Actually managed to get up early this morning specifically to get writing done. There is hope!
Writing-related things accomplished: Characters named and introduced earlier: 1 (Ash), Important plot-things brought in early: 1
One of the great things about having a critique group is that they will fill in the blanks about things as they’re talking. Sometimes they’re right (scarily so). Sometimes they are so wrong that you have to laugh and make sure you didn’t leave out a page somewhere. And sometimes you realize that what was so blindingly obvious to you, the writer, is not obvious at all. In this case I had assumed that almost all of the other creatures were 95+% genetically related to us because they were evolutionary offshoots from a previous bottleneck event. BUT I NEVER PUT THAT IN THE BOOK. So of course nobody else picked that up.
