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319 Public Reviews Given
319 Total Reviews Given
Public Reviews
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101
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Review of I'm Innocent  
Review by cle001
Rated: E | (5.0)
Funny! I really liked this.

The only thing I would add at the end is to indicate the papers were in legalese - which a whole lot of people can't read, either. I realize that you might be working with a word count, here, but that touch would certainly sweeten the punch line.

One point of punctuation: should “My friends sister" actually read "My friend's sister?"

Really good story.
102
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Review of Life Without You  
Review by cle001
Rated: E | (4.0)
Very nicely written.

First a note: I'm not sure if this doesn't speak a little more to road rage than the texting-and-driving issue as mentioned in the intro in the newsletter, but I guess they are closely related. Often drivers on cell phones are the cause of road rage. But, alas, it's a topic for discussion that belongs elsewhere.

As for the story, I don't really have any suggestions for you, just an overall sense or impression of something missing. I'm not sure if I've nailed this completely, but here are some thoughts:

I would have liked to know a little more about the person that was left behind. The relationship seemed rather vague. Was it a parent, husband/lover, or . . . ?

And what sort of future is it that caused the leaving behind or walking out?

Was there a premonition that this person was not coming back? There were a couple of phrases that suggested it, but it wasn't really defined.

I guess having something like any of this to go on would enable me to have some empathy for all the angst that was expressed.

This all seems rather rambling and nebulous, and I apologize for that, but I hope it gives you some things to think about.

You are a very good writer with good form and I encourage you to bring more to the story.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
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Review by cle001
Rated: E | (4.5)
This is a very good poem.

For the most part, you have used a minimalist structure. I think the poem could be improved if more of it was expressed in such fashion. For instance:

"Her feet kicking at the wilting grass" -- only feet would be 'kicking,' so 'Her feet' might be considered extra here.
And
"Their exhaust clouding our vision " -- dropping the word 'their' would give this line more punch.

There was one line that gave me pause: "Modern weaving roads of life" -- it has a nice lilt to it as a stand alone line, but it didn't make much sense in the context of the poem.

These are only suggestions, of course. It is a very nice poem to begin with and you could take it in many different directions to strengthen it.

I hope this helps in some small way.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
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Review of Shy  
Review by cle001
Rated: E | (3.5)
I like your poem. It has real potential, in my humble opinion.

I get most of your word plays in this poem. Pretty clever, too.

I think that what is missing is an actual objective to have all these thoughts work around. It would probably fit into this verse:

""This will be over soon"
my comfort zone no longer
I cringe before my exposure"

It is just a suggestion, but I do think it would strengthen the work.

Hope this helps.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
105
105
Review of Payback Time  
Review by cle001
Rated: ASR | (3.5)
I'd have to call this a very cute story. I did get a pretty good chuckle at the end.

While the thought of a man being torn to shreds by zombie rabbits is pretty horrible, I was missing the suspense of getting to that point.

I think you write very well. Horror is an extremely difficult genre to write in at under 500 words, but you came very close, I think. Maybe paring down the parts about the wife to leave a little room to build more suspense would help. I'm not sure.

In any event, I was pleasantly surprised when I read this story.

Keep it up!

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
106
106
Review of Stay Inside  
Review by cle001
Rated: 13+ | (5.0)
This is a well written and well thought out story. While the tone is overall fatalistic, the Benny character shows the possibilities of becoming a real protagonist with hope blossoming for a much larger story.

You've done a good job of building an unfamiliar world and setting the scene.

I can see why this is a contest winner.

There is, however, one technical aspect you probably need to attend to. Where you can substitute the word 'also' in a sentence, the word too, spelled with two o's should be corrected. I saw a few of these.

I look forward to reading more of your work.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
107
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Review of Out of Time  
Review by cle001
Rated: ASR | (4.5)
I liked what you wrote.

There are a lot of characters for this size piece, but you did well with such a short word count. The reason I mention the characters is because I did have a hard time empathizing with any of them.

Here is another thought: I would have liked to see a little hope that they could escape their fate earlier on in the story. It would make the inevitable more devastating.

These are only vague or nagging notions, though, because all-in-all, this is very well written.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
108
108
Review by cle001
Rated: 13+ | (4.5)
Very funny!

I think that anyone who has been working in the corporate world for more than a decade has had at least one boss like that. Also, that same person has had a day or week where nothing was in their control and could not make up a reasonable excuse for missing a deadline.

Also, excellent use of the zombie syndrome prevalent today - it's a tired concept and you did a good job with them.

Keep up the good work.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
109
109
Review by cle001
Rated: 18+ | (5.0)
Great writing.

I assume this will be used in a longer piece. There were a few places where I had to back up and try to get the gist of things.

Loved the twist about the detective being the target, but again, I could have used a little more insight into the machinations of his job. Its part of what made me back up so much.

I don't know if this could be a book, but I do definitely see it as a TV serial. Hope you work on something similar.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
110
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Review by cle001
Rated: 13+ | (5.0)
Wow! Very reminiscent of Joe Friday. Just the facts. Loved the old fashioned style of this.

I don't think I could recommend anything for you to change at all.

You set the scene to take us back to all those old black and white movies. I used to love them and haven't seen any in a while.

Great work.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
111
111
Review of The Interview  
Review by cle001
Rated: E | (4.0)
I enjoyed reading this story.

There may be a couple of things that could be improved. If you could find one or two people in the class that could recognize what she was talking about, it would strengthen the concept that it is now ancient history. After all, there are people yet today that don't believe the holocaust even happened, most have their own agendas, but they still claim it.

There some passive sentences that could be tightened up, for instance: "We had an assignment to interview someone from a different culture." One more direct way to put this is 'Our assignment was to . . .'

Also, I think that maybe eliminating the last sentence and ending it with your question would make it a little stronger. That last question really solidifies the entire story.

As you can see, my opinions are mostly generic, so you maybe don't need to do a whole lot of tweaking. But you may want to read it over with some of these thoughts in mind.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
112
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Review by cle001
Rated: E | (5.0)
This is an excellent article.

Very clear steps for anyone to follow.

You have enhanced all the information by giving the editor's perspective on this. Very nice touch.

Short of providing a printable checklist (not sure that can be done in WDC), I find this to be most informative and well put together.
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Review of Pain  
Review by cle001
Rated: ASR | (4.5)
Very sensual. I felt both the pain and the desperation involved.

From the beginning I thought that this is really a poem. You could reformat the spacing and make it so, with changes to only a few sentences. The precise wording invokes very vivid imagery.

To keep it prose, I'd like to see a little more about the 'bad guys' hinted at and maybe some indication of how this character got into this situation. I realize that the pain is all-consuming for this guy, but it seems incomplete as it is for a story since there was more or less a resolution at the end.

Cosmetically speaking, one phrase did make me stop and wonder: "A small piece of medal" - did you mean 'metal?'

If you are not used to writing poetry, it can be a bit scary, but do consider converting this into a poem. It's pretty much complete as it is for one. At the very least, it would stretch your talents by having to focus on those few sentences that would have to be changed.

In any event, you've done an extremely good job with this piece of writing. Keep up the good work!

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
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Review by cle001
Rated: E | (3.5)
Poetry is not my strongest suit, so these opinions are just that. This is a fine poem. I think you have a very good start on this.

There are some comments I have that may help you strengthen it.

First, I see you haven't used any punctuation in your poem, until the very last line. When writing poetry in such a style, not only must each word count, but placement of those words must be exact to be effective. So you may want to reconsider using punctuation.

Now for a few things you may want to review: "Pointing their crooked finger" should finger be plural here?

"Laughing of such ridiculousness" is 'of' the word you wanted to use here? I was thinking 'with' or 'in' may be more appropriate.

"Evil bastards full hateful resentment" In absence of punctuation, maybe insert 'of' between full and hateful.

"They have had it all in my eyes" A comma or hyphen after all in this line might help or place the last three words at the beginning of the line - I had to go back and reread it to get it.

There are a few more places with these same sort of issues that might benefit from your attention.

"But even though I have been through hell
No ill feelings do indeed swell" An unexpected and nice touch of rhyme. It would be nice to see it in one or two other places in your poem to give it some rhythm and continuity. I do agree with you, though, that the subject matter would not be suited for a poem that rhymed throughout.

Finally, as you go through it to polish it, do pay attention to each line and the placement of each word to make it flow.

Overall, you did a fine job with this. I encourage you to work on it some more. My comments are just my opinion and other readers may feel entirely different, so take everything with a grain of salt.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
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Review of Enticement  
Review by cle001
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
This is a very clever story. I like it a lot!

I do like the formatting you used. Normally, I would tell you that red text on a white background is one of the hardest on the eyes to read, but considering the subject matter, it's really appropriate here. Although, the colors did get a little mixed up towards the end where she was also speaking in red, not just him hearing it.

As for suggestions, the story could use a little tightening up.

You may want to choose another title. There really wasn't much enticing going on in the story. One character has to be at least reluctant and the other character has to change their mind in some way for there to be enticement.

To do this, you could add some tension to the story by showing a little more push-pull, give-take between the characters. Actually, it might strengthen the story to have some more interaction between them to lend credence to the part where she accepted a gift that she thought was a little too pricey for her to buy and then just walking off with him.

On some of the cosmetic things: You gave her hazel eyes, so a blue bracelet might not set them off quite so obviously. It was a little distracting and most likely an easy fix for you.

I guess this next part speaks to pacing. Since you pretty much gave away his intentions when he first expressed his thoughts, it would be nice to see the path from fun-loving innocence to sheer terror build in this story. Doubt should begin pretty early on and then be dismissed and built up and so forth until the end.

This sentence was a little awkward for me "We walked along the street, conversation easier between us than a knife through butter." There a couple of things that threw me off about it. The phrasing doesn't fit to story line (it just seems out of place) and the easiness of thought comes in the wrong place in the story. At this point in the story I would expect to see some tension or dread beginning to build in her. Or, conversely, showing his ulterior motives growing stronger.

It seems that I gave you very specific suggestions and I don't mean for you to follow them precisely, because you could tighten this up in a myriad of ways - and you should do it your way. You have written a good story and really should polish it up to make it great.

Hope this helps and let me know if you resubmit it - I'd like to see what you do with it - I think it's that good.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
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Review of untitled  
Review by cle001
Rated: E | (3.5)
This shows a lot of promise. I have a few suggestions for you.

First I'll speak to the more or less cosmetic things. It would be good if you broke this up into paragraphs. It's difficult to read such a large block of writing without any white space to rest the eyes. I remember some college textbooks, on really easy subject matters, that were difficult to read through for just this reason.

As you do this, it should be easier for you to pay attention to your punctuation. At first, I thought you had some run-on sentences in the piece, but it may just be a matter of missing punctuation. There do seem to be some missing words here and there that may add to this perception. I think you'll pick all this up with your new formatting.

Now the part that may not have as easy a fix. The question of voice - the voice in this piece seems to be a bit mixed. Most of the piece is written in a casual style, as if someone were writing to their friends. However, there are quite a few words that you are using that just don't fit the style, which makes the voice confusing. If you use a thesaurus, your goal should be to reduce most of those words down to the most effective word to communicate the thought, not the other way around. It's not that you should entirely avoid those four-syllable words, but when you do use them, they should be the perfect word for the sentence. This could be easier for you than I first thought.

Finally, I really think you have a lot of potential with this piece.

It has a great opening and I am curious about what happens next. Keep up the good work!

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
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117
Review of DO NOT READ THIS.  
Review by cle001
Rated: E | (5.0)
What a cheerful read to start my day!

Thank you very much.

The only things you might want to change is in the first line - from your to you're and maybe drop the to in the sixth line or change it to two (unless I missed the point you were making).

This is just absolutely delightful. Again, thank you.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
118
118
Review by cle001
Rated: 18+ | (3.5)
I'll approach this review from the perspective of a reader and potential fan.

You tell a very good story. I would like to read more of it. I think not only you, but this particular story has a lot of potential and what I go into below may seem like a lot, but should be swiftly accomplished in most cases. In a few cases, what can I say? A writer's work is rarely done!

For the most part, your pacing is pretty good. You have set some believable scenes.

There are some problems with it, the vast majority of which are cosmetic in nature. The rest of those problems I'll try to cover more generally.

I've pulled out a few phrases as I came across them and will comment on them as examples:


"All of them loved, all of the cared for." - sometimes a letter is missing, leaving a real word, just not the correct one, this phrase should probably read 'all of them cared for.'

You've heard of 'smoke and mirrors'? - When the sheik replied no, maybe some sort of explanation would be called for in this scene?

"late-August" - the hyphen is a distraction to the flow of the reading.

"In his experience with people he had learned that the eyes were an entry to the soul." - there are a number of places that are bordering on, if not outright cliche or trite. Occasionally, it's alright to use one to move a story along in an unimportant place, but there shouldn't be more than one or two in an entire book. This was part of an intensive scene and probably deserves a unique description. When readers come across too many of these, they think they've already seen all this in life and their minds start to wander away from your story.

"Theodore read Yigal's eyes and saw in them a staunch determination. A wave of pride fell over him, a pride for Yigal's inner strength and character." I don't think you meant pride, here. What had Theodore done for Yigal to feel any pride? How can he feel pride for what is innate in another person? Admiration, maybe but pride?

"Neither was keeping me hostage on a deserted island." - This is confusing. The island was full of people - maybe not natives, but they met the plane. It was not deserted.

"But aging blackness overtook her." - Was a word replaced or left out here? What is an aging blackness?

"heavy enough to prompt her to ground her knuckles into them." - I suspect you just tried to rearrange this sentence and the tense got turned around - shouldn't this be grind instead of ground?

"It was a side of her she had never seen" - A man and a woman are talking, him/she or her/he.

"his mouth watering as the translation to on meaning." - some words just got left out here.

"Churchill" - This comment is about your dialog in general. While it is very good and moves the story along nicely, I think you may have to work on giving each character more distinctive voices. A case in point is Churchill who was famous for his oratorical wit and grandiose generalities. While he may cuss and swear in a small meeting, in this small scene, he otherwise sounds like the guy next door. When you read through this again, I think you'll see that your spies or agents pretty much all talk alike.

"I'm afraid you're going to have to. What we did last night was part of your test. I had to know if you could play along, if you could be loyal. Now I know you can," she said." - Earlier you were talking about how he loved his wife and thought of her when he had to be with other women for the job. So loyal is probably not the correct word to use in this scene - it just seems contradictory.

I know, this sounds like a lot, but most are probably fixed rather quickly. These are only examples. When you proofread this again, you'll need to be on the lookout for similar things. I especially noticed quite a few two letter words that were just plain missing.

As I said, I really like your story and with some attention to detail think it could be great and most likely salable.

I look forward to reading more of your work.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
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Review of Intro: Passing  
Review by cle001
Rated: 13+ | (1.0)
I'm sorry, but I couldn't read this as it is. I did skim a sentence here and there and from what I saw, I would probably be interested in reading it, but you need to:

a) format this into paragraphs,

b) add a space or two after each period that ends a sentence, and

c) fix the line breaks so that it looks more like prose than poetry.

Silly little things, maybe, but remember white space is a readers best friend. And if you're going to write, you do want readers!

If you can fix these things and send me an email, I'll be glad to read it.
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Review of The Fog  
Review by cle001
Rated: E | (4.5)
This is an excellent story. The pacing was exactly right for the subject. It should slow a reader down to absorb the atmosphere of the story and it did just that.

So, the only suggestion I have is about the first paragraph. The last two sentences of it seem almost incomplete for the beginning of a story. I'll admit that I had to read it three times before going on with the story. It's like a dangling participle in the middle of the sentence - why what?

"I found myself asking the age old questions of why, though they continued to remain unanswered. "

Again, a picture of what?

"All the while, angst painted a picture in my mind, one that even I had no desire to be an audience to."

Let me say that this is not a bad paragraph as it is, and might not present the same reaction if it had occurred later on in the piece, but the story opening should probably be a little more complete.

You have written an excellent story and I encourage to to keep it up.

My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .
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121
Review of The Fun House  
Review by cle001
Rated: 13+ | (3.5)
This is a very good story.

You have a pretty good grasp of the age group's dialog, although if you hadn't mentioned their ages I might have thought them to be two or three years younger from it, especially since they were all riding bikes to get around. But, then not all sixteen-year-old kids have access to a car. Not really sure I have a suggestion for you on this one - and it just could be me and my worldview of that age group.

I think you could greatly improve this story if you showed, rather than told, more about the creepy feeling your main character, Kevin, was experiencing - physical sensations he was feeling and such. And, maybe differentiate between the kind of dread experienced from the fun house with that kind of dread you have when answering police questions. Just a thought.

There was one point that made me stop and read twice: "Maybe if you didn't eat so much, you could have gotten through as easily as we did." Becky giggled, as she usually did when I teased Johnny about his weight.

At first I thought Becky said this. You might want to make this into two sentences or something. It is not really a bad sentence, just confusing.

As I said, this is a very good story. I really don't think it would take a whole lot to improve it.

Hope my suggestions help. You show a lot of potential.
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