Nan, your new story shows us once again why you are one of the best-loved writers of Lois and Clark fanfiction. Your prose flows flawlessly; your portaits of the Kent kids are so well done and very interesting; it's absolutely fascinating to see the kids discover unexpected super abilities in themselves; and they interact very well with each other and with their father. And you sure manage to build the suspense as you keep us wondering why the Kent kids are being kept under surveillance.
But because I am one of the world's most die-hard Lois and Clark fans, I would have liked to see more of Lois and Clark in your story, too. The love and togetherness of Lois and Clark is what I'm always looking for in any LC fanfic story, which is not to say that I expect every other Lois and Clark fan to share my preferences here. Obviously, in any next generation story, you are going to see rather less of Lois and Clark and rather more of their children. But for myself, I can never accept the idea that Lois and Clark's love and togetherness becomes less interesting and important once they are married and have children than it was before. And I can't accept the idea that this "married love" should just be there as a sort of comfortable background, not to be much commented on, in stories about Lois and Clark's children.
As I said, I'm obviously just speaking for myself here, and I have absolutely no idea how many other fans out there might agree with me. More to the point, the question of what readers think about writers' stories is not all-important. Creating a story, "giving birth" to it as it were, is such an intensely personal thing. A story can really only flow from the writer's own imagination, dreams, and preferences. In other words: We readers can't tell the writers what to write. We should be grateful that there are so many creative, hugely talented writers out there, with their own unique takes on this incredibly fascinating couple, Lois and Clark. And Nan, you are certainly one of the best.
Nevertheless, just this once, I'm still going to ask you to reconsider your way of showing us Lois in this story. The title of your story is "Mother's Day", and I assume that the mother you refer to here is Lois. Why not try to work Lois into the story more than you have done so far, considering the name of your story seems to be referring to her?
I'm sure looking forward to seeing more of this story. I do expect you to show us the birth of the Kent triplets! Once, in a Superman comic book about ten years ago, when the comic book Lois Lane was engaged to Clark but not married to him, Lois wrote an article in the Daily Planet where she asked people to respect Superman's right to a private life. The way I remember that article, Lois asked her readers to consider the possibility that Superman might live in a house with a white picket fence and have seven children. Well, Nan, you are about to give Lois and Clark their seven children, and I must confess I'm looking forward to seeing how that will work out! So write more soon, please!
Ann
