LaPorte Caves

Hi Circes do you have any news about the next chapter?

Everything is alright CIrces???

It was my mistake to promise new chapters back in December. They aren't ready.

I do work on this when I am able, but that's not very often given everything going on in my life.

I try my best to keep this fun for me, since I have no other reason to do it. And even as the story grows into something longer than I had originally planned, I'm trying to keep it true to my original intentions. Those are the only promises I can make at this point. The chapters will be ready when they are ready.

I guess it comes when it comes. But it's nice to know you're still around, circes.

Good stuff! I remember feeling a bit of pressure when I was writing. Take your time! Enjoy the story and make it worth what you are writing! I really can't give you enough kudos for what I've read so far. ☺

circes_cup wrote: It was my mistake to promise new chapters back in December. They aren't ready.

I do work on this when I am able, but that's not very often given everything going on in my life.

I try my best to keep this fun for me, since I have no other reason to do it. And even as the story grows into something longer than I had originally planned, I'm trying to keep it true to my original intentions. Those are the only promises I can make at this point. The chapters will be ready when they are ready.

Don't worry about that. I prefer that you are ok with your life. Take your time.
Best wishes

Woah! I just seen ch12 (rev) and ch13 hit the library! Going to love this! Thanks Circes!

AuGoose wrote: Small typo in part 13. I think. Could be some word play considering Julia's body .

It was the first of eight orgasms her would give her.

Fixed, thanks.

I concur.I'm liking the new balance you have found Circes. Three new chapters in one day! You'd think it was my birthday!

OK, it's finally done. I'm posting three new chapters in place of the original Ch 12, and have a few more in the works.

For those that have been following this story and asking for more, I appreciate your sticking with me over the last five months as I took the time I needed to make the changes I wanted.

Some of you have wondered whether something you said on the forums, or something somebody else said, caused me to send the story in a different direction. That is not the case. Everything I've posted in the last few days is true to my original intentions for the story, and in fact, my original Chapter 12 was scrapped precisely because it was not true to those intentions. Moreover, I can promise you that the remainder of what I write will also be true to the story I want to tell. There is nothing that anyone can say that would steer this story away from that.

I'm sharing these thoughts with you because I want you to know that you are free share your honest opinion on this forum, without fear that your comments might send the story careening off in a detrimental direction.

One logistical note: the original Chapter 12 will remain in the Library here, labeled "12 - OLD", or something like that. Having left it in the public domain for five months, I did not feel at liberty to simply take it down. For those of you that liked the darkness in the original 12, do not despair. There is more darkness coming.

Thank you to Woodclaw for all the help with cleaning up the formatting and getting this stuff posted so quickly after submittal.

Hope you all find something in this you can enjoy!

I'm looking forward to more of the dark side, whether it comes from Julia or the family. Taking in Howard's closing thoughts in the last chapter, I have an inkling where you might take this great work, but I could be (probably I am) wrong!

Thank you circes, I enjoyed the new revised chapter. It was refreshing to see more of Julia's hesitation about accepting her new abilities; seeing how she processed it was very enlightening. Some of the dialog that was carried over in chapters 13 and 14 seemed to be a little at odds with her newfound clarity at how this was affecting Howard, but it can be overlooked. Sallen's character offered a great way for Julia to get her thoughts in order and give some more background on the new world. I thought there was some great foreshadowing on the benefits of working with a Nourished woman instead of against her.

Howard did seem to accept staying longer a little quicker than I would have thought, but I realized it makes more sense if you think his thoughts at the end of the chapter betray his inner plan to escape once Julia shows him the way back to Kentucky. I don't see him willingly returning once shown the door, even with him still feeling strongly for Julia, which I thinks sets up the stage for conflict between the two very well.

One thing that wasn't touched on though was how Julia would handle going back to normal even if they only stayed the few weeks. I would have expected Howard to question her a bit more on how she thought she could give all this up to go back to Earth and be the average woman again. She says she could because of how much she loves Howard, but there doesn't seem to be any doubt in her mind about it at all.

Overall, I like the direction the story is taking. Julia seems a bit more humble, Howard still has his spark but is willing to negotiate (on the surface anyway), there's some great foreshadowing, and there's more back story given to the world. Thank you again for continuing the tale!

First, thanks circes for continuing this story. I know this rewrite and new chapters were a struggle at times. I can say just one thing, it sure looks good and worth it to me!

I have not read any of the comments yet. So here is my take….

Last December I reread all the chapters, partly to find new possible scenes to illustrate, but also because I really like the read. So when I saw the new chapters posted, I quickly skimmed #11 and read straight through the 3 new ones. You did a great job. The time given to the reflections of both Howard and Julia on how they got to this point in their relationship really work. Using Scallan as an “obi wan kenobi” foil for Julia to rethink her past actions was great. Of course he has a big one and Julia has to just take care of her uncontrollable “urges”!! The additional insight into men and women’s relationships in this different world was a good add to the story.

While Julia had worse transgressions to ponder, Howard still needed to take a good look at himself too.

Looking forward to how they continue to adapt to this new world, plus reading more about my favorite amazon, Julia.

Thanks again circes,

Best,

twitch

Wow, the new chapters are excellent! Thanks for continuing the story. I'm back to hoping for a happy ending for Julia and Howard. Or if it's a sad ending, it would be a genuinely sad one.

I think Julia is still kidding herself somewhat about what kind of life Howard could have in that world. She says there's no crime against claimed men, but it seems like there are plenty of ways for him to get hurt or killed that are completely legal. I wonder what she'd say if Howard tells her she almost killed him in her sleep. Howard, for his part, still seems to think that he can bull his way through this on sheer stubbornness (although it's hard to know exactly what his closing thoughts in the last chapter meant.)

Much is made in the story of Howard being Julia's savior and protector. Ironically, I think she needs him now more than ever. This is looking like something of a battle for Julia's soul. How easy would it be to give in to the temptations of this world? She can do anything her heart desires, there's an endless stream of men lining up to answer her every whim, and everybody tells her fulfilling her own pleasures is some kind of noble duty. How easy it would be to crush Howard (metaphorically or literally) or forget him entirely.

circes_cup wrote: One logistical note: the original Chapter 12 will remain in the Library here, labeled "12 - OLD", or something like that. Having left it in the public domain for five months, I did not feel at liberty to simply take it down. For those of you that liked the darkness in the original 12, do not despair. There is more darkness coming.

After running panicked and bloody through a swamp and the botanical equivalent of razor wire, I don't know how much darker this really has to get, but I trust where you're taking it.

Thanks for these three chapter in a quick sequence :-D
It was a nice reading. Curious about what happens next

Oh, one critique, if I may, circes. One of the traditional hallmarks of these stories is the protagonist discovering her new abilities. Julia has apparently discovered how to use her pheromones to entice (to put it mildly) men, but you just skipped over that whole event and only have her describing it in passing. After the joy of running, swimming, learning the language, and everything else, it seems odd to leave this out as if it's no big deal. Maybe you think that sort of scene has been done to death already, or you wanted these new chapters to be more about bringing Julia and Howard together, but it would have been interesting to see what you'd done with it.

Pepper, Twitch, Torque, Monty, Sam+Norton, Dru -- thank you all for your comments! I'm glad to know that you liked the chapters, and even better, just glad to see that people are reading it (there's no other way to really tell!).

As usual with me, this story has grown larger than I originally intended. There were a number of concepts introduced in the first eleven chapters that were overdue some explanation. And at the same time, I wanted to lay the groundwork for the significant amount of plot yet to come. These chapters were intended to do both of those things, and as a result, they were a bit slower and more conversational than my usual fare. I hope to pick up the tempo shortly.

Thanks again, guys.

Pepper wrote: Oh, one critique, if I may, circes. One of the traditional hallmarks of these stories is the protagonist discovering her new abilities. Julia has apparently discovered how to use her pheromones to entice (to put it mildly) men, but you just skipped over that whole event and only have her describing it in passing. After the joy of running, swimming, learning the language, and everything else, it seems odd to leave this out as if it's no big deal. Maybe you think that sort of scene has been done to death already, or you wanted these new chapters to be more about bringing Julia and Howard together, but it would have been interesting to see what you'd done with it.

That's a great point. It would be fun to explore that ability, which Julia has used in the heat of the moment but never deliberately. I may well be able to work that in later in the story.

AuGoose wrote: With the introduction of the pheromones, it seems like there's definitely going to come a moment when Julia realizes Howard didn't have the slightest choice in the matter of his response to being borrowed . Kind of hard to hold infidelity against a guy when you and every other woman on the planet can strip him of agency at whim. Somehow I don't think a horny 18 year old raised to think men are little more than pets was showing the restrain Julia's trying to exhibit...

So much has happened since Howard was borrowed that I don't necessarily get the impression that Julia is still nursing that particular grudge, much less reevaluating Howard's culpability for it. She seems to have shed her old self almost completely, and is more mad that Howard expresses any doubts about the new Julia. Plus, she's made such a point of how he needs to adopt the local customs that it would be unreasonable to get mad at him for having done just that (although emotional hurts don't usually give way to rational analysis.)

Pepper wrote:

AuGoose wrote: With the introduction of the pheromones, it seems like there's definitely going to come a moment when Julia realizes Howard didn't have the slightest choice in the matter of his response to being borrowed . Kind of hard to hold infidelity against a guy when you and every other woman on the planet can strip him of agency at whim. Somehow I don't think a horny 18 year old raised to think men are little more than pets was showing the restrain Julia's trying to exhibit...

So much has happened since Howard was borrowed that I don't necessarily get the impression that Julia is still nursing that particular grudge, much less reevaluating Howard's culpability for it. She seems to have shed her old self almost completely, and is more mad that Howard expresses any doubts about the new Julia. Plus, she's made such a point of how he needs to adopt the local customs that it would be unreasonable to get mad at him for having done just that (although emotional hurts don't usually give way to rational analysis.)

I agree that Julia probably has let the Howard infidelity issue go, especially as she has had multiple transgressions with multiple men since. A big issue will be if Howard can deal with Julia's "need" to copulate multiple times a day with multiple partners. I find the whole issue that the women cannot fight this "need" to be rather interesting. They are so smart and strong, etc., but when it comes to sex they are like a moose in rut, but their rutting season is the whole year, every day. I find that a curious weakness in my book.

Now don't get me wrong, I would love to help with her needs!!