"How rude," Marie mumbled.  "If he weren't my brother, I'd... I'd..."
Her thoughts caught up with her before she could finish her sentence.
    'You'd do what?  What?  C'mon, Marie, tell me.  What would you do?'
Marie was silent.  'I thought so.'  Marie wondered how her own mind could

I would use some other means of representing internal dialogue apart
from the single quotes.  I found it to be very difficult to keep track of
what was being thought and what was being said aloud that way.  
<These> or [these] brackets tend to be easier on the reader, as far
as I can tell.

                             *     *     *

                  [Insert Channel 22 Commercial Here]

                             *     *     *

Is that really necessary?  I don't know about other people, but I find
this sort of thing so distracting and jarring that it almost puts me off
reading a fic entirely.  I cannot see how it adds anything to the
story.

    "Ow!  Ah, cheese and crackers!"  Marie grabbed the nearest towel and

Is "cheese and crackers" an exclamation of some sort?  It seems
very obscure to me.  A simple "damn it" or a short description of 
Marie coping with being hurt might work better here.


Okay, I've been wondering if somebody would put out a "Marie" fic
anytime soon.  Congratulations on tackling the series - it's fertile
(and largely unexplored) territory.  

The idea of Marie developing an alternate personality has potential,
and I can see that you're going somewhere with the music thing...
but the way this chapter is written was much too heavy on musical 
detail to me.  The indepth descriptions of bands and music, the 
copious detail about the type of music and the philosophy behind
it, the lengthy Author's Notes - they might well be interesting to 
someone who is a fan of the music, but they really got in the way
of the story for me.  I couldn't get into the plot because it seemed
like it was wrapped around a "Rolling Stone" article.  

My suggestion for this chapter is that you go back and thin out
the detail about the music that the characters are listening to and
give us more of the characters themselves.  This might mean 
advancing the story a little more than you had planned for the first
chapter.  A dream sequence for Marie, with foreshadowing and 
imagery which hints at the story's direction (if you have it planned
out to that degree), might help intrigue the reader into wanting to
press on.

Good luck with the story, and I hope you stick with it.

Grayson Towler
grayson@rigroup.net

http://www.rigroup.com/~grayson/relentless