The Review Club Forum Discussion for CC's Monsters C..

This is the place to respond to reviews and for general discussion of CC's Monters Chaps. 1-3.

Chrissie,

Thank you for the review. I'm glad I made it past the first read from you and am not crazy for thinking it's almost ready. I also appreciate the specific little things to look for - that's where I am in revising these chapters, so it was very helpful.

Thanks again,

-cc

Jeff,

Thank you for the kind review. I imagine this was quite something different after The Things You Wanted. (I'm a genre chameleon... sorry.)

I tend to agree with your assessment of the transition in chapter 2. Yes, it is a flashback, and that needs to be clearer - much, much clearer - which I think I can do. I think you may be right about the elipses as well.... (although I can't seem to stop using them in internet talk either). At some point in the revision I realized they were a problem and started to 86 them, but I'll have to ferret the unnecessary remainder out, especially the mess of them before I had that flash of realization.

As for the questions about the nature of the creatures in this story... I have a personal aversion to using the word "vampire" for some reason or another. In some sense, I think all the clues are there for the existing genre audience, but I may need to be more explicit as well. One of the dichotomies that runs throughout the entire novel is physical versus emotional power. Amanda has the physical power over Job... and over many people... but the Conways have a great deal of emotional power (and, in the case of Mitchell, a lot of physical power too). I wonder if you see that setting up at all, or if the idea sounds good, or whatnot.

I'm also curious about your impression that the doors themselves were colored - they aren't, at least, not in my head. Rather, the rooms beyond the doors are decorated in particular color schemes, hence the verbal shorthand for the rooms. If you wouldn't mind, can you point to the area that gave you that impression so I can fix it? PLEASE?

As for the beauty... part of that is a metaphor for immortality. Part of it is genre. The rest of it is, honestly, plot. Amanda has to have a reason to have an immediate response to these men, and they need a reason to consider her. The idea of beauty gets kicked around more, later, when Amanda is forced to reconcile the reasons for her attraction to Job and how that is related to her attraction to Mitchell, and in the sense of humanity versus inhumanity. Does knowing that those themes run deeper allay some of your concerns? Similarly, would knowing that the onion-like layers of these characters start to be peeled back as the story progresses, hopefully to the point where the physicality of the characters receeds into the background, resolve concerns? I genuinely want to know if this appears as a problem to you as an indication of a problematic thread throughout the story or something that gives you a nasty taste even if it improves.... I hope that makes sense.... (More elipses! I gotta get them out somewhere....)

Thank you again Jeff. Obviously you've given me a lot to think about.

-cc ::cool::

CC I was curious is Monsters a working tittle or are you commited to it?

C -
I must've wrongly assumed about the colored doors. I'll have to go back and reread. You know me, always seeing a red door and wanting to paint it black. Surely there's something Freudian in that.

I do like the thoughts of physical power vs. emotional power, if I get what you're saying. And you are correct, a strong natural beauty is the norm in this genre. Maybe I didn't get so much of a sense of Amanda's, here, but I understand it being difficult to judge against Mitchell's and Job's. I think dealing with the transitions would make a great deal of difference.

And I also like you not trying to immediately name what sort of monster everyone is - reminds me of a couple of Ellis books.

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Anthony,

Pretty committed. Why? (My only concern is the closeness to "Monster" - a movie with no resemblance to the book.)

-cc

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Definitely something Freudian....

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So, as long as those themes continue to develop, etc., do you think the first chapters do enough, or is there too much left unsaid to keep the reader?

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Well, that's quite a compliment.

Thanks Jeff,

-cc

Joe,

Thank you for the review and welcome to the group. Good points, which I will take into account when I edit this on a final level. As for the flashback transition - yeah, I know, I know.

-cc

Anthony,

Thank you for your comments. A lot of them are very on point and helpful. I especially appreciate the notes on repetition. It's easy to miss those things from one paragraph to the next. And yes, I'll fix the flashback transition. Otherwise, I'm glad you enjoyed it. As for more chapters... I don't know. They may be sporadic, problem chapters, chapters with a lot of changes, that kind of thing.

Kim,

Thank you. So many of your edits (especially those messy, dangling modifiers) are very helpful. I think you're right about shortening the sentences in the action scene. Otherwise... can you be more specific about why the first paragraphs (the driving, I presume) don't work for you? I'm getting crazy mixed signals on this....

-cc

C,

Maybe if you could give me more of a sense of Amanda's power, I might follow better? What if she does effectively control Job, at first? It would be easy to allude, as you do well already, to this control unraveling. I even think this tenuous command of the situation would add even more tension. Right now, I feel Job has no qualms doing whatever he wants which is less suspenseful to me - more a matter of turning the page and seeing, like Paddington Bear, what sticky situation he gets himself into. I have no idea why I felt so compelled to toss Paddington's name into that last sentece. Maybe I'm hungry for marmalade. Maybe I think all hats are really penises. Why would you listen to me in the first place?

The only thing that didn't work for me about the driving scene is the longer sentences. It didn't portray the action right. Other than that, I think it works fine. It draws the reader into the scene.

I was thinking about that movie also. But the more I thought about it the more I liked the tittle. So never mind :)

Having just finished my review of Monsters, and then read the other reviews and all the above comments, I have just a few things to say:

I thought the whole first chapter was gripping, including the driving.

I didn't think the doors were colored. I've been watching the White House long enough to know there are Blue rooms and Green rooms.

Finally, two reviewers misspelled what has become the newest favorite term in the American lexicon. When I first heard talking heads using it relentlessly, perhaps a year ago, I thought it referred to a two-wheeled vehicle people drive standing up. I scoured the dictionary until I unlocked this secret word. One reviewer spelled it "seg way" and another "sedge way." As we use it, the word dates from around 1913 and is spelled SEGUE.

Big ups, Triple Dub, that little misspelling was irking me, too, as all of us writers experience those strange frustrations a literary misstep seems to cause, only to excuse our own as just being human. I love talk radio and have been bombarded with that word for a long time.

And yes, looking back, it is the rooms that are colored and not the doors. That only slightly changes my impression, though, that the colors are more of a device. Not saying they aren't needed, just trying to salvage what my cracked psyche was trying to express.

Jeff/Bill,

Whew. How ridiculous it would look if the doors were colored. As for the colored rooms themselves, at the moment, Jeff, you're right, it's a device for differentiation. I think, however, that the colors are, in their way, reflective of the characters, both in that Mitchell chose to decorate his house this way, and in the colors that Amanda and Job choose. I'm not sure if this detail really matters one way or another, ultimately though....

-cc

Yea, C, I apologize so much time was spent on whether Mitchell is a decent decorator. Although I do have some ideas for his foyer ...

Oh, yeah, ideas for his foyer? Let's hear them then....

-cc ::drool::

Well, I think he has flow problems. What if he entertains? Does he entertain? I feel people will end up being crowded around the staircase and have to constantly move out of other people's way. That's the sort of thing that really sticks in the mind of the undead voter.

Jeff--

He doesn't entertain at his home, in fact. He entertains elsewhere. Does that resolve your issue?

-cc

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You think the vampires VOTE their leader into power? Pft. LOL.

-cc