with Oz. @spieles knows this genre and age group isn't my fav, so it can be hard for me to get involved with these types of stories. But every time Dion was in a chapter, I was right there. That's why I love him.

So as I sit here, going through book two edits, I realized that one of my nonbinary characters in ASD is named 'Savath'. Coincidence?

Here is where my confusion came from. I read 'tiny' and I think just blocked the priestess part out, since I assumed it was a young goddess. " A tiny priestess trailing swathes of silk walked to the head of the altar, and the others attending took places around the opposite side, forming half a circle opposite her."

Ahh, I see. Yes, I was unclear on this. I read 'small' as young, or kid. Clearly that was my own bias coming into play. Hooray for Savae drops! Gimme gimme! Yeah, I would do this, too. I may or may not have a number of vignettes on hand already, should I ever do a little anthology collection of Ard short stories.

Overall The ceremony started slowly and I was confused with blocking at the start, but I loved the middle and end. Very beautiful imagery, and the more emotions you convey via wings, the cooler it gets. The end fell flat for me. After such a neat ceremony, the clean ups at the end seemed unnecessary. Question about Lasilia I was thinking about this last week after your last submission. Two things I'll share. 1) When I was first drafting AFD, I had a similar issue with Nick. Betas didn't like him. I liked him, and he did what I needed him to do in the story, but he wasn't polling well. Eventually someone pointed out to me that even though I was writing him true to his character, people needed to be invested in a character, and general dislike wasn't going to cut it. I altered him (alas, in chapters now cut), and it really brought the story together better. Amusingly, I think the reactions from betas were the same for him as for Lasilia. He was whiny. He lacked direction. He didn't take direct action. No one particularly cared about his plot line because of those things. Drove me nuts but in the end, the betas were right. Characters need to be relatable and, while that can come in many forms, irritation is not one of them. 2) I think this type of protag issue is more common in TV and film. For instance, Buffy Summers in Buffy the Vampire Slayer is not a particularly likable character after about the second season. It is the secondary characters that bring that show together. So, I'd say you options are to either rewrite Lasilia a bit, or beef up characters like Savae (whom we all seem to really enjoy) to get buy-in from readers. Or leave it be because it's your novel, and if makes you happy, that's a solid enough reason to leave it. To specifically answer your question, I don't care for Lasilia's lack of action. She waits for things to happen to her, she doesn't chase them. She is certainly getting better, and I enjoyed her more this chapter, but early on there is a lot of whining at her brother, wandering about, doing things like finance (which I understand the reasoning for, but this is just my direct, visceral reaction) instead of pursuing something she is passionate about. We as readers are used to highly active protags. For better or worse then, when one acts as Lasilia does it seems almost lazy in a sense. If she were a student of mine I'd schedule private meeting with her and have a firm conversation about pulling her life together and going after what she wants. I'm not sure if that helps. As I go - page one, first paragraph. WRS - I have no idea what the dress enhancement is referring to, and that makes me sad, because, as we know, I am all hands on deck for any orgy play - page 2: Lasilia thinks of Maranthe, and in my head I am already writing the slash fiction. You have to tell me when this thing goes to print because I am going to fanfic it so hard - page two: 'her delicate gestures not ceasing' is awkward phrasing - page 2: "higher and higher' followed by 'brighter and brighter' reads redundant - page 3: You refer to Maranthe as a 'priest', yet I've seen references to 'priestess'. Purposeful regendering of the word? - so, wait. Is the little kid they brought out the new goddess? Did she just appear? The wording confuses me - page 5: Well now. That was a fun reveal! - page 6: but now I'm confused. Why would Kelriel know her name, if he is her - after the ceremony finishes, the end of the chapter, with meeting her escort, falls flat. After the excitement, this wind down makes me want to skim to the next chapter to catch a glimpse of that excitement again

I sent the LBLs to your e-mail. I loved this chapter. I felt more engaged and connected with Oz than I have in any other chapter I've read. He always comes alive more when Dion is around, and I believe I have already expressed my great love of Dion. Brick, as always, delivers great dialogue. The pace is steady, and there were only a few bumps, which I pointed out in the LBLs. Overall, AWESOME! Believability - you know, the action and dialogue were so spot on that I didn't even question the lack of guards. To me, it read more as a quarantine unit where they don't really expect anyone to break in, cause who'd want to be exposed to that? Dion - always. love. Dion.

I would also like to request a spot for the first.

Seconded. Being a good writer is all about being a good revisionist. My first five drafts of any book are usually crap. Around about edit six they start resembling something salable. Revision eight is usually sub worthy. Three revisions later and they're ready for print. It takes time.

Agree. I'm always afraid to call out this sort of thing when there are no other women in a narrative, just out of fear that that one will disappear as well. With war stories, it can be easy for people to forget that movies do not portray war gender divides accurately. Women fought too - often as men, but they did fight. Camps followed armies into battle, comprised of a mix of prostitutes, cooks/washer women, and sometimes even pieces of the soldiers' families. There were children involved too, or at least, what we would consider children now. To make up armies, fictional or otherwise, solely of men is entirely gender blindness, and not historical at all. In this instance, Abrahamic myth doesn't help things (I can't recall female angels anywhere in the apocrypha) but those angels did have female lovers, and children who were giants (nephilim). If the angels in this story must be predominantly male, consider also adopting the females that surround them to help balance gender representation.

Silver you say? ETA: Holy wah that image is huge!

I think I paid $60 for mine, and that was back in 1999! For the revolution of the world!

I'm not certain whether I should be horrified, amused, or a little in-between. Does anyone turn into a car? Are there soul swords in people's chests? (Is it too embarrassing to admit I have a rose ring from that series that I still wear sometimes?)

Always glad to see you subbing here, @spieles! Overall Hmmm. It's more succinct now, for sure. It's lost voice in places, which sticks out more when voice does appear, like Oz making a comment about how hot a few of the brides are. It's nice to see the villain immediately, and I like her sickness addition. I really liked the start with the rat and the world building. Your Questions rat - loved it. Great world building to add, and really grounds the whole situation Elanor's interest - good, but could be even more I feel. Like, she could reach out to touch his face, then pull back at the last moment and Oz could be all confused about it. Or pull away and think about crazy old ladies. Oz' competence: I don't know how I feel about the downgrade. He does have a lot more room for growth now, so it is probably a solid move. I'm conflicted. Which version better? Will you punch me if I say I like elements from both? I like a lot of the anchors of this one, but miss the richness of the other. I think this one is on the right track and could just use some fluffing, if that makes sense. As I go - 'berserker' - because so much of this novel is grounded in science, the use of this word is jarring. It would be useful if it was defined prior, or explained here, or even just changed to something less anime. Consider words like: rabid, deranged, etc - love the rat aside! - page 2: would love just a bit more imagery description of the Brides. This part has always been the first hook for me in your book, and I'm forever fascinated by the Brides. Just a sentence or two more about them would go a long way - page 2: "at least two are really hot" LOL! Oz is definitely younger here

S you say? Eh eh? Overall The magic discussion fell a little flat, but I wonder if part of that is WRS. Lasilia's new mentor is very interesting, and I'd like to know more about her. I still feel no connection to Lasilia, and do not feel engaged in her story line. I am happy Lasilia finally enjoyed the orgy properly. About time! As I go - 'she was the picture of lack of surprise' is wordy - page 1: likely WRS here, but is it just this brand of magic that is illegal, or all magic? I'm missing backstory I think - 'Do you want to revolutionize the world?' Did you ever watch Revolutionary Girl Utena? It's a Japanese anime popular some time ago, and this harkens very much in that direction - page 2: The questions in Lasilia's mind don't connect with me because I still don't connect with her character. Danger, contingency - I think you're trying to elicit tension in the reader, but it falls flat as I am not invested in Lasilia. - page 2: She consents immediately? This is a big deal, or at least so it seems. Why consent so quickly? What does this mean? - page 3: 'squeezing like iron" - iron doesn't squeeze. - page 3: unsure how I feel about the forced kiss. If it was male/female it would be concerning immediately, so I'm not sure if you're trying to elicit that same reaction here, or are hoping for a different one - page 6: all this forwardness from Lasilia seems sudden and out of place for her character. Are you trying to show a change in her post discovering magic and getting tongued for a little too long?

Overall Better than last time for sure! Still struggles in places. More description, especially the concrete, specific kind, is needed. The characters don't stick with me and I have no real feel for setting. Also, per last time, I cannot get behind stories that use female characters and their deaths sole for advancing a male lead. This trope is sexist and needs to die. Please, help us kill it. As I go - page 1: far fewer numbers than before': this is vague. 100? 1000? Give some estimate of number, especially this early on in the narrative. Reader needs grounding - lots of common splices. Check grammar - page 1: all we know about Silvan is that he is shorter than Kendaryk. Descriptions would be very useful. I have no visualization of either of the men right now - When writing dialogue, if you add a tag then the sentence doesn't get a period inside the quotes. For instance, you do this: "That is some fascinating grammar." She said. When it should be this: "That is some fascinating grammar," she said. - Start of page two reads like author info dump, and it would be nice description to have earlier, maybe through dialogue or him hearing soldiers talking about him - page two: "The day following the victory..." why not just start the chapter here, if the previous stuff isn't going to be fleshed out and/or relevant. Might give the narrative some more mystery, too, to start right there. - page2-3: Ah, much better grounding of the character with respect to his family. I am now more interested in the story - page 4: and my fridge logic sensors are starting to tingle. Please, no death of the daughter to push empathy for the father.... - page six: MUCH better description of the attack. Now it is more ominous, with descriptions of the perpetrators. The snatching makes the burning less cliche - page 9: not a fan of the ending. Death of the only relevant female characters to further character development and foster empathy in male characters is problematic at best.

Overall The narrative didn't grip me. There wasn't enough description given for the characters to stand alone from Abrahamic myth, thereby relying on reader familiarity. The male to female ration was incredibly skewed, and the end, where we find Hella's motivation is the death of someone named Jessica....was too much. Evolving male characters and garnering sympathy for them through the deaths of female characters is not a favorable trope. Some changes could be made easily, such as swapping genders on some of the described angels and giving Hella's a proper backstory that does not rely on the death of a woman to ground him. Other things, like the descriptors, need some fleshing out work. Write out Abrahamic standards, then define places where your characters split from those. Highlight those places in the narrative to make the otherness stand out more. Your Questions Hella's new look - I did not notice anything different in this version from the previous. This character still needs a great deal of developmental work. Eye changing - it did help that this was less apparent, although the few times it surfaced again was just as jarring Human versus angel - I've written about this in the line by line. See below As I go - tense change in the first paragraph is very confusing - I don't care for the 'smelled like one hundred burning corpses'. I can't imagine that 100 burning corpses smells any differently than, say, 73, or 12. You've smelled one burning corpse, you've smelled them all - first page has a lot of repetitive stomach churning - The second to last paragraph in italics on the first page has too many adjectives. It feels weighed down. - POV is muddled in first two pages. Is it Hella's POV, omniscient POV? - page two - the descriptions of the angels and Elohim really doesn't add anything new to the mythos here. They aren't well described and rely on reader familiarity with the subject. Also, as these are fictional characters, they don't all need to be male. Check your gender balance in the narrative. - end of page two: the narrative is bouncing between traditional angel lore and humanity reality, and that is very confusing. Angels, according to Abrahamic texts, spend their days worshipping the lord (sometimes smiting...we all enjoy smiting now and then). Here you have them set up as more of a human religion, working day jobs and worshipping at set times. Both of these settings are routinely familiar and are not novel. - page four: the description of the battle with the hellspawn also relies too much on prior reader knowledge. Spend more time describing - page six: Hella's use of the word 'sissy' does in no way endear me to the character. It is at this point that I am starting to have an active dislike for him - seven pages in and the first female character appears. - page 8, chapter two start: see, this 'glowing flecks of energy' being shaken from shoulders is interesting! I want more details here! - page 13: he doesn't want to fail anyone again? Please, let it not be the 'my wife and/or kid was slaughtered' thing. - Page 13: 'Jessica'? See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_Refrigerators specifically the section dealing with 'Women in Refrigerators Syndrome'

I'd like to submit as well on Monday.

Strapped in and ready to go! Overall I like Quirk a lot. Rich imagery trails him, and he has a distinctive personality. I don't often connect with male protags without some female also being heavily involved in the narrative, but I could probably follow (and like) a Quirk narrative. Moth's POV seems rougher. I expect her to see a more gritty side of the city, but the grittiness doesn't come through. Her age seems to bounce as well, which it does for a 13 year old, but it really confused me for a while. I'd love to see more city descriptive views from Moth that contrast Quirk, especially since his were so vivid. I really enjoyed the android scene! Per other reader's comments - I'm with @spieles on Moth. I really did enjoy her character, although I'd love to see it cleaned up a bit in terms of description. In contrast, I liked Quirk too, but mainly for the richness his POV brought to the narrative. I could totally get on board with a robot character as well, especially if well written. As I go - I'm having a hard time picturing what a 'light and shiny' terminal would look like - Quirk likes tight bums on men, eh? OK, you have my interest. - Second paragraph of page two reads as info dump without POV - Yes, Quirk. Tell me more about why you would want to put your hands in someone else's pockets. - Page 2: pouring out love from behind a menu seems...rushed. Pouring out interest maybe? Affection? Love seems a strong word here. - page 3: I don't think pleather needs an explanation. It's pretty well known - page 4: Grown ups were idiots - how old is Moth? Kids up to about thirteen use the word 'grown-ups' like that, but you've described her as more like 16. - Per above, the tongue sticking out on page 4 again puts Moth younger, maybe even down to about 8. I am really confused about her age now - Ah page six and we have an age. 13. I can see that. Carry on.