Contest Lustria-Online Short Story Contest April-May 2015 Contest Poll

The southern heat at #2 for me but I just loved 'around the fire'

 

Another comp, another great batch of entries. I make the assumption that there must have been at least a couple of new authors this time, and I can tell the noobs that they can hold their heads up proudly. I shouldn't be surprised whenever I get to see the originality and cleverness that lies (mostly) dormant in the Jungles of Lustria. But I am. As I did the first read through of the entries I said to myself over and over again, "I wish I could have thought of that!"

I could make a general comment again about posting a draft to check formatting on the forum server, and doing a last read-through out loud, and the challenges of English grammar for non native speakers - but I hardly need to. Compared with last time, the level of polish was noticeably higher. It is like we are... learning. Maybe we are evolving. This is no surprise, given that the "End Times" story indicates that Lizardmen invent space flight BEFORE the wheel.. That's pretty advanced, IMHO.

Lustriapedia is going to need a stack of new entries - there were a stack of unfamiliar LM items and terms, many of which were no doubt there to provide colour rather than advance the plot. I would love to know the definitions / back story of the following items. Maybe after the authors are revealed you can all tell me.
Istari
Sporange
Fabridon
Potec
FangGrove tree
Saurosaur
Spineburl tree


Completely Anonymous Sequel

Characters? There seemed to be some recycling of characters from other classic literature. It begs the question, if parody of a serious work is not a breach of copyright, what if it is parody of a parody? I feel like someone should be lawyering up, but I'm not sure who.

Plot? There might have been one, but I get the feeling that the narrative structure was really a vehicle to pack in as many lame jokes as possible. I've got no problem with that. Aside from the "One Theme" being NOT chameleons, the other theme at work was "averted expectations". The author set us and his characters up to expect certain things to happen and then pulled a switch at the last minute. I came here for a no one expects the Spanish Inquisition.

Resolution? As noted by the very sensible and never silly Scalenex, it did tail away without a real ending. I'll give it a bit more credit, though. It was the fault of the (now well established one dimensional) characters. I expect we will see them again, and I expect there will continue to be no resolution.


Final Entry


Delivery? The diary entry was a very clever and efficient way to get straight into the perceptions and feelings of a character. This couldn't have been done with 3 times as many words of regular dialogue.

Set Up? I hate agreeing with Scalenex, but the whole this being a final letter to his brother and his brother being a Chaos convert could have been clearer. I understood, but it might have benefitted from the kind of emphasis that Scalenex cited. Also, the brother effectively put the protagonist in the position of needing to go on the Lustria trip because of closed doors back home. The character could have put that point a little more strongly - even though he has come to his brothers nihilistic world view at the very last, that is no reason not to make bro feel guilty about it (assuming he is still capable of feeling it)

Description? The horror of the unseen killers and the contrast against seemingly innocuous birdsong - brilliant. If this were my story (and I wish it was) I would probably retouch the first line "I fear tonight may be my last. I feel them watching me." into "I fear tonight may be my last. I can hear them" I would do this because it would link more strongly with the bird song explanation later.


Business Raptor in the Realm of Chaos

Concept? I feel like I went to the wrong forum. ("Disturbing Tales for Children" is the bookmark right beside L-O on my web browser) So unexpected, so much fun. So much hard work!

Pooetry? Possibly, but I've seen a lot worse masquerading as educational content for small children. This is likely to do the little ones harm for entirely different reasons.

Effort? My cartoon pipeline is usually about a week. It can be longer with a complex image with a lot of separate elements. This work was not produced on a whim. It was a well planned, orchestrated and executed operation aimed at subverting the story competition and possibly the forum as a whole.


The Betrayer

Setting? I like that the chameleon was out of his natural territory and forced to deal with inconveniences like hot surfaces and shadows.

Factual Errors? Having orcs worshipping something other than Gork (or possibly Mork) seems odd, but it makes sense. Also, I don't know my geography too well so I don't know if there are volcanoes (and greenskins) close to Hexoatl. I'll let that one go. BUT

Obviously the author had never read this thread.

Character? This guy was relatable in that he had humanlike emotions (risk taking, regret, fear of failure) which we would have shared with him in similar situations. Then he was more than that with his non human skill set and response to the challenges he faced.

Resolution? Did the Shaman die? Does the chameleon die? It bugs Scalenex but I'm not sure it matters to the story anyhow. The orc story was a metaphor for the struggle of the chameleon with his shadow. A metaphorc, if you prefer. The character got what he wanted which was a second chance.

BTW, I think that shaman is screwed. Sotek's blessing double tap at close range = chameleon skinks for the win.


The Southern Heat

Setup? Gosh. It started out like any other Pollyanna-style happy-ending producing story about successful treasure hunters who visit Lustria for fame and fortune. However, the setup for the surprising plot twist (Spoiler Alert - everyone dies) was in the first line. Not until a page later did we find out that stupid Roderick's stupid talisman brought disaster on the whole expedition. The set up was so subtle that it didn't stick out AND it was memorable enough that we could remember it later when it mattered. That was a slick bit of crafting.

Style? I award 3 million style points to the author for engineering the captain making a temporary scaly friend by accidently invoking the name of Sotek. (I'm sure it extended his breathing days by at least one).

Description? The human's PoV on kroxigor and the chameleons did a great job of capturing the horror of all of the doomed ones who would raise their feeble hands against the might of Lustria. They are like babes who cannot learn for themselves. They must be schooled with harsh lessons until they...what? Oh yes. Sorry. The descriptions were OK.

What Scalenex said? I too would like to know more about the expedition and the force organisation. The captain must have had at least one previous successful tour, and yet he came back. Sounds like a bit of a fail from his welcoming committee that time. Liking to know more and needing it to fill out the story are different. The author gave enough to satisfy the needs of the story and give a nice poetic ending, and he / she left out enough to make me wish he will write more in the future (hint). That's a good balance.


Chameleons in the City of Mists

WTM? We've had lizards pretending to be humans, lizards pretending to be educational for tiny tots, and lizards pretending to be rocks. Now we have ?????s pretending to be priests?????

Too mean? From line 2 we knew this wasn't a regular priest. From the 5th paragraph we knew he wasn't a lizard. What was he? He didn't seem to be a daemon and nothing else made sense. The author made us wait until the last line for the reveal. Making us wait so long was mean. I will assume the author did more research than I did, but this brief discussion about Fimir is worth a read. http://www.lustria-online.com/posts/117534/

Po-tay-to / Po-taa-to? Tlaztopozi suddenly became Tlaxtopozi. Then he suddenly became a balefiend. Maybe the spelling change was evidence that his glamour was slipping...

Description? I enjoyed the perspective on LM religious culture, and it is thought provoking to think about how much is ritual rather than useful after 8000 years with no divine guidance. The Old Ones will come back to their faithful and say, "You did WHAT with clams? We said "don't be selfish, not don't bleed shellfish!"

Plot drivers? There was a lot of cool in this but the connection between events could have been made a bit logically tighter. You killed chiefs therefore we must accelerate the plan thereby risking complete failure. (then the plan goes off without a hitch). This might be the temple where the most important plaques are hidden. (Oh, here they are. That was lucky!) I must read all the plaques in order to find the hidden details. (Aha this one is titled "secret plans here. If you are evil please do not read).

It might not have been possible in the word limit, but I would have liked the Fimir to overcome a few more obstacles and possibly have a ticking Slann Bomb adding some pressure to the narrative urgency.

WTM again? So, Kaleroc the Bouncy Balefied is going to escape how?


Around the Fire

Delivery? It was let down a bit by grammatical errors, but it was still clear. If any future author is in doubt about such things they should remember that the Scalenex and Bob proofreading service is still free of charge. Scaly can translate it into American, then I can convert it back into English. Also, Opotchli could have personalised the story more by giving given the name of his last spawn brother, rather than him being "the last spawn kin".

Ideas? This story was short and simple, but in fact this one probably provoked more thought for me than many of the others. The new perspective I have gained is that spawn kin are all like twins or triplets etc. There is a blur between where one personality ends and the next begins. To lose the spawn kin is like losing part of one's self.

The young stalker understands this and he (and me too) is amazed that Opotchli has had the courage to continue existing despite being now incomplete. I am a firm believer in faith in the Old Ones and in the Great Plan but the author showed me that such a faith does not need to be an abstract thing nor is it only relevant in life or death situations. It can give comfort, hope and purpose when things are just mildly depressing. <sniffs and dries eyes with tissue>


Stranded

Juxtaposition of perspective? Yes. The two perspective approach is another clever way to cover all the facts and feelings you want the reader to understand when the word limit is so tight. I enjoyed both sides of the story. I agree with Scalenex that adding the troglodon to the end was unnecessary, but, hey, if you own the model you might as well use it somewhere. You obviously won't be using it in battle.

Onomatopoeia? Yes. Again a clever and efficient way to get a point across. contrast "CRASH!" with "A large beast of some kind crashed through the undergrowth." I don't know what a "kreen" sound is, but since reading this, whenever I hear a cool sound on TV or in life I ask myself, "How could I express that in a word or with description." The author has influenced me in that regard.

SHOUTY ALL CAPITALS? I have no idea what the correct convention is for depicting sounds in text. I think I use italics, mostly. The ALL CAPs didn't look pleasing to the eye, but it didn't do any harm to the story. BUT, (now I'm doing it, too) it brings up the point that you don't need to follow any particular convention, but you should follow a convention consistently. Sometimes the all caps were in inverted commas, sometimes they had paragraphs to themselves, sometimes they were in the middle of lines. Sometimes character thoughts were italicized, sometimes they weren't. It didn't detract from a good story, but it would benefit from a bit of a stylistic tidy up.


Rogue Skink

Another thought provoking entry and very nicely done as well. The author makes the practical details of the setting (flying around spiny branches is tricky etc) come alive. The story might be about a hunt, but the details make it so much more.

The Title? I'm sure it should be "Rogue Saurus", but never mind.

Po-tay-to / Po-taa-to? Huantec changed to Huanec. Aiee! Another Fimir!

Cool ideas and cooler lines? "Skinks swim; saurus drown." There were lots of gems like that.

WTM? So he is a chameleon. On a terradon. With a bow. Makes me think of this image.



I enjoyed all of them, but I only have two votes.

Business Raptor gets one automatically for being so innovative and fresh.
The second vote goes to Rogue Skink, but I am experiencing vague anxiety that three other entries were just as good.

 

Spoileriffic Post - Be Warned!

Essmir challenged us to guess which story is his. Under the spoiler tab below is my semi-uninformed guessing about who may have written what. Don't look until you log your two votes for the story comp. Don't look until after you formulate your own guesses. Even if I'm utterly wrong you might work out which story is mine.

If you aren't going to vote, then vote anyway. The best kind of encouragement of our awesome writing team is acknowledgement. Even if it isn't a vote for me, at least I know that you enjoy the awesomeness that is being produced. So vote!

Spoiler: Author Guesses.

Final Entry SCALENEX
Business Raptor in the Realm of Chaos SLANPUTIN
The Southern Heat GEMINI
Chameleons in the City of Mists PENDRAKE
Around the Fire ESSMIR
Stranded DISCOMUTE
Rogue Skink WHOEVER THE GUY WAS WHO SAID THEY RAN OUT OF TIME TO FINISH THEIR ENTRY FOR THE LAST COMP

I have even had to guess who might have entered, because I don't know the list of authors for this comp. I am only 80% confident of two of the guesses

 

Spoiler: Bob's Author Guesses

Which would suggest a certain Anonymous Sequel may be by a certain Australustrian

Interesting what you've associated my writing style with.

I have some guesses nailed down, but I'm not sure about them all however.

 

Now, I am not going to peep under your spoiler flap yet, Mr Brain Surgeon.

Did you realize that you were meant to put in your own guesses, not mine?

 

I was commenting on your own guesses in some Inception-style spoiler tag game.

I have ideas, but to my shame I do not know the writing styles of our author's well enough to make guesses for every one.

 

Spoiler: Warning! Response to Slanputin's comments on my guesses. May traces of nuts.

You are a loony, and you were fishing for sketching tools and photoshop information recently + No human could have written "sporange". Therefore yours is business raptor. Don't worry your secret is safe with me. Especially if Pendrake did it.
My other guesses are very uncertain. I thought I knew your style and can't see it - if I had a second guess at yours it would be "In the city of mists". There are 2 entries that I thought must have been written by Scalenex (Final entry and in the city of mists), but I think he only did one.

 

Lots of great stories!!!! Loved them