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So I've started having a go at a novel and while I haven't finished the first chapter yet, but I have some progress I was hoping for feedback on. Here's the premise for context: "The world of Erstea has long been ruled by a deity completely incapable of forgiving even the smallest of sins. Knowing that damnation awaits all, some try in vain to live perfect lives despite being imperfect beings while others abandon all hope at being moral and descend into depravity. It is likely this second faction that has provoked the god Valarsten to abandon his previous policy of no intervention and create a new perfect yet ruthless race in his image. While the merciless god does not assist these new Shining Ones or otherwise meddle further, the Shining Ones threaten to wipe out and replace humanity all on their own. In their way stands a strange band motivated either by heroism, desperation, or madness. An idealistic prince, a vengeful father, a hyper-racist slaver, a lesbian, an ambitious scholar, a cannibal, and a woman envious of the Shining Ones' seeming perfection are all going to have to stick together to survive - even if most of them hate each other."

And here's the writing itself: https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/354330929445208065/471417746262065160/The_Unforgiven_Test-ready.docx

 

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/414598897051238401/474668749971259412/The_Unforgiven_1st_draft.docx

First draft of Chapter 1. It is a download link.

 

Place-holder for Chapter 2. Do not reply.

There's just something about that term 'hyper-racist' that bugs me. Too modern, maybe? I was going to say the 'slaver' part already implied that but then I'm not actually sure what the basis for slavery is in your setting. You might also consider giving 'a lesbian' some other descriptive trait than just being a lesbian lol.

(And just a tip, you might want to post an excerpt directly into the thread. People here are traditionally too lazy to click things unless they're interest is piqued.)

What I've seen of the writing so far is pretty strong, although maybe just a teensy bit heavy on the adjectives. I think it may have been a mistake too starting it off with those paragraphs of background, especially the stuff about the prince when you're about to introduce him anyway and could just show all that.

An altered version of the paragraph that begins:

“Ballistae! Cripple those towers before they reach us!” Called out Prince Mirten, warming to the task of command. How hard could leading troops really be? He thought to himself.

...that highlights just how naive and green he is and maybe has some direct reactions from the soldiers would be a more interesting way to introduce the situation, and you could splice in whatever actual exposition is needed after that once the reader of a bit more hooked and wanting to find out how everyone got in this situation. (I'd also question if all these people really would have gone into battle without realizing who their commander was.)

Spotted a few typos and there are some persistent issues with punctuation dialogue (the usual ones everyone has) but I'm not going to attempt to get into that from my phone. Someone might be able to link you to other threads... I think one of Corgi's in the CC was one... where I explained how that works.

One thing I'm also curious about in this setting is how everyone knows so much about this god. He doesn't seem like he's be an especially chatty sort. Or are we just getting the characters' understanding of it all, which may not be 100% at this point in the story?

Alright, thank you. I'll be sure to take it all into consideration. Slavery in the setting varies from society to society with some lacking it and some going full Dixie. I fully agree that the term "hyper-racist" is something that should never be used in-story as it is a modern term meant to describe the character outside the story to a modern audience and I promise to give the lesbian additional description once I flesh out the character beyond a joking nod to one of my friends.

As for the start, I've heard conflicting opinions on that. Interestingly enough, I've also heard someone complain that it was too sudden. Definitely something to consider once I get the raw material through and start hammering it into a more presentable shape. It is indeed a bit of a plothole that they didn't realize he was their commander.

As for how folks know so much about Valarsten, I'm trying to work that out. Something that folks don't commonly know in-universe is that Valarsten only became the one deity a few centuries ago by being the last one standing. The dead of the last few centuries aren't a problem because they're securely in this universe's equivalent of Hell, but dead folks beyond that are often cranky and dangerous since the equivalent of Heaven was emptied out and a lot of em didn't wind up in not!Hell. It's not all of em, otherwise the world would be overrun, but ancient places full of death are not a safe place to be. I'm considering the possibility that when Valarsten took power, the knowledge was burned into humanity's ancestral memory and passed down. Or perhaps (inspired by the way Christians say they feel God's love), humanity can just feel Valarsten's hatred.

Well I wouldn't go as far as calling the commander thing a plot hole, or at least it's nothing that can't be fixed by slightly changing a sentence so not too much of a worry there.

I don't know what speed you write at or if you're one of those people that gets super nitpicky with every sentence or what, but whatever the case you have a clear and approachable style, all the issues I brought up are the kind of detail stuff you'd want to look at in a final draft and so for now I'd say just focus on throwing the words down and moving the plot along.

Gotta say though I really like the whole mythology you've got going on there and especially the bit about just intuitively feeling Valarsten's wrath. I'd love to see the ramifications of that explored. (Would the holy symbol of the god that fucking hates you burn like a cross does to vampires?) Seems like infanticide or just choosing not to have kids at all might also be a widespread thing and you'd have all kinds of cults popping up or people just going nuts if they think about how hopeless the situation is.

What is the actual goal of the quest and how do they ultimately win this? From what you've told us, raising up or waking up a new god or however that works or else convincing Valarsten to have a change of heart seems like it might be more practical and a better fit thematically than a group of plucky adventurers swording all the Shining Ones to death.

Thanks for all the lore suggestions, they seem like good details to include. As for their goals, it's step-by-step. Their first order of business is to survive. After that, they're going to have to search for a way to do something about Valarsten and the Shining Ones. I've already decided that they way to go about that is to bring back the other gods who were around before Valarsten wound up as the last one standing. Said gods really have an ax to grind since they died because Valarsten managed to turn them against each other and then picked off a weakened "winner" or two.

Oh, and speaking of mythology, Valarsten was originally the God of Hatred and from another world where he was the son of that world's God of Vengeance, but was exiled due to his tendency to start feuds where there were none to the point where even his father grew sick of him. Upon moving to Erstea, Valarsten rebranded himself as the God of Punishment in order to have an excuse for his complete lack of forgiveness for even the smallest of transgressions and started working on sowing the seeds of hatred among the other deities to turn them against each other. Another mythology thing is that the Children of the Smoking Plains (not!demons) can snatch the souls of Shining Ones that burn to death not through their own power, but because the dead gods are trapped with them in the Smoking Plains (not!Hell) and can exercise that little bit of spite.

@Zake may be interested in milking this thread for commendations helping Mardox with his story.

Just as I was about to start writing my own thing too... also, milking threads for commendations, sadly, does not work, as most the time after a single post (if it is commendable) you will not get any more from the same thread (unless you really do something amazing). Maybe if I throw in a few super broad paragraphs, then split the final thing in two, I could snatch a extra commendation... but reviewing stories still seems like the best method...

With that said, I have accepted that I won't be getting a very large sum of commendations any time soon, so responding to these sorts of threads is more done to help myself think about writing and what not (and hopefully help the poster too).

I try to avoid reading threads where the author explains or writes a lot about their world, since if they have a cool idea, I won't be able to use it, but by not reading it, if on the off chance I come up with a similar idea, I won't feel bad about using it since I actually came up with it!
However, I have somewhat recently realised that this is a stupid way to go about things, so eh.

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General Feedback

It doesn't seem like you are looking for any feedback in particular, so after having read what you have so far, I offer this general feedback:

• I disapprove of the file name, and the font. Also for some reason I didn't realise it was a download link. Anyway, pretty sure this is just preference (under these circumstances at least), specially the font thing. Guess I'm just to used to the 'default'.
• As a more serious point, this looks good, has the potential to be great even. Main hurdle will be writing it all up, then proofreading to polish it up.
• I like the pacing, you also weave in exposition without stopping things from progressing. This is great and I'm hoping you can keep it up. With that said, as long as things are well written length won't matter too much (talking about scene length btw).

Story Circumstance

I will just ask questions now, but note that I don't think these things are glaring flaws or anything, just something I want you to be aware of. It would ultimately be up to you to decide if these things should be changed or not, but I'm really doing this more as a thinking exercise (and trying to poke your story into pieces).

So tell me... how old is Mirten's father? Because Mirten being the heir, yet being left behind on what is basically a suicide mission, I imagine the father can't be that old? Since if he is, I imagine the king making his last stand and passing the ruler ship onto Mirten would have been better. Granted, I'd say there are a few good ways to explain this away, but I'm curious if you can.

Here is another, if the God of Hatred is the son of the God of Vengeance, does that mean Vengeance existed before Hatred? Also, if a god of hatred worked to make all the gods hate each other, shouldn't the god of love worked to make them all love each other, and thus balance it out? You can literally give any answer here and it will be acceptable, btw, seeing as this is your story.

Overall

Oh please keep writing, there is definitely potential here, but if you don't write it then that is all it is, potential. You seem to have the ability to write well, so all you need to do is write! You can polish it up later, so don't worry about it not being perfect or anything like that. This is a strong beginning, in my eyes, but I am probably not the person to ask (as I really struggle with starting works myself).

TL;DR
Looking good, keep writing! You seem to be on the right path, and so far I find the writing engaging. I'm also curious about how you'll handle so many major characters, but that is something for another time (*cough**cough*). Anyway, good luck, and I hope you got something useful out of this!

P.S. How nice is that list, right? xd

P.P.S. I'm experimenting with modifying my writing style, tell me if it's shit (this goes for anyone who reads all this).

I can't read this right now but good job, this was very helpful and thought provoking, probably!

Thank you for your input, I'll do my best to answer your questions.

First, I should probably clarify that Mirten is not the heir. He's a prince, but not the crown prince. His eldest brother (along with his other siblings) did not volunteer and while his dad is getting kind of old, he still wants to pass on some lessons/wisdom to his heir before making a last stand.

As for the God of Vengeance, he's also the god of Oaths and Wrath. Hatred existed since the beginning, but Valarsten was the first deity to really take to it and be a god of it. His father Naren is the God of Vengeance, Oaths, and Wrath, sure, but he's more about getting even (or more) for offenses that are notable enough to merit vengeance. Meanwhile, Valarsten can't let even the smallest thing go. I'm considering the possibility that he's also the God of Obsession.

Also notable is that the world of Erstea where the story takes place is not the world that Valarsten is originally from. He hails from a world called the Felridge full of magic and home to rather powerful deities but was exiled because the gods of that world - including his father - were fed up with his trouble-making. He arrived at Erstea as a stranger claiming to be a god of punishment and justice. The deities of Erstea accepted him, he bid his time for a while and then his first scheme was to murder the love deity and pin it on someone else.

I really like all this background lore, I'm hoping you have a good way to get it across to the characters planned, as in actually getting to meet some gods who can explain what happened I suppose.

Background lore's a bit of a habit of mine. Back when I was having a go at Mardox's story, I got so caught up in world-building that I didn't get very far into the actual story. This time around, I'm going to try to have a bit more of a balance, but I do plan to sprinkle in a little lore here and there in the story.

Ah, makes sense. I'll avoid asking more questions, as it is clear that you have this thought through pretty well, and as such I'll wait for more of the writing to sate my curiosity (rather than just asking directly).

Definitely curious about how the story will shape up, as you do seem to have a rather big scope (gods and different worlds etc), and so (once more) best of luck!

Actually, you're welcome to keep asking questions since I made some of that up on the spot to answer you.

Hmm, in that case... a few more can't hurt.

1. Are there deities for everything, or just some things?
2. Are some worlds deities just better than those of other worlds? Since one got exiled to another world, but those deities already in that world didn't seem to know that Hatred was forced to go there, so are they weaker? Or do they also exile people to other worlds?
3. How long have the Shining Ones been trying to kill humanity? Since if it is a really long time, I wonder how humans haven't died out yet.
4. Do cities often get burned when Shining Ones are inside? You'd think they would stop rushing in so much if the cities just get burnt all the time.
5. How attracted is fire to the Shining Ones? Say it is night, do Shining Ones use torches? Or will the torches attack them? If they do, how do they handle moving around during the night?
6. Will you ever explore what the Shining Ones are like outside of their hatred for imperfect humans? Like, do Shining Ones play games, and farm fields, and what not? Do they even eat?
7. Does the devil exist in your setting? Pretty sure one of your characters uses devil in a curse, so I'm wondering if that is just so that it is easily understandable to audiences, or if it is actually something deemed really bad.

I'll leave you with these for now. You might notice that I sort of started with one question, then went to similar questions (barring the last one, which is a disguised nitpick).

Oh wait, here is one more: How's the writing going? (And no, I don't expect you finished it all or anything crazy like that, but just curious if you made progress in one form or another since starting the thread).

1. Just some things.

2. Yes, the Felridgean deities are particularly powerful. While Valarsten couldn't take on all the other deities at once, he did defeat the last couple at once.

3. A few decades now. It's been a bitter fight and humanity's barely hanging on with even powerful nations such as Mirten's having to become refugees.

4. No, folks are reluctant to burn down their own cities since deep down, many of them hope that one day, the cities can be retaken. Every once in a while though, someone resorts to extreme measures.

5. Very attracted. The Shining Ones do not use torches but they literally shine and have other ways to cook their food.

6. Absolutely.  The Shining Ones have perfectly ordered societies full of knowledge and productivity with no crime whatsoever, but they're missing some things. It's a utopia but it lacks a lot of the things that make us human such as free will, humor, joy, creativity and so on.

7. Perhaps. I didn't really give it much thought but it's certainly worth considering.

8. I'm a slow writer, but I've got a bit more done. I'll get more done today, but first I have to prepare something for D&D on Sunday.

Sorry for the bump but @Zake @mizal thanks for giving me inspiration with your questions/musing about devils, deadly holy symbols, and cults.

I was cooking up a bit of lore and for starters, holy symbols of Valarsten burn humans pretty badly and while it's not always fatal, it can be. However, with a difficult process involving magic and the bones of someone Valarsten doesn't hate (a child too young to have sinned or a Shining One), one can create gauntlets that allow the user to safely wield a holy symbol and since Valarsten hates almost all intelligent life, the holy symbol becomes a potent weapon as it allows the user to channel the god's wrath against any creature capable of thought (and even some monsters) except for a Shining One. The effects are potent enough that some nations consider using it on another human to be a war crime. Now, this led me to think about what a holy symbol of Valarsten would look like. I ended up going with a wrathful eye gazing out of a stylized sun and decided that folks in the world of Erstea believe that Valarsten watches the world through the sun (he doesn’t actually) and looking at the sun hurts your eyes not just because of the bright light, but also because Valarsten is looking back and a staring contest with him isn’t going to end well.

After that, I thought of the implications of associating the sun with the god that hates everyone and immediately thought of cults springing up to worship someone/thing associated with the moon since it’s pretty much the opposite of the sun. Then it occurred to me that the moon is generally perceived as weaker than the sun and I drew inspiration from the Aztecs who practiced human sacrifice because they thought it would give their gods the additional strength needed to prevent the apocalypse. The moon cultists believe that their “deity” is strengthened by human suffering and human sacrifice. This was already seeming pretty devilish but earlier when I was tinkering about with the holy symbols, it occurred to me that werewolves would be harmed by holy symbols and I considered having them actually be demonic creatures descended from the ruler/spirit of the Smoking Plains (the equivalent of Hell).

With that, the link between the moon and the ruler/spirit of the Smoking Plains was solidified. The moon cultists believe that all the bad stuff souls go through in the Smoking Plains is a necessary evil to give the Lady of Suffering (additional titles include the Moon Queen, the Devil, and the Lady of Woe) the strength to defeat Valarsten and free humanity. Admittedly, I haven’t thought of a proper name for the Moon Queen yet because I’m bad with names but I’ll get to that.

Glad you're still working on this, the mythology is shaping up to be pretty interesting and unique. Just get those chapters out, world building is like my favorite thing but gotta get the scenes down to make it all matter. That's the less fun but more necessary part I'm always struggling with.

Making decent progress on Chapter 2 but I'm worried it's a little lore-heavy and college started on Monday.