love this
This was bautifully written!!! I havent read this one yet but i have a clue what in getting myself into. You really saved from tons of anxiety and rage for this Raymond guy. I think with your narritive it might even be more enjoyable
Yeah! I agreed with you. This is why the story seems realistic.
Omg i am so glad I was able to help even a little bit! I really was frustrated at Raymond at times but there is a difference between being angry at a character and angry at an author. Everything he does is within character and very much understandable in his situation, it's just we know that it's not exactly right. But if we were in his shoes, i am pretty sure most of us will do what he did. He was one of the most realistic characters i have read for a while and I am happy it stayed that way and the author didn't give us clichés!!
Yes yes yes!!!
I understand all the comments hating on Raymond and despising him, finding even his redemption late and unsatisfying.
However, I speak as someone who has written a character like him before and was too emotionally invested in him, I really am so FUCKING glad the author never changed his personality. He is egotistic and selfish, and that much never changed because that's who he was and who he came to be ever since he was 8. Love can make you a better person but some things are just the way they are, and love won't change them. It would've been too cliché if he became a completely different and warm hearted person just because he fell for Ian, and anyway Ian loved him knowing who he truly was.
Having the "i know he is not a good person," inner monologue wasn't just for show.
You so have to bear in mind this is a man who lived nearly 10 years of his life thirsting for revenge, and it was ingrained in him since he was a child not just from witnessing a traumatic event (his father being unjustly executed) but also from the guilt and pressure of Martha and whoever else was harmed due to being close to his father. If he had this life goal and worked day and night and breathed it then how do you expect a simple boy or just love to change him overnight. Did he trample over Ian's heart and use him? Yes. But Ian was aware of it and CHOSE to stay regardless so really... It was mutual.
I think what the author tried to convey and what mattered the most in the end isn't that Raymond should change and become someone else or be something he never was, it's that he chose to not let his bad habits and traits to ruin what he and Ian have. It's that he recognized his mistake. It's that he let go of revenge in hopes of having a better life. It was all about his last monologue of hiding all his filthy sides of possessiveness and selfishness from Ian because he just wants his love and wants to love him, and I think that in itself is a huge step to someone like Raymond who never allowed himself to be attached to anyone else before.
Anyway that's just my opinion!