The Spring Workshop Stories Are Here

The writing is over and the voting is coming.
Tomorrow, we'll set up the voting system on the front page, in the meantime you can all enjoy the stories here.

You can use this thread for comments.

Gargamel wrote:

There are no autor names to the stories yet but maybe that's by design.
I enjoyed all of them thanks for the people writing it. Now I got time to think who I should vote for, tough Sunday ahead.

The name of the authors will be restored after the end of the voting.

The voting pool is up on the front page, it will run until the 16th of April 2023 at 23.59 (GMT).

Meanwhile, you can use this thread to comment on the stories.

guimachajo1 wrote:

Un saludo, para todos. Debo de decir, que acabo de leer todos los relatos de este taller de escritura. Y me han gustado, todos. 
lo cuál hace dificil el votar.
En mi humilde opinión todos son buenos. Y algunos de ellos pueden tener continuidad. 
Pero que conste qué no soy un experto. 
asi que gracias y mi enhorabuena a todos los autores y personas que les ayudaron en su edición.A greeting, to all. I must say, I just read all the stories from this writing workshop. And I liked them all.
which makes it difficult to vote.
IMHO they are all good. And some of them may have continuity.
But for the record, I'm not an expert.
so thank you and my congratulations to all the authors and people who helped you in your edition.

Muchas gracias por estos elogios a nuestros escritores.

Although I stopped myself from giving detailed feedback in a while, mostly due to some worries (some night even say paranoias) of mine.

This time, I find myself in a really awkward position, since I was involved the creation of four entries and I'm privy to the names of the authors.
Even os, or rather because of this, I want to try to provide some decent feedback.

A Conscius Choice
I believe that, out of all the entries, this one suffered the most from the 2k words limitation. Both the set-up and the middle part of the story seem to struggle a lot, with an entire scene told rather than shown. Even so, I have to commend the author for making the best out of this situation and using a single point of view as a device to cirmcumvent this limitation. I think that the final "reverse Clark Kent" moment, albeit foreshadowed, provide a nice opening for an even larger narrative.
I consider this entry more a preview chapter and I hope to see a full version soon.

Between Darkness and Light
Similar to the previous entry, this story provides a good lauching point for more tales, both prequel and sequel. I feel like both Dawn and Midnight have a lot of untold baggage and potential, not only because they attempt to break the mold of the always popular flying brick character. Unfortunately, the main moment of the librarian snapping suffers a bit from the word count. I consider that the focus of the story, but it feels so hard to do it justice, to properly convey the rage and frustration of a character so pissed that she doesn't give a damn, and adding a transformation scene on top of that. The hint of superior power we got from the last moment has that real tease that can go a long way.

Dark Desire
Compared to the previous two, this story feels much more straightforward, a classic empowerment/domination moment. The choice of using one of the version of the Earth-3 Superwoman (already a VERY sexually charged character) provides an immediate recongizability that ease the reader into what comes next. We can all imagine that the unseen punishment would be really... intense. Even so the focus falls on the brief and very intense transformation scene and the mysterious voice, hinting at something alien or subconscious going on here. But what exactly?

Knowledge is Power
If I have to nominate a story even more classic than Dark Desire, it would be this. Here, simplicity is the name of the game. The set-up, the gimmick and the payoff lined up beautifully, I could almost hear the click of the "theatrical mechanism". I do have to commend the author for dodging, albeit very narrowly, the risk of going a little too much in the cliché. This is pretty subjective consideration and I can easily see someone else saying that this story felt a little too "safe" for their own tastes.

The Apprentice
Oh boy, where do I start with this story?
I think there is a lot to unpack here, but I'll do my best to be brief. Like many other entries, this story looks a little to ambitious for the format of this workshop, but writer didn't manage to pull the same trick as the others. This feels especially apparent in the second half with the power showcase. The attempt to create some visual distorsions and is interesting but maybe it needed 1000 words more.

The Greatest Treasure
For my taste, this story feels the most uneven of the workshop. It has a great payoff and a really interesting gimmick, but the middle part and the empowerment of the main character advance very slowly. Usually I'm very much a fan of slow empowerment, but due to the lack of an impending threat or a looming conflict, this slow speed makes the story a little less effective than it could have been. Again, let me reiterate, I love the ending, but... well, it somehow doesn't feel earned.

Less than 3 days left to vote, people!