Dawn of Tears

With apologies to the author and readers, I can only say that I'm now done reading this story and won't be commenting on any more chapters or giving reactions.  This is extreme for me because I like a good sci-fi story, and despite more than a few bad edits, I was enjoying it.

However, from hints in other comments in chapters, I went online and found the full story posted elsewhere, and spent two solid days reading the entire book.  Now I know about the reason for a comment that it hasn't been edited since the original posting because the same errors are still there...but worse than that...is the final chapter.

We cruise through many events in the lives of the characters, good and bad for thirty-two chapters, and they were intriguing and leaving me wanting more, then Chapter 33 is opened, and I was angry and made a resolution to not read any more from this author.  In that final chapter, we get  about five sentences covering more than twenty years...three huge revelations concerning the plot and characters with zero details or story at all--bald sentences just telling the event.

And then--to top it off--the writer says he'd hoped to write a better ending for the story!  Pray tell, it's been ten years since this went online, so what has kept you from doing a better job, unless you're planning to do it in this reposting?  With the errors still intact in this new posting, I don't see that happening, so all I can do is say this: I'm done with this one, and if you want to read it 'til its conclusion, feel free--but you'll be as disappointed and angry as I am at the waste of time you've invested.

I truly hope dkstories will re-write the final chapter here...only that will give me back my former love for this story....

Small hint:

He DID that because people were being bitchy and DEMANDING he write faster, differently and post more often. 

10 years later, no change with that. 

And that's truly the sad part. 

4 hours ago, ColumbusGuy said:

With apologies to the author and readers, I can only say that I'm now done reading this story and won't be commenting on any more chapters or giving reactions.  This is extreme for me because I like a good sci-fi story, and despite more than a few bad edits, I was enjoying it.

However, from hints in other comments in chapters, I went online and found the full story posted elsewhere, and spent two solid days reading the entire book.  Now I know about the reason for a comment that it hasn't been edited since the original posting because the same errors are still there...but worse than that...is the final chapter.

We cruise through many events in the lives of the characters, good and bad for thirty-two chapters, and they were intriguing and leaving me wanting more, then Chapter 33 is opened, and I was angry and made a resolution to not read any more from this author.  In that final chapter, we get  about five sentences covering more than twenty years...three huge revelations concerning the plot and characters with zero details or story at all--bald sentences just telling the event.

And then--to top it off--the writer says he'd hoped to write a better ending for the story!  Pray tell, it's been ten years since this went online, so what has kept you from doing a better job, unless you're planning to do it in this reposting?  With the errors still intact in this new posting, I don't see that happening, so all I can do is say this: I'm done with this one, and if you want to read it 'til its conclusion, feel free--but you'll be as disappointed and angry as I am at the waste of time you've invested.

I truly hope dkstories will re-write the final chapter here...only that will give me back my former love for this story....

3 hours ago, Myr said:

Your entire comment as @mmike1969 said is precisely why the story ended the way it did.

dkstories is no longer with us and Gay Authors holds the rights to all his stories, per arrangements we made.  As the story note says, we are reposting it as is.  And there is a very clear note to people that have not read the story that the last chapter was unsatisfactory.  You chose to read it anyway.  With this story, in particular, we are reposting it for those that enjoy dkstories work.  

dkstories is deceased?  I read mike's comment and knew none of the prior history to this story, which I was loving right up to the last chapter.  It makes me angry now that he felt the need to do that in response to people's reactions--it deserved a better resolution, no matter how long it took to get there.  I hadn't read his work before, so had no idea what to expect, so I was disillusioned at the end, and my anger now is aimed at those others who so badly affected his love for this story.

I am also though, upset that the only note for the reposting was that the final chapter was going to be controversial...I feel it would have been better served to put one in saying that dkstories was deceased and this was being done to memorialize him.  Posting the chapters still under his name made me think he was doing it himself, and thus that we might hope for some changes.  Had I known, I would have approached this view that 'at least it's finished' and be grateful.  There are authors whose fate we don't know, like Dom Luka who just vanished, and leaves us with no closure at all. 

I read Kombat Kids and loved it, bu only in starting the sequel was there a note that that book wouldn't be finished since the author was dead.

If GayAuthors knows the fate of an author, I think it would be helpful to put a note on their work that says the writer has died so we know whether we can expect unfinished stories to be completed in future.  With pseudonyms being used by a lot of us, how are we to research these things? 

If this is stated somewhere on site, then why not gather them into a list and post it somewhere easily found--before I lost a lot of my vision I searched the forums for Dom Luka's fate and found a few things but no one seemed to know...but I went through hundreds of things to find that much.  Now that these things are much harder and I use narration software, it's just too time-consuming trying to go through forums for little posts that might say that an author is no longer living.

I hate to think that I had something bad to say about a good author--I believe in approaching new ones to me with an open mind, and having a dialogue with them.  That he is no longer around saddens me a great deal--I had hopes that he might take up this story again.

I also think if an author has passed on it show be posted by his name as in (In Memory of) I know other sites do that like Nifty has "In Blessed Memory" and Tickie Story Pages's has "Gone and not forgotten author's listed separate. I know there may have been some that have passed away and the hosting site never had a way of knowing. But if they do know it would help for it to be noted. It is so easy to get attached to an author or a story and then they just abandon the story all together. A couple of authors I have followed their stories and they would have 4 or 5 stories going at once and then just stop posting. Like J.P.G on Tickie and Jacob Miller on Nifty Archives and he also has his on site had some great stories going and he kept adding new character after new character to each story and then he just stopped posting. Or Steven Wells at Nifty Archives has some very great stories and keeps adding more and more characters to his but with 3 or 4 ongoing stories it is sometimes 6 months or more before he updates on of them. Hell I have to go back and read a chapter or two to just be able to refresh my memory of the story. I wish he would just concentrate on bringing one to an great end then start on the next one and so forth instead of have 3 or 4 floating like they are. I really do appreciate the great jobs authors are doing and I know 99% are writing both for their enjoyment and for us and the other 1% may be lucky to get a story published to make a little money off of them. But now I try my best to figure out if one has ended and hopefully has an epilogue before I start reading them. Or like on this site I try to make sure that they don't have 4 or 5 ongoing stories at once or look at the posting history before I attempt to read a story. It is just really frustrating to get into a great story and then left hanging for years or never finished.

On 8/19/2018 at 12:55 AM, ColumbusGuy said:

If GayAuthors knows the fate of an author, I think it would be helpful to put a note on their work that says the writer has died so we know whether we can expect unfinished stories to be completed in future.

16 minutes ago, pickuptoy said:

I also think if an author has passed on it show be posted by his name as in (In Memory of) I know other sites do that like Nifty has "In Blessed Memory" and Tickie Story Pages's has "Gone and not forgotten author's listed separate.

There is a Status tag that the Admin can use that reads "Author Deceased" I've seen it on a couple of stories. The Admin needs to know this in order to flip it on their unfinished stories. Sending a PM to any of the Orange Staff members should help with that.

3 minutes ago, Myr said:

@pickuptoy, @BHopper2

dkstories is literally no longer with us.  I do not know his life status.  He left his works with us at Gay Authors and is never expected to return.  I have therefore not marked him as deceased as I don't know if he is or not.

Gotcha. Sorry for the confusion, I didn't know.

Note, if you have not read this story before, please be aware that it is very long, but the final chapter (33) was not well loved. (Message added by Myr)

Whatever happened between the author and Gayauthors, I think it is very bad taste to put such a warning at the beginning of any story. If this were to discourage prospective readers, it could not be better formulated. 

It is sad that a story this good was left as it is. I normally not a big fan of Sci-fi type stories. But once in a blue moon I will run across one that I really like. And this was one of them. Could have just kept reading all the do overs he could have come up with. The Do over series was one of my favorites.

Douglas DD and author on another site had a couple of excellent sci fi stories that kept me reading till way in the night for a few days.