4000th Post Piece Reborn

[Perpetual Man]

Well here it is, the 4000th post... again. It is the same piece. Honest. It might not look like it. But it is. Anyway, this is the result of my meddling. There is more that I would like to do with this opening segment but this is the first time I been through it and felt I had reached a stopping point.

It is a story that has happened before and will happen again.
　　
It stretches back through time and into the future. Through each collapse and rebuilding of civilisation it happens again. And again.
　　
A tale that I have been party to, one of tragedy, brilliance, hope, the shining light of the human spirit.
　　
Simply put it is Love.

　　
Sascha Baylechka was a young man, who lived in Petersburg, the largest city on Ganymede, largest moon of Jupiter. He worked for his fathers retail business, nothing too special, although it was established, which made it successful enough. I knew of them, and while not quite a family friend, I would have been a welcome guest at their home.
　　
Like so many others they had made their way to the Imperial Palace, the heart of the self-proclaimed Empire, Hosted there was a gathering of businesses from all over the solar system, from small to conglomerates, they all moved around the hall doing business outside of business.
　　　　
I was at the convention on my own terms, as I had a minor title and thanks to the graciousness of the Empress I had a duty to take an interest in these kind of things. Being the owner of a small moderate business it was only right that I should have been there.
　　
I slipped over to the two of them, receiving genuine smiles for my trouble.
　　
The convention was taking place in the Third Great Ballroom, and I have to admit the art and imagination that went into the creation of the rooms of the Palace seemed to stumble and fall when it came to the names they had been graced with. How could a room, that had a glass floor, looking down into a undulating sea of liquid silver, which in turn reflected the lights above, shattering the colours of the people and their clothes, so that it appeared to be an ever changing display of colour, a molten rainbow; with walls that slightly curved outwards, not so much that you would consciously notice, divided into panels, each one a full painting, imaginative ideas of how the surface of Jupiter appeared, the ceiling was an array of multicoloured chandeliers, all hanging from a immense carving of the Roman god for which the planet was named - so how could such a thing be simply called ‘The Third Great Ballroom?’
　　
Its opulence was beyond any doubt awe inspiring, age might have lent the elder Baylechka the maturity to deal with it, but for a young man like Sascha, who knows how it might have appeared. He stood there a man in body, but in mind there was still that glimmer of youthful endeavour, eyes wide at the magnificence of his surroundings, everything a kind of magic
　　
The massive chamber was filled with stalls, business women and men, mixing with nobility and investors, from the most successful, to those with only the gimmer of an idea, hoping for a patron. And moving amongst them were imperial servants, dressed in all their finery, providing refreshment and in some cases introductions. If there was something you wished to buy, be it obscure delicacies from who knows where, to impossible ray guns from the technicians of Phobos, then this was the place it could be arranged.
　　
I had been to enough of these things to know how they worked.
　　
I talked to Vassily, the father and Sascha for some time. They were both of Ganymede, and their family was reputed to have been one of the first to come here. They were a good family, although touched by tragedy, but then in the cold eye of truth, whose family is never touched by such?
　　
Vassily had lost his wife in an accident, leaving him two sons and a daughter to raise. Sascha, the oldest, but he had only been ten when they had lost his mother, his sister Natalia had been six, while the youngest brother, Richlieu only three.
　　
When I considered what Vassily had achieved, running and building a successful business while raising three children it was remarkable. The oldest boy had followed him into the business and worked hard to keep it going, allowing it to expand. The last time we had talked they had been considering opening a second shop. It might not sound like much, but for them it was the first step to a retail empire.
　　
Natalia, now twenty years old, was married with a daughter of her own. Her husband, was again, someone I knew well enough. He was a good man, and ran a small shop. To use an archaic term, he was a cobbler, quite a talented one at that. In the years to come he would merge his business with Vassily’s and that would.... but I digress that is another story all together.
　　
Unfortunately Richlieu was considered to be the bad egg. It might not seem fair. He grew up with no real maternal figure after all, which probably meant there were all types of psychological issues running through him. But the cause was irrelevant: he was weak and that would lead him down too many dark roads.
　　
I talked with them. Not just about business, but their family, noting that Sascha had yet to find a family of his own. “I’m not sure,” he told me, “Of course I would like to settle down, maybe find myself a wife, but time eh? There just is not enough of it!”
　　
One thing that occurred to me as we stood there talking is the way that people have that tendency to say 'Oh doesn't he look like his father!' (Or mother); but quite often this applies to the speakers perspective. If was someone who knew the mother then point of reference would make it seem as though the child looked like her; and the opposite concerning the father applied.
　　
In truth I feel as though children look like both their parents and any predilection for one or the other is purely in the eyes of the observer.
　　
Anyway Sascha looked like his father.

 

[The Judge]

Perp -- I see you've managed to subvert the software and introduce the indented lines, but it does make for a great wall of text like that. Could you do the one clear line's space between paragraphs, please, to make it a bit easier to read. Ta.

 

[Perpetual Man]

Sorry about that TJ, I'd love to say it was a cunning genius that allowed me to the indenting, but it just did, and I was not really paying attention.

Tis done now

 

[Ivanya]

Sascha Baylechka was a young man, who lived in Petersburg, the largest city on Ganymede, largest moon of Jupiter. He worked for his fathers retail business, nothing too special, although it was established, which made it successful enough. I knew of them, and while not quite a family friend, I would have been a welcome guest at their home.

You've got "largest" twice in the same sentence here - perhaps switch one out? Also "father's", rather than plural fathers.

Like so many others they had made their way to the Imperial Palace, the heart of the self-proclaimed Empire,

A full stop maybe, instead of a comma?

The convention was taking place in the Third Great Ballroom, and I have to admit the art and imagination that went into the creation of the rooms of the Palace seemed to stumble and fall when it came to the names they had been graced with. How could a room, that had a glass floor, looking down into a undulating sea of liquid silver, which in turn reflected the lights above, shattering the colours of the people and their clothes, so that it appeared to be an ever changing display of colour, a molten rainbow; with walls that slightly curved outwards, not so much that you would consciously notice, divided into panels, each one a full painting, imaginative ideas of how the surface of Jupiter appeared, the ceiling was an array of multicoloured chandeliers, all hanging from a immense carving of the Roman god for which the planet was named - so how could such a thing be simply called ‘The Third Great Ballroom?’

This paragraph has some lovely description, but it reads oddly. Starting the sentence "How could a room" and then having such a long section of descriptive text tends to make you wonder where the rest of the question is, and then when it does come, you ask "how" again. Simple rewording on that and it'd be lovely.

Its opulence was beyond any doubt awe inspiring, age might have lent the elder Baylechka the maturity to deal with it, but for a young man like Sascha, who knows how it might have appeared. He stood there a man in body, but in mind there was still that glimmer of youthful endeavour, eyes wide at the magnificence of his surroundings, everything a kind of magic

Pop in a question mark after "might have appeared" and a full stop at the end of "magic".

The section where you describe Vassily's family might be a little too much too soon? That part might be condensed down, because I'm not sure people would later remember the names of the siblings. It might be better to make mention of their lives and downfalls when they actually come into the story.

If was someone who knew the mother then point of reference would make it seem as though the child looked like her; and the opposite concerning the father applied.

Is there an "it" missing, after the if?

Anyway Sascha looked like his father.

Somehow this part seems dismissive of the whole previous explanation, as if the storyteller thinks it extraneous.

You've definitely gone for a very different approach to the last piece. Does it work better? I'm honestly not sure. I quite liked the universe you were describing to us in the other version, even if it was lengthy.

 

[Bowler1]

It is a story that has happened before and will happen again.
　　
It stretches back through time and into the future. Through each collapse and rebuilding of civilisation it happens again. And again.
　　
A tale that I have been party to, one of tragedy, brilliance, hope, the shining light of the human spirit.
　　
Simply put it is Love.
I’ve got mixed feelings about this opening. It has impact ok, just very distant and I’d prefer an opening directly from the character, as in, the line right below this one.
　　
Sascha Baylechka was a young man, I didn’t feel the need for a pause here who lived in Petersburg, the largest city on Ganymede, largest moon of Jupiter – do we need to be told it orbits Jupiter?. He worked for his father’s retail business, nothing too special, although it was established, which made it successful enough. I knew of them, and while not quite a family friend, I would have been a welcome guest at their home.
　　
There is a bit of a jump here, from distant to present very quickly. Like so many others they had made their way to the Imperial Palace, the heart of the self-proclaimed Empire., Hosted there was a gathering of businesses from all over the solar system, from small to conglomerates, they all moved around the hall doing business outside of business.
　　　　
I was at the convention on my own terms, as I had a minor title and thanks to the graciousness of the Empress, so I had a duty to take an interest in these kind of things. Being the owner of a small moderate business it was only right that I should have been there. – I’d pick one or the other, title or business owner for clarity.
　　
I slipped over to the two of them, receiving genuine smiles for my trouble. Zoom into the characters.
　　
Zoom back out to the grand room. The convention was taking place in the Third Great Ballroom, and I have to admit the art and imagination that went into the creation of the rooms of the Palace seemed to stumble and fall when it came to the names they had been graced with. How could a room, that had a glass floor, looking down into a undulating sea of liquid silver, which in turn reflected the lights above, shattering the colours of the people and their clothes, so that it appeared to be an ever changing display of colour, a molten rainbow; with walls that slightly curved outwards, not so much that you would consciously notice, divided into panels, each one a full painting, imaginative ideas of how the surface of Jupiter appeared, the ceiling was an array of multicoloured chandeliers, all hanging from a immense carving of the Roman god for which the planet was named - so how could such a thing be simply called ‘The Third Great Ballroom?’

The convention was taking place in the Third Great Ballroom, which had an array of multicoloured chandeliers, all hanging from an immense carving of the Roman god for which the planet was named. A room that had a glass floor, looking down into a undulating sea of liquid silver, which in turn reflected the lights above, shattering the light so that it appeared to be an ever changing rainbow of colour; with walls that were divided into panels, each one a full painting of Jupiter as seen through the artists eye. How could such a thing be simply called ‘The Third Great Ballroom?’ I’ve taken some massive liberties here, I hope you don’t mind too much, Perp. I felt the light should have come first for the floor idea to really work. Also, shorter, it felt too long and was Verb heavy to me. I also think this should have come before saying hello to Sascha, as your zooming into the characters and back out and I feel as a reader your pulling and pushing me around a lot.
　　
Its opulence was beyond any doubt awe inspiring, age might have lent the elder Baylechka the maturity to deal with it, but for a young man like Sascha, who knows how it might have appeared. He stood there a man in body, but in mind there was still that glimmer of youthful endeavour, eyes wide at the magnificence of his surroundings, everything a kind of magic. – back zooming into the character
　　
Zooming back out again. The massive chamber was filled with stalls, business women and men, mixing with nobility and investors, from the most successful, to those with only the gimmer of an idea, hoping for a patron. And moving amongst them were imperial servants, dressed in all their finery, providing refreshment and in some cases introductions. If there was something you wished to buy, be it obscure delicacies from who knows where, to impossible ray guns YAY!!! – right after this review I’m off to Phobos! from the technicians of Phobos, then this was the place it could be arranged. WooHoo – RAY GUNS. By the way, you spelled them wrong, you should have used capital letters. I haven’t corrected any comma’s, but there feels to be a lot that slow the pace in places.
　　
I had been to enough of these things to know how they worked.
　　
Zoom back to characters I talked to Vassily, the father and Sascha for some time. They were both of Ganymede, and their family was reputed to have been one of the first to come here. They were a good family, although touched by tragedy, but then in the cold eye of truth, whose family is never touched by such? I like the last line but does it add value to the plot and storyline here?
　　
Vassily had lost his wife in an accident, leaving him two sons and a daughter to raise. Sascha, the oldest, but he had only been ten when they had lost his mother, his sister Natalia had been six, while the youngest brother, Richlieu only three.
　　
When I considered what Vassily had achieved, running and building a successful business while raising three children it was remarkable. The oldest boy had followed him into the business and worked hard to keep it going, allowing it to expand. The last time we had talked they had been considering opening a second shop. It might not sound like much, but for them it was the first step to a retail empire.
　　
Natalia, now twenty years old, was married with a daughter of her own. Her husband, was again, someone I knew well enough. He was a good man, and ran a small shop as well. To use an archaic term, he was a cobbler and quite a talented one at that. In the years to come he would merge his business with Vassily’s and that would.... but I digress that is another story all together. Yes you do digress, and I like that the voice says so, that’s a good touch – but – I’m still waiting for the hook.
　　
Unfortunately Richlieu was considered to be the bad egg. It might not seem fair. He grew up with no real maternal figure after all, which probably meant there were all types of psychological issues running through him. But the cause was irrelevant: he was weak and that would lead him down too many dark roads. I don’t have any emotional investment in these introduced characters so they don’t mean much to me and I’m wondering why I need to know all these details at this point?
　　
I talked with them. Not just about business, but their family, noting that Sascha had yet to find a family of his own. “I’m not sure,” he told me, “Of course I would like to settle down, maybe find myself a wife, but time eh? There just is not enough of it!” – Wow, dialogue!
　　
One thing that occurred to me as we stood there talking is the way that people have that tendency to say 'Oh doesn't he look like his father!' (Or mother); but quite often this applies to the speakers perspective. If was someone who knew the mother then point of reference would make it seem as though the child looked like her; and the opposite concerning the father applied. – I’m not sure what your trying to tell me here?
　　
In truth I feel as though children look like both their parents and any predilection for one or the other is purely in the eyes of the observer.
　　
Anyway Sascha looked like his father. – All this writing about who the character looked like is to me just padding, it’s not needed. Give me the hook, the reason to read on.

Ok, nothing actually happened and as an introduction, this is a bit of a problem.
I thought the writing was good, somewhat dense in places but with a strong voice running through it all. I think you should have set the scene (I like the ballroom and may well pinch the idea, the best complement I can give) and then moved to and stayed with the characters. I also think once with the characters you should have switched to dialogue and moved away from the voice instead of telling us all about this family. But as I’ve said, you’ve not given me any hint of a plot as to why this family is so important, not a single one. I don’t doubt you have a great plot in mind, but readers like me have very little patience. I’m a dump it and move on reader if I’m not entertained quickly (I blame Chrons for my low tolerance these days!). And I can live with the voice and the telling, I don’t mind that as a style if well written (which I think it was), but with no plot being presented why should I read on? So I liked the writing, but felt cheated/frustrated that you’d not started on a storyline.

A hard review, buddy and my apologies for that. I know you’ve been working hard and this version is much, much better, make no mistake. Anyway, just what I think.

I’m off to Phobos to shoot something – shoot lots of something’s actually.

 

[Perpetual Man]

Ivanya - Many thanks for the comments, greatly appreciated. Thanks for what you said about the previous peice, I was (obviously I suppose) fond of the universe etc, and that was part of my plan for the next draft, trying to combine the two.

(The bit about looking like his father was meant to be a bit of humour from my storyteller - if it does not work I'll drop it)

Bowler - Nothing wrong with a hard review as long as it was fair and yours was that. I've scanned through it so far, but taken a few things on board, mulling it through in my head.

I think I might need to say a bit more about the overall story, in that for me the hook is meant to be Sascha and Lena meeting. This a story of their love and in general their life. There is no thing other than that, although it will touch on more active events.

I'll not say too much more at this stage, and see if there are any more comments before I decide what I need to revise...

 

[Mr Orange]

Perp.

This reads a bit aloof to me - I want to know more about the storyteller. i don't think we even find out if Lena is female or not? Also i would place her at the conference before starting to talk about Sascha - maybe begin the description of him and his father as Lena sees them at the conference, and after the description of the ballroom. i personally don't mind the description but then i tend to load up my wirting with it as well!

as a suggestion to make the first few lines more hooky:

I am Lena <surname>. This is my story.
It is a story that has happened many times before and will happen many times again.
　　
It stretches back through time and into the future. Through each collapse and rebuilding of civilisation it happens again. And again.
　　
The story is one of tragedy, brilliance, hope, the shining light of the human spirit.
　　
Simply put it is Love.

of course the above is just my opinion

 

[Perpetual Man]

Sorry Mr. Orange my bad, I did not mean to infer that Lena is the storyteller, she isn't.

The storyteller, in this instance, is simply that the person telling the story.

It gets hard for me to start to say why I'm writing it like this without going into a long rambling essay. But in the broadest possible terms, I wanted to have it as a novella, if I tried to tell the story outright then we would be talking about a huge book, most of it would be hard to write and I don't know whether I would be able to do that.

Having someone able to recount the story seemed the most expedient way of doing things.

Lena turns up a few lines later after I cut off.

 

[Mr Orange]

aaah right then that's different.... forget everything i said then!

well, not quite everything... i'm still a bit thrown by not knowing anytihng about the storyteller...

 

[Perpetual Man]

aaah right then that's different.... forget everything i said then!

well, not quite everything... i'm still a bit thrown by not knowing anytihng about the storyteller...

Ummm, I'll say a bit more about this later, give it a bit longer to see if there are any more comments

 

[Perpetual Man]

Right a bit more detail:

A lot of the short stories I write are centred around the same character. Without tracking through all the detail it is best to call him by his umbrella name, which is the Perpetual Man (might seem a bit familiar)

The idea for me was to have a character that I could use to tell any type of story I chose, from fantasy to SF, and still have the same character taking part.

Some of the stories, well most should be able to stand alone (and they do) Some have even been published (heh, one was so well liked by a reader that it was translated into Japanese and published over there!)

Every now and then I write one which cannot be taken out of context. It has to be made relative and would be used in a collection of Perpetual Man stories should I ever get around to sorting them out, re-editing and getting them done.

This would be one of them. If I don't say anything here you have no idea who the storyteller is, but if it is in a collection of stories about the PM, then you will have a good idea it is he that is telling the tale.

Hope that makes sense.

 

[ctg]

I have opened this and previous piece so many times mr perp but each and every time I've end up with same thoughts: "Don't touch." So I'm sorry, I want to, but I can't cos I really can't give you any comments without hurting you somewhere. And I don't want to do that cos I respect you too much. Sorry.

 

[Perpetual Man]

Thanks for the words ctg, and I think that says a lot without saying anything.

To be honest this is something that has been very difficult to write for a number of reasons, one of which is trying to write in the voice of a character I know so well - and people do seem to like some of the way he tells the story, but in many ways he is not suitable to tell it.

The other reason is that I am working from a template that I cannot really deviate from.

It is something that I want to tell, but obviously, being honest with myself it is not working as well as I would like in this format. Maybe not a case of reworking, but stripping back and completely rewriting.

Probably not now though, as the saying goes time for something completely different.


I knew when I put it up it was not going to be the easiest thing I have ever put up, but when I get generally good responses to something I feel that it is not pushing me in the way I need, and this has certainly has done that.

I did not expect anything too stellar and I'm not upset by any of the comments. It is all solid advice and it all helps.

ctg thanks for your last sentence that was something really special indeed. Thank you.

 

[martin321]

On reading this, I assumed that the first part was written by an omniscient narrator, which doesn't bother me as it's pretty common in C19th literature (which I love). However, I do think that this part needs to have more hook, and I agree with Mr Orange that it would be a good idea to mention Lena much earlier. So I'd probably start with something like,

This is the story of Lena and Sascha, who ....

then finish the sentence with some interesting details that encapsulate the whole novella.

As an example of what I mean (and not having read your whole story it's probably inaccurate), something along the lines of:

This is the story of Lena and Sascha, who first met in the Third Great Ballroom of the imperial pleasure palace on Ganymede, in the final days of a dying empire.

which would set the reader up for a love story set in space with lots of war and conflict (sort of Dr. Zhivago in space), if that were what your story was about, which it probably isn't. But anyway something like that.

Here are some comments; take my punctuation changes with a pinch of salt:

It is a story that has happened before and will happen again.
　　
It stretches back through time and into the future. Through each collapse and rebuilding of civilisation it happens again. And again.
　　
A tale that I have been party to, one of tragedy, brilliance, hope, the shining light of the human spirit.
　　
Simply put it is Love.

　　
Sascha Baylechka was a young man, who lived in Petersburg, the largest city on Ganymede, largest moon of Jupiter [I'd be tempted to cut this, as it is a bit repetitive, or change it to mention Jupiter in a different fashion]. He worked for his father's retail business, nothing too special, although it was established, which made it successful enough. I knew of them, and while not quite a family friend, I would have been a welcome guest at their home.
　　
Like so many others[comma?] they had made their way to the Imperial Palace, the heart of the self-proclaimed Empire,[period?] Hosted there was a gathering of businesses from all over the solar system, from [repeated from] small to conglomerates,[semi-colon?] they all moved around the hall doing business outside of business.
　　　　
I was at the convention on my own terms, as I had a minor title and thanks to the graciousness of the Empress I had a duty to take an interest in these kind of things. Being the owner of a small moderate business[comma?] it was only right that I should have been there.
　　
I slipped over to the two of them, receiving genuine smiles for my trouble. [I found "two of them" a bit vague, I'm guessing you mean Sascha and his father. It is never stated outright above that his father it actually there; Sascha certainly is, and so are "they" whoever that means.]
　　
The convention was taking place in the Third Great Ballroom, and I have to admit the art and imagination that went into the creation of the rooms of the Palace seemed to stumble and fall when it came to the names they had been graced with. How could a room,[remove comma?] that had a glass floor, looking down into a undulating sea of liquid silver, which in turn reflected the lights above, shattering the colours of the people and their clothes, so that it appeared to be an ever changing display of colour, a molten rainbow; with walls that slightly curved outwards, not so much that you would consciously notice, divided into panels, each one a full painting, imaginative ideas of how the surface of Jupiter appeared, the ceiling was an array of multicoloured chandeliers, all hanging from a immense carving of the Roman god for which the planet was named - so how could such a thing be simply called ‘The Third Great Ballroom?’ [I got lost in this sentence]
　　
Its opulence was beyond any doubt awe inspiring, age might have lent the elder Baylechka the maturity to deal with it, but for a young man like Sascha, who knows how it might have appeared. He stood there a man in body, but in mind there was still that glimmer of youthful endeavour, eyes wide at the magnificence of his surroundings, everything a kind of magic [period]
　　
The massive chamber was filled with stalls, business women and men, [remove comma] mixing with nobility and investors, from the most successful, [remove comma] to those with only the gimmer of an idea, hoping for a patron. And moving amongst them were imperial servants, dressed in all their finery, providing refreshment and in some cases introductions. If there was something you wished to buy, be it obscure delicacies from who knows where, to impossible ray guns from the technicians of Phobos, then this was the place it could be arranged.
　　
I had been to enough of these things to know how they worked.
　　
I talked to Vassily, the father [comma] and Sascha for some time. They were both of Ganymede, and their family was reputed to have been one of the first to come here. They were a good family, although touched by tragedy, but then in the cold eye of truth, whose family is never touched by such?
　　
Vassily had lost his wife in an accident, leaving him two sons and a daughter to raise. Sascha, the oldest, but he had only been ten when they had lost his mother, his sister Natalia had been six, while the youngest brother, Richlieu only three. [a little infodumpy, maybe work the information into some dialogue]
　　
When I considered what Vassily had achieved, running and building a successful business while raising three children [comma] it was remarkable. The oldest boy had followed him into the business and worked hard to keep it going, allowing it to expand. The last time we had talked [comma?] they had been considering opening a second shop. It might not sound like much, but for them it was the first step to a retail empire.
　　
Natalia, now twenty years old, was married with a daughter of her own. Her husband, was again, someone I knew well enough. He was a good man, and ran a small shop. To use an archaic term, he was a cobbler, quite a talented one at that. In the years to come he would merge his business with Vassily’s and that would.... but I digress that is another story all together.
　　
Unfortunately Richlieu was considered to be the bad egg. It might not seem fair. He grew up with no real maternal figure after all, which probably meant there were all types of psychological issues running through him. But the cause was irrelevant: he was weak and that would lead him down too many dark roads.
　　
I talked with them. Not just about business, but their family, noting that Sascha had yet to find a family of his own. “I’m not sure,” he told me, “Of course I would like to settle down, maybe find myself a wife, but time eh? There just is not enough of it!” [I'd quite like a little bit more actual dialogue, rather than just reporting of dialogue]
　　
One thing that occurred to me [comma?] as we stood there talking [comma?] is the way that people have that tendency to say 'Oh doesn't he look like his father!' (Or mother); but quite often this applies to the speaker's perspective. If [it] was someone who knew the mother then [the] point of reference would make it seem as though the child looked like her; and the opposite concerning the father applied.
　　
In truth I feel as though children look like both their parents and any predilection for one or the other is purely in the eyes of the observer.
　　
Anyway Sascha looked like his father.

Overall, I liked it and think that once edited it could be quite a readable story.

 

[tinkerdan]

Hi PM,

This is an interesting story and my first question was going to be what type it was-Novel, Novella, Short Story. Knowing it is a novella helps understand a few decisions in style.

It seems a bit odd to take the first person omniscient point of view. This is good for a narrator to a play when perhaps using that narrator to set things up. It becomes a bit more difficult when placing that narrator into the story because then you have the character looking into the camera or out at the audience as he explains things. This is part of the felling you get with this piece although its not until you get part way through and discover that this person is in the play and even then its not until he starts rummaging around in the head of the other characters and maintains him omniscient POV.

The biggest problem in reading this is that it lacks any sort of emotion, which maybe is a plot point at this moment; I don't know.

But as a character in the story I tend to expect more participation at some point and this sometimes means dialogue. And perhaps for this part and trying to pare the size down it became expedient to stay omni cent narrator even while interacting with the characters, but that loses much and I think dialogue from the characters to fill in the details might be helpful. It's a bit disconcerting to have a character in the story dig down into the head of another character to try to give definitive information that should only come from that person's emotions and actions and dialogue. With PM in the play now I would expect more intimacy within the characters and interaction rather than the distancing that we get by trying to reveal everyones thoughts through the first person character.

What I would expect more would be like this dialogue of Hamlet to Horatio.

"Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio; a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy; he hath borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how abhorred in my imagination it is! My gorge rises at it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft. Where be your gibes now? Your gambols? Your songs? Your flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table on a roar? "

Hamlet gives a lot of information about Yorick that is from his memory and his heart. It might not be an accurate representation of Yorick but it is one that contains feeling.

What we have below;

Its opulence was beyond any doubt awe inspiring, age might have lent the elder Baylechka the maturity to deal with it, but for a young man like Sascha, who knows how it might have appeared. He stood there a man in body, but in mind there was still that glimmer of youthful endeavour, eyes wide at the magnificence of his surroundings, everything a kind of magic

What we have here might be accurate information about Sascha but even though I should know better I wonder where this came from because this omniscient narrator/player is a great struggle for me as a reader.

Even so the where it came from is not as important as the fact that we miss the opportunity to put some of this in dialogue and get the real feeling that Sascha has about it.

This may be for economy of words to keep the size of the novella or it might be a plot point to keep the reader and the story distanced from each other at this point. I'm not really sure.

I think this could easily be fixed by placing much of the narrative into the dialogue unless it's necessary for the reader to know that PM has explicit knowledge of all of these things and it's more important that we know that than it is to get a feel for the characters; in order to move the story along.

Right now with PM as one of the characters you need to ask how important it is to have the reader see PM as god because that's how he reads here.

 

[BookerBrin]

Hello.

I have been drawn to have a look at your post here because you asked the question about how we should improve our writing as we age. I haven't read your previous piece, nor have I read the other critiques. Below are my initial reactions and opinions.

Well here it is, the 4000th post... again. It is the same piece. Honest. It might not look like it. But it is. Anyway, this is the result of my meddling. There is more that I would like to do with this opening segment but this is the first time I been through it and felt I had reached a stopping point.

It is a story that has happened before and will happen again.
　　
It stretches back through time and into the future. Through each collapse and rebuilding of civilisation it happens again. And again.
　　
A tale that I have been party to, one of tragedy, brilliance, hope, the shining light of the human spirit.
　　
Simply put it is Love. I do like this opening. It's as if the narrator is speaking directly to the reader as a storyteller. It has a literary ring to it, which, if it was my writing, I'd probably be more flamboyant with the punctuation and use some colons or semi-colons. I think I'd also replace the commas in the penultimate paragraph. (Just my opinion).

　　
Sascha Baylechka was a young man, who lived in Petersburg, the largest city on Ganymede, largest moon of Jupiter. He worked for his fathers retail business, nothing too special, although it was established, which made it successful enough. The highlighted text seems to repeat what you've just said. If the business was already established, then the reader can assume that it's successful. I knew of them, and while not quite a family friend, I would have been a welcome guest at their home. This last sentence works really well, both in terms of establishing the narrator/POV and their relationship with Sascha.
　　
Like so many others they had made their way to the Imperial Palace, the heart of the self-proclaimed Empire, Hosted there was a gathering of businesses from all over the solar system, from This run on sentence should have full stops where highlighted. small to conglomerates, they all moved around the hall doing business outside of business.
　　　　
I was at the convention on my own terms, as I had a minor title and thanks to the graciousness of the Empress I had a duty to take an interest in these kind of things. Being the owner of a small moderate moderately successful? I know the rules say you should stay away from adverbs, but not to the extent to which you change the gist of what you're trying to convey to the reader. business it was only right that I should have been there.
　　
I slipped over to the two of them, receiving genuine smiles for my trouble.
　　
The convention was taking place in the Third Great Ballroom, and I have to admit the art and imagination that went into the creation of the rooms of the Palace seemed to stumble and fall when it came to the names they had been graced with. How could a room, that had a glass floor, looking down into a undulating sea of liquid silver, which in turn reflected the lights above, shattering the colours of the people and their clothes, so that it appeared to be an ever changing display of colour, a molten rainbow; with walls that slightly curved outwards, not so much that you would consciously notice, divided into panels, each one a full painting, imaginative ideas of how the surface of Jupiter appeared, the ceiling was an array of multicoloured chandeliers, all hanging from a immense carving of the Roman god for which the planet was named - so how could such a thing be simply called ‘The Third Great Ballroom?’ I love this description. It's very intense and imaginative. However, the lack of full stops does make it a bit hard to read, even though I think your main concern is to fill in the details and still be able to ask the question at the end of all that. For me, I'd like more sentences and I still think you could make it work as a rhetorical question.
　　
Its opulence was beyond any doubt awe inspiring, age might have lent the elder Baylechka the maturity to deal with it, but for a young man like Sascha, who knows how it might have appeared. He stood there a man in body, but in mind there was still that glimmer of youthful endeavour, eyes wide at the magnificence of his surroundings, everything a kind of magic
　　
The massive chamber was filled with stalls, business women and men, mixing with nobility and investors, from the most successful, to those with only the gimmer of an idea, hoping for a patron. And moving amongst them were imperial servants, dressed in all their finery, providing refreshment and in some cases introductions. If there was something you wished to buy, be it obscure delicacies from who knows where, to impossible ray guns from the technicians of Phobos, then this was the place it could be arranged. This sounds like a place that you, as the writer, can see very clearly. It comes across in the richness of the description, and the array of characters.
　　
I had been to enough of these things to know how they worked.
　　
I talked to Vassily, the father and Sascha for some time. They were both of Ganymede, and their family was reputed to have been one of the first to come here. They were a good family, although touched by tragedy, but then in the cold eye of truth, whose family is never touched by such? And now, I'm intrigued.
　　
Vassily had lost his wife in an accident, leaving him two sons and a daughter to raise. Sascha, the oldest, but he had only been ten when they had lost his mother, his sister Natalia had been six, while the youngest brother, Richlieu only three.
　　
When I considered what Vassily had achieved, running and building a successful business while raising three children it was remarkable. The oldest boy had followed him into the business and worked hard to keep it going, allowing it to expand. The last time we had talked they had been considering opening a second shop. It might not sound like much, but for them it was the first step to a retail empire.
　　
Natalia, now twenty years old, was married with a daughter of her own. Her husband, was again, someone I knew well enough. He was a good man, and ran a small shop. To use an archaic term, he was a cobbler, quite a talented one at that. In the years to come he would merge his business with Vassily’s and that would.... but I digress that is another story all together. The narrator is extremely well conceived.
　　
Unfortunately Richlieu was considered to be the bad egg. It might not seem fair. He grew up with no real maternal figure after all, which probably meant there were all types of psychological issues running through him. But the cause was irrelevant: he was weak and that would lead him down too many dark roads. Introducing potential sources of conflict and obstacles, while keeping the issues real. I assume this is an introduction chapter of a longer piece? You are doing all the right things to encourage the reader to be drawn into the story.
　　
I talked with them. Not just about business, but their family, noting that Sascha had yet to find a family of his own. “I’m not sure,” he told me, “Of course I would like to settle down, maybe find myself a wife, but time eh? There just is not enough of it!”
　　
One thing that occurred to me as we stood there talking is the way that people have that tendency to say 'Oh doesn't he look like his father!' (Or mother); but quite often this applies to the speakers speaker's (as in the perspective of the speaker - singular) perspective. If was someone who knew the mother then point of reference would make it seem as though the child looked like her; and the opposite concerning the father applied.
　　
In truth I feel as though children look like both their parents and any predilection for one or the other is purely in the eyes of the observer.
　　
Anyway Sascha looked like his father.

I liked the writing style, (very 19th Century!) and I enjoyed reading this opening very much. The narrator comes across as reliable, but unpredictable in that as a reader, I felt that I would see everything from their point of view, and that while the narrator is an intelligent and perceptive, they would provide a narrow filter of the story they want to tell.

The main problem for me was the tendency to overuse commas in a paragraph. There are places when you need the narrator to take a breath and begin a new sentence. I've highlighted some of those places.

As I said, this is just my opinion, but I hope you find it useful.

 

[Perpetual Man]

A few more comments and thank you for them.

I am taking everything that has been said onboard, and will certainly not be leaving the story alone. A bit of a busy period coming up at the moment, but I will try and get something a little different together, and see how it fares.