neongrey

Yeah, I definitely have some clunkiness concerns overall with this one, but it's sort of a case of 'hmm I'd rather see what shakes out without me leading a bunch of horses to water hmm this is a bad analogy' This one will of course involve the cannibalization of the original 2... so we'll see how that goes, but I'm overally fairly pleased with the old version there so it's mostly working in tense changes, detail changes, a shift to the direction of the big conversation... and, of course, a priestess with bells in her hair is rather more significant now. And it should of course be jarring because that is quite literally what he wants, so that's fine. Aserahin's fun. He's certainly got that part of government down~ Lumpy would generally mean all over in this case; in part it's body fat, in part it's definitely less prominent things like breasts and butts (alas, poor sir mix-a-lot would not find much to enjoy here), but it's also about a physically unreasonable-to-acheive aesthetic ideal imposed from an outside source; 'lumpy' is perfectly deletable too if that's the primary sticking point. But if shuffling the surrounds or earlier bits will make it more workable, I do think it says something important about the aelin gaze that Savae is rather bitter about here. (Savae, who needs an architect, not a corsetier, to properly bind down, to call upon a line that will probably be discarded entirely) In terms of things that will probably come up but that I just feel like expounding upon, one might suppose that when one is conquered by an empire that considers one's very bodies to be inherently flawed, this has some messed-up repercussions for that sociey's gender roles beyond that initial assignment. Savae's reasons for living among the aelin at all have rather a lot to do with being in the uncomfortable position of being able to choose which axis of marginalization they want to have emphasized. I didn't initially want to be quite so overt, but there definitely was supposed to be an undercurrent that what happened was neither unintentional nor accidental, and I don't think it ever quite got through before. Now, well...

I'm actually going to decline to read here, if only to make the point that submission guidelines are not optional. No hard feelings, and I'll gladly go over a submission that's gone through the usual process, but I'm going to draw my line here.

So this one's all new material if anyone's paying that much attention in that regard. At any rate, direct comparison to the old material is no longer particularly helpful. I'm rather more interested in how this stands on its own merits. Thanks!

I am honestly not terribly surprised by The Martian winning, honestly; it has a very "hugo award" feel relative to the far more meritorious Fury Road. It's a disappointing result, but it's not a lot different from the way certain types of movies consistently win Oscars. That said, I don't think he should even have been in the running for the Campbell. His initial self-pub was long enough ago to rule him out and was on that strength that he got a major motion picture. Dude does not need the Campbell. Otherwise I am pretty happy with the results overall. Fifth Season deserved everything it got.

Can I get the 29th please?

The table is definitely necessary and intended to be included with the complete work, yeah, it's just still in the state of 'thing that is actively being messed with'.

That's fair and in and of itself I'm not particularly bothered by it in isolation, but I just get a bit of a red flag when I see someone we're ostensibly supposed to like getting their back up about other characters exercising that sort of agency. It is not per se an issue but it's also the sort of thing that's common enough that it may be introduced where it's not wanted. Otherwise, you know, depending on what fandoms you're into........................ but yeah that's something that needs to be handled carefully in more serious contexts In that case, I'm not sure how sold I am on people who appear to have generalized awareness of what they're about characterizing them as being so rational overall; given that it's shutting out some definite avenues for them to pursue in dealing with this problem. Not that I think anyone in the story wants to suggest it to them ('goodness, your evil plan would probably work way better if you did this...') but when it comes to this it certainly leaves me going 'well this clearly only works if one assumes everyone's cis and their parts fall within certain defined medical standards', lol I mean if at present they consist solely of the overlap of 'male' and 'born with a penis' that's valid* too but is, I think, at least a slightly irrational position to take when considering propogation of the ?species? (which is clearly not the right word but w/e) So yeah in this I think it comes down to the presentation as rational when it's in a lot of ways an emotional position; I don't know that I've encountered a particular reason to believe Hayden's framing there shouldn't be considered authoritative. Yeah, in this I think the answer is less to dig deeper on it (certainly Oz, I think, is not in a position to really be inclined to go over the nitty-gritty of Rex propogation); I think just the framing and phrasing by people who know what they're talking about would paper it over neatly. Certainly preferable to various food-based descriptors, lol. My thought there would be a bit more to question if the sense of modern white upper-middle class even still exists very much-- but then too I did miss like, all the chapters that would have had introductory stuff like that, so, hey, lol.

Okay, yeah, I can see that. Again, not sure I would read it that way myself but I can definitely see how you get there and I don't mind it, lol. Thanks! My secret is that I have access to a full procedural language generator; it produces a by-word substitution cipher so it's no good for grammar but it's perfect for making sure I don't have wonky phonemes or things that sound out. The use of language in stories is... somewhat important to me, lol. In a lot of ways this story has its origins waaaaaaay way back long enough ago that I don't even want to admit to it that I was taking Japanese and we were going over some stuff and our teacher was telling us how a direct "no" or "that's wrong" is usually quite rude... (certainly the honorifics have some relation in concept too, though they're mostly not analogous; wherever possible I avoid conscious emulation of real-world cultures. unconscious is of course unavoidable but does avoid awful hacking up cultures for parts and mashing them together without regard for societal development) I also get to do weird buried trivia like that shudkathra in the old chapter... 8 that Savae met (if anyone recalls); one (so long as that one is me, lol) could tell she's born on the surface because her name means daffodil, more or less

Playful, really...? Do you mind calling out some things in particular that gave you that kind of vibe? If it's before her brother says what's going on with him, I'm less immediately concerned (not sure I'd characterize it that way myself, but it's within tolerance, I suppose), but if it's after-- her first reaction is a personal barb and sort of downhill from there, so if anything's sounding playful it needs adjusting. Are you basing this on this chapter, or on the prior draft? Your phrasing makes me wonder. I think barring tweaks (or another radical restructure, ofc) I'm fine with the split in this chapter; my eye here too is (primarily, even) on what the reader learns without realizing they've learned it, and in that sense I'm not terribly inclined to part these bits out. That they happen close together is for a reason too, relating to the assertion of control (and it's critical here that it be her brother and not someone known professionally).

Geez, I am just exhausted lately. Let's see here... p.1 Nice start; gives a nice sense of the sort of place this is. 'she introduces herself' is redundant with that introductory line. I'm not sure a wall is the sort of trap you can spring. More of an obstacle one encounters, really. p.2 ... even with it cracking, lol. (it is not the text I am loling at, lol) 'when she finishes' is again a lilbit redundant uugh there's a particular family of possessive behaviour I do not like and I am seeing flashes of it it here and i am just gonna see where this goes for now p.3 'scissoring a glare' is not really an idiom I know, or rather-- the only real way that I am familiar with 'to scissor' as a verb is as a specific sex act between vagina-havers. The previous time I encountered it I could sort of intuit that you meant moving in that direction but I'm not sure how to apply it as a modifier to a glare. I mean, if that's what's going on here, I'm all for it, but somehow I suspect not... 'lips puff out' feels maybe a bit poutier than I think you're going for here with that specific line. p.4 hmmm. 'am I supposed to feel bad about this' feels rather a lot more sarcastic than I think is intended from what I get by the rest of the conversation further down. p.5 Contact, meeting... I'm not sure how well this jives with my impression of the situation, but this is something that feels likely to be from my coming in late to the story. Wouldn't sweat it if it's only me. p.6 hmm. p.7 The bit with the sketch feels pretty heavy-handed to me, honestly. Overall, I, ehh. It works, but that's not my problem here; like, I get the necessities involved, biologically speaking, with sexual reproduction. How ev er, this is sort of where I look at it and feel concerned this is going in somewhat gender essentialist directions, which, ehh. So, my understanding is that at present Rex is something one, at present, becomes via a mechanism I've missed at this point. At present, the cast entirely genders the Rex as male. I am going to assume by this that this is meant as what would typically be assigned male at birth as we at present do. So, it doesn't really follow for the Rex to be universally male; by the above, trans women would also be affected. Suggesting that they might cease to be women once becoming affected would be... unfortunate, to say the least. (do they still gender themselves? similarly suggesting that the coldly rational would assign themselves all as male is unfortunate). Vice versa, if trans men would be affected-- well, then the capture and rape plan they've been running with just seems really inefficient. But since this appears to be a question of factory original parts, one wonders: what about intersexed individuals? Are they susceptible? If yes, it becomes more likely that they might already have among them people with viable eggs (even if they would be unable to carry a term, there's certainly ways to get them out of someone, and if they're coldly rational, I'm sure at least one of them's thought of that). If no, why not? There's a lot of different ways someone can fall under that umbrella. I suppose by and large then the easiest way to look at my issue is as an objection is to phrasings like 'create female Rex'; it doesn't make sense at all for there to be no female Rex if Rex have any gender at all. If their difficulty is propogating themselves beyond the current mechanism, then that's what it ought to be framed as. Right now, eh, implications are kind of unfortunate in every direction.

Yeah, next time sounds realistic so long as I can keep on the ball.

Mine is indeed #ownvoices (though in a way that makes me feel awkward of talking over more marginalized identities than mine, even as I spend a lot of time annoyed at a lack of acknowledgement of bisexuality in media) , but I'd need to have a complete one and I don't think I can write at the rate I would need, not if I want to make rent anyway lol. See what happens, I guess. It'll happen again too, I'm sure. Next one might be more realistic.

Well, I'll tentatively chalk this up as me not needing to have her strangle a dog or stand out in the desert in her underwear with a gun for a cold open, then. :v Sounds a lot like I'm much more where I need to be. On the one hand, I'm glad this is worthwhile, but yeesh, that was a lot of words I tossed, lol.

Certainly more on target to what I intended than how she was coming off before, which was a severe problem with the old one. We'll see how it goes from here. Thanks!

No worries, just hope it helps.

P.1 I am, hmm, not loving the opener here. It's not the worst, but it's got kind of a disconnected feel to it. Honestly most of this page feels like it exists to exposit. There's probably a better way to integrate it; doing this right here isn't strongly compelling me to continue. p.2 Does she think of her father by given name? Seems odd. 'armor covered him' is kind of awkward phrasing too. This dialogue doesn't scan right to me, honestly; it feels pretty affected. I'd also keep an eye out for comma splices; you want a semicolon after 'outing today' or 'second tier lightshow', not a comma, eg. p.3 Lower down on this page honestly feels like a better opener than above, a little. Feels more natural. p.4 Honestly, going over this, I'm trying to find something to say here, but I'm just not very interested by anything going on here. p.5 Not sure about the voice here; I always find it a bit weird when something ostensibly in a character's voice goes into the technicals like gravitational pulls and whatnot. I certainly don't buy that reasoning for why she's unlikely to hurt herself. p.6 Again, I'm not sure I understand why you're using a given name for her mother in the narration. This one's closer to a quibble too because it's a legit enough name, but Moria is a word that's got a lot of baggage to it. So it's relatively normal to be hanging out on skylights? Okay, but I definitely don't buy that reasoning for her being unlikely to get hurt. 'also often obscured sight' is a really clunky-feeling phrase to me. p.7 No one at all present? No, I don't buy that in the slightest. There's always people who don't/won't/can't drop their work, and so on. p.8 Okay so here's where I scrolled back to see if there was any suggestion of how much lead time Riley has, because otherwise what you're selling is more or less that Riley just happened to have a really very specific plan to cause a disruption at this location. And I dunno, it felt kind of spontaneous before. Does she just like being ready to clog vents, or what? p.9 Just how much sodium are we talking about here? p.10 Ehhh. Here too, this dialogue does not scan for me. p.11 This bit's possibly the closest to interested I've been thus far, and I don't think the rest was worth it. I am not loving this overall, all told; it feels very conventional, almost like it's been assembled from parts. I don't hate it, but there's not much going on here that makes me want to read it. A lot feels like contrivance, and the dialogue overall does not work for me; at its best it feels like people talking at each other rather than to each other, and at its worst it feels like an expository vehicle. Your POV's kind of distant which is fine but I think it contributes to things just not feeling very interesting. As it is, I'm just not sure why Riley doing what she's doing should matter to me.

Well, here we are. One of these scenes should be loosely recognizable; the other has an element or two that might be but otherwise will not. I'm going to ask you to do your best to clear your mind of previous impressions of characters and the previous state of the work because the lay of the land is made quite different by this change. That said, more direct comparison to the old is fine, if you must. Overall: The living goddess of the city of Ilidria is dead. Lasila of House Vahendra has other things on her mind: a wealthy new client needs an extensive contract negotiated, and her brother is going away to end the war draining the city dry. The goddess is an impersonal formality; soon she will be all alone in the world. What I'm specifically looking for: Please tell me what sort of person you think Lasila is, based on this chapter alone, and without assessing whether you like that person or not (as best you can). Gonna take a week or two off after this, try and get some of my buffer back. Thanks!

Yeah, possibly the most frustrating thing about tossing the old stuff (and it is mostly tossing, even if I can still consult it) is that it's working quite well. Well, we'll see in a couple days, and then I'm gonna take a week or two off to get further ahead on this.

No worries, but it's literally for your benefit rather than mine (and that's fine too, haha); I'm not able to use the old material for more than notes. So it's good to know which elements are worth sliding over into my rejiggering of things (which would be why I didn't just remove the Lasila stuff entirely from the sub), but there's just a whole lot of entirely different sentence structure that's required. Don't sweat it; where you cut off is good to know too, and the content in this one is far enough out that surviving scenes are unlikely to strongly resemble what they become. Savae's might be more intact, but we'll see when we get there; they too can only benefit from what I'm doing right now. Either way, don't force yourself.

Hmmm. That's actually really helpful, which is a really short answer to you putting in a lot of work but I think is the best way in this case to keep me from thinking out loud in ways that sound like 'but actually'. I think on a lot of this what I was intending to convey just wasn't coming through at all; naive definitely wasn't what I was going for. But the gist too is that a lot of the things you were wondering about is stuff that basically was about to come up, which is ultimately too late for it. I'm rearranging a lot of plotlines here so we'll see how this goes; so far I think the result is vastly superior.

Her or their, please. Anyway, I think I'll definitely have this ready, and I want to see how this plays for people, so I think I'll use the spot-- If something goes horribly wrong, feel free to leap over me. Week after, I'll probably skip. I'd like to get at least a little bit of my buffer back.

Screw it, I'll have this done by the 15th, can I get in too? But if we end up having a sixth interested, they can have my spot instead, extra lead time won't hurt me at all.

It's definitely not the amount of chapters; I don't know a normal length for this form, but the length of each chapter seems fine. It's just a lot of meandering (and I do mean narrative meandering, which I only say because there's no problem with how your character is meandering, haha) between the beginning and the end of the submission, and I'm not certain I see a point or net benefit to the narrative for doing it. I think it would be more than possible to condense it all down and still keep the overall feel you've got going on.

This would, in fact, be a joke, though she's somewhat purposefully keeping Savae disarmed. (but no, she doesn't much care for dealing with children) Indeed he is, and he does-- it's very much intentional (and pins back toward why he and Savae are working together). Savae travels in... very different circles from Lasila, and the overall tone of their story is quite a bit different. I suspect it'll play better when he's more thoroughly threaded-in, but he absolutely is to be an incredibly sharp contrast to nearly everyone else. I don't know that these scenes work at all without that. Savae's plot's in very bad shape in this draft, by which I mean it's ultimately more of an outline at absolute best. Savae here is more than a little overconfident (over-estimating the value of what they retrieved at the party? should have listened to Aserahin) and makes critical mistakes basically the moment Alaeria walks in. (which should not be overtly obvious, necessarily). Savae isn't per se out of their league but they've been put into a disadvantageous position here-- both overall and in this scene in particular. But like I said, I don't know that the scene works very well right now in the first place, so. Swaps here are done along lines of theme, actually (though they are also more or less in chronological order). Religious practice, messengers, the use of forbidden power, etc.

I believe Laurea is your main character, not mine... Anyway, what Savae wants is their debt to be discharged; at present they're obligated to the Ashana. There's benefit to be had from the association, but as it stands it's not exactly a partnership. And yeah, no point to line edits on this one. Even scenes that are being wholly reused need a tense change, so I've got to gut, rearrange, and reframe the component sentences anyway.