What kind of story do you want to read?

"unequivocally vile, monstrous and loathsome"

Lame.

In-depth emotional stories with psychological aspects. And one where we cannot rush to such quick B&W judgement once it's over.

Ooh, subtle.

I think an urban fantasy with invented or re-imagined races, a unique magic system, and a healthy dose of light-heartedness would be nice. A lot like El Goonish Shive, actually.

Funny, I don't see you in the EGS thread much.

"Healthy dose of light-heartedness "? Ugh, perpetuation of the problem with UF . I won't rant here about how I hate that in Urban Fantasy. If anyone cares, they can find the rant on my troper page.

edited 18th Dec '11 4:16:06 PM by NoirGrimoir

Wow. Rants. Yeah. Wow. I mean, well-articulated but... bitter.

</Shocked Xander Speak>

edited 18th Dec '11 5:24:45 PM by JHM

I figured no one would read it who hadn't expected a rant so I could be as bitter as I liked. I just take it personally when the publishers try to sell me blatant clones of increasingly degrading quality. I feel like I've been duped.

@Noir

It has nothing to do with Urban Fantasy in particular, that's just the sort of story I typically prefer.

@Atticus

That's because I stopped reading EGS long before I was a regular on these forums. I'm planning on doing an Archive Binge up to the current place in the story. You might see me around there after I've done that.

Ah, I see.

@Noir,

Hm. I hesitate to say that perhaps I should run my high/dark fantasy setting and storyline by you one of these days. I wonder whether it would pass the test.

Well, I'm notoriously difficult to please, so I wouldn't necessarily take my preferences as judgements of whether something is good or not. If I think it's good it's probably awesome, if I think it's bad it's could still be awesome. But yeah, if your story seems like something I wouldn't like just on the basis of genre, then I'd run it by someone else who can give you a less biased impression. But then again if you are trying to break the mold, then I'd probably be the perfect person to run it by.

edited 18th Dec '11 7:28:57 PM by NoirGrimoir

The basic story is "main character's cousins (not really, but that's basically the relationship they share) accuse him of doing shit, his parents get mad and tell him they're gong to punish him and all his friends, and his brothers can't convince them to do otherwise, even as the cousins conspire to use this distraction to steal all their shit."

...

The main character is the grim reaper, his cousins are angels and demons, the shit they accuse him of is destroying the connection between reality and the afterlife and potentially causing a ghostly invasion, his parents are the gods of the setting, and "all his friends" is one of only two continents.

There's the baseline high concept.

I like this concept. As long as the grim reaper is badass and not whiny.

Well, he is badass (or at least, I do try to make him such, as there is a reasonably significant amount of fighting), though he isn't whiny. Just... detached. Imagine somebody who lived for a thousand years with nobody but the resurrected soul of a dragon grafted to a captured eldritch creature from another dimension so she can shapeshift and an army of undead soldiers to guard a castle which serves as the aforementioned connection between reality and the afterlife.

He's... not well-adjusted or accustomed to dealing with people.

You've expressed your opinion.

Anyways, is it often that a hero turns all the way to being an utter bastard? Either way I'd like to have a piece of fiction recommended where such a character arc is depicted.

It's pretty uncommon. I can't really think of anything off the top of my head.

Reminds me a bit of the third sub-series of Lewis Trondheim's Donjon, actually...

I'm writing some, but they're works in progress. I think my WIP short story The Warden is probably the closest to what you're looking for. It starts with the protagonist — a high-school teacher (like any of my stories that involve high school, it makes the prison comparison) — looking to stop bullying and other childhood atrocities (a noble goal) and eventually resorting to torture, murder and in one case rape in order to accomplish that goal.

Anyways, is it often that a hero turns all the way to being an utter bastard? Either way I'd like to have a piece of fiction recommended where such a character arc is depicted.

We have a whole trope on it.

Doesn't that, however, usually involve the protagonist becoming a fairly sympathetic villain?

It's not literature, but I believe the series finale of Law and Order original handled that from start to finish as you learned about the criminal in question.

I'd like to see a space opera involving humanity's first contact with extra terrestrials, which follows the first forays into deep space and then how those forays shape society back on the homeworld. John Ringo did this with his Looking Glass novels, but I'd like to see one that a.) doesn't have a war in mind from the very beginning and b.) takes place in an alternate universe that has nothing to do with Earth. I like this planet, I live on it, I don't need to see my homeworld torn apart by invasions. Let someone else take that risk.

Not necessarily. Check the examples.