From InBrightestDay on October 29, 2023
Beyond the Monster Isles
Well...it's been a while, hasn't it? Figured even if I don't contribute, I should review both of these by Halloween, so I'll start with yours!
Warning, this review will contain SPOILERS
This one doesn't feel particularly Halloween-themed, but the story itself is pretty cool nonetheless. It kind of reminds me of some of Robert E. Howard's Conan stories, though it's hard to say why beyond a sort of feeling: something about the tone and the harshness of the fantasy world. That actually ties into something I found myself pleasantly surprised by. When Berta's husbands are first mentioned, the way they were talked about felt a little callous, a bit "Well, they should have listened..." It reinforced that feel of the world, of course, and it was clear that Berta misses her first husband at least, but it felt a little unpleasant. fantastical worlds are,monsters are real, quantifiable and objectively true. Taking risks has a far higher chance of dismemberment and or death (massively unacceptable in the modern paradigm actually)
In a fantastical world where gods and monsters are real, front and center and real it is callous… from a modern perspective. Death is abundant and when your spouse is one of the few mortals that can actually use magic at all, They took the risk and lost. Its only later, That Polis in his own overconfidence tell her that it wasn’t a risk at all.
So needless to say when the old man (Polis?) decides to dunk on them some more and Berta's like "Oh, don't you say SHIT about my husbands!" that was a very nice turn of events. It’s one thing to dunk on the risk losing dead, But altogether another when you proudly admit to the sorceress’s face that you personally strangled her stillborn child and that you think its an achievement.
As for the story itself, I feel it's evidence of your continued improvement as an author. A problem that some of your other stories faced was that the shorts would feel like they were part of a much larger story we didn't have, and moreover that they were difficult to understand without the broader context, the feeling of "This story is assuming I've read something else already..."
Beyond the Monster Isles feels far more readily accessible and self-contained. It does venture a bit into that territory with some of the stuff on the island (not sure what was up with the piranha visions or the thing that picks up Berta when she dies), but overall the story felt like it generally told me what I needed to know, and what was out of focus didn't need to be in focus. Temporal Slippage actually, Berta is witnessing snippets of herself from the doomed timeline.
All in all, nicely done!
There's also some really cool visual imagery, especially the bit where the ship gets lifted into the air and then disintegrated. Berta all told is probably the most powerful mortal character I’ve ever written, She doesn’t need a focus, is capable of multiple spells at once, dunked an angel to the ocean’s bottom. And despite all that, her at the apex of mortal capability. (Which by itself puts her in class far beyond HP and Dresden)
The most she had done was displace the angel.
The angel took it’s task literally but being blinded by both depth and darkness, It overcharged the effect and instead of teleporting the boat with its assumption. It’s effect stripped the boat bare at an atomic level. The patriarch in question was rewarded not with his prize but dust, and tons of seawater.