18 KiB
Ward - Gleaming - 9.8
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Author: u/Kanddak *
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Score: 52
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Created: 2018-09-16T00:10:57
Post:
Comments:
u/Kanddak [+19] (5 minutes later)
So I get the sense that the Parahumans setting is sort of controversial around here with respect to if it's rational or not, but the current arc really has me wanting to see /r/rational 's analysis.
!Victoria & Tristan are working around Goddess' influence via their precommitment to following protocols, even though doing so feels irrational according to their current, compromised utility function.!<
u/Amonwilde [+1] (39 minutes later)
I'm waiting until this gets close to being done before reading. How does it hold up in quality to the original? Kind of fine WildBow to be a little all over the place in quality.
u/Kanddak [+28] (59 minutes later)
I think Wildbow's greatest strength as a writer is the use of first-person viewpoint to show-rather-than-tell. He's particularly effective at using this for characterization, to depict psychological trauma, and to depict mind- and reality-altering effects. Ward so far has been primarily focused on these issues and I'm loving it.
u/TaltosDreamer [+20] (an hour later)
Wildbow took some time to worldbuild and character build this time at the beginning (he always does well with that, its just he does it during the action). So the early chapters are light on explosions and near death experiences. More like a novel vs a web serial.
We learned a lot about the world Post-Worm. Even about the politics between the worlds and how earth bet rebuilt in an empty earth so quickly.
Now his story is getting into the action. It is glorious. Due to his earlier chapters developing characters, he has been able to build on the emotional connections. Now that events are in motion, I have cried for multiple characters and even cheered out loud over some of their victories. (my boyfriend has started teasing me about my "poor fictional characters had a big bad author be mean to them again? Do you want a hug?"
All this adds up to Yes, Ward is very very good. Wildbow is a better writer with every story.
lets just say >!The Lady In Blue made her entrance!<, and it was a doozy!
u/alexanderwales [+9] Time flies like an arrow (4 hours later)
We learned a lot about the world Post-Worm. Even about the politics between the worlds and how earth bet rebuilt in an empt earth so quickly.
Huh, I sort of slowly stopped reading Ward in part because it felt like that stuff was coming really slowly. I think the last chapters I read were in the middle of the >!assault on the Fallen compound!<, which felt like it was several novels worth of words into Ward.
u/TaltosDreamer [+14] (4 hours later)
It did start off slowly compared to his previous works. That said, I feel he has amply repaid our patience with what came after.
At the end of the day, trust your instincts on writing that you enjoy, but after the point you referenced the pace changed drastically for the more exciting. Im giddy waiting for the next update.
u/alexanderwales [+10] Time flies like an arrow (5 hours later)
I think that reading something with the idea that my patience is going to be rewarded is almost never worth it. I was reading because I was enjoying things, but there was a lot that was being kept from me as a reader, and teased out slowly, and ... what was actually being put in front of me wasn't enough. I never actively made the decision to stop reading, I just saw the chapter notifications and took longer and longer to read them, until eventually there was this big backlog and I thought "eh, maybe I'll get to it eventually", which I have to admit is probably not the case.
u/TaltosDreamer [+10] (5 hours later)
Like I said, trust your instincts. I found it rewarding and so I shared my feelings on it... but that doesnt mean everyone will.
I just hope you found some good reading material to pick up the slack :)
u/tjhance [+3] (14 hours later)
yeah this is basically me, I didn't intend to stop reading, I just did. The fallen assault was really long and I started to lose interest, and then I got really busy for about a month or two, so I put it down. Then when I tried to get back into it, I had to slog through the Ashley backstory interlude which was... really boring. I eventually got through that, but then I got busy again, and now I don't really remember what was going on, so it's hard to get back into it.
u/Bowbreaker [+2] Solitary Locust (22 hours later)
Huh? I thought it was some of the most interesting stuff to that date.
u/Bowbreaker [+1] Solitary Locust (22 hours later)
Just wait till there's some more then. It only seems slow if you have to wait a few days after each chapter. Just like, say, Pact seemed paced fine if you read it as it came out but is insane when binge read.
u/xland44 [+3] (13 hours later)
Ward was super slow at first but not anymore
u/Amonwilde [+2] (2 hours later)
Thanks!
u/zonules_of_zinn [+2] (5 hours later)
huh, i couldn't bring myself to really care about the characters and stopped a couple arcs in. i was surprised because i instantly fell in love with characters in worm and especially twig.
u/Thrown42694269 [+6] (14 hours later)
Victoria isn't as compelling a protagonist as Taylor, sy, or Taylor. That's probably intentional bad she's trying to live the straight and narrow when none of the others were.
u/Kawoomba [+9] (7 hours later)
Too much angst, and a staccato-like writing style that may be great for putting out a large amount of words consistently but is disruptive to the flow of reading.
I am a big fan of WildBow's earlier writing, in which the world building really stood out. His prose, to me, was sufficient to not get in the way of being awed by the intricate setting. It was a working tool and did not get in the way of the ever escalating plot.
For Ward, on the other hand, there is less relatability in terms of story and world building, simply because the original story has already moved us from a recognizable world to a multiverse-centric "story-aftermath" setting that is much less compelling to me. What remains is a sort of sequence of character studies into angsty teenagers, with whom I find it hard to empathize. When the story does pick up speed, as often as not the story-progressing elements are embedded into angsty ruminations and navel-gazing of a host of mentally ill, struggling young parahumans.
As a sequel to the original setting, the dynamics make sense, but as an aimless dystopic multi-verse filled with PTSD-filled or otherwise traumatized parahumans, it's unfortunately not my cup of tea. Which I truly regret.
u/eleves11 [+12] (7 hours later)
While I don't share your opinion on Wildbow's writing, I can see why it might be tiring to read. I personally like taking my time to slowly read through each chapter and his prose in Ward delivers on that front. Each sentence feels deliberate, and character interactions, especially in the beginning, give the reader insight into what the characters are really like beneath the surface.
The reason why Ward might feel more 'angsty' might be because, unlike Worm, the setting is already somewhat laid out. The story takes it upon itself to become more character focused as a result, and given that all the main characters are damaged to some degree, the dynamics inevitably fall into that sort of deliberation.
It's understandable that the protagonist's ruminations might not be to your preference if you care more about world building, but I really do think that there's plenty of value in delving into the characters, their personalities, backgrounds, and decisions. It's part of what made interludes in Worm so engaging, not only because you get to see a bit more of the world, but also because you get placed into the perspective of someone completely different from the protagonist.
If you're interested, maybe try giving the story another whirl? The most recent arcs have received a pretty great amount of hype from the parahumans subreddit, and I know that I'm eagerly waiting for new chapters to be released.
u/Thrown42694269 [+6] (14 hours later)
His most recent interlude is probably in the top 5 he's ever written.
u/hyphenomicon [+2] seer of seers, prognosticator of prognosticators (5 days later)
Ward seems to be suffering from an overabundance of snappy dialogue and prose, yeah. Every other phrase feels like a stoner trying to show the real truth of the world by emhpasizing certain words, using unnecessary metaphors, and acting really dramatic about the quality of their own remarks. It reminds me a bit of the suspended disbelief snapping dialogue of Gilmore Girls.
u/CouteauBleu [+1] We are the Empire. (a day later)
Kudos for this review, which pinpoints exactly the kind of things some people are likely to dislike about Ward, while addressing how subjective it is.
I see a lot of reviews about Wildbow's writing that go "It's incredibly X, nobody could possibly like this!", while at the same time a lot of other reviews go "I love it because it's incredibly X!".
u/Rorschach_And_Prozac [+2] (3 hours later)
I had to give up on twig very late in the story because it dragged on really badly for my personal taste. Then immediately started ward, but couldn't get past the bizarre intro chapters. Given that I loved worm and pact and 9/10 of twig, should I try ward again? Should I just skip the glowworm chapters with all of the code name internet forum stuff, or is that part relevant to the story? It was really tedious to try to read, only guessing at who the names could be, especially since they were likely to be all new characters.
u/Kanddak [+6] (4 hours later)
Glow-worm becomes relevant eventually, but by the time it did I had mostly forgotten what was in it and had to go back and re-read anyway, so you're probably fine to skip it for now. Lots of hints about the backgrounds of new characters you haven't met yet.
u/Gr_Cheese [+6] (13 hours later)
Like you, I gave up on Twig somewhere around 3/4ths of the way through. As others have said, you can skip the Glow chapters. But I'm bored, so let me bombard you with an unrequested review:
Ward is basically Twig re-written into Worm's universe without Sy & Co.'s explicit time constraints or some their other quirks. It has a heavy focus on psychology and teammates needing to know if other teammates are "all right". I don't find intra-team politics entertaining. But Wildbow just jumps right in to that stuff, when, honestly, I would barely care if he just started killing them off. It's too early in the series to expect readers to be invested in that sort of thing.
And, I've been thinking this for a long while, but after reading Worm, Pact, most of Twig, and Ward, it has become obvious that Wildbow's 1st person fight scenes are very hit or miss when his character isn't effectively omniscient. I understand this this can be a tool to demonstrate the character's own limitations and scope of action, but in practice these scenes have not been well-written or fluid enough for me to appreciate them.
That said, Ward is a fulfilling addition to the Worm-verse. Wildbow still hits his interludes out of the fucking park, which is amazing. If he wrote the entire series like interludes 3.x or 8.y... Well, one can dream.
u/RynnisOne [+9] (15 hours later)
The biggest problem with Ward--at least well through the Fallen assault arc--is that it gives you glimpses of all sorts of very interesting things occurring in the universe, then shoves that into the background to focus on a very small story where the characters do their best never to get involved in such things, and instead spend a vast majority of their time resolving personal issues or undergoing therapy sessions.
We see some of the old characters like Weld and Tattletale, who are up to great things but only briefly cameo directly. We have new 'cluster' variations of the Passengers that have made the powers go from simple, focused abilities to weird combinations that interact differently with others. We have the inter-world portal system get messed up in a big way. We have worlds that are like an expansionist Wild West where anything goes. We have worlds themselves potentially going to war with each other (including one that despite its apparent low number of Metas seems quite well motivated). We have a kind of machine race that disguises itself well and spreads like a virus. We have the remains of Nibolg's old Goblin creations struggling to survive. We have some new side characters that are more interesting than many of the main characters (I would happily read a "Buddy Cop" series based around Ratcatcher and Crystalclear, for instance). We have the views of common people shifting to where being a hero or villain isn't as important to them as who can make their lives better. We have heroes going more 'corporate' and having to sell their brand rather than just being controlled by one generic government agency, and the inevitable corporate competition that follows.
We have ALL these cool references, and almost none of them are considered for more than a few updates before we go back to Team Therapy doing their thing separate from all of it.
It gets better, but it takes awhile, and I can easily see some people not wanting to go through that effort.
Have you read Pact yet?
u/Rorschach_And_Prozac [+3] (16 hours later)
Yeah, I blasted through Pact. The pacing was the best of his stories in my opinion. Seems like I'm going to hold off on Ward until it's finished. Then I can power through the stuff that I find boring or tedious.
The reason I had to quit twig was because I was reading it one update at a time. Towards the end the pacing got really bad and each update was disappointing, and I could power through because I was reading it as it was getting released.
u/None [+3] (2 days later)
Damn, Pact was hella difficult for me in terms of pacing. Just ramping up the ante, no breaks.
u/Rorschach_And_Prozac [+2] (2 days later)
Which can be bad, I agree, but definitely makes sense for a story about deals with demons. I like the constantly ramping pace because it fits the story.
u/Kanddak [+3] (a day later)
Wildbow's work at its best scratches the same itch for me as qntm's Antimemetics Division stories. We get fantastic narration of what it feels like from the inside to try to act rationally on the knowledge that your perceptions, thoughts or desires are actively being subverted by a hostile agent, and it's all very relatable because although there are no master/stranger/thinker powers, reality-eating demons or antimemetic SCPs in the real world, we all have to wrestle with the fact that the human mind doesn't actually need any such subversion — it's already catastrophically compromised at baseline.
So I have really appreciated Ward's tendency to stay very character-driven without sprawling out too much and getting overly distracted by the very rich worldbuilding going on in the background.
u/RynnisOne [+3] (a day later)
Getting distracted by? Yes, what a terrible thing to employ that awesome worldbuilding for more than background information. It would be terrible if the story retained character development while also doing interesting things in a rich, detailed world.
There are plenty of stories with unreliable narrators. And rational fiction is chock full of ones that involve some level of mind control and a protagonist who has to either realize this and find a way to resist it, or who undergoes it and learns how after their thinking was altered. So that's not quite as impressive to me, although its interesting in short bursts.
u/edwardkmett [+1] (11 days later)
To be fair, by a comparable point in Worm, not much interaction had been had with the larger world tapestry, either. e.g. By arc 9, They'd only just faced Leviathan, which was the introduction to the audience of the larger problems.
u/xland44 [+4] (13 hours later)
Glow-Worm was basically a teaser for the fans to get hype rolling, it can probably be skipped
u/CouteauBleu [+2] We are the Empire. (a day later)
It's very subjective. A lot of people love Worm and hate Pact and Twig, or hate Pact and love Twig, etc. I think a lot of external factor in too (like "how busy was your life when you read it?" or "did you read it all in one go, or as it was coming out").
That said, a few pieces of advice:
If you read glow-worm (which really isn't necessary), don't worry too much about pinpointing each character. Just get a feel for the broadstrokes, what kind of dynamics the characters are likely to have, what kind of personalities they seem to have, etc.
Avoid reading too much at a time. Wildbow recommends reading one arc at a time, but pick your own pace. The story takes some time digesting.
Read some of the comments and the relevant r/parahumans threads after every few chapter, especially if you're confused. A lot of the action and the themes are a lot easier to follow with the reddit hive-mind helping you discern what were the major beats of the story, or pointing out subtle moments you might have missed (eg: "Character X rubbed their wrist when Character Y mentioned Master-Stranger protocols! It means X is the traitor!").
u/None [+3] (4 hours later)
Wildbow posted summaries of the characters from Glow-Worm.
I think half the fun in these chapters was trying to figure out who or what each person was supposed to be.
There is quite a bit of stuff in there, you should at least read everything by the account named "Point_me_@_the_Sky", as they are our POV character.