You have a great talent for description and the first half of this could have been poetry. I thought it was interesting how you switched point-of-view between the woman and the man by having them pass each other on the beach. I usually don't like short stories that change point-of-view, but you did it quite smoothly.
I would give this a higher star rating if it was longer. I would really like for more to happen in the story and for you to flesh out your characters. In all your poetic description of the beach, you left character development on the wayside, rather than on the seaside with the characters. The titular three little words were meaningless without more context. We only know they were friends who hadn't seen each other in a long time, and you gave a description that he was almost like a stalker, which I had a hard time reconciling with the ending. I recommend you flesh out this story to make it stronger. Why were both characters on the beach at the same time? You should consider giving them a reason to be there. What happened between these character before? Without knowing that, the ending isn't very rewarding or believable. This seems to be set in a world where everything is perfect. This story will be much more interesting with some conflict.
Anyway, you have the start of a good story. If you rewrite it, I'll be willing to reread and rerate it.
Thanks again for reviewing my story. Sorry it took so long for me to return the favor.
First, I think you have real talent for description. Hakari Prime seemed like a real place, and I get the impression you may be describing a place you've seen before. The attention to detail was incredible.
However, from there, I had trouble getting through the rest of the story. It took me a few goes to get through it. I think I was half-way through the story when I realized why. There is little variation in sentence length or structure. Same goes for the paragraphs. While you have poetic descriptions and good conflict, the story put me to sleep because the sentences read like a lullaby. Same for the quotes. There was not a big difference between the way Summer, Christine or the narrator talked. Whereas dialogue should provide a breather from the prose, the dialogue paragraphs were pretty much the same length and structure as the prose. The monotony made this story very difficult to plow through and I often times felt like I was drowning.
So while you have excellent description and an interesting conflict, you should really consider varying sentence length and structure. As much as you love all your adjectives, you might consider if they are all necessary, especially in the dialogue, since people rarely talk like they write. Deleting some of the adjectives might make for a tighter, more exciting read. If you do rewrite this story, let me know. I'd be willing to reread and rerate it.
This story was interesting and somewhat well written (although you're missing some commas and there are simple mistakes like "too" for "two," "American's" for "Americans," "and" for "an"). The reason I rated it as lowly as I did is because I didn't find it believable. I also pictured your Japanese characters as WWII-era caricatures with yellow skin, bowed legs and buck teeth.
The way Hiro's mother talked was not like Japanese English. Also a Japanese woman would probably never say "American trash." However the Japanese feel about Americans, they don't use debasing words for them, because the next logical thought would be to acknowledge their own inferiority for losing to American trash. In fact, the Japanese women who marry American men, like your character's mother, tend to be good white supremacists, disowning almost everything Japanese.
Did the waitress know the fugu was poisoned? I assumed she did since she said, "Enjoy your last meal." Do you honestly think a woman making $3 an hour before tip-out would go along with a plot to serve poisoned fugu? Would the chef risk losing his license and going to prison to serve poisoned fugu to someone whom he had nothing against? Also, as hard as fugu is to prepare, it is pretty obvious when it is messed up. And there are very few restaurants that serve fugu in America--you can count them all assuming you have all your fingers and toes. And the toxins are removed before the fish are sent to America, which makes this story completely implausible.
The characters were too stereotyped and there were too many factual and logical errors for this story to live up to its potential. However, I'd be willing to reread and rerate this story if you do a rewrite.
I liked this story. It was imaginative and humorous. You managed to avoid some of the pitfalls of fantasy/sci-fi writing (purple writing, misused verbs, adjective and adverb overload). One recommendation I have is since this is set in a fantasy world, you should avoid some American English (like ass for arse). Otherwise this is a good story.
This was fairly well written, but it could be made a little better.
One major improvement would be to hit the Enter key a few times. Right now you have large blocks of text that are very hard to read. Separate the prose and the dialogue with their own paragraphs.
Why was the narrator torturing this man to death? Did you leave that out on purpose? I think there is more to be explored here.
The narrator is clearly unbalanced, but he says the world will be better off without the man he's killing. I think the same words could be said for the narrator. You should do more with that.
You also say "smirk" a lot. It gets kind of redundant. Also, I think a lot of people are unaware of when they're smirking. It is the unconscious, natural expression of someone who thinks they're better than the world.
Anyway, you have the start of a good story here. If you rewrite it, I'd be willing to reread and rerate it.
The story started out fine. I was a little distracted by the style, but the characterization was strong. Then about half way through the style takes over completely and there's not much to the story. I thought it was interesting that it begins and ends in a winter. Because it was the same season, it helped the reader emphasize with the narrator in that the events of 20 years ago still feel recent. But I thought there should have been some kind of conclusion to the story, some justification for reading a long description of the cold of winter that didn't really go anywhere. The real conclusion to the story, as it is now, is the end of the fourth paragraph. It wasn't even clear until then that this was a flashback. If you feel like you need the other six paragraphs, perhaps the structure of the story could be helped by establishing that these are events from 20 years ago at the beginning and working the lonely feelings that the last six paragraphs evoke higher up into the story.
Wow, you wrote a yakuza story. I really liked it. I thought it started out a little slow, but the premise was really interesting and unique. I thought some of the dialogue with Mayumi felt a little forced and I don't think you need all that stuff about her family in the beginning, it would be better to get to the meat of the story earlier. The only thing I don't like about first-person narration is you know that he or she will live and it lessens the suspense, but it is OK in this story because you know some of the characters are gonna die anyway. Great story, overall.
This story was interesting and well-written, but the scope was too large. It would be better as a long piece with dialog and well-developed characters. Also, sailors aren't typically so well-spoken. You should rough up the speech like Long John Silver.
An interesting story with an interesting premise. And I mean interesting in a good way, not the derogatory way that us Midwesterners use it. I liked the ending when that anti-American son-of-a-blank got his cumupins ;)
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