Date: July 25 2014 9:47 AM Title: Marching On
I’m going to be honest. I kind of didn’t remember what was going in the story and I don’t like having to re-read earlier chapters just because of the long delays between them. As for this chapter, it was alright, mainly an aftermath of the previous chapter. I don’t trust nor like Nia so it’s good Michael is being cautious around her.
Author's Response:
You would be correct not to trust her. Nia is simply put completely amoral. At any moment she could kill either of them without hesitation
Date: April 26 2014 7:47 AM Title: Bonus Chapter: Nephilim Dictionary
@zumi: It's good that you mentioned phonology (a language's rules of sounds). Here's some more linguistics:
There's a variety of speech sounds in all human languages. They're classified based on where and how they're formed. Bilabial sounds are produced with two lips (m b p). Labiodental sounds are produced with the lower lip and upper teeth (f v), and so on through the mouth and into the throat. Read about the International Phonetic Alphabet to see the whole system.
Phonemes are the sounds that a language recognizes. Phonemes often include multiple sounds. This means that the languages considers a group of sounds to be all one sound, and the different sounds are allophones of each other. For example, there are different ways of pronouncing t. In water, t is a sound called an alveolar tap, which is where the tongue stops the air at the ridge behind your teeth, faster than any other sound. In stop, however, the tongue spends more time stopping the air at that ridge, resulting in an alveolar stop.
Then there's stress. Different languages have different rules about which syllable is stressed. It could be the last syllable, the first syllable, the second syllable, or the second-last syllable. There are different ways of stressing syllables, too. They can be louder and longer (English does this), or a different pitch.
Author's Response:
Your two reviews combined have at least a semesters worth of ligustics information in it. Have you considered teaching the subject?
And since the giants are virtually identical to humans I suppose the international Phonetic Alphebet will work here. The Nephilim language does tend to use a lot of rolling "r" sounds and I'm not even sure its physically possible to pronounce some of the words with them in there. I'll have to investigate this further. Maybe add pronounciations for each word.
Date: April 25 2014 5:19 PM Title: Prologue
Wow! You've certainly took writing stories to a whole new level now. I'm truly impressed, well done!
Author's Response:
I'm glad you enjoyed this Ifcfan. As one of my best supporter it means a lot to hear you say that.
I guess I have to to something even crazier to top this. maybe I'll do hand-drawn illustrations?
Date: April 24 2014 8:20 PM Title: Bonus Chapter: Nephilim Dictionary
Yes! Love it that you're inventing a language to accompany your fantastic world! I've always found such great pleasure in seeing and exploring the wonderful little treasures that languages are, and you seem to be doing a great job with yours so far. :)
As far as any advice I can give, I've never been to terribly adept at syntax, tenses, and stuff like that, but I do enjoy phonetics quite a bit and might be able to help you some there. Even though while your language is probably going to be exclusively in written form, if you're interested in the topic I'd suggest further exploring the topic regardless. :)
Now for the advice: each and every language has a flow and feeling to it (or lack thereof if made improperly). This flow is an expression of culture, social mentality, and emotional tendencies. I'd suggest then you make a standard alphabet of sounds for your language and come up with rules on certain combinations of sounds that are pennies. For example, a gutteral consonant must always follow a long vowel. Once you come up with rules that meet the flow you're looking for, or one that reflects how you are trying to portray your culture, you can just follow the rules and make a consistent (beautiful) sounding language.
Again, great story! And good luck with the language!
Author's Response:
I'm glad you enjoyed the story, and the little treasure that comes with it ;D
On the subject of phonetics, the giants in the story have no written language. Thus the language has to be a believable spoken one.
The idea of pronounciation rules is something I could probably look into. I have a good idea of the giants culture and everything else so all I need to do is make it happen.
thank you for the advice
Date: April 24 2014 6:24 PM Title: Bonus Chapter: Nephilim Dictionary
I like the line about positive and negative words. There's a concept in linguistics called phonaesthemes. It's an idea that a sound or pair of sounds can be related to meaning. For example, glisten glimmer gleam glare and glow are all related to light, and all start with gl.
I'd recommend adding suffixes for inanimate objects, and making gender markers optional.
You should have a word or prefix/suffix that means "not". You could also have one that emphases that something is the case.
The subject of a sentence is the thing doing the action, and the object is the thing the action is being done to. In "I saw the car", I is the subject, saw is the verb, and the car is the object.
When coming up with syntax, the first question I would ask is: what's the word order? There are nine word orders, each combination of Subject Verb Object. In English, the subject comes first, then the verb, then the object. We call that SVO. Other languages have subject-object-verb, or SOV.
Another question is how flexible do you want the word order to be? English is very rigid with word order. This is because the subject and object are indicated by their position in the sentence. If you changed "I saw the car" to "The car saw me", you would change the meaning of the sentence.
Other languages, however, are very flexible. In Latin, you can put the words in any order you want, and they'll still mean the same thing. This is because Latin (and a lot of other langauges do this) indicates the subject and object by the way the noun end. Femina is a woman who is the subject of the sentence, and feminam is a woman who is the object of the sentence. Their meaning doesn't change if you rearrange the sentence, but it will change if you change the word's ending.
These are called cases. The nominative case is the subject. The accusative case is the direct object, and there's a dative case for indirect objects. In "I gave the book to you", I is the subject, the book is the direct object, and you is the indirect object. Indirect objects often appear in sentences about giving (datum is Latin for giving). This is a massively simplified account of Latin grammar, by the way.
How many cases can a language have? Finnish has 16. Most of those cases are about location. Think of it as merging a preposition with the word it modifies (this is a process that can make new cases). When making a language, you can think about how many or few words it'll use. You can use separate prepositions and have a lot of words (English is like this), or you can use a pile of prefixes and suffixes (or infixes - the one and only English infix is fan-fucking-tastic).
There are numbers you can use beyond singular and plural. Some languages have a dual number, for pairs or for two things. In Sanskrit, deva means god, devau means a pair of gods, and devaa is many gods. Other languages have a paucal number, for a few, and a trial number, for three.
With verbs, you can have a built in subject. Many Indo-European languages do this with verb endings. In Polish, mam is I have, masz is you (singular) have, ma is he/she/it has, mamy is we have, macie is you (plural) have, maja is they have.
You should think about verb tenses, aspects and moods. You have tense. Aspect is whether something is completed or not. A simple aspect distinction would be completed vs ongoing. Moods include the indicative (a statement of fact), the subjunctive (hypothetical statements - English equivalents include "Let us do this" or "Were is possible..."), or the optative (for wishes).
I need to stop sometime, before I write a new linguistics textbook.
Author's Response:
Well now, this is quite a lot of information. I thank you for taking the time to write this.
First off, thanks for informing me about phonaesthemes; I didn't realize that was what it was called. Now that I know I'll probably be applying that idea more in the language. Since it is a primative language it will most likely apply only to universal constants and things that appear quite often and are related.
I'd like a bit more information on adding the suffix for inanimate objects. Do you mean a word that can be combinded with another to indicate an inanimate object? or something like the connector suffixes which for now only include past, future, and present tense? Also on the subject of gender markers; they are optional, and exist primarily for words associated with people.
A "not" word is a good idea. I could make it mean just "not" when alone and "opposite" when used in a compound word. This would reduce the total number of required words by simply allowing me to indicate when something is the opposite.
The final word order I had in mind is basically everything first then the subject. At least for now. Its hard to explain what my idea is, so I'll just post a couple of sentence examples with translation in the dictionary chapter. For now here's a basic compound word to give you the general idea. "Skiŕ’Kala" translates literally to "Foreign person". the word describing the person is in front, and the subject is in the back. If a gender marker needed to be added it would be behind "Kala" thus modifing it. Finally, "Voeŕ Skiŕ’Kala" translates to "kill foreign person" (kind of a brutal example I know). So, i guess the word order, or one of the word orders is... "Verb,object,subject". I need to think about this word order thing for a while. Thank you for bringing this to my attention.
After writing this example I might just remove "Sha'Kala" entirely. It seems to create more conflict than it solves. I also already have a term for "me", which I could just expand to cover all they ways to refer to one's self. What do you think about this?
Lastly, the dual number idea is a good one. the giants are just like humans in that they have two eyes, two genders, legs, arms, etc etc. A concept to indicate duality might make a good addition to the language. Though I'm not sure about the triple number. Perhaps I could use that one, although the idea of a word to indicate duality seems like it'd be much easier to integrate.
[Report This]Date: April 21 2014 6:01 AM Title: Into the Arid Wastes
As a huge linguistics nerd, I'm curious to see what kind of grammar and vocabulary you've come up with. As for the chapter, interesting development. It'll be nice to see where this leads.
Author's Response:
Glad I have someone who appreciates languages around. I am struggling to come up with a concrete grammar system, and could use assistance.
[Report This]Date: April 20 2014 3:28 PM Title: Into the Arid Wastes
Awesome! As if the gts genre wasn't cool enough, the sci fi aspect makes it infinitely better(for me anyways).
I liked the idea of Michael having a bit of power himself before, but now that they're on Nibiru, he's pretty helpless. Oh well. I think the 35 or so bodyguards should help keep them safe. Hopefully they aren't expecting some truly impressive demonstrations of Nephilia's power though. Because jumping high and running fast seem to be all she can muster.
Can't wait to see more!
Author's Response:
It always brings a smile to my face when the first word in a review is "awesome"
Also, Michael isn't entirely helpless. He's got his intelligence, and his resourcefulness to keep him safe. And in regards to Nephila, wait until you see next chapter.
Date: April 20 2014 1:20 PM Title: Into the Arid Wastes
Sometimes Michael feels smaller than he actually is with the way you describe things. A spear long enough to impale 40 cargo ships? You sure Michael isn’t micro size?
I’m also going to assume Athena did experiment on Nephila to make her naturally used to Atlantian level gravity so her own home world gravity would feel light.
And actually feel sorry for the two Nibiru that Nephila attacked. I can see why that obsession is a double edged sword. Nephila’s mind goes on auto-pilot and she runs on instinct. It could get her and Michael killed.
The Nibiru language does kind of sound like gibberish.
I find it hard to believe that one girl acquired such a huge following for Nephilia based on a single meeting.
Author's Response:
Well, Seems I've got some explaining to do. I guess I'll cover all statments in order.
1) No I'm positive he's not micro. Although I understand why this is confusing. You see, because of this stories setting it can be difficult to create size comparisons since everything takes place thousands of years in the past and the technology is differnet from ours. So I can't just do what normal macro authors do and say things like "As big as a phone booth" because then I would be including elements from out own time into the story. That would just sound awful, and pull readers out of the story entirely.
Thus I need to create things that sound large to compare the giants too.
2) Lips shut on this one.
3) An excellent analysis. Obsession is a powerful emotion like fear or anger. It can definetely be a double edged sword. Also If you knew what the girl was saying you wouldn't feel as bad for her. Btw, the boy is fine; he just has a sore jaw and a couple of loose teeth.
4) Yeah... it does. Then again so do many languages.
5) I personally felt it was quite believable. The last time they met Nephila did something that is impossible for other giants to do. Although we understand that because Nephila is accustomed to earth level gravity she can jump very high, Nia (the blue painted girl) does not. She saw what Nephila did as a miracle; a display of divine power.
It may not be as incredible as healing the sick or moving mountains, but to a primative like her, what Nephila did was proof that she possesses the same "divine" power as the Atlantians, who as we already know frequently come down and abduct giants.
Hopefully I was able to answer all your questions to your satisfaction. If you require additional explaination just leave me a review and I'll get back to you ASAP
[Report This]Date: April 19 2014 8:09 PM Title: Prologue
Your right about this being a good chapter! I was casually reading to keep up with this story and my hype for this shot through the roof with this one! Good job, I'll be looking forward to what you have planned.
Author's Response:
Thank god for this review. I was nervous that my new approach to the story would fail, but thanks to you I'm confident about it.
Date: April 08 2014 4:24 PM Title: Escape From the Burning Sky Palace
It's good your continuing to properly pace the story.
It's also good to know you fear is still intact, also I kind of knew you were joking, I was only playing along.
I'm just as bad if not worse then you when it comes to chapter breaks, so don't stress on that too much, we all have lives to live.
When I say closure, I mean an action or subplot needs to feel like it's done, finished, or continuing onwards; not just stopping or fading out. In the last chapter they were just barely getting done finishing talking with the natives, and it just ends. Then in the next chapter it skips directly to him entering the cargo bay. For a moment I thought I missed another chapter on the survival training. There was never a single hint that they were returning from training in the previous chapter.
So if you took a long break from the story, as your readers did, waiting for the next chapter, they might get confused. I guess the word I'm really looking for is transitioning, as each chapter can be read alone, the chapters should ideally flow one into another instead with a story like this.
Athena is who she is, but that's the problem, we don't know enough about who she is, so she ends up feeling like a very minor character who should be more important. Her character feels like a center point for the plot to continue but at the same time feels empty. Having a few more scenes, maybe private ones that can show Athena's hidden character, then this chapters portrayal of her wouldn't have felt so wrong.
Chapters can be purposely fast paced, and maybe I was wrong to say you rushed it. I think my justifications for it seeming to be rushed, is the fact the characters and settings of the story up to this point have not been explored enough. Nephila is going to be a star attraction later in the story as they go planet side. But the audience is only ever going to be able to see the Atlantian point of view right now to my knowledge. Mind you all this is opinioned based, and the audience you could be searching for does not just comprise me.
Seeing other points of views, even from unimportant sources, can give the reader other viewpoints of the same scene in different renewed eyes.
Well a re-write is probably not necessary, but bolstering up the story I think would work.
Honestly I think you're doing really well, so take my advice with a grain of salt.
Author's Response:
I see what you mean now. And I must acknowledge that your arguement as legitimate. Though I probably won't end up re-writing. I will however be much more careful with future chapters.
To put it simply, i'll make sure not to upload without dotting my I's and crossing my T's.
Thanks for the advice Eric, I look foward to hearing from you in future chapters.
Date: April 07 2014 12:21 AM Title: Escape From the Burning Sky Palace
So from now on chapters will be episodic in nature. Not sure if that's your best strategy. Yes break up a story, but keep it relevant. There is such a thing as serialized episodes, in which the episode or chapter has a mini plot but is still part of a main story which continues to progress. That might be better, and almost sounds more like what you want to do.
You only have one fear... You sir, are crazy! When I write I have tons of fears, and those fears lead me to re-checking rewriting and making changes in my own writing to improve it. If you only fear me, you will only cause me to furiously come after you for not fearing your other readers!
Of course I'm going to leave a review, especially when you call me out in front of everyone else....
Now about this chapter. I brought this up last time, but it seems others are also in agreement with me. You take long breaks in between chapter releases, a common issue amongst writers even myself. Yet you never have any kind of hint or reminders to the previous chapters events. There was no closure to the last chapter, and this chapter just jumps into a new scene without any explanation at all! I thought I skipped a chapter by accident. You do not properly setup your setting. I feel like I'm just randomly walking in and out of an ongoing play, catching most of it but also feeling like I missed something important.
That all said, every writer including myself is guilty of not always setting things up properly or letting things play out. So this is acceptable, just please don't let it continually happen. And perhaps it would not have felt so awkward if the chapter releases came out closer to one another. But I'm also guilty of that, and many other writers.
Athena in this chapter was a bit all over the place. She plays the scientist, the exposition explainer, as well as the heartfelt mother.
Mike yet again was just be dragged along for the ride while demanding answers, the same which the readers would ask...
Nephilla was there, but it felt like she fell back to square one.
What about those neat insect like race in the cargo bay, or the Atlantians, I wonder what they were doing, what they thought of Nephila's presence etc. Nope lets rush to the exposition. And that's what this chapter felt like, Rushed.
Move the story, along get Mike and Nephila planet side, explain a little about giants, make Mike feel bad, make Nephila feel bad, make the readers sympathize.
In the grand scheme of things, I understand why and for what reasons you released this chapter under, or at least I think I do. You wanted to release it and you rushed to complete it, you felt your audience wanted the story to move along because there was so much pause between chapter updates. You mixed exposition and storytelling in a half hazard way which could have been corrected. You overlooked it as you wanted to release quickly. This was because you felt guilty you hadn't released anything for quite some time. All writers are often guilty of this, even myself.
I just feel if you had waited, re-read your chapter and touched it up it could have been better. Rushing things is how you can ruin a story.
Your focused on fixing your grammatical errors more than your simple storytelling ones. The chapter passes, but I suggest a future re-write or additions to bolster this chapter at the very least.
Now that may have all sounded harsh, but rest assured, the story is still good, and I will continue reading it.
Author's Response:
Your right. The episodic chapters are basically mini-adventures set along the way of the overarching plot. I think people are a little spooked about the word "episodic" but I can assure you that all this means is that there will be sub-plots to push the story foward.
I was only kidding about fearing only you. I'm actually a little afraid of being grilled by everyone.
Can't help the chapter upload breaks. I'll do the best I can, but I have little agency in my own scheduling nowadays. Between work, school, and lifes many other challenges I only have so much time to write. Also I don't really see what you mean when you say there was no closure. Upon re-reading the entire story, I felt the problem is that there might be too much closure. You may have to explain this issue in further detail.
Athena is who she is. She is the only one who knows this information and can explain it, but at the same time, she is also a mother figure to Nephila.
Rushed is a bit harsh. This chapter was purposely fast paced to get the characters to where they needed to be. The incect race was just a little detail I added in to remind people that there are other races in this universe. I didn't consider their feelings important enough to the main plot to be included.
This chapter isn't that terribly broken that a re-write is in order. However, I would not be against adding onto this chapter.
Date: April 06 2014 12:59 AM Title: Prologue
An update! Seems like Michael will become an interesting hurdle in Nephilias path to greatness. Getting attached to people is the quickest way to make yourself vulnerable, so this development is certainly welcomed.
Author's Response:
More like Nephilia will be hurdle in Michaels path to greatness. Its easy to lose sight of your goals when there is a multi-ton women constantly glaring at you out of the corner of her eye.
Its interesting that you say that since in my opinion Nephilia is already vulnerable. However, chances are she will become even more so as time passes.
Date: April 05 2014 3:29 PM Title: Prologue
I like the story so far. Not sure what you ment by "the attention span of a rodent" though, because I find all rodents to be very inquisitive and they are often very determined animals. Presumably you meant not long attention span if there's no giantess content?
As for your other comment, this story looks to be one with a well thought out plot and lots of character development so it'll be iteresting ose how you'll include sex in this story and keep believable. If there is a love interest for a character then surely can't come from that race of giants (who first impressions imply are very brutish).
It'll also be interesting to find out why Michael was sent there. I can guess but I'll keep my thoughts to myself for now. I'm a bit confused about certain details though but I'm reviewing this chapter on my mobile phone and read a bit fast so I think a reread is in order when I get onto my main computer. Hopefully that will clear things up, and not I'll leave some more comments for you.
Author's Response:
That bit in the beginning was a mini-rant against short-sighted readers who get bored too quickly. I never realized how determined rodents were though, thats good to know.
This is giantessworld.com, so yes, there will be some intense interaction with the giants and giantesses. However, unlike my more... pornegraphic works, in this one I don't intend to go into explicit details. At least not excessively. I'm not sure where I'm going to draw the line in this one.
Also, not all the giants are brutish as you will soon come to see.
Date: April 05 2014 2:35 PM Title: Prologue
Sweet, I'm glad you updated!
Author's Response:
And I'm glad you enjoyed my story enough to review. Thanks again Gadget. :D
[Report This]Date: April 05 2014 9:32 AM Title: Escape From the Burning Sky Palace
Welcome back. It's good to see this story move forward. I like your idea of mini adventures. They can deepen the plot and characters, and develop a rich mythology.
Author's Response:
Thank you for the warm return and the rate.
And your spot on with the mini adventures. I intend to develop a rich detailed universe.
Nephilia and Michael's story is just part of what is to come.
Date: April 05 2014 1:53 AM Title: Escape From the Burning Sky Palace
Well now that they've flown the coop, things will get interesting. I wonder what are the other main senses of a giant?
Author's Response:
I've done quite a bit of research into human psychology and physiology in the time since the day I conceived of the giants. There are a number of interesting differences they have that will be explored in later chapters. Until then, all I can tell you is that they have more differences than just their emotions.
Date: April 04 2014 7:36 PM Title: Escape From the Burning Sky Palace
Well shit now that you’ve called me out I have to read this now, don’t I?
Lol I kid
Anyway, things have certainly hit the fan, almost too quickly I think. I don’t think Athena got to be all that fleshed out. It’s interesting to hear the Alantians have become so arrogant and grandiose that they have homes as big as cities and that the giants can become extremely possessive. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or bad thing for Michael lol
Interesting to see where this story goes now that Michael and Nephila are planet side and Michael is powerless.
I’m not so sure about the episodic chapters, I guess I’ll have to see how that pans out.
Author's Response:
I do believe you called me out first if I remember correctly.
Athena never got the chance to explain how obsessive they can get but I can assure you that it is a two edged sword.
On the subject of episodes. Think of the episodic chapters as mini-adventures as the two (and eventually four) of them travel in search of the axiom. The main plot will never be far removed from these storys, and with the exception of a few multi-chapter specials they will all end with the main characters continuing their quest.
Date: December 08 2013 2:18 AM Title: Prologue
Nice addition, the beginnings of her change in character I guess! Hopefully we'll get to see more plot in the future chapters though, to keep it more interesting. :)
Also, you've been using IE until now? What century have you been living on? lol!
Author's Response:
Thank you Ifcfan. Its good to hear from you again.
And yes, Nephilia will be going through some behavioral changes in repsonse to these recent events.
As for my browser choice... apparently I have been living in the same century this story takes place it because IE sucks.
[Report This]Date: December 07 2013 10:17 AM Title: Prologue
I have something of an interest in mythology, and I'd like to know what mythologies and other sources you're drawing on here. I see what looks like Greek and Sumerian mythology, ancient astronauts stuff, Biblical stuff and 19th/20th century versions of the Atlantis story.
Author's Response:
You have quite an eye for these things Ancient Relic! then again, with a name like that I would expect nothing less.
As for all the sources, here is a list of all I can give you without spoiling future parts of the story.
- First off, Nephila's name... well, that one is a bit obvious.
- Michael's name comes from the archangel who shares the same name, and the Atlantian Military is based on both the Christian and Jewish Angelic Hirarchies.
- The war mentioned in the beginning of the story is derived from christian apocrypha Specifically the book of Enoch. And the un-named leader of the rebellion that Michael killed was based off of Lucifer.
- The idea od Atlantis being an advanced spacefaring civilization I got from a book, which I cannot for the life of me remember the name of. (sry)
- lastly Seraphim Yesod's name comes from the Jewish Sephirot.
You were spot on in your analyisis on my story, and I hope you keep on reading so that I can repy to you again when I have more written.
Date: December 06 2013 8:28 PM Title: Survival Training Pt. 2
This chapter was good.
You further developed Nephila's character, and soundly introduced the theme in the story with Michael's helplessness in his situation. You also enlightened the readers, by allowing to observe Nephila's actions, they can come to terms with the stories title easily. The wild savage I felt was overplayed, but worked none the less.
Dialogue was heavy, but acceptable with proper exposition. I felt that the reader need to refresh themselves before reading the chapter. It might have been good to have some sort of re-cap exposition. I also felt the character of Herme's was severely underplayed, and lacked what he needed to be considered a good side character. Honestly, if it had been me, I would have dedicated an entire chapter to Nephila's interaction with him, before saving Michael. But due to the fact that last chapter involved a very fast action scene, I feel it also couldn't be helped by the author.
The wild giantess I also felt to be a minor character, because she was overplayed, but not so much as Herme's. She got plenty of lines and seven her personality was done well, so in the end, for a random encounter, she passed. Would love to see her develop more if they meet again.
I only saw one run on sentence, and your use of comma's generally gave readers go breath's. You had a tendency to overuse spaces between exposition, but not very badly either, it passes.
The chapter passes with a good grade, for the development of theme, and character personality in the main characters.
I will look forward to reading your next chapter.
Author's Response:
This is high praise coming from you Eric lol.
First off I am glad to see you notice the amount of effort I put into developing Nephila's character and how I am slowly adding more from her POV.
On the subject of dialogue I would have to agree with you in this department, but I felt that the heavier amount of dialogue was acceptable seeing as it was a more action oriented chapter. As for Hermes I have to admit that he is a minor character and will not show up much up until around the end of the story
I'm glad my grammar is getting high marks as well.
Lastly, "The chapter passes with a good grade" all in all a good grade. Thank you Eric. :)
*Spoilers* The wild giantess is going to be a minor character, and she will appear in later chapters