Hey Rosey! It's been for-freakin'-ever, so it's about time I jump straight back into Cat Steps! So I've skimmed the other reviews and I'll try to bring something new to the table here. Let's start!
I'll start with your grammar and style, because you know that's where I like to focus when it comes to issues with clarity. And do we have some issues with clarity here -- while the chapter as a whole is absolutely brilliant (as per usual), I felt like some of the smaller ideas had a hard time coming across, and that can build up to your big ideas.
First off, your description is lacking a bit in this chapter. It makes me sad, because I love being in Kerani's head, but I also wish we could experience the world -- as it is, we're being told about it right now, and it's missing some key details. Like here:
That second sentence/paragraph is the perfect place to add some description. Walking into her room cut her plans off -- why? You answer it a couple sentences later, but there's nothing in the way of really describing the pile of fabric. That phrase is awkwardly inserted into the last sentence, and I feel like if you described it in the second paragraph, you could skip that in the last sentence.Hopefully I would be able to make some progress into this beast before—
Walking back into my room cut that plan right off.
Nitika sighed upon seeing my face. “I dismissed the servants for exactly that reason.”
“I thought I had an outfit…” I muttered, ignoring the pile of fabric on the central table of my room and going straight for the ‘desk’ portion of my workbench.
Some more nitpicky grammar bits include this:
Which makes it sound like Kerani is one of her father's wives. Obviously that's a setting choice you could make -- and she's referring to her mother here, if I'm correct -- but the phrase "other wives" makes it unclear. I would maybe cut it to "Father's dozen wives" instead, and have her think about (or pointedly not think about) her mother as an aside.“Can’t they look towards one of Father’s dozen other wives?”
This feels awkward as dialogue -- like you're telling it to the reader. I think the most tell-y sentence is the second one. I know it's Kerani speaking to Nitika, but I feel like the dialogue itself could be shortened to a more... sarcastic "He would. All he had to be was an accountant." and have Kerani remember or reflect the social pain of trying to create a wardrobe for Ranya.“He would. He was thoroughly exasperated with the Court attention we were getting with Ranya, meanwhile the two of us were busy creating a wardrobe fit for a crown princess and her accompanying servant. All he had to be was… an accountant.”
Simple typo here. Side note, I really love what we see of Nitika's direct characterization. I want to know everything about her, she's so brilliant. <3One of the particularly inquisitive minds of the Empire had taken a liking to our gardens and science facilities I had just begun to use, them [then] newly renovated when my father had been on the throne.
On to good stuff because I need a breather, too!
I... love this. I love this a LOT. I want to feel more of what Kerani's feeling here, I want to know more about what happened -- I think we'll be hearing more about what's made Kerani this way, though, and I'm loving all these hints and drops and the way she reacts to things and honestly it's leaving me so awestruck because all these little puzzle pieces are starting to make the edges of a picture. I can't wait to see the whole thing!Thank the gods she knew how to detect her own poisons. I didn’t have the skill to protect her at the time.
I shuddered to think just what I had missed when I was twelve. And where I would be without her skill.
Yes I love this. <3 So so much! Like, Nitika is just such a good person (from what we've seen of her so far) and she's so patient and so willing to learn and I can't wait!Nitika would make a wonderful mother, for how attentive she was to the younger ones, and the ones who needed a little more time to understand all of the input around them. Jalil was hardly a sensor, but maybe their children would inherit some genes from our father. It ran in the Palahira bloodline almost as much as our claim to the land.
Now some stuff about character and setting/exposition:
So I really want to know more about Kerani's relationship with the kids. Obviously she's Aunt Cat, she's there to entertain them and keep them safe from the big bad world, but I want to know how close she is to them personally. (Obviously don't go down a list like "this was little Johnny who I'd known since he was born and he was such and such, this was little Jimmy..." but maybe single out a kid or two to show more of as a character, and develop their relationship with Kerani.) I feel like it would add another tether between Kerani and her household, and make it more emotional if/when she's torn away from it, because there's more than just a handful of people who would hate to see her go.They all ended up piled in my room, clamoring on every surface available to see the fabrics and patterns. Suggestions of which ones to use for what just made me laugh, seriousness of it all lost for a few moments.
More visceral reactions! More emotions! Give me more give me more <3 I love Kerani and her reactions so much but stuff like this falls flat if you don't have her actually emotionally backing it up.I shook my head vigorously. “Me. Pregnant. Unable to go help people. Do you think that would actually work?”
I want to see all of this world and then some. I want to explore everything about Cat Steps that I can. I love everything about this scene -- it's a good way to calm a bit of the tension while still developing Kerani and Nitika as major characters -- and I think it's a great piece of writing. It could just be a little better.
Keep writing! <3
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