I've designed a crossword with no clues - only a picture. It needs a name.

All the good, snappy names are taken such as "crosswordle" "pictoword" etc

My current contenders are

imagicross
descripticross
pictoworm*
cluezzle

*= Since it'll appear on the backup site, "worm" makes sense in this context

Dear creative brains! Throw me some other outlandish suggestions

Dirk has a great taxicab driver, Leonardo. I'm not sure AI can do crazy yet. And I'll be disappointed to lose Leonardo to AI. However, it is a possibility.

Therefore, how do we keep ahead of all this? My initial thoughts are to reduce human head count significantly. But is that reasonable?

Any thoughts?

George FLC (Future Learning Curve)

A structural issue I face is how to end it where she blows up the ship.

The explosion occurs at the 36k mark. Slightly more than halfway. I've retooled the story to show the lift crash that "Kills" Alice, effectively adding a fourth woman to the cast. The ensuing antics are good for around 15k, netting me 51k. Another 15k would round it out nicely. That's ~ 10 chapters. Hard to pad that much.

One idea is to add an indoor rail. Due to poor maintenance it tips on the doors (bad design) trapping characters in.  I feel like that's a good 3k But it'd be a diversion at best.

Don't wanna pad the chase scenes or increase the #

Any suggestions?.

My first need for help is whether or not God would refer to Satan as Satan or as Lucifer. I start Chapter 1 with Satan and God talking. I assume that almost everyone knows who Lucifer is. And it does sound more sophisticated to me than Satan. I'm really tempted to switch over to Lucifer for Chapter 1. BUT does that mean I should keep it as Lucifer the entire book? Or only when God talks to him.

Thanks for any help.
George FLC

However, Jack, who is currently reading Archangel, felt fairly strongly Imperial should be capitalized. And another online writer once wrote that if a term like imperial galleys refers to galley ships of a specific empire, then Imperial should be capitalized, whereas a reference to the galleys of many empires would be lowercase (imperial galleys), although I don't know if that rule is correct.

Then along came the Enduring Republic of Stars. If I wanted to write a "Republic fleet", Republic should clearly be capitalized since Republic is a proper noun in this case. But, in order to minimize the similarities to Star Wars Republic(s), I decided to use Enduring as the adjective (e.g., Enduring fleet, Enduring worlds, Enduring troops, etc.). Since Enduring is also a proper noun, it should be capitalized as well. That leads to things like this: the Enduring fleet battled the (lowercase) imperial fleet. The latter case comes up a lot.

Thoughts?
Dirk

Be sure to check out the In Memoriam thread for a tribute to Amy Sonada, the group’s founder, who passed away in 2019 after a two-year battle with cancer: https://www.thenextbigwriter.com/forums … onada.html.

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One of the most memorable moments in her novels was the first meeting between the half-elf Kha, a Master Mage of the Guild of Magic, and Sil, a Mage from the ancient Age of Magic, a time when mages were like gods. In their meeting, Sil was unexpectedly released from voluntary service that had held her in many forms, most recently a dragon. But it was the often-irascible Kha’s unexpected ritual of profound courtesy that sealed the dramatic and momentous moment, and perhaps allowed Sil to become a gorgeous – and terrifying – woman once more.

The Guild was Amy’s place of refuge for those cursed with magic to learn in safety. Most were cast out by their families, sometimes as toddlers, because until a mage was properly trained, they were a danger to everyone within a radius that varied with the mage’s power.

Other memorable characters included: young Anver, Kha’s second-in-command at his Guild school, who fought and won a duel to the death against the Mistress Alina, another Master Mage; the baffling Zyrtek, a time-defying chronomancer, whose messages from the ancient Age of Magic watched you watching him watching you; Tilly, the shepherdess of Kha’s grateful, devoted, and sometimes frightening students; and Tazar, a skilled and relentless fighter and strategic warrior, and a dedicated and selfless friend.

Perhaps the funniest character was the aging Alda, a feisty and earthy woman whose practical concerns included worrying about where to find a job that provided free dinners — with beer — were she to be kicked out of her role as a junior priestess. To her dismay, she was promptly promoted to the second-to-top rank of her order in one evening by the goddess Behira. Alda’s plebian attitude led to outrageous, often humorous, and sometimes dangerous solutions to problems, with an occasional push from Behira.

Please feel free to leave your tribute comments below.

See the above riddle? My brain cannot solve this kind of thing.

Switching to an antagonist POV

The seeming randomness of the events in the story give it a Phillip K Dick-esque feel (Not that I'm comparing myself to the Master). Like his works, you are in a constant state of "Huh?" or "What just happened?" It all resolves at the end (well, sort of, as the immortal would say).

So guide me. Vote "Prologue or Epilogue?"

Elusive Paradise is what I might describe as "What happened if Joan of Arc met the Black Prince." It's a Low Fantasy setting, as such limited magic save for a form of reincarnation, and entirely focused on the human element of strife, suffering and hard-won triumphs. So if you like Game of Thrones and Berserk this is your cup of tea.
I don't pull any punches, my characters are the products of a hard life and harsh world, and I want to treat each of them, including the liars, cutthroats, and thieves with respect.

I will appreciate any constructive feedback, even harsh ones since I have thought skin. Will later be doing the rounds and bookmark a few WIP novels in the boards to see what catches my eye.

Best regards, Marius.