Silk

Sounds good!

Welcome! I know you messaged me about joining a while ago, but it's good to see you around

@strange24 Please do. Any other takers?

I also agree.

I'd echo @Mandamon and @strange24 this time around P1 the note that A had to learn to interface with the doors made me realize/reminded me that there’s still thing I feel like I don’t know about the psionics and who has access to what – it’s mentioned that the doors are a bureaucratic secret, but isn’t A a bureaucrat? And since it seems like a lot of people have access to psionics even if we don’t necessarily expect them to (see: G’s summoning in the previous chapter) those doors seem like they may not be terribly secure… Edit: Ah, you hung a lantern on it pretty much immediately after I had the thought. This moment of joy from the soldiers is great, but I actually had no idea the console was the thing placing limits on what they could and couldn’t do, as opposed to being a matter of training. The lifespan piece works better because we knew something was restricting their lives unnecessarily. (I assumed someone wasn’t going around and offing all these soldiers, ahem, manually, but didn’t know other than that.) If the soldiers were actually sickening and dying and a certain point, that might be interesting to play up more. In-world, I wonder what the justification for this restriction is, if there is one. P3 “Xan rand a hand through T’s hair…” are they an item? P4 “One rogue overseer could free us all…” Mm, yeah, that’s actually a good point Makes me wonder how this has stood for so long especially if the enemies aren't particularly smart. If nothing else, I‘m surprised nobody has tried to use this for their own ends. P8 Took me a second to remember what “the body” was referring to. I’m… surprised at the notion that B might have been puppeting dead bodies in monster forms for… reasons? I always assumed he was alive at first. P12 “T flashed a polite smile.” She seems less on board with some of the stuff she’s experiencing now than in the first chapters of the book, when she seemed just fine to help soldiers etc. I’m curious about the difference. Overall: this feels a bit like the breathing room we were talking about needing after the last chapter ended! Although it addresses some different things – it’s still weird to me that we haven’t talked about the Queen’s death basically at all, except briefly to propose (and then reject) propping A up in her place. As for the relationship between M and A, it feels like a nice moment, but again like we don’t have all the setup that supports it. There has been some contention between M and A but on the page, it’s mostly been in-the-moment stuff. We know that there was a previous relationship between M and A when M was P, but don’t have much information on what that relationship was. Plus, the previous A/P relationship plot thread seemed to drop off when P died after the duel, and even after we learned who M was, it hasn’t really been brought to the fore again. As for your comment about this relationship supporting the defeat of B more, you’re probably right there. One way to explore this further might be to give readers a better understanding of this rebellion that A has stumbled into—it seems like it’s pre-existing and M has been a part of it, but we don’t really know to what extent or what’s been in place before A got here. Sort of touched on this, but agree. Not to get too prescriptive but THIS would be a really interesting thing to be able to explore, and could may be do some of that tying back to the main plot that you were asking about. Good call. All of the ministers we've seen have been leading soldiers, pretty much, even if they don't fight themselves.

Yes, I think this is why I was so glad to see the reunion, but it didn't provide quite the space we needed to come down from the last chapter. It makes the events of last chapter feel less significant.

Congratulations on your first submission! We're mostly about craft here, so we're not bothered by looking at IP stuff as long as you're in it to improve Keep in mind that you wouldn't be able to submit it for publication anywhere (no idea if that's something you're interested in) but as an exercise there's absolutely nothing wrong with doing that. I will say that of those who comment here, many of us publish or are seeking to publish are works so we tend to be a little more professionally oriented and our feedback reflects that. if there's a specific kind of feedback you're looking for, let us know and we can try to adjust our feedback to something that works for you. Comments P1 I enjoyed the description of the armour etc. in the opening paragraph. I missed this kind of description in other places in the story – I couldn’t quite tell what sort of world the character was in, what it looked like, whether she was in space or on land etc. One of my biggest questions as I move through the early pages is what the conflict is. The POV character references a battle, but likens it to an errand she has to run. Is the battle important to her? Is she here because she wants to be, or some other reason? What are the stakes? These are the questions I have reading the first scene. P3: In the second scene, my attention is piqued because people are feeling afraid. I’m interested in the sense of emotion we’re getting! But when the end of the scene rolls around I still don’t really know why people are feeling what they’re feeling. P6 “The presence of his mother’s soul…” this is interesting, since his mother doesn’t seem to be actually here, I assume this is something to do with the stones that were mentioned earlier? I also like the description of the body as alien, but it has me wondering what the POV characters look like. Especially from the description of the armour, I had assumed they were themselves humanoid, but that doesn’t seem to be the case here. “You said you would change your path…” Ah, now this is interesting. Gives me a sense of what’s at stake for the characters. Until now all I know is that there’s been or is going to be a battle somewhere and that a kid wants his mother. So… D has been replaced by a banshee? Or is “banshee” the name of her troop? Overall: I enjoyed some of the description and worldbuilding here (note, I'm not a person who is terribly familiar with Warhammer). It took a while, until the end of the chapter, to get to what felt like the inciting incident, the thing that changes everything for the story going forward, and I wasn’t sure how the first two scenes connected with the last one or how necessary they were to the chapter. But my main thought is – I think we need to know more about what’s going on and what the scenario is. Some of the description and emotion you have can help ground the story for readers a bit more. The biggest things I was looking for reading this were clarity about what was happening and what was at stake. Keep writing!

Go for it, it's been quiet

Sorry I'm a bit late getting to this one @Ace of Hearts - I had my head down all week on another project. But here now, so let’s get to it! As I read Hah. Okay. I admit it. I’m enjoying this moment of G getting all angry and flustered when faced with the inevitable consequences of her actions. “When they were about to hit she both summoned…” thought this was referring to A at first, but I think it’s actually G doing the action? P2 So was A telling M to wait because she expected the monster/some variety of trap? P3 “how had it broken down their exoskeleton so quickly?” I had a similar question, since M is supposed to be more-than-usually competent at things, I think. P4 A reacts to the appearance of the new clone like it it’s surprising or a reveal, but then we don’t seem to follow up on it, instead focusing on H running away and the logistics that follow. P5 “Not the first word I thought of…” another chuckle here. P6 “I nearly got us killed but comming L.” “By comming” ? P7 “Plus, I have to see real outdoor soil” – wait. Did they not have that at home? Some of it could be WRS, granted, but every now and then a remark comes up like this that makes me realize I have very little idea what a lot of these places look like. P11 “She could give L a pass for today…” considering the stakes, I was a bit surprised that A let this talk of a plan go quite this easily. Overall: It was good to see the reunion in this chapter and start bringing the threads together, but considering what we’ve seen from some of the previous chapters I was expecting/hoping for a little more of it here. N and T in particular seemed skimmed over in favour of a lot of the philosophical discussion – which I’m still struggling with but I think that’s the result of needing the setup, etc. that we’ve talked about before. The other piece I’m still looking for as we progress is a sense of what specifically A is going to need to do to defeat (or fail to defeat, I suppose) B and the system. We’ve gotten comments at a few points about A needing to defeat B’s ideology rather than B herself, and we’ve had some more philosophical discussions related to that, but I don’t have a better sense of what the answer is now than I did three or four chapters ago.

Please do! Just remember we ask for at least one crit for every item you submit, so make sure you tag onto one of the recent or upcoming submissions as well. Any other takers for Monday?

Hope you had a great vacation! Please do. I'll probably have a couple things to submit myself in a couple of weeks, once I'm ready to shift gears from the current WIP...

Probably unsurprisingly, I have similar thoughts to @Mandamon here. I like this idea. I think it's potentially fine to have G as sort of a stupid villain as long as we have someone scary, but H is presented as mostly a tool of other people rather than a villain as such, while B isn't here, so with G being presented this way in this scene it feels like there's no one to really drive the tension. As I read: P1: The conversation between M and A about the queen sending soldiers to their deaths – still wondering why the queen doesn’t have more power than she does and how B exerts this influence over this whole institution. P2: “…the truth is that it was caused by the military complex that he was the mere figurehead of.” Maybe WRS, but was this actually stated at any point? This feels like new information. Also, again has me wondering about how little power the purported rulers seem to hold. “But don’t think I’m expecting you to get through to B with words.” So does A actually have a plan? A hasn’t said much and M isn’t asking for specifics. P5 “I’m capable of putting my faith in people I try to help.” That’s all well and good, but C really has no training or anything on this, so it feels like A’s allowing him to tag along and put himself in danger for no good reason. P7: A has already acknowledged that she’s freely walking into a trap, so the conversation with H here feels like it’s dragging. Maybe a shortened version of the conversation to show the other side is ready for them/heighten the feeling of danger somehow without spending too long on it? Right now it mostly serves to remind us how twisted H’s point of view is, which we already know. P12 “It’s to prevent psionics… you need to have free hands to use them.” Two questions – one, did A not know this already? And two, why is she now thinking about defeating B in a fight, given her earlier talk about needing to defeat B’s ideology (especially when B isn’t even here)? Overall: My thoughts are really a continuation of what I’ve been feeling for the last couple chapters, which is that I’m still trying to understand how the ministry/soldierly institutions work, why they hold so much power over the queens/emperors of the setting, and the nuances of the gender ideologies of the different characters. I like that we have chapters ending on reveals and/or twists as we build toward the conclusion, I can definitely see the structure of how things are escalating, but I’m still struggling to get a feel for all these big-picture things, so while the bones are there, the reveals and twists are hitting less hard than they could.

Please do! Sorry for my slow reply, I’m actually at a Writing Excuses retreat right now and t’s been sort of a full day! I may (or may not) be slow at responding this time. We’ll see how it goes!

Hey look! I'm responding reasonably promptly for once! Ads I read: The opening sentence of this chapter is a bit of a bear, I had to read it a couple of times to fully follow. “And then came the biggest surprise. Young boys…” I’m surprised by how easily most of the characters seem to integrate this concept of gender into their own thoughts since it’s been presented as foreign to them But also, I thought Xan actually noticed this last chapter as well? P3 “I know that better than anyone.” So presumably Princess L is from a line of clones, but are those clones all trans? This seems contrary to what you set up with A and Am. P4 Referring to the queen as an “insurgent” seems inaccurate. If there is a power structure outside the queen, I don’t understand it well enough to understand what she is rebelling against. Edit: Ditto the later comment about occupying a factory. Can’t the queen just have it shut down? P6 “What about the fact that they’re all going to get their memories wiped…” Wait, so what actually is the plan here? I had assumed it was close the factory and cut the ministry off from this labour source all together, at least at this specific factory, but apparently they’re still going to get turned into soldiers regardless? Edit: I actually think the “we need soldiers, we have to keep some of this system in place for the greater good” is a really interesting conflict to pull on. What I’m not understanding is the practicalities of this factory occupation and what (and how) it’s supposed to achieve. P12 “Not everything we figure out is gifted to us…” Yeah, that line from I struck me sort of oddly, pretty much for the reason Xan says. Glad it’s called out here. “Give the kids easier hour and make up the labour with teenage soldiers…” I’m still not understanding how the factory works and what the insurgents are actually looing to change. Also wondering why Xan being born at the same time as Zo meant that one of them was supposed to have been killed? Wouldn’t the extra soldier just have been put to work? I think this could be as simple as “we only have resources for one and view you all as interchangeable/replacable” but there needs to be a reason. Overall: There’s some interesting stuff in this chapter, but it went on a little long without much happening—it felt more focused on explaining stuff that had happened before than setting up the stakes for what comes next, which is probably why it felt a little dense. For me, it also meant the development at the end of the chapter (which is great as a thing that happens) comes as a total surprise. The “bureaucracy” as a force really hasn’t had much development, so I don’t understand what the specific aims of the characters are in this chapter—which I touched on a couple of places—or how much danger there is in them doing it. Is the development at the end of the chapter viewed by the characters as an inevitability, but one worth whatever specific end they’re hoping to achieve? Or is it a real danger but one that may or may not happen? Those two things will have a very different feel, and I think understanding that better will help the chapter land more powerfully.

Sounds good!

I remember the soldier characters, though it took me a minute to place Th. As far as Xan as a POV character, I was initially surprised when he showed up as a POV character especially since he seems to be framed as a new lead character rather than an interlude. Up until now his role didn't seem any more at the forefront than any of the other soldiers (pretty much all of the soldiers who seem to have been taking more of a lead role up to this point are dead). Similarly, I know it's been mentioned before, but the "do you trust me even though I'm a clone" seems to be much more important here than it was previously. Previously it had been mentioned but not a huge conflict, whereas now it's positioned as central to Xan's growth in this chapter. Aside from that, I thought it worked. As I read: So, does water inside their suits somehow limit the functionality of the suits? Unless they were completely full of water, why would this affect their ability to hold oxygen etc? P6 “squinting in pain at the saltwater” couldn’t he summon goggles or similar? I had kind of thought that was standard issue. “The shark started swimming towards him.” Is it still holding onto L? P11 “The one P had told Xan about…” I think the reminder is helpful but the actual sentence structure here feels a bit convoluted, I had to read it a few times to understand what it was trying to convey. P13 It’s a great line, but why is defending themselves against monsters treason? “T sank to her hands and knees…” So we arrived at the shoreline at some point? I missed that. P14 “...young boys… the same kind that he had seen on Ix” visually, how would you distinguish this? Is it just that they don’t have armor on? Overall: Glad to see these characters making a comeback, there are so many people in this book it’s good that we’re tying back to some of the original characters. I did wonder, if the fight was so hopeless to begin with, would an additional 2-3 people really make that much of a difference? Or is it that it’s 3 people who are also at full strength unlike the group we start with? I am however confused about where we end up at the end of the chapter. Earlier, Xan states that they’re outside J, but then they see soldiers who aren’t soldiers and we’re going into tunnels. Some more blocking/explanation of where we actually end up would be helpful, especially if this is the setup for another revelation. Emotionally the “I wonder if this is how A feels when she leads us” worked for me, and lands better than the “We all trust A because she’s different than everybody else” kind of stuff. The latter just seems a little “A is the chosen one” in a way that the book doesn’t otherwise really engage with (and seems to be not true - there are other characters who share A's sympathies). It feels like the book is heading nicely toward a climax. I look forward to seeing where it goes from here!

Go right ahead!

Sorry for my slow reply - it's kind of been a Week over here. Let’s get right to the comments, then! “…those two know some of C’s friends who might be willing to take charge…” Does Ix not have plans for a line of succession, so to speak, somebody to inherit the interim position until a byelection can be held? “… Learning that his daughter was…” Wait, so was she pretending to be somebody else for her entire life? Wouldn’t telling her father about this present some security concerns? Okay, so she was replaced by someone else. Still, her dad seems to be taking this… Really quite well. This seems a bit contradictory — enough that she came back different, and that he thought she could’ve been replaced, but the other person mimic her mannerisms really well? Since M, A, B are all dspeakers, why is she so much more powerful than the other two, that they don’t stand a chance against her? Edit: I see this is answered later. Maybe worth hanging a lantern on? M’s remark about A killing them seems to be flippant, so I was surprised when A took it seriously. Yeah, I think P and his relationship with A to be a bigger thread to get us to this point. We never really understand why A wants to save P in the beginning, and this is the first real insight we’ve gotten to what their relationship was like before A became an overseer. So… B is the original L from the prologue? Edit: Ah yes, there it is. I’m having a hard time following the lines of how gender is handled by the old empire vs attitudes now. B hates all men (for some reason), scoffs at people who are transphobic but seems to be levelling the same kind of vitriol at A herself, and old empire/our “real world” terms are being used interchangeably with setting terms like “dspeaker.” Not understanding this stuff makes it hard to follow the character motivations (particularly B’s), especially since there’s clearly also some backstory between B and her brother that’s informing this (but that we as readers haven’t encountered yet). “Something…unfortunate may coincidentally happen if you choose not to step in.” Confused again here – is B threatening A (which would have been my expectation) or exhorting her to action (which is what the language makes it seem like)? At the end of the chapter, A has a revelation, but I’m not clear on what that revelation is. This can work, but because I’m already struggling to understand the overall philosophical debate here, I’m unsure whether this is intended or whether I’m supposed to already understand what A understands. Earlier references to “philosophy” being the key to defeating her were also pretty broad. So – I’m looking forward to seeing how the conflict from the prologue has shaped the world and the current conflict in a little more detail. Just need more grounding in the world and the setup!

Sounds good!

“So that’s what the reality bubble they were in was called” – I think I missed it actually being named? P2 “…couldn’t summon her exoskeleton without…” I thought she’d already summoned it, only de-summoning the weapons? P3 “…being given field orders” I mean, I’m also a little surprised that A now trusts M as much as she apparently does. The fact that someone else in the group proved to be untrustworthy doesn’t necessarily mean M is trustworthy. P4 “Can’t keep tabs on him while he’s restrained.” Au contraire, wouldn’t being restrained make it easier to keep tabs on him? P5 “And then I’ll kill them too.” Mmm. I assume the hypocrisy here is quite on purpose. P6 “He stiffened, but didn’t dodge…” So was he just standing there while A decided what to do with him? Wait. Am I misremembering, or didn’t H-from-the-interludes kill H-who-killed-Celosia last chapter? P8 “…not when this boy already knew so much about her.” Does he? All he’s said about her is she’s “supposed to be legendary.” P9 “Are you better than but not…” a couple of missing words throughout this line of dialogue, I think. P12 “Some kid named Hex…” I don’t think he introduced himself… P13: Do neither Jac nor Ix have specific laws about capital punishment, how to handle treason/rioting/murder etc? A and M seem to be having this discussion about whether or not to kill the soldiers in the absence of any larger cultural expectations about what to do with them. P14: Pronouns for M had shifted to they/them after they announced they were agender, but shift back to she/her here. I am having a hard time remembering who Fluo is. P16: “Not the one who died under…” I think the reminder is good and necessary given all the clones running around, but having A just blurt out the whole story here felt a little “as you know, Bob.” Just a little finessing to make the reminder feel more natural, I think. Overall: I like the reveal at the end of the chapter, and the emotional weight that you give the last line, but once again I feel like this could have used more setup. I didn’t really get a sense of “I know you better than I should” from M before now, and the “I want to save P” thread seems to have been dropped/resolved after the on-screen death for P that we did see. (I suspect more emphasis on this will also make the emotional hook come across more strongly--it will feel like a continuation of an existing thread and not re-opening a conflict we thought we had closed.) I’m interested to see where it goes, but don’t have a good sense yet the potential shape of the conflicts to come.

Go ahead!

It happens! I think we figured it out Right to the comments, then: Probably partially WRS, but it took me a hot second to remember who either of these characters were, especially the POV character. I'm glad to see this is an interlude, though, rather than signaling a shift in focus to completely different batch of characters. "...because they had been beaten into submission." Enough people in the ministry apparently think the soldiers are treated badly enough that I've started to wonder why nobody seems to have done anything about it before now. p2 "what lurked beneath--and she meant that quite literally--" this is a fun teaser, but seems like an odd aside for her own thoughts, a little "as you know, Bob" dialogue without the dialogue. p3 "...she hated the comfort she took in that." Nice character moment here. "...all those little boys." Another gendered term here. Having trouble getting a handle on when characters use those before they don't. Also, its use here makes it seem like the gender roles as they are in Ix was common knowledge to everyone but A? "...so broken that they couldn't fit back into society" - hmm, not quite convinced, I don't think we've seen this. Edit: Ah, I see you've hung a lantern on it. Carry on then. p4 Interesting. I had assumed T went to see I because of her relationship to A. The interlude seems like a missed opportunity to give us more information. It's one of the biggest things I've been struggling with throughout the book, and here we have two characters who clearly HAVE more information, but aren't giving it to us. The sense of forward motion at the end of the interlude is great, but I think the factories need (surprise!) some setup before now for it to be fully effective. Otherwise, great some characters we know are going off to do something, but it's a new something that I don't know how it relates to the rest of the story. p5 "And pitiful." Hm, not sure what about this display is pitiful. p7 "even ... or ... are better than 'your majesty.'" Okay that was a great line. p9 "So B was also originally a solider..." Didn't we already know this? I thought B had at least strongly implied at one point that she and A were clones of the same stock, which I took to mean B was trans. "I don't do that philosophy sh..." I thought that was an ancient swear word? p13 "Could it be?" I had assumed this immediately from the physical description in the first few pages, so having A come to it here makes her seem a bit slow on the uptake. Overall: I enjoyed the interaction between A and G--I actually really enjoyed G's personality--but toward the end the conversation felt like it started to drag, and I'm not really sure what it accomplished, or what G wants to get out of the conversation. If he's just looking to protect A and her people, couldn't he have just done that, since he seems to know everything already? I'm also not sure whether to be expecting a physical fight or philosophical debate in the next chapter. The story is better set up for the first IMO, but parts of the discussion between G and A pointed more toward a battle of ideals.

Go ahead! and I'll say right now that I'm going to be late critiquing this week, the block of time I usually use for crits is taken up this week until Friday...

Yeah, I had the same reaction at this point, but then I remembered we do know about it, as I think it was mentioned once before now. It's another thing that could use more setup though, I think it was only mentioned the once.

Here we go! First sentence : repetition of “to the floor/against the floor” “…from terrified to confident” in terms of specific body language, what does this look like? “so lovely and blandly ministerial…” not sure what A is getting at with these comments about ministers here. P2 “The real B was killed and replaced by this… thing.” This… seems like it should be a bigger deal, if true? I don’t think we’ve gotten any preparation for this specific revelation. Some confusion about the blocking throughout this section, particularly in regards to who is staying behind vs. fleeing and what they’re fleeing to. P9 “Let the Cal consume you” this does not sound especially reassuring… P10 “Now Haf stood at the center of the town square…” so what actually happened? Overall: I think most of my struggle with the first chapter of this submission, especially, was my lingering confusion over what was actually happening from last chapter. Clear that up, and get a little more clarity on the physical layout/blocking that I mentioned above, and I think this becomes a lot more compelling. As for the sacrifice, I didn’t find the event contrived, necessarily, but I did find the dialogue to be laying it on a bit thick – “made my life worth living” especially when it immediately follows from “you don’t get it, do you”? Again, I thnk more shoring up of the connections between people and making that feel less contrived will really help here. The second chapter I found my attention wandering a bit more. I’m having a hard time connecting with the POV character in this section—I don’t think it’s necessarily a problem that he’s an out-and-out villain, but that makes it harder to be interested in what he does especially when I don’t really understand what he wants or what his role in the larger story is yet. I’m also not really understanding what happened with C and her crew that led us to this point.