Reviews for Angel |
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![]() ![]() ![]() There are a lot of really strong aspects in this. I was immediately drawn to the character of the princess. Your opening really drew me into her plight and involved me in the drama fairly quickly. I feel like you lost touch with that in the center of the piece. Overall I'm not sure if the princess or the king was meant to be the main focus. I also think you presented a lot of strong concepts throughout as well - the droid collecting the queens body, for example, was very original and it fit with the piece. Your ending was also very strong. I loved the chilling quality of that last dialogue tag although it left me with questions: who are these royals, and why is this happening to them. Keep up the good work. Much love Juliet. |
![]() ![]() ![]() This book sent chills down my spine, as I imagine the author intended it to do. To be honest, this is a little too dark for me, not that I didn't like it. This is a great author, with an amazing ability to increase your heart rate as you stare at the page. Recommended, but not for the faint of heart. |
![]() ![]() ![]() Hmm, I don't know what to say about this piece. I do like that this is written in second person point of view. It lets the reader be engaged with the king and his struggles. I honestly don't know what I should feel about this piece. I feel somewhat bad for the king because it seems like his daughter is sick and had killed his wife, the queen. But past that... I don't know. There wasn't anything that I didn't like about the story. Just that I couldn't understand what I should be feeling. -hassi158 |
![]() ![]() ![]() Wow. It's really difficult for me to review a surreal piece like this, because much of its valuation and meaning depends on the author and what kind of message the author wants to convey. I'll just make a couple of assumptions to help me in that. Overall, the stream of consciousness flows very well. Thoughts and narrative intertwine nicely, and most importantly, the pace is handled right. Go too fast, and you end up with a frenzied, frantic narrative. On the other hand, if you go too slow, I feel like the effect is lost and you end up defeating the purpose of using stream of consciousness in the first place. The effect that I think you're aiming for is there, and the story itself actually makes a surprising amount of sense considering the style of narration. Not much is spelt out, but it's not difficult to make the appropriate inferences and understand what's going on, especially because it's easy to see where you draw the line between imagery and reality. However, I do feel like the piece is a little aimless, or perhaps that's simply my own inability to understand it well. I can't quite figure out what you're trying to convey with the story. Is it simply the tragedy of a cursed child? Is it the story of a man who neglected his family because of his kingdom? Is it about strangeness, or is it about understanding? I feel like I would have enjoyed the piece more if I had a definite idea behind what it was trying to say to me. Also, I'm pretty sure you did this on the purpose, but the anachronistic criss-cross of modern and ancient times adds an unorthodox dimension that I'm not sure I totally enjoyed. It's a nice idea, but it's also jarring. Just a minor note. |
![]() ![]() ![]() [You exploited your beautiful little princess for gain, but what gain, you didn't even know what gain.] - I'd split that into separate phrases; I think the tone is diminished by the commas making it a bit of a lengthy sentence. It would be better as "...But what gain? You didn't even know what gain!". I think overall your punctuation could use a little more oomph; in a stream of consciousness fic they're extra important in portraying the tone at that particular moment and in the story as a whole, and this isn't a meandering piece so more exclamation marks and question marks and dashes could be worked in because I don't really feel much for the father (although, since "king" and "sir" are sometimes used ambiguously, could be a mother as well). I like the way you've worded this though; going back to the unknown things and the throne gives the whole scene an extra dimension, a hint of surreality almost. I also like how you tossed the bit about death in the middle, because it got drowned out with the talk of profit before and after interestingly enough, so it makes me think more about what sort of character the "father" really is. I'm not used to seeing stream of consciousness fics on something action-y based; I guess that's Woolf's influence. |
![]() ![]() ![]() Frantic fasttalking - typo I think I think the only thing I was slightly confused about was the very end in italics, because I wasn't sure if that was happening in the past or the present while Luke is in the house visiting. It was certainly ominous though, it kind of leads me to believe that she kills him in the end - leading me to believe it's in the present. But maybe not! I really liked that ending with her dialogue though, because it came together nicely and was cool and had a good cadence to it. Overall, this was another unique world that you built. You're really good with creating surreal experimental settings/characters. I was able to follow pretty well with this one, I think - I got the vibe that the daughter/princess killed the queen - maybe by accident, but it wasn't good. And then the dad had to kind of be there for her and she had some cool psychic powers. I wonder if she was right about the guards wanting to kill him. Anyway, the plot was morbid and fun, and I liked some of the imagery you threw in - like the drawings in blood and everything, because I thought it did a good job contributing to a more minimalist setting that you're working with. The king/queen/princess language was also cool - gives you a really great last line, for sure. I liked this piece! |
![]() ![]() ![]() So, I really like several things about this. I think you handled the second-person narration well, for starters. Sometimes second-person makes my eye twitch as my head keeps trying to switch it to first or third person if it feels 'off' as second-person, but in this case it reads smoothly, which is great. I also like the open to interpretation feel that a lot of this gives off. It feels steeped in depth-of-meaning where each step of the way I'm trying to piece together what's 'actually happening' so to speak. My biggest issue with it is also in that same boat, though. While I really *like* a lot of the piecing together process, a ways through it I start to feel a little too lost because some of the things I was trying to keep track of from earlier start to feel like they're being contradicted. For instance, early on the narrator/father/'sir' character says that his daughter went willingly to this crazy house(/'throne'/'palace'/whatever - scientific experiment lab?), and that he put her there for his own personal gain. But then later on, it seems like she was screaming and crying and didn't want to go at all, and that he was putting her there because she was a murderer/out of her mind with pychic powers. Still, I really like the concept, and the story comes with a lot of vivid mental imagery. I kind of get the sense that part of why the narrative is so self-contradicting is that the man - Luke - is so steeped in guilt just because this girl is his daughter and probably hasn't worked out all his emotions to begin with. Anyway. Interesting. Nice job. :) - Moonstar |
![]() ![]() ![]() I like the way you presented the princess as innocent when she is anything that because it shows how warped a parent view can be on their child when they are the only one. I however disliked the ending off this story, it felt strange because I couldn't figure out if we were in the present or a flashback and it greatly confused me due to that. Otherwise epic story! |
![]() ![]() ![]() I like the use of second person in this as it means the reader is more engaged with this. It's a difficult tense to use, so I applaud you for trying it out. It's interesting how you manage to create a character without technically including them in the story, and furthermore making him a complex character. "There were crayons shattered on the floor, drawings on the walls. Some in blood, some crayon, all done by your little homicidal angel." Now this is where it gets interesting. At this point I start wondering what's happened before and how real this sugary sweet little girl is. Your use of "Sir" rather than "Daddy" at the end was also very clever, and I love the way you show the growing hatred the little girl has. I love the last line as well, as that adds an entirely new layer: She's been able to read his thoughts, meaning she knew what he was doing to her all that time. It makes me wonder who the bad guy is here that she was so able to be "innocent" if she knew what she was doing. What more can I say? I'm impressed by how much you've progressed as a writer since last time I read your work, and I'm excited to see what else you come up with. It says a lot that you're able to squeeze so much depth into just over 1000 words. Good job! |
![]() ![]() ![]() Really interesting pieceāI love experimental stuff. I really love the opening. The image of the clear glass palace is fantastic. Not only is it unique, I read as a sort of herald of how the child is in a very fragile place. I also thought, at the opening, that the child is the innocent, sacrificial angel type, so I love how you turned it all around at the end and show that it turns out she's the crazy psycho. The ending gave me mixed feelings. I get that there's a distance between the daughter and the father, unlike in the beginning, when she's all daddy daddy, which I thought was well done. But honestly, I was expecting a bit more out of her than "I am not a freak." So in that sense, I felt like, with all the build up, the ending could have been stronger. |
![]() ![]() ![]() This was amazing. It was so well written and perfectly showed all the emotions of the speaker. The use of second person was great too. That's a hard thing to write while still making it flow and you pulled it off. I have no qualms with this, it was just great |
![]() ![]() ![]() Erm...I'm not sure whether or not I like this. The emotion to it is genuine. I feel like for something so short there's perhaps too many unusual things to keep track of on top of the experimental element. It's sci-fi/fantasy as well as being angst/family/insanity...and while I like sci-fi and fantasy...I'm not sure how much it actually adds to the story in this case. Also seems a bit odd that droids would remove the body, but not bother with the blood or crayons on the wall. The blood in particular would be a sanitation issue. |
![]() ![]() ![]() It was a bit confusing to begin with and it seems to be set in the future but never really explore the setting. But as I read more I realized that it was a good idea to just focus on the king and the princess and the last line was so haunting. |
![]() ![]() ![]() There are a lot of things about this I like, and a couple things that I'm a little confused about. I'm going to be brief and specific, so hopefully this'll help you out in terms of feedback over a wide range of things. I really like the repetition. I think it's awesome how it helps keep the pace of the sentences moving very quickly, and it helps with the stream-of-consciousness feel as well. It also creates a really wonderful rhythm that makes me think of maybe poetry or a song; and remembering you saying you're in a band, I'm not surprised to see you're very good with rhythm. I also really like things that need to be read quickly because they're always suspenseful. My basic understand of this story is it's about a girl who has this special power, whether it be from evolution or maybe even an evil force (like a demon-spawn or something). Due to how her father keeps thinking of her as an angel, I feel like that's sort of a pun of her true origin, so that's why I'm leaning closer to "demonic." Anyways, it seems this girl, despite her father trying to protect her, ended up injuring someone. The authorities came and took her away, and now they're experimenting on her, and the basis of this story is the father's guilt for not being able to help her now, and not being able to protect her in the past. I hope I came close to what you intended. :) Anyways, I like how you leave out some of the quotes, but the daughter always seems to have quotations around her dialogue. It's like she's more important than everyone else to her father, and the punctuation shows that. I also like this mixture of father and "sir." One is very personal and warm, while the other is very impersonal and cold. So I really like the transformation there, because it feels like the father goes from "father" to "sir," which is an interesting transformation. The only thing I really couldn't grasp was why some of the paragraphs weren't italicized in the midst of a flashback scene. I'm assuming it's jumping back to the present when the words aren't italicized. I thought maybe putting a scene break indication (or just a blank line to show it's separated from the italicized words) might help the reader ground themselves. Since this is fast paced, you don't really have the time to stop and redevelop the setting, so I think utilizing a visual cue might help you with quick and general clarification. But that's only if you want to - I didn't have much trouble with it, but I imagine someone who isn't as experienced with experimental stuff will. This all depends on how wide of an audience you want to appeal to. Good job, I really like this. :) |
![]() ![]() ![]() I'm glad for that author note in the beginning or I wouldn't have understood the weird flow. It does have a stream of consciousness feel. However, thus causes a lot of fragments and short sentences. And I wasn't a fan of the 2nd person. Sorry, not really my cup of tea but thanks for reviewing my story |