Hi, I'm Bikerider , a judge for

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I have read your entry, "This is Love"  and I offer this review for your consideration. I hope you find my comments helpful.

I'm happy that you choose to enter the Newbies Only contest. It is not always easy to put our work out there for others to see and critique, but I'm glad you did.

Character:

There are two; Kristine and David.

Kristine: It is easy to see Kristine's skepticism, but there is not much else known about her. I would have liked to see a bit of physical description. How old is she? Color hair, eyes, physical characteristics? But you did a very good job in showing both the lessening of her skepticism and her thoughts about love, and trusting David.

David: There is some physical description of David in the story. His almost-black hair falls over one eye. But his personality does shine through in the story. He comes across as patient, thoughtful, and someone who is willing to devote time to get the attention of someone who interests him.

I liked both characters, even without the physical description because for me this story is more about the character's character. Both Kris and David come across as open-minded people who discuss differences without argument, are thoughtful, and before long their interest in each other becomes apparent.

Good job with these characters.

Dialogue:

Dialogue should do two things; move the story forward and give the reader some information in an interesting way. The dialogue used here does both, and it does it well. Not using the normal dialogue tags, he said, she said, is somewhat unique and may be part of your personal writing style, but I did find that at times I lost my way as to who the speaker was. It wasn't a big problem, but it did occur more than once.

Grammar/Punctuation/Spelling:

I saw no grammar, punctuation, or spelling errors that detracted from the story.

Things to consider: These are things that popped up as I read the story.

You wrote: The carousel, considered another of the town’s monuments, spun in all its colorful glory bringing memories of her childhood and the times spent at the carnival with her friends. She loved the bright colors. They reminded her of the flowers in the shop. Each horse painted vividly to stand out on its own, inviting children to climb aboard and pretend for a moment that another world awaited.

Kris threw darts at balloons and missed. She teased David until he hurled baseballs at old milk cans and won her a teddy bear. She found herself relaxing in a way she would never have expected here.

I was lost a bit here, and I think a transition is needed. Transitions are important, but they must be obvious to the reader. Kris and David are riding the carousel and the horses are being described, using Kris's inner thoughts. Without notice, Kris is throwing darts and David is hurling baseballs. Between the carousel and the other activities, your reader needs to know that a change has taken place, that the couple are no longer on the carousel.

But you do very well with the following transition: You wrote: A caramel apple and two bags of cotton candy later he dropped her at her door. This short sentence tells the reader that a change in either location, time, or character POV has taken place, and is well done.

On day three: Kris and David go to a thrift shop and Kris puts on a fashion show for David. This sort of confused me; wasn't it David who was supposed to be arranging the activities for the week? If so, wouldn't David have been performing the fashion show? Maybe if you pointed out that David choose the clothes Kris would try on, locating the very ugliest things he could find, then the activity would belong more to David than Kris.

And lastly:

You wrote: When day seven arrived, Kris found herself disappointed and didn’t understand it. For some reason, David didn’t show up to work.
Kris couldn’t understand the point of all of this. Why would he make the entire bet only to be cruel? David did things she couldn’t agree with but the last description she would use of him would be mean.

I wondered why, when David didn't show up for work, Kris thought it was cruel. I wondered why she wasn't concerned when he didn't show up, thinking that maybe something had happened to him, or that possibly she had upset him in some way.

In conclusion:
It is not always easy to show a character's emotions, but you did a good job with that here. From the dialogue, I learned that both Kris and David have not had a lot of good luck with love; they work together; and there is a hint of attraction between them. Putting all that together in a story almost always works, and it worked here.

And one last thing: the presentation of a good story is much like the presentation of a fine meal. Using the correct format can make the difference between a reader stopping long enough to enjoy your story, or moving on without reading. One and one half space between sentences is usually correct, with a double space between paragraphs. Also, using a font size such as 3.5 gives the piece a better look also, since the default font size is quite small.

Good job, a nicely-written piece that begs for more so a reader can see what happens between Kris and David next.

Bikerider, short story judge for Newbies ONLY Short Story and Poetry Contest.







My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .