One Week of Eternity

[lordcloudx]

Here's something that I've been wanting to post here for a long time but I keep forgetting to. This game was originally released for the third day of last year's Teacup Visual Novel Festival

One Week of Eternity is the story of Alyssa Cruz, a young girl taking her first few steps into becoming a teenager who is suddenly diagnosed with a terminal illness and given one week or less to live. Despite the gloomy premise, this was never meant to be a tear-jerker, as you will find out if you read through this piece.

I originally wrote this as a short-story series back during the run of the first EVN webzine (as far as we know), Baka-Trio Webzine. It was originally written in 5 chapters which were sequentially released monthly along with BTW. The series ended with the 6th volume of the zine since I didn't make the deadline for the 5th volume.

The story itself was inspired by a real-life account of a person of tender age dealing with terminal illness along with some personal research I did on the subject matter. Although I don't have any actual experience with being terminally ill myself, (good) I feel that I had more than enough information to draw from using other sources in order to write One Week of Eternity.

Also, this is my first attempt at writing a story in what I believe to be the "ideal length," which is 5 chapters long at around 1.8-2k of words per chapter except for the last part, which serves as the conclusion. (I emphasized the "I" to signify that it is my personal opinion and I wish for it be respected, and I do not want to get into any lengthy debate on the subject of "ideal length.")

For the visual novel version, I wrote a late-branching path, the main purpose of which, is to provide some kind of an explanation for the small tidbits of the supernatural introduced in the story -- although it may have effectively left more questions than answers.

The original text for One Week of Eternity can be read in volumes 1,2,3,4 and 6 of BTW online or in my fictionpress account as well as through an online ebook hosted here.

Reviews are quite welcome although take note that I am not looking for any "critique for personal improvement."

Screenshots:


I've attached a script.rpy that fixes the typos I found in the original script. You can use this to replace the script.rpy in the game's directory if you wish.
Download: http://games.softpedia.com/get/Freeware ... nity.shtml

I'm willing to quickly compile a cross-platform version, but I'm still testing the waters to see if anyone is actually interested.

[Applegate]

It's funny that you post a typo fixing script. I actually downloaded a bunch of your stories yesterday after discovering Glue and liking it so much. I'll tell you what I think of this once I've read it.

[Applegate]

So I finished reading this. It was an interesting read, to say the least. I regret to report my heart wasn't racing to reach the finish, but I wasn't bored by the story either; I feel it warrants mention as I finish precious few VNs (Japanese and English-originals) because the writing tends to be dull or uninspiring. Of course, being a miser I don't buy anything so I've read nothing but non-commercial.

That said,

I was slightly confused by the purpose of the 'magician' in the story and the strange decrepancy between her parents being all hush-hush about Alyssa's disease, and her father suddenly barging in to tell his daughter she's "going to get better"; I think if that happened to me as a child, and I was supposed to know nothing, I'd be positively frightened. The ending felt a bit rushed in that regard, but on the other hand you kept the main focus on the actual proceedings and wasted no time with drawn out philosophical analysis of the situation as many are wont to do; I like that.

I found it a bit jarring that you sometimes fell into present tense from past tense; stories are best kept in one specific tense, after all. It wasn't actively detracting from the VN, and as you said you aren't looking for critique I'll leave it at that.

All-in-all, I don't consider my time reading this to have been wasted, but I can't say I liked it as much as I did The Wonders of Glue.

[lordcloudx]

Thank you for the review. Jumping tenses is a weakness of mine when I'm deep into writing. I think my editor actually caught those a few times. Those aren't intentional except for the letter chapter.

Possible spoilers

As for her father rushing in to tell her that she's going to get better, I'd say it's an illogical move, but it also adds a sense of realism to the story -- since people don't always behave in a rational manner in those types of situations, this I know first-hand. The justification would be that both her parents were very stressed out and her father had been spending quite a lot of time doing some personal research on her disease. At that point, he was simply ecstatic to realize that there was a cure and so. he simply reacted in the most natural manner and dropped all pretense at being all hush-hush about it. Also, her parents aren't really trying to keep it a secret from her as much as they're trying to cling on to false hope and living in denial up to that point. I wanted to imply that her parents actually knew that Alyssa was already aware of her condition, but are torn between just opening up to her or living in denial for just a little bit longer until her eventual death. It's not an easy decision to make. On one hand, Alyssa has the right to know even though she's still a child, on the other hand, she's also specifically still a child, so she shouldn't have to know.

The purpose of the magician in the story is simply to introduce the supernatural element. Lillet just happens to be a nomad with strange abilities who happened to empathize with Alyssa's plight. She might have done it completely on a whim, or she might have had a similar experience in the past. Lillet doesn't have the ability to cure her disease, but she does have the ability to seal her existence forever in a dream-like state at the point of death, where Alyssa would spend an endless week of playing with her friends every single day. It's either a very pretty picture of hell or a sort of paradise depending on how you choose to see it. (this is the VN-only path). If you chose the original path, Alyssa implies that she understands what Lillet wants to give her and chooses to deny it and live on using her own strength whether she survives the disease or not.

Lillet is quite convenient too since Alyssa is the only one who actually meets her. If people don't like the supernatural elements, then they can just pretend that she's a figment of Alyssa's imagination caused by delirium -- especially because her abilities don't even affect Alyssa's physical state in any way.

Ah, I forgot to add, Lillet gave Alyssa another piece of magic unrelated to her disease. I think you can tell what that might be?

Anyway, thanks again. This is one of the only three detailed reviews I've had on this story.

[Applegate]

Granted:

euphoric people probably don't bother to think about the circumstances while expressing their mirth. I did catch that they knew about it, just that they tried to pretend to her they didn't but drop it so seemed odd, but if you think about it, yes, in a moment of euphoria you do tend to neglect those kind of things.

They're lucky Alyssa knew, or she'd be completely spooked.

[lordcloudx]

edited with an explanation for the magician part, btw.

On another note, I really wanted to explore the sort of one-sided puppy love that Bryan had for Alyssa, but in the end, I decided that it just wouldn't work out without any more gratuitous use of deus ex machina, which Lillet is a personification of .

The timeline for the final chapter (original path) can be quite confusing, btw. I'd like to know, were the sequence of events clear enough for you? Specifically, the intro and the epilogue.

[Applegate]

Anyway, thanks again. This is one of the only three detailed reviews I've had on this story.

Regardless of people's claims, art tends to trump story a lot here. Those who value story over art don't tend to deign to give any responses, which is rather demotivating, haha. I think people can underestimate just how valuable it is to hear you did(n't much) like the story because of reason x over nothing at all.

As for the sequence of events, it was clear enough though it left me slightly confused when you timeskip to Alyssa's "you're going to get better!", then the letter, and then the scene that was omitted; while the order of events was clear, it felt confusing and I couldn't appreciate it as much as I think was intended.

It's funny that you mention Lillet,

I pretty much treated her as a figment of Alyssa's imagination until the magic end.

[lordcloudx]

Ah, I see. You understood it correctly although you did find it confusing. That's good to know. A much longer unreleased piece that I've finished writing has a similar "gimmick" and it's good enough for me if I know that at least someone can understand such things. I personally like being a bit confusing as long as it's understandable .

Thanks for the info. Also, I agree with your statement about art trumping story 100% even though people will deny it to death .

I'm happy that you found the time to read through this and give such a detailed response even if you didn't like it as much as Glue. You might find "Unpolished" more to your taste since I made it to be quite similar to The Wonders of Glue.

[Applegate]

I'm a straight-forward type of person; it's why most of what I write is written clearly and chronologically. At least for the future, I'd advise, as a critique for personal improvement (ha!) that you write a story as this in present tense. While I understand past tense is popular among fiction, a narration told in the past tense implies the narrator lived through the ordeals to tell of it: it gave away that Alyssa would survive.

A present tense makes the reader experience the events and emotions at the time that the narrator experiences them and creates a closer bond; it may be more difficult to write as well, but I think the added value would be worth the effort.

Or is there a particular reason you opted for the past tense in this work?

EDIT:
And I grant that there are likely people who do truly value story over art, but they aren't much the kind to give their commentary much! It's rather depressing, I know, to write something at the best of your ability and receive few comments; it's like your very best isn't even good enough to warrant any commentary.

[lordcloudx]

Heh, your suggestion makes sense. I'll definitely keep that in mind -- yes, it does work better for this story and it doesn't give away things too early. (well, I guess it's better than in some books I've read where the author explicitly states "this would lead to his demise" about 8 chapters before a character actually dies lawlz).

I opted for past tense because I'm a traditional text-only fiction writer and it's more comfortable for me that way. Nothing more than that. I also love to use in medias res in many of my writings. It just feels right to break up the chronology a bit for me. I love playing around with the structure of the story. In any case, the longer unreleased work I mentioned is written in the present tense and I've made up a convenient excuse for any tense-jumping .

I'm impressed. You even got the implication in the visual cues of the ending that Alyssa survived.

[Applegate]

Right, that makes enough sense. I also tend to write regular fiction, none of which interesting enough to publish here, and I often tend to use past tense there too because it feels more right.

I'll go read Unpolished now.

[Omnificent]

I felt that Alyssa (at least in narration) sounded educated/mature enough at times to strain my suspension of belief, even for a particularly precocious eleven-year-old. Maybe 14 at youngest, even if that may have taken some impact away from the tragedy of the situation and her relationship with her friends/parents. I'm also not sure if I can believe that the amusement park memory would be something a rough-and-tumble girl would describe in a last letter to her friends; it may have been better as simply a flashback earlier on to show what the deeper significance of her wanting to get amusement park tickets for her and her parents was. Lastly, a couple more days in the week before Lillet shows up again may have suited the slower pace of the novel better.

I did actually catch the little crush Bryan had on Alyssa, that was one of the small details that made the background characters still feel like real people.

I thought the different chapter title screen images were a nice touch and that, aside from a few grammatical errors here and there, this was quite well-written. I look forward to seeing your next work.

[lordcloudx]

Thank you for reading.

I'm glad that you caught the change in the register of Alyssa, particularly in the letter to her friends. I'm not sure that's the kind of letter that a girl her age would write either, but then again, who can really be unless you happen to be one? Then again, that letter was transcribed by her mother.

edit: The above is the convenient excuse I made up on purpose for that particular chapter.
For the rest of the chapters, I did receive some feedback similar to yours about how mature she seems for an 11 year-old, but I feel that 11 is just the right age when you are practically on the verge of adulthood. I do admit that I could have made some of her narrations less eloquent, but I'm really done with this story, even with some of its existing perceived weaknesses.
As for Alyssa being a rough and tumble tomboy, that's really just how she sees herself and isn't necessarily true.