Goodness, gracious, that was EPIC. It's taken me most of the day, between everything else, and a good hour here at the day's end to read this through, and I feel like I'll be turning this over in my mind for a long time!
First of all - when I asked for John and Rodney dumbface in love, and angst with a happy ending, and world-building, I never imagined someone would roll them all together like this! I'm truly amazed at how many things you wove into this story, and so happy about it!! I love the Team-ness of it, love that there's so much interaction between Rodney and Teyla and Ronon, and that the shorter appearances by Lorne and Radek are so wonderfully fleshed out. The world-building was amazing - and I love that the Catarans have cars! All hail a world where everyone's progressed beyond medieval sets! The attention to detail made me gleeful - it sticks in my mind that the buildings on Catara were built with mortar, and that the team would notice because that's such an unusual thing. It's little details like that that make it feel real, and solid, and a world I could visit (with the right sort of means ;D )!
The science here is a thing of beauty, and you used the Team to such great effect to show Rodney operating on one level and yet able to explain it to others (most especially the reader!) in comprehensible terms. I appreciated, so much, all the thought that had to have gone into putting the plot and the science together, because you plugged every hole - explaining why the Wraith weren't anywhere near; explaining how the orbiting vessel was invisible to them for so long; explaining a division between the workings of state and the workings of private industry that would lead to a breakdown, or a manipulation of the Cataran system. Oh, and speaking of Catarans - Trin was wonderfully realized. The passage where John ruminates on the difference between Rodney's intelligence and Trin's is just so astutely done, and it fleshes out John as a military commander as well as someone who's invested in Rodney's general well-being.
I dug the fact that the tenses changed with the switch between past and present in the story's timeline, and that the POV switch matched each section break. It served the purpose of allowing you to tell so much more of the story than with a single POV (which I noticed as a writer) but it also just added to the depth and richness of the tale (which I relished as a reader!)
There's just so much here - from Rodney's atypically messy room (complete with discarded clothes at the end), to the Earth politics that intrude upon Atlantis, to the multiple ways John constantly scans for exits and points of defense, drawing on lessons learned. I can't imagine how much time this took you, and I am grateful for every minute - and now I'm off to my journal to tell everyone else to come over here and read this beauty!
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2008-12-19 06:49 am (UTC)First of all - when I asked for John and Rodney dumbface in love, and angst with a happy ending, and world-building, I never imagined someone would roll them all together like this! I'm truly amazed at how many things you wove into this story, and so happy about it!! I love the Team-ness of it, love that there's so much interaction between Rodney and Teyla and Ronon, and that the shorter appearances by Lorne and Radek are so wonderfully fleshed out. The world-building was amazing - and I love that the Catarans have cars! All hail a world where everyone's progressed beyond medieval sets! The attention to detail made me gleeful - it sticks in my mind that the buildings on Catara were built with mortar, and that the team would notice because that's such an unusual thing. It's little details like that that make it feel real, and solid, and a world I could visit (with the right sort of means ;D )!
The science here is a thing of beauty, and you used the Team to such great effect to show Rodney operating on one level and yet able to explain it to others (most especially the reader!) in comprehensible terms. I appreciated, so much, all the thought that had to have gone into putting the plot and the science together, because you plugged every hole - explaining why the Wraith weren't anywhere near; explaining how the orbiting vessel was invisible to them for so long; explaining a division between the workings of state and the workings of private industry that would lead to a breakdown, or a manipulation of the Cataran system. Oh, and speaking of Catarans - Trin was wonderfully realized. The passage where John ruminates on the difference between Rodney's intelligence and Trin's is just so astutely done, and it fleshes out John as a military commander as well as someone who's invested in Rodney's general well-being.
I dug the fact that the tenses changed with the switch between past and present in the story's timeline, and that the POV switch matched each section break. It served the purpose of allowing you to tell so much more of the story than with a single POV (which I noticed as a writer) but it also just added to the depth and richness of the tale (which I relished as a reader!)
There's just so much here - from Rodney's atypically messy room (complete with discarded clothes at the end), to the Earth politics that intrude upon Atlantis, to the multiple ways John constantly scans for exits and points of defense, drawing on lessons learned. I can't imagine how much time this took you, and I am grateful for every minute - and now I'm off to my journal to tell everyone else to come over here and read this beauty!
THANK YOU! ♥