I really liked “A Cure for Immortality. ” The characters were very interesting. I liked Athenais, because she seems very real. I like how you go against the grain, because usually, the main female character is usually pretty, and Athenais is no sex goddess. For example, “Most of the time, Athenais's tall, lean frame, short hair, and negligible mammary glands got her mistaken for a man—an ugly man—which was fine with her.” This description flowed with the rest of the story. It wasn’t like you decided, oh, I better tell them what she looked like. She is interesting because she’s a bad girl ---she likes to fight. For example, “Several psychologists could probably tell her exactly what was wrong with her, but Athenais had always put a gun between their eyes before they could finish.” It was her character that kept me reading. I like Giggles, too, because he has a light hearted name, but he is very serious-minded; this goes against what I expected which gives a fresh flavor.
You may want to take a look at the following sentence-- the only one I reread for clarity. I wanted to insert the word “it” after the word “though. ” : And, though was easy for Utopians to change their eye color, colonists usually did not have that luxury.
I know you are looking for criticism, but I didn’t find anything to criticize.
The words flowed, the introduction of characters was unobtrusive, great spelling and command of English, and the story is believable and one is able to be absorbed in another world very easily. Good luck. I hope you get published soon. That is what I am working on : )
This is my kind of story. It was very interesting to the end. There is such a fine line between reality and hallucination: On the one hand, it had to be a hallucination when Nancy starts to eat the corpse, so I wondered if it was a hallucination that Jackson killed Nancy. I have no idea of when Jackson killed Herman. I hadn’t noticed that Jackson had any violent tendencies. When Jackson turned himself in is when I realized he must have really committed the murders. Some foreshadowing of his violent tendencies may be warranted; tearing up the house looking for alcohol did not give me the impression that he could kill someone. Anyhow, the characterization of Jackson is believable. He lived or he once lived. Poor guy. I felt so sorry for him. I wanted him to make it.
The end …the confession: “ “My name is Jackson Bartholomew and I have hurt myself and others.” Nooooooooo. He is not healed. He is still deranged. I don’t think he should say something so level headed. I felt that I needed one more stab of passion. Such as, “I told them to leave me alone. Or “ I have killed all the monsters, now I’m going to be okay. Won’t I officer? Will I be better now? Have him laughing like a mad man, confessing his sobriety.
There is much of the story to like, but I really like the following paragraph:
I traced my hands along the pictures. Some still had parts of their story attached. I started to reread with my new soberer eyes. There they were, still the same, but they felt different too. Here was the child who burned down his parents’ house. There was the serial rapist blaming his crimes on some creature south of the border. Here was the junkie shooting up rubbing alcohol because he still couldn’t feel anything. There was the young French man who had lost his new wife in a Malaysian earthquake, simple, but he claimed giant spiders ate her and that was why her body was never recovered. They were all there. They were all the same. It was me that was different. I felt them. As if the wall was breathing with a life that it had garnered from all these scraps of life. I could feel the wall breathe. Its breath flowed into me and I could feel all the scraps; not just as stories, but as emotions.
Some sentences that are not clear:
1. Norm was not on duty today, but I didn’t recognize the young man who was either.
2. I had taken a yoga class once several years back, the instructor had been quite attractive, so I focused on my breathing. (Perhaps this does not work well here.)
3. Her t-shirt was a baggy old concert shirt from some one-hit-wonder band that I could not even remember how to hum their song(I would rewrite this.)
4. I had become covered like this had happened over a long period of time.
5. Nancy walked towards me on her two legs playing her fingers around her bloody mouth. (Maybe Nancy walked towards me playing her fingers around her bloody mouth is sufficient.
6. You weren’t really shocked and appalled, where you?
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