Looking for feedback on The Confessor Pt. 3

[LucilleCF]

Hey, I just submitted part three of my Confessor series to the Sci-Fi & Fantasy section, but it hasn't received much engagement (I'm guessing because it's the third part of a series they've never heard of before).

I tried to make this one more suspenseful, but I may have overdone it. Would love some honest feedback (24,000 words/ 7 pages).


To spare you from having to read the first two parts, here's a summary of the relevant points. Spoilers ahead:









The story takes place in a fictional version of modern-day earth with a worldwide theocratic government in place. The Church exerts it's influence and control over every aspect of live from the cradle to the grave, but the areas of sex and marriage receive special attention.

Samuel, the main character, and Delilah are newlyweds. Like all newlyweds, they present themselves to one of the Church's Confessors to have their marriage approved and finalized. However, the Confessor is so attracted to Delilah that she fucks her right in front of Samuel only to send him home alone afterwards.

Samuel spends three weeks waiting for Delilah to come back home, during that time he comes into contact with a member of a terrorist group who tells Samuel the truth about the Church, and gives him directions on how to find the other terrorists.

Delilah returns, but Samuel no longer recognizes her as his wife. She has fallen in love with the Confessor and wants the three of them to be together. Samuel resists, only to be assaulted by the Confessor, who uses some strange power to subdue him, and watches as his wife gets fucked in front of him for a second time.

The Confessor leaves and Delilah tries to console Samuel, but he doesn't believe her. So, after she falls asleep, Samuel sneaks out of the house, leaving his wedding ring behind, and goes in search of the terrorists.

 

[invisible_bridges]

The prose is accomplished. The drama has force. The pacing pulls you along. Narrative hooks are in place. The eroticism is charged.

I have a problem though with the world-building. SFF world-building at its best possesses an extrapolatory rigor. It's this rigor that energizes the details, and it is the details that bring vibrancy to an imaginary world, or in 'the Confessors's' case, an imagined social structure. The world of 'the Confessor' feels sketched-in to me.

I think that this is a result of a clash of fantasy modes. There is the SFF alternate history mode, and then there is the erotic fantasy mode. 'A Handmaid's Tale'-style dystopian fiction is interrupted by a lesbian/cuck stroke fantasy.

Anyway, such quibbles aside, I'm excited to read more installments of 'the Confessor' . The drama has now taken a promising turn.

 

[LucilleCF]

The prose is accomplished. The drama has force. The pacing pulls you along. Narrative hooks are in place. The eroticism is charged.

I have a problem though with the world-building. SFF world-building at its best possesses an extrapolatory rigor. It's this rigor that energizes the details, and it is the details that bring vibrancy to an imaginary world, or in 'the Confessors's' case, an imagined social structure. The world of 'the Confessor' feels sketched-in to me.

I think that this is a result of a clash of fantasy modes. There is the SFF alternate history mode, and then there is the erotic fantasy mode. 'A Handmaid's Tale'-style dystopian fiction is interrupted by a lesbian/cuck stroke fantasy.

Anyway, such quibbles aside, I'm excited to read more installments of 'the Confessor' . The drama has now taken a promising turn.

Thanks for the feedback, and I take your criticisms. The Confessor was my first attempt at writing anything. I didn't really plan on continuing it and it's starting to show with the quality of the world building. (I haven't even specified where in the world the story is taking place )

However, I'm going to finish what I started. Then I'll probably take it off of Literotica and edit the hell out of it before I put in on Smashwords or something. :-D

 

[invisible_bridges]

If in the world of 'the Confessor', Goddess worship had replaced Christianity in the history of Western Civilization, that would have huge implications to your world's technology.

Christianity is so embedded in the development of Western thought, that without it would there be cars, TV, young people of both sexes attending college together (all of which are present in your story)? That is what I meant by rigorous extrapolation. But instead of TV, what? Scrying tech? That's where the fun of SFF world-building comes in -- the inventive details.

The energy of your story comes from the betrayal of love and the corruption of the lovers by the powerful. These are rich themes -- betrayal of others, self-betrayal, love turned into an instrument of self-destruction or self-renewal.