The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B. (Page 19 of 49)

Technically, God won't battle Billie. Joseph will. And, if God is to be believed, Billie winds up there because Joseph sacrifices someone critical to his quest who could have warned him not to save Billie from the fire. The Bible varies as to whether the antichrist is one person or many. I'll probably refer to it in the singular, making it a more potent evil.

Regan claimed to be the devil, but reacted to tap water as if she was being burned by holy water. Not sure what to make of that.

Great thought, Bill. Not one that would have occurred to me, so you just made yourself a full member with all the rights and privileges thereof. Which is like zip, zero, nada, but it looks good on paper:-)

Could someone please critique the following paragraphs for me, especially the second. I've received feedback in the past of dumping too much information too soon. We're in Apollo's POV.

EDIT: I included paragraph breaks suggested by NJC.

The above is very early in the book, in chapter two, where we first meet Apollo. The fact that Caligula swears in Latin seems like the right place to mention that they (almost) always curse in Latin, and why.

Here, the fact that Apollo calls Caligula by the epithet coined by Nero seems like the right place to explain it. Each sentence builds on the previous one, ending with why Caligula is not the heir. I mention earlier in the chapter that Caligula is illegitimate, so it needs explaining somewhere, even though it's not critical to this scene. I'm using it flesh out an important piece of history.

Thoughts?

The first one is pretty straight-forward, so I don't think there'd be any issues there. The second one might get confusing for the reader, not for the concept, but for the fact that there are four characters shoved into one short paragraph. De-mystifying this paragraph would entirely depend on which of the characters have already been introduced earlier in the chapter.

That's my two cents, at least.

Has anyone ever seen a bay window used on the second floor of a home (a palace, in my case)? I'm trying to dress up Joseph's bedroom. I don't think I've ever seen it used on an upper floor. It also has to have sheers and (ideally) drapes for the scene to work.

Thank you.

Tada! v3 of chapter two is finally up (in the v3 book, of course). As before, it introduces the two MCs at various ages. Nevertheless, about 75% is new and, hopefully, more interesting.

I've introduced the concept of ghosts "radiating" their emotions/characteristics, which gives me tons of freedom to explore how those characters feel. Chuckling has therefore been eliminated in favor of things like: God radiated mirth. Ghosts can also radiate combinations of emotions/characteristics all in one simple sentence: she radiated mirth and tenderness, but with a touch of urgency and worry.

I added a new character to v3, which ties this chapter together with chapter one (formerly a prologue). Amy will be so proud.

Quick, go read!

I reread it from your perspective. Those radiates stick out like a sore thumb. Will fix. Admiral Windsor was hoping for a real review. She's currently exuding boiling lava. :-)

Upon rereading, I don't care much for the three E's. Fortunately, there are a whole bunch of ways not to say radiated: sent forth, bathed in (for the receiver), arose, brimmed, manifested, etc. And spat venom will probably be reserved for Billie.

I'll resume reading now, since I'm behind on my recips.

Thanks for the review. I'll respond tomorrow.

Yeah, Seabrass killed me with his review. Amy not so much, since I addressed a lot of her concerns from the last draft.

I agree that it's dense, K, but not for the reason you mentioned. I set out to create a much richer chapter, including introductions to a lot of concepts that will subsequently be fleshed out as the story goes. I'm hoping to create much denser chapters throughout, providing for a richer read.

Obviously, I need to get them both involved with God at an early age, so that He doesn't simply appear to both of them in 4017 for the first time. That would blow away any possibility that this might be mental illness.

I could split the chapter in two, which might reduce the apparent time jumping. There are three here: Joseph at age 4, Apollo at age 7, and then 4017. If I split it, then we have Apollo and Joseph when they're young, and then both in the year 4017 in the next chapter.

I've been knocked upside the head before about info dumps. In this case, I put it all in the POV of the MCs. I don't want to stretch out the lives of the two kids when they're little with a lot of unnecessary filler content. However, if I split the chapter in two as mentioned above, I can slow it down a little.

Amy, if you're reading, the reason the epigraph tells you up front what is in the chapter is because it's difficult to navigate three time jumps for two boys of different ages. The epigraph helps the reader follow that. Those jumps are also the reason this chapter couldn't be chapter one - I felt it was too complex as an opening chapter. Also, now that Admiral Windsor comes back from the dead, I have the connection I've been trying to create between the two chapters.

I have to think some more if I want to split this in two.

Let me know if you think it will help.

Thanks
Dirk

One thought that has occurred to me is, if I split the current chapter in two, then I will have three chapters in a row with different dates (3994, 4001 & 4006, and 4017). Yuck! It still seems slightly better to split them, though.

What if I give the year 4017 a name such as the Wrath of God and make all dates relative to it? Instead of a series of absolute dates, I can use something like this: 3994 A.D. - 23 Years Before the Wrath of God. That would make it into a countdown toward 4017, rather than arbitrary-seeming absolute dates.

Thoughts?