5/8/2012 c10 3Sayure
Really love the story and waiting for next chapter

5/6/2012 c10 Starlette420
So, I finally decided to read this through and it turns out I really like it! I guess you shouldn't judge a story by it's title eh? haha.

But yeah, really good, I wish calentine (sp?) would warm up to the general quicker. I think they are going to be an adorable couple. But I guess I understand since he was straight before all this happened. :D

So anyway, I'm really looking forward to the next chapter.

5/5/2012 c10 AsiaLisek
both fruuuuuuuustrating AND worthwhile the slooooowly building feelings between Cal and the General. Ugh.. Instant gratification is RARELY gratifying, so I'm hanging in here, hoping and waiting ever so patient like for the turning point. Yes! Patiently! Lol,

It's got to be 'cuz these characters of yours have such endearing quirks. Definitely.

Thank you!

Please keep at it! :D

5/4/2012 c10 Ranilyn
I like this chapter verrry much. :) And I'm so glad to hear that you are nowhere near the end! Forgive me, I'm just a greedy little reader here and I'm afraid I'm much too attached to Cale and Asotegi to let the story end here. Anyway, I love your frequent updates - I seriously do not know any other who updates as frequently and quickly as you do - particularly with exams around the corner because this is my favourite method to unwind.

5/4/2012 c8 Ranilyn
I think this is one of my favourite chapters so far! I love the relationship between Calentine and Astogei..think I spelled that wrong. _ I've got to waiT really like the way you pace the story - you don't rush the romance or the beginning but actually spend time to build things up.

5/4/2012 c10 xfffxfxfx
So this is a really long review. Most of it is spent on theoretical things, and then on things you can do better. I figure you already know what’s going well, so unless I feel moved to remark on it I probably won’t mention it.

Your grasp of characterization is really good. Cale is an interesting guy, and Asotegi especially is a complex figure. The two have a dynamic relationship that is entertaining and engrossing, and hold the story together. Everyone else is well characterized, people like Alim and Jara getting deftly sketched without belabouring anything. To be honest, the whole cast you’ve created and their interactions remind me a lot of the Wheel of Time. I think you can learn to do better with them, but you’ve definitely crossed the threshold, if you know what I mean. I feel like I am reading real, professional work.

Your establishment of setting is apt but perfunctory. I feel that you could do a lot more to establish mood and colour, especially. Your descriptions remind me of animations with low budgets, with their flat colours and low frame-rates. I think your world would come alive more if you spent some time on dynamic descriptions of place. What are the smells, colours, textures, temperatures, moistures? What does Cale feel about them, what do they bring to mind? Are they lonely, warm, lush, luxurious, austere, comforting, savage? Your world would be more sensually alive and impressive with just a bit more scene setting.

I feel that you haven’t really sunk into the characters’ emotions, especially Calentine. His emotional range seems to run from cocky to ruffled. Are we to believe that someone removed from everyone he knows, places among racist and uncomprehending strangers, suddenly committed to a life he never chose, would feel no extremes of sadness, anger, loneliness, suffering? You’re holding him back, and therefore holding back the emotional authenticity of the story.

All fiction sits somewhere between the extremes of realism and romance. At the very edge of realism it stops being fiction, becoming documentary. At the edge of romance it becomes so conventionalized as to be unrecognizable. Everything else is being pulled by these two tendencies, the romantic and the realistic, and has to find some kind of balance. The realistic tendency usually results in those novels with scrupulous attention to mundane details, where everything is carefully arranged to be plausible. But these stories still show patterns that the human mind imposes. The romantic tendency results in those wildly implausible stories that are frequently popular in any age – the ones involving mistaken identity, children picked up by the side of the road, unknown powers, capture by pirates. But even these stories are somehow rooted in their time and place.

I find that most of fantasy fiction grows out of the romantic tradition. The Arthurian tales, folk stories, horror stories, myths, all of these are romances and obviously have provided the inheritance of fantasy fiction. There seems to be a trend over the past few decades (noticeable in ‘Game of Thrones’ for example) towards the realistic, towards providing a plausible, rationally understandable society and story. So we come to understand our fantasy societies’ class structure, religious values, taboos, and economy as if it were a historical society.

I think most of the writers who’ve been doing this aren’t aware of the conflict (or tension, anyways) between the realistic and the romantic. They are probably just doing what comes naturally. But any step you take towards the realistic is one you take away from the romantic – every step towards depicting outward reality is one away from depicting inward reality. (I’m not saying outward and inward reality are incompatible, but that their fictional portrayal is). I’m not sure what you know of archetypes, but in essence they are some kind of fundamental figure, usually human. So, say ‘The Traitor’ is an archetype, ‘The Princess’ is an archetype, ‘The Foolish but Earnest Young Man’ is an archetype. Each of these things is a portrayal of something broadly and deeply human. The more generalized the archetype, the broader and deeper it strikes.

Obviously, like I was saying above, a realistic portrayal will have elements of the romantic; so a gritty realistic novel will have characters who fit into archetypes too. But the more the story pushes towards the romantic the more powerfully it evokes the archetypal. Psychological literary critics love to dig into folktales; they are a wealth of psychological insight. I read a very interesting article about how Aladdin was all about masturbation. A young man receives a lamp that swells when he rubs it; he has access to unlimited wishes (masturbatory fantasy trumping our real-world limitations); he loses the lamp after becoming happily married. This is just an example of how the implausible can be in actuality an apt portrayal of psychological reality.

Okay, so my point: your story seems to veer between these two tendencies willy-nilly. Sometimes you will pull out something very romantic, conventionalized, and archetypal, like your love-at-first-sight, your honourable warrior, your kingdom at war with itself, your ritualized combat-at-arms. Then you will throw something very realistic at us, like an explanation of an economic fact or social custom designed to have us believe your story is very plausible in its own way. A perfect example would be the history of the kingdom. These dzalin came over and conquered everything, which seems to point towards the vicissitudes of history in flux, a realistic portrayal. But then you set up a status-quo that seems to be more of a psychological situation, with two races warring within the bosom of one nation, one holding both political and magical (spiritual) power.

Your story will always have elements of both realism and romance, but there is a difference between tomato soup and chopped tomatoes. I feel like if you keep aware of this tension, you will be better equipped to navigate your fantasy world. Personally, I think you would do well to go all the way to folktale, throwing any semblance of plausibility out the window. But whatever you choose, I think being able to understand and use this will only make your writing stronger.

5/4/2012 c10 tmelange1
Calentine is very clueless. LOL He might not have enjoyed that massage, but I sure did. :)) Bravo!