Starling Roundup Post
Added 2023-12-29 21:22:31 +0000 UTC
So... I don't love it, but I think it gets the vibe. It won't be the book cover, so I thought I would share it with you all.
I hope you enjoyed the first five chapters of Starling. Right now, I'm aiming at a 20 chapter book, roughly 100,000 words. On the low end of average for a fantasy novel. So for an end of year treat, you got a quarter of a book!
What I would like to ask the audience for now is feedback. Were there things you really liked? Didn't like? Made you stop reading? Made you want to read more? This book is pretty far from my usual wheelhouse, so I would really appreciate hearing your reactions.
Thank you,
Warby
Comments
it is nicely self indulgent. the cityscape is wild together with the mc. both the comic and more serious moments were creating an atmosphere. something of a criticism is when you try to sneak in a tell piece where you instruct the reader how to judge a character or a social injustice. I;d prefer the pure stream of conciousness which goes through the city and interacts with the world. PS: I've just reading the perfect run and I feel a similar vibe here. good work overall.
gostsamo
2023-12-30 06:29:36 +0000 UTCTo follow up my last post. This infinitely vast disconnect between lived experience comparatively between the MC and the reader leads to in my opinion, a very real sense of dread and incomprehension underlying the narrative which absolutely nails the Lovecraft theming.
mark harrell
2023-12-30 05:40:32 +0000 UTCI really enjoyed it! You have a talent for *implication* that really shines through both in Slumrat and here. You really get a sense that the absolutely deranged shit he says and does isn't coming out of nowhere in a *holds up spork* randumb manner which most "insane" characters end up as. I don't even really think he is actually crazy if you think about it. It comes across as he has been in this loop for so long that everything he can possibly perceive in his environment he just has so much history with that its impossible to engage with any one thing without making connections to -even though it appears to the observer as complete nonsense and nonsequitur - a perfectly reasonable comparison or point that originates from experience.
mark harrell
2023-12-30 05:36:58 +0000 UTCReally enjoying the story, the varied setting elements give it a unique feel too, and is a bit of a breath of fresh air rather than "slightly souped up fantasy world #21"
Silveredgallium
2023-12-30 02:02:55 +0000 UTCI've liked it. I was worried that the chaotic style would get old over a web-serial-length story, so hearing it'll be closer to a typical novel in length is good news to me.
Al
2023-12-29 22:06:18 +0000 UTCYeah, this cover would not make me think I was going to get anything quite as wild and funny as Starling has been so far. Actually, the thing that feels closest to the vibe is Phil Foglio's comic book adaptations of Robert Asprin's Myth Adventures series. Those sorts of cluttered, wildly chaotic cityscapes that contained an untold variety of people and scenes vibe heavily with the world you've created. As far as what I've liked; the wildly varying cityscape filtered through our protagonists' cracked perspective is really what's sold me on the whole excursion. He's not likeable, quite, but he's well and truly down the rabbithole and I want to see what happens next. The way you keep a throughline of personality even as he clearly doesn't remember most of what he's done or how long he's been doing it is impressive. The whole excursion is really riding on feel. The fact that those 5 chapters counted as a "normie run" continues to amuse. I'm kind of glad that this is going to be a fairly short story, though. Getting one arc of his journey is probably going to be plenty. It all tastes fresh right now, but a loop story is can't last forever without becoming a different sort of beast. This sort of fresh experience will wilt if he keeps going back to the same places and doing the same things.
MrHrulgin
2023-12-29 22:04:37 +0000 UTCIMO it's shaping up to be the best time loop story since Mother of Learning
rwn
2023-12-29 22:01:28 +0000 UTC
