Summary: "April After All" by sprat

[gurrier.livejournal.com]

Sorry this is a bit late, RL getting in the way again!

riverlight especially liked the voice here, for both Rays. She enjoyed the characterization too - the details of what RayK finds hot, RayV using the "same steady gaze" on Larkin and RayK. She wondered whether RayK really would have 'really would have a "total lack of discretion in who he flirts with"', but decided she could see it.

zebra363 didn't feel qualified to comment on the RayV voice, but thought the RayK stuff was excellent. She thought the time line was a bit off, that it might have been to late for RayV to bring RayK home to meet his mother. She found that the janitor paragraph threw her out of the story somewhat, that it was a bit slow. sprat said these were both points her beta china_shop had brought up!

Thanks to riverlight and zebra363 for their responses. Our next piece will be along later today!

Poem: Appearances

[yeungmaisu.livejournal.com]

I agonized over which of my three poems to post here and I finally decided to go with Appearances. That's because while Appearances was the last one written, it falls first in the characters' timeline.

Now I actually wrote this as a companion piece to the other poems, which are more slashy in nature (and I'll post them here sometime in the future). However unlike either of those, Appearances deals with RayK's feelings for Stella and the nature of their relationship (as I see it).

As for what I want discussed, there were actually several points I was concerned with and would like talked about. One) Does Ray's voice sound true? Two) Was I able to capture his character? Three) Are his thoughts and eventual decisions realistic? Four) What is the underlining emotion or feeling behind the words?

Furthermore, I'm supposed to mention Sprat (sprat75@ gmail.com) is the current moderator and that she'll be leading the discussion this week.

Finally, I would like to thank Sprat and Gurrier for starting this community; it's a wonderful idea that's seriously going to help in building and polishing skills.