pippychick

Yay – thank you so much @JayDee – this has really made my day  
I’m glad it came across as authentic. I really don’t have much confidence in my original work, because to me it seems to lack some kind of sparkle. I’m slowly coming around to the thought that the sparkle I’m missing is the conscious echo of canon that’s involved in fanfic, and I should get over it. Reviews like this really help.
I’m really happy the punchline works too. It’s going back a bit, but while writing I was putting the clues in, and thinking: am I being too obvious here?
Not sure about the rest of the country, but there are well dressings at places like Hope and Eyam, and I don’t think they ever really stopped, just that people lost interest until relatively recently. It does seem to have been co-opted by Christianity, though, which has  probably helped keep it alive to be fair.
Thanks for telling me about the typo too – I’m off to fix it now!
 

Jude's Tale (original title Fate of a Fagottist)
Thanks you for the review! I appreciate the heck out of it. I’m really happy to hear you liked it. Definitely a bit of restraint – if I was her, I’d have wanted to slap him back, but that would probably have detached his jaw…
It’s weird, Kizzy and the others were just created as a throwaway oneshot to end up with the amusing-to-me reveal that one of them’s an angel, and then they kept coming back in story ideas… The continuity can be a bit flimsy and the characterisation varies, but I think Kizzy has mostly stayed the same. I guess one day I’ll have to do a sex scene with her. That could be a challenge. 
I pretty much had to change POV with part 2, but I gotta thank InBrightestDay for the inspiration to keep doing it! Someone gets manipulated like that, well, I guess it’ll come down to what his own conscience tells him…
Whoohoo! Been ages since I wrote sex that wasn’t just re-writing/touching up my old sex writing as part of a re-write, so it’s cool to hear it came across ok!
I’ll get the next part up next week! And I mean what could possibly go wrong with that spur of the moment “Buck up the troops!” promise? Surely the Duchess can’t lose! If he doesn’t strike Kizzy with the blade it doesn’t count, and if it does he shares her fate from which there’s no coming back! 
Thank you again for reviewing! You’re always very kind about my writing and I appreciate it.
Haslet’s the spelling I know, too, but I guess some of these prompts use archaic spellings and definitions so I just went with it. It actually did end up working better in that chapter than what I’ve now drafted for the next part.
These days the challenge for me is more working the prompts into a story I’ve semi-planned out, but I’m sure I’ll get some inspiration from them again sometime.
Thanks once again!

Whoohoo! More water based shenanigans! Plus if a story actually gets written from one of those ideas I wasn’t just spamming the thread with shite. I guess my sig’ll be getting longer…

I’d imagine the cloak makes it hard to discern gender anyway.
No rush.
(very minor spoiler) No amnesia, but she does have to give him a little durability boost.  She’s super strong, after all, so sex with her would be rather hazardous otherwise!

Another review from @InBrightestDay – thank you so much!
Wow – I’m not certain I deserve those compliments, but I’ll run off with them! If I can do ‘creepy’ then I’m happy.
Yep, you’ve pretty much hit it. As I was writing, I surmised that a mortal soul is necessary for the more tedious hanging around the spirit seems to do, and if that soul wishes to move on, then it will get quite aggressive at taking people when the opportunity arises, though I guess they’re looking for one in (probably) millions, so it’s a very long wait. Whether Kathy appears as her own gender, even I’m not sure, but I did have a feeling that the older, less specific legends of the Lady in the Lake might be connected to this spirit somehow. In the end, I decided not to make a point of it.
And you’ve reminded me I have another story to finish for JayDee about angry water. I think I’ll dig that out next and work on it this week. I’ll also get to read some more of yours once the weekend is done and I’m off work again Will Kev and Luzurial get down to it? How guilty will Kevin get? Will Luzurial need to give him a small dose of amnesia to get him through it? Ohhh, imagine that: every time is the first time…
Um… no… smut is not all I think about!
Thanks again!

Another review from @InBrightestDay – thank you so much!
Wow – I’m not certain I deserve those compliments, but I’ll run off with them! If I can do ‘creepy’ then I’m happy.
Yep, you’ve pretty much hit it. As I was writing, I surmised that a mortal soul is necessary for the more tedious hanging around the spirit seems to do, and if that soul wishes to move on, then it will get quite aggressive at taking people when the opportunity arises, though I guess they’re looking for one in (probably) millions, so it’s a very long wait. Whether Kathy appears as her own gender, even I’m not sure, but I did have a feeling that the older, less specific legends of the Lady in the Lake might be connected to this spirit somehow. In the end, I decided not to make a point of it.
And you’ve reminded me I have another story to finish for JayDee about angry water. I think I’ll dig that out next and work on it this week. I’ll also get to read some more of yours once the weekend is done and I’m off work again Will Kev and Luzurial get down to it? How guilty will Kevin get? Will Luzurial need to give him a small dose of amnesia to get him through it? Ohhh, imagine that: every time is the first time…
Um… no… smut is not all I think about!
Thanks again!

Is it a particular topic or fandom? My worst block on stories come when I’m trying to force a story and refusing to work on something else. I feel bad for stuck stories, but getting mad makes it worse. Most often I break block by working on a new story, often silly/satire. I have to be careful that these side stories don’t take a life of their own as I have too many active stories.  I get really stuck when I think I SHOULD work on my more meaningful big stories and then I get stuck across the board. My muse just gets bored, frustrated, and doesn’t like being told what it should do by planning.  Right now I’m doing cleanup on all the drafts I did for NaNo and one plot bunny sticking Vader in something like Quantum Leap (no Al) taht is running short and fast.
Write anything, even a blog journal, to get the words moving...

I’m trying to keep up with reading/reviewing several stories right now, but I should get to Chapter 2 tomorrow.
Oh, it absolutely works!  The “hack” choice in particular does, the more violent connotation has a sort of subconscious uncomfortable effect on the reader (it did on me, at any rate).  And you’re right about having an immediate mental image that your conscious mind rejects; it’s cool to know you were doing that on purpose.
Sorry for how long it took for me to say anything about this, by the way.  I literally just checked the TV forum today!

Thank you, swirlingdoubt – I’m glad you enjoyed it!
Thank you so much, InBrightestDay!
Ah, well, I don’t want to say too much in case I spoil the second chapter for you. But when/if you read, I hope you enjoy it and that it makes sense.
And thank you for the compliment! I must admit, I paid close attention to some of my phrasing and word choices in this fic, because it added to the atmosphere, and I was hoping to make suggestions without the reader being fully aware of it. For example, “... once she'd hacked a couple of feet off the bottom of it.” was supposed to give you a specific literal mental image, even if your conscious mind rejects it immediately as incorrect. It was still there… hopefully.

And… two whole years later:
Chapter 49
Wow… that’s nearly the amount of time that’s passed in the fic.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but Applied Theology is basically Defense Against the Dark Arts for a non-Harry Potter setting.  The idea of all the different faiths coming together is me being kind of an optimist.  I know it’s just as likely we’d start infighting (and I’m sure there was some of that in the setting), but I’d like to think that if an actual legitimately-from-Hell demon was rampaging across America, that everyone would be like “Ok, that’s the bad guy; we should all work together.”
Well, she got a little banged up from the hypersonic Gungnir round, but nothing too severe by her standards.  I actually figured it was kind of important that bullets without proper inscriptions shouldn’t work.  After all, if bullets work on extradimensional beings, then the Army really shouldn’t have had too much trouble with Eparlegna back in 2007.
That was something I kind of inferred from Whore of Heaven.  She came to Earth to help, after all, even after orders came down from the top (like, the very top) that she wasn’t supposed to.  One could interpret this as sheer arrogance, and some level of Pride is certainly present, but the way she stops to help survivors in LA, the way she hesitates to free herself because it would harm the caged women, even though their souls would be safe...all of that suggested to me that her main motivation for trying to intervene was that she cares very deeply about humans, and doesn’t want to see any unnecessary suffering.
So, for The Woman in the Statue, I assumed that she is very, very closely bonded to her mortal charges, and really does love this world she was assigned to protect.
If I were simply writing a Warm Fuzzies piece, that would probably happen...but of course I’m writing a story with action and monsters and whatnot, so she’s not going to have a lot of time to do that.
Lilia Martinez is actually a good cop, and she’ll pop up again for a cameo in Part Eight, but there are bad cops, and you’ll run into a few in the next two chapters.
Funny thing: I wasn’t even doing that consciously.  Looking back on it, I realized that I gave height measurements for all our main characters (Luzurial, Kevin, Abdul, Calista and Chloe) just as part of their description.  The good news is that that tapers off as we get farther into the story.  There’s one more character in Part Four who gets height measurements in cm.  After that, things, generally monsters, do get sizes, but it’s rounded to the nearest half a meter (i.e. “approaching two and a half meters tall”, etc.) or whole meter.
The use of centimeters is due to me having the US using the metric system by this point, because it’s THE FUTURE!!! (there should be an echo on that).
Actually, that’s how you know I’m writing fantasy: not the archangel character, the demonic invasion or the magic, no, the most unrealistic part of the setting is that the US switched to metric.
SONOFABITCH!
*five minutes later*
Fixed!  Thank you for pointing that out.

Oh, I really haven’t! Some of my best friends, etc… I’m actually involved with things at my local church, because of community stuff. I’m not saying at all that others shouldn’t believe – I just don’t share it. If I had to believe in something, honestly I’m closer to being some kind of pagan than anything because it appeals to me on some deep level I can’t explain. The great majority of the time though, I am an atheist.
I’m not trying to get into an argument here, but
Ah. Apologies, but there it is. There can be no justification for some things. I’m not talking of anything that has happened to me. I’m not referring to “ordinary human unhappiness” or even its twin. Throughout the course of our history there are things so absolute and terrible that they only way they can be explained is if there is no God. Sorry, but that is the conclusion I have come to after many years. Also, free will tends to let capitalism off the hook, and I don’t believe we should do that either. Most of us live at the expense of others. If I live without God, then ethically I should strive to encourage the best world possible.
Then there are the animals. Humanity has an overinflated sense of itself. Fear, terror, pain and suffering are not exclusive to our species. Nor is comfort. Any knowledge I may think I have doesn’t make me “worth more than many sparrows” – that’s just pure egotism. It makes me responsible, but that’s a different thing entirely, and I fail far too often (I mean, I still eat meat and there can’t be any justification for that, not now).
I’m so sorry, I don’t mean to offend anyone with these thoughts. If there is any rule at all, it should probably be: believe in what you love and be happy.
I believe in fic.
Likewise.
@JayDee Sorry to have derailed this thread and gone so far OT. Luzurial’s fate did prompt this discussion, though, so I’m blaming you…

The irony of the situation is that this is kind of the same thing that happened back in 2008 when I read Whore of Heaven, got all depressed and wrote to JayDee asking if I could write what, ten years later, would become The Woman in the Statue.  I literally asked if WoH was intended as an anti-religion piece, not because I was mad, but because I didn’t want to write a sequel that would contradict the original story’s message.

Thank you, swirlingdoubt – I’m glad you enjoyed it!
Thank you so much, InBrightestDay!
Ah, well, I don’t want to say too much in case I spoil the second chapter for you. But when/if you read, I hope you enjoy it and that it makes sense.
And thank you for the compliment! I must admit, I paid close attention to some of my phrasing and word choices in this fic, because it added to the atmosphere, and I was hoping to make suggestions without the reader being fully aware of it. For example, “... once she'd hacked a couple of feet off the bottom of it.” was supposed to give you a specific literal mental image, even if your conscious mind rejects it immediately as incorrect. It was still there… hopefully.

Thank you so much, JayDee!
I remember writing this, and I really wanted to add description and atmosphere, but the word cound wouldn’t permit it. It was definitely good practice, though, and I’m glad I came out with something that works.

No apology required! You’re all adults, you can have different opinions over things in this thread as anywhere! Forum mods would have the final say mind :p
She didn’t have left or right wing by the time Eparlegna was done with her! [/tasteless joke]
 

Oh, I really haven’t! Some of my best friends, etc… I’m actually involved with things at my local church, because of community stuff. I’m not saying at all that others shouldn’t believe – I just don’t share it. If I had to believe in something, honestly I’m closer to being some kind of pagan than anything because it appeals to me on some deep level I can’t explain. The great majority of the time though, I am an atheist.
I’m not trying to get into an argument here, but
Ah. Apologies, but there it is. There can be no justification for some things. I’m not talking of anything that has happened to me. I’m not referring to “ordinary human unhappiness” or even its twin. Throughout the course of our history there are things so absolute and terrible that they only way they can be explained is if there is no God. Sorry, but that is the conclusion I have come to after many years. Also, free will tends to let capitalism off the hook, and I don’t believe we should do that either. Most of us live at the expense of others. If I live without God, then ethically I should strive to encourage the best world possible.
Then there are the animals. Humanity has an overinflated sense of itself. Fear, terror, pain and suffering are not exclusive to our species. Nor is comfort. Any knowledge I may think I have doesn’t make me “worth more than many sparrows” – that’s just pure egotism. It makes me responsible, but that’s a different thing entirely, and I fail far too often (I mean, I still eat meat and there can’t be any justification for that, not now).
I’m so sorry, I don’t mean to offend anyone with these thoughts. If there is any rule at all, it should probably be: believe in what you love and be happy.
I believe in fic.
Likewise.
@JayDee Sorry to have derailed this thread and gone so far OT. Luzurial’s fate did prompt this discussion, though, so I’m blaming you…

Thank you!   I suppose now is as good a time as any to bring up some of the names of the characters.  Not everyone’s name means something of course, but some of them do.
Kevin is derived (eventually) from the old Irish name Cóemgein, which starts with the Gaelic word cóem, which means “kind” or “gentle”.  He has some issues, including the odd flash of anger, but he’s very gentle with Luzurial.
Abdul is kind of a cheat, in that it’s a Pakistani name derived from the Arabic words Abd al, which just mean “servant of the”, but I was kind of going for a reference to the Arabic name Abd Allah, or “servant of God”.  Sirki is a Pakistani name referring to a leather worker, which means it’s kind of the equivalent of “Tanner” or something.
Chloe is an English name meaning “green shoot” in Greek.  ‘Cause, you know...she’s new.  Liu is a Chinese surname meaning “kill” or “destroy”, which sounds pretty bad, but it fits her role on what is basically a preternatural SWAT team.
Luzurial, according to JayDee, is derived from the Spanish luz, meaning light, as well as a deliberately misspelled version of the Archangel Uriel’s name.  It’s good that it’s misspelled, since Uriel translates from the Hebrew as “light of God” (or possibly “God is my light”), so Luzuriel would be kind of redundant.
Well, she’s far more resilient than a human would be, and she’s definitely doing amazingly well considering what she’s been through, but there will be issues, which will become rather obvious in Part Three.
I should note that she’s healing far more slowly than she used to.  I tried to base as much of The Woman in the Statue as possible on what we saw in Whore of Heaven, and one of the things I noticed was that Luzurial’s healing, along things like her durability and strength, are affected by her mental and emotional state.  There’s a baseline, of course (she doesn’t just stop healing at any point), but given her trauma, what would in the past have healed in less than a minute instead takes hours.  Obviously, as she gets better, that will accelerate.
That also owes its genesis to Whore of Heaven, where it’s mentioned that humanity went forth with new knowledge of and defenses against, but also new dealings with, the forces of Hell, so I figured some criminals might attempt to make deals with demons, and a branch of law enforcement would arise to deal with that.
There’s actually a deleted scene (as in I literally wrote it and then deleted it because I didn’t think it was necessary) in Part Eight where Luzurial is part of a briefing and a National Guard soldier pulls a “And where were you for the last seventy five years?” at which point Chloe tells him exactly where Luzurial was for the last 75 years.  Cue guilt trip.
Chloe: Listen, Major Dumbass…
Major: It’s “Dumas.”
Chloe: Not right now it isn’t.
Well thank you so much for the review!  I basically wrote this to help me feel better after reading Whore of Heaven all those years ago (JayDee can tell you all about it, but I tend to call this story “my little therapy project”), and I had no idea how it would go over here, so thank you for the support!

Don’t feel bad about not responding to that first review.  I still haven’t gotten around to reading and reviewing Chapter 2, and it’s been a month!
Oh, and I realize you guys were discussing this earlier, but if I may offer my two cents here…
First, on behalf of religious people, I’m sorry for any unpleasant experiences you’ve had.  I know this doesn’t make up for it, but know that we’re not all dicks.
So, on Luzurial’s suffering being her reason for existing, I don’t know that that’s clear.  Cars eventually break down, and the manufacturer knows this will inevitably happen, but that’s not why the car is made.  Luzurial is mentioned as being valued for her wisdom and having distinguished herself in battle, so she has touched the lives of her fellow angels and protected the universe (or at least the Earth) before, and I don’t see any reason that couldn’t be her purpose.  Her rape and torture are things that happen to her, but it doesn’t seem right (to me, anyway) to imagine she exists specifically to be raped and tortured.
With regards to divine omniscience, what pippychick describes is a valid criticism of the deterministic interpretation (the future is set in stone), but there is another way to look at it.  A vital part of Christian dogma, and I think it also applies to Judaism and Islam, is that humans (and any other forms of sapient life that may exist) have free will, the ability to choose.  God is believed to value free will so intensely that He allows it even though many make the choice to do terrible things, so I’ve never been comfortable with determinism, which removes free will from the equation.
Another interpretation, however, is that omniscience means that God knows every possible outcome, all of the billions of billions of possible futures made by all the interacting choices of billions of sapient individuals.  However, while all the possible results of all our possible choices may be seen, at the critical inflection point, our choices matter.  In other words, it’s not “these horrible things will happen,” but rather “these horrible things may happen, but the choice is yours.”
Bringing this back to Whore of Heaven, God would know all the outcomes of everyone’s possible choices, including the chain of events based on the choices made (Luzurial’s choice to intervene, her choice to help the survivors, her choice to try to talk to Eparlegna, her choice to try to spare the caged women, his choice to torture her, Shondra and Molly’s choice to serve him, etc.).  All of these things are known ahead of time, but they are not fate; until the choices are made, they are only possible outcomes.
Or, to put it way more simply, the future is foreseen, but it is not foregone.
I hope I haven’t annoyed or offended either of you.  I’ve told JayDee about this elsewhere, but I don’t have anything against atheists.  In fact, randomly enough, most of my friends in high school were atheists, and now it’s a fairly even mix.  I don’t think you’re getting in trouble for not believing in God.  Honestly, I think that what really matters is that you live your life trying to do what you genuinely believe to be right.
Again, no offense was intended, pippychick, and I hope I haven’t irritated you.  I’m not trying to convert anyone; I just wanted to discuss another potential way of looking at the omniscience idea.

Ahh… that was you! Thank you.   I still need to make time for responding to reviews that have come in while I’ve been somewhat distracted. I will, though!
 
@InBrightestDay As I said above, the great thing about all of this is that we can speculate, and explore, and I’m awfully curious to see how you’ve saved her, and what her reactions are like to that. How damaged is she? See just thinking and talking about it whets my appetite to read your story

The best villains are this way. Though it’s not always easy to write them. You did a great job.
Of course I fancy seeing it! The greatest thing about fiction and fanfiction is that there’s always a different path to go down, and we can look at them all, and ooh and ahh at different interpretations and fresh angles.
Yesss… I’ve been told that before. Unfortunately, when I was made someone forgot to adjust the optimism, or, you know, include it at all.
lol… I find writing harsh things like this does take a toll. It’s hard work, and it’s largely thankless. But you can only write the horror properly if you feel it, just like anything else.
(smirks) To be fair, she’s probably not right wing enough…
Ha, that would be interesting. For what it’s worth, it’s a bit more violent, more pornographic, and is sprinkled with a liberal amount of swearing (courtesy of Clegane).
Thanks. Honestly, it feels great to settle back down. Your midwife story was the first thing I went to  

The best villains are this way. Though it’s not always easy to write them. You did a great job.
Of course I fancy seeing it! The greatest thing about fiction and fanfiction is that there’s always a different path to go down, and we can look at them all, and ooh and ahh at different interpretations and fresh angles.
Yesss… I’ve been told that before. Unfortunately, when I was made someone forgot to adjust the optimism, or, you know, include it at all.
lol… I find writing harsh things like this does take a toll. It’s hard work, and it’s largely thankless. But you can only write the horror properly if you feel it, just like anything else.
(smirks) To be fair, she’s probably not right wing enough…
Ha, that would be interesting. For what it’s worth, it’s a bit more violent, more pornographic, and is sprinkled with a liberal amount of swearing (courtesy of Clegane).
Thanks. Honestly, it feels great to settle back down. Your midwife story was the first thing I went to  

Ahh… that was you! Thank you.   I still need to make time for responding to reviews that have come in while I’ve been somewhat distracted. I will, though!
 
@InBrightestDay As I said above, the great thing about all of this is that we can speculate, and explore, and I’m awfully curious to see how you’ve saved her, and what her reactions are like to that. How damaged is she? See just thinking and talking about it whets my appetite to read your story

Awesome to hear things are better! Sorry about the dog worrying – I’m sure he’ll rest easy once the vet’s had a look. I can hear you little fellow now “Sorry, I know there’s no dignity when the temperature’s being taken but at least you can get a dog treat afterwards. Why don’t you look so happy with that?”
I love seeing your talent too! Your The Price story remains one of the best things I’ve ever read, and that’s against some stiff competition from other writers on here (another one has joined it in my sig… now I need to try and persuade each of you to read each other’s stories! ). Also that Mercy story, lines from that come back to me at random times.

Maybe it’s just me, but damn I’d choose that with my eyes wide open, lol. But, you’re right… it’s not for Chummy. It really was fun to see her trying to deal with it all though. She’s so brilliantly in-character! I’m quite sure this fic would get a few little giggles from Miranda too.
I just laughed so loudly my dog thinks I’m ill. He’ll be taking me to the vet.
Things are better now, thank you (almost lost damn near everything, and have somehow managed to save it all). Reading this story has been like sitting down with your favourite drink after a long, long day, only that day seems to have lasted for months. Exactly what I needed, and again, thank you so much for sharing with us. I really appreciate getting to see your writing and talent - I hope you know that.