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13 Public Reviews Given
13 Total Reviews Given
Public Reviews
1
1
Review by Chris J. Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 18+ | (3.5)
Hello again, Robert,

I think your story is well-crafted and interesting. I enjoyed reading it, which is not always (or often) the case on websites where amateur or developing works are displayed as is the case here. I like the way you gradually reveal and develop David's character throughout the story by using many little details without ever resorting to major information dumps; he is defined by little indications more than explicit statements. His former alcoholism is a good example of this because it says a lot about his identity without being delved into beyond being mentioned. Future-telling ghosts is also an unique angle to take in a story about a haunting which made me interested in the story's progression and was invested in knowing its ending. I think many of the original stories which have yet to be written are hidden in the cracks between genres, and this story element takes your story a step in that direction.

Your writing style is likeable and avoids being too flashy without slipping into being boring; it was easy not to get hung up on the language and just focus on the content which is, generally speaking, a good sign. There are a couple of places where your narrative voice strays somewhat, but this is not so much a problem as an exception to take note of so that you are aware of how it contrasts with the style of the rest of the story. The first sentence is an example of this; it deviates from the matter-of-fact tone employed throughout the rest of the story and is fairly adjective-laden. Don't get me wrong, it's a great sentence and does not need to be changed. I believe there are a handful of other outliers like this, but I cannot specifically recall where they are or point them out without reading it––which I would like to if I find the time.

My remaining points pertain to various elements of character development and plot. Almost all of them are related to David's character and choices, although some of them only indirectly so. Ultimately, it may seem like I am offering a lot of criticism, but most of the criticism is related to the subtleties and nuances of the story and not problems with its core. Ultimately, many of these points could be addressed with only an added word or phrase in the right spot, and some of them may also simply pertain to my personal understanding or misunderstanding of what you mean to express and need not be corrected at all. How or what you change is entirely up to you.

However, there are a few elements which do not seem quite as well developed and do not come across the way I believe you intend them to. His decision to commit suicide, for example, does not flow out of the understanding of the story I had at that point. I understand that it is meant to be a surprise and a twist since even he had not realized it yet, but the circumstances which motivate it did not strike me as dire until after reading his decision. Until then I had assumed that his debt was of a much more common variety and was in keeping with the fact that he led a downer life; his debt and fear of Mickey struck me more as elements descriptive of his character and less as being plot points relevant enough to implicate suicide. While it is clear that they are one of his motivations for using the 'TV' upstairs, this seems like a trivial motivation since almost all people would react similarly, regardless of debt, reinforcing my original, errant perception that these elements were only meant to describe David. I think part of what is absent is his emotions related to his problems; the reader knows that these elements stress him, but it was never my impression that he was in a hopeless state or truly, deeply depressed.

There is another gap related to his suicide which stands out to me, namely David's wife. You flesh out the character of the waitress much more than you do his wife's. This makes some sense since his wife never has any 'screen-time' while the waitress does, however, the wife would be more heavily impacted by his suicide than anyone else, so the fact that he does not even think of her when he decides to kill himself speaks volumes about David's character in a way which I am not convinced you intend; it causes him to seem uncaring and selfish since he cares so little about how his actions impact her that he does not spare a thought for her. Arguably, she would also be a factor driving him toward suicide or away from it, but she is currently just a prop in his backstory as opposed to one of the factors which continues to influence and move him. A simple thought on David's part could solve the problem. Perhaps he feels neglected and estranged from her because she is so busy with nursing and night school. The reverse would also do the job. Perhaps he is intentionally neglecting to think about her because she is such a caring person (nursing, making his schedule, etc.), and he feels guilty; he knows that she does not deserve to be abandoned. Obviously, both of these are just examples which seem like possibilities based on what you have already written, but you are the author, and it is entirely your imagination and decision which should shape the story and their relationship. This is just my observation of what seems to be lacking.

The last real criticism I have is that I am not entirely sure what you want me to feel at the end of the story. I can imagine different intentions but feel none of them compelling me. Am I supposed to feel relief? Fear? Sadness? Confusion? Hope? Disappointment? My interpretation would tend to be that the reader is meant to fear for David since he was suicidal only a moment ago, is still within reach of a bottle and has started a fire in a house full of ghosts which may or may not have just killed an old lady. However, I suspect that most people would gravitate toward interpretations of relief since he did not kill himself and now has a month to work out his problems. Your voice and interpretation is missing from the equation. That might be intentional. You might want the ending to be ambiguous and have a wide range of interpretations, however, the narrative space surrounding the climax of the story seems to be empty, and I think this could lead to some people feeling like the story is anti-climactic or as if they misunderstood what you meant to say. Some sort of indication as to what you mean or the fact that you personally have no intention to pass judgment over his situation seems customary, but maybe that is just me.

Oh, and there was one other technical inconsistency I spotted: the information he receives through 'barroom banter' does not fit the story's timeline unless it is a reference to banter he heard six years earlier before he was sober, since sober men with prior alcohol addictions do not spend time in bars.

As I said before, I like the story and think that it is well-written overall. While I think the criticisms I offered are fair and have merit, they by no means disqualify the story from being effective and enjoyable. To some degree, I think they are the difference between a work which is completely finished and one which can still be improved upon. They are ultimately the reason why I decided that 3.5 stars was a more accurate rating than something higher, but the difference is only one of degree and not of kind; there is room for improvement, which is much better than reaching your potential short of your goal. The story serves to demonstrate that you are a capable writer with an imaginative mind and an understanding of character which extends beyond the black and white dimensions of a page.

I hope my points are clear and helpful. If you have further questions or criticisms of my critique, (haha), feel free to hit me up again.

Cheers,

Chris.
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Review of Sons of Gailland  Open in new Window.
Review by Chris J. Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (3.0)
Charles,

First of all, I want to be careful about making broad statements about your writing, because I know nothing about you as a writer. You could be 15, or you could be 38. You may have been writing for twenty years, and you may have been writing for three. This could be your first story or your tenth. Maybe you want to become published, and maybe you're just having fun. If I knew all those factors I could tell you whether I thought your work was contextually better or worse, but lacking that knowledge I can only make general and objective statements which may not fit your personal situation and, in that sense, may not be the information which is most likely to help you improve.


The general statements that I need to make are these:

The story does not strike me as a very 'finished' or, perhaps, 'professional' piece. It seems like it's the first draft of one of the first stories you've written. There is a lot of room for improvement as far as grammar, sentence structure and phraseology is concerned. There are also aspects of the content which are either highly improbable or fairly common, particularly in high fantasy stories. Now, if you are a young writer––or even just an inexperienced one––who is writing in the hopes of becoming better and to have fun with it, then all of this is normal and is exactly the way that it should be. This reminds me a lot of the first story I wrote, and I learned more while writing it than I have while working on just about everything since combined. However, if you've already written a lot and were hoping to do something 'serious' with this project such as publish it, I think there's serious room for revision.

On the flip side, I think you display a large amount of visual imagination and descriptive capabilities. You do a very good job of fleshing out the scenery and setting, and I thought that the flow of each individual scene was generally pretty good. I also noticed that you were quite good at transitions; by this I do not mean the hard breaks in the story in which you change times, places or view points, but rather the places in which we follow characters through changes of pace or scenery. Your vocabulary is good, and you demonstrate in multiple places that you have the capacityto be very good with words, but you don't utilize this everywhere. There are also examples where your strong descriptive tendency becomes too much. You should work on refining it so that when you use it has meaning and helps the story progress, because there are times throughout when you become too focused on individual details, and it stalls your narrative flow.

Without having read the rest of your story, I cannot say much about the plot. What I can say is that it is a fairly common starting point for high fantasy adventures. This does not have to be a bad thing. If you are still in the process of really learning how to write, it's actually very good, because it means that you're working with structures that are tried and true, and you can learn a lot about the workings of plot and story-telling through that. However, again, if this is something you had higher aspirations for, there is a greater need for revision and caution as the tale progresses if you wish to avoid cliches and write an original and engaging story.

(I would also like to point out that the reason this structure is tried and true is because it's good; many of the best or most popular fantasy stories such as the Lord of the Rings, the Wheel of Time and Eragon were written using it. It's simply more difficult to execute on a level that people, especially people who are familiar with the genre, will want to read.)

That would be my general commentary. If you want to divulge some personal information, I'd be happy to give a bit of advice or even recommend some books on writing which were helpful to me, otherwise there's not a lot else that I can say.

Everything after this point is an attempt to address specific sentences and details which I noticed while reading. Some of it is positive commentary, while other parts address errors and issues.


Content:

Little details which seem unrealistic:

The fact that one wolf drowns on its own blood does not fit the pacing of the scene, because this would have taken more time than they had to stop and stare at it in the middle of their fight.

Having Roth rip out a wolf's throat is certainly cool, but it is ultimately not very realistic unless he has magical powers of some kind or is more powerful than other humans for some reason.

Another example of something questionable is Braydin's walking home after his father's death even though it's already night, and it took 'hours'. If you want him to arrive at night it would probably be more believable if he left in the afternoon or evening. Or, if you really want him to leave in the night, make a greater point of emphasizing what a drastic and erratic move that is.

It would be difficult for him to study minerals with Archy in the mountains and keep it a secret unless the mountains are very close or Archy comes to Thachton regularly. This is counteracted a bit by the fact that he comes to dinner and is 'always welcome', but it still seems like a little bit of a stretch. I don't think 'staring at horses' would allay suspicion long enough for him to actually learn the amount which he claims to have learned, not to mention the fact that I'm not sure he would have had that much free time.

It is very, very improbable that a 10 year old would have had the time develop the skills necessary for creating swords or be given that much responsibility given that swords––and metals in general––were very expensive. At the very end it does say that his brother stares at him in disbelief over his achievement, but pointing out that it's a stretch does not make it any less of one. Unless he is supposed to have semi-magical abilities which make him inherently gifted and prone to crafting (which would be convenient), I would have a pretty hard time buying it.

An ex-soldier having saved enough money to buy a ship does not seem plausible unless he has a mysterious past in which he attained much more wealth than a normal person would be able to attain.


Grammar:

Great sentences:

Braydin stood at the door watching after the man for a long while until the white robe faded into the night like a puff of breath evaporating on a cold autumn morning.

The comparison in the end creates a fascinating image, and you delivered it in a way that feels natural. The single criticism I would have of it is 'watching after'; it seems to me that he can either look after the man or watch the man, but the two words do not sound right in combination with each other.


Turning to leave the room a chill raced up his spine as a hoarse raspy mockery of his father's voice said his name.

I like the fact that you refer to it as a 'mockery' of his father's voice in this sentence instead of using an easier description such as simply weak or strange. Again, a small criticism I would have is that 'hoarse raspy' is redundant (and would need to be separated by a comma). I would recommend deciding for one of the adjectives or the other.


The sun was a dark orange ball sinking into the ocean's horizon as Braydin started up the foot path from the main road up to his house.

This is another visually impressive sentence. As with the other cases, the minor correction I would suggest is removing the 'up' in 'up to his house' because we already know that he started 'up the foot path'. To my knowledge, you can also write footpath as one word, although I'm not sure that it's necessary.



Run-on sentences/recommended sentence breaks:

He was a good man, from what Kalin could remember, who had always put his family first and did his best to provide for and protect them.

In this case the last clause of the sentence seems to be a factual statement because of how specific it is rather than something Kalin remembers. As a result it might make more sense to make that part into its own sentence, making the 'who' into a 'he'.


She was tall for a woman with golden hair that fell neatly to the middle of her back, whenever it wasn't wrapped in a tight bun atop her head, and beautiful green eyes that seemed to light the room whenever she smiled.

The clause about her eyes would be easier to understand on its own. You write enough about her hair that it's hard to associate the 'with' from the first clause with the final clause about her eyes. One easy method of fixing this would be to make it its own sentence by replacing the 'and' with 'her' and removing the 'that'.


"He rests now but his wound is badly infected and it is spreading quickly through his body.

What is spreading through his body? What you mean is that the infection is spreading through his body, but the current sentence suggests that the wound itself is spreading through his body.


He waved to his brother and shook his head as he walked through the front door Kalin 's stomach churned as he was greeted by the delicious aroma coming from the rack of lamb in the kitchen.

I think you meant to be two separate sentences but forgot the period between them. Otherwise, I would recommend this, making 'Kalin's stomach churned...' its own sentence.


Neither boy ever considered sitting in the empty chair at the head of the table, it was like an unspoken rule of the house, that their father's chair remain empty as a reminder that Roth would always be a part of their daily lives.

You should make this an additional sentence from 'it was like an unspoken rule' forward, and the comma before 'that their father's chair' is unnecessary.


General corrections:

daggers for whoever --> daggers for whomever
instrumental in his families--> instrumental to his family's
no worse for ware--> no worse for wear
seemingly staring off into space--> you can removed 'seemingly'. He is literally staring off into space.
as soon as he set foot onto his families land--> family's land

I noticed in the scene with the wolves that you switched back and forth between referring to them as him/his and it/its. It would be better if you consistently used one or the other throughout.


Additionally, it would be good for you to look into the rules for proper comma usage. I have definitely seen worse usage before, but you made fairly frequent mistakes, often using them in places where none were required while leaving them out where they would be. There are places where you use them completely correctly, which suggests that you are probably familiar with the rules but don't always think about them while writing.

This is a link which features all (or almost all) of the rules pertaining to commas.

http://www.grammarbook.com/punctuation/commas.asp

Rules 3, 4 and 7 specifically address mistakes you made throughout, although there were other miscellaneous situations as well.


Ultimately, I know a lot of this was fairly critical, but it's important to realize that only critical input can actually help you improve. I hope this wasn't discouraging and helps you to work out some of your mistakes. I think there's a lot of room for improvement, but I also think that you can improve––it will just take work and time. I would recommend continuing to refine your abilities, and, if you take writing seriously and want to put in the work, I would recommend reading Robert Mckee's 'Story' to learn about the basics of novel- and screenwriting.

Cheers.

Chris.
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Review of Knowing  Open in new Window.
Review by Chris J. Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (3.5)
Hi Mac,

I like the content of your poem quite a bit but think it's form may stand for some improvement.

Your exploration of knowledge is really interesting and compelling. In innocence we think that we know everything, and, in the security of this belief, we are not afraid to explore new worlds of information and ideology. The more we explore these, however, the less certain we become of what we originally thought we knew. Your final question of *who* it was you knew is fascinating, because it suggests that you (or the fictional narrator of your poem) have become so uncertain of the world that you even question your own identity. The story has a lot of honesty, insight and depth and is well worth reading.

Unfortunately, many of the rhymes are fairly forced, and you seem to abandon the rhyme scheme completely in the final stanza, making it seem more like a first draft than a finished product. Your poem also lacks a consistent cadence which sometimes leads the flow from line to line to be a bit disjointed. Although cadences don't have to be present in every poem I did find it a bit distracting in the end of this one, because your cadence *was* consistent part of the time.

Overall I like the poem a lot but can't quite justify giving it a full 4-5 stars due to the structural aspects I mentioned.

Cheers.
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Review of Pantoum  Open in new Window.
Review by Chris J. Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (4.0)
This poem is really fascinating and good.
The way you use repetition as a stylistic device is smart and effective. The repetition seems to demonstrate the way one's thought process moves in circles when feeling lonely or depressed; it's a cycle that's hard to break because you're only able to see more problems when you try to turn away from the things that bother you, and this is symbolized in the recurrence of each line. Overall, this leads the poem to have a very haunting effect on the reader––particularly the repetition of the opening line. I had also never encountered a Pantoum before, so I enjoyed that.

The reason I only gave this 4 stars is because I don't think each line is equally effective in both positions but rather tends to fit one position or the other better. This causes some of the lines to feel a bit vague or disjointed and lessens the impact they have. This didn't influence my rating, but I think you also mean 'breathe' and not 'breath'. :)
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