Krista

Listening is an invaluable tool. You can learn a lot from the person talking if you sit back, clear your mind and listen. Most people will 'tell' you who they are far quicker than showing you.

At least here, they just dropped the law that required students and student athletes to be residents of the county they go to school at. Even districts, for larger schools to openly recruit high school aged kids to transfer to play for them. I don't know how common that is in other states, but it is an interesting point to make. With him living three counties away, then he would definitely become a 'special' case to consider...

Aww. The first two chapters are really heavy handed, especially the first one. There's also not a lot of time spent between them story-pace wise, so feelings, and such are stagnant and there for awhile, like a storm cloud that refuses to move. Sadly they are. I also find that if you really sit down and ask men if they ever opened up to someone, they could list you the person, relationship, date, and time, and tell you they were shut down, made out to be the villain, or ignored completely. As a woman, over the years I've become hyper aware of this. I find it so disheartening when I listen to male mental health speakers share their stories. More often than not, other men will uplift men in crisis, a woman will do the opposite, especially if they're in a heterosexual romantic relationship.

I also forgot to mention, that as I try to envision myself writing a story such as this, I honestly don't know how long I would be able to maintain it. Not long. I live in large paragraphs of retrospection and moods with my characters. So much so, that sometimes it does some of the heavy lifting for me, maybe to a fault at times. But your characters are so vibrantly living in 'now' thoughts and doing it in sentences before moving along. They may say something that has an element of retrospection, but then it comes and goes in passing and it is the reader's job to file it away and keep it for whenever it will be needed again. It is done in ways that allows for us to remember important information, whilst the unrelenting flow from short paragraphs keeps shifting where our minds go with this story. That is why I said the writing is subtly very, or low-key challenging, because it doesn't 'seem' like it would be, but I'd be scratching my head after three chapters, if that... So, you being able to maintain this style, pace, and such and return to it after short respites is truly something. At least tropes do give you an assist, you're still making everything feel freshly baked. Also, I hope I've not put undue pressure on you... lol.

Are you enabling me?

...

Maybe you need a Wildthing hovering over your shoulder saying, "No," before you hit the publish button. And your comment made me squint... underlying reason, you say? 😮 I'll just help myself out, and actually use the "follow" tool... and act like it hasn't been here since the damn implementation of the new story archive all those years ago. You can't be sneaky now.

The comment read very story-telling, narratively to me. It flowed nicely. I loved it. You almost made me sad how you described the selling off of the unwanted land piece by piece. Maybe they needed to be more appreciative of the place built on the land they sold away. Phil took a different path than his father, who farmed. Living in an area where "lot sales" are becoming the sad truth of the landscape, I felt it. There will be five or six families buy those lots, they will claim it as their own and then before you know it they're backed up on your doorstep and there goes your peace, because no one wants to inherit land anymore, to work it. Just to sell it. I like these characters. I want people to believe that there are people walking around just like them, that's why I write the characters that I do.

I laughed loud enough that I had to explain how something could be so funny to my husband, who was only half paying me any attention because College Football 26 came out this month and he's been engrossed in that. I'm also annoyed that I hadn't noticed this new chapter until today. Don't be sneaky, now. So, the jock isn't dumb, just a bit academically disorganized. What happens after Skylar gives him the tools to bring him up well past the "dumb jock," level to a more even playing field. At least, with his unapologetically biased playing field. 😮 The guy also didn't blink with the whole sleeping with Lex thing, completely unbothered. Almost as if he didn't believe that for a second and knew Skylar's mother's interrogation was pointless. Or, he just doesn't care who Skylar may be accused of sleeping with. But, he's also horribly bothered with his girlfriend, to the point of a near end with her. Even on my worst cranky days, if I got that response back, I would have ended it there. We'll see if she has any dignity for herself, because even if she's being a bitchy controlling girlfriend, his response to that wasn't a good one. Just entirely too toxic and high school all around, those two. In it to be Homecoming and Prom royalty, with the bonus of sex, I'm guessing.

Not exactly Gay TV/Movies/or Books... But, "The Summer I Turned Pretty," season three's two debut episodes were a complete and total letdown for me. Mind you, most of season two annoyed me so much that I attempted to read the books. I got through the first half of one. So, I'm not all that invested in the source material, but if the source material has the scene in the second episode play out like it did, then I find it a major fault with the writing. The writing took a step back in season two, but it seems worse in these first two episodes. I'd have to look and see if there was a change in writers or not. I know the author has a significant role in the adaptation, and has since tweaked a lot of it to be more... current. Yes, people can make mistakes. There were just too many excuses made for poor behavior, that should have carried a lot more weight than it has so far. If there is 'less' of that weight in the following episodes, I may DNF it and retain my title of picky to a fault.

I think the next piece of writing will move along the story a bit better. Know that I am soooo tempted to post it. I wonder if I can sneak it in without Wildthing catching me... might dangle a basket of fish and chips in front of him, a cold pint too just for good measure.

I'm glad you did, because I just noticed that I called poor Simon a Clam. lol. Yeah, I think seeing people be accepted, specifically for being like you is something people whole a lot of weight on, before they make up their minds about things. If all you're living on is unknowns, it makes the decisions far more daunting.

I was thinking, aww this comment is so cute. Then you threw a shor'nuff statement at me and it sent me.

The last thing we need to be thinking about is Jonny Lundst Jr. being the hero of this story. But... it is an interesting and very true statement. He came along, annoyed Joel, and became an unwanted distraction. I like Trace thinking all this is a miracle angle better, but you can't deny Jonny's unexpected role either.

Colt... sigh. Well he's Colt.

Krista may also be interested. My paranoid-author self is going to be rereading chapters 4, 5, and 6 really fast after some of these comments. And by 4, 5, and 6.. I mean 6, 7, and 8 since we split up some of the monster chapters and I'm too lazy to re-number them in my documents. I just called them 1, 2, 3A, 3B, 4A,4B. I think 5 stands alone, then 6A, and 6B. Why make life easier and create new documents, one may ask...

Sometimes self-preservation is the only way people know how to live. I've seen it.

Gosh, the only thing I can say is... we'll see, won't we? lol. 😮 Just know, I say this with a twitch and a wondering if I'm going to survive some of these comments knowing full well if I open my mouth too much I'm going to say something that's going to spoil the hell out of something.

Damn, this makes my day... but also, the pressure. This story is roughly over 250k words long, for better or worse. Already written, so you don't have to wait, *hopefully* months between chapters and make the story span multiple years before you get the conclusion. *whistles*

Damn... what a missed opportunity that was... No genetic for familial connections between them though. Shocking, I know. 😮

I'd have to reread a bit, but yeah, I don't think I ever had Lisa or Phil use anything religious against him. Just prejudices, I think the most I went into is Joel overhearing things he didn't like, and knew he needed to be cautious and careful, but not exactly what it was. I mean, people can have physical aversions to homosexuality, because of the sexual act, etc. They may have had a bad experience dealing with someone who happened to be homosexual. It could be good ol' generational hate that she learned from a parent that 'may' loosely be based on religion, but she herself isn't religious, but retained that mindset. That's why I always say that hate is an individual choice people make. They can show strength and break the chains if they wanted. Lisa also doesn't speak to her siblings either. Maybe Lisa is just full of hate and if you give her enough time, she can run through everyone she knows and realize something about them she can't accept. There are people walking this earth that are like that... You are also correct about the span of time so far. Joel is not yet 48 hours into being outed and kicked out of his house. He doesn't have his phone. I don't think many people would even catch on that anything is amiss yet, despite small towns and all that. It is also the summer, so at least his gossip may be slowed down a little, at least until school starts.