Let's Read: Book Club #13

[Proto Man]

I'd like to submit In Blackest Night, Specifically posts 25 to 32, for review.

"The sorcerer Shang Tsung and the (bipolar) Spartan warrior Atelos have become trapped in Silent Hill with the paladin Argento on a mission to discover the town's secrets, where it is believed that you can slip into a different verse. Shang Tsung and Atelos are separated when the latter is 'taken' by unseen forces, leaving Shang to navigate a twisted nightmare version of the town. Hunted by a changing building and a mute monster, Shang barely escapes into the town, where he reunites with Argento and tries to pursue leads about the hospital, where he knows a secret is hidden. Along the way, he starts to run into strange individuals with identity issues."

Ideally, I think someone should read the whole thread, but I just don't see anyone wanting to do that (I'll be realistic).

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That said... Strazio, I tend to do Feedback as more a 'stream of consciousness' thing, so I apologize if this format isn't pleasing.

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Oh shi--, first person. First person is that thing I sometimes would love to do, but I don’t think I’d ever be able to do it justice.

I like that you highlighted the hostility of the Moors as the first thing, rather than the gloom or the sadness. While the Moors are gloomy and sad, they’re also supposed to be a violent place as well, and it was nice that you made that your first post.

I’m not sure why you swapped to 3rd person in your second post, but it seems like that’s what you’re sticking with. I’ll say this now but make sure to keep an idea for tenses, because you have the common trait of mixing them up every now and again.

I like the field conscription scene, as it highlights the general apathy that I feel is probably very prevalent in Darkshire. While I liked the scene where they try and clean up the village (I’m curious if there’s more to this than ‘because it’s nice’), I thought that the transition to the attack was pretty out of left field. I know it’s the start of a new post and you can sometimes get away with that, but the transition could have been a little more efficient.

I immediately got that the giant creature was a Warcraft Abomination. I felt proud of myself.

I like the battle, although I find it amazing that Straz is still rockin’ (although I imagine at this point it’s probably his person). Also – Being impaled with a hook that’s then ripped through your flesh sounds positively f*cking brutal. Like game over if I was in that situation. But of course it wasn’t, because we’re talkin’ a prime who willingly came into the wilds of the Pale Moors.

While I wasn’t a fan of the scene ending some abruptly, I did like that he just passed the hell out. There wasn’t any pomp… he just fell over. I felt that was wholly appropriate given the quick succession of scuffles and battles.

I felt like you took an appropriate time to pepper in a little of Strazio’s backstory, but I also liked how you gave some time to the Sergeant. For a secondary, he has a pretty strangely detailed backstory, and I’m curious that he was just in and out of the story so quickly.

I liked the meeting with Dobson, but I thought it was strange that you opened up with a line about it being uneventful. As a reader, it seemed pretty eventful. I think this is one of those cases to bring up the whole ‘show, don’t tell.’ You could have conveyed the uneventfulness through the next few paragraphs, rather than just telling me up front it was uneventful and then going into detail anyway. If it was uneventful, I the reader should have been able to just skip it, but I needed to know what was going on.

While I liked the pretty pedestrian dialogue between Strazio and Dmitri, I’d argue that a guardsman of Darkshire isn’t going to be totting around a sniper rifle or have radios (although that could have just meant ‘relay information).

Ahh, first person again. You do this very well, and it’s always nice to get Strazio’s thoughts in his own words.

Again, I like how you’ve not balked away from dialing up the violence and the attacks, which was evidenced again with the giant bug monster. This was something that I would have liked to have done with my own stab at this quest, but we would up being pulled off to go ace monsters outside the town walls, rather than atop them. I’m beginning to think that Dmitri might be an outsider (at least he seems pretty modern with mannerisms and the references he makes).

One post later and yea, Dmitri’s a pretty cool dude.

I enjoyed the action with Nemesis. For some reason, I felt far more when Cork died than I think I should have for a character I only just met. I think it’s the whole ‘People feel sadder when animals die,’ since Cork had like, dog traits and was like a loyal pal. I like the interplay between Nemesis and Strazio – a sort of philosophical bout between Fear and Rage was well as two bruhs trying to kill each other.

I think one of the things you wrote that best described Strazio was in that last post, where he bits down on the inside of his mouth and puts on a smile. For some reason, that little sentence resonated with me. This man is an avatar of rage, and I feel like he’s going to have on stellar crusade to gain the strength he needs to rip open the doors to Dracula’s castle.

All in all – I did like the thread. Dmitri was a fun, anachronistic character to have in the Darkshire garrison, and I liked the small cast of characters. I feel like I should have known more about the characters that were already known to Strazio, but that may also be my fault for not reading your previous works. Also it didn’t pull me out of the reading, which is the important. You clearly have a backstory, but it’s not a giant canyon that would swallow up an unknowing reader.

Mechanics-wise, I’d just do the normal thing and make sure you check tenses.

I’d also like to know who you switched from 1st to 3rd person. Was your first thread in 1st or 3rd person?