"the main character ... not commenting on this stuff seems perfectly reasonable to me"
Maybe. I don't think it's completely implausible, but it sort of jars me out of the story that what I expected to be a major revolutionary shift had been completely unnoticed. A throw away half-sentence like "politicians started issuing major press releases in text" or "it wasn't clear if it was going to affect the political order" might have defused the problem, just to show stuff was going on, prominent in the press, but no-one was taking it seriously yet, would have made the story seem a lot more interesting to me.
it enables Matt to admit to himself how much he actually loves Gus and is committed to Gus - which he wasn't really admitting to himself
That's a really good point. I think I'd been assuming he would obviously figure that out -- even if he was scared of ever saying it, that sooner or later there'd be a prospect of losing Matt and he'd realise that couldn't let him go, even if he couldn't verbalise that. But I may be too optimistic or too unobservant of human nature, I know lots of couples do drift along with one party never able to get themselves together enough to make a serious commitment, and sometimes drift apart again. (Especially if he can't shake the idea his sister his selling that his parents will never approve.) I'm not sure it's sufficiently clear, but maybe it was important, I'm not sure...
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Date: 2014-07-16 03:19 pm (UTC)Maybe. I don't think it's completely implausible, but it sort of jars me out of the story that what I expected to be a major revolutionary shift had been completely unnoticed. A throw away half-sentence like "politicians started issuing major press releases in text" or "it wasn't clear if it was going to affect the political order" might have defused the problem, just to show stuff was going on, prominent in the press, but no-one was taking it seriously yet, would have made the story seem a lot more interesting to me.
it enables Matt to admit to himself how much he actually loves Gus and is committed to Gus - which he wasn't really admitting to himself
That's a really good point. I think I'd been assuming he would obviously figure that out -- even if he was scared of ever saying it, that sooner or later there'd be a prospect of losing Matt and he'd realise that couldn't let him go, even if he couldn't verbalise that. But I may be too optimistic or too unobservant of human nature, I know lots of couples do drift along with one party never able to get themselves together enough to make a serious commitment, and sometimes drift apart again. (Especially if he can't shake the idea his sister his selling that his parents will never approve.) I'm not sure it's sufficiently clear, but maybe it was important, I'm not sure...