Critique for 
“tangles of crimson, red hair hung” … crimson = red, so using both here feels unnecessary. But excellent first lines otherwise, I was drawn in by this distinctive character.
“been in love, or lust, with his best” … while I do understand what you are doing here, that short bit in the middle really messes with the flow of the sentence. Maybe put it somewhere else?
I can already tell that keeping Lamont and Liam separate in my head will be tough, those names are a bit similar. Plus neither really fits their character, Liam especially does not feel like a big guy name.
Lamont has a prosthetic hand with talons? Oh wait, I just realized, this is the same Lamont as from the previous chapter? Wow, he is not acting the same at all, not nearly as crazy. And that means Johnny = Mono? So either Lamont is lying to Liam about not finding Johnny, or he somehow hasn't seen Johnny even though the boy has apparently left Baxter's house with Katrina at least once.
Ah, that was a cute first meeting between Liam and Johnny. And their burger date too! In fact most of the scenes with just them. And I like how you switch between angry/drunken action scenes in the present with Lamont and cute moments from the past with Johnny
Whoever decided to nudge their car against Liam's bike – twice even! – when the light changed was either very brave or very dumb. Liam sounds like someone you wouldn't mess with. And who nudges anyway, why not honk?
I laughed out loud at the “manly arm punch of concern.”
“you and that kid were close.” … So I'm guessing Tony doesn't know Liam is gay/bisexual/whatever? But Jen knows, so either Tony doesn't feel comfortable saying it out loud or Jen is keeping it secret?
“He and Jenny had the same looks” … wait, you switched to Tony's perspective? That feels weird, since so much of this chapter has been from Liam so far.
“Aye, alright. I'll come over.” … This line really made me think the transition would take us to dinner, and plus the “Liam finished dressing” fits if Liam was getting dressed for dinner, so I was confused when we are still at work and only a few moments later. Maybe you don't need that transition? Or move the dinner invite to the end of the work scenes to make it a true transition.
You really made Liam and Tony two interesting people
I understand what you mean by “wasn't long in the waking world” but those words are usually used for someone dying so their use here feels ominous.
“wrapping his slender arms around the tree trunk of a waist … Liam allowed himself to fall” … Was that a tackle or a suplex? I really can't tell, why not just describe it? And who tackles a big burly guy?
“he hadn't even seen the” … that pronoun would normally refer to Liam judging by the line before it, so I had to read it again when I realized it referred to the robber. Maybe move it around? “The kid hadn't even seen the Irishman. Liam reached out and grabbed him by the back of his dickies.”
When you say it took four calls to the police to get them there, is that for the ambulance too? I can understand having to wait for the cops to arrive, but at some point don't you just find a car and take the guy that needs to go to the hospital?
“Three weeks later” … that's a really awkward transition. Can you do something with it?
“the friend of the blonde he had detained weeks prior” … also awkward, maybe just give the guy a forgettable name and introduce him in the next sentence as the replacement for the blonde? Does he need to be a friend of that guy?
“he was feeling better” … you are on a roll with this awkward writing, obviously Tony is out of the hospital, we don't need to know that he got better
So all this stuff with Liam working at the shop and such is great, but I'm starting to wonder where the Wicked Dolls story went. Sure Lamont shows up occasionally to be a pest and we're learning a bit more about Johnny/Mono, but I'm getting confused by this side story that is quickly starting to feel like a wild tangent.
“No one really knew where the shade came from, but it was never questioned inside family” … what? I think you just implied something about supernatural heritage here, but what?
“Liam returned home early … as he got comfortable.” … This whole scene is wonderful, but what's the point? Nothing is happening, or else I just don't get the significance of cheese farts, drool stains that don't come out and a blanket that was finished when he was two … And yet right afterward we get this awesome modern encounter with a banshee that feels straight out of a classic folk story. Can you get rid of the former and still keep the latter somehow?
“She had been preparing a quip” … again, awkward shift in POV that doesn't last long enough to feel necessary
There's a few “had had” lines throughout the piece, which technically work but feel wrong.
And once again, just like in chapter five, you have written a really excellent punch-in-the-gut ending. I loved it. It's too bad about Jenny, but that just raises the drama. And you say in the description that Liam is reunited with his best friend? So Johnny/Mono was the blond robber and I assume the driver?
So remember when I said chapter five was excellent for its steadily rising tension? That's exactly the problem here: this chapter has moments where the action is steadily rising but you take a long time getting there and much of it feels unnecessary, plus the scenes with Lamont started the piece a bit higher. Everything in chapter five introduced Vivian and led up to her death and revival, but this one spends longer on character building and a lot less on the death. Chapter Five was like a river that is really subtle about speeding up and you finally notice right before going over two big waterfalls, while this (half) chapter started faster, has a lot of pools along the way that slow things down and only gets one waterfall.
Any questions?
Hmm, I can. Though it's meant to be a brief whisper under one's breath.
*blinks* Lamont and Liam are very easy to separate. And to be fair, Lamont is his nick name. And Liam wasn't a big, burly man-bear of squishy love always. As a teen, he was quite scrawny.
Lamont has a fake arm and fake fingers on the other hand. Consult with RaiseTheSail more on him. She can tell you everything I can't, because he's hers. And yes, he's the same Lamont. And, he's not always crazy. He can be creepy, sane, rude, and anything he really wants to be. He's over 3,000 years old if I remember correctly. Johnny is Mono. And Lamont is lying to Liam. He doesn't like him because he knows Liam's in love with Johnny/Mono, and that's his property. So he's screwing with him. Because he's a jerk like that. *pets* Baxter is no longer here. Ezra Sparrow is Katrina's dad. Dr. Sparrow, Ezra, the Good Doctor. Lamont has seen Mono, they bump uglies soon, but he's messing with Liam.
The switches were my motivation. I love them together, but I can't put them together. They have the most sincere and sweetest friendship of all my stories. Their bond rivals only my main twins from Desherkem. What you see from his past, is what builds Liam into Crimson and makes him the lynch pin of the entire group. He is the protector. (if I recall, that's what Liam means.) And going from the rage to the soft is a way I settle the story, so the reader can have that moment.
It's Detroit. Raise said they did all kinds of crazy stuff when she lived there. But, no, Liam's not someone you'd want to mess with. Tony either. While Liam's a tiny bit more peaceful, Tony will kick your ass, take its name, and marry it's mama.
I have to put things like that in my stories with my manly men. If I don't the seriousness just kills, man, it kills! He and Tor are the worst for over zealous macho-man BS.
See, Liam's sexuality is weird. Few people know he's gay because he never had too many lovers, and no one ever said "Hey, Liam, are you gay?" Jenny knows because she's his sister and she knows everything. Tony's his friend, but he's taken a few hits to the head when fighting. He knows now where the story is and when I do plot spots, but as for now. I think he has an idea something's up. He's not partial to gay things being thrust on him. He likes gay people, but not when they flirt with him. The whole picture with Mai on his desk is an inside joke he'll flip his lid over.
I switch from whoever I feel like it, to be fair. I work in 3rd person loose omniscient. If I want to work another angle, I do. And Tony's angle is fun because he's an outside and you get more detail and things from him. He shows up again eventually. So why not get the people used to the 5'2" sack of Scottish fun?
Transitions for me come as they come. I can take out some things, but if I feel it was needed, it stays. If I recall 9the document isn't in front of me right now, my interent's being rude), he was invited by Tony, but he and Tony had work to do. It wasn't a straight cut, and it needed done in the locker room or else Tony wouldn't have done it at all. He's a busy little man.
I made them interesting? How come?
Uhhh, I can't recall what Lamont did. i think it was just a regular tackle. And he would. He's stronger than he looks. Demon stuff and all that. My fight scenes always need edits.
Yeah, I told you before, when editing, it's easy to miss things because I'm bias. Thanks.
No, i think the ambulance came. I remember having a piece of a paragraph specifying it, but I may have taken it out. And pfft, not if the injured's Tony. He wouldn't want to ruin someone's interior.
Right, this is the part of the reply where I tell you that this chapter alone, is the longest piece of free-flowing fiction I've ever done, ever. EVER. *coughs8 my other stuff is usually pretty short. I may have something close or maybe over, but it's the first documented. When i go like this, my brain starts to laugh at me.
I couldn't think of a name I liked, so I left it be. And yes he has to be a friend of that guy who is like Tony's nephew by marriage or something, i don't remember. And he's important in the spin off with Tony. Because Tony gets revenge.
Was tony out? I can't recall. i don't think he was, or he popped his stitches later on and ahd to go back because Jenny and Liam had a reason to go out and get killed.
Heh, never call Crimson a wild tangent. He's important. This is important, not all, but pretty much most. He's never labelled as he truly is, but he's a very important character. He balances everyone. And he's a sweet, loveable dumbass~ I show you all of the becoming dolls, save for Mono I'm certain I use most of his build-up here instead of in his actual chapter, sometimes it's just longer.
I did, in a way. He's Irish. They have banshees, dullahans, all kinds of things with wild, crimson hair. It's a tip of the hat to the oncoming Ophelia O'Hernn.
Nope. Cheese farts stays, man. It's detail and some world building in a way. They all have significance. He's a bad cook, lousy cleaner despite actually being fairly neat in places, and he's close to his mother.
So you liked the banshee thing? Good, that thing's been bumping around since I wrote Cry of the Banshee.
Not sure if Jenny or Katrina, but if it's there, it has a reason to be, I just can't always tell you what the reason is.
Yeah, when I can't great creative or I write late at night, was, had, have, it and others come out to play.
Have you read part 2? Jenny's content where she is right now, I assure you. She likes the land of the dead. What...? No, no. Mono's Johnny and he has no idea who the heck Liam is right now.He was at home.
I admit, it tapers in places. And it needs buffed, but a lot of the material is necessary. Liam's chapter isn't really meant to do that. it's supposed to have a few small stops. And Chrys' death is the worst, at least in my opinion. Barbata's may be a close second.
None that I can think of, no. Thank you, dear.
“been in love, or lust, with his best” brief whisper … I see, then maybe commas are not the best choice. The commas don't make me lower my inner reading voice for the brief whisper, they just make me take two short, awkward pauses. There are other things you could try that would perhaps better signal an aside, such as “been in love - or lust - with his best” or “been in love (or lust) with his best” or maybe make the aside longer to keep the commas farther apart like “been in love, or lust as Liam figured, with his best”
“easy to separate names” … the two L's makes it tough for me, though it was only for that scene so you should probably ignore me on this one
“3rd person loose omniscient” … eh, but so far there wasn't much in this chapter from anyone else's POV besides Liam – or maybe there was but it wasn't as noticeable? So the short shift to Tony, and then later to Jen, feels like you pulled the carpet I thought I was standing on out from under me. I would say that most of this chapter is too deep inside Liam's head and too framed in his voice to be a true 3rd person; to write in 3rd person is to be outside the character, to describe everything an outside observer would see. I would call your story 1st person POV that isn't restricted to one POV, after all 1st person does not mean only one POV, it means inside their head. I write in 3rd person because it's a very visual style, though I lapse into either 1st or omniscient when I don't know how to show what someone is feeling without just saying it.
“Transitions” … okay, but do you see how a) that invite to dinner followed by b) a scene change space followed by c) the line “Liam finished dressing” could be confusing for the reader? It made me stop reading and completely reassess the scene when I realized that Liam was still at the shop.
“Interesting people” … Liam is a big tough guy with a soft heart who enjoys riding his motorcycle and painting pretty pictures, and yet none of those feel incongruous when they are introduced. The tough guy elements feel natural for someone who was described as a big tough guy, and yet the softer elements feel natural too. Liam has depth, he has layers, he's a tough macho guy but he isn't only a tough macho guy. Tony meanwhile is exactly the tough macho guy, but he's Liam's friend and he married his sister so he's got all these connections to an interesting person that make him interesting too. Tony is less interesting but he also seems to be a less central character so it works, he is interesting enough.
“wild tangent” … no no no, I wouldn't call Liam himself a wild tangent, I can understand the place he will have in your cast of dolls. But this chapter, most everything that happens at the shop and those three weeks that pass by with one line? That feels like a tangent. You put a lot of time into showing Liam's everyday life when what matters to the story is his death, and so his everyday life feels like a wild tangent instead of the important character foundation building that it should be.
Alright. I can see your point.
Hmm, maybe. I still like to switch back and forth. I may try and devy it later on when I do some more edits to it.
I can see your point. That needs some reversing and change of wording.
I remember when I first made Liam, before he had the name Liam. I had a partner I wrote this story's first draft with. She was my partner here on dA until I changed the password and our username. I told her he liked to paint and was a nice guy inside. She laughed and said that he couldn't do that, that he was mean. We argued for a few days about that, and I just gave up. Now he can be who he wants.
Tony, like Chrys' siblings, has little depth, but unlike them, we see him more in other places and he shows up again at the very end. Heartbroken with his daughter.
I suppose. But honestly, his normal routine is what leads into his death.
“his normal routine is what leads into his death” … yes, but how much daily routine do you need? I had the feeling this chapter was going off on a random tangent because nothing related to the dolls plot was happening for a long time. In chapter 5 it took 4 scenes to send Vivian to the conference, 2 scenes to foreshadow her death there and then the seventh scene was setting up Ezra also being at the conference as her killer with Katrina and Mono as sort of a red herring. In comparison, this chapter is spread out by fights with Lamont and memories of Johnny, a day spent peacefully working and three weeks of presumably the same off screen and I never felt like Liam was in danger until the banshee scene (which basically spells it out) right before he then dies. Maybe it would all work as a chapter 1 intro to a central protagonist and his life, but I'm not sure about a chapter 7 intro to one more cast member. You already know the chapter is long, not just for DA but on its own merits, and that's normally where you would tighten it up.