Contest July-August 2016 Short Story Contest Voting Thread

[discomute]

Haha well okay, seems no one

Mmm.
Even if there is some incredible Fight Club style twist that I'm not seeing, it doesn't change what I said in my review. If you want to write a story where the reader doesn't realise the narrator is mad until the end, that's great, but it still needs to be a story.

Yes I agree, clearly the responsibility of conveying the meaning of the story is on the author, not the readers.

Since everyone has seen the clues and still not there... he goes... but a warning that it is going to sound stupid when said out aloud...

So the first clue that he was a saurus on a stegadon was supposed to clue everyone into the fact that something wasn't right. Nothing more than that.
The family unit that he formed there was also un-lizardman-like, sort of like a family. One clue that I definitely wish I had of emphaised was that the team tank collided with him on his way to the battlefield in the flank. Again, not making sense, right, how does that happen? Anyhoo, long story short, his choice is to remain a lizardman. Meaning he controls it. Which doesn't fit the context of sorcery or weird experiments. But what he says they are actually doing to change him is...insisting he is human. And he is choosing to remain a Saurus. So... what if they are right?


Highlight below for full spoilers


Indeed, that was the idea of the story. This isn't set in the old world. This is set on earth. He is human. The saurus that was "like a brother", was his brother, they used to play warhammer together. The two saurus that outranked him that provided him guidance and comfort were his parents. They were hit in a car accident and he can't deal with it and is now institutionalised. They aren't warpstone pills, they are pills. His 'escapes' are just that, but how close he actually gets is another matter. Anyhoo, clearly a fail on my behalf.

 

[Bowser]

I suppose watching more twin peaks or playing more fnaf games may have primed me better for this! Though this does explain a few things better! But I do like the open interpertations of the story!

 

[Killer Angel]

Ok.
That would be the coolest idea of all the contest, and would be worthy of the victory... if only we could have guessed it.
A really powerful subject, i'm impressed. But, in the way it was written, there were really too few chances for we readers to guess the "real" story; which is a real pity.

Tnx for the explanation!

 

[pendrake]

Discomute,

I am all about the variant units. So I was cool with Saurus/Stegadon cavalry.

And I just assumed this Saurus had been captured by The Empire or that he's subsequently fallen into the hands of the Skaven.

 

[spawning of Bob]

So family members did die? How could I be so blind?

I did toy with the idea that he was a gamer, but there weren't enough data points to verify it. Fits the proxy theme perfectly, too!

I also ran with the Brain transplant idea, and decided even that was possible.

The only way I can think of keeping the integrity of his delusion (which was strong enough to fool us,too) AND give the context would be to have a tack on paragraph where 2 people look through the peephole of his cell and discuss his case.

"Any change?"
"He's calmer now with the medication, but he still believes he is a lizard-man."
"Calmer? I bet he is dreaming up some Great Plan to escape again."

Which kills all of the subtlety. It's maddening.

 

[thedarkfourth]

It's a phenomenally great idea, which reminds me of one of my very favourite episodes from one of my very favourite TV shows, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, in which, after like 6 years of fighting vampires and demons, someone casts a spell on her causing her to dream that she wakes up in a hospital where they explain it was all a delusion and that she's just a regular girl who has crazy fantasies. The genius of it is that as the episode goes on, you start to wonder more and more whether it was really the spell at the start which was the dream, rather than the hospital. The explanations for her mania are so convincing.

So my advice would always be to prioritise a gripping story over a cool "twist" or "reveal". (Or in your case, hinting at things and letting the audience piece it together, which can work but is often tricky to get right). I think the much stronger approach would be to be totally open about the conceit, and focus instead on building drama to the point where the crazy bit is not the premise itself, but rather the kinds of choices it forces people to make. So you could copy the Buffy format and have it be a chaos spell, in which a great saurus champion dreams that he has a happy human life, and how appealing that might be, but he has to snap out of it in order save the day (but is he snapping out of it or is he really regressing in his illness because he truly is a human and he's just going back to his delusions of lizard-hood). Or you could have the story of the saurus warrior trying to escape his prison, but intercut scenes from the real world, gradually melding the two together until it becomes clear that the parents' death is the key thing that this character has to confront.

My preference might be to do the exposition through dialogue, using the absolute most classic dramatic device in all of storytelling, the "ticking bomb" (ie a conversation is always more exciting when there's a bomb under the table that only the audience knows about).

The warmbloods kept me tied up for hours. My limbs were secured firmly with leather straps. I tried using my tail to move the chair itself, but it was bolted to the ground. Finally one of my captors entered and seated himself on the other side of a table. He wore flimsy white outer garments and strange lenses suspended before his eyes. This must be the leader of whatever diabolical experiments they conduct here, I reasoned. I continued to fidget with my restraints while he regarded me.

"James," he said, "I'm so sorry it has to be this way. Is there anyone you have we could call? Any family members, close friends of your-"

"My spawn kin are all dead, creature!" I roared, taking pleasure in the way he flinched and cast down his eyes. "And my name is Katocoatl, as I told your minions. I do not know this James of whom you speak."

The human looked at me, and I snarled at the pity in his eyes. "OK, Katocoatl, could you explain to me how you got that name?"

I wasn't going to answer such a pathetic creature, but then I felt a slim wriggle around my right claw. I needed to stall for time. "It was bestowed on me when I was spawned, by Narzl Rex, champion of my regiment," I said, looking my captor in the eye while I worked to loosen the manacle on my wrist, millimeter by millimetre.

Another long stare. "Spawned?"

"Of course, all lizardmen come into the world in spawnings, all according to the Great Plan. I myself come from a sacred spawning that marks me as chosen for the riding of stegadon. Until my mount was slain, by your infernal tanks, I-" I cut myself short.

"Your mount, eh? This was something you held dear? And you say I killed it?"

Curses. I had said too much. But my right wrist was almost free. "A foolish mortal like yourself could never hope to battle a grown stegadon!" I crowed, "But yes, my mount and my crew were dear indeed. We were raised together, did battle together."

"And their loss, how does it make you feel?"

"I feel many things, warmblood scum, but right now, I'd have to go with WRATH!"* I pulled my claw out and slashed the bonds around my other limbs. They had taken my weapons but I hefted a device they had left on the table for attaching strange thin white rectangles to each other. I launched myself across the table at my tormentor, astonished to see that a mighty swipe from my tail had no effect. Instead, I used the rectangle-attaching device, which immediately cast the warmblood to the ground. But fresh opponents were rushing through the door to oppose me, gripping my arms and legs and inserting terrible needles into my body. A teleportation spell of some kind - the room around me began to spin and dissolve, and the next thing I knew I smiled as I felt the invigorating heat of Lustria envelop me again.

At this point I would go into his imaginary lustrian life, where he's given an important mission by a slann, and then return for a final act in the psych lab, where the doctor has recovered and has done some research in to this warhammer thing and is able to confront the patient with all the contradictions in his original conversation ("saurus don't ride stegadon! Aha! You're not a real lizard after all!"). He's confronted with the death of his human family, which makes him emotional, ("aha, saurus don't get emotional!"), and then he has to decide whether to carry out the slann's mission (to remain a saurian spy) or to agree to the doctor's request to try and get better and return to a sane human life.

Anyway, it's all stuff that would take way longer than 25 minutes to get right, but my mind is already racing with possibilities. You've made me insanely jealous again that I didn't think of it.

*another whedon reference, anyone?

 

[discomute]

Yup thanks for the feedback guys. I certainly remember that firefly quote, although I thought I had seen all the buffy series, I don't remember that episode. It is definitely something I will try to rewrite before I submit it again to the board. The issue that I am now working two jobs and just started my law degree... currently home with the flu, thus all the time to write.

And Bob its funny you suggest that. The original ending was him overhearing another saurus talking to the captors, the one that ourranked the riders that died. And the conversation was going to go along the lines of 'If my grandson is happy like this, leave him be. I don't care if it is against medical advice, it's my choice'. But I decided it was too obvious.

Although I very much long for the calm of lustria, I can't help but contemplate what it would look like if I could return. I would never again feel the comfort or kinship of the three that were all I knew. Part of me wonders if I could adapt.

 

[spawning of Bob]

I started writing the following before Discomute's descent into madness.

8. Hexoatl: The Induction Ceremony
If a character has unorthodox views in a Warhammer story, it is heresy. If an author has unorthodox views in a Warhammer story, it is clever. Here we have both.

Set up? From paragraph two, we find that this is an abnormal Lizardmen society (use of a chameleon to do "fake" magic - usually the mighty wouldn't bother to manipulate the (already compliant) masses) and this is an unusual skink (he alone notices the illusion). This establishes the character's central conflict of wanting to fit in to society versus questioning its validity. It makes his choice at the end make sense.

Style? I really like the story telling style - it's like a bedtime story, being told in a casual verbal manner. Engaging little details are just dropped in in an organic fashion ("maybe they weren't as good friends as he remembered", the "dunked in blood and left on a carnosaur nest" aside). The plot is all sequential and logical but the pace ebbs and flows and some "false trails" (the river journeys) take on a significant life of their own, and the tie up at the end was very matter-of-fact and abrupt. I don't know if that was the authors plan, but I enjoyed the reading experience.

The contrasting river journeys are an interesting inclusion - the plot demands a passage of time but not necessarily a journey. I like how the journeys mirror / set his mood - first as one with the Great Plan, and second time with the world against him. As poetic elements they are quite unbalanced and delightful Images.

And hooray, we get name gags, Jurassic Park and other pop culture references too subtle for me.

The reasoning behind the choice, the choice itself and the consequences are consistent with my view of the character - he has been dragged along by the fickle currents of life. His options are to continue to be a passenger in his own life or to go against the flow by seizing his own destiny. And I think the real choice, the one which gave him inner peace at the end was the decision to reject his gods.

So messed up! I'll keep finding other facets to enjoy with each rereading.

 

[pendrake]

I am all about the variant units. So I was cool with Saurus/Stegadon cavalry.

And I just assumed this Saurus had been captured by The Empire or that he's subsequently fallen into the hands of the Skaven.

Saurus Stegadon Cavalry is totally a thing:

...Winged Saurus Stegadon Cavalry no less. Sorta like Polish Winged Lancers only with scales, and horns, and big stompy feet... Clicking the picture might take a lizard to the original Showcase Thread on the Reaper Forums where there are Work-in-Progress pictures (if I did the linking correctly).

 

[discomute]

Looks great, but fitting four on there?

 

[spawning of Bob]

I should have provided a disclaimer before I started critiquing. The problem is that what I produced is different to what I would have expected. Last comp, I only offered one bit of "if I (you know, the arrogant one) was rewriting this I would do..." advice. This time, I have trampled all over everyone, and demonstrably not understood what was going on in art least one occasion. And this is during one of my favorite comp batches ever - I have rarely enjoyed such a fine crop. So I will disclaim now

Spoiler: The Spawning of Disclaimer

(this will sound familiar to anyone who has suffered through my "writer's block assistance service".) I'm a bit cracked. I see lots of things that may or may not be there, and my imagination runs away when I get excited, and my ability to express myself lucidly and consider the feelings of others runs away too. I love to attempt to build on ideas BUT your original ideas are always going to be more interesting to me than any of my own. Therefore, if I offer anything that sounds like advice, I am always happy if you ignore it and do something else I never thought of. I am equally happy to be corrected privately or publicly if I get things wrong, or am cramping your creative style.

9. A Story of the Stars
TDF probably already said, "what story?". Ignore him, he's a grouch. Writing a block of poetry, history, geography, or, in this case, a shaggy dog story, is also valid and enjoyable.

Gags and structure? The hook line is a gag. If you don't recognise the song lyric, you are too young and need to get off my lawn. Whenever anything has an obvious gag in it, I immediately worry that there are plenty of others that I missed, so I spent a bunch of time pronouncing all the names, just in case (and I never bother pronouncing names)

The set up section is magnificent. Using the knowing master / questioning student combo and just enough descriptive prose to establish the situation very precisely and in an engaging way. The horror of the unprecedented conjunction is conveyed with great economy - whatever happens next as a consequence of the celestial collision is obviously going to be spectacular.

The leap into AoS promises some grand unifying explanation of the tragedy of the End Times. Hopes are raised, then... Gotcha. And it is a L-O niche specific punchline. Paraphrasing TDF again, there are probably only 12 people on the history of the internet who will ever see this. Fortunately all twelve will know what is going on, and probably eight of those are fellow competitors. I feel superior now, because something like 6 billion people have no idea why I am laughing and probably never will.

The Dark Side? The idea that powerful individuals will arbitrarily, and without regard to context, assess, accept or reject an object which has great meaning is a sober reminder that you all need to get your entries in for the art comp, so I can arbitrarily reject two thirds of them. With great power comes great .

End of critiques.

 

[thedarkfourth]

Ignore him, he's a grouch. Writing a block of poetry, history, geography, or, in this case, a shaggy dog story, is also valid and enjoyable.

Indeed! Hint: I could help but vote for Story of the Stars because it's great writing and cos it managed to sucker me in a satisfying manner. I won't say where my other votes went because I that's something I slightly regretted doing last time.

So I will disclaim now

I've been trying not to go crazy with my disclaimers - my instinct is to enormously self-deprecate at all times, but I try to stop myself because a) it feels disingenuous to go on about how much of a moron I am and then continue to offer unsolicited critiques; b) I think by this point everyone's already fairly clear that I'm a moron - indeed, that we are all just morons trying to do our best, so it doesn't need to be spelled out constantly; and c) L-O feels like the kind of place where people understand about good intentions and are quite forgiving of moronity.

The flip side to this is that people are so nice here that there is always the chance that what you are doing is secretly aggravating to others but they don't speak up because they don't want to be rude. I'm pretty sure that's just my innate social paranoia talking.

But I'll add my voice to Bob's in saying that because I enjoy the amazing work that goes on here, and because I enjoy commenting on said work, I might be critiquing in ways that people don't like, or think is wrong. I think this is already 100% clear for everyone, but just in case it's not:

1) I'm a moron. Take any advice with whopping crates full of salt.
2) If you find my manner of critique irritating or in the slightest bit upsetting, please please let me know, either publicly or DM, and I will cease such activity immediately.
3) If you want to discuss anything further, as always, feel free!

I mean, when I read Bob's disclaimer all I'm thinking is "This is so unnecessary", and yet here you go, I've just done the same thing.

Bob and Y'ttar I thought your critiques were fantastic this year (if sorely lacking in cryptic author guesses). Let's see some others get in on it!

@Scalenex can we get the comp posted in the rotating messages at the top of the forum? I think we need more readers/votes.

 

[spawning of Bob]

I demand to be the most deprecating! Therefore, if TDF is a moron, then I am to be considered an imbecile, and if I clip enough coupons, one day I might realise my lifelong ambition and live up to my mother's nickname for me: "Village Idiot".

The cryptic author guessing is confounding me this time. I will go for cryptic wild stabs instead.

 

[thedarkfourth]

Yeah - I'm absolutely terrible at being self deprecating.

 

[Killer Angel]

You are obviously the best ones to judge yourselves.

 

[spawning of Bob]

Mother knows best.

 

[Killer Angel]

Mother knows best.

But we are all spawned!

 

[spawning of Bob]

Confession Time. I wrote Days of Terror by accident while I was brushing toenail clippings off the top of the TV.

Also, I had a story planned for this comp, but I just couldn't pull it together by deadline. Its title is Conjunction (Theme - Tick) and I have put it in its own thread.

 

[Y'ttar Scaletail]

Story Four (The Rat and the Serpent) : Ratek and Two on One... Ratek Twotail...Ratty Gnaw... D:

*A Skink attendant appears*

“You’re reading too much into those names, calm down, Y’ttar.”

Yes-yes...you’re right...I think...

Anyway, I always entertained the Grey-Clad Stranger was the true god and creator of the Skaven and that the Horned Rat is either an avatar of the Stranger or another God formed from the Skaven psyche in the Realms of Chaos. But I digress.

This story hits on a very interesting point in the nature of memory constructs in AoS. The three Tehenhauins made for a humorous situation and their realization that all of them were in effect a bad copy of the original/aspiration of Tehenhauin. All the characters including the three felt individual and were interesting, even if the Skaven got slaughtered as per usual.

I’m not sure exactly why but the pacing of this piece felt a little off and over the place to me. Maybe it was the jumps between lengthy dialogue and discussion to the main battle. Though I liked the questions the ending brought up.

In all a great read!

R’ttig’wtil, a Vermin Lord: What-what the Hell Pit is a Ratek?! Maybe if I get-get out of my prison-thing I can correct the beliefs of these misguided fools. I swear-swear to the Horned Master...i’m find-finding Skavenkind more and more depressing.


Story Five (The Project) : Huh, that’s a very unique take on a short story and all the more enjoyable for it.

Pacing seemed to go as well as it could do for a piece comprised of instant messages and extracts. It remained interesting throughout, despite some of the LO interface issues with reading what was hidden by the quotes (which ironically did very little harm to the feel of the story, so go figure.)

I’m not an astro-physicist or geologist, but looking at the data given, it would seem that the author has some grounding or has done a lot of research (or is very good at making it seem he/she knows what they’re talking about!) The whole premise of the Old Ones being effectively snotty university students half-assing their project and having the one guy who hates them and does the main meat of the work for them. I really sympathize with Itzl, those other Old (Young) Ones are arses.

I will admit it was a bit odd to see such revered beings as the Old Ones as emote tossing teenagers, though I guess If the Emperor Had a Text to Speech Device has kinda already been doing that with the Chaos Gods, Isha, Khaine, Malal, and the Hive Mind.

All the same, a very radical and enjoyable piece!

Whizz-Bang: *Gives a knowing giggle*

 

[Killer Angel]

Entering the last week, I'm just waiting for some commentary about the Scalenex Cup...