C_Vallion

Overall: When were we introduced to the concept of what flares are? I had remembered vaguely what the term meant, and am pretty sure that if I was reading straight through, it would have been clearer, but I did do a double-take on it the first time the term shows up here. I really enjoy Sal- and Y- in general, so I really enjoyed this chapter. I didn’t get too caught up on technical terms, but I think the “getting pulled through a door” image that Sal- mentions at some point had developed in my head pretty early on, when they started talking about the cellulose not being broken down entirely. That combined with the knowledge from previous chapters of there being passages between planes put those two things together pretty clearly in my head (I’m assuming that’s what our anomaly is). I imagine it would have been far more confusing if I didn’t have that image in my head to attach the vaguer ideas to. Looking forward to seeing where things go! Pg 2: “…tore a new fissure in her chest.” So the computer is falling apart (losing cellulose). She’s looking for more information about what’s going on with Pru? And each piece of information she’s finding is painful? Is that right? With the ship literally deteriorating, the wording in this line makes it hard to tell if she’s experiencing emotional pain regarding what she’s finding or a physical pain from some connection she has with the computer itself and its deterioration. “…read it out loud.” To whom? I assume to Nick, but I didn’t get that he was interacting with them at the moment. His paraphrasing comments are helpful, since it makes the information easier to absorb, but I think it would be helpful to clarify that he’s summarizing the record for Nick. Pg 3: I like the emotion-shift here, but think there needs to be a more obvious to make the point of realization clearer. Some physical pause or shift or something between “There were Ris- flares on Pru.” And “But Pru had exploded.” I’d normally expect the single line “But Pru-…” to be enough to do that on its own if it’s a short, single sentence on its own line, but it doesn’t stand out quite as much when the lines around it are also single sentence lines, so I think it might need something more to make the reader feel how jarring the shift is for Sal. Pg 4: “…captains had to hold it together…” The “WE SHOULD NOT BE CONCERNED” contrasting with her curled up in a grieving/overwhelmed ball seems like a combination of things that have already moved past “holding it together.” Here and into the next page, the sort of false hope that she seems to be trying to portray hits funny. What exactly is her intention of communicating the hopeful message that she doesn’t really believe when her body language is so clearly sending another message? She’s obviously not hiding anything, considering Y’s line about watching her meld with a chair. Does she think her hopeful message is convincing? Pg 5: “Are planets mammals? Fish? Rocks?” Animal, Vegetable, or Mineral. Go. Also, I enjoyed Y’s mental wandering here. I think seeing him work through processing it makes the details easier to follow and calls out the important things. Or at least gives a sense of "We need to know this much at this point" which for me, at least, makes it easier to just go along with the fact that I don't have all of the details 100% in line yet. Pg 6: “The biometal…went cold” Is this an instantaneous thing? There’s no residual heat in the materials? I don’t know enough about what exactly the biometals do or how they work, but that sudden of a change seems iffy from a heat-transfer perspective. Where is all of the heat dissipating to instantly? Pg 7: “…she typed…” on what? Pg 9: “She didn’t need her stomach and intestines ripped apart…” ouchy… Pg 10-12: “a minute of oxygen left” How long has it been since things shut down. Has the oxygen been actively sucked out somewhere else? I wouldn’t think the cockpit would become unbreathable so quickly, even if there isn’t new air being pumped in. I found this useful-looking post on the matter, but have not done any looking-into whatsoever on its accuracy. It at least seems far closer to my general perception of air usage and dispersion, though. Unless there’s something actively pumping in bad air, or the oxygen is actively leaking out, I don’t see things falling apart quite so quickly. https://kimberlymoynahan.com/2012/04/friday-fiction-facts-trapped-in-an-airtight-room/

Yeah. I'll be jumping back in with either a revised Chapter 1 or a short story that I've been working on here in the next couple weeks. Just wanted some of the dust to settle to provide a fresher start after cutting the old opening chapters. And revising took longer than expected because I started in on some of my to-read list in the process, and have probably been doing more reading and writing this past week or so. Oops. I think that would work fine for the first day or two, but when you mentioned that he'd been there for weeks by then, it just seems like he's setting out to get a beating. Having him learn from initial interactions is an option for him to be actively making a decision not to antagonize the guard, and having the self-control to follow through, no matter how much he wants to strike out (verbally or physically) at him. I was thinking this might help you out on that front as well Ultimately, a lot of religion details can be brushed over if they aren't central to the plot of your story. The fact that yours is inherently tied into the history of the kingdom is going to make that trickier (especially if part of the story leads into unearthing the secrets behind what they all believe), but I would still offer the same advice offered to me about not introducing too much at once, and not introducing it before you need to. I'm still pretty horrible at actually applying that advice, but I do recognize it as good advice. You want to use the religion to tell us something about the characters (which is also going to help with having the feeling of more well-rounded characters). If you're changing the scene around, it's probably not going to be relevant anyway, but the possibilities I liked about A- insisting on praying before the execution were that it either shows him as 1. devout about his religion and really believes that prayer for his soul is necessary to make up for his supposed sins (not as much fun, but it shapes his character) or 2. He isn't devout. Doesn't actually believe in it. But he had to learn things about it as a kid and knows some people are devout and that if the guards are in any way decent human beings, they might humor his going through the rituals, which can buy him some time to do something. It seems like the latter point was what you were leaning toward, but the murmuring of the prayer to himself (instead of saying it out loud) and his actually remembering the full prayer contradict that a little. If they can't hear him, what does it matter what he's actually saying (and if he doesn't actually believe it, I'd expect some fudging of the words to reflect that)? So we get the full prayer, which acts as a bit of a religion info dump, but we don't get as much about what it means to him, which is what we care more about at this point. I grew up in a very culturally-Catholic area, so most of my friends went through the whole process of being baptized and catechized and checking the related boxes of being a "Proper Catholic", but if I asked them now, I doubt many (if any) of them would remember wording of specific prayers unless they are recited at holiday-related-mass. Because it was more of a community expectation than a devout belief. Even now, they probably like the comfort of tradition surrounding it, but may or may not actually believe any of it. At the moment, the concern I would see is not necessarily offending people of a certain religion so much as implying connections to a certain religion that aren't actually there and confusing people. Most religious fantasy readers are going to expect to come across religions that differ from their own (or ones that satirize their own to some extent). But things like using a Christian prayer or even the name/title of Saint Gab- are going to have people that are familiar with Christianity making assumptions about the world that aren't accurate. Which will probably be really confusing and frustrating when they find out it's different. The main issue I see here is praying to Saint Gab- for forgiveness from sins, which implies a concept of sin and a need to be saved from it. In Christianity, the whole point of the sacrifice of the "enlightened leader" is that Jesus wasn't claiming to be an enlightened leader. He was claiming to be God. And his sacrifice was specifically intended to save his followers from the consequences of their sin. Because when God's law is broken, blood must be shed as a consequence —hence the blood sacrifices in ancient Israel— and the only sacrifice big enough to cover the sins of all of his followers is some form of the sacrifice of God himself, in the form of Jesus. So the sacrifice is directly related to the sin problem, and if Jesus is God, he has the power to offer forgiveness, so Christians pray to him for forgiveness, since it was his death that solved their sin problem. In very rough terms. So by having A- pray to Saint Gab- for forgiveness from sins (basically, by referencing a Christian prayer), it's implying that 1. there is a sin problem in the world, and 2. Saint Gab- is the one who gets to make the final call on whether or not people should be forgiven. Referencing Christian prayers might be relevant if that's what you're going for, but unless it's important to the religion and world, I'd avoid the concept of sin as a whole because I think any reference to it is going to tie things far closer to Christianity than you probably want to. There's certainly room for people sort of deifying a great hero or great mage (the follow-up story to Price of Peace deals with this to some extent, so I've thought about it a bit, and will likely be doing so more as I do the actual writing instead of just outlining it). And if Saint Gab- was part of saving the kingdom from destruction, it would make sense for someone to pray to him to be saved from eternal destruction (this branches off into questions about what awaits in eternity. What A- wants to be saved from. And what greater power is in charge of that. But that's a whole other can of worms). But bringing the concept of being saved from sin is going to tie it far more closely to Christianity than I think you are going to want to do because of the implications it's going to carry with it. The closer it is, the more you're going to have trouble with "But if this is like Christianity, then why does x happen. And how does y work. And what ever happened to z?" Many readers won't really care about the answers to those questions (unless they are me and enjoy poking at these things). But if they recognize it as "sort of like Christianity" the questions will come up, and if the story religion clashes with the understanding they have, they'll get confused or frustrated. Whereas if you're mostly working with a great mage/hero/etc. who is now basically viewed as a god, there are theological concepts you don't have to address directly or at all. When you're starting with a blank page, you can just leave some spots blank. But if you're working from something that already exists (and is something that most people will have an existing understanding of), you have to be careful that the spots you would have preferred to leave blank don't already have things inked in. And now, before I find another rabbit trail to start off on, I'm going to leave it at that. Feel free to stop me if any of this is overwhelming or un-looked-for. Hopefully parts of it are helpful, but I know I tend to ramble when I start on these sorts of things. And if it's sort of helpful and you'd like to direct me at anything specific, feel free to point me in that direction and let me wander that way a bit.

1 There’s a much better sense of actual danger through the potential execution and the escape, but the ability to just run away is surprising. Weren’t there walls and gates? Did all of the guards show up weighed down by full battle armor for the execution of a malnourished seventeen year old? It seems like it would take more cleverness for him to get away. 2 I like that he’s far more active this time around. Even when he’s stuck in the cell, he’s trying to keep up his strength, and actively pursues something that might give him a chance to escape once he sees it. I still don’t have much of a sense of his personality, but his struggle to escape is far more engaging this time around. 3 Definitely a lot better (really, all of the language is a lot less wordy and stilted). Though some of that might be a general impression because there isn’t as much of it breaking up the rest of the text. There is still spots that need work, but this is far better than previous chapters in that regard. 4 Yes! Focusing in on A- having to make his own decisions and figure things out on his own does a much better job of making him an engaging character. There’s no one for him to just blindly go along with, and we see more of his capabilities in place of someone else’s. Well done on the changes! Pg 1: Still seeing verb tense errors in cases like “he had kept track of the days” instead of “he kept track of the days.” The latter implies he’s doing it in line with the current timeline of the story. But when it’s talking about “in the beginning” you need the past perfect tense. Any time the character is thinking back to something that had happened before the current scene is taking place. “He had lost track after a week”, “hope of freedom had become”, “series of events that had led him there.” If he has been there long enough to know that the guard is going to start beating him, it seems odd that he would antagonize him. If it was the first day or two, and he hadn’t figure out how cruel the guard was going to be, mouthing off makes sense. But I would have expected him to learn better after weeks. Pg 2: Adding on to the previous point, being motivated by hatred is one thing (seems like there’s a lot of hatred to be motivated by), but knowing when to lay low to avoid beatings or having his food dumped on the floor doesn’t contradict that. Pg 3: “…Ordinary stone. Stone.” Is there some realization being made here? The repetition seems odd. The giant paragraph on page 3 could be split up to add some emphasis to certain lines. As it is now, it’s a rather intimidating block of text. So now he’s trying to get along with the jailer. Why not during the first weeks? Pg 5: Seems like he resists what the count is doing pretty easily. “A- felt foolish for ever believing the count, even for a second.” When did he believe him? At the original dinner? It didn’t seem like he trusted the offer to escape, since he acknowledged that he was just playing along. Also, when used as “the count” instead of the full “Count C-“, count should be lowercase. Is the count not going to give any sort of “if you don’t actually bend to my will, I’m going to kill you” ultimatum? Seems odd that he’d bother to hold him that long then just say “meh. He seems stubborn. Kill him.” What was his alternative plan? Was it so important to have spent weeks keeping A- alive? If so, I’d expect him to push the matter more. Pg 7: Five guards seems like a lot to send for one person who’s been underfed for weeks. How many guards does the count have? And what are they doing all day every other day? Seems like a pretty boring job. Hope they’re getting paid well. [note after reading on: especially if they are also all turning blind eyes to abductions and child-murder] Oh. An axe and executioner and everything. Why not just cut his throat in the cell and be done with it? It does make for a very clear, terrifying picture for A-. I do think that is good. But the part of me that likes to poke at little details isn’t convinced that it’s worth the count’s time or effort to set up this formal execution. What’s the benefit to the count to paint this terrifying scene for A? Especially if he’s not even going to be there. I generally assume that formal executions are going to be a sort of power play for the one doing the executing. To make a public display of the death in an attempt to prevent other people from doing the same thing. Or to show a rebel group that their rebel leader is no more. It makes for a solid threatening image for A-, but from the count’s perspective, why bother making a big show of it? And where did he find six guards who are fine with formally murdering a child? Does he have some hold over them? Or are they just normal guys with lives and families who happen to get paid a ton of money to overlook the horrors they see at work? Pg 8: “Saint Gab-“ I know you had mentioned before that this isn’t exactly Christianity, but at the moment, I can’t tell the difference between this and some form of Roman Catholicism. Even if the name Gab- is more strongly associated with Archangel Gab- in Christianity, there’s no way at this point for me to know that he isn’t praying to an actually-existing catholic saint. Which would make me assume that this is some sort of version of our world, or an alternate history, and not something entirely different. It might be helpful to make some minor adjustments to make sure this first hint at A’s religious beliefs falls squarely into one setting or the other, to avoid confusing people later. I can chat about the religious aspect of world building all day long, so feel free to send a message if you want any other thoughts or feedback on that front. Why do the jailer and guards think he’s a criminal? Were none of them there when his family was invited for dinner? “murmured a prayer he remembered from his lessons” Is he praying this out loud? To put on a show while he’s cutting the ropes? The murmuring suggests not, but the “remembered from his lessons” implies that he’s not all that devout. At which point, why is he going through the prayer anyway? Also, the prayer does not help my understanding of the setting. The terminology is too close to Christian prayers for me to see it as anything else, though the theology issues of praying to a saint (or archangel, with the Gab- reference) for redemption from sins immediately makes me cringe. I think you’d said he was the Jesus-figure in the world’s religion. But for him to go by the title of Saint creates a lot of issues if there are additional saints. Unless all of the saints can grant redemption. Ultimately, I can see any Catholic readers getting really antsy about some of this unless there are clearer lines drawn between this and Roman Catholicism. And a lot of confusion for people who are going to label it as Catholicism then find out it’s something different. Pg 9: “Primordial fear fueled him…He jogged up the mountain…” jogged? I know he’s tired at this point, but jogging, to me, implies intentionally slowing his pace. A few questions about the layout of our escape. Are they already partway up the mountain? Seems like if he’s near the bottom, it wouldn’t be steep enough to scramble on hands and knees and be kicking rocks loose for quite a while. Is there no tree cover where he currently is? Where exactly is he fleeing to if there’s no cover? If they’re shooting arrows at him, I assume they can see him clearly enough to aim, in which case it seems odd that he could have lost them.

Pg 1: The second paragraph feels off from a tense perspective. But that might just be my lack of familiarity with present tense writing. “I linger on her condition during that time…” took a moment to confirm that “that time” was the time her mom was sick, not the time during which she was sitting there thinking. It could use some extra clarification in what she is saying she “could accept” now based on the past, or what she “could have accepted” if it’s trying to address the feelings she’d been feeling at the time her mother was sick. “I could have accepted it if my mom had needed to undergo treatment… the fact that it kept getting worse had left me looking down the road to what horrors awaited the next day.” Is the “looking down the road” looking to the future-future? Or is it about past-W looking to her “tomorrow”s, which would still be in the past for present-W? As someone who overthinks the usage of “tomorrow” or “now” in anything written in past tense, I’m sure this probably ends up catching a little more for me than it would for other people, but it’s seeming not-quite-right at the moment. Also, the current phrasing of “if my mom had to undergo treatment” makes it unclear if she actually did or not. I assume she did. Because cancer. But the sentence structure is currently setting “it kept getting worse” up as what happened instead of her undergoing the treatment. “hours playing strategy board games” <3 “…their first relationship.” His first relationship? Or hers? “…I know they apply…” what does? I am guessing that “voice” might have previously been “words” but I’m still not sure what she’s referring to about “meaning it that way.” Meaning what, what way? “Seems like lingering …job.” Pg 2: “I know that when I’m tired…” Coming back to this after reading through, we certainly don’t get any indication that “cranky W” has taken over. Or that the nightmares have that much impact on her day-to-day life. It’s useful to see that she wrestles with this, and to see that her rational mindset has her thinking of it more as a frustrating interruption to her sleep schedule than anything else, but if it doesn’t affect her later in any way, I wonder if it’s helpful to include it here. Pg 4: “I don’t have to deal with my brain nagging me with new ideas…” yeah. Just wait until you have to do some programming or excel or design project in those engineering classes… my husband still has old projects that he digs out now and then to revise or adjust or take sections out of to use elsewhere. And he still gets notices now and then that his grad school papers are being referenced by some student taking similar research in slightly different directions. That all being said, her thoughts here entirely appropriate to her age/mindset/experience. She can find out that the world is more complicated than that in a few years. Pg 6: “Give me instructions and I’ll check all the boxes, but....” Oh hey! It’s me! Right down to coloring squares on graph paper. Pg 8: “I don’t know if I’ve ever been as close…” What about An? Also, I’m willing to chalk some of it up to character mindset biases, because I think a lot of social structures (especially in high school, but also afterward, in many circles) condition their members to think this way, but it always makes me antsy when friendship and romantic love are set at odds with each other. Or set up with the sort of implication that “friends are all well and good, but obviously romance is a higher, more worthy goal.” It also seems out of place when chapter 1 had W questioning whether she even wanted romance, in which case it would make sense for her to be a little jealous of N & E’s friendship, but wouldn’t necessarily draw the romance comparison into it. Pg 10: “I meant that as a crazy hypothetical.” This doesn’t seem all that crazy or hypothetical. If the world runs on natural laws that are reliable enough for scientists to be able to predict or study things, magic had better have a similar set of laws governing them. Because otherwise, scientific study becomes nearly meaningless anywhere it intersects with magic. There might be specific cases where magic overrules or contradicts the natural laws we are familiar with, but if it doesn’t happen in a way that reflects their own natural laws (I’m tempted to call them supernatural laws, but that would push me toward a whole long worldbuilding discussion that isn’t relevant), science being a predictable, observable thing is in trouble. I have…a lot of thoughts on how magic systems fit into worlds and am glad to discuss if you’d like, but I’ll move on for now. “The whole point…make sense out of the chaos.” This doesn’t quite ring true to me… both from the perspective of research being done to confirm, refine, or correct previous studies and because “making sense of chaos” implies taking a bunch of entirely random, unconnected things and tying them together instead of seeing patterns or connections in what seems like chaos and figuring out why they are there. Or seeing the one thing that doesn’t quite fit the pattern and figuring out why it’s different. Maybe something like “finding sense in the chaos” might hit closer to the mark?” “they don’t hire people like me to be scientists” but…isn’t she planning to study engineering? After reading: 1. Even with the concerns I mentioned, I’m definitely still engaged with the story. That probably wavered a bit when digging into An’s digging into high school social structure things, but that may be more a matter of my not generally reaching for books set in modern high schools more than anything more problematic. 2. I like W a lot, but I’m not quite buying her blind acceptance of An’s opinions on N and E. It makes sense that her judgment is a little clouded to some extent by the pain/confusion/embarrassment of how her relationship with E went and ended (not to mention that memories of the relationship are closely tied to her mother’s illness, which must carry its own emotional baggage that I’d expect her to have difficulty navigating). But she seems to place a lot more weight on An’s opinion and understanding of things that have happened than on E’s explanations. And if she and E were as close as they seem to have been, she should probably know whether or not to trust him about such things, even if she is also irritated with him. At least enough to get more information before assuming that An’s explanation is the full story. 3. I would have liked more direct plot progression. We get more information about the characters and social setting, which is nice, but I think it could benefit from more feeling of movement plot-wise.

Pg 2: “What happened…Ju- System” I’m not getting a good read on B’s tone here. Or how O is perceiving it, at least. “I might need a bit of help.” Having a better idea of how injured O actually is here would be helpful. I don’t have a clear understanding of how much pain she’s actually in and how much she’s trying to cover it. “You’re supposed to be dead…” Again, not sure of B’s tone. She seems concerned enough if she came in to check on things and is going to take O somewhere for help, but she doesn’t seem obviously bothered or surprised by any of it. Pg 3: “It will take me a while to get used to…” but she still doesn’t seem bothered by it. No shock or horror. Just something she’ll have to get used to. “Not trying to haul yourself…” Goes back to the question of how injured she is. Pg 4: “…drugs she’d been given…” would the bird-people have given her drugs if they weren’t even willing to feed her for a few days? Pg 12: “…on the cusp of bleeding to death…” Yeah. Still really confused about how injured she is. She mentions pain a couple times, but nothing that would indicate severe bleeding. And what follows from here seems like a really sudden deterioration. Overall: I think not having a good read on B’s tone created a lot of trouble in my being engaged with their interactions and generally threw me off for a lot of the chapter, since that’s a big focus in the first half. She seems to switch back and forth between being helpful/friendly and cheerily blunt about things like the bird people trying to kill O and casually unconcerned about how injured O actually is. Sassy characters? They’re great. But right now I’m not getting a clear indication of where B is supposed to be coming across on the friendly sarcasm to condescendingly dismissive spectrum. She does make the effort to help O, and gets her to the doctor, and seems to offer to pay for whatever “extra charges” might be involved (but then they go into the whole payment discussion that seems to contradict that), but doesn’t actually seem to have any emotional response to any of it. She’s helpful, but not obviously sympathetic. Which is fine. I don’t mind emotionally distant sarcasm. I tend toward it myself often enough. But O seems to read more emotion and flirtation into the interactions than I’m seeing. It also doesn’t help that I don’t have a good read on how injured O actually is. She seems mostly alright, but in a little pain, until all of a sudden she’s near bleeding to death. I think we need more of an idea of the seriousness of it earlier. I get that she’s distracted by the attractive lady, but her condition doesn’t seem nearly as bad as Y- implies it is. I feel like severe internal bleeding would cause more concern. Not to mention non-functioning legs. Especially if that would stop her from piloting a ship. I would assume that cutting that part of her identity away would be an extremely painful possibility for her. She’s obviously really upset about the destruction of her ship, but doesn’t seem to be concerned about the non-functioning of her legs at all. I may try to read it again later and see if it comes across a little better. It’s possible that my perception was colored by being distracted at the beginning. The dog was extremely distressed and whiny/barky because some children dared to play in their own yard down the street, which is not exactly the best reading environment.

Pg 1: “a voice that A oddly recognized” oddly seems like a strange word here. It doesn’t seem like it would be odd that A would recognize the voice. He just wouldn’t be expecting it to be there. “…can’t very well let you go. But I’m not so ruthless…” if he let the parents go, why can’t he let A- go? What’s he planning to do with A- or Mr. G- long term if he isn’t planning to release or kill them? How long has he had to “think of something better”? Does the count have any reason for coming down to check on them? It seems like he just comes down to say hi then leave again. Pg 3: “…escape just after sunrise before they bring us breakfast.” Why after sunrise (losing cover of dark) but before breakfast? Aren’t they likely to need food? And if they know someone is coming to bring breakfast, that person will definitely notice they’re missing. Pg 4: “But you’re an Aug-“ Is this the first time we would have seen this term? I know it was briefly mentioned in one of the versions of chapter 1, but if that will be changing to Maria’s PoV, will we have any idea what this means? I’m also a little torn about the phrasing of “an Aug-“ It feels strange to have an adjective as a proper noun. “count will not awake until evening” Well that gives reason for them to wait until sunrise. But it might be worth mentioning that when Mr. G is talking about his plans to leave above. It still doesn’t keep the breakfast-bringer from noticing they’re gone, though. Pg 5: How far of a drop are we talking here? Catching slows the deceleration — basically spreading the impact force for the deceleration to take place over a larger amount of time instead of hitting full force on the ground— but that force that is being dispersed is still going somewhere. In this case into Mr. G- If he’s in stone form, he’s not going to provide much cushion for a fall, and if he’s not in stone form, his arms and body taking the force of the fall is going to do damage as well. If it’s a long enough fall, and isn’t cushioned properly, one or both of them is still going to be at just as much risk of injury as if they both just jumped down separately. Also, I thought E- was supposed to be sleeping all day as well. Pg 8: “A- wondered what Mr. G-‘s next idea would be…” In many ways, A- just seems to be along for the ride through all of this. He wants to get to safety to find another way to rescue M-. But he hasn’t seemed to have any thought or initiative of his own on how to do that. Pg 9: “…if I sense any risk at all to my comfortable life…” So…immediately, then? Pg 10-11 This conversation seems a lot longer than it needs to be to convey the things we actually need to know. Pg 12-13 For someone wanting to avoid suspicion, D sure does seem to be intentionally troublesome with the guards. And the guards seem surprisingly patient when D is spiteful and argumentative for no reason while they’re trying to do their jobs. 1. Do you get a sense that the plot is moving forward? To some extent. Physically leaving the castle helps. And the immediate goal changing from rescuing M- to escaping to rescue her another day helps. But A- doesn’t seem to have much active involvement in making those things happen. He would have stayed at the castle to try to rescue her if he’d had the choice. And he hasn’t really made any active decisions other than trailing along after Mr. G- since then. 2. Is the dialogue less stilted? Not really. A lot of the text could still use a good deal of reading aloud to catch awkward wording and structure. 3. Do you at all care about A's plight? While I care that he is trying to get to safety, to come back later to rescue M, the combination of the escape going smoothly and his not being the one to actively push the escape forward makes it harder to be engaged by his role in it. So while on a basic level, I care about his plight, the fact that he’s just been along for the ride through this chapter doesn’t help. He wants to get to safety. But what does he think that means? Getting home? Getting somewhere else? Right now he’s just following Mr. G-‘s lead, and we don’t know enough about where Mr. G- is taking them to know where they are headed or how that will ultimately put them in a better place to rescue M-.

Yeah. I'm guessing that would make a big difference. And if that's what the class is, it definitely fits. There was a little more of that within the pre-engineering social circle at my school as opposed to the general nerd social circle (I only did competitive testing stuff one year and decided it wasn't my idea of a fun time for pretty much those reasons). The prologue and the "there are magical creatures in this world" had made me wonder if this might be the case, since I assumed N has ties to our magical creatures, and "homeschooling" to hide adolescent magical creatures or until people in the magical creature community can properly know how to keep secret things secret seems like it would be a different category altogether. Otherwise I would have probably had a bit more ranting about the homeschool stereotype as well. Approaching it as something closer to "he's from a super tiny town in the middle of nowhere" might be a safer bet to avoid missteps. Especially in the covid-era when there's already a big wrench thrown into the understanding of what actual "homeschooling" means.

I'm actually surprised there aren't more of these. My line editing process tends to be prone to it. Thanks for pointing them out! That's more clearly defined in chapter 2. I do want to add a little more magic reference in chapter 1, but I'm hoping to be able to avoid bogging anything down here when it will fit better with the events of the next chapter Thanks!

Overall: I like this chapter, and other than the sense of concern or self-preservation that O seems to be lacking during parts of it and some confusion about the pros and cons of being mistaken for a Pru-, I don’t have too much to add. Looking forward to seeing where we go from here. Pg 3: “…tingling continued…resuming its course” I am not clear on what is happening here injury-wise. Some sort of pressure change, where blood flow had been restricted until now? I think the disorientation/pain/etc. description is good on 1-3, but this line threw me off. Pg 4: Even if the bird people have been compared to hawks instead of crows, I still like the “murder of bird people” line. “…shapes and contours…” I would have expected the beak shape to be a significant part of the hawk comparison, but if they vary, would that association fit all of them? Or is it just talking about the first one she’d seen? Pg 5: “less killing.” O- seems less concerned about this conversation than I feel like she should be. Even if she is still disoriented. Possibly even because she’s still disoriented. The disorientation does provide reason for her mind to skip over the discussion of beta planes and such, but the fact that she doesn’t acknowledge at all makes it hard to tell if it’s a strange thing to her or if it’s just normal conversation. Pg 6: Recalcitrant is a good word. “I’d prefer you were from Pru-“ this and the following conversation through page 9 gets a little confusing. I lost track of where it’s “safer” for her to be from, and a sense of why until I went back and read it more slowly. Pg 8: “cost too much to feed” feeding one person enough to keep them alive for three days seems like it would be relatively inexpensive. (edit: especially if laser gun charge is also a valuable resource) “…sending thin shards of bioplastic across the floor.” ☹ sad ship. Pg 10: “a pleased sort of quack” hah. “eyes dry from holding the lids open” I mean. She could probably risk a blink or two if there’s no one obviously even in the room. Right? Pg 12: If I could get my hands on some invincible nail polish, I might even bother to paint my nails.

Pg 4: “Scientists hate saying we’re certain…” I find it a little odd that the vaccine reference is their go-to example for this if it’s not related to their field or they don’t have some fighting anti-vaxxers plotline, or it isn’t something they are dealing with regularly in their field. Of course, it may bother me because I tend toward the fantasy genre to avoid reminders of the frustrating and ridiculous things in real life. It’s probably less distracting for people who read more stories in modern real world settings. Pg 5: I like the Korean name and title explanation a lot, but also think it would be helpful closer to the front. Pg 6: Does the school have enough AP classes available to take more than 4 per year (with the assumption that she’d plan to take more the following year)? Seems like it would have to be a pretty large school to make a large number of AP classes available. Then again, it’s possible that they’re just more accessible than they were when I was in high school. Also, I’d assume they would expect students to take physics and calc concurrently. Especially at the AP level. And even more so if the student is planning to go into engineering. “mostly conceptual” If she’s a math whiz, I’d think she’d be capitalizing on how math-based physics is. “like bro culture” This may or may not matter depending on how much of a role her classmates play in the story, and I’m glad to chalk some of it up to cynicism from W, but this doesn’t really match up with what I remember of upper-level math/science classes. I mean. Yeah, there’s some of that. But unless it’s a pretty prestigious school that has enough ultra-math-focused students to fill a class with them, I find it a little odd. My experience had a few people who were actually part of the official math club and did competitive tests, but it was mostly a blend of that with people who happen to be good with numbers but spent extracurricular time on other things (usually track/cross country or band, if not both, if I recall correctly). There will also almost definitely be a few who are on a sort of pre-engineering path because they really like tinkering with things and have some math-sense to go along with liking to work on cars and stuff. If there’s not a ton of focus on classmates there, it’s not too vital, but if there’s anything in the story that relies on a mathlete bro culture, it might be worth considering. Pg 7: “The way school measures…” ain’t that the truth? Pg 9: “finding the right car…is worse for my anxiety…” Ugh. I know this feeling. Pg 12: “I told her the opposite…” The wording of this sentence is a little confusing Pg 13: I have mixed feelings about how E is coming across. On one hand, I know a number of teens who are deep thinkers, and I remember even as a teen reading YA, getting frustrated by how simplistically authors portrayed their motivations and concerns. But he does seem far more self-aware than I’d expect, which seems like a different set of life skills - being able to distance yourself from something that you care deeply about to be able to dig down to what your mind is actually doing… I don’t know. I’m all for self-awareness (especially with the angle of W willfully misunderstanding it), but it seems a little too mature for what, 16 or 17? I don’t know if it’s intentional or not, but I appreciate N’s jumping right into conversation with an adult about things he’s excited about, because it hits the homeschool persona perfectly. If I had a dime for every time the neighborhood homeschool kids came over while I’m walking the dog to tell me about some cool bird they saw or how they’re doing some random project about ancient Rome, I would have a lot of dimes. Pg 15: “fancy professor stuff” seems like an odd way to describe a parent’s work. At least as a teenager “They have their eyes on E-“ I was a little surprised they weren’t more cautious about leaving E- and W- together to go look at the flowers if they knew about what had happened between them before. Overall: I feel like my comments above were sort of all over the place, but I enjoyed this and am excited to see where it goes. I agree with the thoughts on moving the flowers and the Korean name details earlier. In general, my own high school experience was not a super fun time, so I generally don’t get super excited for stories set around high school life, and that’s probably going to color a lot of my comments about some of the thought processes and social interactions of the characters. It falls into my reasons for liking to stick with fantasy genres. There are too many things about high school social structures that frustrate me, and I deal with them enough with the kids I work with, so I don’t usually set out to fill my free time with them. Just as a general warning, if I seem a little cynical at any point. But I am still enjoying reading, even if it’s not my usual cup of tea. 1. Female pre-engineering protagonist? If there’s any high school narrative I’m interested in following, it’s probably this one. I also like the family dynamics a lot 2. I like them. I probably need some extra convincing of E-‘s self-awareness, and I may get tired of discussion of classes and things before too long, but I’m looking forward to see how things unfold. 3. I think it’s a good fit for what I would expect of a YA romance 4. I’m assuming it’s our friendly homeschool friend. Though I do like the fact that it seems like she will probably be working through what happened with E-, and while I’m not convinced that’s something most high schoolers would be willing to do, I’m always up for stories of people working through past misunderstanding or biases.

I was just wondering last week when we might see what follows the prologue you’d posted. Good to see you back Overall, I think the world is really interesting, and am excited to see where the story is going, but I think this chapter gets bogged down in the conversations. There’s a lot of wordy dialogue, which is making it more difficult to be as engaged as I’d like to be with the characters. I am really excited to learn more about the world. I like mechs and airships, and am fascinated by the machine spirits, so the setting is appealing to me and I’m looking forward to seeing where it goes. I’m not getting hugely attached to C at this point, since he’s falling into the same traps that I fall into with my characters far too often, where he’s spending all of his time talking about things, but we don’t get a good idea of what he really cares about. I really like the potential for Sh, but want to see more proof that she’s competent as a doctor and isn’t just going to let her patients do things that are going to make their injuries worse. I imagine that airship doctors probably run into a lot of stubborn patients who don’t want to spend their time recovering from illnesses or injuries even though it’s vitally important. C trying to jump to his feet and go ask questions shouldn’t be that surprising to her, and I’d expect her to have methods of dealing with stubborn patients that still fit her friendly cheeriness. It’s a tricky contrast to convey, but I really like the possibilities I’m seeing there. Pg 1: General paragraph flow note: As long as there aren’t any other characters for “he” to refer to at this point, using C’s name every couple sentences seems repetitive, and can get distracting. “took notice of the room’s other occupant, but not before…” Jumping back and forth in the observational timeline can be jarring. If he notices the room right away, that’s fine, but if the other occupant is mentioned first, I’m expecting her to have been noticed first. Having him observe the room while looking for the source of the voice makes sense, but opening that paragraph by mentioning the other person distorts the perception of what order’s he’s processing things in. Pg 2: “…red hair that…” did the hair seem familiar? Or did the woman seem familiar? Hair seems like an odd feature to find “familiar” unless it’s an unusual color for the area, at which point I feel like it would strike more as unexpected or strange than familiar. Pg 3: The conversation seems to be more involved than I’d expect C to be able to manage considering where we last saw him. On Sh’s side it comes across more as a bubbly personality, so she can get away with a little more chattiness/extra wordiness, but I’d expect more exhaustion/disorientation/pain from him instead of a casual conversation. And bubbly can sometimes run the risk of leaning toward implications of a person being unprofessional or absentminded. There’s no reason a person can’t be cheery and competent, but it can be a tricky balance to portray to have a cheery person who maintains that even while taking their work seriously. Especially for a doctor, whose work is going to tend toward dealing with unhappy/sick/injured people and is going to need to deliver difficult news or deal with loss in a sensitive way. I really like interesting contrasts in characters, and like the potential of a cheery doctor. I’d just be cautious about making sure her cheeriness and friendliness doesn’t interfere with her competence as a doctor. Even if she’s not the best of the best as far as doctors go, there’s a reason they hired her for the crew instead of someone else. Pg 4: “Her red hair…” I figured this might be where the red hair seeming familiar might be going, but if he’s only ever met one other person with red hair (or it’s rare enough to think they might be related) I think the connection would be much clearer on first glance. Similar comments to above about the energy level of the conversation. If I was C, I’d be overwhelmed trying to follow it. “…a few more hours…” how long has he been under her treatment? Is a couple of hours going to make that much difference? What’s the extent of his injuries? Pg 5: “…muscle strain…” Is she saying that’s what’s wrong with him? Or that he’s going to strain himself by pushing himself too hard? I’d expect him to have far worse damage considering the condition they found him in. If his mech thing was destroyed, I’d expect him to have more actual wounds from being inside it at the time. Potentially stitching that he’s at risk of tearing free. Broken bones that he shouldn’t be putting weight on. Dehydration depending on how long he’d been in there before they found him. Concussion symptoms that she’d probably need to wait until he was awake to check. This seems like a good opportunity for her to show us that she may come across as friendly and bubbly, but she’s not going to give any ground when she knows what’s best for her patients. [edit: this is especially true if they don’t need to go up to the deck, which seems to be the case since the captain already knows he’s awake.] Pg 6: “…no particular rush…” Why the opposite impression from Sa, then? Pg 7: A lot of this conversation could be trimmed back to better emphasize the characters and their personalities, and to make sure we’re just getting the key details. I think some of it is getting lost in wordiness that makes it harder to stay engaged. Pg 8: “the first of my questions…do you smoke…” I enjoy these sorts of lines. Yeah, we all know he wants information, and he’ll get there, but first things first. Pg 9: “It’s simply junk, now.” Does he know that? I mean, he can probably assume that it’s in pretty rough shape, but if he was inside it, then passed out at some point, how aware of the damage would he be? Pg 14: “…impressed by her dedication…” What is it that impresses him? I like her, but I still want to see her taking a stricter approach on making sure he doesn’t further injure himself. Pg 15: I assume M giving him the locket is significant, but I don’t have anything to tie his comments here to, so it seems out of place. Especially when there have already been so many things discussed. Pg 16: “A machine sprirt?...” Didn’t he ask the captain to send the machine spirit down? Pg 18/19: I’m not entirely sure what upsets Sh here. Pg 19/20 I like Ir a lot, and look forward to learning more about machine spirits in general. Looking forward to seeing where the story goes!

That's probably a good comparison. I'd always considered it a little fiddly, but hadn't thought of it in those terms. The initial idea of the cords had come about from another project that feels like it was from a million years ago where a tournament scene required the competitors to have their own normal sharp weapons. For rather ridiculous plot purposes. But when I needed something like a normal tournament, but different enough to reflect the safety paranoia, I thought it might work. I do really like the idea of dyed blades to indicate hits as an alternative. Thanks for that thought! And for the much-needed pointing out of issues with things as they were.

This was the note I was referring to when I was asking what you meant. I'm not intending to add more characters. I know that's one of the last things I need. I was just trying to clarify what that note was looking for. I know it needs changes. I'm not saying that it doesn't. I'm just saying that I think it is going to be clearer what those changes need to be once her full-story motivations are made clear. Is- isn't a reliable narrator. She has zero self-awareness and zero willingness to confront the fact that she’s mostly motivated by fear of things she can’t control. So she shapes her world to avoid letting things get outside her control or push her into situations where she faces her fears. And she does a good job of that. Except where Ro- is concerned, because he refuses to fall in line with her expectations of how things should be. Why does she think she wants to beat Ro-? Because she has to do all of the tasks and responsibilities he doesn’t, or they don’t get done, which ultimately makes life difficult for her family. Plus he pokes at her insecurities, which irritates her to no end. The fact that she sees the behaviors that she doesn’t approve of as giving her an edge to win just seems like a sort of poetic justice to her. Why does she actually want to beat him? She wants him to buckle down and do his job because she’s terrified that if he doesn’t step up to do that, she’s going to get dragged into line for the throne. Which is probably the worst future she could possibly imagine. Being in crowded rooms gives her anxiety. Let alone crowded rooms where she’s supposed to be in charge, and would have to have some sort of commanding presence while being shouted down by people who actively despise her. Where any impression of weakness is going to be twisted into a way to take advantage of her. But she doesn’t recognize that as being behind her frustration. Because she is good at convincing herself that the things that irritate her about Ro- are just based in wanting the best for the kingdom, not on protecting herself from having to deal with her fears. And she’s been able to avoid addressing the depths of her vulnerabilities by having the privilege of being able to avoid situations that make her uncomfortable. The court accepts her as quiet and eccentric, and she is able to get away with things that others can’t (things that might make her actually address her issues) because she’s made herself clever and capable at most things to present an image of hyper-competence and she stays out of trouble and does the things she’s supposed to. And she’s friendly and likeable enough to avoid direct conflict with just about anyone but Ro-. So she’s never forced to address any of those fears and vulnerabilities because she’s good enough to hide them. Until she's been poisoned, which pushes her face first into every weakness and vulnerability she's been shoving away. So she has to either find a way to deal with them or eliminate them. And after spending almost two decades ignoring her problems, she's certainly not going to do the responsible thing and address them directly now. Which means finding a new way to deal with things, and learning that expanding her understanding of the world is only going to make her feel smaller and more insignificant the more she goes looking for a solution. The Ch 1 motivations are weak. That's a problem. I need to fix it. I want to fix it. But they are meant to be limited to some extent. There needs to be more implication that there's more to them than what her thoughts are implying, so that it doesn't seem like that's what the book is going to be pursuing the whole time, but if she's aware of the things she really wants out of life on page 1, she has nothing pushing her to look for answers. Does that make any sense for why it looks like I'm trying to keep things the way they are, when what I'm really trying to do is avoid continuing to make a bunch of minor adjustments here (I think we can all say I've done enough of that to show it's not a helpful approach) when I think the best way to find the actual solution is to know where she's getting to and work backward? I'd like there to be an arc in this chapter go from her being capably and confidently pursuing her limited motivation (which does need adjustment) and ending up crashing and burning and desperately grasping for some sense of control as her body is shutting down from the poison. I ruined the latter half of that by cutting back too much on her physical and emotional suffering in the second half of the chapter. Initially, the degradation was slower and spread into the next chapter as the healer realizes it's poison. But there wasn't a good reason to split it up that way, and instead the whole thing just got cut short. And while it did go on too long before, we still needed some of it. That's entirely fair. I don't blame you. I doubt you're the only one. I've spent far too much time muddling through trying to make the early chapters work to explain the more limited scale of her starting motivations. But there's no way to make that engaging for four chapters (shocking, I know), even if there weren't the additional issues of info dumps galore. I haven't really offered much in the way of visible proof that you can trust my judgment when I say that there are larger character motivations and stakes. They're there. They're just in her next chapter hiding behind a glaring wall of trouble with the opening. That being said, I'm going to step back for a couple weeks to give us all a break and see if starting here after restoring some of the emotional tie-in puts things in a better place to move forward. It's possible that I should stick with "cord" to be clearer, since rope does imply something thicker, where I was thinking of it more as the material definition, which isn't quite right. I hadn't thought about the coloring too much, but it would probably at least be dyed to make them easier to see when they've been cut free. This is something I would like to discuss with someone who has more experience than I do on this front. To see if this works as a feasible non-traditional tournament possibility or if I need to entirely change it up entirely. What fighting/combat experience I have is more related to unarmed grappling/wrestling/etc. and asking the internet has only done so much good. It doesn't need to be this way for plot reasons, but I want the tournament fighting to differ from what would have been traditionally expected to reflect the court's attempts to remove the danger from their hobbies. Because banning healing magic after the mage rebellion (combined with the collateral damage of the rebellion itself) did a number on the populations of the noble families. So they started adding to the list of rules that Re- is so irritated by not long after the rebellion when a couple of accidents put important families at risk. Many more traditional families consider the whole thing a bit of a farce and don't bother with it. As written, they are using fully functional weapons, with the cords being there to make it more of a competition of skill and finesse than strength. An effort to maintain the court's tradition of tournaments among the nobles, and keeping them flashy and exciting for spectators while minimizing real damage. Stronger blows to limited areas are allowed for knocking off balance or physically maneuvering, but most "finishing" moves to cut the cords would be little flicks or knife slices. So there's more practicality to dual-wielding a sword and knife. Figuring out how much of that information to provide is going to be another question. Because I'm always going to err on the side of too much. I had a big explanatory section here, but figured I'd cut it and see what raised flags before overexplaining. There was a line about them training enough together to know each other's tendencies, but it got cut out while trying to trim back the fight a little. yeah. I need to figure out how to clarify the end of the match. Ultimately R is being petty, because he didn't notice the match was over and was a little alarmed by the fact that he could have done some significant damage by striking while her guard was down. He'd accept it as a legitimate win, but would consider it a sort of dishonest one because he felt tricked and it almost went badly. But all of that is presented rather unclearly. So confusion is entirely fair. So who cares what he thinks? Mostly Is- because she sees it as working against her wanting to prove something by beating him. But that's all made more confusing by the fact that her reasons for wanting to win aren't clear. That is a good point that I had not considered. I'd considered the possibility of having her just have custom equipment (I mean. She's a princess. And this is a regular hobby. She probably would), but was having difficulty coming up with a reason for it to have been stored somewhere where someone could have had access to apply the poison to the padded tunic. I guess having her things stored in the equipment room so that the servants can deal with the cleaning/maintaining/etc. of it after training wouldn't be too out of the question?

Mostly it's just significant because it uses spellstones, and I wanted to have some reference to what day-to-day magic use looks like, but failed to actually say anything helpful about it (I hadn't considered how out of the blue it is without any other spellstones mentioned) I was a little cautious about introducing too many characters at once (because I have been known to do that). Do you (and @Mandamon ) think it's missing more a sense of what sort of people are competing in the tournament (that it's a fun thing for the nobility, not a more serious competition for formally trained fighters) or specific characters? If the latter, how many is going to be too many to absorb without spending too much time introducing cast members in memorable ways? That was supposed to be hanging a lantern on "Hey. There's something wrong with this," as a puzzle piece for the poison, but obviously didn't work out that well. Need to figure out good balances for these things. Also, it's not supposed to show the outcome for Al-'s match beforehand. It's supposed to be talking about an earlier win that kept him in the tournament. But looking back at it, it's not all that clear. A lot of this was trimmed back. Because my sense of what goes on too long is incredibly skewed when I'm doing revisions. So I ended up cutting too much of this and left too much length in the actual fighting. Her general approach to pain/difficulty is generally going to downplay any concerns about real problems, because she's used to addressing things with a sort of "If I tough it out long enough, things will get better" approach. But there does need to be more fear/desperation at the end as she's realizing that may not be the case here. Initially, it took longer for her to get to where she's near blacking out, and fear started to set in once she was dragged off to see the healers and she started to realize how terrified other people were. But it just went on too long, and didn't add much. Be glad I cut that out. But I didn't move enough of those feelings into the closing scene here, which is a problem. I'll be adjusting that in the revisions. I think I just need to check in on her chapter 1 motivations after another chapter or two when she's realized that the things she has been worried about aren't as vitally important as she'd thought. Her frustration with Ro- are a sort of scaled-down version of her ultimate motivations, but the scale of her understanding of the world shifts drastically when we're next in her PoV. Her motivations here need to tie into that, but I think too much back and forth about it before that direction is clearer is just going to be frustrating all around. And I am still planning to check in with you about those things, but I'm going to hold off until at least the next chapter is brought in, where the magic ties in a little more.

@shatteredsmooth I figured you had answers to some of those questions, and am glad to see I wasn't wrong. I'm also glad that at least some of my rambling thoughts were helpful. I know I sometimes end up off in weird corners when my mind takes off on some of those things. I think the one additional point I'd poke at based on the above is whether or not all of the barge ladies have the same opinions on the matter. Probably more than you need to get into, if you aren't going to be digging too far into their culture, but I like them, so I don't like one whole people group (specifically a bunch of lady scientists) being brushed off as having one single identical understanding of the world. The " 'magic' is just science we don't understand" certainly works for most cases. And I think in some especially hard magic systems, those lines can be really fine, when the "magic" is tied enough into the natural laws that it's not really a supernatural thing. But it seems like the sort of thing where even if the vast majority of the ladies fall along those lines of beliefs, there might be a few who are more sort of agnostic about it (not quite the right term, but the closest I can think of). Where they think it might be a sort of magic, but that's not going to stop them from trying to understand what it means from a scientific perspective. Because it is interacting with the laws of nature in observable ways. So even if there's something more going on, there's something to be known about it. And if they are new to the area or the concept, I could definitely see a subgroup forming that would be deeply "religious" (again, not the right word, since it's not really a religion...) about it. Or fully believing that it's something along that fine line of "super"natural that makes them even more fascinated with the world and how it works. I'm glad you saved the old houses. They are very important to me. I spend far too much time trying to keep ours standing to comfortably watch them get washed away in a flood Edit: I figured there was a good chance that it had been more a case of things getting beyond what E- had expected, but that should be clarified a little better. Especially because there is a good moral conflict there of feeling a very legitimate hatred that would understandably make him want to lash out even though the ultimate end of feeding that hatred and anger (killing them) is repulsive to him. It's a fine line that our senses of morality tread sometimes. I feel this deeply as I'm going through submissions... and I do not have the stakes of a contract to add to the pressure of it. Best of luck to you while you're working through changes!

Overall: So, by saying that LBLs aren’t needed, I apparently went into full-world-building-commentary mode. I think partly because I really like the world-building and setting, and am excited about the things that it seems to be setting out to address. So when I’m in a world I’m excited about, the things that strike as having potential problems with realism or consistency really bother me. Some of said thoughts are just based on the characters’ biases or levels of knowledge, which may conflict with the actuality of the world. So feel free to ignore those. I don’t need to know what the reality is (except for the part of me that just likes knowing ALL the information about interesting worlds), but I want to poke at it to make sure that you’re not oversimplifying things. I enjoyed these chapters (or chapter and a half) a lot. I like E- wrestling with understanding his anger. Ser- trying to be a spokesperson to improve the world around them. I really like the world they’re living in (with caveats that some things might need some additional color or depth). I do think some of the characters are coming across as a little simplistic in their beliefs or biases, though, and are coming across as caricature representatives of a belief or ideal (that’s probably exaggerating it a little bit, but I’m not sure of how to describe it better). Adding some nuance and more realistic ideologies (even for the horrible people. They may be twisted, misinformed, bigoted ideologies, but at least those people need to think they have "good" reasons for what they're doing) would go a long way in making them feel like real people instead of characters whose main purpose is to represent a viewpoint. Pg 5: “Me- and Ma-“ Hmmmm. Well this was a surprising way for me to pick up some context on where in the former US we are. Now I’m even more curious about the area geography post-flood. For someone who is horrified by the very idea of murder, E- seems pretty quick to intentionally feed into his anger here. He has good reason to be angry, but JW’s question there seems rather apt. Even if it’s the river doing the actual punishing, he seems to be pushing the elementals toward it. And seems to come very close to killing the guy. If that’s something E- is supposed to end up wrestling with, that’s all well and good (and I may get more of an answer reading further). But he seems to be in slightly murky moral territory otherwise. Obviously he has reason to be angry. But to intentionally feed into that anger seems like a dangerous step if he knows the river is going to be vengeful. I’d wonder where the responsibility lies if an ambassador riles up a spirit that kills someone, even if the person isn’t doing it themselves. Are they allowed to be fine with that death if the elementals carried it out? Even with the general acknowledgment that the elementals can get out of hand. Is the justice of the elementals generally accepted as the ultimate say in the matter? Or are they wrong sometimes? What is their ultimate goal in all of this? Feel free to throw the moral quandaries back at me in a million years when I get to submitting chapters that incorporate aspects of leaving ultimate justice to the supernatural powers that run things. Pg 6: “Figure out how much of that rage…” Yes. These questions are good ones to be asking. Good job, E. Pg 7: “did not believe in things like…” Wait. What? When they are living a short boat ride away? And trade with the people there (unless that has changed since the previous version of Ch1). There’s a place for assuming things are myth and story, but when you’re living right next door to people who are periodically possessing or being possessed by various sentient spirits, straight disbelief seems unlikely. Like. E-just almost had the river spirits drown a guy. That’s a very visible event. The perspective also leads to a science vs. religion false dichotomy, which always makes me twitchy when it’s a commonly held belief among a group. There will be some people who insist it’s myth, and who probably never leave their barges. But anyone who interacts with the “other” is going to start understanding them. Ser- seemed to be able to see beyond that split, so I’m hoping we aren’t jumping in that direction, but I will be disappointed with my solar barge ladies if they are all intentionally blind to the supernatural. Pg 8: These are rambling world-building thoughts raised by T- and E-‘s conversation. Some of my concerns are probably covered by it mostly being character biases showing through, but the impression they’re presenting is seems a little simplistic in some areas. It obviously doesn’t need to be fully portrayed here, but I have questions about what the reality of the world is like to have created those biases. Feel free to ignore any of said thoughts that are already consistently represented in the worldbuilding. I just like to poke at these things to see if they hold water. Sort of like the barge ladies’ disbelief: It’s hard to have false religions if there are real visible, summonable supernatural powers proving them wrong or actively suppressing them. You’ll still have intentionally blind bigots who are horrible people. And I fully support your raking them over the coals. But if there are river spirits drowning people who are murdering people, it seems like they’d be wiping out people groups tending largely toward abhorrent behavior before those groups can get much of a footing. Which makes the Al-‘s survival a little surprising. Why have the powers that be allowed them to survive this long? How do the elementals feel about these new religions? And why haven’t they done anything about them? Do they have a moral standard that they’re holding people to? And if so, why are they letting people break it? It’s been mentioned that they’re involved in the carrying out of judgments or punishments, but is that them making the moral standard? Or is that As- or community leaders making that moral standard, and using the elementals to carry it out? Are there true religions (and related deities) that exist that the elementals would be in some sort of conflict with (or in cooperation with)? Also, you mention that the elementals aren’t gods, but I assume that there are groups that would treat them as gods. Are they affected enough by people’s opinions and actions to turn into beings that demand worship or service or offerings or whatever? Where they might be treated like deities? I don’t have a good sense of their motives or Pg 10: “The had survived…The Flood.” How long has it been since the flood? And were the houses above the waterline during said flooding? Has the flood receded in the current world? Or is it still “flooded” where most current land masses had been reasonably high altitudes before? If the houses had been fully flooded and the water receded, I would find it hard to believe that could happen without significant structural damage that wouldn’t leave them standing much longer. If they are just above the waterline, that’s less of a problem. If they weren’t, then goodbye, pretty old New Englanders with fieldstone foundations (*cries*). Or any building with a basement, really. “They had to make people listen to them.” A seventeen (right?) year old trying to get a bunch of politicians to listen to them….oof. good luck, my friend. Sounds miserable. Pg 11: If Ser- is supposed to be representing her region/people/etc. why would As- not tell them everything they would need to know to be prepared to deal with the problems they’d raise. If these problematic/monstrous people are attending these meetings, how does it make sense for her to just “deny their existence.” “…believe the Mother is angered…” so this touches on some of the world-building things above. Does the behavior of the elementals where these people are from support these codes? Are they twisted in such a way as to support the roles that these people are enforcing? Is there some holy book or writ or scripture or whatever that is giving them their supposed moral code? Where did these roles come from, and what do they get out of following them? And if the elementals are some sort of force in support of the world, why haven’t they done anything about them? Also, do they view “the Mother” as a female deity? If they are worshipping a female deity and basing their actions and roles on what she would find offensive, I find it odd that the society they’ve formed would be oppressing women. If they respect the “goddess’s” anger and power, that’s going to color their social structure. Ser- and E-‘s greeting is clear about their relationship. Much better than the confusion from the initial chapter 1. “red as boiled lobsters.” Perfect character/setting/etc.-fitting description.

I actually almost asked if the Gabriel mentioned up near the top would be a relevant person. That seems like it would be a good fit. Will be interested to see how the religion works. I have just enough of a theology background to have opinions about religions when they have weird inconsistencies or are dealt with poorly. But I do love seeing when they're well-done and presented in an interesting way that adds to the world-building. I think it will work for suspense purposes as long as the language and dialogue are ironed out. At the moment, a few of those scenes have me tripping over odd wording and sentence structures and getting dragged out of the suspense. Meant to imply that initially, but I don't think I'd realized that's what was causing it until I had posted.

Side note: Did you format it in Garamond? Or did my computer change it? I mostly ask because I do most of my writing in Garamond then switch it over to Times New Roman for submissions, and find it funny that someone else might have the same font tendency. Either that or Word is doing strange things to documents when I’m not paying attention. Pg 1: Still need to keep track of some verb tenses. “Count C… had invited the L…” I like the intro better, but it still isn’t clear who is in the carriage at the front. This includes clarifying how they are related to A-. A mentions “we’re just your children” halfway down the page, which helps, but it’s still not clear how many people are there. And it’s probably worth calling out G- as his father in the line he’s first introduced. There’s certainly something to be said for introducing characters gradually in most cases. For not starting out with “Mom, Dad, A, and his sister M were riding in the carriage up to the castle.” But I think it’s more important that we know they are there while we’re putting that initial image together in our head. Knowing who all is there and what they are doing that isn’t taking part in the conversation. Something that adds to their character. Maybe mom has dozed off leaning against the wall, so she’s not likely to be taking part in the conversation. Or maybe she’s also worried about the whole thing and is trying to be quiet and not bring up her concerns. Or maybe she’s working on some embroidery. Something to hint at who she is, even if she’s not talking. And maybe his sister is busy looking out the window. Or trying to lean close to the window to read. Or draw. Or is just flat out bored. Until something in the conversation sparks her interest. Are mom and the sister having their own conversation, which A- is registering but ignoring because he doesn’t care about dresses or embroidery? I think having even just one or two sentences telling us who all is there and what they are doing would be a huge help both to avoid jarring the reader when characters seem to appear out of nowhere and to add touches of character. Pg 2: Dialogue could still use some work to seem less stilted. I’d second the recommendation above to read it out loud. “he has more to gain from doing business with us rather than taxing us.” I assume he’d still be taxing them. They’d just be getting something back from him if he’s going to be buying their wines. “…you’re scaring M.” I don’t see talk about taxes being scary. Especially for someone who doesn’t have to worry about paying them. Wildly boring, maybe. We could use a stronger introduction to both Mom and M. “I’m not a little girl anymore…” If she’s supposed to come across as not being childish, this isn’t the best way to do it. Probably just leaving it at “He’s not scaring me.” The qualifiers make it sound more whiny. If her age is important to know right here, it would probably make more sense for A to observe it when he’s talking about her being small for her age. “…smaller than most girls at fifteen, but…” or something. Mr G- This is a pretty sudden topic shift. Also, how does M not know that he’s missing? I assume that would have been talked about within the family. G- seems rather unsurprised that he’s disappeared. Has he gone missing in the past? Is Mr. G- irresponsible enough to make it seem likely that he’d just taken off? If so, why was he still employed there anyway? If A- is going to be taking over the business, they’re going to be making sure that he’s getting a proper education. They’re not going to waste money on someone who is irresponsible or incapable. “I liked Mr. G-“ I am surprised that his father is not more concerned about A’s extreme lack of concern about his education on anything business-related. Pg 3: “I could live in such a house.” I really like this line from M. But think it could use some sort character-building tone or expression hint. Is it dreamy awe? A snide/dry response to her brother? How’s she say it in a way that tells us something about her? “splitting the driveway momentarily” momentarily? Watch for extra apostrophes when Lor- has been pluralized. I noticed it once here. A quick text search will catch them, though. “A- covered his nose…” his father doesn’t give him a stern look or sharp word at that response? Pg 4: “He was…calculating.” Repetitive sentence structure here. A lot of “He x. He y. He z” in a row. Pg 5: “I’m seventeen.” We probably don’t need his age earlier, then. “his eyes suggested other moods.” ? Pg 6: It’s still very weird to me that A- doesn’t bother to mention his concerns about the person calling for help from the terrifying, rotten privy. Pg 8-9: There’s a lot of back and forth that confuses me about the family dynamic. How much influence do the kids have in big decisions? How much do Mom and Dad trust their opinions? How likely are the kids to talk back when decisions are made neglecting their opinions? Does O- defer to her husband’s decisions? I think they are all talking in sort of different directions Are they familiar with these priestesses being a thing, or what they do? I’d taken it as some top secret ritualistic thing that most people aren’t aware of. If they’re aware of it, and it is a viable future for her, I think that needs to be mentioned. There’s the “becoming a priestess could ensure a good future,” that assumes it’s something they are aware of and might even be an honor, but they otherwise treat it as a sort of terrifying thing all around. Do they have an idea of what being a priestess implies? Does she? If it’s a viable thing that people do, what about the prospect is terrifying? Is it the count himself? The thought of leaving her family? I just don’t have a good concept of what exactly is going on here. “Thank the lord” Ooo. I get to overthink fantasy swearing. My favorite. Make sure that the things the characters are swearing by are reflecting their beliefs. In our world, this phrase is going to refer some sort of Judeo-Christian worldview. Whether the character believes it or is simply in a culture where it’s common. What does it mean in our Fourfold Kingdom? What lord is he swearing by? I’m guessing that there would probably be some other phrase that would be more relevant, whether the expression is flippant or devout. Is there a deity or power or person that would make sense culturally/religiously for him to be swearing by? Pg 11: The reasons to stay are much better, though I think 9-11 could be trimmed back a little bit. There seems to be more back and forth and explaining of things than there needs to be. “…such things are not unheard of…” are they, though? And even if they are, is he really not more suspicious of the timing? There’s more time spent on the bathing than seems necessary. Pg 12-13 I like how the count comes across here better than before. Seems less flat out evil for evil’s sake. Overall: This definitely did a lot to fix some of the big issues the first time around. Making the count less cartoony. Providing more motivation for the choices they make. Better presence of the female characters, though they still need some additional development. I think there could be a good deal of improvement in the language and dialogue to make things flow more smoothly. And I think reading it aloud to yourself would be helpful in picking out some of those things. Or if you can stand listening to your own voice, recording yourself reading it, then listening to it a little later. There are still a few logic jumps that I’m not quite buying, and places where things could be made clearer, but I think I need a better idea of the full story to offer too many thoughts on what would be important to bring out more or downplay depending on their relevance. Looking forward to seeing where we go from here.

Good point. Starting here takes out all of the other spellstone references, so there's really nothing to tie that to as it is. I tried to make a little reference to the magic issues in regard to the lack of healing magic making most people more cautious, but that will be dealt with a lot more directly in the next chapter. I'll probably check in there to see what might be better to introduce here, but I think it's going to fit better there overall. Yeah. There's definitely not enough expression of the amount of pain she's actually in there. Or her feelings following the match. Ideally, there should be a strong feeling of "This seems like there's something more than just an injury going on here" during her talk with Al-, which should lead to that connection pretty quickly when things are going downhill after she's left the practice yard. Though looking back, it looks like I cut most of that conversation down to him just asking if she's alright... Urgh. Cut section in spoiler box thing for reference. I think by taking that and a lot of her pain-processing and her body shutting down after she leaves the yard, it does make it really unclear how bad things are. Probably should have just taken out the latter part and left this (or some form of it) in.

But that is what happens. The poison nearly kills her. I cut back the effects of it too much while trimming wordcount, but it leaves her incapacitated to some extent for most of the story, which is what pushes her to ask questions about magic that she wouldn't have otherwise. After this chapter, her main concern is never about a whiny cousin. It is pointed in the same direction — "What is best for the kingdom?" (Which she is interpreting on page 1 as "Not Ro-" ), but it looks entirely different once she's thrown off the edge of her simple understanding of the world and realizes that there are bigger issues in the world. In many ways the opening motivation should seem a little superficial. Because it's about to make a sudden turn. So the contrast is important. But it needs to be that without making her seem shallow and clueless, and without losing the reader. Which it's not currently doing.

Progress is progress, I guess. And at least it will mostly be getting her motivations here in order (and buckling down on her next chapters to make sure the change after the poisoning is clear cut and immediate). Would you (or @Mandamon or @shatteredsmooth ) say there's any place for this being a starting point? Where the biggest problem she sees in her world is her whiny cousin and his inability to fit her idea of what a proper heir should be? Because her world, needs, and emotions have never really been challenged by much else until now? I know this chapter still needs to have a more focused motivation than it does now, but I'm still struggling with how to convey that her current understanding of the world is too small to really know what she wants at this point. And she would probably be glad to cruise along keeping everything in her life in neat little boxes so that she can avoid ever acknowledging that she's not fully in control of her life. If she weren't, for an entirely non-random example, poisoned in a sword tournament.

Did this version do any better at portraying motivation than the last version you read? There were some changes to the first couple pages from the last one you'd seen. Still definitely not where it needs to be, but is it at least moving in the right direction? Or is there no noticeable difference between the two? Also, do you know if you'd caught on to the poison possibility your first time reading?

Surprise! Welll.....that certainly needs to be adjusted. How I manage to be both too subtle about things and overexplain them is beyond me...Urgh.

There was more of this before, but it went on too long, and a lot of it got trimmed back. I hadn't realized that I'd taken too much of it out. Exactly opposite of the swordfight problem, where I left too much in. It's mostly just there to point out that she's physically pretty unassuming (being no taller than a 12-14 year old and having to borrow the kids' equipment) but like most things, it's more vague and roundabout than it is supposed to be. It is also supposed to hang a lantern on the fact that the equipment was specifically set aside for her, but we'll get to that below. I thought I'd fixed the wording of that, to imply that they might root for A over either her or Ro-, whoever won their match. But it might be easier to just cut the sentence entirely, since I don't think it adds enough to justify needing a ton of extra words to clarify. Right. Yeah. That should have been a no-brainer on my part. He's talking about her intentionally not dodging the hit before she charges at him. But there needed to be more detail there indicating how much the actual impact of it hurt. Which I think would help with a lot of the problems later on, as well. To show that the blow was hard enough to cause the bleeding/bruising even through the chainmail and padded tunic. Which would likely make it difficult to even lift that arm. Initially the injury that mattered was a different one, but everything around it was too convoluted and confusing, so I switched things here, but failed to stress the severity of this one in its place. If it's not coming across that there was potential for her to have been severely wounded by being flatfooted when he was swinging at the end, I may need to adjust that. Or just cut it. Re- is talking about forfeiting because he panicked a little when he saw her basically just stop in the middle of a match for no obvious reason and could have very easily been killed or severely wounded if she hadn't had the instincts to drop like a rock. Which is entirely out of character because she's clever and level-headed. He's worried about both the injury (which is worse than I've apparently implied) and her mental state. She doesn't care about the injury (as you said. People get minor injuries all the time and keep going), but isn't exactly trustworthy in evaluating her own mental state, and tends toward pushing herself too hard. They don't. That's supposed to be a sarcastic overstatement on her part. He's just concerned that she's more injured than she's letting on (likely) and knows the disaster it would be politically if either of them was severely wounded in what's supposed to be a fun event. Even accidentally. Because there's already a lot of rocky history between their families. Which is what Ro- was supposed to be trying to make up for by befriending Al- That would be the padded tunic, set aside special from the kids' equipment storage. I think a lot of this would be made clearer if the significance of her injuries early on were stressed more. But it's not really the injury that's doing the damage. That's what everyone sees, so it's what they're focused on, but there should be more indication that she's dizzy and sick and uncharacteristically absentminded as the poison takes effect that should give the reader a clearer idea that there's something more going on than just an injury...hmmm... Thanks for your thoughts! I always have really skewed ideas of where I've cut too much or not enough of things after a bunch of edits, so it's good to see where some of those things fall for readers who are new to it and don't know where things are going.

Pg 1: The opening sentences had me thinking this was Y-‘s PoV. Until we get to the “because T- ate the fruit of trees…” line and I got thrown off. Pg 2: “…took a bite of the ‘glass’…” Do you have a comparison of what the hardness/texture of the “glass” is like? And how “liquid” is the lemonade? Does it have any real lemon-basis? Or is it entirely artificial but made to imitate the flavor of lemonade? If you leave it sit too long, is the liquid going to make the glass soggy? I assume it would have to have some sort of disintegration when exposed to liquid for it to be digestible. What sorts of “inks” does the printer work with. Is cellulose the main volume of it, a sort of carrier that has nutrient and flavor extracts added, to be combined in different ways? I assume different species are going to need different nutrients, so that seems like an important thing to be able to swap out. Ultimately, the whole food printing thing takes me back to my materials science classes. And I have questions. Most of which, I’m fine passing off into the “Future tech. Don’t worry about it” category, but which my curiosity still wants answers for, even if I don’t think they’re vital for the story. Pg 3: “There almost to. No.” -> “They’re almost to” ? “Did we not have our fill…” this sentence is a little clunky/confusing. As is “Assuming they haven’t left Ei- orbit…” “I,’ he jabbed his thumbs into his chest…” I know I probably overuse em-dashes, but this seems like it needs them. The commas aren’t quite right. Pg 4: “wetness formed in the corners of his eyes like…” I like this species contrast detail. Being reminded that Sal- is more familiar with st- than with tears. “I’d like to ask follow-up questions.” Lol. Pg 6: “breaking news, peace talks…” Hm. Who would have guessed that a planet blowing up might cause some political troubles? Pg 10: The image of all of the files appearing all through the space is fun and dramatic, but it seems like 1- a really inefficient way to actually sort through information. I can’t even keep track of too many browser tabs. Having them take up physical space might make it easier to mentally process what is where, but having them all appearing and talking at once just seems overwhelming and unhelpful. And 2- it seems odd that she would get even the previews that she does if they’re all restricted. Pg 16: “She tapped to accept, though the fee…” Heh. Always a bad idea. Pg 17: “typed Ma- Pi-“ Yeah. That seems likely to go badly. “Aggression Talents…” I have no idea what just happened or what this means. Pg 18: “You are both very nice but you talk a lot” If I had a nickel for every time I’d thought this… Pg 19: “Y- started to get up” He’s strapped into his seat, right? “This is me not captaining…” I assume this is in reference to Sal- being in charge at the moment? It wasn’t entirely clear. Overall: I like having a little more background on Y- and Nick. And I enjoyed the chapter as a whole, and wasn't bored. But I also like character investment chapters. So I don't know if it will feel slower to other people. In regard to Sal- taking charge, I see far more of Y- intentionally stepping out of the way for her to go on her little adventure than her actually stepping up. Which I think is makes perfect sense for a milder character (I’m sure you’ll be surprised that I like mild characters at least when done well), but I think it would come across better if he actually knows what she’s planning to do. Right now, it comes across a little as him sort of humoring her as she sends them all on this adventure, but she has obviously not filled him in on the details. Which seems slightly deceptive on her part, and could come across as a little patronizing on his (maybe?). Ex. 1: Taking the ship for a little adventure? “Sure, hon.” I think the fact that he’s putting her in charge of the ship could say a lot about the trust and respect that he has for her goals. But that doesn’t come across as well when he doesn’t know what those goals are. So it sort of comes across as her tricking him into letting her run things. She is in charge, but she hasn’t yet proved that she should be in charge in that way. Especially when Y- is sort of stepping back into command then intentionally backs down at the end. Is that a circumstance where she’s capable of leading? Once things have gone wrong? Or is that somewhere where his stepping up is ultimately going to be less likely to get them killed? She can still be the one in charge without being the one sitting in the captain’s seat. And he can still be deferring to her goals and plans without just sitting by and letting all of them get dragged into danger. And I think having Y- fully aware of what he’s getting into, being reluctant about it, but agreeing because it means a lot to her says far more than the current setup. Depending on what you’re intending to do with the characters. If she is a little more deceptive/manipulative, then yeah. This makes sense. But that needs to create more problems when Y- finds out how much she wasn’t telling them about where they were going/what they were doing. Ex. 2: Taking the ship for a little adventure that’s going to be difficult for all of us, and puts us in circumstances that we probably aren’t really going to want to get involved with? “I don’t like it. But I know you well enough to trust your judgment, so I’m in, and am going to try to support you however I’m helpful. By doing what I do best while you do what you do best to accomplish what you’re trying to do.”