12 KiB
[RT][WIP] Delphic: Ch. 1-6
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Author: u/None *
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Score: 28
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Created: 2017-12-11T12:07:11
Post:
Comments:
u/None [+15] (4 hours later)
Delphic is a superhero story about Hector, a young man in Detroit with the ability to see the past and the present. It follows his attempts to leverage this unusual ability to do good in the world while remaining behind the scenes, keeping both his identity and the truth of his powers secret from those who would see him as a threat.
Story threads will focus on several characters as Hector encounters them:
- Hector's sister, Paris, a homicide detective hiding her own power,
- Doc Stevens, a disgraced scientist at the forefront of research on the source of super powers, and
- The exploits of various "Super Teams": government-run groups of supers whose scope of operations have been steadily growing.
u/KilotonDefenestrator [+2] (7 days later)
Liked it a lot.
u/JanusTheDoorman [+8] (8 hours later)
Read the first four chapters.
I found the language overly poetic at first, but eventually it settles in nicely.
Things are a bit disjointed, but in the way that comes pretty naturally from telling a story from the perspective of a well-developed character that's under no obligation to explain everything to the reader.
Has echos of Worm in its setting, but I find Hector's power and the setup he's arranged with the authorities pretty interesting. Kind of like Sherlock Holmes without the massive personality disorder. He seems kind of paranoid, but I suppose we'll find out why that's justified later.
Good enough for me to keep reading.
u/sparr [+7] (11 hours later)
Like the commenter above, I found the language a bit flowery and verbose a bit at the very beginning. You almost lost me at "The mottled pattern of sunlight through the trees shifted rapidly across the bare earth." (yes, that's the very first sentence)
I like the story in general, but I already find parts of it straining my suspension of disbelief. You're going to need to provide a pretty convincing explanation for how
u/None [+2] (14 hours later)
Looks like your post got cut off. What is it you need a convincing explanation for?
I appreciate the feedback.
u/sparr [+2] (15 hours later)
Are you on a mobile device? There's a spoiler tag at the end of my comment after "explanation for how". I'll DM you.
u/None [+1] (23 hours later)
My bad. Yes, I was checking on mobile. Inability to open spoilers certainly seems like a shortcoming.
u/None [+2] (a day later)
I was about to say that this won't come up anytime soon, but it occurs to me that it might be covered in some detail in an upcoming chapter. If it does, I'll probably ask for feedback on whether the explanation passes muster for you, if you don't mind.
u/KilotonDefenestrator [+2] (7 days later)
I too found this a bit unplausible to cover up - shaking hands, hand to hand combat training, a steadying hand on the shoulder during initial gun training, medical exams, the tactile parts of on-scene police work (stacking up before door entry, etc), subduing suspects, hoisting someone over a fence, and so on.
u/wren42 [+2] (a month later)
You almost lost me at "The mottled pattern of sunlight through the trees shifted rapidly across the bare earth."
what's wrong with descriptive writing? it's describing the phenomena accurately - he's rapidly rewinding time and the sunlight is changing patterns on the ground. it's a perfectly good visual introduction to the protagonist's power.
I agree with the suspension of disbelief though. I don't see how they are not both outed by now.
u/sparr [+2] (a month later)
It's just not the kind of prose that I generally enjoy. It does paint a pretty picture.
u/None [+5] (55 seconds later)
I'm writing and publishing a new chapter each week. It occurred to me that I should post here, particularly to get good feedback on characters not behaving rationally.
u/TwoxMachina [+11] (2 hours later)
Can you give us a brief description of the story? It'll help with viewership I would say.
u/None [+5] (4 hours later)
Thank you for the suggestion. I posted a short summary as a root comment.
u/None [+3] (2 days later)
Random critical comments:
Bill Kurtzwile held court in his plush leather seat. He was easily the largest man in the room, both in height and girth, a powerful white man with less than half a head of white hair and the hard vitality of a man half his age. He gestured with a bottle of beer to the three other men taking up the other seats in the half-sequestered area, each man facing the muted TV from which cable news had evidently triggered the conversation.
3 use of half here-- a bit much
lots of tell not show descriptions from the narrator but I'm unsure if that's on purpose (?) to give readers a sense that the narrator is a very methodical/machiavellian thinker. Regardless, it's a bit much. Maybe tone that down like 10%.
More feedback:
I get that you're trying to sell the narrator as very 'in his head'-- but there are still more 'show not tell' ways to do so.
In truth, I shared a lot of Bill’s concerns, but it appeared my opinion wasn’t really being sought. The Bills could easily argue between them until dinner was served.
You could have a little more dialogue here, show the narrator trying to interject, not being all that good at it, then sitting back and observing, which communicates the same type of personality....but in a less 'tell' kind of way.
more feedback:
I have very little experience trying to actively hide this level of nervousness.
have-->had
It had been about three months since SoCAST had asked for my help with a mission, but Polarity was definitely part of the core team at that time – which is how I came to have seen and heard enough of her to immediately recognize her tonight. Fortunately, she would not have seen or heard me.
Kind of cumbersome. I think you can trim this down a bit and make it less unwieldy.
Last I checked, she was a card-carrying member of California Combined Super Team (typically spelled and pronounced “CAST”), a standing combat asset for the LA branch (“SoCAST”) with more than occasional assignments to the San Francisco branch (“NorCAST”). A moderately powerful ferrokinetic, she had detailed control over metals in her immediate vicinity, down to the molecular level. Polarity typically wore a half-ton suit of platinum, iron, and carbon, which she crystallized into some sort of strong but highly ductile steel.
If this is supposed to represent inner dialogue, not sure it makes sense to have explanations for abbreviations. Maybe just something like:
Last I checked, she was a card-carrying member of California's state steam, CAST, and a standing combat asset for LA's SoCAST and San Francisco's NorCAST as well.
Liking first chapter so far, I'll give more feedback when I can.
u/None [+3] (2 days later)
feedback part 2:
“Your right. I shouldn’t have brought it up. Anything else I can help with?” I ignored his grammatical mistake, as usual, gave my goodbyes, and closed the session.
I get that old arguments have a habit of reoccurring...but in my experience, old arguments have a habit of falling into two traps: they become toxic and are mostly avoided or can cause big rancor; or, they are brought up enough that they're more about teasing than a serious argument. This argument doesn't seem to have fallen into either end game, and so, in my eyes, it feels a little inauthentic. Not sure if that makes sense...hard to express but this exchange felt a tiny bit off here.
edit for more feedback:
“You seemed upset from the moment you saw Kurt and Laila tonight. Did they say or do something… um… problematic?”
LOL. Does May think Laila said something racist? Confused by use of problematic...I haven't heard too many people use that....when a friend recounts something like that they generally say something like "did they say something fucked up?" or "oh man did they say something weird?" and with close friends there's a sense in which you're kind of laughing at the person who said the bad comment as opposed to just trying to comfort the person you're talking to. Maybe its just my type of friends but when scenarios like this occurred [someone said something mean/racist/sexist/] its about 50% more humor directed at the person who did something wrong and less outright comfort. Its more about making fun of the person who said something wrong than comforting someone...unless the person in question is really sensitive to slights, which is pretty rare, IME, even with people I'd think would be pretty sensitive to that.
u/None [+5] (2 days later)
[deleted]
u/KilotonDefenestrator [+3] (7 days later)
Kudos for the quality and amount of feedback.
u/None [+1] (4 days later)
I really appreciate all this feedback.
Is it terrible to my readers to make adjustments to chapters already posted? I'm inclined to do so.
u/None [+1] (4 days later)
If you think it'll kill your momentum, I'd keep moving forward but if you think you can edit and write new chapter simultaneously, I'd say go for the edits.
At least for me, I prefer to keep pushing forward with a story when the creative juices are flowing. Just try to keep the stylistic feedback in mind when writing new stuff.
Good luck!
u/None [+1] (4 days later)
[deleted]
u/None [+1] (4 days later)
Yeah but the super short encounter just comes across as a little artificial to me
u/KilotonDefenestrator [+1] (7 days later)
To be fair, May is a college student, and today it would be rather realistic to say stuff like that. Maybe /u/9adam4 used it intentionally to get the college vibe?
u/None [+2] (9 days later)
I am well past college age, and I freely admit that my word choices were based on how I think college students talk. I will try to keep the cringe down to a dull flinch.
u/wren42 [+2] (a month later)
I'm enjoying this so far, just started when I saw the chapter posted yesterday, and definitely want more; my first impression though is that the character's behavior is quite flawed and vulnerable from a rationalist perspective. There's nothing wrong with this, a flawed protagonist is fine; I just anticipate his frequent missteps to be punished.
First, the moment he suspected the coincidence of the other super's move to his neighborhood, a rational response from an intelligent actor would be to investigate her recent past. He should be PANICKED that the government is on to him. He is obviously an enormously valuable asset and is playing cat and mouse with powerful agencies like the FBI and CIA - lying to them and leading them on with hints of omniscience while not fully cooperating.
It's a given they would be after him if they suspected he was a real person, his power is simply to dangerous to be left in the wild. He should know this, and should immediately check on the motives behind the new super's move in case she's part of a plot to entrap him.
secondly, working for his sister seems extremely dangerous for the same reasons. if a certain otherwise ordinary police district begins solving unsolvable cases, it will get notice. The influence of a super would be suspected, and both Hector and his sister would likely be exposed.
That this hasn't happened yet is surprising. If it doesn't happen pretty quickly in the story, it starts becoming unbelievable and drifts out of rational fic, in my mind.