And, to round out our quadrology of stories with flawed endings, we have one where the ending didn't actually happen. That is a pretty big flaw and probably the first thing to be fixed. :p

More seriously though, much like I feel Earthworm probably wanted to dip below the minimum word count, this story probably exceeds the max. And probably by no small amount either. Even accounting for the unwritten portion, there is the bigger problem in that, as it stands, it's way too easy to immediately guess the culprit on nothing more than conservation of characters. It isn't the protagonist, it isn't the trans mermaid woobie, it isn't the "abrasive but really just cares for His People" guy... and that only leaves one other character, who has no other obvious purpose in the narrative and drips offputting racism at every opportunity.

While I say it doesn't need cuts, it also sort of does need cuts, because there's so much extraneous stuff going on here. Building a fantasy world, then crashing that fantasy world with a bunch of earth humans, and also some of those earth humans are monstergirls, and also some of them are in the wrong gender body, let's throw both fantasy racial issues and earth racial issues and trans issues and class issues and fantasy economy issues and also make the crime scene an aquatic D&D adventure for good measure. Why the heck not! (see above for the answer of why not)

Seriously, there is a lot going on in the story and while it is interesting and you manage to get a lot of information out there with real efficiency, it borders on overwhelming. This would probably be be better as an individual episode in a larger story or something, where you don't have to slam all this information down at once.

And to reiterate, this really does need another viable suspect. Even if it's not a true mystery story and more a police procedural, that still requires there be a little more give and take with potential suspects.

And honestly I'm really tired right now and can't focus on giving this a line by line. Check out the Discord if you didn't, because they had some good thoughts. If you're still interested, let me know and I'll put the time in this week.

Let’s start this pretty straight out: of the four fics this round, Brave and the Bold is the one that most successfully achieved its goals. Those goals are not necessarily to my liking but, in measuring terms of success as a complete and cohesive work, this goofy fantasy quasi-grossout romp did it. So kudos. There is 100% something to be said for just doing a solid job telling a story.

I do think the bookends of the story are kinda wasted space. The opening narrative bit efficiently sets some information and then allows you immediately undercut it to humorous effect. So I could live with it. The end one, however, I think, falls flat. The story, as set, is about our two moron protagonists. The introductory paragraph does not establish enough plot relevance to this scholarly presence to really justify closing out on it. It just ends up feeling a bit limp and disconnected.

Imagine if Terry Pratchett had concluded his Discworld stories with an outro that flew back out to Great A’tuin. It’d be a bit of a thud (heh) for an ending because, ultimately, that is not the story being told.

Also it means you miss out on the obvious comic opportunities of our two protagonists to snipe at each other as they drift out to sea. Which I also think would be a better bookend for what feels very much like an episodic adventure.

That said, if you did want to stick with the narrator thing, then you need to establish it as an actual narrative rather than just a brief world setting device.

I actually feel kinda bad after expending like, a million words on the last two stories, because I have a lot less to say here, because you aimed for a very straightforward narrative and you successfully executed on it.

Still, let’s look into the lines a bit.

Oh, right. This might be a somewhat unique problem, but your calling of the victuallers scavs caused a massive derail for me, because I was trying to figure out if they were supposed to be yinglets, especially since you switched to a mammal swear when referring to them too. Obviously being aware of every fantasy race name/slur/nickname is a bit hard, but it just jumped out, especially since the kobolds kinda evoke them too.

But yeah, even looking back through, I don’t really have much to say here. It’s a low-class comedy that executes its pieces well. I suppose maybe trying to work a bit more in the way of actual jokes into it? A lot of the comedy ls leaning on the toilet humor (though there are a couple other lines), so if that falls flat, the whole thing falls a little flat?

The beginning especially is a place where the fic probably plays a bit straight for its own good, with the scene being bereft of any real jokes or even humerous situations outside mildly dumb characters and a bit of silly cursing.

So, as seems to be a trend for this round, this is another story where I feel the ending kind of lets it down. I actually like quite a bit of what is going on here, and I think about partway through the mood established really flourishes into a nice sense of eerie surreality that is pleasantly pretty affecting.

Which sort of becomes a problem when the end slams us into “it was reality all along, mother fucker.” I said it in chat, I think, but I much preferred this story as allegory rather than the titular Earthworm being metaphorical. And hopefully I’ll be able to sort of organize that into a somewhat coherent thought.

I think the sense of disjunction that occurs with the metaphor that occurs throughout the story is a little easier to deal with when this is just a grand and mysterious earthworm, rather than our decidedly less mysterious (but just as grand) Earthworm. The worm being magical allows for a slightly greater sense of disbelief to be easily lent, while the worm being a boy ends up causing me to ask questions. Especially since it is posed as a reveal, which encourages me to go back and find the clues.

And they are most definitely there and well laid, I feel. Maybe I was just a doofus reading the first time through, but I did bypass the clues as our worm being somewhat fantastical in nature, but could clearly see them looking back. But I think they ultimately end up raising more questions then the story was prepared to answer.

Looking back at the beginning, it really sort of amplifies my issue with the end in a few different ways. You start with a fairy tale beginning (quite literally), but the ending does not create a proper mirror for it (at least insofar as I see it, it has been a bit since I read a bunch of fairy tales). I realize you could be going for a bit of a subversion, but I don’t feel like it quotes get there either. The problem is that the story’s throughline just… doesn’t really exist?

That’s where I feel the big disconnect happens. I’m just not sure what the story is trying to say. There isn’t really an emotional or narrative arc that goes the whole through. There are definitely hints of them, but it doesn’t feel like you managed to bring them into the actual conclusion.

Anyhow, back to the body. You start off real strong, introducing idea and motivation. Like I said above, the ideas are pretty well woven here and you do a decent job of concealing your intention. But with foreknowledge of the end, I’m kinda positioned to ask “why?” Assuming I’m not really completely failing at this story, I’m not really sure what the twist here really manages that is better served by making it a twist instead of spelling it out more directly initially, aside from an “ah-hah!” moment.

(I also wish to aside here to say that I remain disappointed this was not a magical worm carving Lovecraftian designs beneath the Earth. Obviously I shouldn’t judge the story for what it’s not, but oh, for the road not travelled…)

With the departure of the family we have a potential idea, the connection between the earthworm and humans, but I feel this goes kind of underexplored, mainly because the two interactions he really has are short and kind of unexplored.

After the departure of the family is where my attention started lagging the first time through, and a second read doesn’t really seem to help. The time spent ruminating on the lost family and in a fairly straightforward “chase” sequence is really long and doesn’t do much to actually advance the story in a meaningful way.

Honestly, I think in the same way that Water is too long for the format, Earthworm is too short for the format. You could probably tighten up to sub 2500 fairly easily? Maybe.

Anyhow, the chase especially is where I sort of lose the plot of what is really happening, so that’s another problem. Like the actual action being committed doesn’t read cleanly either with a literal worm or a metaphorical worm, which really kinda amplifies the sequence feeling a bit flabby.

And then we roll into the end and, like I keep saying, I’m just not sure what to do with it. This is not to say that every story must give you some straightforward, clear answer, it’s just that I’m not sure what direction to take this. Like there is nothing for me to glom onto. The exploitation of art? The dual nature of humanity? The corruption of the innocent? Etc. There are things I think about, but none of them really read well into the text.

The reveal and the final lines and everything have a definite sense of poignancy – they’re good lines – but I just don’t think they stand up under scrutiny.

What I’m saying is this story really needs needs a stronger throughline to deliver a conclusion. I really do love the early half of this story, but I just think it loses steam as it continues. So tighten that up.

Or make it about a magical earthworm that summons otherworldly abominations.

So I think the key issue with the story here is that the two narratives don't really play nice with each other within the context of the story. The character story ends up going underdeveloped because our view is so far removed from the characters (and served out between a lot of metastory) and the metastory doesn't end up functioning because we are kept in a little too close to every get a solid enough understanding of what's going on to really invest in the stakes.

I think both story ideas are solid in and of themselves, but I think together, in this format, they actively detract from each other. A really solid example of this is the entire ending. We don't really understand Charlotte's emotional stakes (we're told she's a patriot, but we don't really have an opportunity to understand why), so her decision at the end feels somewhat hollow - especially because we understand very little of what she's gone through. What we do understand of what she's gone through actually paints a picture of a woman who has been abused substantially and should, by all rights, be very, very angry.

I think the main thing you really want to change here is you want to focus in on the story you actually want to tell: is this a story about a parallel world interfering in a war or is it a story about one woman's personal journey through that? You can have both elements (although in a more unusual narrative like this it is going to be a bit harder), but you need to understand what your real goal is so that you can provide a satisfying resolution to that narrative.

I want to really hammer it home with the conclusion of the story. It really doesn't at all follow with the narrative we are provided. The first character we actually get a view from is William (which sets up the expectation that he is actually the primary character), and, in fact, perspective (as it is) is pretty heavily channeled through him given Charlotte disappears part way through the narrative. And (I'll double check this when I get more to the in-line reading stuff) it feels like the majority of notes are not directly about their personal journeys, but are more about building the meta narrative. So it is very jarring to suddenly have this deeply personal resolution.

I haven’t chatted about the ever popular MICE quotient, so let’s do it here. Obviously writing rules can be broken, but I generally approve of the MICE idea and I think it effectively demonstrates here. Basically, there are 4 main types of story: milieu (a story about a world), idea (a story about an idea), character (a story about… well you get the idea), and event (a story about a thing happening). It’s basically “what is the focus of the story that is being told.”

Now obviously stories can be composed of all these things. Most larger narratives are gonna feature more than one. And that is where nesting MICE comes in. See, you want to have you story resolve in a roughly first in, last out order. Like, this is a sloppy example, but Disney’s Hercules (my child has watched this a lot recently) I’d say, in quick fashion, is a character and event story. The character is about Hercules, the event is Hades trying to do evil shit.

So, with that out of the way, let’s get a bit more specific. The story opens by presenting us Hercules and his life, establishing that this story is primarily about him. It then proceeds to move us into Hades’ plot, establishing the villainous plot. Now, we fast forward and the climax of the villainous plot is then the one to occur with Hercules stopping the Titans, and then the character plot resolves with Hercules becoming a true hero. And it feels good because the primary plot we established was “this is a story about a person” as the biggest idea. Imagine if we resolved Hercules’ internal character conflict earlier in the plot, then dealt with the hades plot. It would feel a bit… limp. Because we were communicated that the main focus of the story was Hercules himself, with a secondary focus on the villain plot, because that’s the order information was presented to us.

So the point I wanted to make with all that rambling was this story sort of trips itself up in three big ways. One, it ostensibly opens as a milieu story (what little we can derive from the actual opening lings positions it as sorta being about the world because that is the only info we have) but ends as a character story, two, it ends as a character story but doesn’t really take us on a journey to get there (not only does Charlotte not change, develop, or really do anything within the context of the story, but we also don’t really see it happen even if you want to argue it does), and three, it unexpectedly swaps characters on us for no real gain by setting us up to believe that William is the protagonist but concluding with Charlotte.

Whew. Anyway. Onto a more detailed look at individual scenes.

Your opening lines are actually a bit of an anti-hook. They do establish some minor things, but the fact that they are basically just me looking at a computer screen in a white room that is providing me with some fairly generic stuff immediately sets me into skimming mode. Ideally we should actually frame Charlotte here, properly establishing her as a primary character. We don’t need to name her, detail her, or anything, we just need to frame it so that she exists, is clearly our primary protagonist, and present some sort of emotional stake that we can key into with that ending. We can let the letters provide the context that leads from opening to ending, making her identity a reveal in that way.

This also cleans up the issue a bit with leading with William’s letter, since now we’ve established our true protagonist, and this instead lets you set up for the subversion to be clearer where you present it as a war romance but instead it is about her lover of her country.

That said, it might still be worth leading with like, the New York City Occupied article with some slight expansions (or just rolling more of that info into William’s letter). There really isn’t much to be gained from obscuring a lot of the basic facts here (who the war is between, what the time period is, etc). It’s clear that it is an alternate timeline (or at least unlikely to be near future) and I don’t think the doling out of those facts adds much.

Like, initially the language provided, the style of letter, ane “North” stuff, etc, instead makes me think this is like, closer to the Civil War or somewhere between. And I just don’t see what the slow roll out of that adds aside from forcing me to reevaluate my mental images.

Oh. And how the hell William and Charlotte come into contact is something that just… never really makes sense to me? Like I sorta get the gist that his unit gets a letter from her, he responds, etc, but all in all it kinda ends up feeling weird because how casually and easily these letters seem to reach each other kinda creates a much less urgent air? I suppose this helps ramp the stakes later, but it does feel weird.

Language is kinda wild in this. The diction puts me in mind of WW2 letters, but the language is often pretty modern. Maybe too modern for the actual timeframe of the story? But I might be wrong there. It just feels like some of the slang and color is more at home in 2020 than 1980.

Sending letters with information like “we’ve joined with a bunch of preppers” feels a bit like a bad idea. To a similar degree, her mentioning that the courier has more info in a separate note also feels a bit weird, sine our private doesn’t really need to know that, does he? This kinda gets acknowledged in a letter or two, but I don’t think it solves the concern.

The introduction of the mysterious building levelling is a problem because, as this subplot grows, it kinda gets more confusing and I feel there is never a satisfactory answer for it? We’ll see when I get back to it, but the combination of the increasing mysteriousness (half of New York gone!) is kinda undercut by the fact that I’m never really sure what it actually means. Like, it’s too mysterious in that I don’t even understand what’s happening in the broadest terms, let alone the secret background explanation.

That said, at this point you’ve pretty reasonably established the overall stakes and players, filled out some motivations, etc. That’s a really good thing! Despite the more unusual formatting, you’ve gotten us to the key information with solid speed and each letter has been important for forwarding the plot. It’s a great use of your format.

It occurs to me that the timeframe for this story is a bit odd. Like, the nature of letters means these are probably getting spaced out, but William seems to take forever to do anything.

The letter about the scuffle works fine in the moment, but it actually feels a bit like a cheat in retrospect? Like, is Estate Zero really so bad at their job that they managed to start a brawl because they didn’t think someone would be curious about the newer tech they were bringing out?

The pronouncement of love is a bit… awkward. Even in terms of it being an immature and brash declaration, the skipped irrelevant letters feel really important here to better establish where this comes from – even if it is just a crush. I dunno. This might just be personal though.

Also, some of the notes are odd. Is this the computer informing that intel gathering efforts in the area increased? Seriously though, personal letters being sent this way seems really iffy. Like, you’re really risking courier lives and getting followed to hidden areas for this stuff?

The old USA reference is actually a pretty clever hint. Though it muddies the timeline further in that I was under the impression the split was somewhat recent, so referring to the old USA wouldn’t be that weird?

I also feel like I must say that I stand corrected and the early half is waaaaay more letter heavy than I remembered.

The Sergeant Major Adam Montgomery note is a weird one and I’m not sure what to make of it aside from portraying William’s obsession as escalating dangerously? Because I’m seriously not sure why he is interrogating a crystal ball reader at gunpoint. Like, it doesn’t feel like we have the build up to this, especially since Andrew refusing to send messages (which might be an additional trigger instead of just one intercepted letter) is the next scene.

Andrew’s response here feels really late here, but I mentioned that above.

It looks like this is why I misremembered the letter ratio: this is where they kinda disappear. And not just the letters either. William and Charlotte kinda disappear from the narrative for a while, which doesn’t work when, at its heart, this is a character story.

This was something that bugged me a lot. The initial implication with the apartment building was that it was destroyed, but now we are talking “vanished” buildings. And what that actually means is important. Like, is it just an empty plot of land? Ruins? Etc? This problem gets way worse later with the more extreme disappearances because I, the reader, don’t understand what I’m supposed to be confused about, if that makes sense.

The intercepted conversation feels a bit forced, largely because David kinda oscillates between being sick of William’s shit and humoring him.

I stand corrected again. We are back to letters. My memory sucks. Though how these letters are happening is a bit of a question mark.

So travelling down, the reveal of Keith’s stuff here is a little awkward, because we get no real view of him. The fact that he is essentially as important as William (arguably moreso to the metaplot) but we get this kinda out of nowhere “stop crushing on Charlotte, dude” letter kinda jarrs the shape of information. In a way that I don’t think works.

And I think this is really emblematic of why this format doesn’t work with the character story here. We have essentially skipped a lot of character information in reaching the delivery of this information: why William is so obsessed, why he goes AWOL to find Charlotte when it doesn’t seem like he needs to, how he finds her, etc, plus anything about Keith, what Charlotte has been doing, etc. And the issue just sort of expands as it continues. Why the hell is Estate Zero letting them see each other. How has Keith so easily evaded the estate. Why Charlotte is saying anything about keeping fidelity when she hasn’t expressed anything back. Etc. basically it gets TOO involved in the character minutiae for the format to keep up with.

So the full reveal occurs and… it sorta leave a lot of questions to be answered? Like we can write a lot off by “the organization is incompetent,” but even then, there are questions like: why? How did they break things so badly? Etc. I also feel like the timeline scanner statement kinda breaks things, because wouldn’t they be better able to predict outcomes with that? It also kinda removes a lot of meaning from the actions of the characters because, essentially, they have been robbed of agency by a larger and more powerful force that they have no impact on. Hell, William doesn’t get any real resolution to anything, getting memory wiped, shoved out, and… ??? I mean, presumably dead by nuke, but for a character who was sorta set as our protagonist, it is a real non answer.

Oh, and the missing buildings are never explained. I assume it is timey wimey, but you really can’t present that as a real mystery and then not provide some sort of definitive answer.

And then we hit the end and… it is kind of a messy in terms of Charlotte. Like, honestly, the entire plot represents a pretty severe violation of her personhood. She is manipulated, kidnapped, brainwashed, etc and she comes off as very… casual about it? Even kind of positive. Yet at the same time she so badly wants to go back to… what is probably a nuclear hellscape? And she romanticizes this in a way that just doesn’t feel like it connects. She is more a symbol than a character in a lot of ways, and it is no more apparent here where nothing about her choices really feels like it adds up. And maybe you could get there, but we lack the character work to do it.

So, returning to the beginning, my opinion remains largely unchanged. I think you’ve got two excellent story ideas here, but you really need to focus in on one of them.

Grats to everyone and sorry for being dead this round. I thought I was over this bug and instead came back with a vengeance. If anyone who did not get a review from me would like one, ask and I will do so once I feel better.

A tightly wound little tragedy that does, admittedly, have me questioning the nature of said tragedy.

Opening paragraph is a little weird as it set me up for like, a fantasy or historical romp when, in fact, this story is very modern. Worth noting that you might want to contextualize that a bit more to better get your reader prepared for the story up ahead. Its mostly the tone of the language, which feels distinctly archaic.

I do agree with struggling a bit with the main conflict because the actions don't quite line up in a way. The narrator is definitely at fault for running away and guilt is natural (though really, all of them - including the professor) are kinda assholes for bailing. But yeah, the amount of negligance displayed our narrator seems to be pretty minor. Whoever made the entire building dependent on that one support is the one who needs to be strung. And while emotions are not always logical, there is a definite bit of painting that the narrator is the one at fault here, rather than the narrator JUST feels guilty for what they've done.

Which brings us the professor, whose smugness is... honestly pretty off-putting. Like, asshole, you were there. You had the ability to clear this up. You had the ability to help! So your kinda smarmy conversation there at the end feels super unwarranted. Just talk to the narrator. Or, I mean, be cheeky and give him a reason to consider you.

Honestly, if you wanted to aim at the personal failing level, that might be a bit tighter of a path. Have the narrator kill the professor to protect himself and realize that he really bore no fault for what happened. Then his feelings of guilt and cowardice have ACTUALLY compounded into something truly monstrous that has moved the narrator from rather guiltless to truly guilty. Or something like that.

Or just spend more time with the nature of his guilt in general. Still, all told, this was a nicely tight little tale (with a few tense mistakes).

A short little slice of life with a good amount of pathos and heart. I will agree wholeheartedly with Bachi that I think the perspective swaps could be smoothed out a bit. The character voices are a little indistinct (especially given the revealed age difference) which makes it a little hard to tell for sure that you've bounced without a better flag at the start of a new section.

I also agree with Anon that I feel the reveal cheapens the story a bit? Aside from very much feeling like a manufactured revealed for added pathos, as someone who lives in in the Bay in California, I see a lot of homeless people on a day to day basis, and very few of the ones I see are kids. And, of course, making it a sadder reveal for it to be a kid... kinda takes away from all the other people suffering on the street, if that makes sense? Like this fairly tragic implication that if this were some 30 year old vet or something that it is inherently less sad (and thus his tragedy is worth less). I don't think that's your intention, of course, but it is kinda what happens when you structure this way.

The cat is a nice little weavethrough detail and the heart is definitely there. Maybe spend a little more time on their interaction so we can see the friendship grow?

A nice little creepypasta with some suitably eerie images, but I think it is mostly let down by its length. This is just waaaaay too long, which results in it being fairly unfocused. What you've got here, I think, is a nice, tight little 3k piece. At 7+K though? You are just losing the focus and meandering too much.

The first scene is a really great example. All that really needs to happen is we meet Antonio, we learn the painting is weird, he buys it. That doesn't need to be... 2.5K? And I think the big culprit is really just that you do a lot of description, some of it doubly unnecessary because contextual clues would suffice (Zacariah's full name being used, for example). But like, in the first scene, really all the other description you do kinda detracts from the idea of the painting being this uncanny, eye-catching thing... because everything gets lavished in detail.

Heck, as structured, you could entirely cut Zach with no real difference to the story!

The other core issue is that the end doesn't really tie back to the beginning well. I think you would better served by establishing that Antonio was maybe a bit obsessive about his restorations, maybe judgmental of people who didn't take good care of their stuff (for example, maybe the frame on this painting is damaged and that annoys him), which then allows you to build the painting in as an amplifier to that behavior. Maybe have him escalate to a notable (but still lesser) level, like lashing out at Zach. Then you can go with the ending, at which point the slide into that is easier to accept.

Descriptions are solid though, especially the stuff with the paintings. Really good and eerie. I do wish the portrait had been the painting of choice (woman slowly gets mad at him) but still, your presented ones are really good.

A cute and energetic character driven story that I don't think quite manages to end successfully. I had an extended discussion with Bachi on this in chat, and, having slept on it... I still feel the same way. I think the ending idea is fine, but I think the actual application here feels a bit lacking in terms of Chloe's self realization. I can sort of see his argument about serendipity vs surprise, but I feel that is undercut a bit by her still using Kladdadle, since that is literally one of the things her grandpa calls her out on!

I guess what it is at a level is the question of what she was going to do with the money was never really hovering in the air in such a way that ending on that particular beat doesn't really feel like it closes out the story. Like, strictly speaking, the "I'm pretty predictable that way" line is the better out since it is the one that really solidifies her acceptance who she is, whereas the "Surprise" instead comes off as a bit smug and self-congratulatory - basically who she was throughout the rest of the story.

Speaking of, her voice is pretty well realized and plays well to her character, but do be careful about this particular kind of narrative voice as constantly being clever/punchy can get a little tiresome/feel a little tryhard. Give a little more space to breathe between clever turns of phrase!

Still, this was a really fun and enjoyable read.

In my restless dreams,

I see that place.

Writeoff.me

You promised you'd take me there again someday.

And you totally did. So... uh... great job honey?

A generally fun and entertaining fantasy ride that really puts me in mind of early Discworld.

Of course, I'm a bit more of a fan of later Discworld. :o

Whoah. Deja vu. Joke's aside, this and Necromance are kinda different stories despite both being goofy sword and sorcery jank. And both have their own strengths (though, ironically, I think the tone of the endings for both would have better swapped - Necromance gets a bit too much heart for the preceding story, Job gets not enough!)

It came up in chat, but the stakes raise in the climax kinda falls flat because there isn't actually a raising of stakes with no real danger to Merryn being presented. She takes the arm loss like a champ. And so it doesn't matter, ultimately. If you want to jar the reader, you need to -actually- make it look like it matters. As is, it might as well be a scratch. And that doesn't mean you can't have the clean ending - people can have some degree of blaseness about danger and means to patch it up well with the in the moment danger being real to the reader.

Otherwise, pacing is a bit rushy and imagery is pretty non-existant. You've got solid character voices down, but otherwise it is a lot of blank slates and white rooms. Which is a bit of a problem when a key part of your story is also the main being a random fantasy creature without easy mental parallels.

I'm having some trouble with this story. As others have said, there are a lot of missing pieces that make it a bit challenging to assemble the actual nature of the narrative because we see so few pieces. Ultimately I come down on the idea that Gloria used to live here, Jonathan does now. It creates a few oddities in and of itself, but based on the art it kinda makes the most fitting sense in the idea that Eli tries and it is all for naught because some rando gets his letter and just trashes it.

Which really kinda makes Jon a dick if true, but c'est la vie.

And, if true, creates kind of a nihilistic outlook on things that makes this story kinda hard for me to deal with because, well, maybe I just respond too well to emotional prompting, but it does create a sense of waste and pointlessness. Which is not a criticism of the story per se: it is effective at being that sort of grim. But it does kinda leave me feeling a bit eh.

The letters I had a little trouble with and I'm not sure if it is that the voice feels inauthentic or just that I'm not good at really imagining how this voice would exist (because being well-read and well-educated makes me blow at emulating and interpreting other voices that don't match at that sometime). I will say the typos end up being a bit distracting in context and I think you'd want a typesetting trick to make the letters look more lettery?

I dunno. Ultimately I guess the most accurate thing I can say here is I just really had trouble getting into this one and it never really clicked with me and I am having trouble really putting my finger on why that is. Sorry.

I feel a slight problem this round was the question of "what is the story being told here" and I think this one is a bit emblematic of it on the whole. Things happen in this story. Events proceed in a sequence. But overall, there is not an overarching narrative direction to the story. There is, at least in my opinion, no real narrative arc, nothing to be taken away from it in the end, etc.

The last scene makes a gesture towards it with this idea of working together, but we don't really -learn- about that over the course of the story, because Patsy honestly just kinda comes in, tells Eliant "yo, you wrong", and that's that. There's no real learning of the importance of togetherness or friendship. Hell, for all we know, he -could- have succeeded on his own.

So yeah. I think that's the big obstacle here. You have good places together, but you need to string them into an arc that sticks together well and builds on itself.

The other thing I'd note (and this one is hard because cartoons are visual and written stories are not), but I don't think you really manage to capture the zaniness of cartoons too well here. Most of the direct stuff is fairly level-headed and mundane. You do express some crazy stuff, but it is generally in the broader "what's happening around Toon Town" sequences. And I think that's -really- important to nail when you're going with something cartoon based. I said it in my other review, but I really do think Necromance captured a cartoony tone a bit better by putting more direct "physical" comedy in the actual sequences, as well as leaning on a more colorful bit of narration.

Still, all that said, this was a pleasant enough read!

So I whiffed on the reveal until it was actually revealed. Its fairly obvious in retrospect (the clues are all there), but it didn't click until it was actually stated.

Which raises an important question. Why wasn't it stated up front?

The reveal gives the story a decent amount of meaning in retrospect. The problem is that I had to read the story -without- that meaning first. We really don't have strong sense of why Mary is doing any of this. Like, they are arguably all generally positive life changes (moving to the city is debatable, but she frames it as positive, so we shall take it as such). But we really don't have any idea why. And there's really no stakes to it either, since nothing implies that these changes are anything but minor life improvements when you are reading without the reveal. She's not an alcoholic (maybe, the scene with the wine actually muddies that but the bar scene certainly implies that isn't the case), she seems financially okay and just interested in getting some more buffer cash, etc.

It's kind of the same problem that Hungry, Hungry Hippo was suffering from. The surprise reveal gives it some strength, but it doesn't really change that the rest of the text is a bit flaccid as a result. Basically, by the time I'm given any real motivation to care about the text (and don't get me wrong, its solidly written, I'm just more talking at a narrative level), it's over. The biggest conflict involves the wine bottle and, well, again, with the provided context up to that point, her warring with it is a little undermined by the fact it seems more like a mild active change rather than escaping alcoholism or anything. So we're stuck kind of wondering why it is being made such a big deal of.

There is good stuff in here. It is evocative and it has got heart. Its good! But I think you kneecap it a bit by hiding like, all the actual conflict and tension right at the very end.

So this is really well written.

I really doubt even a crow would fumble the name of Starbucks, though.

I am conflicted about the place this story ends. While there certainly is some value to the parallel anti-climaxes, at the same time, is rather dissastifying to a degree that I feel it does interfere a bit with the emotional payoff. And then, of course, you do have to somewhat odd meta-positioning of the fact that the story WAS actually submitted (insofar as you want to take the meta-ness to that level - which the fic does invite by being directly about the circumstances of the Writeoff) which works a bit against the emotional punch of the story.

I think like Bartown, this story is a bit hobbled by the fact that it buries its heart pretty deep and misleads you about the actual nature of its conflict until the moment it becomes relevant. This can make for a nice little gut punch at the right moment, but, at the same time, it interferes with actually building to that climax since you're saving its reveal for that moment, leaving the rest of the story feeling a bit... perfunctory? An enjoyable perfunctory as we journey through the process, but a little lean.

And of course, the other issue with this particular short, sharp punch is you are writing it to an audience of writers. While it makes the struggle relatable, it also makes the ultimate conclusion... frustrating? Which I think goes against the tone you are going for. Because while the struggle is indeed relatable, the ultimate thing about writing is that you just have to fucking do it and put it out there. And that sort of self-pitying ending really rubs the wrong way, especially without any real build up to it. Like, I am not necessarily left thinking "poor guy", I'm left thinking, "God, just fucking do it!" And that might be a bit unfair, but that's sort of the problem about writing about writing to writer's who are writing.

And again, none of this is to say you can't have a protag that fails. But it makes blindsiding(-ish) with the failure a bit more of an issue.

All that said, I'm still not fully sure I'm correct here. It's a relatable punch, like I said. And the writing on the way up is fun (though Harmon's last line about Miranda might be a bit much). There's some good stuff here. I do think it would gain a bit from being a bit meatier on the way through. But I'm of various minds about the ending.

Also, as a pantser, I feel misrepresented. There's not enough bashing of the head on the desk, screaming "WHAT THE FUCK COMES NEXT?" :p

A generally fun and entertaining fantasy ride that really puts me in mind of early Discworld.

Of course, I'm a bit more of a fan of later Discworld. :o

Seriously though, it is fun and goofy, but it definitely is sitting pretty hard in that camp, which makes some of the more "serious" beats a bit tougher to deal with? Like, it is a bit of a harder tonal change to go from zany necromancer antics to my dad murdered my mom and and maybe she should be resurrected? Not that I am against heart in comedies (I am actually a big proponent), I just feel like it ends up coming a little out left field given the general zaniness preceding that?

I dunno. I might actually be offbase there. Zany can support heart. I think it is more that the heard just wasn't trying to really show before the end.

The framing device is a bit awkward. You definitely get some decent jokes and mileage out of it, but I think it ultimately kind of ends up being a distraction since it doesn't really factor into anything or have any real impact?

I am a little rusty on reading 3rd person omniscient, but I think this story struggles a bit with it early on, bouncing a bit too aggressively between viewpoints and voices. It smooths out a bit later on, but the intro of our two leads is especially jarring. Which reminds me that the plunger comment by the narrator at the beginning is a bit of a flub of joke since the inversion is obvious.

Ultimately, I think this ends up feeling a bit like the quintessential writeoff story. There's definitely some good stuff in here, the structure is pretty solid, but it does feel like it needs a bit more time to develop and have the pacing smoothed out.

There was
a FIC
here.
It's gone now.

I think the story structure needs to be reversed a little bit. By keeping the reveal secret, you remove all the drama form the actual climax of the story (the burning of the painting) because we don't really understand the stakes. And once we learn the stakes, it kinda makes some of Catherine's questions seem a bit... stupid? Insensitive? "Why did you" is a really patently obvious answer.

Also consider making it clear the first paragraph is describing the painting. That is hella ambiguous.

Prompt relevance... I guess she is not really an ingenue? Sure.

It legit took a second read after noticing comments to really click. The Jeremy was still dead line is just too well integrated into the sentence and I thought it was possibly terminology (stuck in a bad spot, etc). It is nice at how smooth it is, but you probably need to call at least a little more attention to it.

Prompt Relevance... I have no idea and I am too sleepy to think about.

Fine mood piece. Probably one of the more complete of that type since it actually focuses on an idea. Nice prose. Scene break is probably unnecessary and breaks up the flow too much.

Prompt relevance... Robo sparrow? Yup.

Funny last line, but takes too long to get there. Cut some of the chaff. This would be better served at the minimum word count (or as close as you can to get there).

Prompt relevance... dragon/wyvern joke. Yup.

Fine mood piece. I kinda feel this would have been better told in reverse though, with her starting at the down point and then recounting a story that gets her to a positive point so we actually have a bit of arcing and build up.

Prompt relevance... self-identity, etc. I feel it is a bit of a stretch but I can see it.

If your magic system accounts for the soul and it seems to work like the real soul, I kinda feel like that version of the wife wins by default.

Ironically I had more of a problem with this story than Male-Order Bride, since I feel the Problematic stuff is a bit more on display here what with some fairly literal objectification and the fairly comedy normalized two women play along with it and even fight over the man who clearly just needs a goddamn smack sorta thing. Outside that it is fine. I don't have a lot to add.

Prompt relevance... wrong because the homunculus being in possession of her soul should be the real one.

Mostly an emotive piece focused around a single idea. The main problem from an "enjoyment" (to be used loosely here) standpoint is that he story just sort of ends. I'm pretty sure I get the hollow, empty emotion its going for there what with that being the feeling of a decayed and now loveless marriage to someone you hate, but it ends up just really thudding into place in a dissatisfying manner. Should it be satisfying? Art does not always have to be pleasurable. This certainly isn't. But it also isn't mean to be.

*shrug*

Prompt relevance... right there in the title. Yep.