The Necklace of Harmonia

Summary:

An Ancient Greek necklace in Victorian London

The Necklace of Harmonia

Meska 24 Jul 2020 13:37

Seeking crit on a (about 2.9k words) draft I've been playing with. I'm not sure it reads as well as I'd like and I could use some opinions!

In particular, I'd love some feedback on:

• Does the narrative work/is it interesting enough?
• Do the journal entries feel out of place or weirdly paced?
• Do the collapsible at the top and the note after the first two interviews add anything or do they feel out of place?
• Is the behaviour of the Operative really out of place (I'm in two minds about whether it fits)
• Is it obvious enough that the organisation who originally contain the item are NOT the Foundation during the time period of the 'action'?

Huge thanks in advance to anyone who has a look

Sandbox link

Last edited on 27 Jul 2020 17:46 by Meska Show more

Re: The Necklace of Harmonia

OCuin 24 Jul 2020 14:06

[Placeholder from PM]

[+] Line by Line

Objectively, the wearer's appearance does not appear to undergo any quantifiable changes, and individuals familiar with the wearer will be able to identify them without any difficulties.

Describe what things are or not, not what they appear to be or to do.

these incidents² focused around a single individual and occurred within a six week period in the Greater London area.

It's unclear what you mean by this line. Is this individual the perpetrator or the victim?

[+] Overall

I'm not entirely sure what's going on at the end here. It's clearly hinting at something with regards to Lady Cutting and her relationship with Daniels, but I'm not parsing it. Perhaps it's just me, but it feels like there's very little to hint at what you are clearly hinting at, and so the ending feels a little confused and unsatisfying to me.

The dialogue here feels a little over the top and forced to the point of sounding unnatural in its attempt to fit the time period. It's not bad necessarily, but I'd tone it down a little bit because it made it hard for me to connect with the characters and the story, and given that's the centrepiece of the article, it became a fairly large issue.

I guess my main problem here is that the story just feels kinda generic. It's not overly predictable, but no individual plot beat had me surprised or particularly engaged. It just kinda happened, and I read it. I wasn't bored, but I wasn't enthused either. It was just kinda middling. I probably wouldn't downvote this, but it'd be squarely in my no-vote territory, which is a downvote for a lot of people.

forbiddenquest highlight an issue worth pointing out here: we only really see Daniels' perspective. To phrase it another way: it's difficult to really engage in the relationship because we only see one side of it and can only really care about one side of it, especially when our introduction to Lady Cutting was fairly negative. For all intents and purposes, Cutting doesn't really have a character here after the first half beyond "nice pretty lady". Whilst the arc of the romance is fine enough, it's executed poorly because we aren't given an opportunity to really care about the other party.

It feels like you're pulling between two styles of telling this romance. One is a minimalistic one where we see brief glimpses culminating in an emotional high point, reminiscent of Inside the Wall or short skips of a similar style, and the other is a much more involved style that really delves into the characters and their emotions and behaviour. I think the latter is the stronger direction to take it in this case, but it's hampered by the lack of detail created by the minimalistic style in the journal entries and so on.

My primary suggestion here would be to really flesh out the characters and the emotion, particularly with regards to Lady Cutting. The fact that the story is kinda generic could be overcome if the emotions were deeper and more involved, but they aren't right now, so it falls a bit flat. There's good material here, it just needs to be fleshed out and fixed up a bit.

Last edited on 26 Jul 2020 22:33 by OCuin Show more

Re: The Necklace of Harmonia

Meska 27 Jul 2020 18:02

Thanks for taking a look! I'll work on adding in more of an emotional draw in the second half of the draft and try and tone down the language choices.

Re: The Necklace of Harmonia

forbiddenquest 24 Jul 2020 14:07

[placeholder from irc ;;]

Open for critique

I won't be doing LBL, there are other critters more suited for that than I. I'll just identify some problems I noticed that felt immersion-breaking.

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1. Dr Meeks being completely helpless with Anna when Daniels could do fine with her, although sweet, reflects poorly on the Foundation that they would have to use an underhanded tactic to insert Daniel into Anna's life by letting him be the knight in shining armour. You would think that they'd keep her detained anyways even if they found out the necklace was the anomaly itself? She's a potential information repository regarding the anomaly and letting her go and not even getting much information from the time Daniels spends with her is pretty weird.

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2. Okay, so in the Wednesday 12 entry, Daniels mentions about the curse. However, there was no speculation by the Foundation beforehand to determine the reason why these events happened to her apart from an excerpt in the description that explains its effects.

In a heavily-narrative based skip such as yours with a basic anomaly, there should be some indication through the interviews or test logs that somehow, Daniels or Meek or whoever, figured out that this curse was actually the anomalous effects of the necklace. Don't just drop a bombshell with no explanation beforehand in the story (not in the description). I think it'd be better if you moved the foreshadowing of her Anna's mother dying due to the anomaly and some more talks with Sir Cuttings about his past and how he's afraid that will happen to Anna as well, will help characterise both Daniels and Sir.

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3. The tale of insubordination that you're writing here comes off as very weak because Daniels is working as a ruthless operative, he's supposed to be briefed on how to deal with humanoids so that he doesn't become attached to his work. Even then, if he somehow still fell in love, I think it'd require a much longer exposition on his conflict to love or to work, two opposing ideals that torments him. Right now, he conveniently falls in love because he finds Anna a pleasant girl, and the 'chance' meeting makes it weak justification of how they got closer.

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4. Again with the description thing. So basically the anomalous effects weren't explained well? How did Foundation find out about the anti-aging properties, if Daniels only interacted with Anna for a year? There was no explanation of that with Anna's mother as well, and I'd think your article would benefit from adding them in somewhere. Also, as I said in point two, Daniels didn't explore the effects of the anomaly, so how did Foundation figure out these accidents were linked to Anna, especially if the effects continue after it was sealed away? Wouldn't the Foundation test their hypothesis that because this misfortune curse isn't going away, there must be something else on Anna that's affecting her?

In the case that these anomalous properties extend even after it has been taken off, like I said, why wouldn't the Foundation keep her in containment so as to prevent her death/observe how she would accidentally die if she was kept in a safe environment? It seems like your article plays a little too much into the Foundation's incompetency, and I can't say I'm a fan of that.

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5. Referring to my last point, it seems that in the last journal entry, Daniels have been protecting from getting contained by submitting fake reports? This seems to make Daniels a typical John Doe now, because the Foundation conveniently trusts him to such an extent that they do not question the validity of the reports, especially if Daniels decided to resign then and keep living with Anna? Wouldn't the Foundation keep tabs on Daniels so that he won't leak Foundation info?

I have a feeling this old Foundation wasn't developed enough yet, that's why the characters keep committing these acts of folly. Due to personal tastes, I don't like that justification that Foundation was just a small thing back then, even when it has obviously dealt with other humanoids to know that researcher can in fact, fall in love with them, that they would take precautions against it.

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Overall, the story felt contrived to quite a huge extent just to deliver a rather weak gut punch, it felt pretty artificial? Like yeah, Daniels fell in love with Anna and they died together, but even if the story didn't seem rushed, I didn't feel much because Anna really lacked characterisation apart from being horrid in Dr Meek's care. We just have a one-sided view of Daniels feeling this and that. We never hear Anna's thoughts that would allow us to care for her. Like, I was left with the subconscious thought that she deserved it, merely because all I knew from Dr Meek's that she was kinda bitchy? I think you could benefit from justifying this falling in love more, by really fleshing out Anna as a character, while toning down on the old Foundation's foolishness.

It's weak right now, because you're merely playing out a love story that could happen only if the Foundation is stupid and when readers don't have enough material to care about it yet. I'll be down-voting if the issues I pointed out don't get fixed. But honestly, these are pretty personal gripes, so see how others respond to it.

Note: That's all from me! I tried to be critical, so please do understand my frank harshness. Shoot me a Wikidot PM if you want me to take a second look!

Last edited on 25 Jul 2020 01:31 by forbiddenquest Show more

Re: The Necklace of Harmonia

Meska 25 Jul 2020 08:48

Thanks for the feedback - based on that I've definitely trimmed out too much of the background and development. I'll have to give it another look over.

Re: The Necklace of Harmonia

Comrade Waldo 25 Jul 2020 05:31

Greetings! I hope you're doing alright!

Here's OUR critique, fellow Comrade

I'll start with the critique with each question you made in your post, and then I'll make a summary.

Does the narrative work/is it interesting enough?

I'm not sure about the narrative itself. The love story feels unnatural. Operative Daniels feel unprofessional when falling in love with the person he must protect, and secretly observe it. Maybe try to write the narrative more related to Greek mythology, I think it would be interesting.

Do the journal entries feel out of place or weirdly paced?

The time-lapse of the journal feels short for the type of reaction of Daniels. I feel it needs more exploration about the thoughts of him, and possibly of Anna since she doesn't have a lot of interaction in the story, except for the first interviews and the mentions of her in Daniels journal.

Do the collapsible at the top and the note after the first two interviews add anything, or do they feel out of place?

The collapsible at the top of the draft is interesting. It shows how the Foundation documented SCPs during its first years. My main problem with that is it doesn't add anything to the narrative. The note left after the two interviews with Lady Anna sounds unprofessional from Dr. Meeks. And while it's understandable that he doesn't bear Lady Anna, it's pointless to keep her locked if they knew it was the necklace which was anomalous.

Is the behavior of the Operative really out of place

It does, and not just him, but also Lady Anna. There isn't a characterization of both of them. forbiddenquest makes some good points about the lack of personality in your characters. There isn't a conflict with Daniels between his job and love for Anna. He decided to follow his love for Anna without thinking about the consequences of it. Then there's Anna. In the journal of Daniels, he writes that Anna is a delight of as a person. However, this isn't demonstrated anywhere in the draft, except for the interaction between Dr. Meeks and Anna. In which it shows that Anna is the opposite of that.

Overall, this is a draft that still needs development in the narrative and its characters. The anomaly itself is interesting because of the mythological background, but the rest of the narrative does feel flat. If you're able to fix those problems and improve it, you'll have an interesting article if published. I wish you the best of luck, and I hope this has helped you.

Good luck, Comrade!

Re: The Necklace of Harmonia

Meska 25 Jul 2020 08:50

Thanks for your feedback - I'll give the whole thing another look over and see if it's salvageable :)

Re: The Necklace of Harmonia

Naveil 28 Jul 2020 09:37

[Placeholder from IRC]

+ Line-by-Line

Site-4

Just for consistency's sake, I believe it's supposed to be Site-04? Ignore me if I'm wrong on this

[Irrelevant Data Omitted For Brevity]]

Extra square bracket in the interview with Daniels.

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+ General Feedback

I should preface this by saying that I'm slightly more than terrible with love stories, so that might colour my crit for this article.

Personally, I felt like the journals dragged on a bit too much for my tastes? Like, they did their job in developing the characters and making me care about their relationship in a meticulous way, but I just can't say I'm a fan of their length. Pacing might use some work in this case, focusing less on extraneous elements and more so on the bigger picture. I almost forgot about the actual anomaly half-way through.
The journals are a great way to play on the skip's core idea, so with some brushing up, I think it'll be golden.

The clinical tone sort of meanders half-way through. It takes a more narrative approach¹ instead of just cold-professionalism, which is an okay fit for this kind of article? Nine times out of ten, I'd still prefer the standard, but this does it well also.

Finally, I'll touch on the dialogue. It was quite exaggerated, not overly so but still noticeable while I was reading. While I don't think it needs toning down per se² I feel like it was worth mentioning.

Overall, it was enjoyable, if only not my cup of tea. I think you've got a solid base and the way you played with it almost hit the mark.

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+ Other Tidbits

Do the collapsible at the top and the note after the first two interviews add anything or do they feel out of place?

The initial collapsible didn't really feel out of place, nor did it really add much? Like, it hints that the main butt of the article takes place in the past, but that's mostly it.

The note could do with a bit more subtlety and conciseness (see my point on the clinical tone) but otherwise, I feel it's fine.

Is the behaviour of the Operative really out of place (I'm in two minds about whether it fits)

I feel it's fine, albeit exaggerated. That being said, the entire article possesses that feeling of exaggeration, so unless you dislike that feeling, I'd say it's alright.

Is it obvious enough that the organisation who originally contain the item are NOT the Foundation during the time period of the 'action'?

Not sure, honestly - I'm terrible at picking up subtlety in most forms, so I'm probably not the one to ask.

I think I'll leave it at that. Good luck!

Footnotes

1. For instance, this line "rescuers were unable to reach the couple. Their bodies were recovered separately" doesn't actually mention that the couple died directly, which should have been in a standard clinical tone case.

2. And for the record, I know that'd be a pain to do without actually losing the dialect you're going for.

Last edited on 01 Aug 2020 17:12 by Naveil Show more

Re: The Necklace of Harmonia

Meska 01 Aug 2020 17:48

Thanks for the feedback, Naveil - those journal entries are proving to be a real pain! I'll tidy up some of the clinical tone and see if I can trim the journals down a bit.