MobileRead Short Story Anthology - [DISCUSSION & REVIEW]

[arjaybe]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

This is horrible. With every read, I'm finding more spelling mistakes. I wonder if LibreOffice has AutoComplete, fracking up my typing without me seeing it.

Also...

Spoiler:

Should I give the country, the village, the order, the temple, the clearing and the graveyard names? It would make the story longer, probably crossing 8K words.

I didn't notice the lack of names on my first reading. It's too late tonight, so I'll get back to it tomorrow.

[mrmarlowe]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

Spoiler:

Should I give the country, the village, the order, the temple, the clearing and the graveyard names? It would make the story longer, probably crossing 8K words.

I doubt it. This is a short story, not a novel. Besides, I don't think everything has to have a name. Hell, in my first book even the protagonist doesn't have a name.

[Graham]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

I'm reading them now, in bed. At 3AM. I'm thinking about getting some sleep as I need to be up again at 8.

Now, that's dedication!

Graham

[mrmarlowe]

Originally Posted by Graham

Now, that's dedication!

Graham

Hey, you're up still?

[Graham]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

Also...

Spoiler:

Should I give the country, the village, the order, the temple, the clearing and the graveyard names? It would make the story longer, probably crossing 8K words.

Spoiler:

No need. It didn't bother me while reading the story. (Working on my comments now.)

Graham

[Graham]

I enjoyed the story, Katsunami.

My thoughts:

Spoiler:

Plot

The heroine of the story is currently Lady Marlena, not Elani. For us to believe that the goddess would choose Elani over Koryna we have to see Elani defeat the Lich.

The relationship between all three of the Ladies is too cosy, for me. In particular, Koryna and Marlena seem to be telling each other stuff that they both know just to get the information across to the reader.

Koryna's just too nice about Elani, and about losing her position as the next Ayreia.

What would you think about recasting Koryna so that she thought she was the goddess's gift to mankind, the best choice for Ayreia, and that Elani was a waste of space? This would give you lots more conflict from the moment Elani bumps into her in the corridor. It would make the point of view much clearer in the Reflections scene, as it could start with Koryna still fuming internally. This scene would then become more of an argument between Koryna and Marlena, and you're setting Koryna up for an eventual fall when Marlena reveals that the goddess commanded her to not choose Elani as assistant (that was a very nice twist that I didn't see coming), which would be even more satisfying.

The appearance of the ghouls and the rising of Nychandros feel like they've come off a D&D wandering monster table. How could you ground these more in the plot? Do you need the glade? When Elani is running away, upset and emotional, could she stumble on the lich's resting place and somehow trigger its release? (You wouldn't be able to use the ghouls but you could replace them with something like skeletal guards.)

In Elani's interview with Marlena, the emotional outburst from Elani came as a bit of a surprise to me. Can you think of a way to indicate that there's turmoil bubbling under during the opening scene? It was only at this point that I realised why Elani was unsure whether to take her quarterstaff with her when she left her room. Perhaps you could strengthen that more so that it becomes a clearer symbol of the doubt that she is struggling with?

The fact that Marlena is so kind and understanding about the doubts also made me unsure why Elani blew up so suddenly. Can you see a way to make Marlena more dismissive, at least from Elani's point of view?

On a minor note, I found that Elani was weakened because she dithered at the door. She could still argue internally with herself but knock and enter. That way we'd be rooting for inner strong Elani.

At the end of the Recovering Determination scene, the internal revelations actually resolve everything. She decides to go back to the temple and start again. In essence we're back to the start of the story at the end of page four. Can you think of a way to build the tension rather than defuse it here? Could she still be arguing with her inner thoughts? Note that it's not necessary to the current plot that she is heading back to the temple, as she gets attacked and then brought back there by the priestesses.

Dialogue

This is probably due to you working in English, with Dutch as your native language, but I found much of the dialogue to be a bit overworked; I didn't believe that the characters would actually say all the words that they do. Try speaking it all out loud. Perform the story as a play. In quite a lot of cases characters could leave things unsaid and we'd still understand the story.

Other stuff

There are elements that will confuse anyone who's never played D&D, e.g.

• "She spoke a single word, making a dimension door appear before her."
• "she had used all of her healing spells already"
• Having to think through the way her magic works while in the first instants of intense combat interrupts the flow. Can you make this much shorter, or plant the type of magic earlier, in some way?

Small slip in POV: "The high priestess was taken unawares. Of all the possible problems she could imagine, this was the one she would never have considered. For a few moments, she was at a loss for words." - This paragraph is from Marlena's point of view, but we've been firmly in Elani's head up to then.

Probably a translation issue: in the scuffle in the corridor you wrote that Koryna 'nearly avoided' the staff, which means that the staff actually hit her, not the wall. You want something like 'only just avoided' or 'narrowly avoided'.

'Lady Ariana' is a little confusing as the other main characters are also Ladies. It may just be me though. See if this bothered anyone else.

I didn't believe that Marlena and Koryna would still be sitting in Marlena's room all that time. I got a sense that at least a few hours had passed and it had grown very dark.

Minor one: "Marlena got up and walked to one of the windows, staring out at the slowly setting sun while leaning on her white staff" - why is she holding her staff if she's been sitting down? There's also a slight issue with the sentence as written, i.e. how can she be leaning on her staff if she's walking to the windows?

Finally:

“I'm a healer, not a fighter,” made me immediately think of Star Trek and "Dammit Jim! I'm a doctor, not an engineer!"

Graham

[Graham]

Originally Posted by mrmarlowe

When My Father 'Died' - v.1-6 now uploaded, thanks.

It's definitely good that you've combined Mr Zant and the guy from the South, however, moving all of that into the opening of the story unbalances things a bit.

Spoiler:

The opening sequence was stronger before, as we go very clearly from the funeral into the ghostly happenings. The emphasis now is on the contracts which isn't your main plot thread. Can you feed this information in more slowly, a bit later on? These are the things that the guy from the South wants to discuss which the son has no time for.

You've made the shadowy figure clearer throughout now, thanks.

The ending is better than it was, but can you tighten it up? By adding the additional detail it's lost some of the punch you had before.

Graham

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by Graham

I enjoyed the story, Katsunami.

Thanks Before commenting on the other stories (damn, that's a lot of work, doing them one after the other), I'll comment on your comments first You're quite right with some of them, and there are some nice suggestions in there. However, I have some difficulties with others. Not because they're wrong, but because I think I will be unable to get the story to work correctly if I followed up on them.

As you mention (A)D&D, I assume you have at least a general working knowlege of the RPG system, so I'll use it to explain the balance of power and, thus, some of my thinking. Maybe you will be able to proivde some suggestions with regard to implementing your insights

Spoiler:

The heroine of the story is currently Lady Marlena, not Elani. For us to believe that the goddess would choose Elani over Koryna we have to see Elani defeat the Lich.

===

There's a problem here. While there are many high priestesses, there will always be only one Ayreia, the most powerful woman in the order. At her age of nearly 80, she will be akin to a Cleric level 21/Wizard Level 18 combo (= nearly indestructible by normal mortals) so I need a hugely powerful monster to get her killed.

As Elani is only 27, al be it more powerful than expected (+/- Cleric level 15), she would be utterly incapable of defeating that lich. It's not logical to bestow those powers onto her, taking her lack of experience (no assignments) and her age into account.

I would like the following things to stay in place:
- The Ayreia, aged 75-80, must be *a lot* more powerful than Elani, aged 27, at least during the story itself. It might change after Elani's ascension.
- I don't want the goddess to interfere; I don't want her killing the lich, or (temporarily) transferring Marlena's power into Elani. I *hate* Deus Ex Machina constructions.

Do you have any suggestions on how to keep this power discrepancy in place, and still make Elani do something worthwile, while at the same time *almost* getting Marlena killed, so I can keep the "Lady Elani" scene in place?

Spoiler:

The relationship between all three of the Ladies is too cosy, for me. In particular, Koryna and Marlena seem to be telling each other stuff that they both know just to get the information across to the reader.

Koryna's just too nice about Elani, and about losing her position as the next Ayreia.

What would you think about recasting Koryna so that she thought she was the goddess's gift to mankind, the best choice for Ayreia, and that Elani was a waste of space? This would give you lots more conflict from the moment Elani bumps into her in the corridor. It would make the point of view much clearer in the Reflections scene, as it could start with Koryna still fuming internally. This scene would then become more of an argument between Koryna and Marlena, and you're setting Koryna up for an eventual fall when Marlena reveals that the goddess commanded her to not choose Elani as assistant (that was a very nice twist that I didn't see coming), which would be even more satisfying.

===

You're correct. Elani and Koryna are friends. You're basically suggesting I rewrite Koryna to be Elani's adversary, without Elani knowing this. It would mean that she (Koryna) can't root for Elani during the Scrying Mirror scene, and that she won't be eager to rescue Elani.

I don't understand your suggestion with regard to setting up Koryna for a fall. She and Marlena had expected Elani to be chosen as assistant, but instead Koryna gets that position. Koryna now believes she will be next Ayreia, despite she herself thinking Elani to be the better choice.

Why would the goddess first choose Koryna as an assistant, and then switch to Elani as Ayreia? The story was set up to point out that Ariana had chosen Elani as Ayreia almost twenty years ago, without anybody knowing; not even Elani herself.

In short, Koryna never "lost" the Ayreia position; she was set up to believe she might become the Ayreia, only to find out that Ariana had planned for her to be the Ayreia's assistant (first, Marlena, later Elani) all along.

This is also the reason why Koryna and Elani are friends. The goddess knows everything. As I have her in mind as a character in other stories, she would never appoint someone to be Ayreia and give her an enemy as assistant.

I would like some more insight into your way of thinking with regard to these relationships.

Spoiler:

The appearance of the ghouls and the rising of Nychandros feel like they've come off a D&D wandering monster table. How could you ground these more in the plot? Do you need the glade? When Elani is running away, upset and emotional, could she stumble on the lich's resting place and somehow trigger its release? (You wouldn't be able to use the ghouls but you could replace them with something like skeletal guards.)

===

Correct; I was looking for a way to have Elani attacked, and for Marlena to go after her, to get (almost) killed. Maybe the ghouls were indeed a bit too much AD&D-like.

By the way, the flight to the glade is a reference to the Shannara video game, and yes, in the game, there's a locket in the willow as well (edit: thinking about it, Jack Ohmsford, actually gets attacked in that glade as well, being saved by Allanon. Allanon just zaps the monster, however.)

I don't *need* the glade, but I want it there as a reference. I think I might first have Elani flee to the glade, but dropping the locket and the interjections of the goddess to shorten the scene. When Elani can't get her act together in the clearing, I could move her to the graveyard, having her go to the grave of her dead parents to pray, and having her fall alseep there.

After it is dark and she awakens, she'll try to conjure up a light, but her magic will be internally blocked because of her turmoil (and she doesn't have a locket, in this version). She stumbles about the graveyard in darkness, at some point freeing the lich; either inadvertently, or by being tricked into it somehow.

As she starts to fight it, she uses her magic instinctively, not thinking about her belief or the loss thereof, and it so comes back to her.

How does that sound? (And... do you have any suggestions on how I can get Elani to kill the lich, while also getting Marlena to come out and *almost* get killed?

PS: The priestess' magic is given by the gods, where the wizard's magic is purely studied, just like in AD&D, at this point. Without belief and devotion, the priestess won't be able to use magic.

Spoiler:

In Elani's interview with Marlena, the emotional outburst from Elani came as a bit of a surprise to me. Can you think of a way to indicate that there's turmoil bubbling under during the opening scene? It was only at this point that I realised why Elani was unsure whether to take her quarterstaff with her when she left her room. Perhaps you could strengthen that more so that it becomes a clearer symbol of the doubt that she is struggling with?

===

Good suggestion; I thought the sighing, the disparaging of the book ("It's something I have no use for") and the hesitancy in taking the staff would be enough turmoil, but apparantly not. I'll see if I can increase it, and also link it to the battle scene somehow, to make her realise that everything she has been studying *was/is* worth it.

The staff is a personal item; a badge of office, if you will. Maybe I will have Elani pick it up, examine it, put it back again, maybe even cast it aside and then still going back into the room to take it with her.

Spoiler:

The fact that Marlena is so kind and understanding about the doubts also made me unsure why Elani blew up so suddenly. Can you see a way to make Marlena more dismissive, at least from Elani's point of view?

On a minor note, I found that Elani was weakened because she dithered at the door. She could still argue internally with herself but knock and enter. That way we'd be rooting for inner strong Elani.

===

Good suggestions, thanks.

Spoiler:

At the end of the Recovering Determination scene, the internal revelations actually resolve everything. She decides to go back to the temple and start again. In essence we're back to the start of the story at the end of page four. Can you think of a way to build the tension rather than defuse it here? Could she still be arguing with her inner thoughts? Note that it's not necessary to the current plot that she is heading back to the temple, as she gets attacked and then brought back there by the priestesses.

===

Hm. You're right. Elani gets attacked and carried back to the temple. No need to have her decide to return there. I'll think I'll incorporate this into the rewrite of the Recovering Determination scene, and have her go to the graveyard.

Spoiler:

This is probably due to you working in English, with Dutch as your native language, but I found much of the dialogue to be a bit overworked; I didn't believe that the characters would actually say all the words that they do. Try speaking it all out loud. Perform the story as a play. In quite a lot of cases characters could leave things unsaid and we'd still understand the story.

====

My modus operandi is fully English. I'm not thinking in Dutch and translating to English before I write or say anything. The problem is probably caused due to the fact that I have never written any dialogue myself before writing this story, nor seen any play. I hate theatre plays.

Do you have any suggestions on how to improve the dialogue, and maybe point out some points that are especially wrong?

Spoiler:

There are elements that will confuse anyone who's never played D&D, e.g...

===

You may be right. I think I'll rewrite those passages, just having Elani cast spells as she needs to, and then run out of them, either due to power drainage or just having no spells left. Everybody will understand that.

I want my world's magic to be more diverse than the magic used by Terry Brooks for example: the only thing the most powerful man around can do is have visions and burn stuff up using Blue Druid Magic (and sometimes, disappear).

Spoiler:

POV slip: oops. Will fix that.

Spoiler:

Probably a translation issue: in the scuffle in the corridor you wrote that Koryna 'nearly avoided' the staff, which means that the staff actually hit her, not the wall. You want something like 'only just avoided' or 'narrowly avoided'.

===

You lie! I didnt write that. I don't translate during writing.

*checks*

Damn. You didn't lie. That should have been "barely".

Ah. I know! It must have been a corrupted upload then

Spoiler:

'Lady Ariana' is a little confusing as the other main characters are also Ladies. It may just be me though. See if this bothered anyone else.

Yes. Thought about that as well. I think I'll do it like this:

-Call Ariana "Thaya" (goddess) everywhere.
-Have the priestesses just call eachoter by their first names.
-Have the priestesses call Marlena "Lady" or "Ayreia", depending on formality of occasion.
-Have Marlena call the priestesses either "Lady" or just by their first name, depending on formality.
-Drop any titles before "said", except for Thaya Ariana, to make it especially clear that she is apart from and above anyone with regard to status and power:

"... ... ....," Elani said.
"... ... ....," Marlena said.
"... ... ....," Thaya Ariana said.

What do you think of this?


I didn't believe that Marlena and Koryna would still be sitting in Marlena's room all that time. I got a sense that at least a few hours had passed and it had grown very dark.

Doubted that. I thought about having Koryna leave. I actually removed all indications of time from the story to be able to leave her in that room. I'll probably rewrite it to have her leave at some point, being called back later.

Minor one: "Marlena got up and walked to one of the windows, staring out at the slowly setting sun while leaning on her white staff" - why is she holding her staff if she's been sitting down? There's also a slight issue with the sentence as written, i.e. how can she be leaning on her staff if she's walking to the windows?

Missed that. I wanted her to get a hold of her staff somehow, so I could describe her as she turned around: white hair, robe and staff, with azure eyes, sash and glow. I needed that in place for Elani's transformation at the end. Somehow I'll have Marlena pick up her staff *after* she reaches the window and *then* lean on it, to give her almost 80-year old body some support.

Finally:

“I'm a healer, not a fighter,” made me immediately think of Star Trek and "Dammit Jim! I'm a doctor, not an engineer!"

Was it THAT clear? Booh!

But you didn't mention the 'deflector shield' Mwuahaha

I even thought about having Elani say: "She's dead, Koryna", but I didn't think it appropriate.

edit: Dude. You review so quickly

I'm now just going through your story again to type up the comments, and then I'll have three more to go

[Graham]

Lots to think about.

Spoiler:

How could Elani defeat the Lich if Marlena is so much more powerful?

Here are a few ideas:

• Marlena could weaken it, giving Elani time to recover, but then be badly hurt. Then Elani could have just enough strength to finish it off.
  
• Marlena could be fighting it and losing, when Elani spots a weakness of the Lich and takes advantage of it. This would have to be foreshadowed in some way. Possibly coming out of all that book learning, but I'm not sure why Marlena herself wouldn't know this.
  
• Elani could have some power that even Marlena didn't know about, such as the ability to absorb a magical draining attack of the Lich. Marlena finds her near death, beats back the Lich while suffering terribly, and in the meantime Elani's power is growing dramatically. She then explodes into action.

Koryna, Nice or Not?

I'll put your comments here in italics to separate them from my answers.

You're correct. Elani and Koryna are friends. You're basically suggesting I rewrite Koryna to be Elani's adversary, without Elani knowing this. It would mean that she (Koryna) can't root for Elani during the Scrying Mirror scene, and that she won't be eager to rescue Elani.

I suppose my suggestion is that they're not friends. Though perhaps they could become so in time.

Koryna could act as I suggest without being wholly bad. If she has some negative character traits such as self-importance, or snobbishness, she could still be nice deep down but begin the story as an antagonist to Elani. It gives her character somewhere to go during the tale, a way to develop.

She could look down on Elani for all sorts of reasons, but still root for her in the Scrying Mirror scene. Just because you don't think well of someone doesn't mean that you want them to get hurt, or that you wouldn't try to rescue them. That would tell us that she isn't all bad, too.

I don't understand your suggestion with regard to setting up Koryna for a fall. She and Marlena had expected Elani to be chosen as assistant, but instead Koryna gets that position. Koryna now believes she will be next Ayreia, despite she herself thinking Elani to be the better choice.

(Not so nice) Koryna may secretly believe so deep down inside, but her character flaws shout that down. She tells herself that Marlena and the goddess couldn't possibly be wrong, so she must be better than Elani. That feeds into her sense of self-importance. Other people defer to her because of it, and this makes her even more big-headed. Her own nagging doubts would just make her lash out at Elani even more. Perhaps Elani doesn't even understand what makes Koryna hate her so?

Why would the goddess first choose Koryna as an assistant, and then switch to Elani as Ayreia? The story was set up to point out that Ariana had chosen Elani as Ayreia almost twenty years ago, without anybody knowing; not even Elani herself.

For the reasons that you already give now in the story. To test Elani, to forge her. To make her work. Without this, Elani wouldn't have become the woman she has. Does this mean that there's something in Elani's past that we need to know? Was she lazy once?

In short, Koryna never "lost" the Ayreia position; she was set up to believe she might become the Ayreia, only to find out that Ariana had planned for her to be the Ayreia's assistant (first, Marlena, later Elani) all along.

It's the finding out that's the 'fall' I refer to.

• 'Not so nice' Koryna goes into Marlena's office fuming about that clumsy Elani bashing into her in the corridor.
• She gets into a bit of a heated argument with Marlena, expecting Marlena to take her side.
• Marlena reveals that the goddess commanded her to choose Koryna as assistant even though Elani was clearly the better choice.
• The bottom therefore drops out of Koryna's world. Marlena doesn't think she's the best.

This puts Koryna into some nice turmoil herself, for you to play with. If she's not the best, maybe she's not going to be Ayreia? How can that woman be better than her, especially given [insert reason for snobbishness here]?

This is also the reason why Koryna and Elani are friends. The goddess knows everything. As I have her in mind as a character in other stories, she would never appoint someone to be Ayreia and give her an enemy as assistant.

You could have a lot of fun developing this friendship from a very unpromising start, though, and it would feel much richer because of it. The goddess would know how it will eventually turn out.

From Glade to Graveyard

The trouble with placing a reference to the Shannara video game is that it won't mean anything to anyone who hasn't played the game, but could feel like plagiarism to anyone who has. It also has the same problem as the "I'm a healer, not a fighter!" line, which is that anyone who gets the reference is immediately snapped out of your story, breaking the flow that you're working hard to create.

So, by all means include the glade and the locket if they advance the plot, but not otherwise. Yes, moving on and into the graveyard is good. A graveyard's always more promising for a story than a glade!

Now the suggestion about visiting her parents' graves is excellent. I immediately want to know more. She's only 26, why did they both die so young? Does she visit them often? If so, and she's going there for comfort why didn't she go straight there rather than the glade? If not, what is it about her emotional stress that makes her decide to go to the graveyard now?

Long time in Marlena's room

Actually, it's struck me that Koryna was on her way there with a stack of papers, and she's Marlena's assistant. If they had a pile of work to do, they could plausibly still be doing it much later on.

Note that if it is dark in the forest or graveyard when they do the scry, then when Marlena looks out of the window just before, the sun should already have set.

Dialogue Suggestions

I'll tackle this in another post later on.

Graham

[Graham]

One more thing that's just struck me. The story title is Crisis of Faith, so the resolution of this would have most power if it came at the most climactic moment of the story.

Spoiler:

So, do you think Elani's doubts should be dispelled in some way during the fight with the Lich?

Given your comments about this being D&D-style clerical magic this makes sense. Could something click with Elani when she (and Marlena) are all but beaten, and her powers flood back, giving her that last extra boost that she needs to beat the Lich?

Graham

[Graham]

Regarding Elani's parents:

Spoiler:

Whoops, sorry. I'd missed/forgotten this bit:

"after my parents died in that accident... after the horse and cart went over the side of that cliff south of our village"

That probably means that it needs a bit more weight in the story. You'd have a chance to build on this in the new graveyard scene, which means that Elani wouldn't need to say this to Marlena (which is basically telling Marlena something that she already knows so that we as readers can find out).

Graham

[Graham]

Reading through my various comments on the Marlowe and Katsunami stories above, it's probably time to repeat that these are just my thoughts, of course. I'm learning a lot through this process myself, and I don't claim to know all the answers!

In the interest of expediency I'm not writing 'I think' or 'my feeling is that' in front of everything, but please be assured that it's there every time.

Graham

[Katsunami]

Thanks You have given me some nice ideas. I won't explain everything here now, because I'll spoil the "new" story for you. However, I'll incorporate some of your suggestions:

Spoiler:

1. Elani will become quite a different character, creating additional possibilities regarding the Lich fight and her relationship to Koryna and Marlena.
2. Koryna will not only believe she is the better cleric, it will actually be the truth, at the beginning of the story at least.
3. Having been appointed assistant, Koryna is strengthened in the belief she is the better cleric and will one day succeed Marlena as next Ayreia.
4. Koryna and Elani are good friends, but Elani will have a trait that really ticks Koryna off, big time.
5. The "Reflections" scene will become an argument between Marlena and Koryna, regarding points 2, 3 and 4, after Marlena tells her that *she* wouldn't have chosen Koryna as an assistant but was commanded by her goddess to do so.
6. After Elani becomes Ayreia, Koryna will see she has been wrong and that it was only a matter of time for Elani to skyrocket to the top position; something Marlena and Ariana realized a long time ago already. She will now fully support Elani without hard feelings.

Extra: I'll remove the ghouls, the locket, and Ariana's interjection int he glade scene. I'll keep the description in place. I think only VERY few readers who have played the Shannara game AND remember the opening scene of it well enough will recognize it. The reference to McCoy will be removed, and the staff's deflector shield renamed

Edit: don't worry. You have brought up some very valid points, and you have handed me some great ideas to make the story work better.

PS: Graham, if you have any suggestions regarding the dialogue, they'd be most welcome. As I said in one of my other comments, I've never written a single line of dialog before March 6, so that'll probably be the problem. Maybe I could just copy some dialog and poems from Lord of the Rings? Hm... better not.

[Graham]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

Thanks You have given me some nice idea's. I won't explain everything here now, because I'll spoil the "new" story for you.

It all sounds very intriguing.

Looking forward to the next version.

Graham

[arjaybe]

Thank goodness we have Graham. Now I can just read his critiques and toss in a couple of tidbits.

Spoiler:

Rather than pass out and wake up later, saved, Elani could muster one final burst of magic that helps Marlena defeat the lich, but doesn't save her.

The relationship between Elani and Koryna is fine. I understand your portrayal of service and humility. I don't think you need conflict between them.

I can't comment on the fantasy and RPG connections.

When I read it I thought the "nearly avoided" was a typo for "neatly avoided." That's what you really meant, right?-)

Jim