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Printed from https://www.writing.com/main/profile/reviews/mappelt
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25 Public Reviews Given
25 Total Reviews Given
Public Reviews
1
1
Review by Appi (Michael)
In affiliation with WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group  
Rated: 13+ | (4.5)
Well done! You filled the essay with interesting thoughts and good observations.

I like your approach: You position the 'voice of your text' well. In other words you enable the reader to empathize because it is clear in what situation 'the voice' finds itself . Then you sketch out options and possible outcomes for such a person. After focusing on success and trying to get to the bottom of it you end your text with hope and positivity.

I like your essay because it reminds the people that entered the world already about what it felt like and it enables the person standing at the threshold to revise and think! Your text could therefore find itself on parent related blogs, websites or magazines and it would also fit very well in school and youth publications.

All the best!
Michael

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Review of D-Day  
Review by Appi (Michael)
In affiliation with WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group  
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
Thank you Josh, you've done well.

How did you get the impressions you are describing here? Family Member's memories? Friends? Own experience? Books, TV, Movies?

Anyway, I think you've done justice to the event and written a good story about it. The only thought I have when reading it again is: somehow this is all too clinical. It somehow feels as if the person telling the story is emotionally detached from the event. Off course, any person going through this would at some stage have to detach itself from the event in order to stay sane, but nevertheless the voice of the narrator is too calm, too steady for my liking.

As I said, it all depends on the context of the story. For example if the soldier tells his memories to a nurse at the hospital a few weeks, months or even years later, then yes, the voice of the narrator could be like that. But if you want this piece to be closer to the action, more immediate, then the narrator has to be close to loosing it, when he tells the story. There has to be gaspes of air, heavy breathing, chocking, broken, high pitched voices, hopelessness, desperation, desolation, screaming, madness! What do you think?

Michael
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Review of "The Bus Stop"  
Review by Appi (Michael)
In affiliation with WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group  
Rated: E | (4.0)
Thank you. This is indeed a short poem. I personally think that it sets up the scene beautifully for something to follow but then it ends! What happens to the splashes of water caused by the cars driving by? What happens to the breath in the cold air? What tension arises because of the tight huddle? Will the bus be on time? What happens after the rain stops, will they spread out again? Many questions that you would be able to answer!

Keep on writing!
Michael

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Review by Appi (Michael)
Rated: E | (4.5)
Short but somehow it seems to be complete. But it makes me feel as if I want to stay with it a little bit longer. There should be more lines, more content, just to enable me to stay a bit longer with it! What happens next on the mile? Who is I and who is the man? Will they stroll together through the moonlit night? What is their destination? What do they plan to do? Is there a plan? Who or what else will they meet next?

Good luck
Michael
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Review of Watch This  
Review by Appi (Michael)
Rated: E | (4.0)
Hi, this is a strong poem and hits hard.

The content is disturbing though, it offers desperation and little hope. It feels that your last line suggest that the "hero" of the poem a) makes people believe that he is happy even though he is desperate and b) maybe one day his suicide attempts will be successful and therefore all the pain and desperation will end in the "quiet blanket of death". Am I interpreting this correctly? As a side note I do think that the existence of such a blanket is pure speculation. We have no proof that everything of us will end, when we end it...

I as a reader like when things are resolved in the works that I read or at least balanced out. Even though you seemingly end your poem on a positive note, it is not enough to balance out the heaviness. Somehow your impressive works screams for some positivity and real happiness how could you add this to it?

Michael
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Review of Years Apart  
Review by Appi (Michael)
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
Hi, I do like the way you want to tackle the subject. The words you say are very strong and hit hard but they do not really describe what you are going through, I see them more like headings! I think you should try to "Expand" each line with impressions and examples of what you mean. I see the strong desire wanting to communicate, but your work does not communicate enough, it might lead the reader into something that you did not mean? Michael
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Review by Appi (Michael)
Rated: E
Thank you Pat, this is wonderful! Your words draw the reader into a refreshing walk through the woods in a gentle summer rain. I strongly suggest that your poem has a recreational effect on the reader and I for my case read it over and over again just to load my senses and soul with the experience that you are describing! Well done!

The only glitch that I noted is that it should say November 10, 2009 and not Novembef!

Thanking you
Michael
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Review of Shadows  
Review by Appi (Michael)
Rated: E | (5.0)
Wonderful. Displaying the feelings of a parent more than aptly!
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Review of Lost  
Review by Appi (Michael)
Rated: E | (4.0)
Dear Dr. Gonzo. In short I do like your text.

It shows that your hero in the text has come from somewhere and is ready to go on, contemplating his/her life, the current situation and the past. But all looks pretty hopeless because the hero depends still on himself (and after all he/she has brought himself there)?

You start by introducing the hero, realizing that he/she is lost. The core here seems to be "only the silence comforts me". This silence leads to contemplation.

Then there comes a realization, that there is a free mind.

Questions that are being raised by the text are:
What can the hero do with his free mind? Why does the hero wish to stop time? So that he/she can have more of it in order to change the situation, to stop a process? The linear path, where will it lead to? Who is addressed, who's life does the hero want to join in? If it is God does the hero later go against this wish by saying that he/she wants to carve his/her own life? What door has been opened and why is it closed again?

The resolution at the end to stop repeating the past I see as a positive ending. Because so far the hero thinks that he/she has gotten nowhere. But there is little hope in your text, life without hope is sad and futile. Do you want to leave it like that? I mean the only hope that is offered here is that the hero has made a resolve to try again and learn from the past but is this approach not doomed to fail again?
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