Post by sturgeon on Jan 12, 2024 15:09:53 GMT
Good hook: lonely and hot-headed priest is worried he’s crossed a line in the name of the greater good. Starts with a great sense of character and place. But then around page 4 Will hammers home a little too hard his concerns about Ira’s association with people involved in organized crime. We get it, move on with the plot. (Maybe the problem is that there’s a lot of on-the-nose dialogue? I’m usually telling people to do more in dialogue, but here it’s the descriptive prose that’s stronger.)
Anyway, about halfway through the lengthy cap (!) we finally get to its crux, with the Jepsons and the dead kids. By now, though, my attention is struggling. I get that a confession is a neat narrative device, but it has a big drawback: it means we’re hearing all the interesting stuff second hand, reported, after the event – rather than being thrown into the midst of the scene.
After that, I was impatient to get to the inevitable revelation of how Ira had compromised his priestly ethics in the name of revenge or justice or whatever; but by the time it finally arrived, I had come to so dislike this motorboating gambling morally-emaciated anti-cleric that I’m afraid I didn’t care one jot.
Nope.
Anyway, about halfway through the lengthy cap (!) we finally get to its crux, with the Jepsons and the dead kids. By now, though, my attention is struggling. I get that a confession is a neat narrative device, but it has a big drawback: it means we’re hearing all the interesting stuff second hand, reported, after the event – rather than being thrown into the midst of the scene.
After that, I was impatient to get to the inevitable revelation of how Ira had compromised his priestly ethics in the name of revenge or justice or whatever; but by the time it finally arrived, I had come to so dislike this motorboating gambling morally-emaciated anti-cleric that I’m afraid I didn’t care one jot.
Nope.
