I turned a shitty tale into a readable RPC.
Many thanks to Almarduk and Gismo for reading the shitty tale.
Many thanks to Von, Tarbolin, and Red for reading the article.
Y'all rock.
Crit page below:
http://rpcauthority.wikidot.com/forum/t-14553823/clay-girl#post-5226702
It was a very nice read, with a nice, kinda sad plot. While the ending was sadly cur short imo, I still greatly enjoyed it. Hope to see more of your work in the future.
When I saw the journals I was immediately afraid it'd turn out to be a dry slog, but I'm glad to say it really didn't. Not bad.
The specifics and context of the plot are kinda fuzzy, making it hard to follow at certain points, but it works out nicely.
There are some really nice details and moments of sheer poetic wording in this. Nice clay vase for the flowery language, which you have a talent with. The emotional story here is one done plenty but you do a great job of making it re-interesting. You’re not unlike your protagonist’s mate, fashioning something living & new from the mold of something old & gone.
I would have liked to see a little bit of more advanced play in the structure, which right now holds the reader’s hand too much and is too straightforward; instead, put the interview before the journals to really zap the intrigue, and have the journals answer the questions with some call-back value.
4/5, really nice read.
As requested, here is my feedback on the article. Many of my criticisms are nitpicky and subjective so if you ignore any of them I won't feel bothered. Whatever you agree with feel free to implement.
The discovery section is weird to me because it seems to be about the discovery of an arbitrary RPC-496-1 instance rather than the anomaly itself which is what the discovery section is usually meant for. If this were the first RPC-496-1 instance ever found I could understand that but the phrasing "A suspected instance of RPC-496-1" suggests they already knew about other RPC-496-1 instances previously. I don't think this should be labeled as Discovery. It should be an addendum or labeled as something more specific.
I think the notes should be inside a collapsible. You could also put the Media transcript in its own collapsible but I don't think that's as needed.
Carolyne's dialogue feels overly blunt to me. It just doesn't feel believable. I understand that the character isn't meant to be good at writing but that doesn't have anything to do with the perspective of the writing feeling very conveniently like the character is writing to me, the reader, rather than just writing in a notebook for no actual audience. The dialogue in the interview also feels a bit unnatural to me. The story itself though is pretty good.
RPC-496’s
RPC-496's
This is the kind of stupid thing that I don't think anyone but me ever notices but the apostrophes used are different throughout the article. I believe this is caused by writing parts of the article in wikidot's text editor and other parts in another text editor, such as google docs. This also tends to affect quote marks so if you care about this sort of thing maybe do a find-all-and-replace for both.
1. The process of cooking clay in a kiln between 1162 and 1240 degrees celsius. This eliminates moisture and hardens the clay.
I think this footnote would read better if it had "Fired: " or something like "Clay firing: " at the start to signify that it's a definition of a specific term rather than a footnote relating to the whole sentence.
Upon being fired, RPC-496's outer layer will harden as expected; however, it will also grow a surface layer of human skin.
The phrasing of the second independent clause seems off to me. I think the issue is that "it will also grow" almost personifies the clay as a living organism, which given the context may not be too inaccurate but grammatically it is confusing. I would reword it to emphasize that it is an inanimate object which simply has something growing upon it, like "however, upon the surface will grow a layer of human skin."
Whereas normal human skin is layered with the epidermis on top, dermis in the middle, subcutaneous tissue on the bottom, and then followed by muscle tissue
"top", "middle" and "bottom" seem non-clinical to me. I suggest using words like "exterior" and "interior" instead. Maybe you could try to find an example online of how scientific sites describe the layers of human skin more clinically.
RPC-496’s secondary anomalous effects manifest when a sample of it is molded into the size and shape of an appropriately sized living organism.
Repeating "size" twice feels repetitive. Maybe change one to something like "volume"?
RPC-496’s secondary anomalous effects manifest when a sample of it is molded into the size and shape of an appropriately sized living organism.
Early you mention that the clay grows human skin around it, but here you say it can be molded into any organism. If that's the case, then is there a reason why it grows human skin rather than some generic mammalian skin? If so maybe it would make sense to have a sentence after you describe the human skin noting that the Authority determined this through DNA analysis. Or maybe that would be overcomplicating it.
henceforth labeled as RPC-496-1
Total nitpick but I prefer to say "designated" because "labeled" always makes me think of a physical sticker you would put on an object, such as a name tag.
2. Usage of RPC-496 for creation of CSD Class personnel is currently pending approval.
I like this footnote but the placement seems a bit off. Maybe try to find a more natural place to include it? Personally if I couldn't find a suitable location, I would just remove it, even if it's cool, but I value my sense of flow and pacing over individual ideas when writing.
they possess the same musculoskeletal structures, brain waves, etc.
Not sure I like this sentence. It feels very tacked on, which isn't helped by the et cetera.
Of note is the fact that different types of creatures contain varying amounts of ceramic minerals, E.G. humanoid specimens of RPC-496-1 have higher levels of Kaolinite.
I could be wrong but I think "E.G." is usually lowercase.
4. A white mineral with low hardness. It is found in the highest concentrations in porcelain-type potteries.
As I said for the first footnote, I think this would be better if it began with "Kaolinite: "
Also technically that first sentence is grammatically incorrect because it is a fragment. That's fine since it's a footnote but when writing footnotes like that, I personally do not use a period, although I don't know if putting a period is actually invalid. In this case, since there is a complete sentence that follows it, I would connect them with a semicolon as well because there needs to be some kind of punctuation between them.
Instances of RPC-496-1 that have incorrect proportions, anatomies
Obviously no sculptor would be able to get the proportions right, let alone the anatomy, so is there a threshold by which the shape is "good enough" or is it that a vast majority of RPC-496-1 instances will suffer from incorrect proportions and/or anatomy? Maybe you could include this information in a footnote.
will survive for limited periods of time, usually dying from complications.
This feels wrong to me. I'm probably overthinking this but here is my theory on why it doesn't work for me: because the first phrase does not seem to match the second phrase. The first phrase has its perspective on the entity's survival, while the second phase pertains to the entity's death, making it a bit weird. They should either both describe from the perspective of the entity's survival, or from its death. For example, it could be written as "will die after a limited time, usually dying from complications." or "will survive for limited periods of time, later dying due to complications." or just "will die from complications after a limited time."
An Authority agent was deployed to gather intel on it as well as to profile it to ensure its face and habits did not match any currently existing citizens.
This sentence feels clunky to me. Too much going on.
the neighborhood of The Enclave
"The" shouldn't be capitalized unless that's literally part of the title but I don't think it is.
Nevermind, I looked on their website and it seems they capitalize it even when it's not at the start of a sentence. Weird.
Addendum:
This line is weirdly placed. The addendum carries on directly from the discovery so why are they even two separate sections? Just make it a single addendum and have it go directly from the two introductory paragraphs to the notes.
██████ neighbors thankfully didn’t see me.
I think there should be a 's after the blacked out text.
I just held up his copy of Pinocchio to his him
I think you meant "to him".
██████ Even told me
"Even" shouldn't be capitalized.
I’ll take that as a ‘no.’ How does the clay bed function? From where does it get its anomalous properties?
Why would he take it as a 'no' if he was going to ask questions anyway? Shouldn't he say he'll take it as a 'yes'? Saying he'll take it as a 'no' and then asking questions anyway feels like he's trying to look like an asshole.
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