Lightlark- The Most Vibrant Display of Overhyped Failure

[@QueenAleenaFan]

"She ran like she was running from something." The editor was underpaid or not enjoying the work by this point, huh?

[@biihisme]

Given how many times Alex describes something as a "thing" (cliffy thing, yolky thing) I'm seriously wondering if she had an editor at all 💀

[@elphbwckd212]

You think there was an editor?? Lmao

[@davidmauriciogutierrezespi5244]

Bold of you to assume an editor was even involved

[@JaynaeMarieXIV]

🤣😂🤣

[@NC-dw1ir]

@@davidmauriciogutierrezespi5244 Bold of Alex to keep getting rejected by agents and never hire an editor

[@defaulted9485]

Imagine thinking your book going to be made into a 150 minute long movie, and what you get is a singular KZbin rant with thrice the length.

[@deen7530]

They should just show this review in theatres.

[@GreyPajamas]

This comment 😂

[@TheFoolishSamurai]

Upgrades, people, upgrades!

[@lankyfishy]

I'd also like to recommend Crow Caller's 4 hour rampage through it

[@Crested_Hadrosaur]

​@@deen7530 Or split it into three parts like the hobbit films

[@cinemint]

Bragging about no one guessing the twist is like a professor bragging that everyone failed his class.

[@NububuChan]

💀💀💀

[@ghoulchan7525]

they have to reach the word count somehow.

[@Hello-hello-hello456]

Yeah like a professor bragging that they know more than their students

[@SingingSealRiana]

half right. the thing about a good plot twist is, that it should make sense in retrospect. it should be suprising so its not the same

[@yusharider]

true

[@emmettjoyce3100]

i find it hard to believe that in all her years of training, isla was never prepared for having to eat human hearts in front of others

[@SpicyButterflyWings]

Can't afford to waste the hearts on her I guess, she's only their ruler after all 🙄

[@theflyingspaget]

​@@SpicyButterflyWingsHave her eat pig hearts then. Lie and say it's a human heart, if she hasn't seen them she won't know the difference. I'd worry about her dying of some sort of foodborne illness but considering that every other part of her training just seems like an excuse to try to kill her, why would they care about her health in that regard?

[@SpicyButterflyWings]

@theflyingspaget Do the hearts have to be eaten raw? If not then I don't think foodborne illness would be much of a problem. But the pig hearts isn't a bad idea. It seems like such an oversight to prep Isla with training for all these other incredibly situational events but not teach her to stomach a heart. I think it would have made much more sense for Aster to just make the wildlings full-on cannibals. More food to go around for everyone, Grim can still use his little nickname Hearteater, and all they'd need to do to prepare Isla is get her to think of any other kind of meat when she eats.

[@JuMiKu]

​@@SpicyButterflyWingsThis is a far better idea for a nature curse! In fact, just give them all the most horrible aspects of nature. Some are completely horrible parents, but spout out so many that it makes up for it. Some are dangerous cannibals. And so forth. Making them clearly the worst would put MC in an interest bind.

[@todo9633]

Before watching the video, I genuinely don't know if this comment is sarcastic or not.

[@boxprophet]

Me, watching a seven and a half hour video on a book I've never heard of from a channel I've never watched before, nodding and acting like I have a stake in any of this: Yes, call her ass out, get her.

[@TryinBin8889]

literally me

[@jeread5193]

I'm doing this too.

[@viviannoah8039]

Welcome his channel is so fun!

[@Jadeeee2323]

Sames

[@uglyhairygirl7067]

I could not believe when you said "seven and a half hour video" and had to check. it went by like nothing today!

[@abs-urdity]

The poorly defined "if you love someone they get your powers" mechanic makes me want to write a Lightlark fanfiction about Oro's ridiculously overpowered pet dog. The best little good boy.

[@ghoulchan7525]

i think if your beta readers have enjoyed the twist and mystery you left enough clues. adding more could make it too obvious.

[@abs-urdity]

@@ghoulchan7525 agreed, but what does this have to do with the poorly constructed and unnecessarily convoluted magic system?

[@ghoulchan7525]

@@abs-urdity ... Nothing i think i wrote this in reply to someone else's comment. No idea how it ended up here. Freaking KZbin

[@SlimbTheSlime]

@@ghoulchan7525 brilliant website. I’m glad it’s super reliable and stable.

[@ImaginaryAlchemist]

Honestly I'd read that, it'd be infinitely better than actual Lightlark

[@katelynhanninen1866]

all the obstacles just feel like a bunch of kids playing an imaginary game and where one says "i fireball you!!" the other just goes "nuh uh, i actually have fireproof armor 😌"

[@raineatscheese]

This is such a beautiful representation

[@Pandachu123]

So like South Park: The Stick of Truth, got it. 🤣

[@ixeliema]

As someone who has been molding my own story concept (that I first came up with when I was 12, supposedly the same age Aster was when she began reaching out to publishers about Lightlark,) it's likely not an accident that the vibe is "kids roleplaying a fight." Editted some phrasing to clarify my statement, because no matter how many times I reread my original comment I couldn't grasp what my original thought was. Also adding, my story idea when I was 12 also sort of gave this "poorly constructed anime fight scene" energy that I've worked really hard to avoid having at all in more modern renditions, even cutting more than half the combat to focus solely on character interactions, since those are more important to the story than the fights are. Given that this story I consider my brainchild first started when I was twelve, I can see in Aster's story what pieces likely remained somewhat the same over the course of time. It makes sense that her fights play out like that, because I feel like when you're young and inexperienced as a writer, you tend to accidentally make things very "Animal Jam Warrior Cats RP in Sarephia Forest." As in, "he bleeds out. Actually, he missed and can't die. Actually...etc." Kids want to make stories and fights interesting, but instead they tend to write themselves into corners or accidentally break their own canon and then write themselves out of corners with bs logic because...they're kids and that makes sense to them. What I was trying (and failing) to say is that it feels like too much of Lightlark's story/fights/characters never evolved past her earliest drafts, since a lot of these issues cropped up.

[@acewmd.]

@@ixeliemayou sure you won’t suffer he same faults? Let’s hear this story concept?

[@ixeliema]

@@acewmd. Please point to where I said that, friend. I literally just said that there's a reason that this vibe comes across so strongly.

[@mafaldaviana9060]

The fact that the ruler of an island is called Isla Crown is so lazy it's actually funny Like calling a lawyer Mr. Law

[@thesetwofloofs5397]

Law J McProsecutor, the J stands for Justice

[@mafaldaviana9060]

@@thesetwofloofs5397 and his arch-nemesis, Mr. Defense Attour Ney

[@pikapower_kirby]

Lawyers with ridiculous names? Huh, rings a bell...In all seriousness though, Ace Attorney to me is the perfect way to give characters over-the-top names and make it work. "Isla Crown" is a pretty name but it's too on-the-nose; it's too easy.

[@nohintshere]

​@@pikapower_kirbyRhythm Doctor does it well too, with Cole Brew (a caffeine addict) and Nicole Ting (a smoking addict) being the two most obvious examples

[@pikapower_kirby]

@@nohintshere Those names are amazing!

[@BenMarcWilliams]

I'm really amused by how much of Isla's outfit is apparently secret knives. I have this mental image of her tripping and accidentally killing herself and everyone else in the room.

[@deen7530]

She trips and knives just shoot out of her clothes like she springloaded them, everyone lives just long enough to yell at her for being a dumbass before succumbing to their wounds. The realms are doomed.

[@krussyarts]

She trips and a bunch of knives just fall out She tries gathering them back together as everyone else in the room is looking at her like this -> 👁️👁️

[@KM-hv1jg]

Talk about a sharp dresser!

[@dracocrusher]

For what it's worth, it is kind-of fun in a really stupid way. Like she's just constantly this massive weirdo that's so paranoid she's just constantly hiding weapons on her body and she's just always twirling swords or fucking with knives or something. She's basically that one kid you knew in Highschool that was super into sword, but they're a bit TOO into it to the extent where it's kind-of lame? Super unintentional characterization, but it is a bit endearing with just how dumb it is. She would totally be the type of person to just start waving a dagger around at random just to fish for someone to ask about it, lol.

[@laughingseagull000]

Instead of spaghetti spilling out of her pockets, it’s knives.

[@marysueme]

This channel feels like an English professor got his tenure and decided to exclusively study and give lectures on terrible books. I'm here for it.

[@Rasafrag]

I'd take that elective course. Hell, once I get my PhD, I actually would teach it! I think everyone could stand to learn from the horrible as well as the wonderful. Both offer a level of transcendence in knowledge.

[@becuaseimbored3481]

He's better than my actual English professor. Apparently, everything is connected to Frankenstein.

[@marocat4749]

With his trusty assistant ash.

[@marocat4749]

​@@becuaseimbored3481mayby shalley is like the mom of modern scifi ,but everything?!

[@becuaseimbored3481]

@@marocat4749 it wasn't even sci-fi it was stuff like hellboy and v for vendetta

[@tuckershuff1441]

I can vividly imagine Krimson stumbling out of his editing room covered in blood after all of this was done and just groaning, "Well that was tedious."

[@KrimsonRogue]

Aside from the blood, that actually did happen.

[@tuckershuff1441]

@@KrimsonRogue Sure. 'No blood'. Wink-wink.

[@KrimsonRogue]

>.>

[@astrothsknot]

i heard that in his voice

[@Ramsey276one]

The Infinite One Rodin of book reviews! XD

[@legateelizabeth]

"I don't eat hearts. But pull that again, and for you? I'll make an exception." is actually a pretty raw line. I know it's one line out of seven hours but it struck me that that's actually pretty cool in a vacuum of heart-eating people.

[@caroklureza6067]

I had the same thought, that line does kinda rip

[@aleahcim24]

He ate honestly

[@jesustyronechrist2330]

No it's not! It's so lame! Like, what: You are so angry that you are not just going to kill them, but to eat their organ? You will do what they are accusing you off, proving them correct, because you are angry? Excuse me, you are correct: It's is a raw line. It's "foooocking raw!"

[@jaslikeart]

​@@aleahcim24unlike Isla with the heart

[@thetweefirebug]

It's a surprisingly good line. Also, the way Krimson read it was actually kinda menacing somehow XD

[@KaiseaWings]

I feel like authors sometimes get so wrapped up in their ships they forget the reality of boundaries. It's actually very invasive for a stranger to press chocolate up against your mouth and feed you from their hands, no matter how attractive they are. Like I get it, we wanna get to the cute stuff, but it's very strange for something so sensual to be happening right away. I wouldn't buy this level of physical comfort even if they'd slept together immediately.

[@harveyhaslostit]

Especially since that scene seemed to be written in a "platonic" way. I wouldn't even be entirely comfortable with my partner feeding me chocolate like that. Even my closest friends wouldn't be allowed to do that. Also Islas reaction was weirdly sexy

[@alexwyatt2911]

@@harveyhaslostit Plus, they’re in public. It’s already weird but Isla is orgasming over chocolate in the middle of the marketplace

[@reginaldforthright805]

@@harveyhaslostit how about your grandma

[@c.s2193]

@@harveyhaslostit how about your dog

[@PriyaPans]

@🌸 𝐄𝐫𝐨𝐠𝐚𝐤𝐢𝐏𝐚𝐭𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐬 🌸 problem is that kawaii anime romance is so incredibly unrealistic and arguably in some cases harmful of the younger folks who watch it (especially of a large chunk of their adolescence was spent in lockdown and not socialising outside and learning how to socialise with members of the opposite (or same) sex. The only time I hand feed my partner is when I'm in the passenger seat and going on a very long drive and he's driving and wants a snack or some sweets.

[@elanorniennandilme3292]

this books biggest crime is going "the protagonist comes from a people that eats hearts. she doesn't do that tho" just disappointing, think of all the good heart gore it could have had

[@Pandachu123]

And reading this comment made me want to get Pandora's Tower. 🤣 A major plot point of the game is *feeding the hearts of monsters from a dangerous tower to the protagonist's cursed girlfriend.*

[@caedilly]

her having the curse but no powers would be so interesting, and ngl since shes half nightshade you could even make her being kept inside work. since oro stays indoors mostly her mentors could have just tried to convince her to stick to him so she never finds out until their plan has worked or she goes out at night and oro saves her for drama. man it would be so easy to make this book work by simplifying

[@yanstein8464]

at the beginning she has no powers and no curse, but later it turns out she has all power, no curse tho it's such bullshit, i hate it, i don't like calling characters mary sues but i have no other word to describe her character, she's a mary sue who has powers with no setbacks other characters have

[@Nerobyrne]

fun fact: In the very first Final Fantasy game, you could eat parts of monsters to turn into them and gain some of their abilities. Not entirely though, you'd basically become a hybrid. You'd have their form, but retain all your mental abilities. That game also involved sci-fi time travel. Truly a masterpiece of weird.

[@crazybunnyproductions7287]

What irks me isn't just the fact that she specifically doesn't have the non-thematically appropriate curse, but the fact that she doesn't even remotely behave like someone raised in a society where that curse has existed for several centuries. No one behaves like anything in the world has happened. It's just set dressing.

[@theultimatelifeform7077]

Me: I can't start a new TV show, they take too long to watch. Also Me when I see a 7 hour book review: Don't mind if I do!

[@ithseem]

Mood lmao

[@dragletsofmakara1120]

I feel seen.

[@marliestol9414]

Great minds think a like

[@deen7530]

I have a final essay worth 30% of my grade due on Monday that I need to finish and yet I'm sitting here starting a 7.5 hour long video. Edit: Thanks for the advice, everyone, I turned it in this morning. I'm hoping for a solid B.

[@RAHowes]

Yep, agreed. 😂

[@mafaldaviana9060]

I think the most telling thing about Lightlark is that its AO3 tag had 33 works and half of them are re-writes or one-shots where the writers admit they hate the original book

[@Roman-m7e9m]

Even ao3 doesn't want it😂😂😂😂

[@moonleafteaofthemonth]

When I hear "star stick", I think those cheap gold glitter star wands they sell to go with fairy and princess Halloween costumes.

[@chelsey8737]

Yes!

[@oddeyes9413]

She definitely could have used an object name generator (they're great to get started, and for a good laugh sometimes) if she couldn't think of anything better, it would have helped her stuff not sound so childish. 👀

[@marocat4749]

Even star wood sounds better.

[@NorthernShinigami]

good. Someone here has to have a clear mind. Cause i'm think of a whole different kind of "star stick"

[@adrianbaxter2049]

honestly, all I can picture is the Star Rod from the Kirby games. Stripes and everything.

[@caoilfhionndunbar]

"an immortal kung fu Monkey" is literally one of the central characters of the most famous work of Chinese literature ever written

[@shanicek5188]

Sun wukong u will always be famous

[@misteryA555]

And my bestie

[@EE-jp5ev]

​@@misteryA555 UMMM he's MY bestie actually

[@gerrya2133]

The whole description, including the space pirates, wasn't too far off from DragonBall Z.

[@st6x]

the whole description was arguably just warframe

[@eb3ast]

"even Twilight got people to read, and once they started reading, they learned to read something better" this is gold lmaoo

[@TheFran2555]

So true

[@asherscott3151]

The thing is that twilight isn't THAT bad. Not like this

[@starsbythepocketful.]

@@asherscott3151 so true. Atleast Meyer kept us engaged till the end, and she can write well without using words like "meanly" and "yolky thing"

[@tonichan89]

Or they went on to read 50 Shades and Colleen Hoover 😥

[@scz1770]

​@@asherscott3151 It's definitely not good but this is truly next level

[@netnet_in_a_sweater9351]

I think I can see what Aster is trying to do by constantly listing the qualities each realm has. It’s like Hogwarts houses (Harry Potter), godly parents (PJO), courts (ACOTAR), etc. Theyre all categories that fans can imagine and subdivide themselves into. Aster probably wrote her world imagining all the buzzfeed quizzes people will take to determine what realm they are

[@laughingseagull000]

I’m convinced HP is still so popular because there’s four separate personality tests in it: Hogwarts house, Ilvermorny house, wand, and patronus.

[@Jessamine29]

​@@laughingseagull000makes for easy merch too

[@deen7530]

I can just imagine what it'd be like in a world where Lightlark took off. "Haha, don't take me personally. I'm a Sunling, so I speak my mind no matter what!" *Skylings Are The Most Powerful Race In Lightlark, And Here's 10 Reasons Why:* "Uh, you can't have two powers and two curses. This is a lore-accurate roleplay server, so follow the rules!"

[@teslashark]

@@deen7530 Usually, if you can't quantify it into a computer MMO character creation, the power system is broken.

[@silia0637]

It wouldn't even work because nightshade is so obiously the best realm

[@yanpuri]

I find it amusing that Isla is revolted by a glove made out of human skin while her entire realm sustains itself exclusively on human hearts.

[@OfficialROZWBRAZEL]

kind of like when a person watches gore without blinking but cringes and gets nauseous seeing someone hawk a loogie

[@Nixahma]

I mean, seeing as she herself doesn't eat human hearts and has been sheltered her entire life, it would do shit to you seeing it irl compared to just knowing about it

[@NA-AN]

I decided to scroll through the comments before the video officially started and seeing this comment without any context from the book made me chuckle for a good while. This is a really stupid book isn't it?

[@wolfetteplays8894]

@@NA-ANsame

[@cellamarino]

​@@OfficialROZWBRAZELno. that's valid. spit is vile.

[@judeackroyd662]

Everytime she wrote "Fisted" to mean someone is making a fist is a curse even Lightlark won't break

[@razzle8140]

Ew

[@NateReadsDiversely]

Reading this book is like being invited over to that annoying kid in your class's house and when you start playing pretend, he starts making up a bunch of shit that gives him more powers than you in order to beat you and then progressively throws more of a fit when you outsmart him and you're not old enough to drive so you have to stay there until your parent picks you up.

[@luciferspasta]

so glad others had this experience as a kid

[@cloudy.eyes._]

This is too accurate 🤣🥲

[@annagusto6133]

Yes! I thought exactly the same!

[@HappyBirddi]

I'm so sick of reading these stories where any other woman outside the main character is either the mean bully/the secret villain pretending to be your friend or basically non-existent

[@familyberente1407]

Omg yes! That was one of my main problems with this book and others like this. (I tend to not give too much thought to books people tell me should not be given too much thought)

[@marynoble9464]

Literally. Like, tell us you don't have meaningful relationships with women due to your ego without telling us

[@Shindo9Kyu]

Krimson: makes a 7+ hour video Also Krimson: So you gotta watch this at least twice

[@222pichu]

And you know darn well I’m gonna! I love listening to these during long gaming sessions (Stardew Valley or Terraria or Skyrim, usually)

[@LittleCircuitBreaker]

Currently doing just that!

[@JemaFox]

@@LittleCircuitBreaker Same! I finished the video yesterday at the end of the work day and I am compelled to listen to the video again to pick up the things I missed the first time around.

[@linstar9172]

Me: Sure thing!

[@jenndoesstuff]

Deal, but the 2nd watch is going to be in 4-ish months when I've forgotten a lot of the details and can be surprised again.

[@TravisBroski]

The idea that Aster kept pressing on her story to be published so much that her agent literally quit (according to her) is incredibly funny

[@mariatourino9545]

Yeah... and not something she should be smug about. You're not a 5 year-old, Aster!!

[@TheAdrift]

Maybe this is because I'm not overly-blessed with self-esteem, but if I had to work THAT HARD just to find someone willing to publish my story, I might think maybe the story is the problem here. 😅

[@sora1498]

@@TheAdrift narcissism at its finest, the narcissist us never the problem, its everyone else!

[@Nixahma]

just realized it would be so fucking easy to fix the double curse thing: just make wildlings crave the taste of their beloved's heart in particular. make it a self control thing

[@C.C.353]

That also gets rid of this weird exception (don't know if it's explained why they're an exception later tho)

[@Nixahma]

@@C.C.353 Yeah, you could twist it into a loveless marriage trying to combine two realms' powers. edit: and going by the taste thing, maybe make any regular old heart taste disgusting. maybe there's an underground group of wildlings that's so depraved that they run an organization centered around making hearts taste the best; aka either purposefully helping their clients love their victim while forcing said victim to endure prolonged captivity and possible torture or a hitlist system where you can hire people to kill and take the hearts of people you love, yet consider expendable enough to kill for momentary satisfaction. Sounds contradictory, I know, but the level of detatchment from morality and common sense it would take for someone to be capable of regarding love as a tool for self-satisfaction at the cost of murder would *actually* make the wildling's reputation as monsters believeable.

[@theflyingspaget]

You can also explain how the wildlings don't starve this way, they can eat normal food just fine but the second they fall in love the only thing that can save them from starving is their lover's heart.

[@Nixahma]

@sparksparkle i'm a writer by hobby so this is really nice to hear :)

[@Nixahma]

@@theflyingspaget That also works, but if you want to enforce the narrative that Wildlings are seen as monstrous, it's best to write a reason to see them that way. The more choice you give them in the matter, the more reason the other realms would have to hate them. Starvation as an effect of love is especially cruel and definitely fits the narrative, but other realms' perception of them would need to change accordingly.

[@crazypegasie9748]

Honestly just hearing an author say 'no one guessed the twists of my book' this proudly is just a huge red flag because it usually means that the twists weren't set up properly and or just thrown in for shock value

[@corinneeaglebridge]

It’s like when a teacher/professor says “only 10% of you will pass this class”. Like ok so you’re a terrible teacher then.

[@HaliaStone]

New fear unlocked: writing a book and ending up in a KrimsonRogue video 😅 these are great advice on what not to do.

[@hagfish2201]

as an author, yes 😭

[@HaliaStone]

@@hagfish2201 on one hand I'd love an in depth critique like he does but preferably before the publishing happens xD

[@quietone2674]

I dunno...I think it'd be nice to show up as a positive comparison to a bad book. He does that quite often. Is a small shout-out, but a nice little dream.

[@Virgo117]

Same 😂 But breaks are important too ❤

[@Dani_77709]

That's a valid fear I'm kinda developing myself. Honestly this kind of critique would be more than beneficial before I publish the book because when I do it at least I would know I published something decent...and not a second draft at best with whatever Lightlark has going on.

[@aurora5481]

2:47:09 Every TTRPG player knows a story of a game master who really just should've written a book. Aster is an author who really should've just ran a D&D campaign.

[@maideninorange240]

This is...the best description of this book honestly. Probably would've been a more enjoyable experience too!

[@aurora5481]

@@maideninorange240 She has some interesting, if not particularly ground-breaking, ideas in her worldbuilding. If the world of Lightlark and the concept of the centennial was pitched to me as a D&D campaign to join, I would probably be decently enthusiastic to create a character with the theming and basic building blocks given, and use the societies and aesthetics to create something of my own, influenced by those things but not defined solely by them. Alex is not. She's clearly very interested in worldbuilding, and good at creating complications and rough plot beats, but isn't interested in how to solve them or in building characters within the societies she sets out for herself. Isla effortlessly conquers every obstacle because Aster wants to move on to the next description, worldbuilding element, cool challenge, and not linger in what the choices and actions of the characters mean so they barely make any. She genuinely seems like she'd have decent chops as a homebrew DM, or at least as a campaign setting writer if she lacks improv skill, but her lack of interest in narrative moment to moment and in fleshing out characters dooms her as an author in the genre she's trying to establish herself in.

[@maideninorange240]

@@aurora5481 Honestly, you summed up Ms. Aster really well with that, and that's been my takeaway from this whole book. She has some interesting ideas, but none of the skills to properly make use of them. At least not in the form of a book. It definitely would make for a fun campaign as long as the DM knows what they are doing, since this plot screams that it would work best with others to drive itself forward, and not just the will of the author. In it's current form, it just feels very clunky at best and downright inconsistent at worst. What a shame, since I really like the concept of a whole society being forced to adapt to a curse and would've loved to see it explored further.

[@ayajade6683]

​@@aurora5481 she'd be better off teaming up with someone who hates world building but has great prose while being a realist to prune things.

[@aurora5481]

@@ayajade6683 If what you mean is a ghostwriter, then yes. Because no author in the world looking to make a name for themselves are going to split the credits with someone who just had ideas for a neat world and left them to do 90% of the rest of the work.

[@oddeyes9413]

She started querying at TWELVE?! Yea, no wonder she got rejected. The agencies and publishers are not gonna risk anything on a kid. I was published at 17 and got rejected repeatedly just because of my age. I started to query at age 15 and it was a very hostile environment. Now I'm 29 and still working on getting books published and when people ask me if I think they should try to get published as a teenager I tell them: *"No. Spend a few years tweaking, beta workshop in your manuscript and learn about the industry. Wait until you're a bit older and then try to get published. The industry is not kind to young authors and agents and publishers can and will take advantage of your inexperience. I know personally how it can go."*

[@rowanquynn9964]

Thank you for this, i feel like there's this real attitude of start young or you'll fail forever. I feel better about not rushing myself now

[@oddeyes9413]

​@@rowanquynn9964 No problem. I wish you the best of luck in your writing ❤

[@gloriafrimpong17]

I remember my father trying to publish my unfinished book when I was 14 because he said I would only be successful if I published young

[@oddeyes9413]

​@@gloriafrimpong17 A lot of people think that. I've noticed it becoming a trend and it's a worrying one because the publishing industry is extremely cutthroat and honestly isn't a good idea to be published young.

[@rowanquynn9964]

@Odd Eyes94 would you be interested or willing to drop some more advice for aspiring writers? If you're not no pressure

[@nathancongdon248]

Isla: “Hey Oro, have you ever heard of the bond-breaker?” Oro: “No- wait, don’t you mean the bond-MAKER?” [Roll credits]

[@klane2004]

Have I read Lightlark? No. Will I watch every BookTube video talking about it? Yes. Will I tell my whole family I'm sick so I can stay in bed and watch a 7 hour Krimson video? Absolutely.

[@deen7530]

I had raging tonsilitis all week and now I'm wishing I caught it later than I did

[@klane2004]

We have strep throat going through our house atm, so it's not exactly a lie but I may be playing it up a bit 😅. I hope you're feeling better!

[@deen7530]

@@klane2004 I finally started recovering yesterday, but it was six days of misery before that. But I'm feeling well enough to go to my Easter gathering tomorrow. Thanks for the well wishes!

[@DragonSlicer]

I always love listening to very long videos

[@klane2004]

@@DragonSlicer same!

[@Starsim99]

The fact that the sequel got announced so close to the release of this video has me deeply worried for Krimson’s sanity.

[@gracekim1998]

Wait What?😅

[@essixthefalcon8657]

14 hour sequel review, let's go!!!

[@alexjewett7455]

My guess is it's going to take him quite a to get around to the sequel when it comes out.

[@ellie-angel9254]

@@gracekim1998 I think it comes out in November… I facepalmed so hard when it showed up on my Amazon page 😅 poor Krimson 😂

[@Tytoalba777]

@@alexjewett7455 He joked that he would have a video out in March/April of 2024, a full 5 months after release

[@GhostForgerSVF]

"They are ONE WET FLOOR away from a realm wide GENOCIDE" is now officially my new most favorite out of context quote. Thank you Krimson!

[@chillin_in_a_dark_room]

Didn't watch the video yet, I'm now assuming it's about a tribe of sock wearing jedis :O **On the brink of turning to the dark side

[@StrunDoNhor]

No joke, I have a list of weird lines that I want to include/allude to in my own WIP, and I just added that one after watching this video :v At the very top of my list, and I'm not making this up, is a _testimonial_ about a US congressman from the late 80's, who became so enraged at the ballooning budget of a scientific megaproject that _"he became non-linear"._ Goddamn, I love that description.

[@pau_5435]

​@@StrunDoNhor Gilmore Girls, 1st season, when Rory misses the huge Shakespeare test they have been working so hard for : "We have stretched ourselves as thin as humanly possible without going completely postal!"

[@SuperFloxes]

For the sake of anyone curious and for future reference: 1:37:45

[@Takimeko]

I'm reminded of a Splinter Cell shitpost that was just called "Causing WWIII by dropping a single bottle" or something along those lines.

[@shinyumbreon696]

The fact that Isla is in her 20s while most of the other characters are hundreds of years old, yet she still managed to hold her own against them, genuinely bothers me. They have had HUNDREDS OF YEARS to master their skills. Imagine facing someone in combat who has had centuries of practice. No twenty-something can beat that. This is something that the worst-thought-through vampire novels have managed to get right and brings Mary Sue who a whole new level.

[@tealrootsg]

I don't even think she's 20-something, I heard that she's 19

[@quanticflowers]

@@tealrootsgwhy are they always so young? every isekai romance (acotar for example) seems to make their female protagonists like, 17-20 and its actually so lame. then they just proceed to make the dumbest decisions possible. it’s especially uncomfortable given how often the male interests are hundreds or thousands of years old. i want a middle aged protagonist who actually makes rational decisions and acts in a mature way.

[@tealrootsg]

@@quanticflowers agreed, a fantasy book with characters in their late twenties/thirties would be a nice change

[@jart1984]

​@@quanticflowers because younger protagonists appeals to a wider/younger audiences

[@SpookyScarletShadow]

The reason the protagonists are in their early twenties/late teens is because the intended audience is ALSO that age.

[@abibgail]

Thinking how the rulers have overall remained constant throughout the centennials makes it all so much funnier/worse. Just the same people in the same room showing off their powers which are the same as last time they went through this weird summer camp talent show

[@cloudy.eyes._]

Hahaha, maybe that’s why all the demonstrations were kinda dull, they’ve run out of ideas over all this time

[@PriyaPans]

It would've made such a good book (or better at least) if they showed how they're all basically exhausted emotionally and mentally by doing this BS every year and nothing changes, and yet now suddenly it's culminating into seriously immediate danger and they've been out of ideas of centuries already. It would be so much better if they decided that so much if the rules might just be for show and they had to figure out what rule was okay to break and how to work together to beat this BS. The exhaustion and ennui of living for so long could make an interesting discussion. As well as a sort of railway track philosophical conversation between leaders about how on earth they could try to save the most lives possible. But that's potentially too thingy for stereotypical YA? When the typical tropes are love triangles and young woman who does good fighting in a fantasy land that's all dystopian and the ruling system is generally awful.

[@virahpayam]

😭😭😭

[@TheLegend-oy2sg]

I always hate the “no one can guess my plot twist” having the murder in a true crime story be a dragon is also a twist no one can guess. It also ruins everything

[@s0LLagal]

... Now I just wanna read a fantasy murder mystery

[@wolfetteplays8894]

Elder scrolls: am I a joke to you? (No really, the dark brotherhood has dragons)

[@StartOfTheYear]

I mean, fantasy crime novel where a dragon IS a murderer?

[@secondsea2]

@@s0LLagalMay I direct your attention to the Dresden Files?

[@s0LLagal]

@@secondsea2 I will check that out when I can, then

[@mining_schnitzel4034]

7 hours? Holy mother of all that is holy, KrimsonRogue is truly sacrificing his life and blood and tears for us

[@nickonerd]

Oh yes sure bullying a writer that was 12 years old when she wrote this book is so heroic, are you daft?

[@TwixxieGhost9768]

yesssss he is!!!!!!! the most complex movie marathon ever.... condensed to a book!

[@bigbabado8296]

I've never been more ready!!!

[@ArielleLavecchia]

KrimsonRogue's going to need lots of catherapy after this video...

[@Andrew-Winter]

You can see Krimson's locks and beard grow in real time:)

[@Vashiane]

When you said the nomenclature was very immature and childish, I was like “Oh wow, that’s really hyperspecific, I wonder what stuff is named to generate that comment because I’ve never heard someone say that specifically about a book before.” I was not fucking prepared. Literally Inky, Blinky, Pinky, and Clyde, residing on Ink Island, Blink Island, Pink Island, and Clyde Island. I named shit like this when I was EIGHT and saving my stories to a FLOPPY DISK.

[@leotamer5]

If you are following the naming convention, it should be Clde island.

[@DarkSlayer9587]

​@@leotamer5 hahaha Clde island I see I'm not the only one rewatching this video to remember what the fuck happened in the first book before watching the second. I've got a lot of really slow shifts this week and I'm just playing this at work

[@gracekim1998]

@@DarkSlayer9587 yeah I'm trying to finish this video before going to the second

[@mateorondon5291]

Every time Krimson explains more of Isla's 'training', I think the 'training' was actually a series of elaborate assasination attempts that she survived through plot armor and dumb luck.

[@biihisme]

It can't have been plot armour because there is no plot

[@anarchy7535]

Aurora: "Raise this child and I'll spare your race." Terra and Poppy: *Abandon the child in a hurricane, stab it multiple times with spears, etc* "Are we doing it right?"

[@zoeb3573]

"We abandoned her on that branch 10 hours ago and she's still holding. If we get her down now and tell her it was training, she might spare us."

[@subroy7123]

"You'll be learning how to hold your breath underwater for a long time. Now that we've chained you to this rock...."

[@surrealkit4843]

It sounds that way with her clothing too. A blade around her neck?

[@ssj4rit]

Bill was a sad boy. He got bullied a lot and cried after school. So, one day, he turned into a tree. There, I made a twist none of you predicted. I am therefore an amazing author.

[@onelovelylilidiot4959]

Bill Nye the Forest Guy

[@reneekuijpers5160]

Quick give this man a movie deal

[@ANAMEHASNOTBEENTAKE]

I’m invested.

[@LuchaLLibro]

I mean, this sounds like a great start to a folk story about how the weeping willow got its name.

[@slightlysasie535]

Literary genius

[@thomasallingham928]

Weird thing I noticed that confused me: Wildlings supposedly wear cloths that emphasize their natural beauty so why would she roll her eyes or be aghast at revealing clothing? For her that should be the normal wardrobe and wouldn’t be anything of note it be like me being scandalized about getting a t shirt as a gift

[@misteryA555]

Uh, because she's Not Like Other Girls 💁‍♀️

[@azrobant2390]

The biggest problems with this story are: 1.) The worldbuilding is like YandereSim, adding a bunch of cool shit cause it's cool without making sure you have something that actually works 2.) The plot regularly possesses the characters to make them say or do whatever it needs 3.) I could describe every character with a single word

[@purplecobra52]

Isla: dumb Grim: edgelord Oro: old Azul: gay Cleo: bitch Celeste: bitch Ella: disabled Juniper: expostitory Terra and Poppy: bitch

[@ChariotLee]

Allow me: Isla: overpowered Grim: horny Oro: annoying Cleo: bitch Azul: huh? Celeste: evil

[@gem9535]

No, YandereSim is too far-at least the creator actually finished the book instead of making endless excuses for over a decade.

[@becuaseimbored3481]

It's feature creep but for novels

[@costinamezinca5508]

Out of curiosity, can you actually describe every single character with a word? I want to see how creative you can get.

[@Oobs212]

I always find it weird when writers brag about how not a single reader guessed the twist in their story. If done right a plot twist consists of clues and foreshadowing throughout the story, the final piece given right before the reveal in the narrative so the reader can puzzle the whole thing together themselves and feel vindicated. Not just... not giving any information and being smug about it. Like, I'd guessed the Celeste is the final boss twist, but only because "bff turns on the protagonist" is such a recurrent theme in female lead stories that the moment Isla and Celeste were described as "juming in a small cirkel, laughing" and "having slumber parties" I just knew.

[@fallingstars5683]

i actually had said offhand to a friend of mine early on in the video that, had i written this story, i probably would've made poppy and terra the villains, and i REALLY don't like that that ended up being Not Wrong

[@LuneEvenfall]

Also, I feel like twists can have LAYERS to them, too! Like, just using an example from a recent game I played with a friend: we KNEW from the start that there would be a twist with the mayor plotting something to take over the state and start some war shit, but what completely took us by surprise was that one of the guys we had basically blindly trusted was directly involved too, and you just stand there going "WHAT" about it, but the context is there, you just overlooked it because the mayor was such a giant fuckin foreshadowing curtain in your face! Or another part where an unexpected party joins your team, and you KNOW he's hiding something. You think you know what it is only to have that completely subverted by the end. I fucking love that shit. You never quite know what to expect, but at the same time you don't feel like your intelligence is being insulted; the writers are just great at drawing your attention to one thing and then making you overlook other things.

[@quinnzykir]

That’s why I like the Alex Delaware novels. I like a good detective store where you’re worried about the characters and guessing who the killer is. But the twist makes sense

[@quinnzykir]

@@fallingstars5683 Ayo what the fuck?

[@vimaln6613]

@@LuneEvenfall Wow, the game sounds interesting. Mind telling it's name?

[@taylort3674]

"She can travel to all these different places endlessly, meet new people, and has to get back before her guardians find out" This sounds like it should have been a book series with that being the first book so we see her learn about the world and then build up to the larger plot where that knowledge gives her an advantage over others

[@crowthewicked8344]

Wow! A good idea, no wonder why it wasn't in this book.

[@butchwherewolf]

This could've also been a good way to keep the grim plot and then it ends with her losing her memories of him and coming back home for the centennial (if the plot was even kept) like, bruh

[@MrHarperMD]

Let's appreciate how "Hearteater" must sound to wildlings. And imagine same plays-on-their-curse names for other islanders? Sun-coward? Wave-victim?

[@safala]

I would be dead if I was drinking water while reading this comment.

[@jojol.2630]

Sun-coward is so good

[@eldritchabomination9726]

​@@jojol.2630that's just what I'd use to bully a vampire

[@deen7530]

AU where Isla is a Starling: Grim: Hello there, Dead-Child.

[@eldritchabomination9726]

@@deen7530 how, er, romantic?

[@Queen_Cnidarian]

When Krimson mentioned that the rulers (except for Isla and Celeste) are hundreds of years old, I pictured them to look like they’re 50-70. I imagined them with wrinkles, some of them with greying hair, and that Cleo had a cane, even though one was never described. This mental image of the characters worked against me as soon as Grim started flirting with Isla and later Oro joined the love triangle.

[@homedepoturinalz8974]

I kept imagining Oro as looking like King Henry the 8th throughout the entire reading lmao

[@Ellisepha]

I always imagined him as a 40-something black man, probably because Sun Realm = hot land in my head​

[@Queen_Cnidarian]

@Ellisepha Personally, I pictured Oro as Mansa Musa, the ruler if the Mali Empire, a kingdom rich with gold. Cause, you know, Oro literally means gold, and Mansa Musa had a shit ton of gold.

[@Ellisepha]

@@Queen_Cnidarian Yeah, I also had a sirta Mansa Musa type oc character in mind for him!

[@Acidfrog475]

I pictured Oro looking like the Ice King from _Adventure Time_ but OrAnGe, Grim was just non-descript “dark knight”, while both Cleo and Azul looked like the azure rainbow fairy from _Barbie: Fairytopia_ (Azura) in my head. I’ve never read the book, I don’t intend to, and two characters looking the same except they’re sometimes a little greyer than each other is infinitely funnier to me. Edit: I also thought Oro’s name was spelt Auro until I finally got a glimpse of it in the video. Can you tell I don’t speak Spanish?

[@cjboiss5779]

I'm not the only one who wanted to tear their hair out every time Aster started listing stuff about the realms, right? "The Sunbutts had X, the Moonlips had Y, the Borlings had Z." Infuriating.

[@alexwyatt2911]

I need to go to sleep because I lost it at “sunbutts.” Just glowing cheeks. No, not those cheeks. _Those_ cheeks. Holy shit. I just saw moonlips. Full lips. Wax lips. Okay, I seriously have to sleep

[@mrcephalopod]

​@@alexwyatt2911 "sunbutts". Those for whom 'the sun shines out of their arse' isn't just a turn of phrase

[@lunab541]

You don't see GRRM going "A trout for the Tully, a giant wolf for the Stark, a lion for the Lannister..." It's exausting. And she keeps adding things, like the blood, to hammer home each realm's element. It's not even creative, it's exactly as one would expect. The characters feel like the fairies from that Barbie movie about a magic rainbow

[@ibeamy]

Sunbutts made me pee myself

[@noranizaazmi6523]

The sol-arse system

[@lancemaxwell8464]

This book is so densely packed with information and lore that it feels like Aster accidentally published a fandom wikia instead of a book

[@ps1hagridoufofcharacter]

fr. its overthinking and underwriting but also _underthinking_ and _overwriting_ at the same time. reminds me of the """fantasy novel""" i was writing when i was younger. got so tangled up in the lore and drawing maps nobody would ever see i didn't write more than like 60 pages in the _six years_ i actively tried to work on it, and i never even figured out a plot to write! it was all worldbuilding and creating characters who then did nothing! how stupid is that? i mean, what's the point in creating a universe that you don't tell stories in? how is it interesting to hear about a stagnant, intricate-on-the-surface world where _nothing_ is happening and the "main character" is so bland they're barely even flour needed to make the proverbial white bread??? you're not writing a textbook, or a brochure, you're writing a goddamn novel! the story should be the main focus, the rest is set dressing

[@__a_4444]

@@ps1hagridoufofcharacter It's not stupid if you're having fun worldbuilding I suppose :)

[@ps1hagridoufofcharacter]

@@__a_4444 that's true! it _can_ be very fun in itself, it just probably won't spawn the novel i set out for haha

[@JeanPaulBeaubier]

@@ps1hagridoufofcharacter SAME... listening to the plot of this book was giving me flashbacks to the bloated novel i tried to write for most of my teenage years.

[@Hello-hello-hello456]

​@@__a_4444 It's stupid if your main intention is to write a story. If you only intend to worldbuild, then ofc that's fine

[@TheAdarkerglow]

Krimson single-handedly keeping Post-It and Staples in business.

[@rizkyanandita8227]

Nah they would be fine. You will be surprised on how much it is still used.

[@davidmauriciogutierrezespi5244]

Krimson and poorly written books Imagine Krimson getting a t-shirt from Post-It and Dtapples for his million purchase

[@TheAdarkerglow]

@@rizkyanandita8227 Really? I've been to every staples in the world and they all said the post-its were sold out because of him. Maybe it was just after he'd seen booktok.

[@mafaldaviana9060]

Isla could have been soooo interesting if she was affected by the curse. It would be so refreshing to see a monstrous protagonist in YA. I wish everyone was a little stranger and more unnerving. The vibes would be so great. And the "killing the people you love" thing could have brought such tension to the romance! And the "eating human hearts" thing could have been a way to say that, even though she does something many would consider horrifying and disgusting, that she's still just a person affected by the poor circumstance of the curse, and would make us root for her to break it. Instead, having her be the only one not affected by the curse makes her the peak of "I'm not like other girls".

[@Chaoticchaos732]

You’d love the book I’m writing then lol. All my females (ew hate how I said that) literally have a “curse” (I’m not specifying cause I wanna get it published and have it be a surprise but they’re nasty) and yes my mc does have good traits but all of my characters are some sort of wretched and it just makes my story ten times better.

[@doriandawes]

"Aurora was so pissed off she damned everyone in the world" honestly, best character in the book from that description. we stan a petty queen. iconic behavior.

[@inkchip7351]

Right?! These people suck Aurora ftw!!!!

[@glumbortango7182]

**from that description**

[@raineatscheese]

Don’t be fooled, she’s an unlikeable character like everybody else from that godforsaken book

[@gabeclement1131]

As a hobby writer myself, I think of writing as the study of everything. There's a saying "Don't make characters who are smarter than you", which I think is just off base; It should be "Don't make a character who knows more than you." You can make a character smarter than you, by just having them put the pieces of a problem together faster than you would have done it. If you make a character that knows more than you, you have to make stuff up, and you run the risk that whatever you make up will actually be stupid. When writing a character, who was a heart surgeon, I read a bunch of medical text books, so that I could make sure that he knew what he was talking about, and knew what he was doing, whenever he did something related to his job. I still remember some stuff from reading about a double by-pass surgery, though only enough to know how to kill the patient faster.

[@raineatscheese]

This 🙌

[@ariannay766]

YESSS as long as you know what pieces your character is putting together, even if you wouldn't put them together fast or at all, then you're good. If it's sound logic and you know what you're working on. I was writing a fic where a character figured out that she was dead and was kind of a clone situation in about ten seconds flat after gaining consciousness, and could I do something like that? eff no, but she did have the information required to figure it out, and was a really smart character so I let her.

[@Democratsknowbidensucks]

The only thing preventing you from writing a book like this is having extremely rich parents.

[@krussyarts]

People actually say that???? Nah.. How boring would death note have been if the characters weren't smarter than the writers I'm-

[@JaynaeMarieXIV]

This author is in no fear of writing a character smarter than herself, if that is even possible.

[@clockwork_mind]

2:27:00 this honestly reads to me like she loved that scene from Hunger Games where all the contestants display their unique abilities before a bunch of judges so they can get a score, and Katniss shoots the apple from the roasted pig's mouth. It's like she loved that scene so much that she thought up the moment with the throwing star and king's crown, then worked backward from there to create the rest of the scene to justify it, never realizing that it makes no sense in context. The whole scene only makes sense when you as a repeat-reader (or author) already know that it's just a framing device for that single throwing star moment.

[@birdjericho]

So let me get this straight... the first page of this story STARTS with a protagonist with a questionably-unpronouncable name (unpronouncable because not even the book keeps it straight) using an item of unlimited magical teleportation with few restrictions on range and for no cost? And you're telling me this thing WON'T be solving all the problems? **checks timestamp** There's still SEVEN HOURS of review to look forward to?! **straps self into cockpit** My body and soul are ready.

[@gracekim1998]

*Irish names exist* (I had to say it because the top comment said unpronounceable 🤣 it was a reflex cuz I’ve Very used to people getting my name wrong. It’s why I’m called Grace online…also I couldn’t resist)

[@birdjericho]

It's true, they do, but when the reader doesn't know how to pronounce Cú Chulainn or Siobhán (especially if some of the characters in the book don't either), you end up with what I like to call Hermione Syndrome: you can't tell me you knew how to pronounce that name when you read it the first time unless you knew someone with the name before reading it. And it was frustrating to me that everyone in the book knew how to pronounce it when I didn't. I felt I'd missed the explanation, even though there wasn't one. It's just odd that even the name "Isla" is complicated for this particular book. It's like Aang's name (reading it without knowing how it's said in the cartoon, is it Ah-ng or Ay-ng?) Or is it said with a certain accent, like the name Hermes (reading it without knowing how it's said, is it Ehr-mez or Her-Meeze?) Gotta make it clear. It helps for authors to say their characters' names out loud themselves, IMHO. Soon and often.

[@fiery_scream]

@@gracekim1998 You're giving Aster too much credit by assuming she understands name conventions.

[@abookishmess]

😂😂 this is hilarious and accurate to what we all felt. It's giving the eagles from LOR

[@stitchgroover]

@@birdjericho Aah, good old Hermyown. As an Aussie though, the name Isla is quite familar thanks to the actress Isla Fisher (aka Mrs Sasha Baron Cohan) As for Hermes, in my mind the designer bags are "Er-mez", the Futurama character is "Her-meez"

[@gabrieljankowski9159]

I’d like to hear this story from Azul’s perspective, lol. Mostly clueless, figures out a twist, but forgets to tell everyone about it. Generally just hanging around wondering where the other rulers are.

[@aaalex1311]

and pinning after his lost lover ofc

[@tumbleweedfish]

Just a sad gay dude fumbling around

[@GalaxyStarLily]

Damn he jus like me fr fr

[@TreeDwellingShrimp]

The 'death tournament' is more of a talent show for rulers than anything else.

[@DrZuluGaming]

Yeah, this wasn't exactly Squid Game, the Hunger Games, or even the Tournament of Power. And the Tournament of Power ends with all the universes restored.

[@alyssamay9237]

Yeah, it's like if Hunger Games had the tournament just as the opening ceremony, interviews, and training scores. No arena, no fighting, just the set up with no pay off

[@bleakautomaton4808]

Gotta have that tournament arc in your anime - I mean book. Anyone else get odd 'weeb' vibes from Lightlark characters? (I mean the author being kinda 'weeb')

[@eldritchabomination9726]

New title: LightLark's Got Talent

[@DamienLavizzo]

I love how the comments have come together and literally written a better book than the one being reviewed.

[@ComedyPlastic]

And they'll do it again 😎

[@randyzochoa6358]

Concerning the rags to riches story she touts, it has to be stated that her parents own one of the biggest and most successful car dealerships in the country and both she and her sister grew up being in their commercials. The loan you mention her sister got to start Newsette came from her parents. Alex received a similar loan herself. There’s also the fact she treats this book as her debut when this is her third trad pub book.

[@darkiepoo8949]

its not rags to riches at all. but she did become famous on tiktok by her own savvy. and that's what made her successful. her first two books were only picked up because of the "latinx" fantasy angle. it was a diversity publish. it went nowhere. the author smartly pivoted away from that.

[@dannylamb456]

Of COURSE it was some upper class type claiming to be "rags to riches". The fact that this video keeps getting weird comments from a barebones blank channel seemingly humblebragging and supporting the author's decisions also makes one activate the almonds on just how massive of an ego is involved here.

[@noneofurbulllllll]

all that money and they never thought to get some creative writing classes 😭

[@laughingseagull000]

@@noneofurbulllllll I think it may also be a case of not reading enough novels herself. To be a good writer, you have to be a good reader.

[@treceslez]

What I would've liked this book to be: 1. The MC was the starling ruler instead. It'd give her a more personal motivation, because if she doesn't break the curse during the centenial then she is going to die, since the centenial only happens once every 100 years. The MC could still be powerless, and that would make it a "the lesser of two evils" type of choice for her: either she participates in the centenial and fights these centuries old powerful rulers or she dies when she turns 25. Which could help to give the MC more personality: why is she so afraid to die young after 500 years of that being the norm for her people, shouldn't dying young not scare her anymore? Maybe there's something she still wants to do, maybe she found something she wants to keep on living for or she has an older cousin that is like her sister and she's already 24, idk, something like that, make it personal for her instead of just being her duty as the ruler. It'd also be pretty interesting to explore a society and culture where the people in power are teenagers/young adults. 2. The Centenial has no rules. Instead of being a game, it is war. It could be that rulers don't have access to the other islands, until the centenial when portals connecting the islands appear and they can come and go as they want, and maybe only the rulers can use these portals. You can have rulers attacking this or that island, making alliances with this or that other one, but no one is safe, not even regular people. I would have liked to see the normal people preparing for the centenial, do they have any sort of tradition around it? Festivities? Or they just hide hoping a ruler doesn't directly attack their island? I also would have liked for the Centenial to be shorter, just 10 days instead of 100, and given that in this version the MC is a starling, it'd make everything feel more urgent. 2. The MC was on it with the whole memory erasing thing. It could be that the MC was the only one that could travel between islands before the centenial because she has the star stick (it makes more sense for her to have a "star stick" if she's a starling), something that no other ruler has, and since she's powerless she tries to use it as her advantage, spying on the other rulers to find out what their plans for the centenial are or something like that, then she meets Grim, they fall in love (maybe that's why she doesn't want to die so young, she found love and she wants to keep it), and together they come up with this plan to save her from her fated death or something dramatic like that. The plan could still be that she needs to seduce Oro, but she asks Grim to erase her memories of him (but still remember the plan) because she doesn't think she can pull the act off with him around, since she loves him that much blah blah, and Grim, because he loves her as much and wants her to live, agrees to it. And she doesn't need to be a seductress or whatever, she has the star stick and she spied on all the rulers, so she knows what Oro likes and dislikes, and she'll use that to manipulate Oro into liking her, or that's the plan. This would give the MC some agency and personality, and it would also make Grim a more interesting character, even a bit tragic, because he did what he did to save the girl he loves, and now he has to watch as said girl falls in love with another man because she doesn't remember him, but he can't do anything about it because her life is on the line. With this you can also have the "plot twist", because we start the book with the MC without memories so the reader doesn't know what's going on yet, and the plot twist would be even more of a shock to the MC this way because she'll find out it was her idea all along, have her be the villain of her own story without she even realizing it until the very end. Add some inner turmoil there, some conflict. 3. The wildlings don't exist. Wildlings don't make sense, just take them out of the story. Also this way you can only have celestial/cosmic magic: sun, moon, stars, night and day, and all of that related to the space/cosmos. 4. Have a different origin for the curses. I don't like that the curses are the personal vendetta of a girl with a grudge. Have it be a punishment from the heavens or the cosmic gods because 500 years ago the rulers tried some forbidden magic or something like that, as cliche as that sounds it makes more sense. I think this would make a more cohesive story. Give the MC one single clear goal: to seduce Oro so she can live longer (and save her people ofc). She's powerless, she can't try to kill the other rulers, but she can use her wits to make Oro fall in love with her, that way she will live longer and will save her people, and she only has 10 days to do it all. Keep it nice and simple. And well, this was a long comment for a long video hehe.

[@bettyunicorn6132]

That’s amazing

[@elvingearmasterirma7241]

Congrats. You understand streamlined plots better than Alex Id read that story any day

[@aug1014]

Making her a starling would totally fix her lack of real personal motivation. Love that

[@Duhgel]

Good job son, here's a cookie/honest

[@TravisBroski]

Dude it's reading stuff like this that makes me REALLY wish I could take the time to rewrite this (or someone else does) cause this would be SUCH a better story in comparison with the jumbled mess we got.

[@TheSlurpy11]

One of my many throw-the-book-across-the-room moments with this book was Oro's flair being that people cannot lie to him, and yet Celeste/Aurora, a walking, talking, living lie, exists.

[@mrcephalopod]

Oh god, I didn't even think about that one. The Starling ruler lies about her name, age, and personal interests at EVERY centennial and he just... shrugs and accepts it?

[@CommanderViviax]

That is a big plothole. Maybe her Shapeshifting Flair means she seems like the person she's imitating. She appears to most to be who she says. It creates a false layer in her mind. So anyone looking in her mind sees the lie.

[@TheSlurpy11]

@@CommanderViviax good point, but it's not the readers' job to theorise an authorial plot hole 🥲 Aster just didn't think anything through because she doesn't care

[@CommanderViviax]

@@TheSlurpy11 She did that a lot. It sounds like it is rarely thoroughly thought out, that book. She absolutely should have put why he didn't know. It's a book. Not a game, etc. A game or something like The Backrooms, SCP, RPC, etc. That is supposed to be theorised over. Because game developers are focused on the game itself. You can have mysteries. But they're also supposed to make sense and not have plotholes, too. Books are supposed to have answers in the book itself. That book is swiss cheese.

[@zoeb3573]

I didn't even think about that. People can't lie to him, except the main villain, who has been lying to him for centuries. Makes sense.

[@cursedcontent4207]

Back again to throw hands about how the author deliberately picked a name that is commonly pronounced as is (Eye-la) says "I pronounce it differently" (eyes-la) and then has the audacity to say "I didnt expect so many people to get it wrong."

[@truecassowary8320]

Seriously, I frequently had taekwondo classes with a girl of the former pronunciation. When Aster was ragging on the “wrong” people I was well and truly flabbergasted

[@ariannay766]

It'd actually be funny to watch Aurora, aware of Oro's flair, try to avoid triggering his lie sense. All the phrasings that are misleading but technically true. All the "they call me celeste" rather than "i'm Celeste"

[@Omnicrom]

That would actually be an example of good writing, so it isn't here.

[@mothtransman]

maybe this is why she doesnt write dialogue or anything about the other rulers lol

[@breadguyyy]

this is like 90% of Aes Sedai dialogue in Wheel of Time

[@sverizona]

Re: the dressmaking scene. I'm a dressmaker and there is a precedent for draping the clothing directly on the person who will wear it. However, it is of course done with a lot of care and there are still trial-and-error steps where you take the fabric off, assemble it, test the fit again, and so forth. Making a dress (especially a fitted one like Isla's) is a complex endeavor. If the Starling magic is purely about telekinesis, there's no way a regular human being could keep track of all of those components simultaneously, especially without accidentally stabbing the client with needles. But then, having the magic handle all of that could also explain how a society of only young people can manage the expertise necessary to have master tailors. Remember, this dude also can't be older than 25. You can find a few master tailors or dressmakers at that age, but they are rare, and they're not going to get there without plenty of older masters to learn from. As for a technical quibble, she mentions that the dress has a built-in corset, but it's also implied to be made of nothing but fabric and ribbon. Corsets by definition are a structured bodice that use a strong, inflexible layer of fabric (the satiny stuff mentioned does not qualify) supported by boning (flexible steel is the common modern choice for boning). It's *possible* that the boning and strength fabric just wasn't mentioned, but given the amount of detail given to the rest of the garment, it seems a large oversight to me. But my secondary specialty is corsetry, so I'm inclined to pay attention to those details.

[@sverizona]

As I'm continuing, the commentary on Starling's "unparalleled metalwork" is also a huge problem when they can't live past 25. The early death curse is terrifying on a personal level, but the story could have so much potential by exploring how it upends the civilization that endures it. So many traditions lost, a society that once created great things but now barely gets by. Think of how the Lord of the Rings contrasts recent crafts with high Numenorean skill, but even more intense. That's what Starling craft should be like.

[@KaliqueClawthorne]

I mean there are corsets that are structured through cords. But they wouldn't have been very ... aesthetic. Corded corsets were definitely only underwear because the cords were very near to each other.

[@chelsey8737]

Oooh I love when experts come to pick apart bad descriptions and explain the actual process. Thanks!

[@frog.theorist]

Convinced that the author has never seen any sort of blade before. She cuts vegetables with a sharpened spork. Possibly, she's never seen metal before, either.

[@raineatscheese]

This comment is golden

[@totallynameless8861]

​@@raineatscheeseAster: "This comment is what?"

[@farkasmactavish]

"Where darkness meets light" is clearly Isla as Oro and Grim plow her at the same time.

[@arkkon2740]

Im not fearful of the love triangle of book 2 becoming a weird polygamy plot

[@lighthouse6543]

I would write this smut

[@grape-rr3ik]

it’s not a place or a time but…. a person 😨

[@TheTrueKarin]

@@lighthouse6543I am always for encouraging young writers but …. But I honestly think this world is not ready for that fanfiction genre. I am we were not even ready for Lightlark so a story were Isla and those two will probably destroy the internet😂

[@Dalek59862]

Why did you say something when you could have said literally nothing. That thought needs to be locked away for the safety of man, should any of its many limbs reach out into the universe they will usher in many dark eons, locking the universe in its slimy grasp forevermore.

[@12makbe]

I was one of the ARC readers that she blocked. All I did was ask her why she was telling people who read our reviews that the scenes she promised would be in the final when they weren't in the ARC. Yes, sometimes there are changes between the ARC and final, but the sheer amount of things that were missing would require a damn rewrite to be fit in. She blocked almost all of us and then gaslit everyone to say that our reviews were fake. I honestly encourage ppl to look at the early goodreads reviews bc you can tell, it's legit. We were writing PARAGRAPHS about what was wrong in the book. She went as so far to claim as that it was IMPOSSIBLE for there to be this many ARCs out despite the fact they gave away 100 physical copies at a BookCon, Netgalley was set to auto approve anyone who requested the audio book, and every barnes and noble employee had access to the e-reader edition and most stores were sent a final copy of the book early.(and this isn't touching her sending her editor after us but that's a whole other thing)

[@HaliaStone]

Oh shit, really? I don’t get people that can’t take criticism taking the traditionally published route, since that requires feedback. She should’ve just self published if she couldn’t take the criticism and suggestions.

[@Gchildwarrior]

Wow. That is awful of her to do that to ya'll. I'm an aspiring writer on Wattpad and I appreciate it when a reader points out something I missed. One pointed out a plot hole and I addressed it with edits to fix it after thanking them

[@marymccann3500]

God that sucks. I'm sorry she did that to you.

[@farkasmactavish]

@@HaliaStone Clinical narcissism.

[@chiefpurrfect8389]

@@HaliaStone Tbh even if she was self-published she wouldn't have an excuse for this behavior. Self-publishing is not the shield from criticism some authors think it is. The moment you publish something anyone can say anything about it and there's nothing you can do to stop it- ESPECIALLY if you charged them money in exchange for access to your writing, they have every right to hold your work to certain standards (regardless of whether you felt comfortable having critique partners or not) and leave a review of their experience as they would with any other paid product so idk why some authors expect/demand to be coddled by the people they sell to so much. If you are *that* uncomfortable with receiving criticism, then simply. don't. publish. Even if your book is ready, you are clearly not and that's at least half the equation. Another case study of an author who thinks that being self-published means people don't have the right to criticize her work is Piper C.J. with how she handled "The Night and Its Moon" (y'know, aside from it blatantly being a yassified Witcher fanfic). Tl;dr policing the way people talk about your book and attacking reviewers will not make you any friends in this community.

[@irisaferg2524]

Fun idea for a better direction the weird training isla's tutors gave her could've taken: isla could repeatedly assume she will do good in challenges, each time remembering a certain extreme/dangerous situation her guardians put her in. However, despite this, she never actually has the edge she thinks she would have, with her either getting mediocre results or failing miserably due to her overconfidence and lack of proper preparation. As she gradually gets closer to the other rulers, maybe she casually mentions her backstory to some of them. They are all appalled by her descriptions, and basically break it to isla that no, she wasn't being trained, she was basically just being tortured and abused by the only figures of authority and guidance she had in her life. Not only would it explain the plot hole of how bad isla's "training" is as an in universe thing, it could also provide her with a proper character arc, that being realizing that being raised to be little more than a tool whose only self worth lies in how resilient and useful she can be was unhealthy and she deserves better treatment from the people around her. It could even potentially provide a reason for isla naively latching on to so many people who are obviously manipulative or suspicious (namely grim and the star chick); due to her never having recieved positive attention from anyone else in her life and therefore being blinded by the affection they give her.

[@TitaniumShortcake]

I love this. It would definitely make for a much more compelling and relatable protagonist than the snarky "not like other girls" badass that's becoming such a terrible archetype lately.

[@honeybea4845]

that would also mesh well with the fact that her guardians essentially groomed her and their "plan" was for this 20something-year-old girl to seduce a man well into his 500s

[@a_newcomer9403]

I agree! however i don't see how celeste is suspicious or manipulative ( i haven't finished it so maybe that's part of it)

[@mrcephalopod]

That makes so much more sense. Makes the adult characters actually seem like mature adults too

[@pikapower_kirby]

This would've been so good! And then instead of her being thrown into a love triangle, the older rulers could give her support and guidance from a platonic or even parental sense. I'd ask why Aster didn't do this, but then there'd be no romance in her YA book (which is clearly so important/s) so I suppose I answered my own question...

[@jodilackie2097]

At this point, I’m convinced Aster saw Divergent and really liked the scene with all the kids pouring their blood into different bowls of stuff: rocks, coal, water etc. and figured she would use something like that in her book. And then forgot about the elemental blood when it was inconvenient for the plot.

[@robinvannoortwijk631]

I thought the exact same thing when the fear mirror came up, an aspect that was also very prominent in Divergent!

[@cringusmoss9937]

According to a study the human heart contains roughly 650 calories. According to the math each adult actually does need to eat three human hearts to reach their daily caloric needs. The requirement is *literally* three square hearts a day.

[@alqualonde2998]

Tbh that's the worst kind of critique. Cinema sins vibe. This is a magic world not our plain physical world. Human hearts sustain them because they are required to eat it because of magic, not because they need nutrients.

[@cringusmoss9937]

@@alqualonde2998 Critique?

[@Dr.Starbound]

@alqualonde2998 I would normally agree that this is a nitpick if the author even bothered to explain this. Maybe they do need 3 hearts a day, maybe one a week? We don't know which it is because she never tells us, and the fact that calorically it matches up to the joke is a hilarious coincidence, a coincidence because I refuse to believe the author put even that much thought into this

[@Dalek59862]

​@@alqualonde2998 seemed less like a critique and more like the joke coincidentally lining up with reality.

[@honestkyn718]

​@@alqualonde2998even so that still means you need to be able to support it. Where do they get the hearts?

[@hannahhannah7002]

Lightlark feels like youre playing "rock paper scissors" and your opponent pulls out gun. Everything Aster tells us she just throws away arbitrarily. The heart is connected to a plant! Nevermind its a bird. The heart is in a Place! Nevermind its a time. Its angering and frustrating

[@benwamboldt4418]

Are we all going to ignore the fact Krimson saw a man die, and not just that, but that man was underwater for 10 minutes and they managed to revive him????

[@StarWarsomania]

If the water is cold, revival can be possible after a surprisingly long time. Some woman fell through a frozen creek, and they revived her after like an hour? Something crazy like that.

[@ibeamy]

we all just collectively committed to the cringe more.

[@laurannatraverso]

I absolutely hate how the wildlings are written in this, it all just feels like wish fulfillment to make Isla the most prettiest perfectist girl on the island. The should be wild and terrifying to everyone else. Yeah, nature is beautiful, but it is also harsh and unforgiving. Part of their curse actively requires the suffering of others! Make them scary and brutal, willing to do whatever it takes to survive. That could help with Isla's insane amount of skills and martial prowess, she's grown up in a society that's built on being strong. Make them have morally questionable ways of getting their food. Maybe they trade agricultural goods for the hearts of the undesirables of the other islands, or perhaps they hunt their prey by any means possible. Maybe take some inspiration from something like the Bosmer from Elder Scrolls where no part of a dead body goes to waste, because there's no reason a society who survives off of cannabilism should be that put off by skin gloves. Dark, I know, but goddamnit if you're going to write a series where a whole group of people can only survive by eating human hearts, it's gonna get dark if you think about it for more than two seconds. Also, just imagine how much more interesting it would be to have Isla starting off not only being one of the youngest rulers on the island, but also have to contend with the inherent prejudice against her people. She's physically dangerous because her people are natural hunters, but she's challenged by needing to ensure that the others feel safe enough to not want to kill her people immediately. Also it would make the Wildling healing elixir stand out that much more. Showing that her people are much more than the monsters others assume they are. I get that Aster wanted the whole "dryad/nymph" thing with the seduction and manipulation stuff, but it feels so surface level. She's a YA protagonist. Just make her real pretty, no one's gonna bat an eye, but you can do so much more and Aster just refuses to do anything with her set up.

[@eems4565]

yall r better writers than miss aster honestly

[@morgannolan3183]

My personal theory is isla is asters self insert. The two of them look incredibly similar to one another, and I wouldn’t put it past her to want to do so.

[@piffba]

God now I want a book where the woman love interest is a straight up dangerous and intimidating person😭😭 like it’d be so fun to have a woman who is kinda unhinged and craves blood, but is adjusted enough to know she can’t behave like that at all hours of the day and tries her best to mask it.

[@soroshiazuma1332]

@@piffba not a book but that is quite literally himiko toga from bnha lmao and her inability to behave that way reflects the unfair societal prejudice against on her and bnha kinda sucks but toga in particular is pretty well written

[@generalgrievous2202]

@@HappyBirddi idk how it would be problematic, it just means Aster couldnt think beyond those distorted mirror things they have at circuses

[@vibesvibeman6722]

While there are many, many, many problems with the magic system in Lightlark, the one that strikes me as the most frustrating is the Wildling curse. The heart-eating aspect is dead in the water and only relevant for shock value and the Wildlings reputation, while the need to kill someone they love comes across as a contrived obstacle for the love triangle. Since the connection to animals is never utilized, I think it would've been much stronger for the Wildling curse to be that their presence drives animals into a violent frenzy. Although the civilization of Lightlark is very poorly fleshed out, it seems likely that they would be dependent on animal power for agriculture, transport, etc. Magic can't replace everything. In this way, giving the Wildlings a curse that makes them incompatible with wildlife could simplify the story without changing much. They could still be outcast and hated for disrupting the flow of every day life every time they get too close to work animals. It could explain their harsh training, which would be necessary to defend themselves against wild animals. Or you could go the other direction, creating a cultural belief that wildlings are too delicate to defend themselves. This could also add depth to the Wildling emphasis on natural beauty, functionally objectifying themselves as an attempt to prove some sense of worth. While I don't understand or like Oro, his motivation to protect Isla from beasts on the island can remain mostly unchanged. It's pretty stupid that Isla's exempt from the blessing and curse, but even if you wanted to leave that in with these changes, why not make her an animal lover? It appeals to the audience, but it provides opportunities to create conflict between Isla's personal desires and the secrets she needs to uphold. For example, you could set up a scene where a stray animal approaches her with interest, but she has to shoo it away before someone realizes it's being friendly instead of violent. Doubt anyone will read this but it's fun to talk (or type) these things through. Aster's complete disinterest in internal logic is simultaneously painful and my new favorite playground. Who knows, maybe I'll go off the deep end and try to write LarkLight, where I just try to fix everything I hate.

[@JuniBeeReads]

Finished the audiobook today after watching this video and honestly the entire thing is meh. I would have been pissed about the so called twist if I hadn’t known but honestly? It’s an average book, clearly written when she was younger without ever going through the proper editing channels or accepting any kind of criticism for it. I know that, because I have a shitty novel written from when I was in Sophomore year of high school that will never see the light of day because I was self aware and self critical enough to realize that it wasn’t good. That no amount of rewriting could fix the problems. So I plucked the characters I loved and put them in different settings with new characters to see how they react. Currently, I’m nearly 50k into this novel and loving it.

[@vibesvibeman6722]

⁠​⁠​⁠@@JuniBeeReads That's the same way I like to go about making characters and stories. I'm a comic book artist but I have all of my old sketchbooks dating back to freshman year of high school, and its kind of cool to see how some old characters got redesigned and changed into what they are now. I always have a good time dissecting bad media and why it fails at its goals, but when the issues overlap like lightlark it definitely loses its appeal. Anyway, good luck on your novel! It's always a good sign when an author (or any artist) has enough self awareness to reflect on problems in their own work 👍

[@itsgonnaBmay]

I read it- and I think you make some really good points 😄

[@Queen_Cnidarian]

I recommend doing it as a writting exercise. I did it once for a movie I watched and hated, and it helped me improve my writing style.

[@RotaAbyssian]

​@@vibesvibeman6722I do this as well, to an extent. I am an aspiring writer and Tabletop Role-playing NERD, so there have been many character concepts I've come up with before I knew how horrifically bad they were. However, I've kept most of them around and tuned them over time, so that they are much more rounded than the flat Mary-Sues they once were. Even characters I've based loosely on myself (my username being my longest running persona) I have tuned to be flawed people to help prevent that type of flippant criticism.

[@matthewmcafee2957]

2:27:30 "Isla's power is to blindfold herself and throw a ninja star at the king!" I think I understand why its taken Multiple centuries to try and break their curses.

[@jessicagarcia2297]

Don’t you know Krimson? The curse of the Wildlings is essentially every cliche: “Oh, my dear lover, we can’t be together, for you see, I am a Monster!” It’s essentially Bella and Edward but the concept reversed.

[@elvingearmasterirma7241]

Thanks I hate it

[@eldritchabomination9726]

It's that one gender swapped Twilight book Meyers wrote all over again

[@deen7530]

Are all of the Wildlings women? They seem to imply that.

[@leahdavis9434]

​@@deen7530 they're not all women, but the curse makes them kill the men. Praying mantis style thing

[@lauriechan1426]

Yeah...it is the 'we can't help but being hot af' cliché

[@wmstan1127]

Why couldn't Celeste just be a villian by herself? Why did it have to be Aurora? She already had the motivations, her curse really is the cruelest one, it makes sense for her to become greedy and not only break her own curse but also obtain everyone else powers, its all there and it makes sense. It also makes sense for her to know about the original offense since she loves hidden libraries so much.

[@bigbadgammagnome]

The villain reveal would've been way more impactful to have Celeste just be Celeste, too. Aurora doesn't care about Isla, but Celeste? Imagine if she actually DID care for Isla. Then, a few years after being friends, Isla reveals her secret just like in the book, that she's powerless. Now, pretending for a moment that the magic system is better defined, let's say that Celeste knows/figures out through her love of libraries, through some hidden tomes, that that means Isla must have both Nightshade and Wildling powers. Then she hatches her plan with the BondMaker. Now we can actually have a humanising moment for Celeste. She may feel a twinge of guilt but ultimately chooses to lie to, betray and even sacrifice the person closest to her, solidifying her villain status and making it easier to despise her, even as the audience can feel for her plight. Because honestly? I feel nothing for Aurora. It's all "boo boo woe is me" bring out the tiny violins, trite. But if Celeste didn't spin the curses and actually once cared for Isla? Now that I could've got behind. But then we couldn't have that *dramatic twist* now could we? ... sigh

[@rosamy2017]

this feels like the kind of book I'd find at the Scholastic Book Fair when I was 11 years old and read it front to back in 2 days and then gush about it to my parents and have them feign interest because they can tell its bullshit but don't wanna squash my love of reading

[@oliviamcnally7030]

It honestly does! Plus the fanfic you would write for yourself soon afterwards. No one wants to hurt your feelings but can never find a good way to say that both need serious work and editing to fix!

[@porcelaincrown]

Lolol so true. I miss when I was a teenager and had honestly no taste in reading. Literally anything was art back then - and I mean ANYTHING.

[@zoeb3573]

And then you'd find it covered in dust in a few years, fondly decide to re-read it again, only to be shocked by how bad it was and the fact you read those weird food feeding, almost naked swimming scenes at 11

[@TheStarsTwilight]

So a few people in the comments have already posted their takes on a better Wildling curse, but here's mine: the Wildling curse is that their direct touch causes nature to rapidly decay. This means that while they have incredible control over plants and animals, they can't interact without killing them. Most processed materials like clothes or wooden furniture is fine because despite using plant/animal materials, at that point it has been contorted and removed from its original state so much that there is no life left. How the curse applies to other humans is particularly curious - a Wildling's touch doesn't immediately kill other humans, but is still very painful and dangerous, decaying far more slowly. On the metaphorical side, this can be used to represent how humanity often places itself above, and thus away, from nature. On the in-universe side, it'd be far more cruel to have a population struggle long-term with a curse that has a glimmer of hope to be lived through but still blatantly filled with turmoil than to just quickly wipe them all out. The result of this rendition is Aster would actually get to keep the cannibalistic seductress angle. Most food still needs to be eaten fresh, while the plant/creature still has some life left in order to transfer nutrients, so this version of the Wildling's curse would likely have them still resort to eating the only meat that won't immediately decay in their mouths - other people. Still dark, but it's less of a logistics nightmare than the official curse because it's not just restricted to human hearts. The fact a Wildling's touch is still dangerous also makes the act of love-making potentially lethal, to say nothing of how much more deadly childbirth would be. Hell, heavily processed foods would also likely be fine, so Isla saying how much she loves chocolate wouldn't give away her lack of powers to boot. To say nothing of how much this would still work with, if not add to the desolate state of Wild Isle!

[@eldritchabomination9726]

That would probably affect how they dress too. Since even the lightest brush of skin could result in horrible, painful death, they'd probably end up wearing a lot of covering styles, adding salt to the wound since it seems like (based on the clothes Isla is described in) revealing fashion is what they prefer on Wild Isle

[@justasidequestnpc6396]

This is such a good idea and I'm shamelessly stealing it for my next DnD campaign.

[@lilypyrope4620]

Okay Zeref

[@thehermit8618]

I like the concept of how fast they decay something based on how removed that thing is from nature. Like say, a fresh steak could probably rot in their mouths and would end up spitting it out while they could probably muster to eat a frankwurst with minimal issues. This would color in Wildling culture twofold: 1) they would develop a highly process heavy culture wherein they try to strip what they need out of nature as much as they possibly can to stave off decay, houses made of dried bricks and petrified wood, clothing made of recycled fabrics being priced over freshly woven ones for their endurance, highly technical dishes so far removed from their ingredients you can barely taste them at all and it torments them because it keeps them away from nature. 2) they would have a borderline reverse germaphobe attitute to everything, touching things without gloves is forbidden, eating without utensils is taboo. They have to forcibly remove themselves from the world they so desperately wish to keep being a part of just so they dont kill it

[@quinnstraught9636]

@@eldritchabomination9726 I'm sorry but the sentence "it seems like [...] revealing fashion is what they prefer on Wild Isle" is fucking ICONIC.

[@CoLe31404]

My brother recovered from Cancer, and I have Autism, so your charity and "Ready Player 2" videos mean alot to me thank you. Love your content.

[@KrimsonRogue]

Big congrats on your brother kicking cancer's sorry ass, and you're welcome. I'm glad my videos mean so much to you. :D

[@marocat4749]

🥳 good the cancer is beat

[@atherisGAY]

Ayyy congratulations to your bro for kicking cancers ass!! 🎉

[@einfachpi5730]

So happy for u!!!

[@linstar9172]

"So much is said, yet so little is explained." Such a great line.

[@Ellisepha]

Another plothole that (I think) hasn't been brought up yet: Isla's ancestor lost a hand and therefore had to produce an heir lest their disability put them at a disatvantage and risks killing houndreds of people, but Oro's poor health literally caused a palace to crumble, and nobody, not even he himself thinks "hey maybe 500 years were enough, you should have kids and die my dude." ????

[@jaslikeart]

I haven't picked up the book in a while (and too lazy to do so), but if my memory serves me right, Oro kept that shit secret like the selfish coward he is. That's why it was requested for fire to never be put out, just so he could mask the fact he's literally dying.

[@nyacat39]

Here's what I think could have made this story work: Make Isla a Starling, gives her more reason to try and find a way to break her curse as she's on a time limit as opposed to the other rulers. Her powers could also not be as developed DUE to the curse on the Starlings, as they don't have enough time in their lives to master their magic to the same degree as the others of the realm, this under developed magic could then easily come off as her practically being powerless. The story would then be Isla trying to prove the Starlings worth with all her limitations. Let's add another thing to this now, the Nightshade curse, since we don't seem to see what that is along with the Skyling curse, why not have the Nighshade curse be the reason why Grim wasn't able to attend the other Centenials? Make the curse be that while Nightshades have powerful abilities, their body is slowly claimed by the darkness each time they use it? Example: Every time a Nighshade uses their magic, their body slowly becomes encased in shadows until eventually they no longer have flesh and now require light to prevent their shadowed bodies from fading away completely. This could put Grim on an equal time limit like Isla, like say about 70% of his body is encased in shadows by now, and give them a bit more chemistry as now both of them are determined to find a way to break their curses. Instead of exclusively eating hearts for the Wildling curse, make it that whenever they fall in love they are compelled to kill their lover. But! More in the sense of how some insects mate, Praying Mantis as the best example, where the female will eat the male during mating. This lowers the amount of men for Wildlings and then makes it more common for them to spread out among the other lands to find men to try and keep their numbers from dropping. Drop the Origin thing with Oro, but keep him as possibly the oldest ruler there and thus having the strongest magic. But make him more desperate to find the heart now. He's one of the last ones in his realm that remembers what it was like to live in the sun and feel it's heat before it became deadly to his people. Make him a no nonsense ruler, make him loyal to his people, make him a possible antagonist if you have to with how tired he's become of this curse, of how many Sunlings he's had to lose over the years. Or make it that it was part of his young foolishness that caused the Heart to be lost in the first place! Make him desperate to fix his mistake that only he remembers anymore. Make him feel the guilt of being one of the last rulers of that time left alive to know that it was through his fault that these curses came to be. That so many lives were lost due to the loss of the heart. Also make it that the Heart of Lightlark is the ACTUAL "Bond Breaker" and it's either find the lost heart to break all the curses. Make it that the heart was lost like 500 years ago by the previous rulers, and it caused the curses on all the people of the realm to slowly crop up until we've gotten to where they are now. They could have still had to get a prophecy to try and find a way to break all their respective curses, and it tells of two ways: 1. Return that which was lost (the heart) to it's place of origin. But for that part to work ALL the realms must work together THUS making the rulers agree to work together and be at least on peaceful terms. Or 2. To replace the heart of Lightlark, the fall of one realm must be done to forge a new power much like the old heart. Thus keeping the idea that one ruler would have to die as a way for the curses to break, and having the stakes keep raising as the years go on. After 500 years with no luck in any of the former rulers being able to find the heart within the 100 days they would have access to Lightlark itself, make it that all the realms are slowly getting more and more desperate. Thus making it actually dangerous this time around and forcing Isla to work as hard as she does for her people AND to find the lost heart as the heart is the only chance she has to save her realm then. That's all I've got, but personally this feels like it would have more actual characters to it.

[@daianarutolo3068]

I love all of your ideas ❤ They sound way way way more interesting than the actual book.

[@thethmooteresa]

Such brilliant ideas 👍👍

[@Hello-hello-hello456]

Really good ideas! This would make a compelling book worth reading.

[@coffee-things]

Fantastic ideas i love them all I would cry if I could read a version of Oro like you described

[@OlDirtySam]

My idea would have been to make this story work: burn it and write a new one, but yours could also work. 😜

[@marynoble9464]

Okay the blood thing could have been dope, imagine Celeste in a dire situation and homegirl slits open her palm to shoot sparks at an assailant. Imagine oro cutting his arm and training blood through an area to burn it. Cleo's bloody hand freezing someone's skin, Azul using a sphere of suspended blood like a projectile, grim using black blood as camo. So many awesome, dire, moments completely missed 😢

[@Murmarine]

That would need a certain level of creativity the author probably does not possess.

[@forgodsshake5387]

It has been a long time, but if you can stomache young adult, that is literally the red queen series! (sorry, fucked up the name in the og comment)

[@wiener_process]

It could be easily expanded into an entire blood based magic system of basically arbitrary complexity. I mean, a tournament between cursed wizard lords who use their various kinds of enchanted blood to murder each other sounds like an amazing premise. And the whole thing with the main character lacking magic powers and just relying on their skill and wits could make it even better.

[@MasterCookies]

Imagine hurting the tips of your fingers to improve your hand to hand combat or shake blood droplets at the opponents. Damn that sounds cool.

[@ShadowWolfRising]

This sounds like Deadman Wonderland.

[@spacecat_scribbles]

It's so obvious that Lightlark is something Aster wrote as a teenager. The lazy nomenclature, the color coding, and the surface-level culture building all feel uncomfortably similar to the kind of worldbuilding I (and probably many others) did as an 10-12-year-old. I mean, props to her for actually finishing a novel, but it probably should have been left as a practice book and never published. Also I'm definitely going to read your book when it comes out, Krim!! The way you've described it sounds interesting, and I'm a sucker for super well researched worldbuilding

[@Nevernamed]

I designed a world about this shallow and contrived when I was 16- there's a reason I never did anything with it.

[@crypticcryptid4702]

I wrote something similar when I was about 14. All of my 14 year old friends thought it was great. Six years later I can barely make it through a page.

[@lancemaxwell8464]

Ive loved creating short stories and worlds since i was little, and this feels like something i would've created when i was 12 and edited when i was 13

[@jans.g6033]

When I actually had the time and effort to write down my ideas when I was younger, most of them were a mishmash of tropes I liked just because it looked cool. Feels like that's what she did with this book too.

[@definitelyadarkangel9225]

What if I told you this was her fifth novel

[@BlueSpiritFire1]

You know, a story like Lightlark would actually make for a hilarious isekai or reincarnation story. You have the big bad who lays out all the plot twists meant to shake the main character, but the protag is like 'That doesn't make any sense according to the rules of this world' and ends up unravelling the whole plot.

[@YDV669]

One Isekai story at least has the gall to outright justify summoning heroes to the world because the Demon King has 100% unassailable unbeatable plot armour which can only be defeated by summons who are given powers outside of the world's internal logic. The MC of the story isn't even the Hero(who had previously been summoned to the world and are still active), but just some rando from Earth whom the Goddess of Reincarnation is using as a hotel room to take vacations from her duties.

[@geralfol117]

​@@YDV669you just described the plot of most isekais

[@WalkInMyPawsteps]

This is actually similar to the plot of Scum Villain's Self Saving System! It's very funny, the main character gets isekai'd into a book he HATES and is forced into the body of the villain that dies horribly, so much of the story is him making fun of everything around him while also desperately trying to change the plot so he wont die at the end. It's also a gay romance and parodies both straight harem series and infamous gay tropes. Highly recommend!

[@Tamaki742]

@@WalkInMyPawsteps Then meets the author who also got isekaid lol And has his own romance

[@xiexielian]

​@@WalkInMyPawsteps I really love MXTX novels this SSVS is awesome, funny. Very creative way to write.

[@nekoettechan5433]

i am devastated to discover that no one has written any oro/grim fic yet, they've got it all, really, light and dark contrast, actually being similar ages, working well as foils and parallels in a story. yet no one has made them kiss yet. upsetting.

[@amonrawya3064]

That is genuinely shocking to me. Not one fic? POIROT has fanfiction!

[@deen7530]

I think it would be great if Grim was also there to seduce Oro and was way better at it than Isla

[@internetdragon7624]

I'm on it

[@PriyaPans]

@@amonrawya3064 wait poirot?! Please tell me all. I grew up watching Agatha Christie adaptions and have ended up a mystery loving perpetual 80 year old.

[@amonrawya3064]

@@PriyaPans That's great! I watched the show with my Dad (took a while, haha). But, unfortunately, I'm not sure it's the type of fanfiction you'd enjoy. I could be wrong, I just don't want any memories to be tainted 😅

[@thewholekitandkaboodle7569]

I feel like the Starlings would have to raise their children communally in large groups just by pure necessity. Edit: And that they wouldn’t really be able to have childhoods, since 12 is middle aged. Like, as a culture not having space for children to be childish. That’s actually a really interesting idea to worldbuild around! Shame that it doesn’t seem we’re going to see any fun things like that

[@dagda1180]

Reminds me of the middle ages and how in the early times children were just seen as young adults.

[@StarWarsomania]

Sort of like Kes’ people in Star Trek Voyager. They only lived to be seven years old. Kes appears to be a young woman but in reality she only just had her first birthday. If I recall correctly, they usually had kids by two or three, then a few years of something resembling a “career” before they entered old age and died.

[@thetimmon]

that's basically how it was in the past, you were only a "child" for like, 10-11 years, and after that you're just treated like a mini-adult and expected to know what you're doing. granted, DUE to the times back then, you typically did know what you were doing, because instead of so much of your time going to schoolwork that you'll never use outside of school, you were busy helping your dad from basically the point you can walk with whatever job he had, that you would take over when he croaked, and that's what you'd do for the rest of your life until you die (and raise your own son to do the same thing) on top of presumably communal parenthood, there'd also be the practical need for, well, a continual need to survive as a species, which would probably lead to rigid gender norms where females are basically treated as baby factories, and males do pretty much all the hunting/farming/etc for the village's food source

[@zoeb3573]

It would most likely also mean that they would have more strict gender roles: girls would be required to have as many kids as they can from as early as they can without it killing them (even if you're desperate for kids, risking your 12 years old girls immediately dying in childbirth isn't worth it when they could have had eight babies between 16-25). They would probably have arranged marriages since there's no time to date and look for "the one", and everyone would learn practical skills from early on: you'd have 12 years old kids already working the forge, being taught by their older brother, because their father is already long dead. It'd be interesting to see a Starling and a Wildling interact considering one doesn't have time to develop healthy relationships before everyone they cherish dies, and even less find romantic love, while the other runs from the idea of love so they don't have to murder their loved one. You could write a decent story just about that.

[@daughterofyith5393]

That's actually explored a bit in an episode of Stargate: Atlantis.

[@QuiteSpiffing]

Avatar The Last Airbender did colourschemes for the different nations very well. Fire nation wore reds, but with predominant black, grey, browns and sometimes Gold trims. Earth Kingdom wore greens, but also a lot of brown, grey and mint green too. Air nomads wore simple two-tone robes of light and dark orange, but still managed to look interesting with a sky-blue arrow tattoos over their bodies. Water tribe wore furs with blue overtones, but a lot of brown details in their leather. Using single tones to indicate the different cultures is so incredibly basic, you cannot possibly describe someone's dress in any significant/interesting way.

[@audie3600]

Imagining someone just hanging out and all of a sudden they sneeze and start their period and just like fireworks or fire erupting from their crotch is hilarious to me

[@arkkon2740]

The image of a stray tampon acting like a flare is.. An interesting thought 💀

[@Horvath_Gabor]

6:41:30 I find it weird that she was proud of that "nobody could predict her twists". I can only speak for myself, but one of the most fun parts of writing a webnovel is seeing the audience's reactions and them piecing together the foreshadowings and Chekhov's guns I put into the story and trying to predict the upcoming plots and twists using them. When they get things right, it tells me I'm putting in adequate clues and can ease up, and if they don't, it tells me I should give more hints, and it's this balancing act that makes long-running mysteries fun. Trying to actively deceive your audience for a gotcha is just such a weird concept to me.

[@marctaco2624]

Shymalan made a whole career shoehorning in b*llsh*t twists, why can’t I? Because he made one good movie first

[@deen7530]

And the best part of a twist, as a reader, is going back and seeing all the little clues and details pointing to it that you didn't notice the first time around.

[@StarWarsomania]

I guess it kind of depends on what an author means by “nobody could predict their twists”. For instance, in the first Harry Potter book, I never once guessed on my first read as a preteen that the person going after the Sorcerer’s Stone and in league with Voldemort was anybody other than Snape. I distinctly remember reading the chapter that ends “It wasn’t Snape.” **flips page** “It was Quirrel.”🤯 I remember it because it was the first real “twist” I’d ever really experienced. HP was a series of mystery books LARPing as fantasy books, and I didn’t realize that growing up. I pretty much started re-reading the first book immediately because I was just going 😱😱😱, and at that point I started catching things that Harry colors with his own interpretation (HP would also be tagged “Unreliable Narrator” if it was an AO3 fic). Like various conversations Snape and Quirrel had, or when Snape gets bitten by Fluffy. So, if that’s what the author is going for, I am all for it. I feel that sometimes the reader not seeing the twist coming can be a real improvement. We as the audience are being prepped for A but we don’t even see it happening. On the other hand, I do enjoy times when I can see where a story is going and how a twist is going to play out because I caught things the author dropped for me. For instance, my favorite callback of all time, at the series finale of Elementary when they made a callback as Season 7 was coming to a close all the way back to 1x02, “the opposite of helpful”. So. There could be value in either approach, in shocking your audience with something they couldn’t realize during their first read, and in dropping enough clues that your astute readers will see what they expect play out, What doesn’t have value is setting shit up just to drop it along the way and then insulting your audience for even having tried to come up with an explanation. Or just making a random twist that contradicts established canon. And then saying “nobody could predict that! I subverted your expectations!” But it’s not like I’m making a very specific reference here or anything. *cough*

[@Door_Into_Summer]

Do the Sherlock Holmes books get better? The twist with the dart and vertically challenged person sucked

[@gratuitouslurking8610]

To borrow the thesis from Overly Sarcastic Productions, in a way you kinda WANT your readers to catch the twists, cus that means they're paying attention and trying to understand the piece. If the twist comes out of left field, all it basically is doing is the author saying 'look how smart I am that I can FOOL YOU!' and the reader will instead see how up their own ass the writer is for the jarring railroad of this unfitting plot twist.

[@fierybookworm]

A better moonling curse would have prob been a werewolf situation. Once a month, everyone morphs into mindless beasts. The culture could be intricate; every household had reinforcements from strong doors to sturdy prison cells. Women and children, though also beastly, would be sparse and require even greater protection. Staying inside wouldn't be enough. They would be powerful but lack control. Other clans could try to exploit them, even, or traffic them for war purposes. So much potential but nope. Just... spooky ocean tides.

[@SpicyButterflyWings]

I was thinking a better curse for the Moonlings would be they become hypnotized by the full moon to seek out the ocean (or any large enough body of water) and drown themselves in it. Would still carry a tangential relation to the moon affecting the ocean tides. And it would still functionally be similar enough to the current curse that not much would beed to change plot wise. When the full moon comes all the Moonlings would lock themselves away indoors, completely block out the windows, and hunker down until the moon sets to avoid mindlessly killing themselves. If only this was a better book, both of our ideas work so much better than what Aster went with.

[@totallynameless8861]

Why would women and children be sparse? Because they'd be eating each other?

[@alexjewett7455]

Doesn't really match with the moonlings' water/ice motif. A curse like that would better suit the wildlings. Especially since they're supposed to be viewed as dangerous, maneating monsters. You could even keep the heart eating thing by having that be the only way to stave off the transformation.

[@Queen_Cnidarian]

Personally, I think the biggest fumble was having moonlings and nightshades. Two groups associated with the night is a bit… weird, especially because there are sunlings, people who are associated with the sun and have power over fire. I think it would have been better to combine the moonlings and nightshade into one group, and then have earthlings or something of the like fill the role of Cleo and keep the number of groups even.

[@leotamer5]

Separating moon and night is fine, especially since we have stars and sky. If anything wildlings are the odd ones off since everyone is based on celestial objects, the sky or the concept of night which could tie into being outer space.

[@65firered]

King: *coughs violently* The people: "WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!" King: *gets papercut and starts a fire in the library*

[@gaiusfulmen]

Least insane monarch:

[@thedeepfriar745]

Sorry you said King, and I was thinking Stephen King and how hilarious it would be if he were to just absolutely roast the ever loving hell outta this novel.

[@Imagigirl]

Maybe Nightshade island is gone because Oro banged his shin on the coffee table once.

[@ceciliaparadise8468]

Sometimes predicting the twist before it's reveal is just as exciting as being blindsided with it. I've had plenty of moments while reading where the, "I KNEW IT All ALONG," was better than the, "I never saw that coming."

[@Queen_Cnidarian]

I personally love guessing a twist, especially if it’s logical and required a keen eye. I feel like a genius.

[@RotaAbyssian]

It really depends on how well seeded the hints are. The Ace Attorney franchise is a great example of this. Early on, the endpoint is laid bare, so the gratification lies in arranging the breadcrumbs to that endpoint. Later on, even in the first game, piecing together all the evidence towards that ultimate "Gotcha!" moment becomes the reward. If the twist is lit by neon signs, it's boring. If the twist is subtle enough to have multiple possibilities, it is rewarding to have chosen the right one.

[@gokuxsephiroth4505]

Absolutely. I prefer it when a book has the foreshadowing to keep me guessing - it becomes an exciting guessing game and I feel like Hercule Poirot when I'm right. If a story becomes too hard to guess the twists, I find myself zoning out and just waiting for the reveal sometimes, and that's not nearly as fun

[@tikki2340]

One thing I really love about your videos is how despite constant snark, you’re very quick to point out things you like or are quick to point out how certain tropes aren’t actually inherently bad even if they’re done poorly. You strike a very good balance of comedy and genuine good faith criticism that makes these videos ones I always come back to. As an aspiring writer, it’s a huge help

[@davidsherlock5528]

If the condition for the curses to be broken is the death of one of the rulers, shouldn't they have been dispelled no more than 25 years after they started? Since, of course, Starlings die at 25, the passing of their leader at that time should have marked the end of the curses.

[@MJ-98]

Congratulations, you thought about this more than Alex Aster!

[@Mecharnie_Dobbs]

No, it has to be the correct ruler who dies and they have to not have any heirs at the time and several other conditions have to also be met simultaneously.

[@Nixahma]

@@MJ-98 While I'm sure OP did think about this more than Alex, there is actually a reason the curses don't break.

[@pau_5435]

Hmm but if the Starling leader had died without an heir, their realm would have died out ; which means they died with an heir every time, so the curses weren't lifted

[@sappy_]

I'm finally getting to the end of the video, and what I've gathered is that this book is the epitome of the first drafts I wrote when I was thirteen. From the twists that don't make sense, to refusing to let the characters have actual consequences, etc...it's honestly astounding that this got published.

[@raineatscheese]

Hah, exactly! Also, funny that we meet here at this video-I’m a big fan of your work on wattpad and knew I recolonized this profile pic

[@sappy_]

@@raineatscheese oh my goodness, words I never thought I'd hear 😂😂 thank you for the support, it really means a lot!

[@universal_stupidity]

exactly, it reads like a first book, written out of a bunch of ideas and individual scenes stuck together but never really edited into one book. its not bad concepts, its just not put together in a good way. Its just, immature writing

[@universal_stupidity]

@@sappy_ also this is so cute, Wattpad writer recognized?? more at 6

[@allengordon6929]

I wrote better than this at 10. Granted it was wierder and infedecimally harder to understand but it was at least more coherent. I really ought to ressurect that stupid pre-isekai about a ghost-like aggregate entity who has mutually exclusive memories of the real world from possibly multiple different peopl stumbling through what can best be described as anime elder scrolls where everybody is a max level adventurer and the kids are starting that journey, then this wierd sci-fi setting that used to be cyberpunk until all human inhabitants killed themselves and all the current inhabitans are ai, and jumping back and forth whilst trying to figure out the mystery of who they are, and who they aren't.

[@axelvoss9653]

Isla is *100%* a Mary Sue; even when she fucks up due to her own stupidity, the plot bends over backwards to make sure she gets out as cleanly as humanly possible. She ends the book with ALL OF THE POWERS by ACCIDENT

[@xiexielian]

The same in Acotar, crescent City and etc... all the woman protagonists need to be like a Super Sayajin without trainnig

[@axelvoss9653]

​@@xiexielianIt's really not about her being a woman; this happens to non-female protagonists too.

[@sanakimchi88]

@@axelvoss9653well feyre and Isla is a self insert for romance readers so the entire appeal of her is being a woman so readers can self insert and get with the tall dark handsome super powerful “shadow daddy”

[@notribadsvault]

The wildlings needing to eat human hearts is the definition of “grim-derp”

[@thehermit8618]

To me it sounds more like "derp derp" its not even that miserable. Just a bit edgy and dramatic

[@neoqwerty]

@@thehermit8618 It's a poor man's huli-jing tales

[@letsreadtextbook1687]

The whole thing is just an excuse for her edgy love interest to call her Hearteater

[@RaccKing21]

The part where Krim mentioned that the writer likely omitted that curse from Isla (is that how it's spelled) due to it being "icky for romance" reminds me of one character. The Skyrim mod "Song of the Green" adds a follower called Auri. She's a Wood Elf who, due to religious reasons, cannot use plant material and must consume tge enemies they kill - it's called the Green Pact. As she follows you around, she sometimes comments how the last bandit must've been ill since her stomach is upset. She can also become your romantic partner, and the whole "eats people" thing us never really an issue, since she's a well written character that you grow to enjoy spending time with. The writer of Lightlark just sucks and can't get over the initial "ooh, that's icky" reaction.

[@crowdemon_archives]

Eating human hearts isn't even too "icky" like...IDK man, other than cannibalism, hearts are pretty delicious.