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Rated: 13+ | (5.0)
Great story! Made my day of social distancing. The voice resounds like you. *BigSmile*
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Rated: E | (4.5)
I think you people do a wonderful job. You give honest and positive reviews. What more could a writer ask for.
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3
Rated: 18+ | (5.0)
Well, someone gave you a one and a half on this? Hmmm, I guess they thought you were going to hand them the golden key to the meaning life. Got news for them. They have to find it on they own.

I do like your blog entry. It's a departure from the seriously serious.(OMG did I use an adverb?) Shame on me. It's honest and tells about you and what you hold dear. Keep it up!

I'm an ex-middle school teacher.and still alive to talk about it.

Milhaud
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Rated: E | (5.0)
I am reviewing this piece because it is a Quill Award winner. First of all, I think this is a terrific poem. It is so good, in fact, it doesn't stand a chance of being published in The New Yorker (That's a compliment.).

But . . . I do have a couple suggestions.

The first is rather banal: capitalize the poem's title so that it reads "The Man Is Not an Artist".

The second would have been more substantive, but you have already edited it -- the part that said "Their words are the lightning, stretched out like bony fingers."

Great job and a wonderful read.

Milhaud
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Rated: E | (4.0)
Once again, you make a nice effort. I have suggested a few changes for flow and clarity. Keep writing.

Lowing to self, I ask slowcomma

O my master! Where to go?



Said the self left in me,

“To wandering paths in woods and meads Do you mean to have an off rhyme here?

lying ahead in world of treads.”



“To the path which leads you to

the valley of thy destined goal.

Not the path which left you in

the valley of horrible den.”

Thus, answered the other power.no period

and left me in a confused mark.



I felt done when a voice within

told me a certain thing.

“Never to Getting rid of "to" helps meaning and flow. worry what path grace

All paths go….. To same place.”
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Rated: E | (4.0)
Once again -- a nice try. As you can guess, I like forms that are less restrictive. I think for a haiku to be absolutely effective one has to smack the reader with opposite, but not totally exclusive images. They must be approachable and reconcilable to the reader. I think the second one comes closest to doing this.

Good luck and keep writing.
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Review of Paper World.  
Rated: E | (4.0)
I'm not a big fan of flash fiction, especially mini flash fiction. To do a decent job in this format, you have to be poetic. You do that. But here's the problem: in a short story, the story is filled with characters, setting, plot, conflict, and resolution. An accumulation of details that is arranged properly makes the story clear. Here, you can't do all that. For example, "from the vale of relations" has me stumped. I don't know what you are getting at.

I think you make a valiant attempt, but the fault is in the form -- not in you.

M
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Review of The tollbooth  
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
From an ambiguous beginning, this morphs into a tale of horror. Good effort. I just left a few suggestions. Do with them what you want. Good luck with your writing.

The Tollbooth

1.

Bill Soughton was a stout man of sixty years, whose expanding width seemed to be compensating for his diminishing stature. On this night, just as like? every weeknight for the passed thirty years, Bill worked the lonely tollbooth that stood at the single lone? entrance of Amaranth Island. As usual, Bill sat in his booth listening to an old radio, which played more static than music, and staringplaying more static than music. He was staring down Falls Bridge: the only thing connecting Amaranth to the mainland.

It was a gorgeous night. The clouds, which had spent all day obscuring the would-be shinning shining splendor of autumn, had descended into a luxuriously thick ground fog, revealing an elegant full moon suspended above. The other end of the bridge was nothing but an obfuscated skeleton in the density of the dense fog; the mainland itself could not be seen at all. Bill had only a moment to reflect on the notion that this lovely little island was all that there was was left? in the world, before a pair of headlights burst through the mist, shined shone? down the length of Falls Bridge, and illuminated the little tollbooth. If Amaranth was the world, an outsider had arrived.

At first, Bill didn’t think the vehicle was moving, but as the car’s shape gradually began to gain definition, he realized that it was Sometimes less is more. But why was it proceeding so slowly? Before He realized that he was frightened, the hairs on the back of Bill Soughton’s neck stood up. He felt a moment of panic and imagined a maniac, behind the wheel of what Bill could now see was a Cadillac, loading a great big gun full of great big bullets with his name on them. Suddenly he felt very silly. It was the fog! No one in there their? right mind would be speeding down a narrow bridge like Falls on a foggy night like this. Are you sure you want to say this? Your words say that the person driving is not in his right mind. Bill let out a little chuckle, more from relief than humor, and leaned out of his window as the Cadillac rolled up to his booth.

“Those high beams make it harder to-“

The words caught in Bill’s throat. The car was totally empty. The Cadillac’s radio was playing classical music. The jazz coming from Bill’s radio blended with the music from the Caddy, creating a wickedly ”wickedly perverse" is overkill. perverse piece of dissonance: T{b] Lower case “t” because you are ending a sentence. he symphony of a lunatic, Satan’s final movement.

All the fear he had felt upon watching the car approach,no comma slammed back into his bones so hard that he began to shiver. The moon, which had looked so elegant a moment earlier, now appeared demented and no longer perfectly round. It seemed to loom over him in the sky, engorged and entertained by the horror playing out in Bill’s little booth. Now the tollbooth felt more like a coffin. The picturesque fog on the water instantly became a sea of restless spirits, no longer jostled, but antagonized by the waves below. They would awaken from their tortured dreams and rise up; they would look upon Bill with the empty holes which now served as their eyes and…

And something was in his tollbooth with him.

There was a soft, wet, smacking sound coming from behind him. The sound almost reminded Bill of someone trying to get a bad taste out of their mouth, except this was slightly different. The sound was slower and more subtle; it was almost coital in its nature.

The thing behind him began to laugh.

It was a guttural, rasping, coughing sound, which surely must have been coming from an ancient throat. The laugh seemed to say ‘Checkmate,No comma; exclamation point. You’re mine.’

When Bill Soughton turned around,no comma slowly on his heels, it was not a gesture of curiosity; it was one of acceptance. Bill knew that whatever was standing behind him was going to kill him, so he would die facing his murderer. What he saw before him turned his chocolate brown complexion to the cold grey of a tomb stone.

It was tall. Bill had to look up to see its horrible face, and its head was cocked at a harsh angle so that it could fit into the booth. The eyes were mad and seemed to be bulging out of sunken black pits in its skull. Its nose was animalistic, almost a snout. His face (Bill believed it to be male) was deathly pale and pitted with pock marks, but the mouth! It was far too big for its head; sickly disproportionate and full of razor sharp teeth. This creature seemed as if it had a mouth full of rusty barbed wired wire +comma and the look on it face was wild and indisputably insane. For an absurd instant Bill thought that it was going to scream ‘HAPPY BIRTHDAY’, but instead it ripped his throat out.

In one of the often strange mercies we are sometimes afforded in life, Bill Soughton had the luxury Are you sure “luxury” is the correct word? of dying before losing his mind.
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Review of The Scarecrow  
Rated: E | (4.0)
Hi, although I have a different name, I am the same reviewer. This is a fine piece with vivid imagery and a plot that travels unswervingly to a well-thought conclusion. All I did, using your words, was suggest a few different phrases and punctuation corrections. Good luck in the contest. Nice parable.


The Scarecrow


WC:1000


A river passes through a wide farm land surrounded by three gigantic mountains in the Western Ghats of the Indian subcontinent. The farm land around the river is extremely fertile, and the villagers that own and cultivate the land leave as much land as possible for farming by living on the decline of the mountains live on the decline of the mountains, to leave as much land as possible for farming. The villagers have constructed their mud-homes in rows, very similar to the steps on a stairway, in such a way that the ground in front of each row of homes is the roof to the ones below.

It was aA week before the Holi festival, the play of color in celebration of the coming spring, and made the village was ecstatic.

At the crack of dawn the Sarpanch - head of the village - stood in front of his house, sipping on a cup of tea, watching the descent of the mountains the mountains descend into the fog below. As the fog clearedcomma something peculiar caught Amrithlal's attention, something colorful. Amrithlal grabbed his stick, put on his Ghandi hat, and took to the little common path in Unnecessary “in”. between the rows of houses that ran all the way down into the farms.

"Sarpanch-Ji, I see you have made some changes to your farm," yelled one of the villagers, puffing at a Hookah in front of his house.

Amrithlal payedpaid no attention to the man and kept walking.

Another villager called out, with a smirk on his face, “Amrithlal, I did not know you had a knack for art and color."

Amrithlal hastened his pace, but said nothing.

"Oye!" shouted a village elder, "The spring will bring its own color, Sarpanch. Your job is to do the watering not the coloring." Laughter rang out through the valley.

The embarrassed leader began an awkward wobble down the hill side hillside;no semicolon! Use a comma instead. a mix of walking and running. He entered the farm, and there before him, right in the center was his Scarecrow, dressed in a colorful Saree or Sari?.

"A female Scarecrow?" Amrithlal murmured to himself angrily,no comma and stripped the lifeless figure furiously. The laughter died. The Sarpanch then climbed back up the hill, not even once looking up.

"Which one of you kids is trying to tarnish my reputation around the village? Eh?" Screamed screamed Amrithlal, as the kids dispersed like running water.

"Leave the kids alone, husband, and if you continue screaming out loud like this, you will be the enemy of your reputation."

Amrithlal turned to look at his wife, standing right behind him, her arms and eyebrows crossed.

"I dressed the Scarecrow. What makes you so angry, husband?" She said as the children ran out of the house.

For the next few hours the villagers heard the Sarpanch raise hell out of his little hut, but as expected, they heard nothing of his wife.

The next morning when Amrithlal woke up there was no breakfast or tea waiting for him; the children were not fed, clothes were not washed, and bath water was not heated. Memsahib had gone on a hunger strike; she wouldn't speak a word and refused to perform her household tasks.

Quickly life got hard in the little hutcomma and Amrithlal tried to force his lady to break her strike, raising his voice often, but the lady refused to retaliate change her behavior. He tried the soft tactic too, but that didn't help either.

“Dear, what is all this? Where has all this come from? This stubbornness, this unhappiness? Please eat something...love... eat something."

The woman said nothing.

Days went by and Amrithlal's private home became the subject of public debate. Men, women and even children discussed filled the recesses of their hardworking lives with the discussion of Sarpanch and his dilemma. Who was right? What is the right thing to do? Who is going to give in? Before long the whole village was divided into two groups: Those those who thought the that Sarpanch was right, and those who supported Memsahib. Whether for it or against it, everybody had an opinion about a subject they had never even thought about before. Amrithlal was not happy.

Four days passed and the lady's health began to deteriorate. She looked as if there was very little life in her, and the Sarpanch was worried. The village doctor was called upon to oversee the first lady's well being well-being.

"Sarpanch… Memesahib's condition is critical. I am afraid if she continues with this...she will..."
new paragraph"Bite your tongue medicine man. You have done your part. Now you can leave."

The Sarpanch gave it one more try,period or colon "Woman, Holi is coming... Holi! It is a time of celebration and mischief. It is bad a omen to sulk like this. You wouldn't want our spring to be fruitless, do you?"

She said nothing.

The day before Holi arrived, and the villagers were up early, preparing for the big day. Fragrance of various delicacies enchanted the morning air, Sarees were tried on, colors passed around, drum skins tightened, and dances were being organized.

The Sarpanch stepped out of his house, and it all came to a halt. Amrithlal stood there, expressionless with a Saree on his shoulder. Everybody gathered outside their houses, lining up the hill sides hillsides with belts of people; comma like spectators to at a play. Amrithlala looked around; the hills looked back at him, in absolute silence. He walked down the muddy road all the way to his farm, straightened his hat, and draped the Saree around the scarecrow.

The Sarpanch walked back up the path, stood in front of the house, cleared his throat and declared, "Memsahib is indeed a committed and forceful woman." He then walked into his house.

The next morning, morning of Holi, the Sarpanch walked outside, and there was his tea, and found his tea sitting on the stool. He began to sip on it and amuse himself with the play of the morning mist. Once the mist cleared he saw that the farmland was more colorful than ever. Every farm had a Saree-draped Scarecrow. Ah! It was spring.

Four springs later the first Woman Sarpanch was elected to head the village.
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Rated: 18+ | (4.0)
You certainly do reveal the dark side. On the whole, this is very good writing. Usually I have to wade through a hive of punctuation errors. Not the case here, other than maybe an unnecessary comma. However, the basic rule for dialogue is: when a new character speaks, begin a new paragraph. For example:

She looked at him, but before she could speak he saidcomma "You really don't look happy. Is it because I'm late or because you missed me too much?"

She stared up at him with half a smile. He grinned as he placed a small black box on the table in front of her. With a quiet gasp, the woman's eyes lit up, and a small smile formed on her elegant face. She opened the box and took out two small diamond earrings, and looked up with excitement. "Oh, Eric! These are absolutely beautiful. I don't know how to thank you!"

Good luck with your writing.
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11
Rated: ASR | (4.5)
I was perusing this page, checking on the status of the contest. Noticing your piece, I couldn't help but check out the competition. What a beautiful, touching story!! What a wonderful voice. I assume this is biographical. If it isn't, you do a tremendous job of leading the reader astray. The only reason I gave it a 4.5 was some grammar/ style issues. I hope this wins.

Suggestions:

1. “Yep,” he would say and wink at us, hence making six boys own the world. The use of "would" stylistically becomes repetitious after a point -- and unnecessary. After the first couple uses, you can slide into the simple past tense.

2. It didn’t matter if it was the foggiest day on earth,period + new sentence when that barn door openedcomma I swear the sun shone in as if God was smiling, saying, “Have fun, boys.”

3. We stood in awe every Sunday as the scene sparkledcomma beckoning our imaginations.

4. We had the grand idea that when we grew upcomma we would mass produce our time machine and make a fortune.

5. Besides, my camaro Camaro got us around town in style.

6. Our eyes widened,semicolon here. we were speechless.

7. She went to the trunk; shakingcomma she opened it.

8. . . . paying tribute to a man who lived by the one simple rule he had. his one, simple rule.
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Rated: E | (4.5)
I t sounds like you handed your father over to the Lord. Powerful piece.

1. Technically, it should be "My Father's House".
2. . . . no Atheist(s) in foxholes.
3. non believers. should be "non-believers", I think.
4. "Dads faith in Atheism" should be "Dad's faith in Atheism."

5. I found several punctuation errors. Here is one paragraph corrected. Sorry, my English teacher past is sticking out its ugly head.

My sister Cathy couldn't believe what she was hearing. She turned to the man who was in the bed next to Dad's and asked himcomma "Mr. Scott commais this true of what happened this morning?"
Mr. Scott leaned forwarded and saidcomma "Yescomma and I too was touched."
After Dad was dismissed a few days later from the hospital into home hospice carecomma he was a changed man.
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Review of Tokey's Boat  
Rated: E | (4.5)
It's interesting that two people experience the same event can remember it totally different. This story reminds me ironically of the old, wooden boat I bought covered with five coats of paint. I stripped it, refinished it, and ended up with a gleaming wooden boat built of marine mahogany. Most of the fun was in the fixin'. I probably only took it out a couple dozen times before I sold it and recarpeted the house. I still have the photos. It was a silk purse made from a sow's ear.

Good job with your story. I like the voice.
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Rated: E | (3.5)
I like your idea for a parable, and your writing shows promise. Try not to use the passive "was" so often; it sounds stilted and slows the action. The end is puzzling; I really don't get the leap from king to fisherman. I believe you need to connect the ideas for the reader. Write on!

More Suggestions:
1. In the country lived a boy that who was believed to be the true king. Generally "who" is used with people, "that" with things."

2. Try to use a few more active verbs. I counted 4 "was's" in the first paragraph alone.

3. With heavy hearts the village people cried out to him unnecessary because you are stating the obvious wishes of luck and safety.

4. "Soon the boy came to the walls of the great city. Outside of which, sat an old man wrapped in an ugly brown sheet." Combine into one sentence. The second is a fragment.

5. "You may leave through that door," the man indicated to a door in back, "you'll find it much easier than the other." Neither of the quoted parts is a speech tag. ALL three parts should be separate sentences.
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Review of The Last Ride  
Rated: E | (3.0)
This review is part of a port raid from WDC Frontliners.

I think the concept for your story contains possibilities. It is clear from the reading that some upheaval has hit the country. But you aren’t clear on what. You don’t explain why tech things were banned. It leaves the reader swimming to find direction. You really need much more of a back story to put the reader where he is comfortable to understand the action.

I included a line by line. I hope this helps.

Write on!

The Last Smuggler

I couldn't believe it. It was all so beautiful. The sand, the heat,period + new sentence; otherwise, this doesn’t make sense as written. the few plants that were strong enough to survive were flourishing. The desert is a hard place to visit, much less live.

I wasn't there to stick around. Just long enough to do my job and leave as quickly as I could. People that do my job generally aren't welcome here. The end of the War brought an end to the industry being legal in the States, but at the same time, smuggling has never been legal.



It wasn't always smuggling though. Sending computer and radio parts used to be as normal as walking down the street and smoking a cigarette. It wasn't until the Government began controlling the media and information in the country that itWhat does “it” refer to? was outlawed and people like me became criminals. A desk jockey in a suit became Public Enemy #1. Of course, getting parts from manufacturers wasn't a problem. The real problem came from getting the parts to the paying customer. That's where I came in.

Monterrey, the closest city to the States, became a haven for all kinds of contraband. Drugs, weapons, people. They were all run from Monterrey. But the highest paying runs came from people wanting tech. Pirates, press, even peoplecomma following the underground fad of illegal Net transmissionscomma needed equipment. As long as they had the money, somebody had the hardware and I had the means of getting it there.

After the first few decades, the market thinned as people realized that the Government was serious and had the means to stay in power. Kids in basements were caught, rich heirs turned a pageThis makes no sense to me. You need to explain. , and the population began to turn towards the new Order. But there were still a few that kept work comingKept coming? Kept doing what?. They weren't amateurs. They were die-hard Resistance that who Use “who” when referring to people, “that” when referring to things. continued the fight, and after a time, it seemed they had the chance to win. All they had to do was wait for the right day. And their day was coming.

It came after new, stricter laws were enacted in the States. No electronics except light and heat. No music, no radios, and absolutely no broadcasting of any kind. The country was up in arms and a new light shinedshone for the Resistance.

They placed an order. Enough computers, dishes, and other parts to set up a nationwide broadcast Net. In triplicate.



The only way from Monterrey into the States isDon’t change to present tense here. It confuses the reader time wise. a two-lane blacktop that's under constant observation. Even though itsit’s only four hours in and four out, if you ran it once and didn't get caught you were lucky. If you ran it twice and lived, you were good. This would be my eighth time to the States and I wasn't hired for cheap. The Resistance had asked for me and two other Runners personally. We were as close to legends as possible in that wasteland and were about to become more More legendary?.

The plan was for each one to run a complete set of the order into the States, drop it, and make the run back. No hello, no goodbye; strictly business. This had been done before, but never with cargo designated to be so important. I personally wanted all three of us to succeed and the Resistance to win, but I wasn't in it for a causeperiod other than money. I offered my services strictly for cash.


We left early, hitting the blacktop before it was light out. Making good time across the desert, I almost fooled myself into thinking we were free and clear. The New Dallas skyline was just visible when my radio crackled announcing the presence of a People's Protection Patrol on the road ahead of us. In the lead, I instructed the other Runners to step on it and make some time. The heat off the engine blurred everything that wasn't distorted by the land and made almost impossible to see the People's Air Corps flying low towards us.This line suggests that the Air Corps is in front, but the next line says they are behind. Which is it?

I wished the other Runners good luck and told them to continue to New Dallas through the wastes as I continued on the blacktop with the Air Corps right behind me. Pushing the pedal a little harder, the engine crept into the red line as I raged towards the drop point.

In secondscomma I was upon the Road Crew. Their black armored vehicles rushed against mecomma and I veered off the road to avoid being smashed. They had no way of catching me out in the desert, and I could buy a little more time for the others. The temp gauge on the motor had broken long ago, but I felt more heat from the engine as I rushed headlong into the desert, pushing it as hard as possible. I only needed a few minutes before the rest of the hardware reached its destination. As long as the Air Corps was after me and not the others, they still had a chance to reach New Dallas and deliver.

Running hard across the dunes, I heard the first burst from the machines above. They grazed the sand in front of mecomma sending liquid glass across my face as I ignored their warning shots. I down shifted, flew across the sand and pulled ahead of them. Air Corps pilots hate being out run, even for a short distance. Their next shot wouldn't be so friendly.

The .67 cal rounds from the next burst trashed my cargo and set it to flames. Another trick they use to try and discourage any Runners from continuing further. A crackle in my radio told me my companions had outmaneuvered the law on patrol in the desert and were on their way to the drop point. Too bad the Air Corps didn't hear it.

After their warning tactics didn't work, the Corps opened fire on me and riddled everything with holes. Gauges and sensors exploded all around, showering me with moltenMolten metal? Wouldn’t it be shards of metal? Or maybe they use lasers? metal. As I went airborne the tachometer buried and the engine gave all she had before it exceeded the limit and went out with a terrific explosioncomma sending me tumbling through the Waste.



The incessant beep of the few remaining sensors and the static on my headset brought me back to consciousness. Everything around me was heat and sand. The engine wasn't in flames, but it was hot enough to think otherwise. The Air Corps that gunned me down had landed and released its ground squad. Twisting my head revealed Net hardware and engine pieces strewn as far as I could see.

As the ground squad crept closer I reached for the Full Do you mean “failsafe”? Safe detonator stored on my vehicle and held it to my chest. Craning my hearing into my busted headset, I made out that the other Runners had made the drop and were on the way back to Monterrey. I clutched the detonator to my chest and closed my eyes. It was all over. The Resistance had their equipment and would soon be in contact with every citizen of the States. All I had to do was push the button.
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Rated: E | (5.0)
I loved this piece. I can see you are a teacher -- like me. I would imagine that much of this is true. It serves as a wonderful character sketch. Keep writing.

Two notes:

"ConstantlyUsually, when we begin a sentence with an "ly" adverb, it's best to use a comma after it. we hear how children can be mean, and while I won’t disagree with that, I was seeing an instance of children being considerate."

"I continuedcomma here: it reads much better as I tried to nonchalantly throw the rejected pencil in the waste basket, . . ."
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Review of Good Conversation  
Rated: 13+ | (4.5)
This is a review requested by WDC Frontliners.

You have written an entertaining story with a twist at the end. From being a “pig farmer” in a small town for thirty years, I was sniffing something in the works. Nice job. You move seamlessly between POVs. As the title would suggest, your dialogue is natural and easy to read.

In the line by line, I simply pointed out some punctuation problems and suggested you delete a couple of unnecessary words.

I enjoy your writing.

Good Conversation

She entered the hole-in-the-wall bar with a look that dared anyone to approach her tonight. Glancing at her watch, Kyra wasn’t sure 4:45 p.m. was technically considered ‘night’.

“The usual?” the bartender asked as she slid onto the stool.

“Make it a double, Rob,” she replied as her body relished finally getting off its feet.

“Your usual is a double.”

“Two times two. Figure it out,” she said with a twist of sarcasm and teasingunnecessary.

“Kids giving you a hard time today?” He mixed the drink without even looking at the bottles.

“Like you wouldn’t believe, and I hit construction driving to this ghost town, and to top it off I have to go in early tomorrow to show some newbie around.”

It felt good to be somewhere they knew her only on the surface and waited on her for a change. Thursdays were her 'escape the world' days. No carpools, no little league, no ballet classes, and the kids went to their dad's house for the night, allowing her a little time to recoup and be ready to unnecessary face the world again. She only indulged herself for an hour or two; there were still plenty of things that needed to be done at the house. She sipped her drink, closing her eyes to let the poison work its magic, just taking the edge off. Rob left her alone; he knew the routine. Kyra would be flashing that amazing smilecomma, compound sentence and her cerulean eyes would become twinkling sapphires in no time.

“The next drink is on me.”

She hadn’t even noticed the dark-headed man sitting a couple of seats to her right.

“Look, thanks, but I’m not interested . . .” Kyra began her usual refusal. Rob hid his grin from behind the bar; he knew this play by heart.

The man, undaunted, got up and walked over to Kyra. Holding out a well-manicured hand, he introduced himself. “Jason Rice.”

Kyra rolled her eyes as she shook his hand. “Ms. Fox,period I mean, Kyra. Kyra Fox. And honestly, I’m not in the mood for this song and dance, so save yourself the trouble.”

“Not searchin’ for trouble, just a little conversation.”

“Whatever. Sit. Maybe Rob’ll talk to you.”

“You know, Ms. Fox, your words could blister a man’s heart.”

“It’s Kyra.” She didn’t even look at him.

“So . . . . Kyra, what’s got you in such an agreeable mood this fine Thursday?”

“That’s your best line?” She raised an eyebrow, but at least she finally met his eyes. She softened a little, unsure whether it was the alcohol taking affect or the look in his deep green eyes. “Just a rough day on the job. No big deal - tomorrow’s a new day and all that jazz.”

“Understandable. What kind of work do you do?”

Rob’s ears perked up. This was his favorite part. She always made up a different job and lied with such ease; it never ceased to impress him. She once confided in him that it was because if she heard the same old teacher/student fantasy line again, she might literally kill the man. And apparently, jail wasn’t a goal of hers. Another part of it was privacy. It was the same reason she drove twenty miles to another town to have a drink. Teachers are held to a certain levelWhy are you using boldface? Quotation marks for emphasis work nicely. of standards, and even if it was just an innocent drink,new sentence it wasn’t smart to partake in the same town you teach, especially in the Bible Belt of America.

“I own a pig farm north of here about thirty miles,” Kyra answered. Without missing a beat, she continued. “The market is down, and the cost of feed is up. Can’t find good help to save my soul.”

Jason stared at her while he sipped his drink, trying to get his mind around the image of this petite, beauty of a woman slopping pigs or whatever it was they did on a pig farm. He let his mind wander, picturing her in a Daisy Duke outfit running the ranch. It brought a smile to his face that he couldn’t have hidden if he wanted to.

“Well, I guess we know who brings the bacon home at your house.”

She couldn’t help but laugh at the stupid joke. “You know . . . Jason . . . It is okay when you have such an absurd idea to keep it as an unexpressed thought.” Her sarcasm bit, but her laugh overrode any malice.

“Seriously, can I buy you another?”

The tension was waning, and it felt good to have some adult conversation for a change.

“No, thanks. One’s my limit, but feel free to stay and talk. I’ll try to be nice. What do you do for a career?”

Jason paused, caught up again at how lovely she looked. Not perfect, but so real and with a spirit she didn’t try to squelch.

“I’m an architect. Just in town for a couple of days finalizing a project in the city. I decided to do some sight seeing, check out the history of the state, and somehow the road led me here.”

“Well, I hope you enjoy your stay.” She sounded softer, actually sincere. The stresses of the day were wearing off.

Talk continued easily. Everything from childhood to politics was fair game. Rob watched as she charmed the stranger without trying. There was some innocent flirting, but it meant nothing to either of them. Tonight the conversation was enough; it was what they both needed.

Kyra smiled at the realization of the change in her mood. She found it remarkable that a few laughs, good conversation, and a strong drink could do a lot to improve the day.

“Kyra, doll, it’s almost seven,” Rob said interrupting her thoughts.

“Oh gosh! Thanks, Rob.” She leaned over kissing him on the cheek.

Her attention turned back to Jason. “Rob is so good to me. Always reminds me not to keep the pigs waiting. It’s hell to feed them in the dark. Again, I hope you enjoy your stay in our neck of the woods.” She shook his hand this time with friendship instead of disdain.

Both men watched her waltz out of the bar.

“So, what’re you building in the city?” Rob asked while wiping down the counter.

“Huh? Oh,” Jason chuckled. “I’m not really an architect. I actually just got a job in a small town about twenty minutes from here. I hate telling women I’m a teacher. Somehow in their eyes, it’s not a noble profession for a man.”

A look of confusion came over Jason’s face as Rob could no longer contain his laughter.

wc 1032
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Review of SPIRIT CATCHER  
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
This is an interesting piece. It's, for the most part, well written with good adjectives and a nice flow. Howevever, I found too many punctuation errors to give it a perfect score. One repeated error comes when you have two adjectives modifying a noun -- "white pasty look". If white and pasty both describe the noun "look", there should be a comma between. See line by line for other examples.

Another concern is the ambiguity of the ending. Maybe you were working with a prompt? But, to me, it does not stand well alone. After all, who is "him"? This is my genuine opinion. Take what you want; throw away the rest.

I hope to read more of your work -- especially the short stories.

Many regards.



Spiritcatcher

David took off his thermal mittens and blew softly into his freezing hands. The tips of his fingers had a whitecomma pasty look as if frostbite was trying to force its way in; he had lost all feeling in his ears and couldn’t tell for certain if they were still attached to his head. The weather was getting worse.

He jumped as the startling screech of a Crow blasted him out of his private reverie. The stupid bird had been tailing him half the morning either in hopes of scavenging a free meal or simply to laugh at the ungainly creature on two legs fighting a losing battle against the deepcomma bitter snow.

David bent over, picked up a frozen limb and threw it forcefully in the direction of the annoying bird. With an angry screech the Crow simply jumped to another limb and mockingly continued his ecstatic cawing.

He'd heard that the Native Americans considered the Crow to be a prankster and to be the bringer of death. But, what did a bunch of dumb Injuns know! The white man licked them didn't he?

Ignoring the incessant noise, David continued into the thick brush along a small valley deep into the wilderness restricted hunting grounds of the Apache reservation.

He was a poacher.

He did not consider himself a poacher. Instead, he was simply doing what came natural to him. God made the animals for man to huntcomma and he was only doing what God commanded.

The fact that he hunted for fun and not for food did not bother him,period + new sentence he felt no guilt. The furs and other items he salvaged brought a good profitcomma: once again, a compound sentence and he was not one to punch a clock or stand on an assembly line.

The freedom of the great outdoors was where he belongedcomma? just like the mountain men he idolized from the western novels he devoured in his spare time.

He was following a blood trail. The magnificent buck he had fired on hours earlier had bolted when his round went high into the neck instead of the killing zone behind the front leg.

For hours he had been following the crimson drops of blood sprinkled on the pure white snow. He knew the animal had to succumb to the loss of blood before longcomma and he wanted to be near unnecessary to get another killing shot at the evasive buck.

He wanted the buck to suffer first. It was his right to kill, he was the chosen of God, he was the primal hunter and no animal had the right to make him suffer through thick snowdrifts and freezing weather. I think it’s best to separate these run-ons into separate sentences. You can, however, separate them with semicolons.

He angrily fought his way through ice coated brush, the crisp sun melted crisp, sun-melted snow crunching beneath his heavy boots like air bubbles in plastic packing wrap.Good, original simile.

Once again, the unexpected screech of the old Crow startled himcomma causing his feet to slide out from under him. He went sprawling and slidingslide X 2? down a step incline into a muddy ice crusted stream; I believe it is more correct to delete the semicolon and use a dash here. his precious rifle sticking like a spear into the soft moss covered bank.

He stood and jumped up and down in anger and rage, pulling his hat off and throwing it in the direction of the Crow. He decided at that moment that he would waste a round on the pesky bird for the soothing pleasure of watching it die in an exploding ball of feathers and blood.

Retrieving his rifle from the mud, he glanced up to locate the insufferable bird. Insteadcomma? he spotted the magnificent buck not thirty paces awaycomma trying to hide behind a small stand of evergreens. All thoughts of the old Crow suddenly disappeared.

The buck was incredible, beyond doubt the noblest animal his eyes had ever seen. He was perfect in every possible way. He was also near death, rapidly succumbing to the loss of precious blood.

Seeing that the wounded animal could run no further, David pulled out his canteen and poured himself a liberal helping of the strong whiskey he craved. He would have a toast to the noble stag before he put a last round into its heart.

There was no hurry. The buck deserved to suffer. He had to prove that he and he alone had God’s permission to kill at leisure.

He glanced up as the pesky Crow flew high into the upper limbs of a tallcomma white pine. It would be next. He could not allow the stupid bird to mock him. Bullets costscost moneycomma but he had one with the bird’s name on it. The pleasure would be almost as great as killing the stag.

Finishing his canteen cup of harsh liquor, David gently picked up his rifle, checked the barrel for dirt then slowly chambered a round. He gently caressed the coldcomma dark wood of the stock as he laid it against his numb cheek, then with a sigh of utter contentmentcomma slowly started to put pressure on the trigger.

For a second everything went fuzzy. His eyes could not focus and he had a sudden strange shiver run through his entire body. Then everything went totally dark!

He was lost in an abyss of black swirling mist. He felt totally detached from his body, from his surroundings, from his very being.

Suddenly, as if a switch had been turned on, he could see very clearly. He was in pain; the agony was almost unbearable. Tears dripped from his eyes, mucus from his nose and blood pumped down his chest in small rivulets to drop like scarlet rose petals onto the pristine snow.

What he saw then terrified him and cast his mind into an agonyagony X 2. You just used “agony”. of despair and his soul fleeing for safety. Standing not thirty paces awaycomma a man was pointing a high powered rifle at him, the trigger slowly being drawn back.

It was him! Okay, be careful! This is much too ambivalent. Is the “him” the hunter, shooting himself? Is it the crow? Is it the buck magically transformed? If I missed something, you should not have allowed me to.

He listened to the echoing cry of the laughing Crow as blackness slowly took him in its eternal brace.
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Review of City of Sin  
Rated: 18+ | (4.0)
Chapter 22, Joseph's Story

Plot: Joseph finally tells his back story, about how Riley killed their mother and his hatred and dependence on Riley.

Characters: good job. Although Joseph has put this off for a long time, he is now vulnerable enough to make this part believable.

Grammar: commas, periods, misspellings. See line by line.

Style/ Voice: really a very nice job. I only tried to tighten things in a few places by eliminating unnecessary words and phrases.

Setting: nice job of using the setting to set the mood.

Overall: well done with a well-crafted “hook” at the end.
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Rated: E | (3.5)
The following is my honest opinion. Interesting (but overused) premise for a story. You write it reasonably well, but tend toward the wordy. You use the passive voice frequently. You use some auxiliary verbs like “had” to excess. You also make a few punctuation errors. I did a line by line review so that it would be easier to make changes – if you care to. You show promise with your writing. Good luck and keep on writing.

Some Doors are Better Left Unlocked “Are” should be capitalized.

Ursula Le Guin: "The only thing that makes life possible is permanent, intolerable uncertainty; not knowing what comes next." Is this a direct quote? The semicolon is used in an odd manner – like Henry James might use it in the 1890’s.

Irving was a fortune-teller. At least that's how his wife had sometimes described his work. He preferred the title on his gold-embossed business cards - "Stockbroker". It was a living, but a lousy one, because Irving was a lousy stockbroker. You could make good money buying all the stocks that Irving didn't. He occasionally made a correct choice by chance, but the only reason he hadn't yet found himself on the sidewalk holding a cardboard box filled with his stapler and his Howard Miller Rosewood Desk Set and Clock is that his father's name was on the door of the business.

Life was difficult for Iriving. He had tried hard, but he had as much innate talent for predicting the stock market as Milli Vanilli hadToo many “had’s”? for tight a capella harmony. Until The Accident, that is. One blustery afternoon a bus laboring up the steep hill on which Irving's office building was situatedby Irving’s office building The rule of economy applies. If there is more than on way to say something, the simplest is usually best. had parted company with its right rear wheel, which immediately decided to convert its considerable store of potential energy into kinetic energy.It may be taste, but I consider the previous sentence too wordy. Free from confinement, it made good its escape, rapidly gathering speed as it tore down the hill. Luckily for the pedestrians down on Main Street, its progress was abruptly arrested by the bus shelter in front of Irving's office. Unluckily for Irving, he was in the bus shelter.I would like you to describe the crash.

Miraculously, the only injury he had sustained had been was a tremendous knock on the head, causing a little cerebral scramblingThe first part may be going a little overboard. and rendering him comatose for a week. As soon as his brain had rewired itself sufficiently to come back online, he awoke and realized he was in the hospital. He also realized that he felt subtly different somehowwordy, like locked doors in his brain had been sprung open. He couldn't put a finger on the difference though, and promptly forgot about it, likely because a size 13 headache had his attention. Once again, in an effort to sound clever, you try to do too much with this sentence. Think simple.

Two weeks later he was back at returned to his desk, despite the entire staff's insistence that he take a few more months off to recover. He gave his first client some advice that had his colleagues shaking their heads,no comma and looking for a cardboard box. By the end of the day that client had made almost a million dollars. In fact, every client he had advised that day had done well. "Bound to happen once in a while", his colleagues muttered to each other, knowing that luck was the biggest part of success in the business. But as this remarkable scenario played out day after daycomma Irving slowly realized that luck had nothing to do with it; he KNEW what was going to happen in every case. That month he had earned $3,000,000 in commissions.

Intrigued by this newfound vision, Irving expanded his horizons, entering the frequent baby pools in his office, which had an abundance of fertile employees. Feeling cocky, he bet on the exact minute of each birth. He was never off by so much asmore than a minute; getting the sex right was trivial. He even bet on twins once, proving the doctors wrong.

This was all fun for Irving, who had now become the most successful broker in the business. But his brain continued to rebuild the damaged circuits; his vision continued to expand. He soon could predict the outcome of any sports event. This was good for some quick pocket cash, but soon became boring. In fact, watching sports, which had been a his favorite pastime, became utterly boring. He could do the play-by-plays a day ahead if he wanted. He could predict the newspaper headlines a week in advance, a month in advance if he could be bothered.

What happened next shook him to the core. Talking with his father across the vast expanse of his oak desk, he had a sudden vision of an airplane, one wing torn off, plunging into the ocean. The chair where his father sat was empty for a second. All returned quickly to normal, but Irving was unnerved. He asked his dad if he was planning any trips soon. "Nope", he grinned, "Business is so brisk herecomma thanks to you, I'm staying put to enjoy the ride".

Reassured, Irving said, "OK, see you tomorrow then"period. , and Then he left. That evening, his father received an urgent call from Hawaii. His brother had suffered a heart attack and was not expected to survive the night. He caught the red-eye flight out of Los Angeles. At three o'clock in the morning the 767 flew into a Pacific storm. There was a mechanical failure; a wing separated from the plane and it went down. There were no survivors. No one survived.

For Irving, it only worsened. He glanced at people and saw their entire lives laid out bare. He adapted to this; he kept his knowledge secret, no matter how fortuitous or horrendous the fate. This helped. But his own life was another matter. He lost interest in work; it was no challenge, uninteresting now that the novelty of success had worn off. He couldn't read a book or watch a movie; he knew the ending before the author had written a word. He knew what people would say before a conversation started, so he stopped talking to them. Life was unbearable, an open book with no surprises; it wasn't worth living.

Late one night, Irving had had enough. He wrote a last note to his wife, whom he had not spoken to in weeks, and climbed into his Ferrari for a last ride. Pulling into a dead-end street, Irving took a last longing look at the starry night sky. He floored the accelerator, dropped the clutch, and made his best effort to drive through the building at the end of the block. As fate would have it, Ferraris have an outstanding crash safety rating. When Irving awoke a week later with a size 15 headache, he felt only deep despair. And deep hunger. Only after he had asked, "What's for breakfast?", did he realize that life was going to be incredibly difficult, but worth living again.
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Rated: 13+ | (3.0)
You have an interesting idea for a story. You keep the reader guessing all the way. I made many suggestions. They should assist you in a rewrite.

A Man Who Has It All

My bare foot breaks through the thin ice and sinks into soft moss. Any exercise is too much for my aged lungs, and this isn't just any exercise,period + new sentence the rest of my life is at stake. Reaching my goal of the tree line, I dive for cover. new paragraphMovement out the corner of my eye pushes me deeper into the brush.

A guard, wearing his pastel uniform, stands in the door I just vacated. He scans once from left to right, stopping to gaze and at the sunrise. His eyes sweep the path one more time. I hold my breath to stop the tell tail puffs of fog.

"Come back now. Come back in. It's nice and warm in here. Come on now,period + new sentence come on." The ignorant guard calls me like a puppy lost in tall grass. I'm not lost, nor am I a little puppy. Despite the strain on my body, the short sprint to the treetwo wordsline was worth my while. I'm out of his sight.

Apparently satisfied, the guard turns to someone inside and says, "It's probably just a bad connection. This alarm has been going off every couple of hours. I'm really getting tired of hearing it!" Since you are telling this in the first person, it doesn’t seem realistic for the one in hiding to hear all this unless you establish the probability.After one last disgusted look, the guard closes the door with a resounding clang. The fake "short" I established over the last several days,no comma yields the desired result. The path was only given a cursory inspection. I can't remember being so excited. The hardest part is over, or so I think.

Behind the short trees facing the path,no comma is a small swamp covered in dense brush. In captivity, I hadsaw no indication of this major obstacle.

Everything out here is the gray of deep fall. The leaves are long gone, and frost has killed everything else. The trees twist together like the yarn in that crazy scarf Trudy gave me last month, a ghastly thing. From that point on she stalked me, until she died.Who’s Trudy? Why did she stalk you? It’s not clear. After her death, I discovered I'm so numb, I barely noticed a person I lived next to for a month being dead. Her death was my a first indication of danger. Apathy is sucking at my soul. I'm determined to pay attention to every second remaining of my life. In my old life, two hundred people are held in hospital style rooms. Beds fill and empty everyday. Most of the beds are emptied into cold storage. Even people who are only there for short term care,no comma are quickly depressed to tears. Be careful. You change from past to present tense. Why?

I'll never see anyone die beside me again!

I shake my head to clear it of this nonconstructive rubbish. The trees inmaking up the thicket,no comma are not my worst problem. Large clumps of grass jut out of brackish water. The clumps stand up to my knee,no comma and are spaced randomly. The grass is solid enough to support my weight, but twists every time I move.why is this important? The icy water could kill me. cause my, believe it or not, untimely death. My day isn't over yet,period or semicolon I have things to do! The brush lends some stability into my twisted, deadly, game of hop scotch. Jumping from clump to clump, I splash into the water often. My thin robe has dark lines marking how deep I dip into the water. The dead weight of the water is draining my strength. Like the nursing home, tThe swamp has no malice,period + new sentence it just exists. There's nothing solid to push against. Apathy is my enemy, and I will not yield! Finally, the sounds of the road grow louder. The sound reaches past the beating of my heart and is sweet to my ear. In a surreal way, I've become very aware of my surroundings. Unnecessary. Serves no purpose.

At the edge of the swamp, a deep ditch parallels the county road. Breaking the wind Sorry, but when you phrase it like this, it sounds like passing gas.,New sentence it provides a convenient place to catch my breath. Icy air turns to fire in my lungs. After several minutes of rest, my breath still comes in fits and starts. I have to make a run for it. Why? You don’t make the reader aware anyone is in pursuit. The next time the road seems to be clearWhen the road is clear, I get up to cross. As I lift my head above the ditch, a semi roars by. The wind from the truck causes me to huddle deep into the ditch. Before I face the road again, another car, a cop car turns the corner. He slowly examines the sides of the road. If I had crossed even a little bit sooner, I would be nice and warm in the back of a police car. I would be five short minutes away from my comfortable cell. Direct thoughts should be set off by italics. While these things are going through my mindcomma the road clears. I crosscomma trying to look both ways at once. Mud froze on my robe, causing it to slap against my bare legs. Crossing the large open lawn by the house, no commaat anything close to a run is hopeless. Instead, I decide to play it cool. I act as if I haven't a care in the world. Fortunately, no one to can see my display. My audience would undoubtedly see through my thin gown, if not my convulsive shivering.

The easiest point to enter the house is the back door,period + new sentence it can't be seen from the road. I missed my meds this morning and my knees are very weak. Too To remain standing, I lean on the door knob. I slowly turn the knob, listening intently for an alarm. The door opens as easy as you please. Because of my weight the knob slams against the wall. I freeze, my body is half inside and half out in the cold. I quickly realize how silly my butt sticking out of the door must look, so I solve the problem.

Inside, an open stairway leads to an impressive living room. A huge television dominates one wall. The T.V. is hugeYou repeat “huge”. ! I try to put my arms across it, and can't reach all of the way. The kitchen directly off from the living room has solid hickory cabinets with blue streaked marble, it and accents surroundings beautifully. It doesn’t seem logical that under the circumstances the escapee would delve into aesthetics.The kitchen begs to feed me.

First, I need to take care of personal matters, right now! Off from the kitchen a bathroom door is slightly open. I see relief. When I come out, so does the smell, "That's fiber for you," I absentmindedly say.

Nowcomma this is more like it! High ceilings and skylights,no comma cause the over sized common area to seem even larger. A wide hall off of the living room looks promising. Surely, there is a place to warm up and get comfortable down there. I laugh at myself, "I'm Goldilocks, looking into every room until one feels 'just right'.". I continue working my way down the hall. The children's bedrooms are obvious. Loud colors and posters plastered across the walls,no comma haven't changed since I was a young. What I'm looking for wonapostrophet be found in their rooms. At the end of the hallway is an overwhelming a huge master bedroom. Over-sized, and extra-plush,no comma are the only words that come to mind as I rifle through the room. The suits in the closets are about my size, but I came for relaxation not business. I see a Capitalize brand names. speedo and laugh, "definitely not my style." As I walk into the bathroom a plush, royal blue robe hangs on the wall.

If the kitchen begged to feed me, the hot tub grabs my attention like a shout. It promises to caress the frost away. I leave my filthy, frozen robe in a pile by the tub. I enter the tub in the buff, of course. The hot water sizzlesI believe sizzles is a painful word much better used with bacon. against my legs,period I enjoy every painful minute. My bones seem to take a little longer than my skin to thaw. I don't begrudge my bones their extra time,because it's worth it. The fire in my lungs caused by the cold, the steam soothes away. The steam soothes away the fire in my lungs caused by the chill.

After a long soak, I reluctantly get out of the pool and put on my plundered”Plundered” does not fit. robe. The deep blue of the robe is a sharp contrast to the white of my legs. I've gotten soft laying in bed. I decide to take the kitchen up on its offer of a meal. The carpet doesn't really call for slippers, but I use them anyway.

Now, what to eat? The things I'm not aloud allowed to eat in the "home" are at the only things on my list. Seeing a bowl of crisp apples, I shake my head and mumble, "No rabbit food today." Steaks with potato chips and beer sound great! Combining meat with secret Why secret ingredients? ingredients, I quickly turn a pile of meat into something to die for. When I broke in, I noticed a stainless steel grill on a well used deck. I make my way out to the grill with a plate of steaks I can hardly lift in one hand,no comma and a beer in the other. The steaks grilling on the back porch,no comma cast smells that literally make Be careful!!! You change verb tense again. me drool. I quickly wipe away the offending liquid.

The doorbell rings ruining my mood. I look around, trying to avoid notice. I'm not supposed to be here after all. The cop I saw on my way here is looking around the side on the house.

He calls out, "Hey, there you are! I could smell steak all the way from the car!"

"Just a minute, I'll be right there!" I call back.

As soon as the door opens, he says, "Hi, I'm Officer Swanson." While talking he's trying to look around me deeper into the house. Is looking around like this his habit, or is he suspicious?

It's a good thing a nurse isn't here,no comma or one of the brutish guards. They would have recognized me for sure. I reply, "Hi, I was just getting ready for the big game. These steaks and couple of beerbeers are going to be a real treat!"

The cop warns, "Don't drive with alcohol in you now."

I promise, "I won't. Do you want some steak? I have enough."

The cop laughs, "No, I'm still on duty. Have you seen anyone walking through here in just a thin robe? He would be about your age and build. It's very dangerous for someone his age to be out in this cold. He has a bad heart besides." Officer Swanson proceeds to describe me in detail.Does the narrator have any clothes on? I don’t believe he dressed after taking off his robe.

I agree, "No one here but me. If I see anyonecomma I'll call."

"The local station's number is 555-1212, period + new sentencejust ask for Swanson, that's me."

I nod,period "I'll do that."

"If you see him, call right away. After exposure to these temperatures, someone his age could die." As he's leaving, he reminds me, "I meant it about the beer, now."

Slowly he backs out onto the street. From the door, I anxiously watch the blue cruiser leave. I calmly close the door,no comma and laugh so hard I spill my beer! Now that is excitement!

Back to more important things. My favorite ball game is on. This game is the reason for my haste. I left while the orderlies were still busy diapering, dressing, and drugging all of the patients. I never had a chance to put my clothes on,period + new sentence they're still on the hanger and my shoes are in their cubby. All this hard work is all worth it now.

Where's the remote? After a frantic search I finally find it,no comma and flip the large screen on. It's strange, even though I only want to watch one channel, I still need the comfort of a remote. My beer and steak call me. One beer is finished before I get to the steaks. And my next is a lot lighter than it started out, when I put it down. The steaks are still sizzling On the grill?,no comma when I flop down on the couch. Steak should only be eaten two handed, one cuttingcomma the other shoveling. The excitement in my mouth caused by the beer and meat is overwhelming!

I'm late! The ball is already in the air. The game is an edge of the seat affair, a real knuckle biter! While cheering, steak juice dribbles onto my borrowed robe. A commercial gives me just enough time to grab a couple more bottles of beer. After opening onecomma I set the others down on a table. Even with all of the excitement, my head settles back on the couch and sleep over takes overtakes me.

As the beer slips out of his hand, so does his life. Wow! Suddenly you change point of view. This is very disconcerting. Skipping out of the nursing home before taking his heart meds, the incredibly hard trip to his sanctuary, and the beer slips him into a comma he never comes out of.



The owners come home, and find him so relaxed, they let him rest for a little while. When he doesn't get up, they check his pulse. No heart beat is the last step in his plan. You mean he planned his death? This is a surprise.


Apathy lost! Why this at the end?
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Review of Jessica's Wish  
Rated: E | (3.5)
This is a touching story. You have listed it as fiction, but it is story totally within the realm of belief. In editing your story, I really just used your words. I suggested that you begin it differently to involve the reader. I suggested certain punctuation changes. Mostly I suggested elimination of redundant or unnecessary words. Nice idea. Pretty well written. Write on!!

Jessica's Wish

I struggled to read through my tears, my daughter's letter to Santa. Above her entry of this year's must-have toy (Barbie - whose 112th edition was accompanied by a magnificent prancing pony) - was her dearest wish:

It’s probably better to start with Jessica’s wish below. It draws the reader in. The if you need to explain more, go ahead.

"Santa...pleeeease can I have my Daddy come home. I need him to see the presents you get me. Please make him stay."

Her childish scrawl , which, on the whole, was steadily improving as she progressed through infant school, still took up most of the page. I stared across at my little sleeping angel and turned off her nightlight.

John had only been in the army six months when I met him, so it was a fairly new experience to both of us. It had been exciting at first,no comma to follow him half-way round the world, though after a while all the barracks looked the same wherever they were. Once we became seriouscomma I made it clear I wasn't prepared to drag any family we had round in the same way. We chose a great village in North Yorkshire to settle down in, turning this a beautiful cottage into a warm and welcoming family home - something that would keep John wanting to return to us each time he left.

So life fell into a pattern. I got a job in a bank and gradually got used to sharing my husband with around fifteen other men - those of his regiment. Toby was born a couple of years after we settledcomma and Jessica came a few years after that.

I felt another pang of guilt and pain as I held the letter to my chest. The kids didn't usually ask after daddy; they just accepted itAccepted what? His absence?, and didn't really know any different. To them he was a larger-than-life stranger who scooped them into huge hugs when he was on leave, only to disappear a week or two after. I was the mainstay, the one they could rely on - daddy was just a bonus.

I could tell that John's last visit had been different. Jessica had been having problems at school with a boy who'd insisted on teasing her. He'd told her horrible things about soldiersNo fair. You need to mention some of the things the boy said. (God only knows how he knew what he did) and had frightened the living daylights out of her. She'd become clingy and when John was on leave, she wouldn't let himJohn out of her sight. He'd returned back ”returned back” is redundant. to his duties a few hours early, slipping away in the night; we thought it had been for the best, so as notdid not want to cause a scene. Now I can see that that idea had probably made things ten times worse.

I slipped Jessica's note into my diary and tried to write down my thoughts. I needed to be able to tell her - and Toby - of the phone call I'd hadreceived that afternoon. John had been involved in an accident; he hadn't been killedcomma but he was badly wounded; he'd actually lost both his lower legs. , losing his lower legs. He was being transferred to a local hospital as soon as was practical but was at a military hospital in Surrey for the timetwo wordsbeing, making visits extremely difficult. He had also been discharged from active service. This is unnecessary. You are stating the obvious.

I found my moment the next afternoon. Toby, being the eldest, had guessed something was wrong and wouldn't let up until I told him. Jessica sat on my knee as I explained in the simplest way I could what had happened to their father.



Toby sat quietly on the settee - pensive. Jessica threw her arms around my neck and hugged me tight. I hugged her back, just as fervently, hoping that I could ease her pain. As she drew away, I was stunned at her beaming smile.

"Santa has brought me my Christmas present early!" she said.

"Santa? What Christmas present?" I struggled to understand.

"Daddy! Santa has brought me daddy!" she said.

"Oh, sweetheart. Daddy will be home soon, but he's very hurt. I don't think this is your Christmas presentcomma" I said, trying to soothe her.

"It is!" she insisted, "If he's got no legs, he can't run away from us again....."

So politically uncorrect incorrect but honest. And probably a very warped way to celebrate her father's return - but to a six-year-old girl, this was her greatest wish fulfilled. Daddy was coming home,no comma for good this time.
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Review of The Prince  
for entry "Invalid Entry" 
Rated: 18+ | (3.0)
Plot: a gang of boys break into a house of a wealthy merchant when the owner awakes and chases after them. Then security guards take up the chase.

Characters: D-man, Sticks, Twitch, Feather. It’s difficult to picture them since you only mention one physical trait of each.

Grammar: missing commas and more. See line by line at site.

Style/ Voice: you get into the action right away. Maybe you should spend more time setting the scene. It is difficult to read as written with odd constructions adding to choppiness. I made a few suggestions.

Setting: some city in an imaginary land. You don’t go into enough detail for me. Maybe you will gradually unfold the setting?

Overall: the present style is off-putting. Try to make it flow so that the story is more accessible to the reader. The story, however, shows promise. The pack of juveniles seems almost Dickensian.
24
24
Rated: E | N/A (Review only item.)
Plot: two people are driving down a single-lane highway toward the eastern sky in Kansas. We don’t know much more.

Characters: a man, who is driving, and a woman, who appears to be aggressively intent on getting her way.

Grammar: commas and speech tags. Commas are used with speech tags. Otherwise, use periods.

Style/ Voice: you attempt to write in a spare, lean style. I like the attempt. See line by line for suggestions to make it even leaner.

Setting: nice job. You describe “out in the middle of nowhere” well.

Overall: this is a prologue. Prologues are meant to give us information about the plot, characters, and/ or setting before the actual story begins. Make sure to follow up on the prologue very soon, or it will become meaningless and excess baggage. Keep writing.
25
25
Rated: 13+ | (2.5)
Thanks for reading my brand new piece, but you didn't tell me how to improve it before you passed judgment. I did a line by line review. They are more meaningful. Follow the lines and the corrections should at least help the grammar and spelling. As far as the rest of the piece, it reads like piece from a spy-detective magazine. Not bad. But there's no depth. I'm left with questions. Why does the guy need or want the money? Is there a back story? Why does White turn up? What does he have to do with Carlos?

I believe with more back story and more character development this could be decent. As it is, the story sounds a bit like someone trying to make their writing sound cool.

Keep writing!


“You have the money?”

“Don’t lose your ragIs "rag" British slang? In the U.S. it means a ladies' sanitary napkin., Logan,period I’ll get you the money.”

Carlos brushed by me, clipping my shoulder as he stuffed his hands in the pockets of his leather bomber jacket. I didn’t flinch, I just glared daggers into the back of his head. Scumbag’s going to pay, whether in cash or with something more precious. But he was going to pay.

The beeping in my own jacket pocket told me that I was needed in the office.

Ohcomma well. Play hard, work hard, I supposed.

My office building, if you could call it that, wasn’t far. Head Quarters, for being the intelligence center of all of Western Europe, could not have chosen a more non-descript nondescript building for their main base. FoggedDo you mean frosted: fogged doesn't make much sense. windows blinked from the dilapidated gray walls, staring at me as I approached the entrance.

I strode into HQ, raising my eyebrows at the receptionist. She rolled her eyes, and our obligatory interaction was done for the day. God, this place was a drag.

I swiped my card and stepped back to let the steel doors swing open with an industrial hiss. The workday was already well under way, from the looks of the men who huddled over their computers behind the glass walls. A few, in stained half-buttoned shirts and loose ties, looked like they had been there all night. Ah, the benefits of clawing my way up the hierarchy; I could come and go as I pleased.

I strolled down the hallway, hands stuffed in my jacket pocket. A bloke juggling a stack of file folders stumbled out of my way, nodding as I passed.

“Koust, there you are,” a gruff voice behind me said. White poked his head out his door,no comma and beckoned me inside.

His office was as spotless as his employees’ shirts were not.awkward metaphor His pencils, all sharpened, were lined up next to stacks of stark white paper, all identical heights. obsessive-compulsive, ehh? His own appearance complimentedDo you mean complemented? the room, neat and tidy, with his combed salt and pepper mustache, black coat smoothed over impossibly broad shoulders, and a white silk tie knotted neatly around his neck. I nudged a pencil, just to see something in the room out of line.

“Koust, I—”

“I hear you’ve been assigning people to the base in Havana. If we’re expecting trouble down there, I’d like to be there to supervise.”

White met my gaze, unwavering. Then he sighed, staring instead at his pencil arrangement. He pushed the errant pencil back into rank.

“I need you here, Koust. I’m sending Fischer to supervise the base in Havana.”

He wouldn’t meet my eyes again. The old bastard didn’t trust me.

“Well, then. I’ll be in my office.”

I stood up,no comma and made for the door.

“Logan,” White called from his desk. I paused, just out of shock of hearing my first name. “Take it easy, will you?”

I stalked back to my office.

Damn that old man, he knows.

But how could he know? I played over our recent encounters. I hadn’t let anything slip, not a clue. How could he know?

But I couldn’t deny that he was slowly squeezing me out of his plans. Me! His second in command! He must know something.

Every time I saw him,no comma he watched me with that goddamned knowing glint in his eyes and that irritating purse of his lips. He was judging me. Judging me for using means other than his means to eek out a living. A bloke needs money, White! And it’s no different than the means than you use. You justify manipulating government as being for the “greater good.” So why can’t I manipulate people if it’s for my greater good?

I slammed my fists on the stacks of paper that cluttered my desk and rose from my chair. I needed to worry about my own good. And that meant getting my money.

Time to pay Carlos a visit.

I loosened my tie as I walked from my office.combine sentences Down the hall lined with exhausted workers and through the steel doors. I ignored the receptionist’s curious glance as I walked into the open air outside HQ.

Carlos was the doorman for a sleazy apartment complex, the type that shouldn’t need a doorman with. Ddingy brick walls, dented mail-slots, and a crooked stairwell slanting from the lobby. Carlos reclined in his sagging chair next to the dented mail-slots, mouth lolling open.

“Wake up, slug. Your time’s up.”

I loosened the gun from my belt and kicked the leg of his chair.

Carlos tipped off the chair with a yelp and landed in a heap. He stared at me and the gun I was stroking before scrabbling to his feet and barreling head first into the nearest door. With a sickening crack, the lock gave way and both Carlos and the door tumbled into the room.

My slow, deliberate steps followed him into the room.

The apartment we broke into was small, with a kitchenette taking up any discernablediscernible foyer, and a beat-up couch defining the living area. Carlos clawed his way across the shag carpeting, trying to make it out the back door. I stepped on the back of his legs and kicked him on his back.

His eyes bugged out of his head as he stared at me, cheeks paling to the color of curdled milk. “Logan, mate, I’ve got the money. I’ve got it. I’ll get it. Heycomma mate, I have a family,period + new sentence come oncomma why are you pointing that at me man I’llgetyouthebloodymoneydon’tshoo—”

I sneered at him and cocked the gun. He’d had his chances, and getting money from a dead man was easier than waiting around for this scumbag to pay his dues.

I pulled the trigger right as I heard the back door kick open and a woman’s shriek. Before I could even register a face, I was diving across the room, pinning her to the wall, and shoving the muzzle of my gun against her cheekbone. She was a small thing; she wilted in my grasp and stared at Carlos’s corpse with eyes like saucers. She must live here. Would I have to knock her off too?

My ears pricked up at the sound of footsteps charging up the hall—quick, heavy, and measured. I knew who was going to bust open the door before they reached it.

Sure enough, White filled the doorway, and then filled the entire kitchenette before barreling into the living area. Johnson and Greenam, White’s bodyguard and head of security respectivelysounds too formal for this piece, stood on either side of the doorway, angling their guns across their bodies. Their eyes switched between Carlos and the girl I had pinned against the wall, but White’s eyes zeroed in on me.

“Koust! What are you doing here?”

I met his accusatorystating the obvious stare. “I got a call about strange behavior here, White, and came to investigate even though I was off duty. I just got here a moment ago, right when this chit? pulled the trigger.”

White finally broke our staring contest,delete comma and commainsteadcomma analyzed the girl. He pursed his lips, and met my gaze again. “I’ll take the girl in toI believe, in this case, the correct word is "into". custody. Koust, escort Greenam here back to base, and wait for me in my office. We need to have a word.”

I nodded, though I had no intention of going back to base.

As we exited the apartment complex, I whipped out my cell phone and checked an imaginary incoming message. “Bugger. I’ve got to run; wait for me in White’s office, ok?”

Greenam nodded at me, no commaand continued down the sidewalk. Gullible bastard.

Carlos was predictable. I knew just where to find his stash. Distrustful of banks, his money was stuffed in a sock under his mattress. He was short two-grand.

His family would have to make up the difference.
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