Dun fret about the review counts. Chapters 1-3 are greatly loved on this site. Once you hit chapter 4, things naturally dry out, and only the really dedicated reviewers remain.
Also welcome. You'll get a lot of help here, and I'll be able to pick on you even more for not writing Yufu
And it begins...
Is Thecla going to be in it?
what is the angle bracket made out of... Vibranium??
Think about your hook... if you had to choose four words for my eye to fall on in the first sentence, what would they be?
I'd hazard to guess "fourteen boy special powers"
It's probably not "Living orphanage Rome fourteen". That "Grab" is for a very different book, probably closer to Les Misérables.
Once you have your key terms, try to topload them if you can.
These things are always easier to see in other people's writings, so he's a sample for VQS:
Travelling amongst various monasteries, Shinji, the son of an accountant, loses his Sensei on planet Venus. He must apply his skill with the sword to survive a hostile and alien world.
Thrust onto a hostile and alien world, Shinji must use every combat skill he can to survive. He's lost his Sensei. He's but the son of an accountant. How can he survive?
(Actually, that can be much more top-loaded, but that's a whole different topic)
Indeed. There is a reference to the Pope among some others I spotted. Rome is implied. Once you say Pope, you've also implied Christian and Catholic.
Paragraph two lost me by word #7 (Don't accuse me up pulling punches!). Hopefully by the time you're ready to publish you've got that whittled down to awesome-sauce. Here's my rendition of line 1:
Fourteen-year-old Connor has special gifts.
I like the first paragraph... it's snappy, it's clear who the players are, it sounds like an even match, and there's the mystery of the dare
Now that you mention it, there is a certain redundancy in having a mother + a grandmother in one head + a father in the other.
Perhaps he doesn't cause her death - anti-religion lunatics do?
It's an interesting place The Edge. I like working in there a lot, but it isn't actually seen until Book 2.
This one writer has a place called the [E a r t h w o u n d] that's a fascinating collision of energies that kinda creeps up on the reader. Basically you have this bad place. And the story doesn't get into exact details about how it got there. But the characters respect it, which makes it terrifying.
It seems that song is from the 17th century. Surely copyright has lapsed on it
and half-naked Russian women wanting to be friends
I hear in Soviet Russia, Facebook delete you!
(All joking aside, does one ever delete a fb account? Or does it just go inactive and stay indefinitely so shady companies can harvest the data?)
Do you feel that it works as an early tempter for the other side of the world?
I didn't gather that's what they meant... but I don't think I need to this early in the story - not without it dominating the chapter to the point of distraction. "The Edge" is enough for now that I get a feeling it's not a place anyone wants to be.
Feather of the Dark Angel
Divine Treachery
No major quibbles. Details don't override the pace. Of course you can thin / make precision-based finesse on future passes. But nothing felt brushed over - nothing screamed to me "missed opportunity".
To add to what Vern said, yes review lots... but realize that 90% of your current reviews are on members who haven't issued reviews in several months. You're only going to collect ROI on 10% of your efforts at that rate.
God Emperor had a wicked ending
I thought the son did an ok treatment of Butlerian Jihad... but I still think Chapterhouse was heads and above the best of any in the series.
I have Hunters here unread tho. I read page 1, put it down and never came back. Erk
today's obsession with opening In Media Res would rule out this engaging, fascinating opening
Not really progress, but fitting. here's just so many distractions these days, I find a book has to sparkle harder to get me engrossed. I go back to re-read books I liked back in the day, and sometimes I'm thinking wow, how did I ever have the patience to slog through 200 pages of this crap to get to the good part? (Tommyknockers, I'm looking at you)
All things being cyclic, this fad will one day disappear. Probably not until we as a society find a way to tame the noise of entertainment
Apollo banishing his mother later in the story is just an excuse to allow her to go to New Bethlehem
If it doesn't suit the story and it also doesn't suit the character, it must be banished
Apollo also orders the failed commando raids to arrest Admiral Lupus and Governor Hadisius
Take their families. If you're serious about forcing concessions from them, that is. All you need is a niece or a nephew to gain the cooperation of a 7th brother who doesn't overly like Lupus. Okay... that's a bit too hardcore for Apollo but he's in the tank of sharks
I may have missed it, but what is the motivation for Dr Francis to evoke so much chaos?
I've been doing a lot of thinking on Apollo's reluctance to make war. We have this guy who assassinates his father and banishes his mother, but he won't order the guards to fire because someone might get hurt. I've been rolling this around in my head trying to harmonize the two aspects of the character.
It would seem you're writing Apollo in the style of a morally scrupulous leader. As such, he must always make the decision that involves the least loss of life (or if loss, kill evil people first). This approach would surely result in the decisions he makes.
If this is not what you were going for, consider that we'll still respect a ruler who must do a few evil things. King Solomon ordering a baby cut in half in order to determine who the mother was is the first example I can think of. If it is what you were going for ignore my comments like he's not prepared for war - he clearly is not if that's the case. And if not, ya might as well go ahead and hit all the accompanying notes that go with being a pacifist leader of a military state.
Can't really out-cray the cray.
They're so much better at it, and they're usually holding back
increasingly obscene here, Toronto-wards
