Novelty's DOR Review - Chapter 21

[Novelty]

First off, this review is dedicated to Trebs - don't ask me why I'm donig dedications all of a sudden, I did it in the last 2 and I'm continuing the trend. He was the first person to message me to tell me that this chapter was up and he's also kindly purchased a modem for Dan as well over the weekend. So yay for Trebs.

 

First off, Emoe makes his first appearance in an actual DOR chapter with an original sentence. I have no idea if that comment was left in deliberately to satiate the bloodlust of the danimals or if it was just a formatting error on Dan's part. It was a little bit distracting, but since I knew that it was an Emoe comment, I skipped over it and went back to it on the second pass. No big deal there and definately nothing to nitpick about.

 

It is good to read about the Rushes again - besides Reagan, they were the only other people in Do Over that I loved. One of the reasons why I liked them is because they are unique and they stand out from the rest of the other characters. They have their own mannerisms, speech patterns (not to mention a completely different language at times) and characteristics. In a fictional world, they seem very flesh and blood to me. I said in my previous review, that most of Dan's portrayal of characters in DOR so far have been ephemeral. The short section with the rushes in this chapter stands out so much that they were almost like real people caught up in a dreamscape. [in retrospect, so were David and Sam as well, althought those two have not got as much "screen time" as Dyadya and Tyatya.]

 

I was ready to rant about how getting spoilers in advance could spoil the enjoyment of the story, for example, how the cliffhanger didn't work in 18 because we knew Brian won't show up until 20. Well the converse is true. Few people know that I got Chapter 14 early because I "guessed" correctly who the Walkers from the sentence "the Walkers are really aliens from the planet Jubabub". Well, it was surprising to see how that fits into the context here, although it's scary to know that Dan was like 9 chapters ahead at that point in time.

 

The other thing that I'm beginning to find distracting is how that now I've gotten to known Dan a little better, I can actually tell which sentences are from Dan's mouth and which are from Davey's. Granted they are the same person, but it's a little bit hard to suspend belief and picture Davey as a real person when he speaks with Dan's mouth.

 

Truth be told, I wasn't looking forward to the interactions between Davey and Brian. I had no expectations leading into the story and I had none coming out. One thing that's nagging at the corner of my mind is how "uncurious" Davey seems to be this time around. I hope Dan isn't borrowing a page from Dom's book on that, but I figure that Dan, being Dan will only reveal certain things when the time is right.

 

The one thing that bothered me about Brian in the last story was that he was very one dimensional - the only thing that motivated him was his love and dedication to Davey. It made him almost less of a character since he was being defined almost exclusively being tied to Davey. Even when he wrote an entire chapter, his entire focus was Davey. I'm not saying that is wrong or that doesn't fit the story, but here in DOR, he isn't tied as much to Davey anymore. Hopefully, the few years apart from Davey has given him more room to develop as a character/person. There is some indication that this is so here, but it's too early to tell.

 

While I'm nitpicking, Mr. Mulkey gets to wander around a military base unescorted?

 

I'll end the review on a positive note. I know Dan has Hollywood in mind and has been and still is a huge movie buff so it's no surprise that the scenes were framed with that in mind. My absolute favourite scene in this chapter, isn't even a scene or even a paragraph. It wasn't even a complete sentence.

 

"His voice faded out as he led the group towards the main stairs..."

 

The use of both the visual and the aural coupled with a directional modifier paints the scene perfectly, and although it's not earth shattering or end-of-the-world-esque, but it shows Dan is starting to get serious about painting his scenes with more than just the visual element.