Reviewer: Casanova Signed
Date: September 05 2013
Title: Chapter 1: Setting Up and Starting Out
tokubetsu, this is one of the best unaware stories I've read in some time. Your attention to detail, especially, brings the piece to life. Readers can really feel like they're experiencing the story, which is tough to do when the perspective is so alien to our actual lives. Your descriptions really stimulate the imagination -- not an easy thing to do.
I do have a bit of criticism, however. From a purely literary standpoint, the story could use some streamlining. For instance, you make a big deal out of how the family's parents have completely disappeared (in itself a bit tough to believe, since apparently they're both somewhat well-to-do), but this seemingly important revelation doesn't factor into the story thereafter. My feeling is that you could just do away with this distracting detail and have his parents be on a weekend trip or something, because presumably you don't want them around to detract from the potential sexiness. And yes, admittedly the family's lack of parents factors into the characters behavior and their family dynamics, but I didn't think that it was such a huge detail that it was essential to include (Yasushi could just be motivated in general, Yui could just be a brat anyway, etc. without having the parents gone). So unless their effective orphanhood plays a bigger role in the story, I feel like it's unnecessary.
Ultimately, though, that's just a tiny weakness in an otherwise fantastic read. I think that authors in general should tend to overdo it and then "trim the fat" vs the other way around, so in that sense, you're already doing amazing. Thanks for the story! It's a very impressive debut. (I'm secretly hoping for a toilet ending.)
Author's Response: Hi Casanova. Thank you for your thorough review, compliments and criticism alike. Both are really valuble to me. I'm really working hard to make each chapter descriptive and easily-imagineable, using as many believable set-pieces and interactions as possible. For me there's nothing worse than a sudden immersion-smashing "he fell off her tits into her ass and now he is inside and then he is in her hair" transition. I try to plan each 'encounter' from both sides, imagining what the giant person would reasonably do, and how it would affect the tiny. Some deviations from pure logic have to be made, sure, but I try to keep it believable.
Re: the backstory. I understand what you're saying, and I agree that I sort of "dropped" the bulk of the background. To me the most important purpose of it was to give Yasushi a reason to throw himself 110% at creating something amazing, a reason to obsess and become an expert in something. I watched and loved the movie Kokuhaku (imdb -> /title/tt1590089/ ) several times over the last few years, which gave me the childhood-abandonment concept. I also wanted it to provide an explanation for the character's personalities to an extent, but I would definitely say the links are hazy at best in the story. My idea was that with no parents, Yasushi and Rena would become the "forced into maturity" pseudo-parents to the younger pair, with Rena picking up the role of the breadwinner to an extent, and perhaps harbouring information about what happened to the parents that she keeps from the rest. Mika, as the middle sibling, becomes the kind, neutral character - generally empathic and nice to be around, but with no outstanding traits. Yui, feeling untrusted and patronised as the youngest member, becomes petulant and... 気まぐれ (capricious? whimsical? changeable?), her outburts or sudden inclination toward mischief representing a desire for attention, to show that she can do things too.
I hope that explains some of my choices, but I fully understand and agree with your point. Once the story's finished, I intend to go back over it, merge some chapters for ease-of-reading, fix any typos that slipped through my checks, and tinker with bits that are not-great. That includes the background setting. Thank you so much for your input, and I look forward to hearing from you again.
Keep reading and your wishes might be realised, *wink wink*
I mentioned it somewhere below, but I'd be interested to hear which sister people would like to see interaction with, or even specific interactions. I tried to make all three appealing in their own ways, but I'm not sure I succeeded.
- tokubetsu