Nobody bets against Alice -- even Rose.

Its been said before, ahhh its a great quote!! Can Bella truly start to love Edward again? it seems so unlikely....we trust you Alice..

She's my life, you know, Mark wrote at one point, and Edward replied, Mine, too.

oh, well done,  this is very touching, my eyes dazzle...

Bella is number one on his speed dial.SWEET he obviously loves her more than ever but its a paternal kind of protectivness.. ahhh but where's all the passion gone? surely the chair has not changed that between them? that'd suck...

Author's Response:

10 years and Bella's grief changed it. ;>  It takes time to get over the loss of a spouse.

Its a shelter not a bar Emmett! ha ha lol funny...

I just LOVE Rosalie, she's such a great character - I'm looking forward too next chapter...

He'll be whatever she wants, for as long as she wants.

You have the best last lines!!!!!sigh...

ohhhh speechless! I'll be back and onto next chapter after I cook my poor hungry family dinner...

this is too good to stop and review.....ahhh!! ive got to keep reading....

Talk about getting there in the nick of time... (hopefully). That was very intense writing and I was so caught up in it.

I knew she would be sitting. Thank you!!!

I can't say how happy I am for Bella that at least Charlie and Martha are in on the secret and her change. She might be able to see them come time. I also share your opinion that it was wise not to tell Renee.

I feel sorry for Edward that he is so tormented, but it was to be expected, wasn't it?! :)

I *adored* the takeout line. It was just one of those *brilliant* little moments where a character gets summed up in a single line. And you already know I'm a HUGE fan of Martha. I say, screw reviews, just write a new piece only about her. Or write a book about her. I'd buy it. :)

The way Martha took the news in this chapter I thought was very spot-on for her character. She cares about Bella, first and foremost, and so of course that's first on her mind. Whatever happen, happens, and as long as these vampires seem to love Bella, that's all that matters. I liked that a lot, because that's really the message in the books as well. It's about the who and the why, and not about the what. (I'll get to the God doesn't make mistakes prayer later--but that was a genius stroke, too.)

I admit though, that the use of Southern dialect / AAE (wasn't sure which one you were going for, and the two dialects overlap quite a bit) for Martha threw me, and I don't remember being thrown by it in previous Martha chapters--did you always do it? I felt tension here (and in the next few parts) between your tendancy toward perfect SAE grammar and the task of getting a nice natural rhythm flowing with Martha's speech, and I kind of wanted you to either lessen its use to a handful of really key places or really pull out the stops. But then, AAE is a sticking point for me, in a way I fully admit it is not for others!

 

Author's Response:

I was actually trying to do AAE and probably accidentally falling more into Southern because while I've (obviously) been around it (a lot), I wasn't RAISED with it, and that matters.  And yes, I've used AAE for Martha all along ... and it's interestingly got me slammed by a few people who were (I *suspected* from their email but can't be certain of) WHITE.  So far, the AA readers I have (who mentioned it), love it or ignore it.  I'd expect, if someone objected and WAS AA, they'd say so, but I can't be sure, so I won't say with 100% accuracy that the complainers were none of them AA, but I think they were from several clues.  I find that ... interesting.  I had three different AA reviewers who actually thanked me for 1) letting Martha use the dialect but 2) making it obviously they're anything but dumb, and at least one remarked ont he fact Martha and her kids talk differently, which was fully intended.  Mark's English was pretty much standard most of the time, although he could certainly do dialect when he wanted.  Same with Jada (although less with Rosa, although you never meet her).  But that's been my experience; even within families, the degree of dialect usage varies.  My ex- totally DIDN'T read that way and even over the phone with the slight vocal difference, some people actually thougth him white.  But his brother -- who actually had a higher degree than he did? -- totally AAE much of the time unless he was giving a presentation, then he'd flip to standard Midwestern no-accent like a switch.  Completely the craziest thing!  I loved it!  (The only thing I did not do with Martha was use some of the classic transposed pronunciations like aksed, because I wasn't entirely sure how to *spell* that and not have it be completely confusing.  I'm hoping readers HEAR it anyway.)

But yeah, I'm not surprised if I sometimes lost the AAE for sheer rural Southern. Ha.  See, that's the sort of thing I should get YOU to read back through it for, since it's your speciality, and fix Martha's speech, because I'm quite sure I blew it in places.  If I were still with the ex, I'd have had him read it and fix it.

Shneezle. I am a solid ten chapters behind. *Gah.* Oh well, this will be interesting, because I'll be thinking backward and forward at the same time.

What I liked in this Chapter was the raising of a really mundane issue (well mundane is probably the wrong word. But very normal, *human* issue, as opposed to the issues posed by the vampires, turning, the Volturi etc.) that you've been foreshadowing through the use of the shelter--that it makes only perfect sense that Edward would be the first go-to as the suspect for the disappearance. I remember when a woman went disappearing in my state the year before last and we were all screaming at the news, "It's the husband! It's the husband!" And it was. Because that's the usual reality. So I really liked that you took the opportunity to run with that here--even though *we're* all on Edward's side, it's very nice to realize that the rest of the world doesn't automatically presume he's flawless--and in fact, probably quite the opposite.

Author's Response:

Hey, NO need to apologize.  I actually have the latest chapter of Ithaca open on a tab, waiting for when this next part is posted and the last edited the final time and ready to be posted.  It's my REWARD. *grin*  I expect it to be very emotional, considering the first 4-5 paragraphs I read.

And yes, on husbands.  The percentages are really frightening.  I remember seeing them, way back when in women's studies, and it was something between 85 and 90% (87% is sticking in my head, but I'm not sure that's right), as a national average for cases of missing adult women.  Husband, boyfriend or (a little less commonly) lover (in cases of adultery).  In Bella's case, because of the Brady thing, the *police* might be a little more willing to think it COULD be Brady (or another husband) here because shelter workers are sometimes victims, but Edward would very MUCH be on the table until the ransom video.