Hello, and good afternoon

I found this item in the Review Request board. It read to me like an entertaining horror piece needing few suggestions, which is why I rated it with four stars. For your reference, I'll link my personal policies on rating and reviewing here: "Bobbi's Rating and/or Reviewing Policy" . If you have any questions, feel free to drop me a line.

In your request you asked for structural revision suggestions over proofreading and grammar help, so I will keep my suggestions to this as much as I can.

A few things I noticed as a reader:

The first thing I notice is that the introductory paragraph is just scene description, which can lose the reader right off the bat in a horror story. I feel that if you cut that section and pepper the description into the action as you need it, then you can have a stronger intro that will keep the reader intrigued with the grisly scene going on:

The wide, empty stretch of Pacific Coast Highway. . . a dot on the horizon. The foothills of the Santa Ynez Mountains burn in the steady ticking of a car’s emergency lights. The car is an old gold Chevy set askew across the wide, empty northbound lanes of the Pacific Coast highway. Its horn blares across an otherwise still darkness, bouncing off the burning foothills to the east and disappearing across the abyss of the Pacific Ocean to the west. (Doesn't have to be worded exactly like this or anything, but you get the idea.)

I also noticed that you used a present tense throughout your piece. I don't see that very often, and you were consistent with it. For Stuart's memory recollections, however, I would try out using past tense, since they were past events in the story's timeline, and see how that goes.

Your piece, overall, was an entertaining read. I certainly didn't expect the ending, and I'm not sure how to wrap my head around it. It read like one of H.P. Lovecraft's strange and horrifying dreams. I'm not sure if I should take the events of section four literal or not, or if they are the delusions of an incredibly guilty mind.

Thank you for allowing me to review your piece. I'm just another reader and writer so use or discard any of my suggestions at your personal discretion. If you make changes and would like me to reassess your piece for a higher rating, feel free to e-mail me.

Keep writing and keep improving!

--Brandi