Asmodemon

Overall I enjoyed reading this chapter. What I liked was that the sisters are doing something proactive, even though it’s such a spur of the moment thing that it should be doomed to fail (which would be a nice source of conflict and drama for them) yet doesn’t (at least not yet). I also liked the interaction between them, they really complement each other well. That said, there are also some things that didn’t work quite as well for me. Some of these I also remarked upon in the last chapter. Easy life: I still have the feeling that the lives the slaves live in this plantation are too easy, especially now that we know that the previous mistress of the place gave the girls some education. By the way people talk and act I can’t tell the difference between a noble and a slave. Other examples include the fact that, aside from a token fear in the last chapter, the sisters aren’t averse to escaping at all. A slave like Tia (who doesn’t seem very bright) can bribe guards, rat out her fellow slaves, and come out on top without repercussions (or has she lost fingers too?). There are no fences even though a plantation with magic fruit would be a target to thieves. And apparently slaves don’t want to escape from the place. It doesn’t ring true to me. Tia: I didn’t like Tia’s brief appearance. She’s the cliché annoying fellow slave who’ll betray anyone to get ahead. The description alone is also needlessly antagonistic: “Tia had a small, upturned nose, giving her pale face a mean quality.” Her whole point of being in that scene is superfluous. There are other ways to show that Belili has magic, but none as easy as this. There aren’t any consequences to the confrontation. The girls aren’t delayed by her being there, the scene didn’t have real tension (simply because the whole of it reads rather like a cliché), and aside from showing Belili has magic none of the POV characters are changed by the scene. The guards also aren’t really alerted to the escape any sooner than could otherwise be the case. Now, things might be different if Belili had killed her instead – that would have created a source of conflict between the sisters, since Kisa wanted Belili to stop. Belili would have a death on her conscience, another source of conflict, since other than being a slave and on the run the sisters don’t really have a conflict. Hair-colour: It’s great hearing more about the magic system, but something felt a little contradictory about the various shades. How do you define nearly brown hair, because now it seems that brown hair can be both blond (non-magical) and not blond (magical)? Noble savage: The noble savage/native, whom apparently aren’t often seen, speaks the language very well. It seems that someone taught him. I’m not sure what to think about this character yet, he seems remarkably modern in his ideas about freedom and his magic is very advanced. The moment he’s described as having purple hair and with the dogs coming you know that he’s going to do something with his magic and that it’s going to be powerful. That kind of sapped the tension. Hunting: Interesting that the slaves can go hunting. Are they allowed to do this (limited to the plantation, or outside with supervision) or is it something they do covertly?

Thanks guys, you've given me some good stuff. I'm giving the story one more polish and then I think I'll start submitting it around - see what bites.

For of all, I like how the story starts with the perspective of slaves – I don’t read a lot of stories where that is the case. One great thing about this is that your main character(s) are at rock bottom, everything they do to improve their lives is a struggle. That’s a great conflict source. One thing though is that Kisare and Bel didn’t really feel like slaves, they had too much free will and initiative for people who grew up as slaves (I’m just assuming here they were born slaves, I don’t think you mentioned that in the text). Cruel master: Kisare describes Aricaba-Ata as a cruel master, but for a slaver he doesn’t seem so bad. Yes, he does backhand Kisare for dawdling, but as a slave she should’ve known better than do that in front of her master. The same with Bel losing her finger – she should’ve known better. For a cruel master he leaves his slaves a lot of freedom if Kisare and Bel can so easily be tempted to hide something from their master and go out into the night later to retrieve it. They even have plans to run and save for some perfunctory hesitation they easily decide to make a run for it. If he is so cruel, maybe we should see more of it, otherwise Kisare and Bel are lucky (as far as you can speak of luck when you’re a slave) with such a lenient master. Capital letters: These didn’t work well for me either. In text I can see the difference between Apples and apples, but in speech…not so much. I have to assume that the two are pronounced differently, otherwise, how can one tell when someone wants an apple or an Apple? Do Apples look differently too? Are they like green apples or more reddish apples? Are they bigger? If they are significantly different, maybe they should have a different name. If not, maybe they should have a different name too. It could be something as simple as calling Apples by a brand name or adding something too it, like divine apples or something like that. The same goes with fruit and Fruit. Blond: I have some issues with hair colour deciding societal rank. It reminds me first of all of Brandon’s Stormlight Archive, only with hair instead of eyes and dark and light reversed. This isn’t that much of a problem, but it did cross my mind and automatically creates a comparison even if you don’t want one. Nobles have less blond hair, and colour is somehow magical. To me that would mean that the someone’s rank is lower if they have more blonde hair. Aricaba-Ata has two reddish streaks, but otherwise is completely blond. To me that doesn’t scream noble, but more middle-class. And maybe not even that – not a slave, but not a noble either. A chief steward or a head guard? Blond hair is caused by recessive genes and in our world it’s estimated that only two percent of the world’s population is blond. If the same holds for the story’s setting (and without being told the contrary I’m assuming the same rules apply) that would mean that 98% of the world is not blond and therefore noble…that doesn’t sound very maintainable. Part of why the Stormlight Archive works for me is that people with blue eyes are fewer in number than people with dark eyes, so stretching that to a noble/ruling/upper middle-class is not so strange. Doing the opposite requires more explanation. Aside from these things it was a good start. Looking forward to see where you’re taking this.

I don’t have much to say, I quite enjoyed this story. Will: I liked how Will finally stood up to the council and that in the end he made a choice for himself – choosing to die – even if that was futile. That said, him making decisions on his own only happened near the end, for the remainder of the story he was very passive. Things happened to him and he underwent them. I understand that the choice he made, to die, is hinged on him becoming tired of the life he leads and part of that is him being tired of the programming he’s had – programming which makes him passive and follow orders – but that doesn’t make him very engaging. I do have to say that the story interested me enough that Will being passive didn’t bother me as much as other stories have, who had passive protagonists. Voice: The voice inside Will’s head seems like the part of him that has shaken off his programming and I like that part – the way he’s conflicted about it. Maybe the flaws in his programming should have come out a little sooner? Ending: First of all, I liked the ending, it was inevitable that Will would get tired of his lot in life. I was half expecting him to join the rebellion, but this was better: resisting by choosing to die. I’d have liked to have seen him fight more for his right to die than he did, that way the end of the story (where he failed to do even that) would be more poignant, I think. Right now he simply underwent everything that happened. I’d have liked to have seen him struggle in some way against getting collected. Maybe to have him try to die faster before the collectors get him and the cycle starts all over again. After all, he knew that the soldiers who were hurt badly enough couldn’t be revived, so if he damaged himself enough before the collector got to him… Language: Language-wise I think you can prune a lot of adjectives from the story. Especially in the beginning I found the descriptions bordering on being purple. It got better later on.

I’ll second what Mandamon already said, it’s good to read more of this, though I do start to find Cadmia’s rich girl attitude more annoying as I read more of her. She does have agency though, something which Varus is lacking, especially when we’re not in his perspective. Magic: So far the magic system of your setting is a confusing to me. There are curses and cursed men, as apparently Varus is, but so far Varus’ curse is only helping him out – I don’t see the curse part of what has happened to him. When Hostus uses him magic to transform you say: “His body and voice were still the same, but his features were those of an elderly woman.” If his body remained the same, what features are you talking about? Is it just the face, because the way I see it his face is part of his body – and his body didn’t change. The other thing with this transformation is that I’m not clear on whether this is a transformation or an illusion. I assume it’s a transformation, since Cadmia knows magic and she’d know if it was an illusion, right? Power of the guard: I’m a bit concerned about how much power and authority the guards have here, as Cadmia was able to bully herself past the arena guard rather easily. I understand that if a senator comes by that a guard might let him through, but Cadmia is no senator. She may be the heir to one, but she’s a woman too and women, in this setting, don’t seem to have any power openly. So a spoiled girl wants inside to the cells and the guard, a legionary, an actual soldier, let’s her through. I might be able to forgive this if we’re talking about a hired guard, but this is a soldier. He should have the authority to refuse spoiled nobles entrance into the cells. Why even have them around if they can’t do that?

I agree with what the others have said, there are some good things here ( which I’ll get to in a moment), but on the whole it is overshadowed by the execution. Characters: The others have already said it, but there are no characters to speak of in this story. We get several disjointed perspectives on either side of the war, but don’t really follow anyone, nor do we see from their perspectives whether they lived through the event or died. None of them really matter to me as the reader. Milieu: I get that this is more of a milieu or setting piece, but for me, to make that work there has to be a purpose to it. I don’t really get that until the end when one side finally wins the battle for the pass and even with that, what’s the point? What happens now? All through the story I’m told that the front is meaningless, this part of the war is meaningless, the pass is worthless, etc. So what is the point of me reading about it then? Talking heads: I have no idea what these people look like, there are no descriptions for any of the characters. When they talk to each other they just talk and don’t do anything. Slow pace: The story reads very slowly. In the first scene we have a general who does nothing but lament the fact his drink didn’t arrive. In the second scene two characters, a captain and a tactician, engage in a conversation that is below the both of them and doesn’t do anything more but repeat what the general thought one scene before. And that’s about a quarter of the story. So, lots of exposition, but no likeable characters to ground any of that exposition. Charge: The charge that gives one army the victory is anti-climactic and not unexpected. One army has killers (most of whom are at the front of the charge) and the other pampered nobles who want a cushy position. The fact that they’d break is not surprising. Someone dies at the end: But who dies? I think it’s the captain, since he’s in charge. But by the description it might as well be the tactician, since he was sent there for speaking his mind and disobeying orders too. Dichotomy: Now, I did like the dichotomy between the two armies. They both see this as a meaningless front, but one sees it as a way to punish soldiers and another as a post to promote soldiers or reward them. Symmetry: This is a little hit and miss. On the one hand I like the symmetry between the two sides you’ve got going. Scenes for the western side have two characters in them, scenes for the eastern side only have one character in them. What I like less is that, because of this, there is no dialogue for characters on the eastern side. And that results in a lot of thought and exposition for the scenes with the eastern army. Potential: There is potential here, in two armies in a state of deadlock over one pass. One side clearly has no intention of moving from their cosy position, but the other side is suffering. When the captain says the suicide rate is up you might make it worse – maybe the army is already decimated by suicide and he expects the force to break on its own any time soon. If he still wants glory and if he still believes he’s fighting to protect his nation, that gives him a good driving conflict and a clear deadline. Add a new tactician who isn’t broken yet…

It’s been a while since I last submitted anything. I submitted this story once before years ago, but it’s gone through some extensive rewrites since then. Pitch: When the black ship emerges from the storm the siren Linaeve sets out to claim her mate. But will she succeed when her song is pitched against a haunting melody lurking within the vessel’s holds, claiming the ship and everyone on it as its own?

It's been a while, but I've also got a piece to submit this week

I’m a bit conflicted about this story, there were parts that worked and parts that didn’t. On the whole though the story didn’t work for me. The start was confusing and when I’d gotten through the confusion Joan was in a bar, doing nothing, until the very last scene where she joins the arena. Disconnected start: Like Mandamon I had some trouble identifying what kind of story I was reading – Joan’s thoughts made me think fantasy and when I realized she was in fact in America I had to pause to let that sink in. It’s because of Joan’s observations, which, for her, make sense since apparently she’s thrown out of her time and into the future (and in a different land). But to the reader her lens of confusion only makes it confusing and I don´t believe that is what you set out to do. Joan of Arc: Joan of Arc is bastardization of her name (Jeanne d'Arc) that didn’t come into favour until after her trial. The story is of course written in English for an English audience, but for me it still felt a little weird that she referred to herself as Joan. Aside from that though I did like Joan’s character. And while her confusion caused the disconnected start it does work in a few places. For instance, when she orders fries in the bar. Money: I didn’t really buy into the part where Joan orders food and only then, when it’s too late, realizes that she has no money. She grew up poor, she’d know that food doesn’t come for free. English: Apparently, though she speaks it in a broken fashion, Joan of Arc understands some modern English. It’s hand-waved away in the first paragraph, but that doesn’t really cut it. At first, because the start confused me, I also missed that particular sentence. I was thinking that it was very unlikely that in her own time she knew more than a handful of English words so the fact that she understands it to such a degree was mindboggling. It wasn’t until the second read-through that I caught the sentence that addresses this. The fact that she has trouble forming coherent sentences on the other hand was a nice touch and made her seem more real. French: Though Joan is French she never uses the language except the one ‘oui’, not even in her thoughts. I’m not saying you should overdo it with the French, but a couple words here and there, maybe a sentence in her thoughts, would work in fleshing out her character. Magic: How did Joan come to be there? Is she the real deal or not? As far as I understand the setting it’s the modern world. To me something as fantastical as a time displacement in the modern world needs a bit more explanation than ‘To her surprise, she understood the babble of the people around her’. Purpose: What’s the purpose to this story? You’ve got Joan of Arc and Genghis Khan, either (1) time displaced, (2' reincarnations, (3) cosmic coincidence, ending up in a fight in an arena, but why? You know, other than the fact that you as the author wanted to write it? There’s nothing there to indicate why Joan would want to do this. It’s not because of the money, she’d already received 200 dollars to do with as she pleased. So why? What is her motivation to do this? She was also in that bar by coincidence, she didn’t set out to find it and therefore couldn’t know the fight was going on there.

I like the atmosphere of the story so far. It really does have a noir feel to it and the breath magic looks really nice. I also liked how you portray Ben. The observations he makes paint a good picture of the kind of man he is. The very start of the prologue is nicely done too. “He was here to kill a man”. That works really well for me. What worked less well are the following things. Explanations: After the zinger at the end of the first paragraph you go into a full page of explanations on what Ben is doing there and how his magic works. Neither of those is necessary, since we see both to good effect when his target shows up. Run-on sentences: A lot of the sentences tend to go on too long and end up rambling. Example 1: A politician who could convince even those who opposed him that he was the greatest thing to walk this earth since the men who killed the gods was far too dangerous to be allowed to run free. Example 2: Ben had already opened his collar but it did little good; his shirt was already drenched in sweat at the armpits and back making him long to strip the damnation thing off and dash, bare-chested, from the barber’s screaming. Small contradiction: “The door opened and a short man in a bowler hat strolled in with his two bodyguards, one waiting outside the other stepping in with him.” The man walks in with his two bodyguards and the man walks in with one of his bodyguard while the other stays outside. That’s a contradiction, either the two bodyguards come in or they don’t. As an aside, I agree with Mandamon that this paragraph should really be the second paragraph of the story. The sooner you get to the action the better. Preparation: On page two you state that Ben had prepared carefully, but he only has a single plan which is, on the whole, rather flashy. When it fails he retreats, knowing that his employers will come after him. This doesn’t sound like a prepared man, at all. Weird observation: First we get a detailed observation by Ben on the kind of man Giovanni is and then comes this sentence: “None of this really passed through Ben’s mind once he noticed Giovanni enter the shop”. Then who made those observations just now? Plan and boom: The explosion came rather sudden. The way I read the actions preceding the explosion was Ben going over what he had to do in his mind, not that he actually performed them. So when the explosion came it felt weird. Gel: Maybe it’s magic gel, but I don’t buy it that he has on a gel that leaves him unharmed but completely incinerates his clothing. The fact that he can sit in the barber’s shop without getting noticed means he’s wearing a thin layer of gel. Otherwise people would know he’s a man making a lot of smoke, carries an ignition source, wearing flame-repellent gel… It stretches belief that a thin layer could protect him that well. Recognition: Ben identifies a completely charred body with absolute certainty. This is odd, especially since the heat should have made everyone completely unrecognizable. You mention that the only reason he could was because of the burning remains of the bowler hat – the heat in the place completely charred Ben’s clothes, how did the hat survive enough to leave burning remains?

I’m also joining again this year, for the sixth time. I made it all the way to the 50,000 words in the previous years, so this year I’ve got the personal goal of reaching 100,000 words. My personal strategy is to just plan the hell out of the story so I’ll know what needs to happen in every chapter from beginning to end. That way I’ll just need to sit down and type it all out without losing time halfway through the month deciding where I need the story to go. It also has the added benefit of allowing me to skip chapters if I don’t feel like writing them. I also try to go for 10K days in the weekends – which is something I only started doing in the last two years as I couldn’t write in the first week or two of November and had to catch up (vacations abroad are not conducive to writing time). This time I’m not on vacation and will be starting on the first of November so, in theory, 100K shouldn’t be impossible…we’ll see if I can make it.

Most of what I wanted to comment on has already been said, so I’ll just make a couple small points I wanted to address. Carl’s scene: I’ve seen in the other critiques that the others thought that Carl’s bit was the best written, and I agree. I don’t think this was the place to have that particular scene however. It’s set in the past to explain the character Carl, whom we’ve not met yet and who doesn’t even appear in the present in this chapter. To me it feel like an info dump, breaking up the scene it’s placed in. I found it jarring to read. In my opinion this part is better suited to be integrated in a scene where Carl actually has a role. Had: You use the word had a lot to explain what the characters were doing just before they got on the scene. If it’s important for us to know what they were doing, maybe you should have started there. A lot of instances can be cut completely without losing anything, such as in the third paragraph: “Jerome had waited for most of the other passengers to leave” could just as easily have been “Jerome waited for most of the other passengers to leave”, which feels a lot more direct than the original example. POV: You have two points of view in this chapter, Jerome and Chloe, in a rather short chapter. You also broke these points of view with a separate section on Carl, which just comes right out of the blue. Is it important to go into Chloe’s POV? Because Jerome’s could be used just as easily here and it will make the chapter feel more unified.

I enjoyed this part, especially the ending, it fit and the reveal with Tarquin worked very well. Mandamon has already made most of the points I wanted to make, like him I found the parts where Blacklake was alone to be dragging (he’s stumbling around, thinking of what to do, leaping to strange conclusions and plans), while the scenes with the other characters actually went somewhere. Despite Blacklake being un unlikeable main character this story could work if pruned here and there to cut down on his introspection. Greed: On page three Blacklake is thinking that Sabine told him his greed caused Marius’s death, but did she say that? I can’t remember and I couldn’t find a reference when I looked over the previous parts. It also seems like a lie, because knowing what Tarquin and Sabine are it seems unlikely that the tontine agreement and the greed associated with it caused Marius’s death. Blacklake: For a main character I found him to be largely ineffectual in these last parts. Sabine has rattled him, I get that, but throughout the last two parts all he’s accomplished is get away from her – and that seems to be because she was toying with him. He wants to reason with Sabine, but he is more of a liability to her than an asset. He knows what she is. If she kills him she can stay with Peter and maybe Peter would figure things out (unlikely, unless she does something stupid like reveal who she is, like she did with Blacklake) but more likely she’d just coast by. And given the ending where Tarquin becomes the lord of the region they never needed Blacklake either. It would make a lot more sense for them to have had him killed as well. Joshua: Is there a point to Tarquin actually being called Joshua? Since you stress the name it makes me think it’s important, but in actuality there is nothing in this part or any other that makes reference to a Joshua. To me that makes this ‘reveal’ pointless and a distraction to what’s going on, since I’m wondering why the name is important rather than focussing on what the story is actually doing.

Part three, the best part so far. The reversal with Sabine and Blacklake was exactly what the story needed. It was clear earlier that there was more to Sabine, but not that it was this much. And just when Blacklake seemed like the monster in the story. I agree with what Mandamon said already. Additionally I’ve got the following small points. Clement: I was a little concerned to see the part start with Clement’s POV, as it’s another in a long line of POVs in this novella. So far we’ve seen Blacklake, Peter and Sabine, do we really need one more – especially if it’s so short? I didn’t think his POV added anything to the story. POV switch: There is an abrupt POV switch between Blacklake and Sabine on page eight, with the sentence “Sabine appeared at the doorway in a halo of fire.” Before that we’re in Blacklake and without warning we’re in Sabine’s. There should be a scene change between them. His ally: The sentence “The thought that Sabine might be pursuing his ally…” was very confusing. He and Clement aren’t friends and they certainly have not been aligned before this moment, so why does Blacklake suddenly consider Clement his ally? Conclusion leaping: Maybe it’s because Blacklake is rattled, but he’s leaping to some strange conclusion – including that Sabine is after Clement (and she actually was, but why?). He is sure she can speak to animals? How so?

After reading the prologue and the first chapter I’ve got the following points. Favourite hand: The first sentence really threw me for a loop. The mention that Diro’s favourite hand was cut off really made me pause – not something you want in a first sentence. I’ve heard of a dominant hand, but never seen anyone refer to a hand as ‘favourite’. Start: The first part of the prologue has some good visuals, like the skycraft falling on Diro, and the molten fire falling from the sky. Unfortunately it is bloated by confusing sections: did time pass fast or slow? It can’t be both. His memories are scattered but come back in flashes in one sentence. What’s the point of him not remembering then? The roundabout way of going about telling us Diro lost his arm didn’t really hook me either. I’d start with the second paragraph (minus the first sentence of that paragraph) of having the ship fall on Diro – that’s an attention grabber. Weird sentences: There are a lot of examples of overly long, overly complex sentences that only serve to confuse me. Awkward and passive: “He would have cried at that thought had he the ability in this floating void his mind now found vacancy within.” Awkward structure: “The orb indicating the Gourd-Smasher had turned belly up and the crystal that had given off a powerful emerald light now shone nothing at all.” Run-on sentence: “The deep darkness of a sky filled with stars that have been blanked out by the bright scar of red light bursting from the mountain fortress cast an eery silence from the vantage of the not-too-distant village that had once been known as Respid.” POV shifts: I wasn’t sure if you were writing in third person omniscient or third person limited with POV errors. The first chapter starts with a paragraph in Fistrid’s POV, then the next paragraph is Maren’s. You keep shifting it up through their sections. This should be tightened up. Unless you are writing third person omniscient. I’m not a fan of it and it is out of style(for a good reason, in my opinion). Aftermaths, a passive feel: You have a lot of references in both chapters to rather interesting things, but we’re never actually there when the interesting things happen. For instance, Diro’s perspectives are all about looking back at what has happened since he’s in some kind of limbo. To me that makes me feel like you’re skipping the actual interesting parts (the attack, breaching the mountain, things going south, the collision with the other ship) for recollections of those events during quieter moments after. We’re told what happened, but we’re never actually shown those events, which are what I would have liked to see. I’d like to have been there with those characters. It was too bad you put the focus elsewhere, that’s like taking the easy way out. Had: I counted close to a hundred instances of the word ‘had’. Now it’s a valid word, but its use turns the pacing down. Instead of telling what ‘had’ happened, show what happens. Speaking frankly: Maren asks permission to speak freely after she had already asked him if he had enough sleep. Seems like she was already speaking frankly. Info-dump: First chapter, Diro’s perspective, we’re treated to a lot of background information, such as how his ship got its name. At this point of the story, why should we care? The ship is gone anyway. You also describe the original plan that went south in the prologue. We’ve already seen the aftermath, why should we care about what led up to it and what their intentions were after the fact? The fact that Diro lost his son in the war isn’t particularly interesting at this point either. In fact, that whole section of Diro doesn’t advance the plot in any meaningful sense. It fills in some blanks left by the prologue which, at this point, don’t really matter anyway. Conclusion: Overall you could have some interesting things here, the sky ships, the opening battle, demons from the volcano, but it’s hampered by everything being an aftermath. We’re always told what happened rather than shown. I could like the characters when I get to know them better, though so far they aren’t really memorable yet.

I don’t want to sound harsh, but this story isn’t really memorable. There’s talk of a mutiny, it happens, people die, the end. Passive: In the time it took before the mutiny happened we see Bryon waiting for it to happen. He already has a plan, he’s already sure it’s going to happen. All he has to do is wait and that’s what he does. That’s actually rather boring. There is no suspense, only certainty. The main character is passive throughout the story. What captain waits for the mutiny to happen? He should have rounded up loyal men and arrested the traitors. That’s far more pro-active and interesting. Of the ship: Nitpick, but the second paragraph contains three instances of ‘of the ship’. After the second one I was thinking to myself, yes, I know we’re on a ship, please stop mentioning it in the exact same fashion. Jared: His betrayal didn’t come as a surprise at all, I’m afraid. Plan: I’m confused about the plan. On the second page Bryon notes that the mutineers would see how outnumbered they were and give up. Well, at the end, it’s just Bryon and Jared against the mutineers. I was scratching my head, where were the reinforcements and why isn’t Bryon surprised they weren’t there? If ambushing the mutineers was the plan he should have made note of such a massive deviation. Point: What was the point of the mutiny? I get it that Jared might be a power hungry bastard who wants to off his captain, but the captain seems like a good man. He seems to keep a good ship – why would these crewmembers, who would not become the new captain, join the mutiny? What’s in it for them?

I’m going to have to echo the others before me as well, they’ve said most of what I wanted to say. I enjoyed it, but it felt like this was part of something bigger, rather than a fully rounded short story. Having it end the way it did was a bit of a let-down, truth be told. Initial worry: I was a bit worried at the start that the whole story was going to be one big fight scene in the arena while other characters were doing interesting things, like assassinate the queen. Good thing that didn’t happen, though why Corkle was needed as a distraction is a bit beyond me. The flight capabilities of the grasshoppers seem like such an advantage and there wasn’t anything stopping him going up to the box when the king appeared. Now maybe things were different when the queen was alive, maybe there were defences against flyers (if so, how did the assassins reach her), but I saw no signs of that. The assassination went a bit quick as well. Conflict: I didn’t get a sense of what the conflict was about. Why are the ants the enemy and why should we care about these assassin grasshoppers? The premise behind the arena battle didn’t work well for me. It’s clear there is a conflict between ants and grasshoppers, but why would a contest, one against one, settle things for two entire factions? Personally I don’t believe in such single combat stratagems, but more than that, why is a mantis representing the ants in this conflict? If that’s allowed why haven’t the grasshoppers used a proxy and have Corkle lead the attack against the queen? King: I liked the idea of a king as twist in the story, but if felt like there should be more to it. Who was he? How could he do what he did? Resolution: Corkle dies at the end, but nothing gets resolved. Why did the assassination occur? Who was the ant king and how could he do what he did? Who is winning the battle after Corkle dies and why should we care which side wins? It felt more like this was the first chapter of a larger story than a fully rounded short story.

Interesting, it’s been a while since I’ve read a ‘hard-boiled’ detective story. Like jParker I got stuck on this on the first paragraph, though I thought first of Garrett, PI (by Glen Cook) rather than Harry Dresden. And it strikes me that I’ve said this before, when you posted chapter one of “The Lady and the Fool” a year ago. It’s nice to see you take a second shot at Eodral, though so far I haven’t seen anything truly special yet. As far as I’ve seen so far there are two major hurdles that get in the way of the story. Rough language: It’s hard writing in English when that isn’t your first language and unfortunately that shines through here quite a lot. Mandamon has already said plenty on the subject so I won’t belabour the point. Tropes: The hard-boiled detective genre has a lot of tropes and you’re hitting a lot of them right from the start. Beautiful woman? Check (usually the woman’s is the client). Mob connection? Check. Snooping neighbour? Check. Since it’s a fantasy setting I’m just waiting for Eodral to announce his distrust of horses. To get a better handle on the tropes of the genre I suggest reading some fantasy detective novels, if you haven’t already, and to take a good look at what you’re doing and what they have done. My suggestions: Garrett, PI series by Glen Cook. The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher. Eddie LaCrosse books by Alex Bledsoe. The important question is how you can make yourself stand out from these well-established examples. These books are good reads and they can show you the kind of things that have been done before a lot better than us telling you about them.

Faster start: The second part starts off faster than the first part, which is really what the story needs. All three main/important characters are together and all have hidden motives, which could prove to make an interesting dinner. Manipulation and innuendo, you could do a lot here. Unfortunately the momentum dies quickly and there are some clunky bits that made me stumble for a bit, such as ‘snapped casually’ (how does one do that exactly?) or ‘To Blacklake’s slight advantage’ (I get that Blacklake wants to hide his faux pas, but to call someone’s hesitant answer a slight advantage doesn’t feel quite right). Inner cackling: I found some of Blacklake’s inner thoughts/monologues a bit hard to believe. Like the section starting with ‘God how this woman stirs me’. It’s like he’s the stereotypical villain, cackling at his own brilliance. He also keeps alluding to something he plans to do, and has done so since the first part, but for the longest time doesn’t think concretely about his plans. Now, maybe it’s just me, but I like to know ahead of time what a POV character plans to do rather than hint at it in their own perspective. We are in their heads, we should know, especially since it’s on the character’s mind. When we do find out his master plan, dealing with drugging Sabine, it actually felt anti-climactic. Dwam: I’ve never seen the word ‘dwam’ before and had to look it up. Initially I thought you had misspelled some other word, but apparently it means stupor or daydream. You may want to reconsider using the word. Later you do misspell the word soul when you use ‘God rest his sole’. Long paragraphs: You use long paragraphs and they make the story feel long simply by being large blocks of text. There is hardly any variation as well. Perhaps you’d consider splitting up some of the longer blocks into smaller chunks. Unnecessary hostility: What I had the most problems with was that all the characters are unnecessarily hostile, all the time. This was the case in the last part and it’s the case now. Prime example, the constable enters, calls Blacklake’s name and Blacklake practically explodes at him: ‘don’t toy with me’, where did that come from? Guilty conscience? Then the constable answers him reasonably and Blacklake urges the constable to be calm – the constable was calm. Which I cannot say for Peter, since he’s the guy who explodes over Blacklake’s words next. Did he expect Blacklake to confess or something? For people who are supposed to be good at manipulation and who hold positions of power they let their strings get plucked rather easily. Confusing leaps in conversations: Some of the things the characters say are responses to things that weren’t said, nor were they implied. Some of that I mentioned in the above paragraph. Another, which was a real head-scratcher, is when Sabine says that there is nowhere for Blacklake to run. Nobody was talking about him running or fleeing in any way, so where did that come from and why do all the characters find this a natural thing for her to say? No emotional connection: After reading the two parts I don’t care for any of the characters. Which is partly due to them being so incredibly hostile they are near unbelievable. When you revealed Blacklake’s intention to have a ‘tryst’ with Sabine by drugging her I didn’t really feel anything at all, aside from the basic premise of his plan being deplorable out of principle. What actually happens to Sabine though can go either way for all I care. Maybe that’s your intention, to write a story about characters no one gives anything about. If so, you’re doing a good job. But if we’re supposed to care for some of these characters you’ve not hit the right chords with me. That can become a big problem. Purpose of dinner: What was the purpose of this dinner? The way it was foreshadowed in the first part and the start of this part I gathered they had important things to discuss, but in the end they didn’t say anything important to each other at all. What was the purpose? Not your purpose as the writer, which was to bring Blacklake’s plan in motion and drugging Sabine, but the purpose of the characters. Why was Peter there? Why was Sabine there? What did they have to gain by this dinner?

I must concur with what the others have said, there are things here that might be leading to something interesting in the next parts, but this first part didn’t really do it for me. Slow start: There’s no hook to the story. The first paragraph is overly long and descriptive and this trend continues all throughout the first section of Blacklake’s perspective. There’s a lot of background material and descriptions of surroundings, but the story doesn’t really go anywhere for a long time. Case in point, Blacklake does nothing except stand in the courtyard for the first eight pages. He only talks to two people and the conversations are noticeable for how little the characters say and how much descriptions are put around the dialogue. Style: The prose is bloated with adjectives, which makes the whole thing rather purple. I’m fine with a little flowery prose every now and then, but with so much of it, it really dampens the reading experience. The sentences are overly long and convoluted and you also use far too many commas. It slows the pacing way down. Letter: The letter that Blacklake receives is a clear example of the above point. It’s so convoluted I had a hard time understanding what it said. It also made me think that nobody writes letters like that. That plays havoc on my suspension of disbelief. Characters: I don’t really care for the characters so far. Blacklake is full of wrath, Peter is full of greed, Sabine is spiteful for little reason. Now I don’t necessarily need to read about likeable characters, but if you combine unlikeable characters with pages upon pages of background information and descriptions, with nothing happening, that’s not a good sign. Tontine agreement: I liked the idea of the characters bound by the tontine agreement, it’s got a lot of potential for intrigue and I’m interested to see where you take it. A word of caution though concerning the definition for tontine at the start of the story. When I see such a dictionary definition I see it as being part of the world in the story. You mention Naples and France – this immediately makes me think that the story is also set on Earth (an implied promise you make to the reader), yet by the magic that’s being used it’s probably another world entirely.

I agree with Mandamon on this one, it was a good story up until the end, when the story stops but doesn’t really get resolved. There is no twist, no surprise and no climax – the final pursuit is a kid who backs off, not really the greatest adversary. Taru: I liked Taru, he was as a good protagonist with a clear plight and some heavy setbacks and tough choices to make. Descriptions: While I liked Taru I didn’t really have a clear mental picture of him. I don’t think you describe him anywhere. While that’s understandable, since he’s the POV character, it is something I missed. You do the same with the other characters, save the daughter (whom you describe as red). The stranger coming down the mountain is a blur, the youth near the canoes is a blur, I don’t know what they look like. Tension: Things never really felt tense to me, the threat to Taru, his wife, and his daughter is in the background. He successfully tricks his village into looking in the wrong direction (if they pursue him at all) and we never see them again. They quickly go into a jungle and trying to find anyone in a jungle is next to impossible, so they are safe from pursuit. Nothing threatening happens in the jungle either and afterward it’s only because Taru tried to steal a canoe that things heat up a little (why not wait until deeper in the night before stealing a canoe? Taru knew some people could still be awake and it wouldn’t have cost him anything to wait). Mori: This ties in with the tension in the whole story. The mori could be a great threat or antagonist, you certainly hint at their power through Taru’s fear, which also serves to make me curious about them. But the one Taru comes across doesn’t do anything. They might as well not have been in the story and it wouldn’t change anything. Screams (nit-pick): This is a minor thing, at the start of the story you use ‘screams’ in both the first and second sentence – I don’t really like repetitions of words and right at the start of the story it worked against me in getting hooked to the story. Flow of the first paragraphs: To me the flow of the first paragraphs was a bit off. Specifically, the second paragraph (description of Taru’s surroundings) feels disconnected from the paragraphs around it. The first paragraph is tense, the second is upbeat, then the third is tense again and the fourth is upbeat. I’d move the second paragraph to after the fourth paragraph (so after “I’m a father, he thought proudly”). That way you have tense, tense, upbeat, upbeat. Taru would only notice his surroundings and how beautiful the weather is after knowing that his child is born.

I agree with the others that this could become a good story, with most likely the children, grown-up, as the protagonists. If that is so than I can understand why you’ve got all their perspectives in the prologue so we can get to know them, but I wonder if that was the right thing to do. The way I see it, this prologue has some problems with using the children as protagonists. First, if the next chapters have them as adults, or young adults, it means a great number of years have passed. People change a lot from such young ages, so whatever traits and characteristics we see here don’t necessarily translate to their later lives. If that’s the case, we don’t need to get to know them now. Second, the children don’t act, they are acted upon. There is tension in this prologue and danger, to them and their parents, but they don’t understand it. They simply follow along and observe and so the tension actually seems farther removed from the reader than it should be. The one character who does act is Juliane and she also understands the danger. I believe this piece would be stronger if things happened from Juliane’s perspective, rather than the children, which then ends at her death. Third, you need an adult perspective. That’s why the children’s perspectives are an incongruous mix of adult words and concepts which they don’t understand but that you as the writer need in order to give the reader the information you want them to have. This is especially true for Rowana’s perspective. In that case you’re better off choosing an adult perspective. I also don’t understand why Juliane had to die. The way I pictured the ship she was outside its airlock in the hangar. Cain has enough time to get away once she initiated the override sequence. Why didn’t she have enough time to jump into the ship’s airlock and escape?

There isn’t much more that I can say that the others haven’t already mentioned. They reversal of expressions with the aliens is an interesting thing and I really like how Jack names them mockers at the end, but aside from the confusion Jack feels at the aliens there isn’t much more to the story – the ‘mystery’ isn’t a mystery to the reader either, I figured out what was going on with them by the time the first aliens ran away from him, laughing. Especially in combination with the title. I would have liked to have some more description about Jack, his space suit and the ship itself. I didn’t really like the beginning of the story, with the ‘sound effects’. Other than that I don’t really have anything to say about the prose per se, the writing itself was very good.

What I liked most about part one is the setting, specifically the poquat. They are very alien compared to the usual fantasy races and their stance on memories is an interesting one. The story started good, I liked the first line, it sets a good scene, as well as the conflict on what to do with the portal: both options have danger and there is no clear solution. The rest of the story so far doesn’t really hook me though. Sence: Part of the problem with me losing interest is Sence’s perspective in the first four pages. She doesn’t really do anything – the other characters act and, with the exception of a few comments, she doesn’t have much of a presence here. It gets better when she tries to reach a decision on the portal and subsequently convincing the king. These scenes show she’s intelligent and capable, though she knows her decision could have grave consequences she’s not afraid to take the risk, as doing nothing is also destructive. Philosophy: The second part of what made this harder to read than it should be is the philosophy. I don’t mind characters waxing philosophically, but it’s too soon. The pacing really drops to zero when she talks about identity with Quoras and without being hooked to the story that’s a sure way to lose your audience. It didn’t help, for me, that I didn’t really buy into Sence’s side of the argument. Riot: This bothered me a little, why is the wizard outside the palace during a riot? The chances of Sence and Alina meeting just when Sence is being knocked to the ground are astronomical. Serendipity and all that, but it’s too convenient to feel real. Maybe it wouldn’t bother me so much save for the fact that the wizard shouldn’t have been out there, and neither should Sence, come to think of it. Also, the fact that they are able to have a quiet conversation in that place runs counter to what you stated before, that there is a real chance of being trampled to death. Naïve King: For a merchant king of a merchant city-state I thought Vasco was terribly naïve in his arguments with Sence. He sounds like a youth who doesn’t understand the way the world works yet and is in for a rough awakening. He doesn’t sound like a king at all. The argument between him and Sence didn’t resonate with me because of that. Nitpick: There is a perspective error on page 12. “I told Quaros. She didn’t agree with him, but she couldn’t come up with…” Should be something like “I didn’t agree with him.” First sentence: I’ll agree with Mandamon that the first sentence reads a little like a generic fantasy opening, but I still liked it. That’s due to the second sentence “That much was to be expected”. It sets the cliché on its head, since even your characters know it’s a cliché. Conclusion: Overall you’ve got some interesting things here, with the poquat and their memories and the dilemma between reopening the portal and keeping it closed. The philosophy drags the pacing down though and that makes it hard to read, which is something of which you should be aware.

What I liked most about the story is the Aztek feel of the setting, I don’t see that in stories much and it is, I think, the strongest suit of the story. Plot-wise not much happens, a sacrifice at the start and the storming of the priestess’ chambers, which, as it is a short story, might be enough but it still felt lacking. All though that might also be because I didn’t really care for any of the characters. Characters: The viewpoint character is pretty bland and reactionary – he has to sacrifice the girl because it’s his duty, he then has to be convinced to save his own life by attacking the high priestess and then, in the battle, he doesn’t contribute much at all. It seems everyone has an agenda and is acting upon it except for him. The high priestess is a faceless enemy, she has no characterization other than being the monster to defeat. Ixtli comes across better, as a manipulative bastard. The other named character is throwaway, he says nothing, does nothing, he only dies. It felt he only had a name so Texcoyo is justified about trying to kill the priestess, even though she struck him down out of self-defence. Tavern: Everything always happens in a tavern, which is a bit of a cliché. This is compounded by the fact that the prince, who is now actually the king, can just sneak out as he pleases – if he can get out, assassins can get in, so in terms of security the palace is a joke. Priests: What I found most interesting about the priests was that they lived for a very long time and can’t stand the sun, which made me think they were vampires. It’s never stated if they are or not, but it’s an interesting thing, a human society with vampires as a priesthood. Magic: The magic is a little generic, with force fields and flinging blue fire around. I’m not really sure about the rules of magic, what it can do and what the limits are, and since it’s magic that resolves the conflict in the story you might want to flesh this out a bit more. The biggest drawback comes back to Texcoyo – there is one battle in the story and it’s the most important one, but he can’t really do anything and is relegated to the side lines while the priest first weakens the priestess and then kills her – though granted Texcoyo did hit her with an arrow, but her powers were weakened by then and Ixtli could’ve taken her with a little more fire. Descriptions: The descriptions, for both the characters and the locations, are lacking. Now I understand this is a short story and you’re not going to describe things as lavishly as you could in a novel, but of the characters I’ve only got a clear image of two: the young woman who was sacrificed and the high priestess after the fireball. The rest are shades of grey, so I feel those could be fleshed out a little more. Final reveal: I liked the ending, but it didn’t come as a surprise – at all. I knew exactly what was going to happen when priest Ixtli said he was going to be the next High Priest after they killed the priestess.