Mandamon

This is another beefy one, all of part 11 at around 9100 words. Things are definitely wrapping up here. Only one more section after this with about 6000 words. Let me know what you think, and as usual, any and all comments are welcome: plot, setting, character, grammar, etc.

Thanks @Warmacky, @shatteredsmooth, and @Sarah B! Sounds like this one reads slower, so now I'm wondering what @kais will think of it. I know they enjoy the sciency parts more. I'll see what Kais says. It might just need some edits. Good point. That will help me figure out what to change. You'll get a big one next chapter! Makes sense. Maybe I need to stagger the first and second parts of this chapter a bit. Glad this worked! I really like writing these characters!

Thanks @Warmacky, @Sarah B, @kais, and @shatteredsmooth! I really enjoyed writing these parts, so glad they're enjoyable. You can rest easy with Al. I decided to give him a break this book ;-) Yep, I can see this. I was going to say Kais' comment might be handled by the next section, but Shatteredsmooth already read it, so I'll need to beef up this arc a bit. Thanks again!

Well, I have another 9000 word chapter. If not one else is going next week, anyone mind if I take two slots again on the 16th?

This is the second half of part 10, and we're getting close to the end of this book! I'm actually under the word count for once. As a reminder, this starts up right after Al goes out dancing in the last submission, and this part largely focuses on building the colony, again. Let me know what you think, and as usual, any and all comments are welcome: plot, setting, character, grammar, etc.

Actually within the word limit this time! I'd like to submit the rest of part 10 on the 9th.

Thanks @shatteredsmooth! Yep. Definitely fueled from...er...events. Lol. Glad you like him! Again, it's really interesting to see who likes which characters. I think between six people responding here everyone has a different POV they like most and least. I hope that means this format is working. Yes, @kais mentioned the same thing. I think I need to bulk the last lines up a bit.

Thanks to @Sarah B, @Silk, @Ace of Hearts, @kais, and @Warmacky! Ha! Yeah, that would have been fun. Not...yet! Great comments on this section. Ji is definitely an optimist, always looking to how she can move tot he next best thing. Tying this more to the kids will definitely happen in the next few sections, but I can add some more here for the emotion. On communal support for A, I think I need to make this clearer and tie it to her stubbornness as to why she's trying to do it all herself. Can do Probably a bad idea, but then the whole colony is at major risk anyway. But yeah, I can adjust this. Check and check. Will address. Yep! It comes up more later as well. They changed when the ships landed on the planet! Yes, specifically chosen. I was using this as a bit of a mental power play from J, showing where she thinks of herself in relation to the others. I'm using these sections as a type of general update to show what's happening at a higher level, but I can up the emotions as well. Hopefully that will make these connect better. Yes, this is something specific to the biomass to enable it to build larger structures. I was assuming it just hadn't finished with the vein they found. There are others around, but much harder to find. I can clean this up. I think I need to dig into this a bit more and up the emotions in the section to get away from the infodump and address Gen complaints more. It won't fully come to a head until much later. With handwavium? Wil address. Part of this is just to keep the Gens busy so they don't have time to revolt or get our of hand. I can make this clearer in J's sections. Noted. I can make it clearer how fast they're running out of materials. Yes, they're sort of NPCs at this point, just because they're so young. But they will play a larger part later, and will also be important in books 2 and 3! It's really interesting reading through the comments on this book in general. Different people like different POVs more, which was what I was hoping. The snapshots of the colony was definitely an experiment on my part, but it seems to be working? The next edit is focusing on upping the emotion and making sure the stakes remain high, so I'll address those points. Excellent comments from everyone and thanks again for tackling this huge section!

I have surprisingly few notes on this! It was a very well constructed story. You have good worldbuilding, exposed piece by piece through the story, the characters are excellent, and the plot fulfills a nice single objective--T getting her cat back. There were a lot of grammar errors and typos in here, so another pass would be good to catch all those, but that's a second draft issue. If you want a place to cut this down just a little, the interaction with the townspeople in the middle went on a little long, but has good tension as to what they will do to her. This can definitely work as a stand alone. It gives plenty of depth to the world and characters. I also love the idea of other stories in this world. Some things that caught my attention were the idea of the Catlords, like Tru. I'd love to see how that works. The townspeople were also interesting, in how they survived. I really liked the Wild West feel of the story though, roughing it out in the apocalypse. I wonder how much wildlife survived this new apex predator though? I'd imagine game is getting scarcer in the Catlands... Notes while reading: Pg 1: "There was no border in the Catlands and even if there was no self respecting cat who would abide them." -- missing a comma and an extra "who" Pg 2: genes -> jeans Pg 18: "since she spoke with Sir." --is this P.? I think this is the first time she refers directly to him this way Pg 19: "could have been her cat." Is this the mother? A little confused.

Here's the majority of part 10, which not as big as last week, but still large! The last bit of it will come next week. Feel free to read this in parts or only comment on sections, or whatever works best. Another of my favorite sections in this one, when I realized I was writing a hobbit... Let me know what you think, and as usual, any and all comments are welcome: plot, setting, character, grammar, etc.

Works for me!

I'm fine with the whole thing, as long as no one else want to go for next week. Between the two of us, that would take up 4 slots.

Well evidently the next section of my book has surpassed even my usual lengthy tendencies and is over 12k words long! Would it be okay if I took two slots again on the 1st and submitted about 7800 words? The week after I could finish out the chapter with a section that's actually under the 5k limit.

Thanks @shatteredsmooth! Emotions always seem to suffer on my first passes. I'll try to dial it up the next edit. Yes, all the main characters (except for J) are early 20's. I know I've mentioned it before, but it's been a few chapters. I'll see if I can find another place to slip it in.

Excited to read this! I agree with @Warmacky that there is a lot here that could be condensed, but that can all be corrected easily in the next edit. There were several infodumpy sections and I also noticed some of the dialogue was a little stilted. However, I thought there was a good arc to this chapter. We see S as proactive, taking the lead on the investigation, and learning more about the crystals. I enjoyed that we learned what the red ones were for. I didn't have a problem with the amount of worldbuilding, personally, but I like denser stories like this with a lot to learn. The character interactions were probably the most stilted for me. I really like the characters that are here, but there were several places where it seemed like extra pieces were inserted to help tell what the character was about. Showing that more subtly would read smoother. Once we had the character building mostly out of the way in the first half of the chapter, the second half sped along nicely with the investigation. Notes while reading: pg 1: "She thought there was an ongoing infiltration into the palace" --So I guess if this is happening, it's not to obvious. pg 1: "do after his marriage" --this was a little confusing. I expected he already had something arranged from this line, but reading further, it sound like he doesn't have any prospects yet. pg 2: "still attracted to him" --had something changed? pg 2: "didn’t report it to authorities" --there's some good potential conflict here, but I don't think it's big enough. This should be one of the first thing he thinks when running into the palace. pg 2: "hide the sensitive parts from her" --Is there anything not sensitive about one of the siblings of the ruler trying to create a coup? pg 4: "And while it was now part of the unified religion" --a bit infodumpy through here. Also, wouldn't S have sought her out before now, since she has information on the Red Angel? pg 4: "They had some explanation about him having an additional nonmale inheritance unit when boys were only supposed to have one, but none of that made any sense to S" --Could probably delete this sentence. I don't think this adds much. pg 5: "his betrothed." --oh, well that threw me for a loop. I assumed he wasn't engaged yet. pg 6: "since palace nobles so much as knowing..." --yeah, this echoes what I was thinking above. pg 7: "What he needed to do was mediate the situation" --This is good--it gives S some space to shine and be competent. pg 10: good action through this part. S is actually doing something, which makes him more interesting. pg 12: "We’re both playing with secrets beyond our station." --Now I'm wondering where J is. He's talked about a lot, but hasn't made an appearance. pg 12: Nice to learn what the red crystals do. pg 15: The last half of this read very quickly and I quite enjoyed it. Nice flow and good tension!

Thanks for submitting! It's an interesting character sketch of L, and shows his compassion, but I'm not sure there's actually a story in here. We do see change from the boy in that he stands up straight, but there's not any change in L from the beginning to the end. You might think through Mary Robinette's MICE quotient and pick one of the four that you want to show off in this story--likely either "character" or "event"--and that might give it a little more direction. Assuming I'm correct on the song title, this is short enough you could actually lean into it more, going through some of the descriptions in the song, which would also being some humor into the situation, as L is trying to do. Notes while reading: so I'm guessing the song is, pg 1: "but they wanted to be part of it even less." --is this implying they would be hanged for not showing up? It's a little unclear pg 2: L and J's names are a bit on the nose with the above song title... pg 5: If I'm right on the song title, L could also end with a bow to the audience...

This is all of part 9, which is a whopping 9200 words. But less than the max for two submissions! At any rate, feel free to read this in parts or only comment on sections, or whatever works best. I know it's a lot. There are only three more parts after this, so things are lining up for the conclusion of this book. The second book starts up about 20 years after this one ends. Let me know what you think, and as usual, any and all comments are welcome: plot, setting, character, grammar, etc.

Thanks @Silk, @C_Vallion, and @Ace of Hearts! Check. I'll see if I can address this. Good point! I'll have to address this. Could be. I'll check this out. Yeah, that line may go. I'm adding in some more description and showing the extra immunization steps taken. I think that's more what it will be. I'm adding some more conversations in this edit about how the Gens know what their placement is in the colony, even if they're not happy about it. Lol. Now you're giving me ideas. Nice! That's exactly what I wanted. Good point. I can have someone more "official" say this too. Cool. I'm working on that part now. Awesome. I'm glad this is working.

Thanks @C_Vallion, @Silk, and @Ace of Hearts! Thanks for all the corrections! Those will go into the next rounds of edits. I'll go back and look at F's reaction too, see if I can rationalize that better. More that it was really tall, but away from the wall. They hadn't cut back the length of the tower away from the wall. I can clarify. Good point. Can do. Yeah, this has been in the back of my mind the whole time. I'm changing up the delivery system a little in the second draft so spores aren't so dangerous. I'll look into this on the next edit. There's a little bit about this in the next chapter! It's a bit of each...which will have more ramifications in the second book ;-)

Thanks @Ace of Hearts! I'll be working on the emotions in the second draft, so hopefully will fill this out. This is another thing I'll be adding in, with more pushback from the other Admins.

If everyone's alright with it, I can submit the whole thing this week and see how it goes. That would be four slots with you and @jamesbondsmith, which is still technically below the 5 sub limit. If we get anyone more, I'll only do half.

Submitting again for the 25th. This will be part 1 of part 9. Unless... If I'm the only one submitting, does anyone mind if I take up two sections and submit the whole section? It's about 9100 words total and can easily be broken into multiple sections while reading. Only 4 parts left in the book and if I can do it this way, I'll be done mid-May.

Thanks @Sarah B Good to know. That's sort of what I was intending here. I see if I can make it clearer. Noted I'll check this part out.

Thanks @kais! I'm going to have to prop this up a lot in the book. Maybe they get spritzed with goop derived from the parents? Immunized to certain common diseases? And fed lots of sounds and sensations. I'll need to add some more at the beginning but I don't want to weight it down too much. I'm pulling the inspiration for this from Bujold's Vorkosigan saga, and because it frees up all genders in relationships. So I want to keep it, but I need to make sure it works. Sounds like this is consistent, so I'll adjust. Partially WRS. They did both agree, but I'm also working on upping A's emotions a lot during this rewrite to make that clearer. Do they not? I swear I've heard them do so...

OOoooooo. You know this is going right in the book. Pink bees! Thanks @kais!