Comment on come home yesterday

  1. HannaMoi (Guest) on Chapter 55 Fri 15 Feb 2019 10:08PM UTC

    Dear author,
    Finally, I have read your whole story, so this is my honest (and obviously biased) opinion on it.
    First of all, I am not a native English speaker, therefore don't be mad if some of my sentences stop making any sense. :)
    Secondly, I am not a writer of any kind myself at all, and especially I am not an academic author, this comment is just my humble and unprofessional opinion - you are absolutely free to ignore it.
    Thirdly (this is where my actual review begins), in most of the cases you have done an astounding work of developing characters and maintaining compliance between the stated characteristics of the protagonists and their deeds. I have to admit that this is quite an achievement for every author. It is a very useful and necessary skill - to be able to keep the logic of the plot.
    Fourth, in my humble opinion, you used too many words. I don't want to hurt your feelings in any way, but I'm sure that you might have halved the number of the words and your story would have only benefited from it. There aren't enough events in your storyline to justify this size of the work.
    Fifth, I think you created too many unusual characters, especially in the way of sexual orientation. I am completely fine with LGBTQ+ people (I am queer myself), but as I understood you wanted your story to be realistic and in reality, there aren't that many people with non-traditional sexual orientation (only about 10% of the worldwide population). So I really doubt if it was that necessary to make Maria and Natasha queer too. I think the story would have been better if you had found someone else to date them or if you hadn't written about their love interests and life at all.
    Sixth, the ending! I had some concerns when I was reading the last chapters, but I was hoping until the last minute that you wouldn't make an open ending. Yes, you didn't make the worst one, but still, I would like it much more if you gave us some specific information about Steve's and Bucky's lives afterwards (would they ever become really happy again? Where and when?), information about the next decisions of the US and world governments' on Steve's and The Avengers' fates, etc. All I'm trying to say is that I am not as satisfied with the ending as I might have been.
    Conclusion. Honestly, I started reading this work only because you mentioned that it was your undergraduate thesis. I was so thrilled because I had never read any academic novels (if I am allowed to call it this way) before! I wondered what is it like - to write your own story as a university project. But now I understand that it is not very different from any other works that I read on this website (and this is not bad at all). Reading this thesis was as much of an exciting experience to me as writing it was probably to you. You have done good work as a psychologist. In 90% of the cases, I believed your characters, even though I think that I would have had other points of view than they had had. Your plot was pretty entertaining and complex, some moments made me cry, and feel strong emotions. I guess this is the best award to a writer - the knowing that your work made a reader indeed feel something. If I were an expert or literary critic, I would rate your novel 6/10 (and as for me it is a good mark, I am a very particular person, when it comes to rating something as subjective as art: movies, music, literature, paintings). So, well done, author, and keep it up! ;)

    Comment Actions

    1. customrolex on Chapter 55 Wed 27 Feb 2019 06:01PM UTC

      I'm glad you enjoyed the development of the characters, but if I'd used half as many words, they would have been less developed. And I have the events of Captain America: First Avenger, Winter Soldier, Civil War, the Avengers, Age of Ultron, Iron Man 3, and allude to the events of Black Panther. I needed that many words to cover that many movies. As to your desire for an ending where you find out if they'll be happy again, and when, and where... Did you miss the scene where, in Wakanda, after the events of Civil War, they settle in a riverside village in Nakia's tribe's territory, and have a talk about how to be happy again?
      You have some strange criticisms but the strangest is that you think I have too many unusual characters (and you don't even mean that nearly everyone is superpowered like Bucky or Wanda or hyper-competent like Nat or Clint! Tony's a billionaire - literally amongst the top quarter of the one per cent - how unusual and uncommon in "real" society!). But you're reacting to "non-traditional" sexualities. Whose traditions? Why should I be bound to traditions which exclude people? Why do queer people need to justify their existence as necessary, even in fiction? Why do I need to justify my queer characters as an author, or as a queer woman? Maria is good to Natasha; that's all the justification she needs to exist in the story. Was Melissa Nguyen too unusual for being Vietnamese? Was Elizabeth too unusual for requiring a wheelchair? Was Bucky "too queer" as a polyamourous nonbinary person? And more importantly, why would you think I would care if this novel is "too diverse"? I'm sorry that your world isn't as integrated and positive as mine.
      Again, I'm not a psychologist, but I'm glad you liked the work overall.
      If this complex, historically researched, and intricate fanfiction, a science-fiction-romance fusion with a critique of heterocentric gender norms longer than the combined Hunger Games trilogy, is typical of your selections on AO3, I'm glad. After all, all fanfiction is created with the intent of sharing it with a community; it's all Important Work even if it's not usually a thesis. "Academic" novels are most novels. Rarely do people slap a novel together as Lonely Christopher or Kerouac do: in a drug-fueled and unfocused haze. Most fanfiction writers do their Work with the intent of sharing it with an analytical community, of practising and honing their craft of writing while critiquing or responding to a piece of external media. Fanfiction is written as a serious interaction with a piece of media, with the Self, and with a community. It's all as serious as this thesis is.

      Comment Actions