Face-Lift 1534

Guess the Plot

We the Brazen

1. Ever-expanding robot hive mind Izkssisst runs out of materials for their next generation in a rocky asteroid belt. They resort to using brass, which leads to a splintering of the commune. Can we new Tissizks branch off on our own, or do we truly wish to be a part of the them?

2. When Clam gets tasked with cooking for a diplomat, she has no idea he'll turn out to be a young child. On the bright side, it means she'll only have to make pizza and chicken fingers.

3. It takes a lot of gall to march into the governor's mansion, take paintings off the walls, and burn them, but that's what the new tri delta pledges have to do. It's hazing, 2025-style.

 

Original Version

WE THE BRAZEN is a high fantasy standalone with series potential, complete at 76K words. Fans of Deeplight by Frances Hardinge may enjoy the focus on friendship and the underwater setting.

Clam swore she would kill the next master she could get her hands on, [She must've been really steamed. Get it? Steamed clam.] and they heard her. [Not thrilled with "Clam" as the name of a main character, though I'll allow that it's better than "Lobster."] [Who is this "they" that heard her? The masters?] For twenty years she was condemned to kitchen work, never to serve an Exalted again. [Is serving an Exalted a cushy job? Because I think I'd rather work in a kitchen than serve some highbrow snob who considers himself exalted. Are the Exalted masters?] ["Condemned" is a pretty strong word for kitchen work, a job millions of people choose, and billions do in their own homes. Judge: I find you guilty as charged, and condemn you to 20 years as a personal chef.]

When she’s put to work under a young, disabled diplomat named Asran, she begins to suspect she was sent to him because of her threat, not despite it. Her home is a eugenicist dystopia, [Do you mean Asran's home? She was sent to him, right? I assume she works in his kitchen.] and does not take kindly to people like Asran. [Meaning disabled diplomats?] As much as she wants to make good on her promise, she's unwilling to kill a sweet child. [If "they" want Asran gone or dead, why don't they just banish or kill him?] [Wait, Asran is a child? And a diplomat?]

Her suspicions only deepen when she’s sent an unsigned letter that instructs her to give him foods he’s deathly allergic to. She must try to keep him and herself alive in a hostile world, and find out [identify? expose?] Asran’s would-be-murderer before they can finish the job. [If they were willing to finish the job, they would have done it already, instead of trying to get Clam to do it.]

___________ is [I am] a first reader for The Colored Lens and has [have] an affinity for the strange and the fantastic. They are [I am] autistic like Asran, and enjoy staying up too late talking to their [my] friends.

Notes

Does this sweet child, Asran, have parents? If so, I think they would be interested in finding whoever sent the letter. Why is Clam the one investigating?

If I want Asran to eat deadly food, I think I'd sneak it into his food myself, rather than tell someone else to do it, which leaves a a paper trail.

I'm not clear on what the eugenicist dystopia is. Is that Clam's homeland? The home she lived in before she was sent to Asran's home? Is she working in Asran's home, even though the people in this home don't take kindly to people like him?

My problems are with the plot, as much as the query, unless the query is giving me the wrong ideas about the plot, in which case you need to clarify the plot points I brought up.