1. The story is quite good and especially original. I can't remember reading anything like it before.
2. The opening paragraph is a very good introduction to the story and piques my interest.
3. The twist at the end is pretty good, but you could have foreshadowed it a little more to draw out the horror.
Needs improvement:
1. "gourmand" - I don't think that this is the word you mean. Gourmand would be something that tastes pretty good, but is pretty common. Think Chili's baby back ribs. You certainly wouldn't have to search far and wide for them, but they are quite tasty.
2. I could relate to Milo as soon as they brought out the head. You'd think that once it was presented, he'd recoil in horror. But he doesn't -- he's more curious. You're missing the opportunity for some good horror here.
3. "Milo was aware that the pictographs suddenly made perfect sense." -- explain this more. I didn't get what you were trying to say until my third reading.
4. "feast upon their aqueous orbs" -- ugh. Aqueous is the wrong word. Also, he's really not believable at this point. He doesn't have any kind of revulsion and digs right into cannibalism. Huh? What brought him to that point? What's attracting him to finish this mean. If any one of us were presented with this, we'd have to go toss our cookies. What makes him different?
5. "orgasmic sneeze of pleasure as the masticated proboscis made its perestaltic journey to his gut." Oh lord. Much too much.
Nitpicking:
1. "passed his plump lips" should be "past his plump lips"
2. "of it's type" should be "of its type"
3. "lowered the morsel" -- unless the head was HUGE, or was on a pedestal, he would have raised his fork.
4. "“But that cannot be” wailed Milo “Eating is all I live for,"" should be "“But that cannot be,” wailed Milo. “Eating is all I live for!"
5. "parted poor Milos body" should be "parted poor Milo's body"
Summary:
Good start, but not quite there. Even though you've got an interesting premise, you've managed to disengage your character emotionally from the story. That lets the reader disengage from you, which should not be your goal. When the restauranteur cuts poor Milo's head off, no one is going to care.
Hi Spikiki! I have the following comments to offer:
The good:
1. this reads well
2. spelling, punctuation and grammar are good.
3. the action moves along nicely
4. you get a real sense of what this cat is like.
Needs improvement:
1. It's not clear what happened to Levi. Did the TV repair guy run over him?
2. "Levi certainly was unique. Named after the blue jeans, he had the biggest, bluest eyes anyone had ever seen. He’ll always be remembered" -- this paragraph is weak. It seems that it was his personality that made him so special, and you didn't mention that at all. You don't miss his blue eyes as much as you miss other things.
Nitpicking:
1. He seemed dimwitted -- he didn't seem to be dimwitted. He was dimwitted. Don't qualify.
2. "He seemed dimwitted, which was kind of cute as long as it didn’t get too far." -- "He was dimwitted, which was cute." or "He was dimwitted, which was cute in small doses." The phrase "as long as it didn't get too far" doesn't add anything.
3. "seriously" -- get rid of this
4. "that would seriously make you wonder why he..." -- "that would make me wonder why..."
5. "I opened to double doors" should be "I opened the double doors"??
6. "(rather forgetful)" -- get rid of the parens.
7. "...trying to escape, so I immediately got him out..." -- run on sentence. Make it two. "...trying to escape. I immediately...."
8. " Levi also had a fascination in wheels" should be "Levi also had a fascination with wheels"
9. "In fact" -- get rid of.
10. "We were eventually driven ..." -- passive voice
11. "miserable as an indoor cat..." -- repetitive. You said "indoor cat" twice in nine words.
12. "only about fourteen" -- "only fourteen" -- the "about" isn't adding to the story.
Summary:
Good job! I enjoyed reading your story and hear about your cat. I'm totally not a cat person, but I can relate to the special critters that come into our lives.
You've got a lot of fluff (extra words) in here. I'd cut about 5% out. You've got a lot of qualifiers here which makes it sound like you lack confidence. Tell the story you want to tell. Don't ask anyone's permission.
The good:
1. Mostly proficient in regards to spelling, grammar and punctuation.
2. Good description of how the magic works
3. Good visuals
Needs improvement:
1. Why is Gen doing all of this? What does he want? And why does he want it? What is he feeling? Happy? Sad?
2. This piece is a little wordy. You'll probably want to get rid of about 10-15% of it so the story moves along better/faster.
Nitpicking:
1. "They always seemed to move the moment before, but they always returned..." -- you may not want to use the word "always" twice in the same sentence. It becomes repetitive.
2. "“Today will be a turning point whether he succeeded or not; a better tomorrow for the Tower of Light.”" -- is this a thought? If Gen was thinking this, he's not going to use the pronoun "he"
3. "It felt foggy in a way." weak. Find another way to say this.
4. "“We come to make a request of you, Ancient. If you would allow us access to your flows, to utilize your power for good--”" -- who is "we"???
5. "Instantly, the forest seemed to relax." -- if the tension in the scene is expanding, why is the forest relaxing?
6. "His wishes simply were; simply became." -- awkward
7. "Time did not exist as he did this." -- awkward
8. the dialogue is stiff. Say these things out loud and without inflection, then rewrite so it sounds more natural.
Summary:
Good start to a story. It would be nice to have some kind of indication why this person is doing what he's doing.
The good:
1. good action
2. your spelling is pretty good.
Needs improvement:
1. The tense that your piece is written in keeps bouncing from past to present. The conductor fumed. She heads. She squeals. He huffed. Decide to use either present or past and stick to it for the whole story.
2. You can say "said." The people in your story huff, fume, yelp, whisper, etc. It's distracting from the story.
3. You're telling the story from the first person, which can be really powerful, but the narrator doesn't feel anything when all of these extraordinary events happen. Everyone else is afraid or terrified, but if the narrator feels anything, he doesn't show it. Even if he knows the person waving the gun around isn't going to hurt him, he should be feeling *something* when it gets pointed at him.
4. How did she escape? After the gun was knocked out of her hand, no one tried to stop her???
5. "I wonder if this is what being in shock is like? I mused" -- if you're in shock, you're not going to "muse." Put it in italics.
6. “You said create a distraction sweetie. Did you mean you wanted me to strip or something?” -- why was she supposed to create a distraction? Was the narrator supposed to be doing something while she was acting like a maniac?
Nitpicking:
1. "you could tell what color bra she wore." Just name the color.
2. "Put me down." should be "Put me down!" -- exclamation points aren't always appropriate, but this is one place it belongs.
3. It’s in my pocket you oaf. Lemme down ‘n I’ll give it to ya! -- should be in quotes
4. "Look where that got you Mr. Bravery. I thought" should be "Look where that got you, Mr. Bravery."
5. "Bad move. I thought." should be either in italics like #4, or like this -- "Bad move," I thought
Summary:
Good start, but the story doesn't make a great deal of sense. Think about the story that you want to tell instead of thinking up different ways to say "said."
Hi allenalien. I have the following comments to offer:
The good:
1. I really liked the opening sentence. :) Gives me a very clear picture of who Jimmy is and what the situation is, in a clever way.
2. I really liked the use of the song to tie the whole piece together. It is personal and specific and reminds me of the random things that draw us to one another. Well done!!
3. Good use of the "show, not tell" technique.
4. Spelling, punctuation and grammar are pretty good
5. The hard work you've put into the piece really shows. It's polished and very readable.
Needs improvement:
1. No major issues.
Nitpicking:
1. A little too much foreshadowing here -- "What he didn't figure on was falling in love". Make this a little more tantalizing. Make me curious. Don't give me the goodies right away.
2. "paralysed" should be "paralyzed"
3. I'm not getting this -- "Words slipped and slid and wouldn't assemble in his brain." Be a little more descriptive and a little less literary. "Enough of the globules of his shattered wits had run together that he could form a sentence" -- this is much better.
4. "querulous" -- look this word up. I don't think it means what you think it means.
5. "Not a sign of her." Weak. And a sentence fragment. You can say this better.
6. "...but he could now die a happy man" -- you kind of make this sound temporary here. You might want to indicate that he thinks he's found his one true love, or he can imagine a future, or he wants to bring her home to mom.
7. "He went to Clive's to look for her" Where was he looking for her before? He always found her in Clives, right?
Summary:
Nice story with interesting characters and good pacing. I enjoyed it very much.
Hi {user:James Dean}! I have the following comments to offer:
The good:
1. Nice characterization of some of the characters! Bogey manages to come alive.
2. It reads well
3. The subject matter is interesting and compelling
Needs improvement:
1. You really need more of a sense of who the narrator is. She's talking (I'm assuming she's Kate Hepburn" but she really doesn't put a lot of feeling into it. "I always thought that...." "It made me crazy when he did...." "I liked doing...." You're using first person POV but you're not really getting into the character's head, which is where most of the power comes from in first person. You can figure out who the narrator is by the way she describes the other characters.
2. There's a lot of fleshing out you can do to this story, and not all of it has to be description. What is it like to be a movie star looking back at your career? What is it like to be yourself, in a world that wants to put you on a pedestal? There are just so many angles to go in. Try to put yourself into these people's heads and figure out more about their world. Give me some kind of special insight.
Nitpicking:
1. "the shuffle of feet of their children" -- awkward -- "the shuffle of children's feet"
2. "liver problems, which was what Bogie was suffering from now" -- excellent time for a show, not tell.
3. "had got" should be "had gotten"
4. "He was always full of laughs that man" -- awkward
5. "He made everyone he was around feel ten years younger, feel like they were young again, " -- cliche and repetitive
6. "Spence was always in such a rush" -- this would be a good time for a show, not tell
7. "It was present in her eyes." -- cliche
Summary:
Nice story that is generally pretty good, but needs a little work. It might be a good idea to do some research/ daydreaming to figure out an aspect of their lives that hasn't had a lot of attention (the friendship between the two actors is a most excellent start, but you need more.)
Hi bscholl! I have the following comments to offer:
The good:
This is an interesting little story about someone being "eaten" by technology. It's quite an unusual concept. I don't recall ever reading anything like this before.
Needs improvement:
It took me a while to figure out where we were at first. I realize that there was a word count limit, but you would have been better served to say, "Monica, the museum tourguide" than "Ms. Wikki, their teacher."
Nitpicking:
The POV kind of hops a little. It's pretty subtile though. You're using third party POV with Monica, the tour guide being the protagonist. A little later, you refer to the two boys by name, which the narrator, if she's just the tourguide, isn't going to know. You might want to say that some of the boys were roughhousing, and leave it at that.
Computers don't say "wrong input." It would be "input not recognized."
Summary:
Nice flash fiction piece. It's difficult to frighten people with so few words, but I think you've done a good job. Thanks for letting me review your work :)
The good:
1. I like the way you used first person to immediately draw me into the story. I almost feel like I'm chatting with someone who's going to be my friend very soon. That said, you should use something a little stronger than "ha ha, funny joke." You want to make me feel like it would have been more likely for George Washington to hop off Mt. Rushmore and catch the midtown bus, or something equally unlikely. This gives you an opportunity to really unleash your creativity, and also set the direction your story is going to travel. (Funny, serious, mysterious, etc)
2. Interesting premise.
3. In the latter part of the piece, the dialogue is much better.
4. you've got a very likable, relateable heroine.
Needs improvement:
1. Try to build the tension in your story. You start out with a small amount -- it's funny I'm in this situation -- to BLAMMO! Everyone is yelling at each other and Kara's mom killed herself. Dole a little bit of the story at a time, and reel your readers in like a fish. Tease. Entice. You might want to dole out a litte bit at a time, putting poor Kara through the ringer, and the last reveal of this chapter is that her mom killed herself.
2. The dialogue will probably improve when you do #1. Right now, it's kind of melodrama.
3. Give Nathan and Caleb personalities please.
4. Make Michael more interesting. He's got a lot of potential, but right now he's just Evil Guy #23. Did he think he was doing the best thing for his family? Does he think that it's his responsibility to populate the world with people like Kara? Why is he such a bastard?
Nitpicking:
1. "Michael Patterson, Inept Father" show me, don't tell me. And you're in first person. How would your character introduce her father? "My dad?" If they're not close, "The Sperm Donor?" "The Bastard?"
2. Italicize this -- Oh, yeah. Rush home because your daughter has powers, not because she’s graduating high school or you miss her or anything. This too -- "Gag me. Who did this guy think he was?" You get the idea.
3. It's weird that she keeps calling her father "Michael." A little explanation is in order. See #1.
4. "continue about my business as if none of this had ever happened..." is that really what would happen if she killed him? You'd think that she'd spend the rest of her life in the funny farm, or jail.
5. "he held my hand under the table again" -- excellent time for a show not tell. If she's really tense and pissed off, wouldn't she be squeezing for her life?
6. " I mean, if it drove Emilia to insanity—,”" Huh? If the visions didn't drive her nuts, what did?
Summary:
Very good piece. Just needs a few finishing touches. Pace the story a little better -- this may need to be two chapters.
The good:
1. good ear for dialogue.
2. Nice action sequence.
Needs improvement:
1. I'm not sure what voice you're using. You start out with a deep third person with Taliesin as the narrator, but then you have Orpheus running around without his knowledge. If you choose to keep with a deep third person, Taliesan isn't going to know about Orpheus running around. You'll have to keep to the things that Taliesan can see/hear/feel/touch. He would *see* his papers are messed, and he might *smell* an unusual scent around them.
2. I can't really get a feel for the characters. I know Taliesin is older and more experienced, and Orpheus is younger, but that's about it. WHY is Taliesin teaching Orpheus? If Orpheus wants to learn faster, why doesn't he just go to another teacher? Explain in your story -- don't email me.
3. I don't really understand why Taliesin won't teach Orpheus. You give him some vague mumbo jumbo, but it's not really a good reason. Give Taliesin a good reason, or he sounds like a jerk.
4. "It’s taken ten years, he thought, having finally found his former pupil" WHAT?? Ten years have passed? It's kind of a sloppy transition. And we still don't know why it's so important Taliesin finds Orpheus.
Nitpicking:
1. "Master I don’t understand?" should be "Master, I don’t understand."
2. "over due" should be "overdue"
3. "Using the opportunity Orpheus dismissed the servants for the weekend and paying them as if they had worked for that weekend." -- it's repetitive to use the word "weekend" twice in the same sentence.
4. "...still seemed full of energy. The hallmark of a lich" should be "still seemed full of energy, the hallmark of a lich"
5. I'm totally unsure what is happening here. "Clutch his heart with your icy hand, “Hand of Death!” "
6. "He gave no resistance he finally understood for the first time what his master had tried to instill in him." run on sentence.
Summary:
Not bad for a first draft, but you might want to work on it a bit before you ask other people to read it. Firstly, standardize your Point of View. Either keep in Taliesin's head (my recommendation) or find another way of telling your story. (Orpheus's viewpoint might be fun too.) You've got characters doing things, and I'm not able to understand why they're doing what they're doing. You want to make it clear. You want to have your reader sympathize with at least one of them. You have a lot of energy in your piece -- you just want to point it in the right direction.
the good:
You've certainly spent a lot of time working on your character, and you've got quite a complex mythology to go with your story.
Needs work:
Your character seems like he/she was just rolled from a D&D manual. You've got a lot of information about what spells s/he uses, but nothing about what makes her different from any other magic user. What is it that she really wants in life? What is keeping her from that goal? What's her family like? Etc. We read about people we are interested in, and we are interested in people who reflect some of our own characteristics back at us. For example, we are all afraid of losing someone/something that we love. If your character is afraid of losing the place he calls "home" or the person he calls "mother" or "friend," that's something that we can all relate to. There are not very many readers who are pondering the consequences of water spells versus earth spells.
Overall impression:
You've got some interesting ideas about magic, but I think that your reader is going to need a reason to care.
Thanks very much for writing this. I've done 36 reviews so far, and I didn't know half this stuff. I think I'll be able to do a much better job reviewing now. Is there a similar guide for reviewing poetry? The couple of times I've reviewed poems, I've been blasted by the author, so I've been reluctant to do it again.
1. good grammar and spelling
2. good dialogue
3. the mechanics are good
Needs work:
1. you're switching points of view rapidly. It gets confusing for the reader. And annoying. I almost didn't finish reading your story because of it.
2. Koby is annoying. He doesn't have any redeeming qualities. Give me a reason to like him.
3. the action isn't compelling or realistic.
4. the characters are cardboard. You might as well give them white hats or black hats. And your main character switches hats without any reason to.
5. the characters do things that are unbelievable
1. Nice, enjoyable characters
2. Good story
3. Not quite realistic, but rather poetic dialogue
4. Pretty good spelling and good word usage
Needs work:
1. I don't really get a sense of who the prince is, other than he's pretty. Give Coal Black a personality, please.
2. I liked this line, “And he is totally hot," but it doesn't fit in with the rest of your work. Either add a whole lot more (and change the whole tempo of your piece) or get rid of it.
Nitpicking:
1. You said, "She summoned a hunter and ordered him to take Coal Black hunting, far away from the castle. She ordered him to kill Coal Black and to prove that the deed was truly done he was to cut out the Prince’s heart and bring it back to her. The hunter was sad, he loved the boy, as did all the people of the kingdom, but the Queen had chained his wife and daughter in the dungeon. " I'd have the queen capture the wife and daughter first, then summon the hunter.
2. Buy some commas and use them. :)
3. This is confusing. I'd get rid of the whole sentence. "He barely remembered her now, but his mother still visited his dreams on occasion." And it doesn't add anything to the story.
4. "Yes, you’re Majesty" should be Yes, your Majesty
5. "oh Queen, are fair, I cannot be deny," -- get rid of the "be"
6. "as she sat in her rooms" -- the queen can only sit in one room at a time
Bottom line:
This is a really great piece. The dialogue is just right. If you can make it more contemporary and add some humor, go for it. (I think you've got it in you!) If it turns out to be too forced, just cut the anachronism out. Good job! Keep on writing!
The good:
1. Cool, exotic location
2. You seem to have brought the conflict of the piece early, which is good. (I'm not 100% sure that's the conflict for the entire story though)
3. Very dramatic
4. you've got the setup for a nice story here, and there are a ton of directions you can travel in. You're not projecting at all here, and that's good. I don't want to be able to guess what's going to happen. Or you can string me along in the wrong direction. But from the looks of it, you're going to take me somewhere unexpected.
Needs work:
1. I don't like either of these characters. I don't know why they're doing what they're doing. Does Cpt Black love Magda and doesn't want to see her married to a jerk? Is the old lady afraid that the Cpt is going to rape her grandaughter? Or is the old lady saving her granddaughter for more nefarious purposes? Give me a reason to care about either of them.
2. Why is the Cpt and crew afraid of the old woman? Can I get something that shows me that everything is not what they seem? Cause normally, big strong pirates aren't afraid of elderly folks.
3. You should do a better job of your descriptions -- I'm not really not feeling stuff like "orange dress" or "curly black hair." You can use metaphors and similes to describe stuff -- maybe describe the guy as having a curly, black rats-nest jammed under a sweat-soaked scarf, or a dress that would be more at home in the back alley's of Budapest, or something that gives me more of a feel than simply "orange" or "black and curly." You want to draw me in to your world.
4. same with "muscular fierce sailors." Blah.
5. It took me a while to figure out what happened here... ""And then what happened?" eight-year-old Lorena said" It's a pretty sudden transition and I was wondering where the kid fit in with the rest of it.
Nitpicking:
1. The bracelets wouldn't "chime" without her moving around *a lot.* This is distracting.
2. "when a ship with white sails and a figure of a terrifying black face with bright red eyes on the front of the ship" is awkward. Nice imagery though.
3. You switched case here -- distracting. "He had always thought that the woman was more than meets the eye. Furthermore, he has worked too hard to..."
4. Who is Soledad to Lorena? Mother? Older sister? Grandma? I'm lost.
5. "The fisherman found one half of The Ghost's" The Ghost's what??
6 "?!" is good for e-mails among friends, not so good for fiction, and it's kind of out of context here.
Bottom line:
You've got a nice premise and the good start to a story. You haven't worked yourself into a corner. But you've got to give me a reason to continue reading. You haven't really brought me into the world you're trying to create. Give me more so I can imagine it better. Give me more so it interests me and holds my attention. Give me something to care about.
Really excellent tutorial!! With great advice! I was wondering why my story was dragging, and now I know I have to bring my central conflict in sooner. It probably needs more PUNCH, too.
Obviously, this is a subject that you feel very passionate about.
Here are some suggestions:
1. Invest in a dictionary.
2. Invest in a word processor that has some kind of grammar check.
3. You don't really have a direction here, so you're not really making your point very well. Start with an outline and organize your thoughts in a coherent manner. You've got a lot of points, but you fling them out without any order. For example, you start out with being depressed when you go out in the world. From there, you talk about overweight people, with some kind of pep talk. Then you express concernation that overweight women are being exposed to a detrimental message.
You are just all over the place. It's very tiring to read, and you're not really making any kind of point.
My advice would be to go back and figure out exactly what you're trying to say, and why you think so. figure out your main point, and get some supporting facts to back you up. You may need references. For example, you might want to say something like, "the american heart association says that you need no more than two servings of peanuts a day," or whatever the facts are that back you up.
I liked the ending. Very mysterious. Overall, nice job :)
I'm wondering what about her made the narrator long for her? She doesn't seem very real or have a personality.
Either way, you've expressed obsession very well. But I can't figure out why he likes her so much. Was it the way she moved? Her scent? Did she have some kind of memorable encounter with him? It doesn't have to be much, but you should give me something.
Nice clean story. Good characterization. You were able to describe their relationship very well. The story itself was kind of spooky and kind of romantic at the same time. You could easily take it in either direction.
cute, sweet little story. I love how you kept the mystery until the end. You established your characters early on, and made them likeable and relatable. Well done!!
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The good:
Needs improvement:
Nitpicking: