Mandamon

Hello all, Here is my latest short story, once again. Comments last time said this fell flat and wasn't engaging enough at the end, so let me know if this is better. And any other comments, of course. Deconstruct away!

Alright, I think I'm ready to resubmit Rey's First Job on Monday. It's about 5500 words now, so a little on the heavy side if that's alright.

Much better chapter. It cuts down a lot on the slogging and talking, and I think it still gets all the salient points across. I also enjoyed the larger theme of magic in this chapter, and building out some of the history. S studying magic is a bit a a contradiction though, so more explanation of why S is suddenly engaging with magic would help. I do agree Sam's emotional impact is better for having the interlude about them. pg 2: "Sam brushed past me, his shoulder hitting mine hard enough to force me forward. --maybe too much? I would expect some reaction from S for this. (edit: the one at the end of the chapter works, but still not sure about this one.) pg 2: also/also two sentences in a row. pg 2: people live in villages *on* the glacier? pg 2: "No side trips. Four generations haven’t been able to find Iana’s Lake, and we’re not going to, either." --glad this clarification is in there, but it's sort of out of the blue. Has anyone else mentioned Iana's lake recently? The kiss-and-tell section does a better job of getting us information and showing the relationship between S and M. However, why does Sam keep creeping up? I would think after the first time he saw them occupied he would have left them alone for a few minutes. pg 7: "I shrugged and leaned into M. “She likes curly hair.”" --Lol pg 8: "It was an alchemical study, nothing more." --hmm...I dont' quite buy S wanting to study old magic. S has been violently opposed to it until now, thinking it was a perversion of nature, unless something has changed. The lake experience with S is much better. Still not completely sure about S wanting to study the lake though. pg 12: "If the lakes act like that, no wonder the Miantri villagers were spooked when you appeared from nowhere." --ok, I'll buy this. pg 12: “I don’t need to get drunk and I have no interest in magic,” --yeah, this. Why would S go out of the way to study it? S says nearly the same thing a couple more times. pg 19: “You toss it aside like a toy. Without respect for your guild, or our family’s history.” --yeah, ok. Have to say I agree. Some of it is A's pushing, but I get the feeling S never full-stop refused to do woodworking, and in a certain sense, was stringing A along with hope that S would change.

I remember this somewhat from the first time you posted, and this time it's reading smoother. The others have good thoughts on Joe lacking a personality and the privacy invasion. I didn't have as much problem (although selling surlpus military drones is a bit odd) with the lack of privacy, but maybe I was already expecting a dystopic society, from having read this before. If that part gets some more setup, I think the drones might be more believable. Maybe some of them belong the government and citizens just started following along? As @kais said, this does need some editing on the show/tell front. Some of the dialogue and reactions are a little too on-the-nose and the dialogue is still one of the weakest parts. If you don't already, it might be good to say the lines out loud and see if they sound right. Aside from that, I really enjoy the payoff at the end of the story. You've got a good try/fail cycle, and good feeling of success at the end. Notes while reading: pg 1: "Marlene Schaffer" --I'd maybe put this with the first instance of the name rather than further down in the paragraph. pg 1: "Predator done before" --Drone? pg 2: "Wedding present" repeated in the same paragraph pg 11: "They showed every part of her body in lurid detail. The pictures made her feel violated. Then she saw the comments below the pictures." --The middle sentence is uneccessary. Telling pg 17: "Joe pretended not to hear what the privacy fence had just said. The cold, glaring expression on Marlene’s face showed otherwise." --again, telling

Yes--there was shouting involved...

pg 3: "The large animals defecated on the cobblestone road, pulling the aristocrats in their decorative wagons," --these two thoughts perhaps should be in different sentences. pg 7: "flickered toward the amulet on the table's damaged edge" --Wait, Rowan put the illegal magical thing, punishable by death, out on the edge of the table? Why? Yes, similar response to @kais. This is better, but still not there. My biggest two issues are the amulet on the table, and that I'm still lacking the "why." Why is Warren randomly sending young men to their death? He seems to have a reason for it, but he was surprised by the Rowan embracing the fire. We need some reason why Rowan would go through with what is obviously a bad idea, besides complete stupidity. Has Warren promised him a huge amount of money for transporting an illegal object? Also would like to know more about the woman, the blind man, and the swordsman at the end, though I'm assuming they may come up in another part? Is this the first chapter of a larger story, or meant to stand by itself?

Hey all--it's the last day of my Kickstarter! Just wanted to share that I've passed the first stretch goal--yay!! I'll also be at a local street Con all today, hopefully selling more people on the Kickstarter, so it may go even higher. I'll let you all know what happens. I am definitely ready to be over this thing and get back to regular writing. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/spacewizard/the-seeds-of-dissolution-a-dissolutionverse-novel

Edited! Thanks @Chaos. The link decided to turn into the video, for some reason.

I like that.

Hey folks! Poking my head out from the Reading Excuses rock for a quick post because I was excited to share an achievement with the other readers here! I've been writing seriously for about 10 years now, and decided to put my latest book, The Seeds of Dissolution, out by Kickstarter. I was very happy to see it got fully funded with a week to spare! Thought the folks here might be interested, as it definitely has some inspiration from Sanderson and Jordan. The campaign ends on Saturday the 16th, so go take a look! The artist is Micah Epstein, who has done several covers for Tor.com stories. He'll be doing several interior illustrations for me as well (based on stretch goals). Only three days left, but I'm very happy about my progress! I hope to do more Kickstarters for later books... Edit: The first two chapters are linked from the project page, if you want to read them! Edit2: Here's the actual link!: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/spacewizard/the-seeds-of-dissolution-a-dissolutionverse-novel

I thought these chapters were much improved. More color to the townspeople and the guilds vs. machinery. This escape makes a lot more sense as well. I didn't think this interlude was too long. it held together better than the others to me. Pg 1-2: better conversation between M and S. I'm glad M is asking some more pointed questions. pg 3: "Border towns near the glacier have a bad history with the unbound guilds. " --yes, but why? Or is this explained elsewhere? A couple sentences about the witches killing a villager in a border town or something would help. pg 4: "Miantri took down its guildhall last year. For an entire year that factory has been running in secret, churning out cotton thread faster than any human hand could. No wonder the textile guild disbanded!" --Love this. Much better on the worldbuilding side. pg 6: The dynamic between M and S seems different, though not bad. I'm glad M is addressing how S has been isolated, but don't want S to lose more agency. Ch 9: good improvement. There's a lot more urgency and I can see a lot more worldbuilding about the guilds and industrialization coming through. pg 11: :but you know what a witch means here" --I'm assuming this is covered before ch 9, then. pg 13: I like the version a lot better. Makes the villagers better than just an unruly mob, since they cacn be talked to. pg 16: "Is there an amulet around here?" --glad this got tied in more. Ch 10: Also reading much better. I got sucked into reading, so didn't have as many comments. I can tell the guilds and worldbuilding is threaded back into the story more. pg 19: "soundless on it’s rusting " --its pg 20: "Really, there’s no limit to magic, unlike alchemy, which has that ridiculous set of rules.” --No one had mentioned alchemy, so this reads as an infodump. pg 20: "that tick of yours, too" --I assume this is scratching S's arms? pg 20: "The floor will need a full strip and refinish as well" --Surely the varnish isn't very good if it gets messed up with every mess?

1) Does the story work? As a try/fail cycle, yes. It does get a little repetitive, as A just goes home to Dad and thus gets the next idea. I like A as a character, and the moments between her and her father are well written. However, I agree with a lot of what the others have said on the near-future aspect, especially the information gathering. As a city planner, A. would have access to lots of driver's data. However, unless she worked for a car company, she would not be able to push an update to the cars. She could push updates to the traffic regulation system, and potentially change what information the cars read, but not what they did with it. Also, looking at individual drivers is a sample size of 1, which doesn't tell you much. You would need the data cubes from 10k+ drivers (or some sizable fraction of actual traffic flow) to see all the patterns well enough to determine where to make corrections in the programming. I'm also bothered by the potholes, for some reason. I'm not surprised money would go to advertizing, but if the cars are reading something from the road, potholes could potentially cause errors. 2) Does the story work for the theme? Yes? It's about making cities more efficient, and thus using less resources, but does it make the city more climate friendly? Not sure. Notes while reading: pg 2: "The car shuddered as it fell into first gear." --Just from a futuristic/wrolbuilding aspect, the car is likely to have a CVT (continuously variable transmission) and thus no discernible gear changes. pg 4: "What’s a walmart?" --eh, Walmart will probalby be around for a while. pg 8: "“Understandable. New technology can take some adjustment,” Mickey said." --Where'd the switch to a nickname come from? pg 8: "not sure I could get it passed city council" --past pg 11: good try/fail cycles, although you could pad them a little. There's a definite pattern of go to Dad's house, he does X that makes A come up with a new plan. pg 13: "Vinyl records were well out of fashion by the time she was a teenager" --maybe before she was born? They were going out of fashion when I was a teenager, and I assume this is set in the future. I enjoyed reading the story, and I think this is some of your best writing. The problems mainly stem from the technical aspect, which is the hardest part to get right in a near-future story.

I think @Robinski covered this pretty well (especially the grammar, so I will refrain on that point)! I did enjoy this, however. I think the overall intent was good, if a couple of the plot points weren't quite there. Character buy in: I think you have the start of a good character. Like Robinksi, I had trouble with him suddenly forgetting one number when he's gone over the plan so much. I think that could be removed to raise the "competence" slider, even if he's a bit naive. Story and character consistency: I'm not sold on the plot yet. Is Warren getting gullible marks to "turn in" forbidden magic items? Why can't Warren just be a magical bounty hunter and turn them in himself? Why does the priest feel the need to burn innocent people when claiming the artifacts? He as much as said he was burning R for show, and I think we need that information in the story to have the plot make sense. R's magic powers at the end: I don't mind this as much as Robinski. We often see "the chosen one" manifesting strange powers, even if that trope is well-used. As long as we get an in-world explanation fairly soon, I'm ok with it. You could also seed something in with the magical artifact information about how the magic here works. The bar scene: Yeah--can take it or leave it. There is a lot of opportunity to make it something more interesting rather than relying on old tropes. Cultural appropriation: This is a touchy subject. 1) Clydesdales: I'll admit I was pulled out by this as well. I think naming them specifically would make it take place on Earth, simply because it's a very specific type of horse with a history of how it was bred. If you want to say they were huge draft horses, bred for strength, and R was always awed the size of them, that could work because you establish a history for them. 2) The same sort of thing happens when you take a bit from Native Americans/Japan/Scotland etc. Without showing a history behind them. Katanas are cool, but that's because of our culture's fascination with Japan. Why are they cool in this world? More to the point, who made them and why? It may be okay to have the same type of item that exists on Earth, but there needs to be a reason why besides "I saw it in another culture and it was cool." Notes while reading: pg 2: he can't remember what to do about the tables, then top of page three he runs through the instructions. Sounds like he doesn't have trouble remembering. pg 4: thoughts need to be in italics pg 4: "Of all the possession he'd lost in the last few years, his sketch pad was all the was left" --could just say that the sketch pad was his only possession left. pg 5: "R wasn't sure who he was supposed to be meeting here," --wait, what? All that planning and they don't actually know who he's meeting? In all, I did enjoy this, and I think it has a lot of potential!

Thanks @Robinski for the comments and language clarification! I have some ideas how to spice this up already. I'm going to work on it this week and see if I can't make it pop a little more. I think showing how messing with the machine impacts the community will help a lot. Yeah--this is a bit handwavy. I may just delete it rather than trying to explain. Re: the crate. This needs a lot more clarification, or maybe just to be scrapped and replaced with something clearer.

All of them? ;-) (Looking through my Goodreads list...) Recently, I've read Sanderson and Mary Robinette Kowal (of course), N. K. Jemisin, Kameron Hurley's The Stars are Legion, Becky Chamber's Wayfinders series (which is space opera), Jim Butcher, Nnedi Okorafor's Binti series, The Expanse (SciFi again...), V.E. Schwab, Seanan McGuire's Every Heart a Doorway, Charles Stross, David Levine's Arabella Series, Max Gladstone, Marie Brennan's Lady Trent series, Robert Jackson Bennett's Divine Cities... And many others...

@Ammanas Love those! Hurley definitely has a thing...I think the first line of The Stars are Legion is something like "I remembered throwing away my child."

I'm glad I'm not the only one who didn't like it. That was the first of Hurley's book's I tried to read. I made it through the first one, but only just. I really liked the worldbuilding, but like you said, I didn't really enjoy the message. I've heard her other stuff is really good, so I was happy to enjoy The Stars are Legion.

That's awesome! Yes I think Kameron Hurley may have primed that pump for you (so to speak...). Have you read The Star Are Legion? I just finished it and it's really good. As for your (good) problem, maybe sell preorders? Have a laptop, sell on Amazon, and sign bookmarks or cards instead?

Yep, parking has certainly gotten more expensive in the last couple years. In other news, the Kickstarter got funded yesterday!!! Yaaay! There's still a week left, so I'm hoping to hit a couple of the stretch goals...

Interesting! I wonder why they went to Raleigh instead of Charlotte? Charlotte's closed to the North/South Carolina border and bigger.

Aha--that may help out. Thanks @rdpulfer (also thanks for backing!!!)

This is better than the first time around, but still has a lot of adjectives and extra words. I think this sets up the inciting incident, but still could be cut down to get there. A sparring session when we don't know the characters doesn't tell us much about them, and the first three pages or so are just P recovering from getting knocked out. The last couple pages of this work well, and I don't think a reader would miss anything from starting on page 4 or so. Notes while reading: first paragraph is pretty awkward, especially "shouted half a falling man’s cry." I'm not really sure what that means pg 1: "Hearing silvered bees?” --do what? pg 3: "Landon wasted no time" --you suddenly change from "his uncle" to "Landon" here, and don't introduce his name. --Also, most of the text between him falling on his face up to here doesn't really add anything I can see. pg 6: "contubernium" --I have no idea what this is. Needs a couple words of explanation. Is it a machine? an animal? a group? a person?

Thanks! if you know anyone who like a copy, let them know! Good comments on the pacing, @TKWade. I'll try to tighten it up. Thanks, @industrialistDragon! Yes--I think this is what's been nagging me about the story. I'll look for better ways to engage him. Ooh--I like this solution! I may steal it, if that's alright.

Thanks @Robinski!

Interlude 2: I'm with @industrialistDragon that I never showed off to anyone else either. But I'm an only child, so maybe it's more a sibling thing? I didn't feel the interludes were too long. Are you planning them as separate chapter-ets, or tagged on to the beginning of a chapter? I'd do these as separate. pg 2: "I climbed back onto the bed and hovered over her" --like, S is laying on top of M? pg 2: "I think we’re supposed to be sleeping." --I would think they would have gotten some direction, or at least know it was past bedtime. pg 2: The story reads more as an infodump. Or maybe S is a really bad storyteller ;-). Also not sure what the parts were that made Sorin uncomfortable. Where those what she left out? Is this meant to replace telling that story up at the glacier? If so, I'd expand a bit to give it some depth. If it's told in both places, I feel like that will be redundant. Interlude 3: The setup is good, but I want something a little more out of the ending. You hint that A is keeping S away from M, but never really give a reason or how this affects S. I'm not sure whether the focus is S and M or the binders. Interlude 4: I like this one the best of the three. The only problem I have is this section: "I stayed on the ground and raked my hands over my arms. It relieved that horrible, incessant itching that came when people looked at me, or talked to me, or assumed, insisted, that I was a girl." I think it would be more powerful if we knew before that Sam was going to accuse S of being a boy, and thus not an heir. That leads better into S's quandary and why the scabs on the arms. It kept my interest, but partly because I had heard of the situation from later on in the book when Sa/S reference it. If I didn't know about it, I might be more lost, so placement in the story is probably important.