Silk

Got it! Generally speaking, whatever will be more useful to you is what you should submit! Submitting the short might give you enough time to revise and put it through the group again, if you wanted, but that probably depends on your sense of any changes you already want to make to the draft. As for the extract, yes, please do split it up if that's what you choose to submit - we have learned from experience that anything over 5k words becomes difficult to keep up with in a real hurry.

Sure thing, it looks like we have @Mandamon and @jamesbondsmith for tomorrow so far. Any other takers? Mandamon, I'm hoping to catch up on your other sub today!

@Mandamon so far. Any other takers? Shard won't let me tag you. Did you want to submit this week?

Yeaaah know that feeling. It happens!

Have fun! So it looks like just @kais for Monday so far. Any other takers?

Congratulations on the first sub! As I read: The introduction works well enough, but after the first paragraph begins to feel a bit long. P1 “Swaying gently… G contemplated…” for some reason I thought they were moving at a full gallop, but this suggests otherwise. I think it was the sense of urgency in the first two paragraphs that queued me to believe they were moving at a run. Okay, onto the second page and the introduction is definitely becoming long. There is a lot of reflection in this first couple of pages that seems at odds with the sense of urgency the chapter started with, and even as far as three pages in we’re not getting any more information about why it’s happening (though it’s good that we get some explanation of why he’s so reluctant). “Many others in my position hunger for this chance…” I was initially fairly skeptical of this. It wasn’t until later that I realized he was being assigned a command position without any prior experience, which makes this make a bit more sense. May need to move some of the info around. This conversation reminiscing about fistfights with siblings also seems – again, just at odds with G’s tenseness before: during this conversation he seems genuinely relaxed. I see why you’re aiming for that structurally as the pause before the ambush happens, but from a character perspective it doesn’t quite make sense. It seems like a very long time passes between the initial attack on the horse and people actually running out of the bushes for an ambush. I could maybe just buy G’s failure to notice the arrow for that long given his inexperience, but the ambush definitely took too long to happen. Top of p7 “The attacking soldiers reached them” I thought there were already people pouring out of the bushes? My impression was that G was already in the thick of things by now. “G’s eyes widened and he cursed…” seems pretty overstated for just having the sword get wet. Or is this about the fact that he hasn’t even unsheathed his weapon yet? If so, that’s worth hanging a lantern on. “I have a feeling they won’t spare you just because you’re not the prince” Well, we did see them do just that with the other folks. Overall: There’s some good interiority here and some good glimpses of the horror of war, but I think there are two major things missing. First, a clearer idea of what the stakes are – who’s fighting? Why? Why does this action that G is riding to right now matter, for him personally, for the bigger picture? Second, I mentioned the interiority above, and I think it’s both a strength and a weakness. I highlighted several places in my LBLs where it felt like the reflection from G went on too long. In the early parts fo the chapter it’s mostly that we’re getting too much reflection without moving the plot forward, and in the later parts of the chapter I’m having trouble suspending my disbelief that he has that long to stop and think about things in the middle of battle. It feels like the world around him often pauses a little too often to accommodate his tendency to reflect. That said, I’m quite happy to get a military fantasy where the main character isn’t a soldier or brilliant warrior, and I’m totally on board with G freezing up in a fight as he seems to do here. Worth noting that I would expect him to continue grappling with this in some way through later parts of the narrative, but you already seem to have that setup underway. And, as others have mentioned, the prose itself is pretty clean and easy to read, and it looks like you've got a good way forward for the next chapter. All in all, a good start! Congrats again!

Looks like a spam post. Dealt with accordingly, thanks.

P1 “were the start of the new infection” that being what And’s colleagues experienced the last tim they were in the mushroom hole? P2 good sense of tenseness from And here. Makes me realize that this was largely missing in the last scene. Are the Gens also in containment suits, I hope? (This question could also be phrased as “exactly HOW evil are the Vs/Ads?”) P3 “The person flailed until another began…” It feels like there’s a missing word here. Another person? Another V? P4 “Five fellow v soldiers” V should be capitalized, I think “First step was to clear out this cavern.” Since this is not going well for them, and since the cavern opened up from underground (I think?) would it not make more sense for them to try and seal it off? Silk-the-SFF-reader knows this won’t work, but they don’t seem to have considered this option. “partially sterilized by the ships landing” meaning that some bacteria etc would be cleared out? Otherwise I’m not sure what’s meant here. Does this planet even have bacteria, or is it mostly mushrooms? “Hoping there were none of the mobile fungal animals around” this seems pretty understated, since I don’t think this is something we’ve actually seen on screen yet. We’ve seen F mention them, and we’ve seen the fungus eat animals, but I don’t think we’ve seen fungal animals yet, unless I’m suffering from a particularly acute case of WRS here? I ADORE the phrase “hateful lily pads” “…they would have known the Kh was unstable…” I definitely agree with Al on his complaints, but this paragraph is a bit jumbled as he jumps from complaint to complaint – first that they didn’t know the ship was unstable, then that untrained people had been running drone herds, then that it had been landed improperly to begin with (I think?). They’re all valid complaints but they seem to come in no particular order. P7 “dunking ten more vial in” should be vials F’s scene mostly seems to exist to reveal that the fungi are all connected. I think something to connect it back to the larger story – an emotional touchstone, or something that gives us an idea of what this actually means for the colonists – would be helpful. P10 “Think like someone who is very busy…” Okay, this interaction between J and F is helpful, as the first interaction between the Ads and the Gens, because it really drives home what we’ve been seeing sideways so far, the unhappy relationship between the two groups. Also, it’s the first evidence we’ve seen of J herself actively being a jerk. “…start rationing the flamethrower fuel.” They haven’t been doing that already?! These people are – yeah, you know the rest. F is using the word “plants” when he actually means mushrooms. The rest of this scene is so very “scientist talks to the laypeople” (which I am enjoying, btw! I have a secret weak spot for scenes like this) that the him saying “plants” seemed off here. Also, the way F so casually references fire propagation also seems off – that seems like it would be a much larger concern, since they have been pretty liberal with flamethrowers and, you know, ship engines and general burning things so far. Unless they have pretty solid evidence that fire propagation doesn’t happen with this biomass, I think It’d at least be worth a mention that “hey setting them on fire could actually be helping them reproduce.” …Is C about to suggest eating the fungi? They’d better not to be about to suggest eating the fungi. OMG EATING THE FUNGI IS A BAD IDEA C NO Again, F at least seems to somewhat get the gravity of the situation, but the “as long as the mushrooms don’t keep growing and eat us from the inside out” seems kind of understated here Wait, Ji is back on-screen? Obviously she’s out of the hospital and at least somewhat recovering? I didn’t realise there’d been such a large time jump. The “back to the cavern” scene in particular led me to think that this was pretty immediate (since I assume they would have wanted to tie up that particular loose end promptly). This section with Ji ends on a more optimistic note than I would expect, given that she nearly got pulverized by a falling spaceship last time we saw her. I could see it making sense given the way she’s been presented so far as a character with big-picture ambitions, but might be worth hanging a lantern on. P13 “but Amin had insisted” should be Adm I think? “We poured it specifically instead of printing it” great detail here. “I’ll make sure we’re both remembered” Oh no P14 “Vs didn’t get distracted” I know that And is distracted because of his hand, but the “other Vs were shifting, around him” (and I think the comma there is extraneous by the way) suggests that they are ALSO distracted, so I had to read this a couple of times. I’m assuming this is the same hand that got the mushroom bite. Might be worth confirming that somewhere in here – though might be equally worth being subtle about it (noting it had healed over, or whatever). The last “muux” should be capitalized, yes? Start of a sentence. “getting taller and eyes growing noticeably larger” good idea, but remind me how long they’ve been travelling again – how many actual generations has it been, I thought it had only been four hundred years or so? I don’t know if that’s enough time for evolution to really take its course that noticeably – at least on the eyes. I think the lack of gravity actually can make a relatively immediate difference in terms of height (probably not that noticeable in general, but over several generations it might be). P15 “And you forgot about it?” Glad you hung a lantern on it, because I was also scepitcal of this. That may come from me being a person who knows she is reading a science fiction narrative, though. P16 “I’m going to palpate this a little…” She’s already done this. Could just change to “again” if she’s trying to squeeze mushroom out of his hand. (which, ew.) P17 “I fear it may be a losing battle…” This seems like a large/abrupt jump, especially since we’ve had no indication other than the hand that And is all unwell. This might make more sense if she starts asking him about whether he’s experiencing alarming symptoms – I feel like we need more of a ramp up to this. Oh, they do have MRIs. Good. The definite no on “anti-fungal medication” also seems abrupt, since it was a quite logical question on And’s part. I think we need a bit more explanation here – no anti-fungal medication strong enough/nothing that would respond to this specific fungus? Anti-fungal medication takes too long to have an effect given how quickly they think it’s moving? Actually seeing the fungus reaching for important organs on the MRI? …Okay, now I’m just having fun at your expense and should probably stop. Overall: Still enjoying this, but I'm starting to feel a bit antsy for - not for things to happen, because things are happening, but more for a better sense of the bigger picture. We're getting lots of little slices of the different challenges people are facing, but I'm now looking forward to seeing how things really start to come together.

As a flash piece or compact short story, I do, yes. I actually thought you were going for a short story with "Magic requires X" as a framing device at first. But then I like to play with weird structural things.

P2 “It certainly enough power” it certainly wasn’t enough power? I think? I’m curious as to why it makes a difference whether the seaglass is already part of a necklace, but not sure it matters to the story. P3 “She made due” should be “made do” Hmm. p4 so when F noticed blonde hair in the water, I initially assumed it was snail girl. Since F doesn’t react, I now think it wasn’t, but I think we need a confirmation either way. When you introduced St at the meeting my first thought was “Steven Segall” p7 “a restaurant that specializes” should be “specialized” “A lot of it involved spying on the police.” I thought H was asking her to be involved in interviews? Spying on the police doesn’t sound like interviews. P8 “After they got the time and cause of death for the police…” should be “from the police Still not sure how this involves spying on the police, though. Assuming that information is not released publicly (which would probably depend on whether or not the police suspected foul play, for cause at least) you already have someone sneaking into the morgue. Couldn’t you get the information from the files there? I was confused by the last line. It feels like it’s supposed to be significant, but the library seems to be unrelated to anything Overall: I’m going to say this off the top because I think it’s probably colouring my opinion fairly strongly – I actually thought this was the opening to a short story, and it wasn’t until the coven scene that I figured out it was probably supposed to be the opening chapter of a novel. I was expecting a quick escalation that didn’t come (well, sort of did, with the finding of the body) and so wasn’t looking for quite the same emotional touchstones as I would have been if I’d realized I was reading a novel. That being said... I’m definitely intrigued! The first scene in particular had me pulled in pretty much immediately, and I had almost nothing to say about it. My biggest question is around the scene with G. I wasn’t originally going to suggest it get cut, but it seems very different than both what came before and what comes after in terms of tone and content, and I’m not sure what it adds to the narrative other than presumably setting up a neighbour who becomes important later. If it stays, I kind of felt like there should be a scene break between it and finding the body. As for the tense change, honestly, it was so smooth I barely noticed it. I thought the immediacy of the present tense definitely added to the first scene. As for the rest, it’s pretty normal to use past tense obviously and the scene change made it very easy to adjust.

It looks like we have @Mandamon and @Mwindaji so far for Monday. Any other takers? The forum isn't letting me tag you so I quoted you instead. And, seeing no complaints on the 5300 words I think you're good to go there, Mandamon.

"Fungal Inaccuracies" is the name of my next band. As I Read: “She didn’t know if they would survive…” Okay, whoa. I know the structural damage was significant and obviously so are the deaths, but I didn’t think there were so few of them as to put us immediately in “the colony may not survive” territory. Edited: Okay, this is mostly answered below – I’m more willing to be convinced that this is not just significant, but possibly fatal for the colony. But when it comes up again, it’s actually with a less powerful statement: “The losses were significant.” Maybe consider reversing the order of these two statements? P2 “...removing as many plates as possible from the KH to reduce the overall weight” its overall weight? Bottom of p3/top of p4, A is thinking about the effect the incident on construction again. Starting to feel a bit repetitive at this point; I’m not sure I need to be convinced that this is bad news a third time. If you were introducing a new problem, like A thinking of the consequences of the animal pen being affected, this might make more sense here. P4 “More in critical care might still succumb” missed opportunity for an emotional callback to J here, I think. The switch from the damage to construction and people over to thinking about animals with fungal infections seems very abrupt. “The ducks always had seemed confused about water sources, and those with four legs…” It took about three reads for me to realize that it wasn’t the DUCKS that had for legs. I know I was just saying this paragraph is in the wrong place, but I do want to say it’d be a shame to lose it completely. It’s hilarious, adds some great verisimilitude, and I demand that we get a short story of the Great Horse Awakening. P6 “a pained blatting from a goat or a cow” I love “blatting,” but goats and cows sound pretty different. “...still feel like I’m running a marathon with each…” Not sure why this one jumped out at me so much, but consider ending the sentence with “marathon.” p8 “This assignment, though devastating…” Unclear antecedent here, it’s not really the assignment that’s devastating. “A much better use of his time…” I think this refers to him burning growth at the edge of the city, but I’m not sure. Hey, no fraternizing with the civilians there, Andy Okay, the thought of these supersoldiers all continuing to smoke up as they rappel down into the mushroom cavern is darkly hilarious. Welp. I guess meat’s not back on the menu after all. Given that And’s first thought is that the thing eating away his comrade’s face might be spores, I’m surprised the first thing he does isn’t to yell that people need to try and protect themselves from said spores. If the Vs have no way of doing that, probably worth hanging a lantern on. Having a bit of trouble picturing what’s happening here in the aftermath. The fungi attack three people, and then just … wait patiently for them to clear the casualties and get the flamethrowers ready? They don’t seem to be doing anything while all this happens. Note: I originally mis-typed “flamethrower” as “flameflower,” because my brain thinks I’m reading a Super Mario script, apparently. All that’s missing are turtles. Had to go back and re-read after the goat-spore-cloud because my first thought was “aren’t there already spores?” but I guess that was just A speculating about there being spores. But since the spores come up again I definitely think it’s worth either him either actively trying to protect himself from them or ruing the fact that he can't. Also… if he was just on the edge of the spore cloud, what are the chances he caught some spores anyway? You can see the cloud because of the volume, but there are probably still spores floating around farther from the point of origin that just aren’t visible. Just saying. Overall: Again, not really much to add here! As noted I do feel that chapter is somewhat out of order, particularly in Ag’s point of view, and the bit about worrying about the fungal infections feels like an odd insert that possibly should have come even sooner than here, where there is a pretty major escalation, and I think would probably feel even more so if I’d read the whole chapter in a single sitting instead of spread over two subs. I also think there's some repetition in Ag's POV that can be cut. But that’s about it. Once again, nice work!

As hilarious an image as this is, can they maybe just have lab-grown meat?

Go for it.

Just sliding back in here to say that I am unreasonably enthusiastic at the idea of fungus that smells like apples (or whatever). Being able (for the admins, I guess, not the Gens) to identify something that smells like home when it absolutely shouldn't would be a great way to turn the creep factor up a notch.

so @Mandamon and @shatteredsmooth, any other takers?

Excited to read this! As I read: p2 “Did they think there were going to be fighting off aliens…” Oh, A. Also “there were” should probably be “they were.” “The Gens still outnumbered… but A would have guessed the ratio was higher.” At first, I thought this was implying that a bunch of Gens had somehow died during the revival. It took about three reads to figure out that A was referring to the population growth of the Gens and not realizing how many Ads/Vs there were. Augh. They don’t know how seasons work and they don’t have any drones at all dedicated to reconaissance? These people are bad at their jobs. You know what, from this point forward, please just assume that I’m repeating that every few paragraphs or so. P3 “The Gens were given no such...” suggest “had been given” Hmm. So are the Gens completely genetically unmodified, as opposed to receiving mods that enabled them to live in space (say, withstanding radiation) but that might be maladaptive on the surface of a planet? Just a thought. “...and what felt like a cow riding on her back.” Gravity, or just getting older? You decide! Also, I 100% pictured one of @Snakenaps’ characters for the cow… “This day is absolutely…” Hah! Great transition here. Also I sure hope I’m not supposed to sympathize with this guy, because I definitely don’t. “fight fungus with fire,” yes, excellent Score another point for a certain nail polish… The poltergeist line is great. 12/10. p6 “...faster without eighty percent of the populations” should be population p7 “threatening, but not immediately.” Maybe “not immediately so”, to make it clear that the antecedent here is actually “threatening” rather than the fungal jungle (say that five times fast) which is what it currently reads like. If the ships are pepperoni, how big is the radian? How did they transport that much material? P8 Why… why do they need a VR rig to read emails? P9 “Any why twenty four…” Should be “And” “they’d had to add five leap minutes” as opposed to just adapting their units of measure to the new planet (which nobody’s explained to the Gens, apparently)? WHY? These people are – you know the rest. “They’d traveled at relativistic speeds for four hundred years…” Here’s Ji using earth metrics when she was literally just complaining about them. “...and she’d been at for too long” At it? Oh no. This is the scene where Bad Things start to happen, isn’t it. Poor J. P10 “Until they got a viable, renewable power source up and running” How were they charging the batteries during spaceflight, and why is that not an option now? (Also, these people are… etc.) “Ji had seen the supersoldiers in the weight room…” I mean she’s also personally been decked by a V, wouldn’t that be the more prominent memory here? “The supersoldiers had no emergency reflexes…” This is a hilarious flaw for a supersoldier class. Well, that’s not the bad thing I was expecting to happen, but I guess I called it? Hope those cuts don’t give Ji the same problem the livestock are having… “As if the Kh had decided to grow a gaping mouth…” That… that is some foreshadowing there. Whew. Overall: Again, not much to add. I was a bit surprised to see us spending more time with J and the administration this quickly, as I'd assumed they were going to be an occasional sort of thing, but not sure that it's a problem; I just took it as a cue that the scope is a little broader than I'd expected. One thing that I think is worth mentioning is the way the narrative is currently drawing a fairly bright line between the administration and the Gens, with the former being fairly unsympathetic as a whole. They're not just frustrating our protagonists via incompetence and cultural differences, they have a pretty overt disregard for the Gens that is painting them fairly unambiguously as villains (in addition to antagonists). Might be worth considering whether you want a little more grey in their portrayal, especially if we're going to be spending more time with them, as this chapter seems to suggest.

As I read: The first sentence is a long one, enough so that I stumbled. Suggest trimming and simplifying. “the Writing, Reading, and Study Skills…” Maybe trim this and/or combine with the next paragraph? It seemed weird to have this statement stand on its own since it’s really just an explainer of the help centre. “Pens moved on their own accord” should be “of” I think Uh, the computer is belching green smoke? That seems like an issue. Are toxic fumes not an issue at this school? Even magical toxic fumes? P2 “There three people waiting” stumbled on this sentence. I think it’s missing a word and maybe needs to be two sentences? Oh, I just realized what “Ethernet” must be and that’s delightful. Inconsistent capitalization of “Ethernet” P3 “…to think about what they said five minutes” I think this should be “five minutes ago” but the line also threw me in general. I had assumed the thing they were avoiding thinking about would be the protest over SO66 or the fact that their colleagues apparently know who they are, which happened more than five minutes ago… until I got to the end of the sentence and realized that they were just worried about being awkward. “Until J walked over and introduced R.” So I like the tension, but we’ve just spent a lot of time in summary/interiority and the introduction of R puts us right back there again. I think it might be helpful to see the introduction happen – to see Al and R get introduced and Al realize – before Al goes off into another spiral, to break things up a bit. I like the description of R. “The illusion worked so well it cut off power from those charms…” Hm, I’m wondering about this. It feels like a potentially significant reveal, one that should possibly come a bit later in the narrative? Or maybe what I’m struggling with is that It feels like a lot to add a new magical mechanic when we’re also meeting a new character for the first time, one who hasn’t even had a chance to speak yet! P5 “…had been so ambitious about becoming healer” should be “a healer” Oh man, this tutoring scene is giving me flashbacks to my TAing/tutoring days. That being said, I wonder if it is a little too long? Or perhaps I’m only feeling that because we’ve spent so much time in Al’s head already, this chapter. Currently having the kind of reaction only a non-American could have to descriptions of American healthcare, good lord. P10 “The things we add will balance it out.” And next paragraph “Anything else I can help with?” Was there something skipped or cut between these two things? It seemed like Al jumped right from “we’ll add some sources” to kicking R out. “Al wanted R gone as soon as possible. They didn’t want…” Great line. Coming back to the idea, though, that the tutoring scene should probably be trimmed. I like the tension between Al being at once in their element and really uncomfortable with R, but it’s a bit long for what actually happens. P12 I was about to comment that the long paragraph of info on how magic works seemed a little out of place where it is (though I agree that it needs to be somewhere!) but I really like the way you drew it back to Al’s identity at the end. “Inhale, exhale, inhale, cookies” made me laugh. I’m not sure that was the intent, but I’m … not sure it’s a problem? “Al, you’re spiraling.” Good way to get the readers who aren’t familiar with anxiety spirals to understand what’s going on. Very nicely done. P13 “OR she might now.” Should be “not,” I think? “The wards on the house and your workshop prevent that.” Prevent what? A magic flare? I am unclear. Overall: Still interested in the story, and Al's voice feels stronger as it goes on. I am getting antsy for things to start happening. The protest thread has been almost lost – J mentions it, but it’s very much taking a backseat to the other stuff. The major threat throughout these three chapters seems to be Al’s identity being revealed, but threat has been pretty consistently defanged by the narrative; B and co. already know who Al is, which saps most of the tension, and R could make things harder for Al on a personal level but she doesn’t even remember who Al is. It makes the curse-breaking thing feel almost routine, since there doesn’t seem to be any question of whether Al can actually do it (and maybe WRS, but I can’t remember what effect the curse is supposed to have. What happens if it’s not broken? That would probably inform the tension, too).

So we have @Mandamon, @shatteredsmooth and @C_Vallion so far for this week.

100 percent agree.

As I read: p1 “Is this an idea from one of those books you read?” Not sure this follows from the topic being discussed? “while she got stern gazes,,” extra comma here p2 “The stars faded from his eyes” also not sure what’s being said here? Is this literal? Or starry-eyed like admiration? I wonder if you can bring the information from this flashback scene into the present, or at least roll some of the memory into a current scene? It seems to exist only to establish the relationship between the characters and the detail about the mats. If it were a more significant moment I might be more inclined to give it its own dedicated scene, but that doesn’t seem to be the case here. So… Z ran away from home to join a resistance cell, but can still come and go as she pleases…? P6 “in his sunset eyes” great turn of phrase, but did S not do the eyedrops thingy this time? “Did you ever really care about either of us?” This seems like a leap on S’s part. It seems odd to me that the “why aren’t you mad” is the only discussion of Z’s apparently well-known participation in an a rebellion against the monarchy, or the break-in at the palace. I would expect that break-in and the capture of Z’s girlfriend, both, to be driving the story a lot more than they seem to be. P9 “...fine with a standard communal pot for two” feels a little as-you-know-Bob. P10 “he could create a solution of—” Hah. You kind of deserved that one, Z. “If I figure out what happened to N…” This isn’t working for me as a motivator for either character, because we know what happened to N; both Z and S saw it happen and have told us about it multiple times. I know there’s a link to the RA somehow, but it feels like a very tenuous connection, enough so that I don’t know why the characters are basing their thinking or actions on it so definitively. So D is Z’s … handler, yes? That relationship isn’t at all apparent in this chapter; it reads much more like D is a friend. Neither is the fact that Z has to this point been kind of rebellious even within her own organization. I keep expecting to see some consequences for that and it hasn’t happened. Bottom of p11 “if she shows up, he shows up” I think the first “she” is a typo (though at first I thought it was D misgendering S) Z has been acting a lot more conciliatory over this chapter than previous chapters would have led me to expect. P13 “dilapidated enough to the point…” So they’re squatting? And wordsmithing, I’d probably say either “dilapidated enough” or “dilapidated to the point that…” as the two communicate different things. “Like she needed another reminder of how she was the one…” in the last chapter she seemed very willing to be part of this revolution. Why the change of heart? This note from Z’s leader… was it written in code? Sealed? Any sort of security measures at all to keep the wrong person from reading it, or assure Z of its authenticity? Another point of confusion… Is Z just being allowed to wander around? J seemed to want to have her captured in one of the previous chapters, I think, given her relationship to some of the revolutionary elements, but with the possible exception of the fight in the street she’s run into no opposition from that corner. Overall: This chapter gave a better sense of where Z and S stand with each other, in a way that actually feels like a significant shift from previous chapters. I think some stronger emotion would help us get a feel for where the relationship stands as it's obvoiusly complicated, but it's hard to pick up the nuance when the characters are both pretty calm throughout this conversation. Still, I think it gave me a better sense overall of where their relationship is at. I don’t, however, have a good understanding of how to place this chapter within the overall story, because I don’t have a good grasp on the story itself yet – which of course is a problem four chapters in. This letter revealing that J is somehow working with the RA feels important, maybe even understated. Given the way the story’s been circling the RA so far, I wonder if this letter should be moved waaaaaaaay up front. It could kick off the story by giving Z and S a more compelling and concrete reason to start pursing the RA to begin with, with that initial search leading them to the inciting incident somehow and the rebellion/break-in thing being a B-plot or complicating factor, since that seems to be very much a secondary thread.

As I read: “Who would have thought a suitable chuck of rock” First of all, should be chunk. Also, dang, these people really don’t know anything do they. Oh. Oh so this is THAT kind of group. Figures. P3 "These Gens were stepping stones..." They really don't think of the Gens as people at all, huh. “on the original procedure…” Which procedure? Landing procedure? Yes. Brilliant. Find a new, life-bearing planet, and then destroy the “biological mat” – that we haven’t even sampled yet – that covers the WHOLE PLANET. (Sorry, I’m just having fun snarking these people now) p4 “If all went well, they all” should be “they’d all” What does the population of Gens. have to do with whether or not they’re insubordinate/whether or not they like the Vs? “...a few instances between squatters” a few instances “with” squatters? There’s no subject other than the squatters, i.e. it doesn’t say between the squatters and whom. Unless the squatters are fighting amongst themselves. “what did not show on the face of a senior administrator…” But she never actually follows up on this comment, we don’t then see her trying to read the assistants’ faces. So have the Gens been awake this entire time? I thought they were being brought out of sus-ani in shifts. P8 I love the way the ships are described in this interlude. “...carry on the advantages gained. Though the method” Should this be a comma instead of a period? P9 “gained as much knowledge and” should be as Hmm, in addition to the bone supplements, I wonder if they would have all been assigned some kind of exercise routine to help them adjust to gravity on the planet? Astronauts do this to prevent muscle and bone loss. “Gravity precluded nearly sixty eight percent of the storage…” Great detail. p11“it’s been exposed to a monoculture…” but he was just going on about how the diversity in the samples vastly outstrips the variety seen on Earth. “The nutrient ratio is probably far out of calibration” They have samples, wouldn’t this be one of the top priorities to confirm? P12 Hmm… If the ‘animals’ have the same cellular biology as the fungus, then what is F defining as “animals” here? Is he just going off the fact that they’re more mobile? P13 “which includes making sure the colony is…” Which should be capitalized p14 would this entity have a frame of reference for “cherry-red” light? I almost didn’t comment on the above because you have to be able to give us some visual information, but this one stuck out to me a bit. Also, the narrating entity doesn’t seem to recognize this phenomenon as the ship entering atmos[phy “...against such pressures that much” that “must”? P15 “...solid ground flowing like rivers” Oooh. Does this planet have rivers? Normally I’d remark that you’d think that would be a priority for the spaceships to confirm, but at this point I think we can leave the rest of my “these people are bad at their jobs” comments unsaid. Except for the one I just made, I guess. Overall: Since it was commented on... I didn't think thought the political machinations scene was just long enough (though I like this stuff). I'm not especially connected with the POV character on an emotional level, since she seems to be motivated by entrenching her own power and that's about it, but it didn't seem to me that the purpose of the scene was for me to do that, so I was fine with it. I really have nothing to add other than what's in my LBLs. Nicely done, carry on.

As I read: Love the chapter title. “her equally pastel beverage…” this is the first time pastel has appeared in this sentence. Maybe the beverage is horrid? (I mean, I assume it is… yikes.) Oh, so THIS is where the “oh god why” starts. I … I take it G’s grandma did not like G’s partner. P4 “You parent is old” should be “your” Where they expecting the grandmother to be here? It seems weird to me that the grandmother is here. “and G wedge in” I’LL BET HE DID. I mean, uh, that should be “wedged.” (I’ll just show myself out) p7 “Incorrectly labeled…” Is it incorrectly labeled because the wood actually isn’t teak? Otherwise I don’t think I follow. I do not associate “sleek unfinished” with luxury, I associate it with splinters. p8 “I try to be mindful of chemicals…” I cannot for the life of me figure out what this grandmother\’s deal is. She’s trying to be mindful of chemicals but still poisoned her child-in-law with a dildo…? “The allergy was unfortunate…” Okay, I guess it was not an entirely deliberate poisoning. P9 “...covers the medical bill,” need a closing quotation “No one was permanently injured.” I mean, if someone required a vaginoplasty I feel like that’s kind of permanent. “C needs to chill” C HAD TO HAVE A VAGINOPLASTY WHY DOES NOBODY SEEM TO THINK THIS IS A PROBLEM Did Y get fired from her job? If so, I’m sure it was spectacular. CALLED IT p11 “You’re very defensive for someone who didn’t…” Hahahah YES “How are things with your ex, P?” At first I thought Y was addressing D as if she were P. I’d just leave as “How are things with your ex?” “tossed square at D’s face” missing an “it” Alas poor Jiffy Lube, we hardly knew ye D did not make a “while Rome/Jiffy Lube burns” comment in response to Y’s “occasional fiddler” comment. D is a better person than I am. P15 “Am Ha is very close to Am Hi…” Really? From a PI? I thought she’d be more savvy than this. Wait, if her timeline was that tight why did she drive all the way out to the dildo factory today to begin with? Overall: I wasn’t sure what to make of the G-C-Grandma scene, and I’m struggling to put my finger on what wasn’t landing for me. I think it’s partially that I didn’t totally understand the purpose of it – D says she follows up with everybody at six months, but surely she does it with some sort of purpose in mind? And it had this weird family therapy dynamic, though it's probably supposed to be weird. Sorry, I wish I had something more specific than “I had a hard time with this scene,” but I definitely did. Thinking about it a bit more, maybe hanging a lantern on the fact that Grandma is there when she shouldn’t be (D doesn’t react to this at all – come to think of it, the other party doesn’t really react to Y showing up unexpected either) would help like this. And… people are weirdly cavalier about the fact that somebody needed surgery. That doesn’t strike me as a “no harm done” kind of result. Y worked better for me this time—in fact by now I’m quite taken by her—but it took me a few more pages to warm up to her. I think because that’s how long it took for us to seeing something from D other than “NOPE.” It’d be helpful to see a tiny bit of her redeeming qualities – some reason D keeps her around, basically. She can still be a disaster! Just a very slightly mitigated disaster. I’m still really enjoying this! Looking forward to the next chapter.

Hmm. I still wonder if moving this bit down might help as Al has more chance to stew on their thoughts and we get a chance for a bit more context. Or maybe you need to spell out the hypothetical steps more clearly for readers so that we can see that they're unreasonable. Or a combination?

As I read: p1 “sacrificial parents” uh, I interpreted this a little differently than how I think it was meant, which I think is selfless parents paying for their child’s school and not parents being lead to some kind of altar…. “Students could learn magic at the school where they…” This is picky, but I stumbled over whether “they” referred to A or the students here. Grammatically the antecedent could be either, and since we haven’t yet been definitively told that A is nonbinary, we don’t have the context to figure it out. So these are college-age kids? Yes? J seems… almost like he’s in charge. Sometimes A’s last name has an e on the end, sometimes it doesn’t. Oh, whoa, that was a more definite response from A than I was expecting on the community magic question. P3 “How hard would it be…” This should probably end with a question mark? Okay, so I kind of adore the PPG club. I’m having a hard time putting my finger on how the relationships work – this doesn’t feel quite like a teacher/student relationship to me. I’m having a hard time articulating why, though, which I know isn’t terribly useful, sorry. I like the hints we’re getting about A’s identity and their abilities now, and was engaged with their worries all the way up to dead cops – all of that made sense to me. But then we were suddenly on revolution and insurrection, and it felt like a large jump. I’m not even sure that’s a bad thing, but definitely a jump. On the next page now and reading about the bill. This is starting to make more sense. I wonder if there’s the opportunity to move the bits specific to revolution/insurrection down, after we’ve gotten the information about the bill, to give it a bit more context. Then it will also feel more like an upping of the stakes, as it becomes clearer that A is probably gonna go to this thing. P4 “A knew they governor” should be ‘the’ I don’t know why, but I laughed at the description of J being built like a tank (in a good way). Maybe it was just the juxtaposition. And oh, okay, the background on J we’re getting here is helpful. Maybe move, if not all of it, at least J’s age up to earlier in the chapter so we know he’s supposed to feel like the adult in the room. P6 “A backed up” makes it sound like they’re backing away from the students, i.e. retreating “why some people even though” should be “thought” Torn between deciding “famous mage of unknowable power” is too on the nose or just on the nose enough. It definitely brings a bit of a lighter, more humorous tone to the worldbuilding IMO, because it’s a bit over the top. The sparkles and glitter are great though. P10 I take back my comment about MUPs. This is perfect. Please carry on. “About time you got here.” Confused. Isn’t this person entering the place where A is, not the other way around? “The fridge that had A’s supper.” Okay, I adore this detail. Why, I believe I recognize that nail polish “G is cursed…” I don’t know what I was expecting from this ambush, but this wasn’t it. So… this is a fairly modern world, yes? Does A have a completely separate legal identity then, that even the top administrators at the school don’t know? Or does illusion power somehow cover birth certificates, taxes... Overall: I enjoyed this. There’s definitely some good stuff in here… I almost wonder if it isn’t too much, and should be broken up over a couple of chapters. You’ve got the march/protest, with an almost immediate jump up to possible revolution/insurrection even before we know context of the protest. It’s probably a few steps, IMO, from “funding cuts” to “insurrection” but here they’re both dangled in front of us at once. And then you’ve got A’s secret identity that they struggle with, which is almost immediately threatened mid-chapter before being outright revealed at the end of the chapter (with a new thread no less, the curse!) and defusing what I had assumed was going to be a major source of tension. Based on the first few pages, I completely misinterpreted what was going to be the inciting incident, which I thought was going to be A going to decide to go to the protest against their better judgment with the threat of their identity (and related bad stuff) hanging over them. Instead they’re discovered right off the bat, by two different sets of people, and I’m left unsure how this ties into the “save the college from funding cuts” thread at all. I think what’s needed is to figure out which of these threads is the inciting incident, with immediate short-term ramifications, and set the rest up as longer-term conflicts that will arise as the narrative goes on (which is why I think some of this might need to be in more than one chapter). I don't think you need to EXPLAIN their gender, but giving us one spot early on where we can identify what pronouns they use would probably be helpful, only because in this specific case you have "they" referring to a bunch of OTHER people and things before we see it referring to A themself. I don't think it did, but this is a great detail, and worth including - if not in this chapter - than in a later one. I don't think so, FWIW. I thought it was a good distinction, useful characterization for A and for the character who originally called out the deadnaming (sorry, I don't remember who but that's because my brain is mush not because of your writing). agree I think this really nails it, yeah. LOL this sounds about right for a draft.