Speaking of Doyle being daft to move to such a remote place with such a major and disabling injury… Pride and depression and all allowing, I can't see him being that stupid about it - he had a go at death-wishing, it didn't work, and Doyle's a fighter, to me that's an integral part of his character, and he's smart. Then the rest of that thread - going private for the back surgery (with Doyle's socialist beliefs?), a long NHS waiting list for it (not sure about that either, not when he was in so much acute, life-threatening pain, not back in the eighties - and I've been there, seen it, done that too) and then having it done incredibly quickly privately and walking, absolutely pain-free, after apparently major surgery within 48 hours…
Otherwise, and as empty_mirrors says above, I have no sense of the characters as people in their own right, let alone Scottish, let alone Islanders. I didn't get the motivation of the doctor suddenly entertaining a gay relationship either - there was absolutely nothing to hint that he didn't have a very happy, stable het relationship with his wife. Yes, these things can come out of the blue, but again there are so many things coming out of the blue in this story that they stop ringing true after a while.
Ditto the earth-child moment about the "upper deck" of Doyle's house, and the bizarre standing stone supernatural trauma - there was so much else going on (I mean Doyle was out there about to die, right?) that it just seemed thrown in there for the sake of it.
Oh, and I must stop now, I'll probably have to double-post as it is! The worst thing is that those are all random things that have occurred to me again as I've flipped through the story - and I won't even go the way of grammar and too many typos - this isn't even me at my most picky. But so many things are what have kept dragging me "out of the story" by the scruff of my neck, it was happening on almost every page. It's not good to start laughing when you realise that one of the lads is about to faint, or burst into tears again, or on top of everything else can't get it up, or… you know? Part way through I realised that I was car-crash reading - not because I cared about these pathetic versions of the lads, but because I wondered what in the world was left to happen next...
I promise that after reading her first two stories (Chances and Broken Cover) my first thought on seeing Angelfish fic has been yeaaaaay - but it's just not panning out in either this story or the last one. It's as though she's lost any sense of balance as she tries to make the words more beautiful, the characters more traumatised, and the world a more magical place.
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timeasmymeasure
Re: Major Spoiler alert
Date: 2007-07-19 10:13 pm (UTC)Otherwise, and as
Ditto the earth-child moment about the "upper deck" of Doyle's house, and the bizarre standing stone supernatural trauma - there was so much else going on (I mean Doyle was out there about to die, right?) that it just seemed thrown in there for the sake of it.
Oh, and I must stop now, I'll probably have to double-post as it is! The worst thing is that those are all random things that have occurred to me again as I've flipped through the story - and I won't even go the way of grammar and too many typos - this isn't even me at my most picky. But so many things are what have kept dragging me "out of the story" by the scruff of my neck, it was happening on almost every page. It's not good to start laughing when you realise that one of the lads is about to faint, or burst into tears again, or on top of everything else can't get it up, or… you know? Part way through I realised that I was car-crash reading - not because I cared about these pathetic versions of the lads, but because I wondered what in the world was left to happen next...
I promise that after reading her first two stories (Chances and Broken Cover) my first thought on seeing Angelfish fic has been yeaaaaay - but it's just not panning out in either this story or the last one. It's as though she's lost any sense of balance as she tries to make the words more beautiful, the characters more traumatised, and the world a more magical place.
So... is it just me then? :s