Thank you for your kind words everyone, and I appreciate the vote of confidence. But Lawpants is correct. The pacing has stumbled these last few chapters, and it's because I got distracted. I don't intend on ending Act 3 on as dramatic a note as the previous act, but I've sort of put myself in a weird situation, with the growing length of chapters, that because I'm worried about a sheer overwhelming volume of content (not to sound like I'm bragging, I really am concerned about matching the length and pacing of the original routes), I'm in an awkward place where either I drag things out and make the trip home the end of the act, or I jump right into it like I should, and then risk the last few parts of the act dragging. But I think I have things figured out now, and as soon as I get a little more time, things will be proceeding as they should have been.
Lawpants wrote:(Warning, I wrote this when too tired to be completely coherent. Contents may be subpar.)
I adore your Snoozu. I really, really do. And you're very clearly a talented writer.
But when it comes to moving the plot along, there -is- such thing as too much fluffing. Let me explain.
I like the previous chapter quite a bit. It's a very cute, pleasing to read fluff. The problem is that it's very much placed wrongly, in my opinion. An important aspect of writing is understanding flow, and I feel this is where you're faltering. You've put off the big reveal -too much-. Placing hints early, and slowly unfurling them is of course, a good writing technique and builds tension and suspense, but it gets to a point where it stops being suspense, and starts being frustration, and I think this is the chapter where that really set in.
Every time a chapter goes by now, where it isn't addressed, I groan to myself and a large portion of my enjoyment from it is gone. It's evasion for the sake of evasion. This scene could easily have followed the reveal itself, and been used as a breather and relaxer to the reveal itself, or (I'm assuming you have your own workings and plans for it), used as a back to status quo scene AFTER everything, where people are just asking for more of what they love.
And it kind of confuddles me a bit, because of how talented you are. You've managed to create a story that very much sucks you in, you have very believable characters, and you manage to weave just enough conflict in to make it a metaphorical page turner. Snoozu herself is perfectly flawed, and it makes her endearing. I'm fairly picky when it comes to the people I trust, and I find myself sucked into her sleepy charms. I have no problem painting pictures in my head of her written activities, and the writing itself has a vivid life to it's simplicity.
All of this, of course is just my opinion, so take it as you will. I will, within reason, follow this story to it's conclusion, and I hope what I've written has at least some small positive impact.
Thank you for taking the time to tell all this to me, like I've said before, I want this story to be the best it can possibly be, so pointing out the bad is probably more important than pointing out the good. I understand what you mean, and I agree, the story flow has slowed down. I really did consider skipping past the events of the previous chapter, but in the end I decided that I wanted to explore the rest of their evening out, as well as add a little more relationship development before the trip to her parents' house. But you're right, the pacing has been thrown off and it's time to get things back on track. I can promise you that (most of) (a lot of) (a good portion of) (okay, most of) people's questions will be answered soon.
Thank you for helping me improve my story, thank you for reading, and thank you for your warm words. (:
Machoman wrote:Really like everything so far
I'm glad! It can be hard to tell how many people are actually reading and just waiting for something that really prompts them to chime in. Hopefully with the next chapter, or the end of Act 3 coming up, it will be a good opportunity for people to express their thoughts on the story as a whole so far.
hernytan wrote:I can't believe I haven't seen this fanfic until now!
After scrolling through all the comments and thankyou messages, I don't think I can thank you enough, especially since I'm not one for words.
So just thank you, really just thank you. I have no idea what you do in life, but if you're not in a career that involves writing, then you might want to reconsider a little
Welcome, thank you for checking the story out and for telling me your thoughts! And, um, thanks a lot for your kind words, that made my morning.
But really, I should be the one to thank you people. The sheer amount of interest and response to this story is... like nothing I've ever experienced in writing before, it's overwhelming, it's incredible, and I know I'll cherish memories of this time for years to come. Okay, that was kind of corny. But it's true. My current line of work does not involve writing, sadly, but after KS has given me the drive to pick it up again, I don't really see myself stopping again any time soon.