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@obrian-of-the-surface-world Prologue Meeting of Monsters!

1. Is there anything that stood out to you as intriguing about this scene?
The contrast between the two villains was fascinating, especially as they plotted dividing the people. Contrasting the villains’ different appearances with the division they plan to work make increase the flow and clarity of the plot. The scenery was very interesting as well, a lot of it Biblical details, has an edge of Revelations tone to it even if most of the details are from a huge variety of scriptural passages. and leaves a trail of mysterious details and facts that haven’t been explained yet. I might be concerned about giving too much information all roughly the same amount of attention. Instead maybe a preliminary explanation of a couple strongly scene-relevant details that can be tied to something to help jog the reader’s memory. But again as a prologue it works just fine.

2. What would you say the mood was of this scene?
The mood seems to continue the feeling of angst and horror effectively. It has a heavy overtone of mystery and impending doom and sets the stage for a very exciting adventure. The imagery is intensely Biblical and leaves no question as to who the villains are and what their end-plan is to any Christian reader.

3. What character(s) in this scene would you like to know more about?
I would be interested in a little backstory between the two characters, but at the same time as eldritch abominations that’s not a particular requirement for a good monster. I have heard that the scariest villains are relatable and should be treated as characters especially as “almost human”s where people can “almost” have empathy for them perhaps through an innocent sort of quirk or something that masquerades as kindness without any obvious malicious purpose but that of course is waaay farther down the line.
Probably I’d be much more interested in the origin stories of these creatures without even bothered with making them relatable as long as they take something important to the reader. I rather wonder how they’re able to work together reasonably smoothly at this point and this may be something you want to accent or adjust depending on how the story goes.

5. Which of the following, as a reader, do you wish I had developed more fully in this scene?
a. Setting
b. Character thoughts and motivations
c. Character appearance and/or mood expressions
I think the tone. One area in particular you have nothing but dialogue which I think would be an exceptionally interesting stylistic technique if you didn’t give any prior descriptions at all and left the reader to a simple piece of ominous conversation without any immediate explanation.
But with descriptions already in place you may want to adapt that and put more breaking details between the dialogue. But then those details can’t extraneous I might try to narrow in on a couple things that’ll be immediately relevant to the next scene. Assuming you want to leave the virtue stones and the historical setting in the dark for now I might focus on the relationship of the two monsters trying to make it as credible as possible and go more into why they need each other’s help for this plan and whether or not they intend to stab each other in the back and if so how soon and how suspicious they are of each other etc.

6. Do you feel that the dialogue in this scene flows or is mechanical and stilted? I think the dialogue itself works with the tone and mood as well as flows with the plot. I might worry if you tried to hard to make it unnatural and scary it would lose impact over time. But overall especially for a prologue it has excellent dialogue.

7. Did you learn something in this scene that you wondered about in a previous scene?
I learned something more of her purpose in stealing the stone but I don’t think I appreciate fully her goal in trying to destroy it, exactly how much she stands to gain or lose. I still wonder why she chose to possess a body to do her work instead of some other dark magic method or what but I did learn more about her goals if not her purpose in this scene and that sets well for a story.

8. Did this scene make you want to read more scenes? (Why or why not?)
Absolutely, especially as a prologue it fits into its stylistic tone well and the dialogue makes it more active and current. The characters are beginning to establish their roles and the stakes are starting to be introduced.
On an odd note does anybody know what the fascination with symbolic magical stones is? I’ve read so many books with magic stones it’s one of the most popular magic items in fantasy and even in real life rocks are often associated with witchcraft. (This…has nothing to do with an actual critique just the weird random question of the day I guess XD)

9. Is there any part of the scene that you personally felt did not belong?
Personally I would say there was a lot going on, there were two evil monsters, virtue stones, impending apocalypse themed disaster. Without knowing the whole story I wouldn’t be able to say what goes in the prologue or not. It might seem cluttered and confusing to me but again as a prologue its not meant to explain so much as wet your appetite and it did just that. So perhaps simplify or perhaps heighten surrounding details but really it’s great for its purpose and should work just fine.

10. What, if anything, would you change about this scene to make it more interesting to you?
I might try to hit an extreme either going no details and all dialogue or exaggerated aspects of the tones and key plot settings and try to do that to isolate one or the other to account for the readers lack of familiarity with the story. But it’s very optional and personal preference more than anything else. It serves its purpose great as it is.