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Reindeer Readathon Announcement!

Happy Monday, my fierce valkyries! I want to open this post by stressing this is not one of Bookish Valhalla’s readathons, nor is it one we’re participating in officially this season. We’re merely the messengers spreading holiday cheer by shouting all about this merry and cheerful reading event. So pour yourself a piping cuppa cocoa and wrap yourself up in the warmest, chunkiest blanket you’ve…

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Writer In Motion |CP Round Two

Week Four: Feedback & Reflection

It’s week four of #WriterInMotion and, as usual, I’m fluttering about like a hummingbird with no head trying to do everything at once. Over the weekend, we moved into our very first house, and I’ve been editing Five Glass Flowersin the bathtub, crouched on the worn, wooden floors, and in between scrubbing out the cupboards in the kitchen. So it’s taken me quite…

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This week has been PACKED with edits for Five Glass Flowers and navigating round one of the Feedback Phase of #WriterInMotion.  First off, I was BLESSED to be paired with Jeff and Sara as Critique Partners for this round. They’re both writing Science Fiction as well and are familiar with some of the genre-specific elements I brought to my story.  So a massive THANK YOU to both of them for their invaluable insight, suggestions, and, of course, for trusting me with their work as well.

Market & Genre: Science Fiction, Literary lean, Dystopian

Word Count: 1,210

Loose Comparisons & Inspirations: Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer, Orange by Ichigo Takano, and Inception.

Trigger Warning: Five Glass Flowers is set in a world with assisted suicide and touches on mental health. This isn’t fleshed out entirely at the moment, but it’s pretty obvious in this draft. The completed version will also allude to a light rail bombing (so, warn future you maybe) but this isn’t touched on yet.

I read the feedback side-by-side and made lists based on areas of concern: 1) what did both CPs like? 2) What was unclear to them? 3) Did the haunted, dystopian vibes come through? 4) Was everything balanced?

Most of the suggestions were minor–a need for clarity here, an awkward sentence there–but the real joy was seeing how they interacted with and processed the content. It’s been a LONG TIME since I’ve written any sort of science fiction, so I was concerned it didn’t fit enough within the genre or that the story, given its literary lean, might be confusing in some way. However, Jeff and Sara both swept those worries out the door! I love how Jeff came across the title of this chapter (The Janus Project) and did his own little research about it. I’d deliberately picked JANUS because it’s the name of the Roman God of doorways, time, transitions, and endings. I enjoy embedding meaning everywhere, and was tickled when Jeff picked up on this right away.

I also appreciated his attention to detail, such as pointing out the awkwardness of Asra’s position in the opening line or prodding me to elaborate on how the tally on the hologlass was discreet. His style of critiquing is similar to mine: stream of consciousness, reader reaction, and the occasional quill stab for needed edits (only I think he’s nicer at that than me LOL).  Both Jeff and Sara has similar suggestions, which indicated certain things SANG and a few things SUNK, but I liked the consistency in feedback. For example, there’s a line where the narrator points out that priets “don’t usually help someone die” and both CPs countered that, technically, one could argue they DID. So I adjusted the sentence to flat out say suicide so that a line is drawn between guiding one to their natural death versus allowing something a priest wouldn’t normally condone.

Sara’s style was a little more sparse and less reader reaction, but her insight was so helpful to catching potential world-holes and unclear exposition. For example, I’d never explained the whole reason behind Asra having THREE Caseworkers during her year of mandatory therapy. At the time, I wondered if that kind of info was even needed and left it out because I didn’t want to drag the story down with too much setting/backstory. However, Sara’s feedback revealed how unclear that section of the scene was and the kinds of questions it raised. I really appreciated her attention to details like this, especially since I have a tendency to be either painfully vague or vomit details everywhere. Her feedback gave me an idea of where to balance hints and reveals. She was also great at catching some of those little typos that like to sneak in!

My biggest concern was the atmosphere. I was shooting for haunting, mysterious, and poignant. I didn’t want the disturbing aspects of the world to overshadow the inescapable strangeness colliding with Asra Aeilstrom’s life. I worked to deepen her own backstory (settling on a traumatic subway bombing) about where her affliction came from. The first two versions were too vague in doing this, I think. The atmosphere was there, but the characterization…wasn’t. So I guess that was, more or less, my second big concern. Sara and Jeff expressed wanting to know more about Oblivion and why Asra is seeking it, so I think, to an extent, I’ve achieved building her character, but will need to also add her backstory in throughout the next few revisions. Here’s the overall feedback received:

1.

The Janus Project

The causes of death on the state-issued certificates gently floated along the tinted hologlass walls. Asra stared up at them with permanent conviction, dark sunglasses lessening the glare of light:

Xu Heng, 32, Inconsolable sorrow after absorbing displaced emotions.

Torin Thallos, 17, An uncontrollable desire to be full.

Lucho Gálvez, 23, The belief that nothing–including oneself–exists.

Ella Walsh, 47, A longing for things that cannot be named.

Lorne Thale, 50, Fell Hopelessly In Love With Annihilation.

Ian Ito, 38, Hysterical fear of drowning in air.

Every forty seconds, the certificates flickered out of existence, new ones appeared, and this cycle repeated. A discreet tally sat in the bottom right corner of the glass, where the day’s successful journeys to Oblivion tick, tick, ticked like a 24-hour clock: 66, 000. 70,200. 82,350. 93,800. The clock never seemed to stop, even after it reset to zero.

“It’s a painless, peaceful process.”

The office door hissed open and the Caseworker shuffled in. He gave Asra a reassuring smile, gray eyes shining with plastic empathy through crooked frames.

“Are they all…have they chosen to…” Die.

Asra tore her gaze away from the hologlass, and settled it on the pamphlet in front of her. She’d read it countless times in her year of therapy after she made her decision.  It was a requirement to know all the available options, even if one couldn’t afford them. Or, in her case, want them. If she closed her eyes, she could recite the entire pamphlet word-for-word, and yet, she couldn’t even recall–

“They chose Oblivion.”

As if rehearsed to a habit, the Caseworker reached out to console her with a light squeeze of a gloved hand. This, too, Asra was familiar with; she’d had three Caseworkers before this—completely normal for those of her particular situation—but they all behaved the same: a pitying smile here, a kind hand there, voice never above what was considered appropriate for a funeral. Asra slipped her hands off the table and into her lap, trying not to look at the slash of scars across her fingers. The Caseworker said nothing as he pulled up her chart and settled into his seat. A clinical silence hung between them.

Somewhere down the hall, whimpering began. A tea kettle whistled. A cheerful voice called for the head psychiatrist over the speakers. Caseworkers walked down the halls as if they had all the time in the world. Maybe they did. The smell of something sterile clung to air. Fingers tapped against a tablet. The hologlass tick, tick, ticked with new certificates. Shifting in her chair—one of those hard, plastic ones bolted to the floor—Asra tried not to interact with her surrounds, to listen too closely, but restlessness prevailed.

Once again, her eyes scoured the room one last time: the glass box of an office (or counseling room, depending on who you asked), walls of frosted hologlass and floors of snowy quartz. Everything was bleached with the brightness of the UV lights overhead. Absently, she pushed the darkened shades she wore up the bridge of her nose and pulled the hood of her jacket over her forehead. The offices were always kept at a constant 59 degrees. She’d never thought to ask why.

At last, her gaze settled on the man across the desk. Like all Oblivion Caseworkers, or OCs as everyone generally called them, he wore the standard lapis lazuli tunic that covered him from neck to ankles. An inverted triangular insignia sat snug against his Adam’s apple, shifting every time he swallowed, which wasn’t often. The name tag on his chest said Julian, and she wondered, doubted, whether that was even his real name. The OCs all looked freakishly similar, almost like priests.

 Except priests didn’t usually help people commit suicide.

Asra cleared her throat. It was a harsh sound in the manufactured silence of the office. Those silver scars on her hands seemed to gleam in the lighting. “How long will it take?”

“Less than the time you’ve been suffering.” Julian’s smile grew softer, more pitiful. “The Janus Project prides itself on providing only the most compassionate state-issued Oblivion in the country. It will only take as long as you need it to. You’ll be transported to the doorway at –” he checked the location on his tablet “–the Howlan House. It’s as close to the site of the accident we can get you. Everything you need is already there, including the funeral materials, and alternative pathways, should you want them.”

           “I don’t.”

“It’s there if you do.”

“There’s no point to it.”

The words broke the air as a hoarse whisper. She pulled the cuffs of her sweater over her hands, blinking furiously as spots clouded her vision. Alternative pathways, she wanted to scoff. As if she were a candidate for Transplant or Reboot. Asra waited for anxiety to wash over her, as the pamphlets had warned, but none came. She searched herself for pangs of regret or second thoughts, but as always, she felt nothing. Even as she touched the tablet the Caseworker slid across the table, she could sense neither the warmth of where his hands had been nor the coldness of the glass. Not even the weight of it registered. She caught an unfocused glimpse of her cheerless pale face and muted green eyes on the screen, though she couldn’t be sure it was her face anymore; it was diluted with their images–a jagged collage of features that belonged to other versions of herself living in alternate worlds. Other versions she had, unfortunately, collided with that harrowing day.

            And since then, she felt nothing of herself.

            Sensed nothing of this world.

            Remembered nothing of her life.

Nothing except November the 20th, but she didn’t want the memory.

“Given your…. situation…. we want you to be as comfortable as possible. When you’re ready for Oblivion, it will embrace you. You will find peace, Asra.” He sounded so sure, she had no choice, but to believe him. The Caseworker indicated to the tinted walls and nodded at the tablet. “Shall we announce it?”

She pulled the tablet closer and froze, a hollowness burrowing deep into her chest. Her thumb brushed the photo of a house in a twilight-kissed field, the black shadows of mountains hovering in the distance. She wondered if she would have once found it beautiful, the fireflies drifting up like falling stars caught in reverse, or what the breeze caressing the patches of weeds would have felt like. She couldn’t see the suspended railway of the old Muika train line over the water, but she knew it was there.

“It’s as close as we could get you to the Fragmentation Zone.”

A memory skipped across Asra’s mind–a kaleidoscope of twisted metal, the snap of bones against water, putrid smoke–before it faded back into the shoebox she’d buried it in.  She blinked, waiting for a voice of reason to echo, to say live, live, live. But nothing came. Nothing but a wetness sliding over her chilled cheeks, dropping in time with the relentless tick, tick, ticks of the walls, and onto the glass tomb housing her death certificate:

Asra Aeilstrom, 26, Fractured, Irreparable feeling of being out of place & time.

Five Glass Flowers Playlist

Writer In Motion | Round One of CP Revisions This week has been PACKED with edits for Five Glass Flowers and navigating round one of the Feedback Phase of #WriterInMotion. 

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Writer In Motion | Messy Self-Edited Draft

Hello, Valkyries. And yes, this post is very late. Very, very late indeed! I wish I could say it was me procrastinating, but really, it was a mix of going off the deep end into world-building mode and then wrestingly my inner perfectionistic tyrant who likes to pick at everything.  I’ve been writing for years now and I know the self-edit phase is probably my worst. It’s not that I suck at editing…

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Writer In Motion | The Hellishly Messy Draft

  Hello, Valkyries, and welcome to my ink-stained hot mess of a first draft of my Writer In Motion story. This week of getting words on paper was nine levels of HELL, mostly because I am a dedicated plotter, but I didn’t have much time to flesh this out priorto writing it, so it was a real adventure to sort out the details. The urge to draw out the character ARC for Asra Aeilstrom or map the…

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Writer In Motion 2020 | The Prompt Has Dropped

Writer In Motion 2020 | The Prompt Has Dropped

Hey Valkyries! Gods, it’s August already, can you believe it? This summer is burning by fastand I have no idea where the time is going; down a rabbit hole, maybe? A slit in the time-space continuum? Er, we’ll get our best mages on it…STAT. Time-leaks aside, this week heralded the arrival of something so GRAND, so MYSTERIOUS, so EXCITING that I don’t think I can procrastinate on this post any…

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Blog Tour: Excerpt of The Lost City by Amanda Hocking

Excerpts! Excerpts! Read all about this YA Fantasy by @Amanda_Hocking. This hidden gem ticks all the boxes for us, and then some! #newrelease #YA #bookbuzz #bookboost

A very Happy Hump Day, Book Valkyries. I know things have been quiet on this blogging front–mostly due to our big move to Tennessee–but this doesn’t mean nothing amazing has been going down in this ink-stained realm. This week we’ve been invited to participate in Wednesday Book’s Blog Tour event for THE LOST CITY by Amanda Hocking. Before John Karle had reached out, we’d never even heardof this…

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Lord of the Readathon: So It Begins

Did light prevail or have I fallen into darkness? Is this Hobbit doomed to become a Gollum? It's all revealed in this #Lordofthereadathon post 👑

Calling all Valkyries to Middle Earth! The Beacons of Gondor have been lit, and we must answer its call, whether we creatures of darkness, light, or somewhere in between. It’s July, which means it’s time for THE LORD OF THE READATHON CHALLENGE ⚔️ 👑🐉 

  Ever since I took a class two quarters ago called Tolkien: A Mythology For England, I’ve been slowly dipping my toes back into his works and…

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Attack On TBR: Witches, Fae, And Breaking Up With Blake

The latest Attack On TBR: Witches, Fae, And Breaking Up With Blake #currentlyreading #bookishthoughts

Hello, darling readers. IT’S FRIDAY!!! There’s nothing more exciting to me than a weekend full of book hauls, tea, fun treats, and mail surprises. It’s been over a month since we last took a peek at the reads I revived from the TBR grave, and there’s so much to discuss! From witches and wicked faeries to  sassy serial killers and unrelenting darkness, April was packed so manyamazing stories.…

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Excerpt: A Touch of Ruin by Scarlett St. Clair

  A Touch of Ruin Scarlett St. Clair (Hades & Persephone #2) Publication date: April 23rd 2020 Genres: Adult, Paranormal, Romance

Persephone’s relationship with Hades has gone public and the resulting media storm disrupts her normal life and threatens to expose her as the Goddess of Spring.

Hades, God of the Dead, is burdened by a hellish past that everyone’s eager to expose in an effort to warn…

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Blog Blitz: Excerpt of The Crystal War by Tracy Auerbach

Check out an Excerpt of Tracy Auerbach's new release, The Crystal War! #XpressoTours #Adult #UF #Bookbuzz #bookboost #blog

  The Crystal War Tracy Auerbach (Fragments #2) Published by: Parliament House Publication date: April 14th 2020 Genres: Adult, Urban Fantasy

The line between human and monster is not as clear cut as they once thought.

In the weeks since her escape from the hell of the Eastern Fortress, things have grown more complicated for Kai. She cast her lot with her brother’s self-absorbed boyfriend, who…

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Attack On TBR: A Feast of Vampires, Samurai, and Space Ships

Hey all! Want to know what I'm up to, bookwise? Check out my new ATTACK ON TBR post: A Feast of Vampires, Samurai, and Spaceships!

I’ve got problems, and all of them are related to my Babylon Tower of books I own, but have never read. Since transferring to the University of Washington, creating Bookish Valhalla, and diving into literary internships, I devoted most of my free time to either reading for authors or studying for exams; I don’t regret a single day of it!

However, I domiss digging around in my TBR pile and reading…

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DNF: House of Earth & Blood by Sarah J. Maas

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Disclaimer: I received an ARC of this story from Netgalley in exchange for my honest review.

I tried, tried, tried, but for the life of me, I couldn’t finish this book. My experience with Maas is not unlike a rickety roller coaster: I’m certain the whole thing will crumble; I brace myself for the thrill of the fall, but when the ride is finally over, I’m actually moredisapp…

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Book Review: Swallowtail by Brenna Twohy

Welp, I finally got around to reviewing Swallowtail by Brenna Twohy. And here, my lovlies, are my thoughts.

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Once upon a time, whilst perusing Netgalley, a starving reading came across a magical collection of — Hold up. This is NOT how this fairytale of poetic adventure went. Well, mostly. It’s true I stumbled on Swallowtailwhile searching through ransacking Netgalley. It’d been awhile since I’ve stepped outside my circle of favorite poets and I wanted to give new…

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Blog Tour: Interview With B.R. Myers, Author of ROGUE PRINCESS

I had the honor of interviewing @br_myers this week, author of ROGUE PRINCESS--a gender-swapped SF retelling of Cinderella! Learn more about Myers and her book at Bookish Valhalla 💜

Rogue Princess B.R. Myers Published by: Swoon Reads Publication date: January 21st 2020 Genres: Retelling, Science Fiction, Young Adult

A princess fleeing an arranged marriage teams up with a snarky commoner to foil a rebel plot in B. R. Myers’ Rogue Princess, a gender-swapped sci-fi YA retelling of Cinderella.

Princess Delia knows her duty: She must choose a prince to marry in order to secure an…

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Blog Tour Blitz: What Lies In Paradise by Leah Cupps

Blog Tour Blitz: What Lies In Paradise by Leah Cupps

  What Lies in Paradise Leah Cupps Publication date: January 10th 2020 Genres: Adult, Mystery, Thriller

She’s got 400,000 fans. One of them could be the killer.   Instagram Influencer Sydney Evans carefully curates her enviable public persona. Despite being freshly widowed, she’s eager to strike a pose at her best friend’s extravagant destination nuptials. But Sydney’s feed goes dark when she…

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Blog Blitz Tour: Sneak Peek Of Starlight by P.S Malcolm

Blog Blitz Tour: Sneak Peek Of Starlight by P.S Malcolm

Starlight P.S. Malcolm (Starlight Chronicles) Publisher: Parliament House Publication date: December 10th 2019 Genres: Fantasy, Young Adult (age category)

A treaty upholds the peaceful lands of Ersarence— who have suffered from the spilt blood of their humble goddess, Titania, which stains the hands of the ruthless Urenphians.

Julian Rancewood— a small town delivery boy— wishes he could afford to…