All Comments on 'F6: Bliss'

FAWC is a difficult challenge. I know I failed twice to finish on time. You did a great job on this, Oh there were a couple of errors, missing letters or little things, but in all a very enjoyable story.

This was an okay story that didn't go where I expected it to in several places.It would have benefited from an editor/proofreader to pick up those places that needed some better explanation as well as the errors in spelling/grammar.

Good Fawcking.

Good story . Wonderful happy ending . One bit of dissonance , Gabriel would not exclaim "Oh fuck" . That really struck me. Thanks and 3*s .

AMerryman

People often write good characters but the story gets spoilt because you can't imagine why they are doing the things which move the plot along. Motivation was so well drawn in this fresh delightful First Time story. In particular, Lisbeth finding out that the new exciting world outside the Assembly was a cage of a different kind - that was so probable, and deftly handled. The way in which young girls are sequestered in the Assembly and feel trapped, without realising that as adult married women they do have freedom, was also smoothly narrated.

A good edit will bring out the strong story you have here, which is about parenting and the support young people need as they enter adult life as much as it is a tender First Time romance.

Not sure what I thought of this. It was certainly well-written, with defined and different characters. But I couldn't get a hold of the setting. Initially I thought it was some kind of fantasy world, but then there was a Greyhound bus. :) It could be that there was too sharp a divide between the different worlds. It really felt like Lisbeth, Gabriel, etc., were from almost a different dimension than Eric and Kasey.

I thought it was a dystopian thing at the beginning, so perhaps more detail about the commune (cult?) would have smoothed out the beginning for me. It was a little bulky in spots, where a good, hard edit would tighten it up and streamline the story. I absolutely loved the scene in the yurt. It put the dash of sparkly sweetness I was looking for.

Almost forgot. In the early parts of the story, I had no idea whether to root for her freedom or for love. I found it very satisfying that she got both. I think it says something about our everyday lives. Many times we feel trapped without realizing that freedom is right there waiting for us.

Great story.

Firstly, I really liked the overall direction of this story, the exploration of what makes a prison, and the challenge to what, exactly, is freedom. That's a first rate idea. That you played with expectation was refreshing.

As was mentioned by another comment, there was a strong correlation between this and Margaret Atwood's seminal story. That might have been unfortunate for you because her work is so very good. If you write a story about an escaped slave and a white boy on a raft, it's probably going to be unfavorably compared in some ways to that OTHER rafting story. But that isn't a failure on your part, especially if you haven't read the other piece. I have a work on Lit that suffers this same fate. Goddamn other people having my good ideas before me!

Because of that, I also had issue setting this work. I thought it was dystopian at first, as well.

It kept me from effectively settling into the narrative for much of the first part of the story. There was also a blandness to some of the writing that I found hard to get into. It just seemed as if there were large, stark chunks of prose that lacked a sense of motion and excitement. It made for a fibrous read at points. I felt that the sentences lacked variability as well.

Once I chewed through to the later sections, I found myself really enjoying myself. I loved the ending. It surprised me, even moved me a little. But were this not part of the challenge, I'm not sure I would have made my way all the way there.

I'm glad I did. It was worth it. And once I realized exactly what story you were telling, I found it engaging and pleasurable. But I'd get someone I trusted to really take some scissors to the middle of this.

P.S. Bonus points for including a song by The Ranch. I saw them when I was still in high school and it was one of my favorite concerts of all time. Keith Urban might be pretty, but what he can do with a ganjo is just filthy.

This is such a nice story! I got bogged down in some of it, and it seemed like it was rushed midway to the end, but the characters were sympathetic and well-drawn where they could have been stereotypical. I loved that Lissbeth misunderstood things about the people around her, wrapped up as she was in her own desires. An effective "be careful what you wish for" tale. It's a little rough and meandering, but completely likable and I found myself reading into late hours, to see how it ended, and I got the happily ever after I was hoping for. Nicely done.

The author who wrote this story is xelliebabex. Thanks for FAWCking!

I read this when it first came out and it is just as good on the second reading. I really appreciate all the stories you share with us. Thank you.

I really enjoyed how Lisbon learned how much she loved Gabriel!