Writing.Com General Discussion

Without seeing your writing, I'm guessing here, but it sounds like the issue is problematic writing, and truly figuring out what's wrong with it in a way that you can self-correct or prevent it.

I don't get the impression that you got specific enough feedback, or truly absorbed what it meant so you could change it.

I suggest sticking to the short story format, for now. It's faster to practice with, cheaper to get somebody to invest their time critiquing (shorter text = less commitment). If your short stories are getting problematic feedback, there's no point generating 80K words of problems.

Also, reset your perspective. You just posted your FIRST story that anybody has really read for the purpose of critiquing. I'm assuming that prior to that, it was all secret words that nobody saw. Nobody hits it out of the park on their first story that another human reads, because we all need those first readings to learn from. Part of the craft of writing is learning to write for other people. So find as many specific points of what's wrong as you can. and work on those. Then write a new story, and keep that in mind (or as Zen did, write a new variation of your original story).

If i get time (or you post a link), I'll see if I can check out your story and find something specific to suggest, so you can see if that helps you improve.