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Review #3979941
Viewing a review of:
 How long had he been here?  [13+]
Short story about despair
by hope75
Review by Bikerider
In affiliation with SIMPLY POSITIVE GROUP  
Rated: 13+ | (5.0)
Access:  Public | Hide Review (?)


I saw this short story listed on the Review Request Page and took a look. I hope you find my comments useful.

If you were aiming for despair in this piece, you hit the target dead on.

Despair is a strong emotion, and evidence of the emotions associated with despair is found throughout this piece. Here are a couple of places that caught my attention.

1. The small room, which now seemed smaller, consisted of the chair on which he sat, a broken desk and a table light unable to illuminate since the power went. A small window in the corner, hastily boarded up, added to the gloom inside.
You not only set the scene with these sentences, but you set the mood. Dark, repressive, lonely, in this case. Setting a mood in a story is as important as any other writing element, and you've done it well here.

2. She entered his thoughts again, standing there in that floral print dress she would wear in the summer. “Jesus she was beautiful.”
What can show loneliness better than a melancholy memory of someone who was 'beautiful' but is not with you now? This short sentence shows so much more emotion than the few words used would imply. Nicely done!

3. As she turned and walked away in his mind, tears stung his eyes. What had he done? As well as loneliness, this sentence shows remorse. Remorse for what? Did he do something to wreck his relationship? Or did he end the life of his love? Leaving your reader wondering and thinking about a story is something all writers strive to do.

4. Fragments of his childhood swam in and out of his thoughts. Things were normal before, before all this. Where was his loving family now, what had become of them?
I love the phrase; fragments of his childhood swam in and out of his thoughts. The rest of this made me shudder. Had he done something to his family?

This story resonated with me in more than one way. I'm a retired police officer and I have heard about 'suicide by cop.' The further into the story I read, the more I thought that is what was happening here. And maybe it is.


There are so many things here that make this story good. It is not easy to 'show' emotion in writing, but you have done it well, very well.

There may be a couple of grammatical errors found in this story, but the story itself overshadows any minor errors that might be found. This is a 5 star rating if ever there was one.

Brava! Hope75

Bikerider









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