Oh, you really really pulled it off. Very well. I liked that you didn't spell things out, but you also didn't write in such a way that you would a) make the people who didn't get what was going on feel stupid or b) do some big dramatic reveal that would make readers who've already figured it out go, "Duh, I got that ten pages ago. Get to the point." :D The hardest thing about suspense, IMO, is restraining yourself from those two things, and the second is the worst; when writers try to build to a big "Aha!" moment but haven't done it deftly enough and the reader is way ahead of them, it just reads like cheap emotional pandering. (My best example from a non-storyline standpoint is the movie Bicentennial Man, which IMO tries to force the audience to experience the emotional impact the screenwriter was going for by bashing them over the head with a melodramatic musical score. :D)
You did a really beautiful job of just letting the story unfold, letting the detail trickle out and letting the characters drive things forward. In fact, you did such a good job of that that I need to go read it again. I'm sure this work can wait for a little bit. :D
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Date: 2010-01-06 11:28 pm (UTC)You did a really beautiful job of just letting the story unfold, letting the detail trickle out and letting the characters drive things forward. In fact, you did such a good job of that that I need to go read it again. I'm sure this work can wait for a little bit. :D