This will make a fine addition to the Prompt Quest collection.
My favorite part of this piece was how you split up the dialogue/narration. Having the main character, the AI/Computer/Assistant, and the sensory descriptions divided by text style and surrounding characters made the whole piece feel "science fiction"-ey. It felt like I was reading it off a CRT display in some deep-space shuttle.
Initially the style of the descriptive pieces (the ones in the angle brackets) threw me off. Sometimes they were sentence fragments, and sometimes it seemed like they were another character's thoughts/narration. By the end I became more comfortable with the style. And my favorite line in the story came from one of those: "The reactor core glows now. Radiation pours out. Caesium-137. Swamps the atmosphere with beautiful charged particles." - ghastly and beautiful.
Great addition to the quest IMO, and good job telling a full tale on limited words.
Thanks for your excellent comments Sam - and I'm really pleased you liked it!
I know what you mean about the angle brackets stuff. As I sort of suggested in the intro there's clearly a 'what happened before' element here, and it throws you right into the middle. Just before you'd have something like Frey (normal text) asking Qyi (the AI, italics) to establish a transmission connection so she can broadcast what's happening and what she's about to do, so the three '...' at the beginning are suggesting that's the point where the connection is established and the recording starts.
The <text> then is supposed to be the audio description. Later, of course, I end up getting a bit postmodern, breaking the so-called fourth wall thing, and using the first person singular in the <text>, so you get the narrator coming through. Also, about halfway through you get the 'visual recording start' bit, which is where I can start providing visual, rather than just audio details. In a similar strange way, I suddenly insert bits like 'sound of her conscience dying' which goes way beyond an audio description. So I think I was trying to create a sort of dissonance in the reader's mind there. Hopefully it worked. I can understand how it might not, though.
This kind of idea is the difference between the writer and the reader - I, as the writer, obviously know exactly what's going on and especially since I've read it about ten times (editing etc.), so I can never experience what it's like to read it for the first time. The reader is totally different.
Meaning, perhaps - I think it rewards a second reading. Knowing all of this, and having it in your head will, I hope, create a different experience.
Having said all of that, this piece was I admit a bit experimental - normally I write pretty standard narrative (although there is some postmodernism there in the sense of 'you as a reader know there's a narrator' and 'sometimes so do the characters' - so it blurs the lines between the story and the viewer (you'll see this in the D-zero meson oscillation story).
Anyhow - if I ramble any more I'll be in serious danger of sounding pretentious, so I'll stop right there...
I did a second read with this in mind. The <narrator coming through more as the story progresses> was much clearer. I’m not sure if I would have reached the exact definition from your comment above (being, as I am, remarkably slow), but I think I’d notice the gradual fourth-wall-rupture. The <> didn’t confuse me at all the second time.
The one thing that didn’t land for me in the way you describe above: that the early text is ‘audio only’. <She bounds through the maintenance shaft. Too small for the invading exospecies. Dim red guidelights along the hex-walls. Infrared glow.> - this came across as mostly visual. That said, it didn’t bother me that the angle-bracket text was a mix of visual and audio. On the first read I assumed that both were part of the transmission from the beginning.
Overall, the added context made the work yet more enjoyable. I like to see a story’s hidden bones.
P.S. Proofreading: <Automatic portal slides open> - I think that needs a period inside the brackets.
Hmm - yes, you're right, it isn't all audio only is it! In general terms perhaps but not totally. I sort of realised that as soon as I posted it. I was probably thinking too much of the clear divider 'visual recording start'. Maybe 'restart' might have been better.
Maybe not fourth wall so much, but certainly 'narrator as a real person with feelings and so on'. Fourth wall would be 2nd person stuff - and I tend to shy away from that because it seems a little contrived. Having said that, using the 2nd person plural sparingly works - like at the beginning of the Katrina story the narrator says she arrived 'in your year 2021' - so I was trying to create a kind of 'yes there's a narrator here - hi' and second a sort of otherworldly feel to it. So yeah, I do like playing around with the kind of thing. But your points are quite correct.
I'll have another look at the proofreading note - thanks. If I leave it as it is, though - assume it's deliberate (for some reason not even completely known to me).
Stumbled into this from an email I received Prompt Quest #1. I just signed up for the whole Lunar thing so joined pretty much at the end of this quest. I very much enjoyed your story. High energy action and also pathos as the poor thing does things she would never do normally. A good indication of the - dare I say - dehumanizing consequence of war.
A riveting read, Evelyn! The unusual structure was really effective in 1) making this feel like it was happening in real time, 2) making the story seem a bit "alien" which is appropriate given the theme, and 3) immersing the reader in the thoughts and feelings of the main character. Dynamic writing, entertaining, and thought-provoking. Thank you for sharing with us!
Thanks for your lovely comments - those aspects you mentioned are indeed some of the main things I was trying to get across, so you have nicely reassured me there!
I think about the self-fulfilling prophecy of the label 'monster' a lot, and you captured it so well in this: "The worst thing about these monsters is they make you a monster yourself...and [then they point to you and say 'You see, they really are what we told you']. Incredible piece, thank you.
Thank you! I think you must be the first person to have understood the Palestine reference (unless others did get it but just didn't want to mention it, for some reason). I was especially making a reference to Palestine in the bit when she says the invaders have 10,000 of our people in camps and the stories we hear are horrific. Whilst all the mainstream media attention is on 'Israeli hostages' we hear little or nothing about 10,000 Palestinian hostages, suffering the worst kinds of abuse.
Given that people do see the world through stories and narratives, I do think it is often incumbent on writers to tell the right stories.
This will make a fine addition to the Prompt Quest collection.
My favorite part of this piece was how you split up the dialogue/narration. Having the main character, the AI/Computer/Assistant, and the sensory descriptions divided by text style and surrounding characters made the whole piece feel "science fiction"-ey. It felt like I was reading it off a CRT display in some deep-space shuttle.
Initially the style of the descriptive pieces (the ones in the angle brackets) threw me off. Sometimes they were sentence fragments, and sometimes it seemed like they were another character's thoughts/narration. By the end I became more comfortable with the style. And my favorite line in the story came from one of those: "The reactor core glows now. Radiation pours out. Caesium-137. Swamps the atmosphere with beautiful charged particles." - ghastly and beautiful.
Great addition to the quest IMO, and good job telling a full tale on limited words.
Thanks for your excellent comments Sam - and I'm really pleased you liked it!
I know what you mean about the angle brackets stuff. As I sort of suggested in the intro there's clearly a 'what happened before' element here, and it throws you right into the middle. Just before you'd have something like Frey (normal text) asking Qyi (the AI, italics) to establish a transmission connection so she can broadcast what's happening and what she's about to do, so the three '...' at the beginning are suggesting that's the point where the connection is established and the recording starts.
The <text> then is supposed to be the audio description. Later, of course, I end up getting a bit postmodern, breaking the so-called fourth wall thing, and using the first person singular in the <text>, so you get the narrator coming through. Also, about halfway through you get the 'visual recording start' bit, which is where I can start providing visual, rather than just audio details. In a similar strange way, I suddenly insert bits like 'sound of her conscience dying' which goes way beyond an audio description. So I think I was trying to create a sort of dissonance in the reader's mind there. Hopefully it worked. I can understand how it might not, though.
This kind of idea is the difference between the writer and the reader - I, as the writer, obviously know exactly what's going on and especially since I've read it about ten times (editing etc.), so I can never experience what it's like to read it for the first time. The reader is totally different.
Meaning, perhaps - I think it rewards a second reading. Knowing all of this, and having it in your head will, I hope, create a different experience.
Having said all of that, this piece was I admit a bit experimental - normally I write pretty standard narrative (although there is some postmodernism there in the sense of 'you as a reader know there's a narrator' and 'sometimes so do the characters' - so it blurs the lines between the story and the viewer (you'll see this in the D-zero meson oscillation story).
Anyhow - if I ramble any more I'll be in serious danger of sounding pretentious, so I'll stop right there...
I'm really pleased you liked it - thanks!
I did a second read with this in mind. The <narrator coming through more as the story progresses> was much clearer. I’m not sure if I would have reached the exact definition from your comment above (being, as I am, remarkably slow), but I think I’d notice the gradual fourth-wall-rupture. The <> didn’t confuse me at all the second time.
The one thing that didn’t land for me in the way you describe above: that the early text is ‘audio only’. <She bounds through the maintenance shaft. Too small for the invading exospecies. Dim red guidelights along the hex-walls. Infrared glow.> - this came across as mostly visual. That said, it didn’t bother me that the angle-bracket text was a mix of visual and audio. On the first read I assumed that both were part of the transmission from the beginning.
Overall, the added context made the work yet more enjoyable. I like to see a story’s hidden bones.
P.S. Proofreading: <Automatic portal slides open> - I think that needs a period inside the brackets.
Hmm - yes, you're right, it isn't all audio only is it! In general terms perhaps but not totally. I sort of realised that as soon as I posted it. I was probably thinking too much of the clear divider 'visual recording start'. Maybe 'restart' might have been better.
Maybe not fourth wall so much, but certainly 'narrator as a real person with feelings and so on'. Fourth wall would be 2nd person stuff - and I tend to shy away from that because it seems a little contrived. Having said that, using the 2nd person plural sparingly works - like at the beginning of the Katrina story the narrator says she arrived 'in your year 2021' - so I was trying to create a kind of 'yes there's a narrator here - hi' and second a sort of otherworldly feel to it. So yeah, I do like playing around with the kind of thing. But your points are quite correct.
I'll have another look at the proofreading note - thanks. If I leave it as it is, though - assume it's deliberate (for some reason not even completely known to me).
Stumbled into this from an email I received Prompt Quest #1. I just signed up for the whole Lunar thing so joined pretty much at the end of this quest. I very much enjoyed your story. High energy action and also pathos as the poor thing does things she would never do normally. A good indication of the - dare I say - dehumanizing consequence of war.
Thank you - I'm glad you liked it!
Yes, we should dare to talk about the dehumanizing consequences of war. Especially in these times...
A riveting read, Evelyn! The unusual structure was really effective in 1) making this feel like it was happening in real time, 2) making the story seem a bit "alien" which is appropriate given the theme, and 3) immersing the reader in the thoughts and feelings of the main character. Dynamic writing, entertaining, and thought-provoking. Thank you for sharing with us!
Thanks for your lovely comments - those aspects you mentioned are indeed some of the main things I was trying to get across, so you have nicely reassured me there!
Achingly apt for Palestine right now.
I think about the self-fulfilling prophecy of the label 'monster' a lot, and you captured it so well in this: "The worst thing about these monsters is they make you a monster yourself...and [then they point to you and say 'You see, they really are what we told you']. Incredible piece, thank you.
Thank you! I think you must be the first person to have understood the Palestine reference (unless others did get it but just didn't want to mention it, for some reason). I was especially making a reference to Palestine in the bit when she says the invaders have 10,000 of our people in camps and the stories we hear are horrific. Whilst all the mainstream media attention is on 'Israeli hostages' we hear little or nothing about 10,000 Palestinian hostages, suffering the worst kinds of abuse.
Given that people do see the world through stories and narratives, I do think it is often incumbent on writers to tell the right stories.