Yamaku Book Club (20220124 Dish Washing)

[NuclearStudent]

And that is a problem, because people do need feedback to improve.

You can imagine me sitting there, not quite knowing how to improve on the text presented, and hesitant to say anything negative without something positive to offer. And after some time has passed, I too regretfully pass. The problem is with me—I don't think I'm very good at giving useful advice most of the time.

Generally, if I can see a fix that isn't just language-based, I would offer it. But sometimes I'm quite sure the author doesn't want it fixed. In the past, I'd say, "Hey, this doesn't have the right tone," and the response would be, "Too bad." Or, "You could try making the plot less of X and more of Y," too which I'd get, "I was going for X."

Maybe I should go back to trying. Or not. But when people offer me advice, I do take it seriously myself. People like Oddball and ProfA actually 'forced' rewrites out of me, or at least lengthy clarifications.

Related to this discussion about giving feedback, I wrote a whole "Iron Saki" shitpost in lieu of being able to give coherent feedback about Learning To Fly. LtF is a lovely story written by a lovely man who I deeply grateful to be friends with, and I don't click with it. There's nothing wrong with LtF. The opposite, actually. I've spent quite a long time thinking about pieces in this fandom that I don't emotionally connect to. It covers suicide, music, and other problems that kept teenage me up at night, but at some point you accept that people are emotional islands of their own. Hence Iron Saki, which is a flat representation of my own bored perceptions and the wanderings of my mind. If Zade Wither's author was a friend, I might take my own shitpost based on it.

Euro finds it hilarious, which I'm thankful for. Other people seem to have found it funnier than I have. I fundamentally don't really believe in good or bad stories. I am not a rational analysis person in terms of storytelling. You can't fight a story. It's all spooks.

[brythain]

Related to this discussion about giving feedback, I wrote a whole "Iron Saki" shitpost in lieu of being able to give coherent feedback about Learning To Fly.

I can empathise with that, because 'After The Dream' is the shitposting that emerged after I came here, read through all the writing then on offer, and wondered what actually happened to everyone after Yamaku. In some cases, I borrowed from others after seeking their permission; in some cases, I wrote my own versions.

You can't fight a story. It's all spooks.

I totally agree with this. And again, AtD is based on that premise quite a bit.

[ProfAllister]

In all honesty, for as many issues as the main character has, this generally manages to avoid *most* of the pitfalls. I mean, set aside the edgy name, the "Fresh Prince of Bel Air" rationale for going to Yamaku, and the cool idea for his eye socket (I'm gonna bet it was a trained pet worm).

1. He doesn't immediately melt the panties off the main girls.
2. He didn't simply chloroform Hisao and take his place in the narrative.
3. He is not impossibly smooth and charming.

But, all that said, it's almost remarkable in how "middle of the road" this is. I mean, 3 chapters is pretty short to have much of anything, especially with chapters this short. But that's kind of the issue - the story just fizzles out before there's anything much to really elicit a reaction.

In short, Zade Wither is most certainly a piece of KS fanfiction that was posted to the KS Renai fanfiction section.

[Hacksorus]

Me: "Hey, looks like everyone's having a fun conversation about this one. Let's join in!"
*sees the entire first part is condensed into a single large paragraph*
Me: "Oh no"

...Oh boy.

Well this lunch is going to be interesting.

I can only assume that this is why the story stopped where it did. The rooftop lunch with Lilly and Hanako was simply too much for us to handle, and the author decided to take mercy on us.

I could joke all day about the amusing ideas this story brings us, from a badass protagonist who is immediately okay with only having one eye 10 seconds after discovering he lost the other, to an intense amount of foreshadowing about his plans for his own empty eye socket. But at the end of the day, the author had the courage and initiative to write it all up and post it here, and that's always something to be respected.

[NuclearStudent]

Related to this discussion about giving feedback, I wrote a whole "Iron Saki" shitpost in lieu of being able to give coherent feedback about Learning To Fly.

I can empathise with that, because 'After The Dream' is the shitposting that emerged after I came here, read through all the writing then on offer, and wondered what actually happened to everyone after Yamaku. In some cases, I borrowed from others after seeking their permission; in some cases, I wrote my own versions.

You can't fight a story. It's all spooks.

I totally agree with this. And again, AtD is based on that premise quite a bit.

To divert the conversation further into AtD, I recently had a conversation with Prof where she described AtD, in complimentary terms, as extremely high-effort shitposting. I agree with that assessment, and it's precisely what I find infuriating about it. As a work, it's my impression that it makes no effort to deliberately imitate the texture of human thought and speech. It follows the course of human lives and conversations accurately, but the characters don't necessarily talk like people do. Normie's commented that his personal opinion is that it's pretentious, and I see where he's coming from.

Feurox probably knows some high literary term for it, but a story has no obligation to imitate or reject reality in any particular manner. Someone once said that an artist uses lies to tell deeper truths, but those deeper truths are just amusing bunk too. It's really all shitposting, despite our attempts to convince ourselves otherwise. We are all Zade Wither on this blessed day.

1. He doesn't immediately melt the panties off the main girls.
2. He didn't simply chloroform Hisao and take his place in the narrative.
3. He is not impossibly smooth and charming.

What's even the point, then? Greatness comes from a clearly articulated aesthetic, and that aesthetic must come in the form of gratuitous cripple-fucking.

But yes, Zade Wither wasn't the worst. The author had an objective in mind that wasn't a straight self-insert. They didn't have a compelling aesthetic approach defined-they were no AtD-but they had a nonzero something.

[brythain]

To divert the conversation further into AtD, I recently had a conversation with Prof where she described AtD, in complimentary terms, as extremely high-effort shitposting. I agree with that assessment, and it's precisely what I find infuriating about it. As a work, it's my impression that it makes no effort to deliberately imitate the texture of human thought and speech. It follows the course of human lives and conversations accurately, but the characters don't necessarily talk like people do. Normie's commented that his personal opinion is that it's pretentious, and I see where he's coming from.

I too agree with the high-effort shitposting to an extent, having confessed as much. I don't think AtD makes no effort to deliberately imitate the texture of human thought and speech. I think it makes too much effort to imitate the texture of east Asian thought and speech without shifting it into the analogous western English patterns. And when characters are in what I think of as magic-realist or mythopoeic mode, they won't sound like normal people. But there are lots of normal people in there. I can see where 'pretentious' comes from too; yes, guilty—making what was nice slice-of-life genre material into something disconcertingly over the top.

As for Zade Wither, one of the factors that turns me off for such fiction is the way everyone ends up so awfully 'US high school, Hollywood style'. It ends up like Riverdale and suchlike.

[woohootouhou]

This really isn't as bad as I was first expecting. I think with some "cleanup" of the character, he could actually be pretty likeable.

[Oddball]

Another omake scene from yours truly by Penguinmayhem.


Once again we take a step back to before the game actually came out. Way before in this case. We're talking about year one of development here. Most of the comments are even from the devs (sadly whatever image Delta posted is gone now.)

It's a Hanako/Lilly story. A bit too flowery for my tastes, but an interesting look back to when nothing was really set in stone yet.

[brythain]

Ah, this was from the "Lilly is as rich as Croesus" era. By the end of the story, had Hisao been around, he would've hnnnnnnnged himself. The prose is a little rich but it is a cute story, very micro-VN. You can even imagine the graphics and the pastel colours.

[Xeraeo]

Just realized I was in middle school when this was written... KS has been around a long time.

A little too flowery for me, and I wasn't aware of the super-rich Lilly era, but there were elements that were cute enough to still make it an enjoyable read.

Now I'm just left wondering what Delta posted...

[Feurox]

Quite an enjoyable read. Bry is right about the colours of this story, it’s actually really quite evocative. I don’t mind super rich Lilly as a concept that much, so honestly, this is an alround good read for me. Though a bit flowery at times.

Quite humorous seeing Aura and Cruds comments.

[Oddball]

A little too flowery for me, and I wasn't aware of the super-rich Lilly era, but there were elements that were cute enough to still make it an enjoyable read.

Considering what we know of Lilly know, the idea that at one time they considered making Lilly half African and her family owned a diamond mine is just way over the top. I'm really glad to see that gone toned down.

[brythain]

Considering what we know of Lilly know, the idea that at one time they considered making Lilly half African and her family owned a diamond mine is just way over the top. I'm really glad to see that gone toned down.

I ended up writing a story about Hanako making friends with a South African girl whose family owned a diamond mine. Not Lilly, of course.

[Hacksorus]

I.. uh.. was in elementary school when this one was written.. oh boy..

Wait. This was supposed to be a discussion, not an existential crisis. Back on topic then.

As was inevitable, these characters feel so far removed from how I know them that it's probably better to just think of them as completely seperate entities. This was a short, humble story, and I'd say it did what it wanted to do well. Vividly described autumn nature, large boats, girls being gay. What's not to like?

[Xeraeo]

This was a short, humble story, and I'd say it did what it wanted to do well. Vividly described autumn nature, large boats, girls being gay. What's not to like?

I'm kinda partial to small to medium-sized boats, myself.