What’s going on with the portal thing mentioned in the Synopsis?
The exact wording is “After the chaos, the political drama ensued, followed by the discovery of portals that brought deadly creatures.” As stated, it will follow the chaos and political drama; does that mean that it isn’t happening at this moment? No, it could be happening at this time and no one notices or it could begin in the future. It says discovery, meaning that it was previously unknown; it doesn’t say when the portals arrived. Deadly creatures coming out doesn’t mean people can or can’t go in; more will have to be revealed during that arc.
How will you do the political part?
The politics is unavoidable … I mean, if this is taking place in a fantasy world, or our world, there would be political drama. I’m going to focus less on the overall scene of the political battle and focus on what affects our protagonists themselves; I tend to write things from the character’s view as I write in 3rd Person Limited. Could there be news reports, youtube commentators, etc. that they end up watching? Sure, like any normal person would in their daily life when certain things affect them, especially for a big event like this that changes the scape of the world.
That being said, those of you that read ATM know that I try to stay pretty neutral and logical with my views on philosophy. I’m not going to calculate to slam or subtly drop a political agenda down your throat. Each of you can interpret what I write as you like, but I won’t try to spoon feed you ideology … this is a fictional verse, take out of it what you will. I try to do my research, and do my best to present things in a rational way … which the political sphere can be entirely opposed to (on ALL sides … a lot of mob mentality). So, my answer, that part of the story will be touch base as I develop some of the events our MC’s go through and how THEIR personalities and backgrounds connect to it.
Do you have everything all planned out?
No, how I generally write is with pillar events. My writing process: Imagine me being dropped into a virgin world (as some scene, plot, or character pops into my head). I take a look around and consider the different directions I could take, climb up a tree or small cliff, and start developing my tools to make the journey I marked out, be it an ocean paddle ride or hiking a snowy mountain. I’ve marked out a destination or pillar event I want to get to and begin my path toward it. On my journey, I’ll see another destination beyond that event and I keep pushing forward. It’s an adventure to me too as I forge the path and mark it for you guys to follow. =))
Will there be romance?
Yes, Kilala, haha, yes, you will get your romance. I’m sweating just thinking about writing a romance as I’m not practiced in the art of romance, but I’ll do my best. I tend to view writing romance in the long-term as I’m not a fan of the head over heels type most series go with; life is complicated and so are relationships. Just a heads up too, I don’t intend to write Yuri either, just not my thing—don’t flame me >.> you have your likes, and I have mine; no hate to you Yuri fans, just not my thing. Ironic since I mainly just write female characters … it’s a bad habit I’m trying to break. Romance, in general, hasn’t been my thing; I’ve usually written characters as more Asexual, but I’m going to give it my best shot!
Will there be Slice of Life?
Oh, absolutely, I have the tag there for a reason! I’ve mainly written Thriller like novels over the years (ATM and THC with a host of other series I haven’t published). However, I’m trying the Slice of Life approach with ATM recently and now TO. It won’t be action packed all the time as things start to settle down, but there definitely will be action arcs; the world has changed a lot, and there are a lot of things coming up. There will be our girls just trying to figure out how to live in this changed world and this world trying to figure out how to live with them.
Have you noticed your writing suffers from slow/fast pacing, too much/little emotion, repeated content, too much/little internal or external dialog, style sucks, characters are not human enough/too human-like, have something against men/write too many women, it’s not realistic enough, etc.?
Yes … I have received PM’s, comments, and reviews that throw everything under the sun at me. All of this is entirely subjective, and I’ve received comments and advice up and down the river (as you can tell); I don’t go a week without many contrasting opinions. People view the reviews/comments and see one that has a decent amount of upvotes or that they agree with, but I’ve talked to many of my fans and even had a poll on pacing at one point to try and address some of these complaints, which a vast majority told me it was fine and that it was a minority that thought as much.
For the number of people that view/review/rate/upvote/downvote novels, it’s usually those that are extremely happy with the novel or those that have some bone to pick that go to upvote/downvote or review/rate. I mean, the amount of people that have viewed ATM and not left a review/rating is massive in contrast as well. Those that are content tend to creep in the background and those that find fault or high enjoyment tend to voice it. I’ve taken every review and opinion seriously, which many of my readers have expressed that I shouldn’t, it’s my story, I should write it how I envision it. I can’t please everyone, and if I try then it will just make everyone angry, sorry if you’re not pleased. =[
Why can’t you release more often? Why did you go the web serial route? Why are chapters only 3k-5k word count and not more? Why aren’t you more like Pirateaba?
Sigh … many readers tend to forget that I don’t get paid enough to make writing a job. I work 70 hours a week and try to spend break hours and what little time I have off writing. Writing is surprisingly a time-consuming endeavor; I have to write it, think about the subtle details included, proof/edit it, take time to post it on all the sites I post to, then expect to fix a few things after posting as some of the more dedicated readers PM me about potential mistakes … you’d be shocked how much time is spent not writing to make a final product … that’s not even including the time to reply to comments/PM’s. Pirateaba only has one story, I have three, and because of my time constraints, I’ve had to put THC on hiatus since I just can’t dedicate the time to continue writing in it.
Short answer: I do what I can.
The military is too fast/slow/incompetent.
Think about this for just a moment; yesterday, less than thirty hours ago from the current time in the novel, the entire world changed, people of all positions in life. In the beginning, Rachel heard talk about internal strife as to if people with powers should be able to participate (chain of command issues). You have massive humanitarian efforts and policing being done on a large scale across the entire world; resources are extremely tight, even for a superpower like the U.S. It’s actually a wonder how they’re doing as well as they have, but I am by no means trying to downplay the military. There are just a LOT of factors that they’re dealing with externally and internally.
You make SEALs look like fools and idiots!
Imagine this happening, Martial Law being issued, everyone called to action; now you’re a SEAL team. Your command gets word that some gangsters are killing people and causing problems in South Beach and order you to take them out. This is no more than several hours after TO happened; you have no clue what you’re walking into, resources are extremely stretched with chaos happening everywhere.
These SEALs go in and are faced with people like Conner, grenades can’t bring him down, he can break any restraint, destroy steel crates with ease, move fairly quickly since Rachel noticed he was faster than most people, and gives our girl a run for her money in moonlight. Again, they know none of this while Terrell can spy on their command and locations without them knowing. Daran can teleport men to locations, including Conner. They have a shield user and a lot more ability users than you’ve already seen as the two grunts told the group there were fifteen ability users with them.
SEAL teams operate with sixteen members, only fifteen were rescued by Scarlet … where’s the last guy? It didn’t even look like they trusted Rachel and group, but simply let them go so they could do their thing. I’ve tried to think this through; they would have retreated, if they could, obviously, they couldn’t.
You make the gang too strong … I mean, pushing out the military?
As stated above, this has only been thirty hours or less since the event. Military ops take weeks of prep work; they had no idea what they were walking into with Terrell, but Terrell was preparing. Most of the gang were idiots, trying to play around with a tank (that the SEALs weren’t aware they stole), but they had powerful people on their side that just powered through, like Conner and likely Relica, but Terrell’s other ability users are nothing to scoff at either. Look at the Ice-man incident; a guy that can create an ice shield that can expand into a blizzard that freezes a ton of stuff. There’s a big gap between people’s abilities for some reason.
How would Terrell, some gang, hire someone like Conner?
Conner told Rachel that they never planned to stick around forever in South Beach, but were just playing around before heading out; Terrell had information he wanted. He also told Rachel that he’d known Terrell for a long time. Remember, Terrell was a sex trader, arms and drug dealer, etc. He’s not a good guy and ran a pretty successful gang, likely with the Cartel.
There’s so much language!
Yes, our resident gangsters do swear a lot, because that culture is RIFE with expletives; that’s not an exaggeration. Swearing or any kind of curse you do is also linked to certain reactions from an evolutionary biology standing, such as viewing a snake. It’s used as intimidation, warning, and many other emotions to express something which is also enhanced based on culture. Crap, butt-hole, etc. are no different than the meanings attributed, but given different levels of threat. I wanted this to be more realistic, so I forewent my usual standard to saying “He cursed” to actually expressing the curse. That is how the culture is.
You make the gang so evil…
Well, they’re involved in a lot of evil stuff and there are gangs like that in Miami, linked to the Cartel. If these people suddenly got a ton of power then they’d indulge in it and all their dark desires would flood to the surface. Power reveals the monster within people.
For instance, Hitler, if you read his speeches and study his life. He wasn’t that bad of a guy at first, but the people created him; he was a puppet for their desires. He had to shift his views and speeches to align with the people. The people were the ones that moved Germany, Hitler was just their mouthpiece and figure that they created. Terrell gave them the opportunity to do whatever they wanted, they took it, and if you were in the gang and didn’t feel right about it … well then, mob mentality, you’re not with us, you’re against us.
Rachel thinks too much in fights!
She has an ability that allows her to think at an accelerated rate … it would be stupid and inconsistent for her to not think strategically and to even be emotionally frustrated in fights. However, she’s also experiencing a host of other things that are contrasting within her. The pride, being self-critical, pondering her own emotional neutrality to murder, etc. She’s not okay either; there are a lot of issues compounding her mind.
You don’t describe the scenery that well!
Alright, I’m torn on this one. In ATM I go into a lot of detail about certain things, such as clothing (yup, haha, a lot of detail) and places like Sora’s suite. I also have to wonder how accurate I can be with 3rd POV Limited as people normally don’t focus on that kind of stuff. They’re more objectively minded (depending on the person). When I go into a room, I don’t notice everything right off the bat, I don’t need to. I just go into my room, see my blanket/bed and jump in to fall asleep. I don’t notice if a drink had been moved, one of my lights are out, or if I’m missing a drink in my beverage fridge. I most certainly don’t go into a room and see a chair and ponder the age, if it’s worn or not, or how many flaws it has. If it was 3rd Omniscient then sure, but Limited, people don’t normally study everything around them, they have things on their mind.
That being said, people do scan their environments to gain a general understanding of objective paths one can traverse safely in a glance. Pondering tiny details in their environment is a usual no though. Certain characters you’ll find notice more about their environment than others though.
What’s up with all four Mythickin being girls in the area?
Like I said, I’m working on my girl protag issue … surprisingly that was only pointed out to me two months or so ago. Yes, I have a problem with that it seems >.> my bad. However, there has been male Mythickin stated. You’ll learn more about the distribution of races later … again, it’s only been like thirty hours since the incident.
Your side characters aren’t the memorable … well, maybe the doctors.
Every character introduced has been for a purpose; I have no filler, none. Every chapter from Scarlet to Fiona has had massive plots introduced and every interaction/character had a purpose and will have later impact. However, people normally meet random people that you’ll never meet again in real life. I think most of the side characters are pretty decent so far though. Zoey, people love the cat-girls. The doctors, well, of course, you’d remember them, they were in a few chapters. The Green Berets, pretty memorable. Random people that were saved … seriously, you want me to slow down the plot to give them more life and screen time? They were there for a purpose and are fulfilling it (yes, present tense, future plots for them too).
You focus too much on characters instead of plot!
Plot … plot … everyone has a different term for it or what is the important plot. Character internal development is plot in itself, so are dealing with the gang, and helping the SEALs, and many many many other things. There are so many plots happening that I haven’t heard anyone even hint at catching yet. Especially with the side chapters that everyone seems to think are nothing but character development or sob stories … there’s plot in there for many future events too.
Author Note:
You will now be following Maria, Fiona, and Scarlet through their side of the engagement until Chapter 30 when Rachel will conclude Volume 1.
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