Reviews for The God Complex - FictionPress.com

JaveHarron
2008-06-18
ch 3, anon.

abuseIt's cool to see a von Neumann grown human and colony ship AI. Do they reproduce in space, or do they set up an industrial base planetside to produce more starships?

ecwix
2008-03-12
ch 1,

abuseVery nice! You started and ended very well, and that gives me a very good parting impression of the short story.

There are just a few things I'm going to bring your attention to that might be able to be changed for the better. Who knows? It just might be my own personal preference.

-"I am the Light, the only light of human beings, [all of the species’ power converging in me.]"

The bracketed part is a bit awkward. It's breaking up the parallel structure used in the previous fragment: [I am] the only light... [I am] all of the..."

As a result, the sentence ends on an off note, reading sort of weird to a reader previously used to the well-flowing sentences of before.

-"I was greeted by an impasse:...I do not know. I do not know. I do not know./..Insufficient..data.."

Hm... these sentences really took me by surprise. You had built up the feeling of complete invulnerability, complete knowledge, complete decision, and this paragraph almost completely destroyed that feeling. Whether this is what you wanted or not, I'm not sure.

It just seems to me that the "God" shouldn't have been suddenly rendered so irrational. If the consciousness was complete, then it should know everything about itself and its capabilities. It would know exactly what to do.

Is your portrayal of the sudden freeze an attempt to destroy the feeling of invulnerability and reveal a small margin of truth behind? If so, there's nothing really wrong here. The only thing I can really say then is that the shift in mood comes rather abruptly, from a calm omniscience to a panicked indecisive state. A little more of a buffer or a small hint before the hit could keep the reader from experiencing the feeling that something rather important just happened and he or she is missing it. Sudden shifts tend to cause such things (at least in me). If not (going back to earlier), then a rewrite is probably warranted, although I'm sure this will not be the case.

-"Control of the heart and lungs became erratic; even its unconscious[ness?] was failing it now."

-"Control of the heart and lungs became erratic...The heart was frozen."

There doesn't seem to be enough spacing between the two mentions of the heart. First the reader hears that control becomes erratic. The very next sentence, he hears frozen. The word frozen just has a slight connotation of time (to me at least). From there, a bit of confusion ensues. Maybe try a buffer sentence, or using a different word. [The heart was unmoving]. I don't know.

-"The heart was frozen, the muscle shocked into [stillness]. When it fell, all was [stillness]."

Stillness twice, both times the last word of the sentence...

-Overall, I am very impressed. The last sentence implies a great amount, and perhaps (if the uncertainty interpretation of before holds), even a realization of self-discovery and reassertion. You do a great job grabbing the attention and developing the voice of the 'God'. Great job! :)

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