Posted by Imrhys 15 years ago Report

Dear gods OMG... and other things i can't say here...

You did world building, magical voring, magic systems, a big bad old one, sexy without ANY sex, and turned a big bad vampess into a reason to have a threesome with her going DOWN as prey? AND many double meanings too <3

*bows at the feet of an up and coming master*

Wonderful read, even though it took me a very very long time.

PS: can't wait for part three *nosebleeds*

Posted by fwbrown61 15 years ago Report

Heh. I promised you vampires. You got 'em, munch munch. Pleased you liked it. Again, no sex required in this story; it's enough to know that a ton of it will happen after the last page.

Have to think carefully about the next story. I'm getting ideas that suggest there will be dragons in the next one...

Posted by sansuki 15 years ago Report

Well, and what do we have here? I am not honestly sure how I missed the predecessor to this story, but after about two minutes realized I'd made a terrible mistake. I would have commented there, but that's a bit full, so this will all have to go here. The first story was a wonderfully executed single scene- this is a world getting built in front of our eyes, and in fairly a fairly natural and unforced way which is a TRICK. I am going to run through all the things I have to praise, because I'm nearly first on this one, before I hit the small things I find not to praise.

The history you've built up is compelling and believable, on first blush. Things proceed reasonably understandably from a fixed point of departure, follow logical paths, and end up in a coherent and- more importantly- narratively interesting world. That's no small trick, speaking from experience it's really easy to worldbuild into a corner. You've got three characters that are fleshed out with actual personalities that aren't carbon copies of each other, and 'feel' like actual people. The best stories are ones where the plot results from the clash of independent motivations and emotions, and this signally achieves that. Even mechanically, you write well. The most impressive, I think, is that you handle dialogue excellently- although (and I may be keying off a bit of the subject matter) do I detect just a whiff of Niven/Pournelle influencing the way you write conversations? Just a feeling.

As for complaints, they are sparse and petty. The setting seems like it could easily tip over into a utopia, and start draining away sources of narrative conflict. Not insurmountable, but the picture presented of the world was an EXCEEDINGLY rosy one- but admittedly, Tom may not have been the most reliable narrator quite at that instant, and there may be far more problems in the world that just weren't good to bring up right then. You tend to use the person-verbed heading into a quotation mark a lot, which breaks up flow a little. Tom chuckled, "Dialogue." And so on. Again, it's a tiny thing, one I wouldn't even consciously note with most stories, but when you're looking at a 9.8 you instinctively look for ways to make it a 9.9. Pure descriptive details are also a little thin on the ground- thinner than the other story, which leads me to believe you trimmed some out while you were writing this to keep the length reasonable. Am I wrong? Again- these are tiny things compared with how many pages I could gush, but I figure other people will hold up the praise better than I could.

To close, looking back at your comment on the last story about wanting to do something more than simple smut- admittedly, that is what I do here. A scene or two, focusing on a character or two, with the focus on the porn. Well written porn, I hope, but to be sure that is the point; after all, this isn't the only community I write for, and so far I have figured more meatier (sorry) efforts would be better aimed elsewhere. I may perhaps be wrong.

Posted by sansuki 15 years ago Report

P.S. Sorry for clogging your comment thread.

Posted by Imrhys 15 years ago Report

I think this is the sort of comment all writers dream of, Sansuki ^_^

Posted by fwbrown61 15 years ago Report

Ha! Yes, this is the way the game is played: I write something that gets to people, and back comes cogent criticism. Pardon me while I glow a little over here. And thank you for the time taken to do it.

Just a couple of reply points. Yes, Niven's an influence, but less on style and more on his ideas on magic-as-technology (see the magnificent Warlock stories). He got wordage out of magic as a non-renewable resource. Here, I mine the idea that it's very much renewable. Why? Well, there was this bunch of particle physicists who dropped a stitch...

Tres topical, and as an ex-physics student, you bet I'm keen on CERN. Let's have some fun with the joint.

SF to the core, and hard SF too. Is it plausible? Enough? Not Hugo-class, but it'll do. Arguably I've put waaay too many balls in the air here; writing this felt like trying to keep a pinwheel spinning, all on the thin justification that Tom really had to nail Veronica with his point of view. And tell us *everything* about this world in the process. He could have been gabbing for hours. *And* I had to get him and Letitia to talk their way through this. Gab, gab, gab.

The real trick here was expanding on the clues laid out in Valentines about this world, it being a world that derives from the present day. Tricky, and mandated a history lesson that had to click. That also meant going into some depth about furs, and the magic/software analogy, and then there was needed exposition about vampires. All not done too ponderously, but still a lump of text in the first part. Wince.

In fact, this whole story boils down to three people talking (plus the chatty Omniscient Author), plus a vore session shoehorned into the middle. And everybody saying deep things to each other. Yah, the dialog does drift into a recognizably SF mode of speeech (Niven didn't pioneer that), with the occasional stylistic awkwardness, but saving grace: leavened with moderate humour. Descriptive touches might have added to the effectiveness of the dialog, but it was words, not action or setting, that was I was focused on here. The conversation did not flag (I hope). As for trimming, no, they all said pretty much what I felt they needed to say.

Utopia? Great Cthulhu, I hope not. Conflict there still is in this world, insofar as people haven't changed their nature, even if magic and technology have changed everything else. SF has always been a child of the times, and you can see the swings between utopian and dystopian plots and themes over the years; science 'n tech will save us all, will send us to Hell, etc, etc. In this day and age, we seem to be sending ourselves to Hell, so I find myself tilting to optimism and speculating on how/if we'll figure things out. And what comes after that. This world represents my most out-there take on this, good and bad in their measure. Like any society.

Exactly *what* kinds of conflict may or may not be found in this world will take some thinking about. Got a few ideas about politics. And dragons.

We will see. Yes, we will see. And thank you again for the comments. Next story looks like a challenge.

Posted by sansuki 15 years ago Report

Dragons. A fine thing! To reply to the replies- Yeah, I know the SF mode of dialogue's distinctive, I was just guessing out at the specific author the dialogue felt like while I read it more than anyone else. It felt more Niven-y than, say, Clarke-y or Baxter-y, is all. If I had to pin it down, it'd be the almost staccato rhythm it goes into every so often. At least I didn't compare your writing to Robert Forward- wonderful scientist and imagination, but the poor guy can't write a character to save his life... anyway.

The reason I tend not to let myself indulge in worldbuilding is exactly because to set the ground rules, you need a tedious and dry setting document nobody particularly wants to read, dozens of stories to slowly build it up over time with actions and reactions, or you have to write something like this to get most of the exposition out in a single batch of an actual story. The first isn't fun for the readers, the second can take years, and the third is very difficult to get right, which you pretty much did. That you were consciously deemphasizing description in favor of dialogue also explains what I noted, though- the 'trimming' comment was specifically referring to description and not dialogue, answered by your decision not to have as much. Sorry for the confusion.

As for the utopia, yes, it was mostly commenting that that's how the world was coming across in this story itself. That's the downside of a large block of exposition coming from a character who at the time has an extremely vested interest in presenting it in as rosy terms as possible. It's understandable to see how the setting might not be such unvarnished pleasure in other stories, from other points of view at other times- I was just voicing a concern that it be so.

I certainly look forward to reading whatever else you come up with in this world.

Posted by iliapoerion 15 years ago Report

Wow... Just wow... I read this earlier, but I figured that the other amazing comments covered everything I would say, and said it better anyway.
Out of curiosity, I stuck the story in Microsoft Word to figure out how long it is. This is a whopping 45 pages of text (in Word, 11pt font). 45 PAGES. That is astounding. You could add up other vore writers' entire (can't think of the right word. Portfolio? Folder? Album?) and it wouldn't equal this story in terms of length, let alone writing ability. And you somehow keep it interesting through all of that...
Man, I'm going to check your archives one day and find an entire BOOK. And it will be wonderful.

Posted by fwbrown61 15 years ago Report

Thenk you muchly. Good to know I got this one right (when it could have plotzed; length, length...)

The present world of magic 'n Vore ought to be good for at least another story or ten, I know that much. We are dealing with genre fiction here, and with some pretty narrow conventions 'n rules 'n limits too--somehow, somebody has to chomp on somebody--but that just means there's fun to be had inventing new ways 'n reasons for the chomping to happen. Let's twist the genre's tail and see what we get, done here by putting the characters in a fantasy setting that's actually an SF setting . Tricky.

But the genre can't bend too far: somebody's still gotta eat somebody. Straight Vore stories leave it at that and do tend to be short. The act of Voreing is all that counts, is all the reader is there to see, and is usually somewhat sexualized. No problemo.

The challenge I've set up, however, is simply, can an act of carnivorous devouring mean more than that? Possibly even be a solution to a character's problems? I've done it twice. Notice how much character and plot it took. There's more where that came from.

As for an entire book, the Love and Cooking thing already in the archive is slated to be just that (if I can ever finish it; also heavy on the SF). Inspired by Sharue art of a cute bunny fur girl on a spit in a cooker (with Sharue's trademark great boobs), oh yah, this is definitely a Vore subject all right. Save that I got to wondering how she got there. What If, as a prey fur, she actually wants to be there...?

Well. Can't rip this notion off in a short story. As far as I've got it thought out, the last chapter's shaping up as one scorcher of a Vore scene (with sex), and if it comes in at less than 50K words I'll be lucky.

Dontcha love it when the keyboard runs away with your fingers? I gotta type faster. :-)

Posted by iliapoerion 15 years ago Report

... Damn...
Now I want to read the Love and Cooking story... If it is designed to be a whole book...
>_< But I don't LIKE cooking... Why must you be such a good writer?