Book: This Mockery of Light
Author: avadel 
Chapters Read: 2
Genre: Short Story
Blurb:

The Dark is dangerous. The Dark is deception.

And the Dark is the only thing she wants.

What would you do if the only beautiful thing in the world was the one thing you couldn't touch?

---

A collection of stories to entice your mind, enthrall your senses, and ensnare your memory. Dare to dive in.

Cover

My opinion of the cover is quite simply that, well, it's simple. It's a very simple cover. You have the background image, a splash of decoration, and the text. All the basic elements, but what makes the cover work is that they're used very purposefully and effectively.

All of it is very pretty, very neat, and very well put together. It overall is just an example of a pretty cover done right. It's still alluring without having to go all out. And really, I just love the text. So nice ;w; It matches the gold of the borders, which just goes very well with backlit by a starry night sky. So yeah. I'm rambling now. I'll just mentally clap for you and move on! XD

Title

Honestly, my main problem with the title is probably that it's just too good?

Okay, it's good. How is that a complaint? Well, it's a short story compilation. This Mockery of Light? That title is epic. It deserves an entire book dedicated to it.

Honestly, not much more to say about it but that.  Get this book a new title and give This Mockery of Light its own book.  That is all :D 

Blurb

Blurbs with short story collections are... hard.  Why?  Because there are so many different stories that you will likely delve into.  I've not had experience with this myself, but this is my review, so I'm going to trust myself and give feedback based on how I believe most effective.  Okay?  Okay.

For the most part, I'm not a fan of your blurb.  Why?  Because it sounds like a summary for a specific short story.  For a blurb for a short story collection, it would be better to focus on the overall theme that plays throughout the book.  Based on the start of the summary and the title of the book, I'd think there was a theme of light versus darkness.  So the very first line of the blurb is solid.

However, the new two lines are very distinctively one idea. You begin to mention a specific character, and sure, the book could technically be a collection of short stories about this one woman, but I highly doubt that, because it's presented as a short story collection rather than a non-plot-driven portrayal of a woman's life.

So my suggestion is probably just to be broader with the blurb. Perhaps, if you want, you can dip into a sentence-long explanation of different stories, and that then segues into explaining the theme.

Example: So-and-so longs for the light but can only experience the darkness. Other-person tries to live their new life, but dark deeds of the past continue to plague them. Dive into multiple lives as they each discover just how twisted and deceptive the darkness is—that it is nothing more than a mockery of light.

Lame example, I know, but just something to give you an idea of what I mean.

Experience/Plot

THIS MOCKERY OF LIGHT

Okay, so, just starting out, I'm not gonna lie, coronas ripped me right out. I legit had to stop to google what it meant, and even then, I got something about a Mexican grill.

Okay, getting into actual story, it seems like we may be going for something more symbolic and poetic—wait, no, now she's heading home. The darkness... Seems literal now? It is coming to life and killing her family.

I like the ending. I like how it's all tied together while also calling back to the very start, plus adding an extra oomph to it with that final line.

I don't have much more to say, and it isn't only because it's short. It is short, don't get me wrong. Only about 830 words. But that is, like... 10x shorter than I want it to be, and there in lies the issue.

Much like the title of this piece, I just don't like it for a short story. The ideas are strong in this. The allure of darkness, the risk of hoping love will be enough to make someone listen, flaws of parenthood, all that stuff. But those are pretty loaded themes paired with a pretty loaded background. Am I saying it's impossible to make them work in a one-shot sort of manner? no.

Am I saying this would be way better to tackle in a novella/novel? Heck yes.

This is the moment where I admit this may just be my "big story" brain at work, but I think I'm on the right track with this having a feel that is just too big for the medium you're using. It makes everything feel too compact, and it really lacks the intended punch before of that.

Ah, well, while googling, I found out that works that are less than 1,000 words are known as Flash Fiction. So yeah. This doesn't work very well as Flash Fiction to me. Maybe if it had stuck as poetic, but once it started to breach into the real world, creating an actual lore behind all of this, it just didn't fully hit for me. Anyway, I'm rambling on this point now. On to what comes next!

Now to touch upon something with the writing itself that stood out to me. I want to start out by saying that although I like the idea of "The Dark is dangerous. The Dark is deception", I also really hate it. And I'm picking up on this because, given its repetition, it seems like it is a main part of the story. Now, why do I hate it? The answer is quite simple: it is set up to be a pattern, but it isn't.

So yes, I liked the whole "The Dark is..." pattern that you went with, but "dangerous" and "deception" don't work. "Dangerous" is used as a descriptor. "Deception" is used as a noun. It just makes it so that it doesn't work. It would be an easy fix to change "deception" to "deceptive" except at the very end, you turn the duo into a trio with "The Dark is death." Meaning you've now used two more noun-ish words to describe the Dark, so logically, the first one should be as well. So I guess you could do "The Dark is danger." Doesn't read as well as dangerous/deceptive, but death sounds better than deadly so... Pick your poison?

SOME INFINITIES

Really solid introduction. You do a great job establishing Anya's voice and getting into her head. She feels established and like a character I'd enjoy following around. You also sprinkle in little bits of worldbuilding that I'm enticed to see expanded. Not only that, but right away, we see a central conflict for her, one many can relate to. So just hitting a lot of good points with the first section.

However, the ending of that first section feels a bit rushed. Anya may not be overly emotional, but after the fleshed out little peak in her mind, the last two paragraphs just didn't really hit. Maybe add a little bit more—maybe just another paragraph—to really make that final line of the segment hit as hard as it's wanting to?

"Not in another life! You only get one. And Pieter only gets one. And the Arithmes only get one!" <----- I really really like this line. It's a great argument about the "not in this life" remark, and once more you're giving me a concept that I'd really rather see explored in a full-length novel, gaaaah. I don't think short stories are for me. All they do is leaving me desiring more ;-;

Oooh, Lada's brother sends riddle love notes. I ship VwV Also, I see he's incorporating the "some infinities" line. Which, for some reason, has me a bit worried. I dunno. This short story gives me tragedy vibes so I'm waiting for him to die.

It is at the beginning of the third section that I stopped putting thoughts here as I read and just read the entire thing in full. This is mostly because I had one entire thought reading through the third section, and I wanted to see if that nagging thought stayed there as I continued to read... And it did.

This one-shot is tackling a heavy theme with the working class of the station being absolutely abused, with poor living conditions and their deaths basically treated as sport. It seems specifically that things like higher specified knowledge is deemed something only important for the working class (math and arithmetic primarily).

The central figure to this plot is a 'princess' character who loves math and has a pure heart, but is constantly crushed by a dystopian dictator-esque leader and upper class.

So it uses elements of fantasy and sci-fi that many readers have experienced before, and it also uses a real-world struggle of the working class endlessly being screwed over. That said... what was the nagging thought?

The nagging thought was that, even with these themes and stuff that readers would be familiar with, there just wasn't enough weight or depth behind what we were reading. It was too quick moving with moments that could have been really strong if given a little bit more time to spread its wings or if we'd had more story and character established.

Honestly, that quote I so loved about only having one life is a great example. It's an epic line that falls short because there was no build up to it. Sure, we see she's discontent with her life, but it stems from a place of fire that just seems to ignite suddenly.

I could continue talking, but I think I should move on to the conclusion of the review, because if I don't, I'll ramble.   

In Closing...

This review was not done like one of my normal reviews. I skipped a lot of sections and just put a lot of my thoughts into the Experience section. This is because, as one-shot short stories, it seemed like there wouldn't be enough to expand upon for each instance.

But also... I began to realize something. Either these first two short stories of yours are just too weighty to be such short stories, or I am just a horrible short story reader.

Neither of the two I read ever felt "complete." They felt rushed and too large for how little writing was given to them. I'm not saying you need outright novels, but they definitely felt more fitting of at least novellas.

This could 100% be a me thing. I can't write short things because they always—ALWAYS—end up expanding to something much larger. This is especially true for fantasy and other speculative fiction (is that the right word?), so it's very possible that I'm just also not good at reading it.

I didn't really touch on writing or characters because both of them felt negatively impacted to me because of the shortness restricting the stories. Ah, yes, restricted. I think that's the best way to explain how I felt while reading these. They were these excellent ideas restricted by being short stories.

I strongly apologize if this isn't the review you wanted, especially after such a long wait (a wait in part that occurred because I was struggling so much... U^.^). I cut myself short on the Experience section because all I did was want to ramble about how nothing was truly hitting home for me, but there's too much unknown about if that's a me thing or a genuine criticism, and I apologize for the fact that I can't answer that.

Solid writing with some bumps. Ideas I adored. I just... I don't know. Now excuse me while I flop on the floor and cri because I wish I could tell if this was a me thing or not T^T