The opening paragraph was excellent. It did the job of intriguing the reader and compelling him to continue into the story. Personally, I didn’t like the first sentence, it gave me the sense that “sorry” was another way of saying “worthless”, and that was not the meaning at all. Perhaps it is just me and my southern cultural bias, for down here “sorry”, when used in the third person, is followed by “son of a bitch”.
The last sentence of everything written above the five asterisk scene break is almost a non-sequitur – it is not a graceful transition from interior monologue to the present sense narrative dialogue that follows the scene break. I can’t prescribe an exact use, but I suggest that in some way the old saw about “death and taxes” would be useful to you at this exact place of transit.
*****
“…as Bo's gut sucked his tongue down the back of his throat.” I agree that an exaggerated physical symptom of psychological stress is need here, but I don’t think this is it.
"Issues?" Bo said on the trailing edge of an unrestrained gulped.” This is not reader acceptable; it is vague, grammatically incorrect and banal. I assume you meant to imply Bo said the word on a rising inflection, like a Valley Girl ( in a manner that implied a question in less than a completely uttered sentence).
“The Tax Auditor looked like an "Auditor." He wore a black suit, white shirt, black tie, and spectacles. He was about the same age as Bo, thirty-something, short blonde hair, and pale skin. Bo hated those bookkeeper types, he felt inferior under their scrutiny.” I like the idea that the auditor could be picked out of a line-up of random occupations by his “uniform” and paleness ( I assume the otherwise useless “blond hair “ reference fit in with the bloodless paleness motif). Suggest use of an adjective with “spectacles" (good word choice BTW), suggest a narrow tie, and “cropped” in conjunction with hair, but only if you want to give a governmental stereotype to this example of “the insolence of office,” to borrow from Hamlet.
“Bo felt a giant fist, slamming into his chest”
“Bo's stomach churned, feeling as if it would release its contents”
The writer has a missed opportunity to be original here. Perhaps in a rewrite?
*
The rest of the story is a little rushed, possibly to squeeze under a 2000 word maximum, and the ending could use a little more foreshadow, allowing the possibility a reader may have forgotten the opening second paragraph. Some mention, somewhere. Mention might have also been made that Bo had yet- to- be-completed dreams of his own: a subtle, but rememberable mention. Yes, my spell checker underlined “rememberable”, but let it stand.
So far I have been the nitpicker, the fault finder, and the nay sayer, so sorry, but it is after all the job you are paying me the outrageous sum of 1800 points to perform. You should get what you pay for. That being said I will continue to the next part of my critical work – the part where I damn with faint praise.
I don’t know what the actual assignment was that predicated this contest so I will invent one that fits your resulting story – the one you had to pay me to read.
Assignment - In 2000 words or fewer respond in short story form to the following quote from Winston Churchill: “There is nothing more exhilarating than to be shot at without result”
Bo experienced a risk that focused his mind remarkably upon what he has missed much like Scrooge’s final ghost prophesied what SCrooge had yet to miss before the grave - in the manner of Bo’s grandfather. It is plain that it does not matter exactly what his grandfather missed. What matters is that Bo does not miss his own best destiny through inattention.
To write a good story and shoehorn it into the parameters of the artificial constraints of contest is an achievement of dubious value. The best result is the attainment of very best in artificiality. Kudos, this is it.
The great redeemer of contest winners is the rewrite. The rewrite transforms the plastic baby into a real live breathing, squalling, full diapered child. The danger to the rewriter lingering over the success of the contest, is of actually believing the contest has meaning of itself. CONTESTS HAVE NO MEANING, only writing has meaning in our world.
This writing of yours will always be a shallow, entertaining story if it never sheds its contest skin.
The writer has the chance, in rewrite to make it the best shallow, entertaining story a reader can read.
Hope this was helpful, send the money.
NB: I see you have a uniform average of five stars. I won't interrupt that rating, but you know what I think about contest responses.
DC
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