Mandamon

Welcome to Reading Excuses! Looks like most of my critiques have already been covered. That's what I get for commenting late. Overall, the writing and grammar are pretty rough, as others have said. Most errors are consistent through the piece, so it's not just an isolated mistake. I can't really find a point to the story yet. You have two points of view in the first chapter, and the POV occasinally switches from first to third. There is also a very abrupt ending to the chapter, in (as far as I can tell) the middle of a conversation. Keep writing, but I'd make sure to build up Jerome's character as the story progresses so the reader can identify with him. You don't have to have an indication of where the story is going in the first chapter, but I would cut out a lot of the extra bits and focus more on introducing us to your character and world. In specifics, the two that bug me most are: "your" vs. "you're." Definitely watch for this one. Learn it cold and never let an editor or agent see you make this mistake. This WILL keep you from selling books. The switch from 1st to 3rd POV. Especially at the start of a story, and especially for a first time writer, make sure you keep to either 1st or 3rd person, and don't switch to another POV unless you have to . The few sentences that were from Jerome 1st person POV I thought popped out the most. When re-writing, you might try putting this all in 1st person POV from Jerome and see how it works. jParker's comment on the US south are very pertinent! I can second them, being from the south myself. This was painfully obviously a British work where the author didn't know a lot about the US customs and social structure. At first I thought you were being satirical as this was set in the future, but nope. Sadly, the "Cornland" bit is probably accurate. Last, I'll also agree Carl's story kept my interest better, but needs to be in a different place. It shouldn't be plopped down the first time we hear his name. Keep writing!

Congrats Silk! So that means we're going to be seeing lots of submissions from you now, right?

I agree with andyk, so I won't repeat his comments. I liked the tone of the story, such as it was. You did a good job of painting the background of Hal without spelling it out. But that's pretty much it. Not that you have a lot of room in something this short, but I also thought it felt like a scene. It was a painting of a few moments in time, but didn't actually get to the end of its train of thought. This might benefit from some explanation of what you meant to achieve. If this was a study of describing a character, then good job. As a (very) short full story, it felt unfinished.

Glad we attracted your attention again Guen! Akobel--I'll start on yours this week. Looking forward to seeing the rest of the story.

Okay--let's try this thing out. I've put The Seeds of Dissolution in the Writing Group "Alpha Reader" folder on Dropbox, because I'm just picking at it now and I need people to read it. If you want to read it and have Dropbox, send me a PM with your email and I'll add you to the group. If you don't have Dropbox, you can link to it here (It's free and this link gives me more space if you use it). I'm looking for overarcing issues, plot holes, ignored possibilities, and other things like that. I'll also steal from Mary Robinette Kowal, by asking the same questions she asks alpha readers, namely things that: 1. Confuse you 2. You don’t believe 3. You are bored by 4. You think are cool I don't really care about grammar, but if you do find a typo and want to mark it down, or see a word I use constantly and it annoys you, feel free to jot it down. Timeline: End of September. I'd like to have some comments back by then if possible. To avoid cluttering up the dropbox folder, why don't we try adding responses to this thread? If that doesn't work, then I guess stick a text doc or something in the Alpha Readers folder. Also, I'm certainly willing to trade a read for a read if someone else has a completed work they want me to critique. I know this takes a lot more time than a single chapter.

It took me a while to remember which story this was a prequel to (blame all the different submissions...). The Paladin Heist seems almost in a different universe than this one--there's nothing to suggest that it's off Earth, for instance--although it does explain the comments about the VR system. I was puzzled by the "two worlds" reference until I remembered. I don't know how relevant this is, since you're starting over, but the two pieces had almost completely different feels to them. I wouldn't have put the first one after this one. Other comments: How big is the armored vehicle? Kate has room to walk a few steps before punching the wall? Is there even space on the wall for her to punch? It seems to be a really big vehicle--more like a wheeled battleship, if it has full beds. pg 1: you refer to Kate as "the woman," when it's in her POV. it dissasociates the reader from her to do that. I seem to remember you doing this in another submission. pg 2, end: "The private aimed his weapon above the pile of debris, firing blindly into the crowd" --Kate just prayed about not firing about civilians, and she doesn't stop the soldier from firing into the crowd? I think you need more setting. During the action, I'm not sure where they are, or when, and it's hard to tell when people move from place to place. Later you do explain that they're not on Earth, and the riot was in New California, but I think some of this information should come up front. On the "generic evil politician," I do agree with jParker. He's far too open. The government can still be completely corrupt, but run by smart people. While Akim's actions are frustrating because Kate is powerless, what is far more frustrating is for Akim to stick to bland answers, but still do the same actions (refuse the resignation, threaten her) with a smile on his face. Depends on how you want to set up the character. Overall, good prose. Just needs some more clarify in describing the setting and action.

French names: Mainly the ones I brought up: Rauchain, Ealuan, Lierax. Also Richard, I guess, if you say it with an accent... Mainly it was the time period and civil unrest. Seemed very Les Miserables. I got pretty close with a guess at the time period, so that is probably alright. Some of the context will come through in the book cover and where it would be sold, of course. It's harder to get that across in this forum, where we're just reading bits of prose out of context. Do you mean this is a world that is not Earth, in a period similar to the 1680's, with no magic? If so, I would suggest to make it an alternate Earth, so you can give out some place names we might recognize (Gaul, Paris, London, Constantinople...) or institutions (Ottomans, Catholics, Moors...). If this is an "alien" world with no connection to Earth places, but somehow having humans and human-like structures, you're going to have a much harder time getting people to suspend disbelief and not ask questions about how things got the way they are.

So this has some of the same problems as the first chapter, mainly the lack of context. Again the writing itself was good, and it was easy to read. I didn't really have any problems with the dialect, either. pg 2: you repeat "children" in two consecutive sentences. Sounds a little awkward. pg 3: "As the crone tied a small knot, Layna swore she caught a glimpse of the woman’s soul." --is this a hint of a magic system, or some sort of metaphor? I looked for anything during the rest of the chapter to explain it, but there was nothing. I finally decided it was an intro for the description of Mae, but it reads as melodramatic. pg 7: "For a moment, it might have been Layna’s heart strings Jake was playing. Storm clouds gathered behind her eyes, threatening to unleash their torrent. No, not here. Ruachain was a time of celebration, not mourning. And Layna knew what was said behind her back." --this paragraph doesn't make sense to me. You've just said Jake is not a good singer and Layna wants to leave the room, the music is so bad, and then he is tugging at her heart strings and inspiring memories? Layna seems to have some hidden demons, which makes her more interesting than any of the characters in the first chapter, but there is still some context missing. She seems to be familiar with the possibility the village could be attacked, but we don't know why or by who. Does she have a guess? The very end of the chapter was a little confusing as to who was speaking, and I had to read it a second time to figure it out. "Layna knew she should have run after the men and their wriggling mass" --Are they carrying people off with them? Also, these three names came up during the chapter. I figured out the Euluan was the family name, and Rauchain seems to be a celebration of some sort, but we don't know for what. I have no idea whether the Lierax are a rival town, an army, or a group of animals. Rauchain Ealuan Lierax So at the end of it, I still would like to learn more, but this is almost as rough as the first chapter. You don't want to give away too much too early, but at the same time, there needs to be more explanation of the basic situation. As it is, I'm too confused to draw conjecture on what the plot might be. If I know a little more about who the fighters are, or who Miller and Pate were supposed to be spying on, I could guess. Some of the names sound French, but at this point, I don't know if this is an alternate Earth history, an alien world with magic, or an adventure tale from the 1700s.

Robinski--Thanks! Will do. The more the merrier. I'm aiming for about two and a half more weeks until I finish it up, and then the whole thing will be ready for alpha readers.

Wow! Thanks very much for all the feedback! I'm finishing up the first edit now, so this comes at a great time. I'll answer a few things here for all the chapters: ch5: I've already reduce the first 4 chapters to three, and I've been thinking about turning it into a prologue, as you suggest. I'll probably want to compress even more if I do that. Specific description seems to be my main problem, as you've picked up on in a few places. I think I need to do a complete read-through after the first edit and add smells/sounds/touch/taste ch7/8: I've made some changes to agoraphobia, but haven't addressed the Nether being telepathic. Good catch. I'll go back and edit. ch9: Rilan and curses--glad someone picked this up! Enos and the telepathic Nether--again, good catch. Hadn't even thought about addressing it, but there is a reason she doesn't mind. ch10: Sam hits on Enos. Yes--this was not well done, and I've changed it around in the edit. On self identifying as a cult: I think I need to add some more description on this. I meant it in the "secret mystery" sense of the original Greek/Roman, where "cult" was not necessarily a bad term. ch11: The Effature is intended to be mysterious and aloof. Does it work? Tad, Names, and being disgraced. Another good catch. I went back to look and realized I never really explained. The Naiyul clan is made up exclusively of the "disgraced," which is why the question wasn't (completely) impolite. Guns and Guards. Thanks for the input. I agree this is a weak point. Enos and the Drain is a coincidence. hmmm. Yes it is. I need to add something in later I forgot about... ch12: The traders who caught the sterilization plot were actually different. This whole subplot refers to a short story I put together about a year ago, and included the repercussions as part of this larger story. If I ever could manage to get something in this universe published, I want to have some tie-in short stories. Vethis defeating/silencing. Yet another good catch. Avoiding the question on more than 10 species. Glad you thought about the Aridori. That's what I intended. Also, Rilan and Origon have traveled a LOT together, many years ago... ;-) ch13: I cleaned up the money a little, and took out the denomination breakdown. ch14: "another day later" -- I went back and searched for this line. I remember it bugging me too, and I think it's been edited out. Glad you're thinking about the Nether. That makes me feel better about my little world... I've been noodling around with this concept as well, and do have plans, but they didn't get into this book. So, thanks again. I'd love for you to do an alpha reading at some point after I get finished (if you have time). I'm willing to trade for it! You do pick up a lot of my weak points and concepts. I have five "good catches" marked down that I hadn't seen. In addition, you specifically brought up four items I intended to be mysterious/misleading, so hopefully that means they were visible enough, and hopefully not too annoying (especially if you don't find out the answers in this book...)

Hi all. There was some discussion of getting feedback on full books (pacing, plot holes, character and story arcs...) rather than just the chapter format submitted here. This would be something that does not compete with the weekly submissions, but takes place over a longer time, where volunteers can read over a full first draft of a book and offer critique. Resources: This idea came up before, and resulted in the creation of a Reading Group A, listed in Silk's Welcome post. There is a dropbox shared folder under JamesW. Not sure if we need his permission to add more people/if he's still around. I can set up a new group if needed. The problem we had before was that people would put things into the shared folder, but there wasn't any notification, so no one has kept up with it. I propose we keep this thread going as notification for those that are interested in reading/having alpha readers for complete books. These critiques would be less about chapter edits and grammar errors and more about the flow of the whole book. We should probably also have a time limit or certain range that is available for alpha readers so 1) the shared folder doesn't get cluttered and 2) the author can gather all the critiques at one time. So far, myself, Robinski, and akobel are interested. At least two of us have books going through final edits that will be ready for alpha readers shortly. Thoughts?

Yes, there is a dropbox set up for full reads (the link is in Silk's Welcome to Reading excuses thread under Reading Group A). The problem is there's no real notification on when something is put in there. Maybe we should have a thread for Alpha read notifications? I'm in the same situation as you, Akobel, having gotten a lot of good feedback on Seeds of Dissolution, but needing alpha reader for the finished book (which I'm 1/2 through editing). I'd be willing to swap and do an alpha read with you, focusing more on plot, pacing, and arc. I think the synopsis might be good for plot holes, but won't convey much of the useful (and exciting) information about the book.

The others covered some of what I saw. There were two main issues: 1) the magic system and 2) punctuation. Magic System: I'm pretty forgiving on the knock-off aspect, so I'm not as concerned that this smells of Sanderson. If you can do a good job with it, I'll read it. It has to be a part of the story, but not the defining part. Sanderson's books have interesting magic systems, but the books are about the characters. However, like the others, I was still very confused by how Lithomancy worked at the end of part 2. I gather there are resonances, and it has something to do with rocks, but there seemed to be no obvious tradeoff to Luther channeling the energy. You may have it all planned out, but it didn't come across in your writing. Sanderson has talked about this in W.E. episodes, especially in how it influenced his writing of the first Mistborn book. He showed the magic with no explanation at first, then only explained it in the 6th chapter, because it was complicated. Even better is if you can show us how the magic works as it is applied. Punctuation: Yes, this is a rough draft, but there needs to be a basic level of accuracy even the first time around. The lack thereof made it very hard to read. Mostly, the problem was with commas. You have many sentences that need commas to be parsed correctly. If they're missing, the reader can't understand what you said, and you get lots of run-on sentences. For example: "If the sprint directly up a mountain had been insanity it had at least achieved one very important feat." -> insanity, it pg9: 'Are you insane?' Crillon called to her 'to die for the stones.' -needs punctuation. I'm not sure whether the last phrase is speech or Luther paraphrasing something. pg 10: 'You know that the power to make the air heavy was one of the talents of the Aragi?' Gana said her eyes shining with tears. --"said, her" All speech needs to have punctuation after it. (pg 6: "'We have Lords' Marcos said with a trace of exasperation.") If there is a dialogue tag, it ends with ," ?" or !" You never end with a period. If there is no dialogue tag, you can end with a period. Story Structure Comments: The beginning does not have a very exciting hook. You start off by talking about the weather. Then the first 2 pages have a lot of backstory, and not a lot of action. Then there is a page of infodump about the Toth. We only learn on page 4 that Luther's here to feel the pulse. It's the first direct action we know about. Then there's another infodump about pulses. I think of lot of this can be cut out or moved to later. Start with Luther feeling the pulse, or even with the argument about desecrating the burial sites. Information about the island can come later. In fact, if you just have Luther use Lithomancy the first time without any explanation about pulses (a la Mistborn), I'd accept it easier. Then you can fill us in later about how the magic works. Get our attention with it, then when we're hooked, give the background and facts. pg 11: "Crillon had almost got them killed and then completely overlooked the fact that Luther had saved him" --the reader already knows this. You've shown and now you're telling us again. Overall, I think the story has promise. There are hints of an Atlantean culture, rock-based magic of some sort, and conflicts between nobility and islanders. I'd like too see more to get a feel for where you're going with it.

I'll third (or fourth or fifth) the Bas-lag books by Meiville. I saw mixed reviews of his stuff, but then read Perdido Street Station and was completely sucked in. I plan on reading the others. I just finished the first three Majipoor books. They're definitely science-fantasy, but I can't really recommend them. The plots and characters are just not that great. Another I finished recently was Throne of the Crescent Moon by Saladin Ahmed. It is medieval with a class structure, but is set in the middle east, so a little different. It's his first novel, and it shows, but the story is still enjoyable. One last one no one has mentioned yet is Larry Corriea's Grimnoir Chronicles. It's set in the 1920's with mobs and gangsters (power stuctures!), but is full of magic (if scienc-y magic). No steampunk either. The first and second books are out, and the third is coming out in August. It's very enjoyable; sort of a detective story. It's Earth, but fairly alternate Earth. If you like urban fantasy at all, do yourself a favor and read Jim Butcher's Dresden Files. Reaching back, if you haven't read the Deathgate Cycle by Weis and Hickman, I highly recommend it. I've read the whole series several times. It's certainly fantasy, and takes place somewhere that doesn't look anything like Earth. Weis and Hickman also wrote the first two books of a planned trilogy called the Starshield series, where "quantum weather" makes different places in the universe act under different laws. Cool books, if you can get around them being unfinshed (the sales weren't what they expected).

I'm fine with some character building and instrospection, but the first few pages come across as too much. It feels like you're trying to cram all the backstory you couldn't get it earlier to these pages. For example, you could have dropped a sentence in earlier that her aunt used to be the head priestess, and use it as a reference here, to make the introspection stronger. pg 4: "She wasn't prepared at all for what stood on the other side of that door." --This is a bit too much of a "And then she..." It seems artificial. I would take out this last line and let the tension of her going into the room stand by itself. We know something's going to happen. pg 5: "even the twinge of pain in his hip forcing him to limp went unnoticed." --it's not unnoticed if you just called it out. pg 5: "He would have to lit a fire in his chambers if he ever wanted not to be turned into an icicle" --this sentence is awkward and passive (also light for lit). There are some other senteces like this as well--watch for them when you edit. pg 5: "As much as he distasted antagonising his head priestess" --disliked pg 12: I get the feeling Mahau is crawling along the floor because of the time shroud and he's moving in slow motion, but you never really say this, and you don't say he ever sped back up. I was also a little confused that no one recognized anyone else. a little more shroud description would be good. pg 14: "She was usually the strong one and seeing her frightened like this disturbed Mahau more than he could explain." --Watch for telling instead of showing. There's a bit of it in this chapter, especially around Neda. pg 16: "Mahau soon noticed the dagger buried deep in the assassin's side." --wait, so the god with half his body cut away needs to/can stab himself with a dagger and kill himself? First, if the cutting away half his body hasn't killed him, I don't think a dagger will do it. Second, I doubt he's going to be able to even move, or he would have aimed the dagger at Mahau. pg 17: Why doesn't Mahau know what the other gods look like? This seems a very bad position to be in, especially if the gods fight each other all the time. Overall, a good chapter. I like the progression of the story. We now know about all the missing gods, and the plot has thickened. The middle action of this chapter drew me in and captured my attention. There were some minor things, but nothing detrimental to the story as a whole. It's a good end to the first act. I was going to say I was looking forward to finding out more, but then read that you plan to stop posting. It is harder to get good comments on the middle and later portions of books, especially if people haven't read the first part (as I found out myself with Seeds of Dissolution), but at the same time, I think if, as a forum, we can keep interest in a book going all the way through then it will give some better comments on the overarching plot. I know posting an entire book will take ages, but what would others say to posting summaries or specific chapter segments to help critique character arcs, plots and endings? ...I may need to make this a poll or some such. This is probably not the right place to bring it up!

I thought this was well written, but agree with Carcinios about the lack of setting. I really wanted to like the story--I felt like I should like it, but it kind of fell flat. It's an in media res, but maybe too much "media." Despite that, this has a lot going for it. The descriptions of characters are convincing and the setting has enough description for me to get an idea of where and when it is. I did't have much problem with some names being ordinary and some not. It sounded like the delegation was from another country. I more had an issue with so many being introduced with odd names--I had no idea which was which throughout the action. There were a couple places your writing sounds like you're trying too hard to embelish. Below are a couple of examples: pg 1: "slick hands" --I think you mean they are dextrous, but it sounds like they have oil on them pg 2: "notorious teetotaler, which only occasionally included teenage boys." --Tetotaler of...people? I read that he didn't drink, and then you're talking about boys. Pg 4: "The doors opened eagerly" --the doors probably aren't sentient. The reversal/joke/reversal again also didn't work for me. Rugier wants them arrested as spies, then is like "nah, JK, let's eat," then insults them again, then does arrest them as spies after a meal. He could have cut through all that and just arrested them in the first place. There wasn't even any diplomatting taking place, so why have the whole contingent of dignitaries even show up? I think this story has definite places it can go, and I like the characters. Just needs some more outlining and investigation of plot details. I definitely would like to see more.

Here are my comments as I read through: pg 1: you use "mistook" twice in a paragraph pg 2: the reader remembers Normanton Church. You don't need to bring attention to it again pg 2: didn't he leave his cloak in the church? Or did he get another one? pg 3/4: I don't know if the thought paragraph all needs to be in italics. It's not neccessarily all thought. pg 3-7: there's too much of Blacklake reasoning with himself. Nothing really happens and it's weak logic at best. Why would Blacklake want to reason with Sabine? Is his greed for the inn more than the fear of death at her hands? pg 9: swithering? Had to look this one up. pg 11: "‘She’s inside. What happened, Blacklake?’ Tarquin plucked the artist to his feet and discovered the extent of his injuries when Rutland almost collapsed from the pain in his leg." --a POV cheat here. "‘No! There’s no time, Tarquin. He’s in danger!’ The artist’s cries fell into seemingly delirious murmurings." --This seems like it's from Tarquin's POV pg 12: "Tarquin noted that Blacklake was regarding him through eyes half-closed with painand fatigue." --Also from Tarquin's POV pg 15: are we supposed to recognize Tarquin/Joshua from somewhere else? Overall, a good story. I wasn't expecting the twist, even though I was trying to figure out how you would finish it, so good job there. But I think the second and fourth parts especially can be cut down to get rid of the wandering and thinking. In this part, there's no real threat when Blacklake is deciding what to do, and I'm still not sure why he came back and didn't just run off. When there is a direct threat--Sabine or Tarquin--the pace is very good and keeps me interested. When Blacklake is off by himself, it slows down too much. There were a couple problems with POV, but that's easily fixed. Just make sure you don't show anything internal from the characters who aren't POV. There were a couple words in the four sections which I wasn't familiar with, being American, but that's an easy correction if this goes out in America. Very nice! All four sections need a little tightening up and some adjective pruning, but very enjoyable. I'd like to see the others as well.

I've found I'm very much an outliner. If you listen to the WE episodes where Mary tells how she outlines, I do it almost exactly the same way (by coincidence). I know all the main points of the story before I begin to write. That's not to say they stay the same--I let the discovery process while I'm writing dictate what "seems more awesome." But the main storyline and likely the end will be similar to my outline. I outline in bullet points, writing about 9-12 pages for a 70-100k book. Then I translate at least some of it to Scene / Sequel format to get a feeeling for what the conflicts and challenges are. In my later writing, I've started mapping out characters as well. Even if I don't have a complete arc, I know what their personality traits are. I've found this helps to speed the writing process along--for example, I know if I have someone who would be reluctant to take action, or someone who is really over excited about doing things, or a happy person or a sad person. That then dictates some of how each scene will go, depending on the POV. This is how I do it. This may not work for you. Try to write different ways and see which brings out the best story for you.

Very nice. Glad to see some action finally! comments: pg 4: okay, Blacklake is gross. Good job on making such an interesting character. pg 5: And suddenly we come to magic. There's been no mention of anything so far, so it's a little out of the blue. I'll accept it, but maybe seed this idea earlier when Blacklake is thinking about his poisons? At least hint that alchemy or magic is possible. There is some confusion during their struggle as to who is where. Also, why did he put his cloak in the cupboard? I assume if Blacklake were to get his way, more than his coat would be removed... Sabine is either pretending to be affected by the poison, and makes her body seem dead, or she is actually affected, but her powers restored her. In either case, why use telepathy rather than speaking? It seems unnecessary, unless she needs to heal her vocal cords after being choked, and there's not a clear description that Blacklake choked her. It's a great intimidation tactic, but not quite as impressive next to the telekenisis and coming back from the dead. pg 9: You say "A daring spy would have seen" during Sabine's transformation, but then later tell us Blacklake is hiding in the bushes. I'd take out the spy part. The section is from her POV, so it's a little bit of a cheat to tell what she would have seen had she not been distracted. You could actually put those last few paragraphs from Blacklake's POV, and not lose anything. There's a bit much of Blacklake flailing around in dirt and mud at the end. Yes, he's panicked, but he's starting to remind me of the girl in high-heel shoes in horror movies that constantly falls whenever the monster gets near. pg 16: "but his spine cracked into jutting cobbles" --I can't quite imagine this. He fell into a creek with tangled plants, then is somehow hitting his back on a pathway of some sort? I think my only problem is in the action descriptions. There's not enough description of the surroundings, and then you reference walls, rock, cobbles, etc, as part of the action when we haven't seen they exist yet. I had to read over both the confrontation in the church and the scene at the creek twice to make sure I absorbed all the action correctly. Otherwise, I was sucked into the story completely. I knew something was going on with Sabine, but that twist threw me. The descriptions of her magic and transformations are very creepy. Looking forward to part 4...

Asmodemon caught most of what I did, so I'll try not to repeat. Mostly I was confused throughout this, by the lack of description, the awkward and passive sentences, and the innumerable "hads" I read the first paragraph twice to make sense of it, and was even more confused after the first page, almost enough to stop reading. I think because first section all happens in white-room. There's no desription of where or what Diro is. pg 3: Wait--Diro was a sea captain first? Then when you tell me about ships, now you're always going to have to clarify sky- or sea-ships. You're throwing out made-up names with no indication of what they are, and most seem not to matter anyway. Uliman Murn Riark Evridins yet you explain exactly how an Ibuin fruit works... How does a metal skull fly? Is it even aerodynamic? Are they using rocket boosters here, or hot air and fabric? pg 7: At chapter 1, I am more confused than when I started reading. The 3rd omniscient really threw me. I agree with Asmodemon that you should go with 3rd limited for a first book. Also, is his name Fistrid, or Fist? Were they the ones with the flying skull? I'm confused as to which side they're on. pg 11: Why was Diro trying to break through rock to get into a volcano? That makes no sense as to why it was the only option without some more explanation. Also, now you're talking about sea ships again. Which is it? pg 12: now you finally say the volcano is some portal to the demon world and that's where the skull sky ship came from. Tell the reader this in the first page of the prologue. pg 10 to 14 is an infodump explaining some of the things I've been completely confused about the whole time. It's unlikely I would have read this far to understand, and a 4-page infodump is not the place to explain. These tidbits need to be at the beginning of the book, as you bring in new ideas and words, to help the reader understand as he reads. I'd say take a step back, look at exactly where you want to go with this story, and start from the beginning, building up characters and descriptions of the new world you want to show us.

Okay, by now I'm repeating things, but I have a few different comments as well. Notably, you never actually say Corkle is a grasshopper. I assume so, but given that the ants hired a mantis, who knows? Comments: Descriptions are a little confusing on the first page. "Left shield/right shield". basically he's holding each diagonal to the other. I had a little problem with hand-dominace, as TracerTK notes, but then I thought he might not even have a hand-dominance, being a bug. How big are things? I sort of assume the mantis is large, compared to the ants. Maybe bigger than the grasshoppers. How big/what is Corkle? Are they all bug-size, or is this some magical/evolved future with giant bugs? pg 3: "He turned to survey the crowd. The grasshoppers were cheering wildly at his small success" --I guess he's fighting for the grasshoppers, then? pg 5: "There was a short skirmish, resulting in the death of the mantis and two of the grasshoppers." --this seems anticlimactic, after all the fighting Corkle did. Maybe a few sentences about how the grassoppers killed it, when Corkle was having so much trouble? pg 6: "Their comrades were just killed, and they’re laughing, Crokle thought. Are we so inured to death…?" --I'm not invested enough in the characters to sympathize here. pg 6: “Why don’t you stay here and rest,” the older one said Corkle. “We’ll go join the rest in killing off those ants.” --The repetition of "rest" with two meanings throws me off. pg 6: "Out of the corner of his eye, he saw movement in the box. A tall, thin figure had climbed in, and now crouched beside the dead queen." --So the grasshoppers created an intricate plan to kill the queen, but then didn't anticipate someone else would take control? Seems odd, as Corkle knows a lot about the ant colony structure. Overall, I didn't buy this story. I couldn't suspend my disbelief long enough to get into it. Several points contributed to this: 1) Still not sure what species Corkle is. 2) Why are the ants and grasshoppers fighting, and why has it come down to Corkle fighting a mantis? we know nothing about how he got here. He's not suited to fighting, so there's got to be a story behind it. Also, he doesn't believe either side wil keep their word after, so how would the two side have agreed to start? 3) There's no such thing as an ant king, and the ants wouldn't freeze without their queen--they'd probably frenzy. I know this comes under writer's license, and it's your story, but the reason I bring it up is your setup depends on using bugs as they exist in nature. Aside from somehow building an area and roping a mantis into fighting for them, they are basically bugs. So then you have to tell us how they are different (the ant queen has absolute magical control over her subjects), or use another species (the buglike alien Antzes are fighting the underdog Grs'prs over land rights) and then use the Earth species to give us an idea of how their bodies work. A couple others have made similar comments. I think the main issue is this doesn't work as a short story. It could be part of a longer story where you give us the setup for why this is happening, but not here. I didn't have a big problem with the end, mainly because by that point I wasn't cheering for Corkle. There needs to be more information to get us to where this starts. I think there could be a good story in here, but it stil needs some work.

Generally, I agree with Carcinios. I thought the story was well written, the characters were fine, but I guessed at the twist from when Jared was introduced as having sussed out the mutiny. The story was a pretty generic lineup of stating the intent and then just writing it out. Again, nothing wrong technically with how it was written, and I thought the atmosphere of the ship was very believable. But, either there should have been another element to the story idea, or the story should have been longer to develop characters more. One technical comment: pg 1: "Bryon wondered why anyone would choose to spoil such a scene." --was someone spoiling it? was he referring to mutiny? If so, the reader doesn't know about it yet.

Yep--TracerTK nailed the problem with this chapter, without even reading the other ones. First some comments: pg 2: Weigh instead of weight pg3: "Mahau exhaled the air he had kept inside his lungs without realising." --You have several of these types of phrasings, where it can be simplified to: "Mahau breathed out" or "Mahau sighed" or "Mahau realized he was holding his breath and exhaled." This is something to do in the editing process, but just be aware of them. pg 4: "She never uttered a word but her eyes cowed the god into shame. Assai lowered his eyes and didn't dare speak anymore." --This is sort of a POV error. You're almost into Assai's mind here rather than Mahau's. pg 6: "Assai's mouth gurgled almost as if he was going to throw up" --Not sure you have te right word there. Maybe twisted instead of gurgled? pg 8: "'In a sense we do have followers,' Mandos said. 'You lesser gods are our life blood. Take too much away, and the greater gods weaken." --And the elephant in the room. this is BIG revelation to drop on a lesser god. I assume this is guarded secret, since Mahau protests. If so, this needs to treated a lot bigger. The greater gods have kept it secret for a reason (presumably because it has something to do with becoming a greater god and they want their control) and they are not going to part with that information easily. It could target them just as much as the killer. I'm not saying don't reveal it--it's a great piece of worldbuilding--but make this a much bigger issue. Some of the greater gods will not want it revealed, and this would be a great shock to a lesser god, to realize he's suddenly just as much a follower. You can't just pass this information by in a paragraph. This section starts to reveal a lot more about the gods, and this is a great chance to put in some worldbuilding and tell the reader about what's going on. I don't think you really took advantage of that. We learned about how the lesser gods affect the greater gods, and that there are about 50 lesser gods. Who are the greater gods? I assume they are gods of something, like the lesser gods. How does this affect their personalities? Would it make some less willing to reveal their secrets? You mention Arden is Arlon's father, but we have no sense of how the gods would procreate. Is Arden his biological father, or adoptive, or did he make him in some way? I can only draw relations to the Greek/Roman gods based on what you've told us so far--in that they are just as petty and fight as much as humans. But each of the Greek/Roman gods had a very distinct personality and area of godhood, which you haven't really given here. Overall, I think this is what is missing in the book. You have a good setup going, but you tend to skip past a lot of the questions (and fun) that immediately come to mind if someone were to say "a lesser god is investigating the murder of other gods."

If no one else minds, I'd say post it to the group again if Silk is ok with it.

Did you ever send this one out?