It´s time for me to write my few comments here. And I guess it won´t be a short post...
First of all, this is one of the most awesome stories I ever got to read. Jestor, you have my respect and deepest appreciation.
You pulled of this story, made it what it is and you suceeded doing so in a way most people could only dream of. It´s truly the work of a genius, everything coming together. But I´ll start where all this began for me.
When I first started to read this story, everything was still fine for me. I accidently found this when looking through the AAR-section in some minutes of boredom and I started reading, anticipated by the somewhat uncommon title.
I read the first few pages in one sweep, before real-life forced me to stop reading for some time and I slowly forgot...
By this time, I was already of the opinion that this is a good AAR, worth reading despite the fact that I´m not the guy who reads through long narrative parts.
But everything matched when I started to read.
The CK-Parts excellently connected with the story-part.
At the beginning, it was quite confusing and caused some of the headache Nick experienced...
However, I forgot this story for sometime, until three weeks ago I was struck by severe problems with girlfriend breaking up with me because of some other guy, loving both and not able to decide which one to take / keep.
After she finally decided to take the other one, I was so depressed that I simply looked for something to do.
In fact, it was in this situation when your AAR came back to my mind.
Hoping for some nice lovestory, I began reading again. After the first few pages, I experienced something that usually only happens with the very best books: I got addicted to reading this.
I read everything, the Story, the comments, the guesses and speculations of the entire readership.
It was a strange experience reading through this story, especially in the state of mind that I was in.
It was like I could perfectly understand, and just didn´t understand at the same time, as Nick is a somewhat different Character than me.
However, somewhere in the middle I had to stop reading for some days, when the letter came and reminded me somewhat of my situation.....
I took my time and started reading from there again, in a better mood, and I got afflicted by it again.
The biggest negative critique I have to let lose on you is the Becky-thing... It was all too quickly, at least when reading the entire story in one part.
She appeared and 2 updates later Nick was soooo fascinated by her and stuff, although he should have though more on Melody instead.
It´s not the general happening that bothers me regarding this, but the speed... At least when reading it.
However, you got this thing rightened after some more updates, so I was finally over it a few pages later, especially as Nick recognized what going on with him...
When it came to the end, I was somehow surprised by the sudden twist, cutting out the CK-Part of the AAR for the sake of the story.
On the one hand, it speeded things up, on the other hand it had really been interesting to see even the AAR-part continue... Because, as much as I looked forward to reading the story-updates, I missed the CK-Part in the end....
Another thing about the end.... I don´t even know how to find the right words, but it was astonishing.
Just the way you managed it to keep the thrilling suspense even in the moment when the suspense was about to fade because of decisions made (especially mentioning the "choose your girl"-part at the Suchet-Party - it was intense, and I really really hoped it´d be Melody... and then you came up with using "she" instead of the name - I almost died ^^)
The duel... well... I don´t quite know what to say. That was impressive. Really impressive.
Especially as you switched the view and gave us a look into the different perspectives - It was like watching a film. It was like a screenplay for the cinema in my head.
At this point, I had already started to feel with Nick for almost 25 pages. It was not always the understanding of his actions, indeed, in certain situations I was shocked about his behaviour, but it was always those emotional parts that made me literally melt away.
Scenes like Melody showing her gems, the first weekend they spent together, the letter, the dance at the party and so on - those were the really intense ones, that made up for everything that sometimes bothered me.
But back to the duel...
Perfectly inscenated, perfectly executed and with a surprising end. With an awesome end.
I especially liked that everything came together - even small details from the beginning: Terry calling.
This was really impressive!
And in the end, love prevailed...
We all know that life´s not always that way - but it is just like there could not have been a different ending.
Not really, at least.
Not satisfying in any way.
In a moment of fascinated reading, I had tears in my eyes, although I´m not that emotional for normal.
But this really dragged me into itself...
There´s no way I could have been in this state of mind if any other ending had been chosen.
Thus, I have to bow before you, Jestor, for you have written this wonderful tale that I may never forget. It gave me a distraction, a warm shelter in one of the worst times I ever experienced, it helped getting rid of some of the worries I had.
As everytime I finish reading an excellent story, I somehow regret that it has endet... Reading such stories is just like wanting to go on reading forever
Well, this AAR does not only deserve the title of "best overall CK AAR" - but "best overall AAR"
Unfortunately, this category does not really exist yet.
However, in my opinion it is the best overall AAR I´ve read so far.
And I´ll stop here for now, of course eagerly awaiting the next AAR you´ll write.
Sincerely,
Robert