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1,096 Public Reviews Given
1,123 Total Reviews Given
Review Style
Minimalist. Focus on technical. I also look at how a work would fit into the traditional publishing landscape. I don't use a template. Warning: I am Australian, and so cultural differences may apply.
Favorite Genres
Most, really.
Least Favorite Genres
Fan-fiction
Favorite Item Types
Short stories and essays.
I will not review...
I will not review porn, fan-fiction or pro-religious/OTT-pro-USA essays. No interactives either, please.
Public Reviews
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Review of Hollow  
Review by s
Rated: E | (4.0)
An interesting poem. I like the way you want people to get their own interpretation from it.

A couple of small things.

"I drift gently like a surfer riding waves" I think this would work better as a metaphor instead of a simile because you continue the imagery as the poem goes, so I would suggest getting rid of "like" - "I drift gently, a surfer riding waves"

"But something tugs at me
Something pulls me away from my dreamlike state"
The repetition of the word "something" feels like it doesn't belong, as it does not add anything to the poem - "something" is not a key word or concept.
I'd go:
"But something tugs at me
Pulling me away from my dreamlike state"
And "away from" is not the usual term used here - "out of" is more common, but that is more a personal thing than anything with poetic technicalities.

Anyway, good poem.

Good luck going forward.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review of The young girl  
Review by s
Rated: E | (3.5)
The story here is a strong one - a girl being sold at auction. There is a sense of depression about the piece that really adds to it.

However, there are a lot of errors here. Punctuation errors abound, and direct speech rules are broken (new paragraph for a new speaker, capital letters, etc.). There are phrases and words that do not work, and some extra words are thrown in that are confusing.

For example, you wrote:
         The young girls don't know if its day or night.
How many girls? We're only with one. It should be:
         The young girl doesn't known if it's day or night.
Note the use of the apostrophe.

You also tell us a lot of things instead of showing us. You tell us she doesn't cry out when her hair is being combed, instead of showing us her expression, her body's reactions, the woman doing the cleaning's responses. We are just told. We need more to feel sympathy for the character but we are removed.

There are also a lot of sentence fragments, but I would let them go, as they do help with the tension in the piece.

So, at its core, this story is a strong one, and there is a decent atmosphere, but it really does need a proper edit.

Good luck going forward.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review of Revenge Feeding  
Review by s
Rated: 13+ | (3.5)
A nice take on the Voodoo motif, with the revenge being very personal. The way Samantha reacted to gaining weight was interesting and I think you did a good job of indicating how she felt her life was suddenly spiralling out of control.

Now, technically, there were some issues. The opening chapter jumps from present to past tense and is an info dump, a lot of the information not being relevant later on (e.g. eye colour). It did draw me out of the story.

Also the language was very simplistic and the sentence structure rarely varied. To engage a reader, there should be a number of different sentence structures throughout.

As to story beats - a school nurse would never give medication beyond paracetemol or something pre-prescribed and on file. And no medical professional would ever not tell all side effects nowadays with litigiousness wide-spread; they definitely would not just wave them off. Also, talking with the doll felt odd. I think it would have been more effective if the voice was just in Hanna's head. And surely the other students would have made fun of her even having a doll? I mean, they were nasty in every other way.

This does sound negative, and I apologise, but I do think there is a good story in here, and your character study of Samantha works well.

Good luck going forward.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review of The Concert  
Review by s
Rated: E | (4.0)
This is a nice piece of flash fiction, telling a whole story in a very few words. The idea of a relationship starting this way is very pleasant.

One technical thing, there are a few issues with punctuation in your direct speech that just need some tightening up.

While I know it is flash fiction and the word counts are very restrictive, I was a little confused as to what was happening when they were changing spots in the line. This random stranger helps the girls? Why? That didn't really click with me.

Apart from that, good use of the flash fiction length.

Good luck going forward.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review of Predator and Prey  
Review by s
Rated: 18+ | (4.0)
The story, once we got to it, was a really strong one. Ellie being tied up, the bear, the escape, the captor coming back, the bear getting her revenge for her - well done. There were some good passages of genuine terror in there, the use of prayers and nursery rhymes throughout was well-done and really suited the age of Ellie.

However, the story starts in present tense and then went into past tense. This was jarring and made it feel disjointed. The story could have started at "Thirty-six-year-old Eddie Burton tossed another log..." becaue everything else you mentioned before is either irrelevant or is mentioned in the dialogue later on anyway. That whole opening felt like an info dump and would turn off a reader.

Likewise, the very last paragraph, the single line that starts "Did she run..." is not needed. If it's open-ended, then all you need is: "...opening and dropped into the snowbank below and ran." Just those two words.

On a technical side, there were very few errors, but you do use a lot of the same sentence contructs: Doing something, the person did something else. That clause construct is everywhere. It would help to vary the sentence structure.

But, like I said, the acctual meat if the story is very well done.

Good luck going forward.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review of Predator and Prey  
Review by s
Rated: 18+ | (4.0)
The story, once we got to it, was a really strong one. Ellie being tied up, the bear, the escape, the captor coming back, the bear getting her revenge for her - well done. There were some good passages of genuine terror in there, the use of prayers and nursery rhymes throughout was well-done and really suited the age of Ellie.

However, the story starts in present tense and then went into past tense. This was jarring and made it feel disjointed. The story could have started at "Thirty-six-year-old Eddie Burton tossed another log..." becaue everything else you mentioned before is either irrelevant or is mentioned in the dialogue later on anyway. That whole opening felt like an info dump and would turn off a reader.

Likewise, the very last paragraph, the single line that starts "Did she run..." is not needed. If it's open-ended, then all you need is: "...opening and dropped into the snowbank below and ran[/b}." Just those two words.

On a techniccal side, there were very feew errors, but you do use a lot of the same sentince contructs: Doing something, the person did something else. That clause construct is everywhere. It would help to vary the sentence structure.

But, like I said, the acctual meat if the story is very well done.

Good luck going forward.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review of Being Kirk  
Review by s
Rated: E | (3.5)
This is an interesting take on the conversation with William Shatner, and definitely the best I've read here (there's been a few). You have captured a nice interview scenario, with a respectful interviewer and pleasant subject, showing some nice knowledge of the lore of the series.

However, there are two things.

First, there is no difference between the voices of the two participants in the conversation. They sound exactly the same. I feel there should by a point of differentiation between language or something like that.

Second, Shatner was notoriously cantankerous/egotistical, especially after the first season of Star Trek, and so, to me, this did not feel like Shatner himself.

However, like I said, best Shatner dialogue I've read here at WdC.

Good luck going forward.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review of Displacement  
Review by s
Rated: E | (4.5)
This was a really strong piece. Selkies are such a fascinating source of story-beats, and you have used it so well, not giving the reveal straight away.

I think my only issue with the story was to do with the father. The letter he left reads in the same tone and style as the rest of the story, not as something separate, apart from its italics. The language and writing style should be different from that of the first person narrator. Also, finding it really did seem to be a greater matter of chance than would give an expectation of it being found. Maybe in the back corner of a wardrobe would make more sense. She still would not have found it until the father died.

"It was no wonder my father was glad to see me go." This seemed to come out of nowhere; I think more could have been made of the father being more aloof and distant earlier, especially as you said earlier, "We continued on just as we had before."

The ending also felt rather abrupt, but I am putting that down to a word count issue.

But, all up, this was a very good tale, and I think the prompt is handled really well here.

Good luck going forward.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review of Close Encounter  
Review by s
Rated: E | (5.0)
Excellent use of the dialogue only format. I think you had the frustration of Shatner down.

My only two comments would be the excitement of the fan felt muted, like it was dialled back. Second, the title gave away the twist ending somewhat, so I sort of knew who this fan actually was.

But they are minor quibbles. No errors otherwise and a fun little story.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review of Super  
Review by s
Rated: 13+ | (5.0)
Okay, you got me. I thought this was an X-Men fanfic, and suddenly it was twisted, and then twisted again against our POV character.

This was really well done. I cannot offer anything to improve it; sorry. Technically and story-wise it hit all the beats.

Excellent.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review of The New Year  
Review by s
Rated: E | (3.5)
The idea behind this poem is a strong one, looking back and looking forward at a new year.

Quick note - tomorrow is the correct spelling of the word.

Okay, when I read a poem, I do it out loud.

With the attempted rhyming scheme of the poem (second-to-last stanza does not quite work in that regard), reading it feels a little awkward as the syllable inconsistency makes it hard to get a flow into the rhymes. It does feel like this could be the first draft of a strong aaa-bbb-ccc-ddd-eee rhyming poem.

However, it still works at the moment. I just personbally feel (and this is my opinion) it could be tightened up.


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Review of Addicted to ABBA  
Review by s
Rated: E | (5.0)
Okay, I really liked this. The sentiments are some that I can relate to (I recently reviewed the new ABBA album positively) and it makes perfect sense.

As a poem, spot on. adcb rhyming scheme throughout, 8-6-8-6 syllable count without fail - top stuff for a nonsense poem that deserves to be read out loud. One two of the syllable lengths did not quite work, but I think with a few readings out loud, you'll find them and they'll be easy to fix.

One of the better poems of this sort I have read here on WdC, so - really well done!


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review by s
Rated: 18+ | (3.0)
Okay, the idea behind this story is an interesting one. I like the way you don't over-describe the setting, because set so far into the future (post WW6? that seems far-fetched), it would be hard to do that believably.

Now, there are four main things this story needs looking at.

1) Your direct speech punctuation needs work. It is okay, but issues of when to use commas and how multiple paragraphs by one speaker are formatted are evident.

2) The tense keeps changing from past to pesent and back again.

3) Half of the story is telling us what is happening, not showing. We need more show, need more internalisations, need more feel for the world you're building. I know I said the lack of description is good, but that's physical. We need more beyond that.

4) The characters do not feel real. They feel 2-dimensional. They need more fleshing out.

So, look, the idea behind the story is strong, and the concept of the aliens not wanting to be engaged in a direct war is really good. But the technical side of the story I think needs work.

Sorry this sounds so negative. I actually only review things I like, and there was enough here to draw me in.

Good luck going forward.


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Review by s
Rated: E | (5.0)
Not much to say, really. It is really quite good in all aspects. The horror writer in me kept waiting for the body to talk, but that's just me! But I liked the story, I liked the conversational tone, I liked the fact it was technically really good, and I think I like your mother as well.

Well done. I like these little slices of life.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review by s
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
An interesting story, a sweet one, really, and something my ex and I would be able to relate to. Our dance lessons were hard until we hit the waltz as well.

Technically, this story was fine. I could see only one glaring error, which is quite the rarity on WdC. (You wrote Sre for Sure.)

I also liked the way you showed a lot of how the MC was feeling, especially with a limiting word count. If you want to get technical, how could he know his cheeks were turning scarlet when he couldn’t see himself? You can’t feel a colour. Feel heat as he knew blood was rising in his cheeks, sure, but you can’t feel scarlet. That sort of thing is there.

Also, with the waltz, step-step-step doesn’t feel like it conveys the way it is done. I’d emphasise the first step: step-step-step. This shows where the emphasis in the movements is.

However, my biggest issue with this is the dialogue. It didn’t feel natural. “Oh! I’m so sorry, Gwen, I didn’t mean to step on your foot!” is not what a person would say. The other person would know their foot had been stepped on; You’d most likely say, ”Sorry, Gwen.” and then she’d reply, ”I know, you didn’t mean it. But my feet are getting really sore!” So, maybe look at how your characters speak as well.

But, in the end, it was a sweet story, and one that reads really well. I only review works I like, so nicely done.

Good luck going forward!


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review of Only the dead...  
Review by s
Rated: E | (3.5)

An interesting story with a great premise, this shows huge potential to be made into something really scary.

Now, I only review things I like, so with that in mind:
“No matter where Jacob was, death was at the door.” You’ve told us this, but there is not ‘show’ here. That makes this statement have no impact. Did people he know die? Did loved ones die young? Could he see the Grim Reaper everywhere? I get it was a morbid fascination, but why was it there?
”His pursuit of the elixir made him deathly sick and even drove him to the brink of madness.” More tell. We need to see this, not just be told it. It detracts from the horror of the piece.
Past tense of “rend” is “rent”.
The ending needs more description of Jacob’s feelings. There is no sense of horror.
“I am what you seek,” the darkness spoke with an airy voice. Spoke is not a dialogue tag.
Ends with a lot of tell, but we know nothing of what Jacob is actually feeling and experiencing. We need more ‘show’.

Having said that, technically, this was very clean, with only one or two minor errors. The ending was perfect, the note, its words – worked so well.

That’s where I stand.
Good luck going forward.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review by s
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
The story is a strong one, with a good premise, an update of the old shop of horrors anthology comics/books. There were some strong situations and a good sense of dread.
Now, having said that, there were some issues.
Technically:
* Need to watch the punctuation/formatting of direct speech.
* Also in direct speech, each new speaker gets a new paragraph, no matter how little they say.
* Watch passive structures (e.g. “An archway was revealed…”; I would rewrite that paragraph as: “Welcome… to Chateau Du Macabre.” With a flourish, the strange figure bowed and moved aside, revealing an archway. It loomed above a weathered oak door which opened slowly with an ominous groan.)
* Watch how often you use ellipses and what you use them for.
* Comma usage also needs a bit of work.
Story-wise:
* The two boys felt interchangeable. I could not tell one from the other and sometimes I got the names confused based on the actions they were doing.
* You mentioned dust bunnies rolling away… and then there was nothing else about them. Remember Chekhov’s gun, especially in a short story. (Having said that, you described a number of items as the boys first investigate the show, and it did feel overdone, but then you used them in your final battle, so that was a great use of the Chekhov’s gun concept.)
* There is some confusion in what is happening in the final battle. You jump from yokai to hand to other displays in the same paragraph and sometimes without identifiers. This needs tightening.
* A final one: “…a distorted purple.” The word ‘distorted’ feels wrong in this context.

Now, this does seem negative, but like I said, there is a strong story in there. Your descriptions are good – especially the description of the yokai, that was nicely done – and you have some nice turns of phrase (e.g. “lethal caress”). You also have a good sense of dread that goes through the tale. You do not have many echo words at all, which is a real positive, and you did manage to construct a claustrophobic feeling in the tale.

Well done. You have a good sense of horror and terror and translate that well to the page. This is a good piece, but there are just some things that need tightening and looking at – especially in the punctuation aspects and the characterisations – to make it a truly great work.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review by s
Rated: E | (4.0)
Okay, the following are notes I've written about specifics in the story. Sorry if they;re hard to follow, but they are in the order they appear in the story.

Nice opening paragraph.

Then ushered those drunken minions indoors, where they sought sanctuary behind deadbolts, door bars, and chains. – This is a sentence fragment; it needs a noun before “ushered”, even a pronoun.

For the moment, I lay hushed, hesitant to move, and afraid I might awaken her. Then I thought, "Maybe I shouldn't wake her at all. I should just slip out the door. – this feels clunky. I’d go with “For the moment, I lay hushed, hesitant to move, afraid I might awaken her, contemplating just slipping out the door without a word."

Fresh air filled my lungs, so I leaned out the open window. -> I think this needs a qualifier: “I needed some fresh air to fill my lungs, so…”

…I searched her neck for a pulse. I found nothing, no signs of life. – his response after this feels strangely muted. A sense of panic, maybe?

Punctuation: …will use his passkey if necessary," the officer explained in a cold, dispassionate voice. (I also changed exclaimed to explained because he’s not yelling if his voice is cold and dispassionate.

The brick wall exploded in front of me and pelted my face with more dust that settled inside the sweat. I staggered, my eyes burning from the powdered brick that sprinkled across my face. – use of the word face twice feels awkward. I’d change the end to “…my eyes burning from the cloud of powdered brick.”

My stomach lurched into my chest as I slid down the rope, -> don’t need “the rope”, we know what he’s sliding down.

And aren’t the cops shooting at him? Won’t they see him slide down and continue to shoot?

…hole. Then dragged me down into the sewer after him. -> either put a noun in front of “dragged”, or a comma after “hole”, lower case t in “then”.

As far as I knew, Jonah Knightsbridge denied the existence of the Six Apostles. So how did they know I was an Apostle? "So, who are these Six Apostles?" -> so, he knew what an apostle was, why did he have to ask?

Taking his shoes off in the sewer would surely take a lot of time…

The only sound came from my wheezing gasps… -> the quotation marks are not needed here. He is not talking out loud, just thinking and as it’s 1st person POV, it is part of what we already see.

Why is there a scene break between ...as he slumped into the muck. and I laid up to my chin in slime… paragraph when they are the same scene?

Now he knows and understands everything about what he is? But the previous section said he had no idea. If he was playing dumb, why would he do so in his own head, which was what first person POV gives us? And now he knows what Darla was and what killed her? Either he knows and understands, or he doesn’t. This is a confusion that can be overcome by simply him being concerned that this guy and ‘Allison’ knew so much about him, not that they knew more about him than he did.

It might have been something he told me, or maybe I read it in a history book. Oh, well, it's probably not that important. -> while I get the need to foreshadow, this last line feels tacked on and does not fit in with the tone of the passage.

"Management must have let Baby go home due to the commotion," I thought… -> It is not usual to put thoughts into quotation marks. When a thought in a 1st person POV especially does not fit into the narrative, it is usual to have the thought words in italics.

Punctuation: …Did you kill her?" she asked, bending as if her skirt… And this is a lot of info just like that out of this person, just because he’d been “nice” to her? It feels way too convenient. Yes, I know where it's going, but he should have smelt a rat after so many years of life at such reasoning.

Punctuation: …to her lips. "Shshshsh," she… And they have a drawing? In this technological society? Really?

Punctuation: Let's go to your place," I insisted. You do need to keep a better eye on your direct speech. The rest of your punctuation is generally really strong; it’s direct speech where you slip up. Not all the time, but sometimes.

Punctuation: …never actually seen one," Baby answered.
Straight after this you have a two paragraph speech. That’s fine, but there should be quotation marks at the start of the second paragraph as well as the first. You are correct with no closing quotation marks at the end of the first paragraph, though. This happens at the end as well.

The section from Elmo nearly passed out… is a good, brief info dump, but I would move the last paragraph to be a part of the first, and finish with Elmo being rude. At the moment, it feels like the last was added later.

Baby went ahead while I retrieved Elmo, and she unlocked her front door. I watched as Baby stepped through the threshold at the exact moment I repositioned Elmo's unconscious form on the porch beside the door. -> don’t need door twice. Finish the second sentence at porch.

Punctuation: "What do you have on your mind, handsome?" a sultry voice breathed…

After Jonah’s death, the jump from 1st to 3rd person POV is sudden and jarring. I’m not sure what you could do here, but it does feel awkward.
         There might have to be a way of indicating this better, as Jonah comes back later – maybe make the 3rd person sections italicised.
         The entire section starting Memories of Jonah Knightsbridge broke through… is an info dump for a character that we are suddenly supposed to feel for this late in the story. While interesting, does it matter?
         Okay, truth be told, these sections in 3rd person POV about Baby/Allison are unnecessary for the story. The gist of the information could be fragmented memories downloaded into Jonah’s core when he has the whole Jonah I/real Jonah vision later on, but, really, most of them do not add to the story.

The conversation between the mailman and Jonah felt unnatural. I think there needs to be a lot more informality between them.

I had to read the ending a few times to understand what was going on. I think it feels too much like an essay, the cyberpunkian aesthetic fading from the writing. It’s your story, so it’s your ending, but there was a little let-down to me.

Other Questions:
What was the deal with Jason? Who was he? Why did he help? You said Jonah went from hotel to hotel every month or so, yet he had a permanent address where the mailman knew him? How did Jonah get fixed? Was the Jonah we were following before Baby shot him Jonah I or one of the (other) Apostles?

Overall…

This story is a strong 1st person cyberpunk tale, told from the story of an AI, which is not done that often, especially after we are over the first section where he just acts like a confused man. The main character, the Jonah we follow, is well represented (again, after that first section). There is some nice world-building without it being just exposition dump after exposition dump. We get an idea of this world really nicely.

The story is a good one, but there just needs to be some tightening in elements of it. We don’t need to know everything about Baby/Allison, and some questions arise.

Still, I did enjoy it, and this is a decent example of some well-thought-out, not over-explained (on the whole) science fiction. Well done.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review of Poems  
Review by s
Rated: E | (4.0)
These are some fine poems, very personal (I am guessing), and in that free verse style that can suit this sort of emotive outpouring.

Now, I had two issues with the poems as a collection:

1) They feel very similar. Similar language, similar themes, similar emotions. There is very little to differentiate them from one another. Taking them one after the other, this becomes a lot more stark to a reader.

2) The language was very plain. Poetry should use more metaphor, especially over a course of a number of poems. it could help make them feel different. If it was one or two poems that were in this confessional tone, fine, but a whole series needs some metaphor/simile ideas to break the patterns/language up.

But, look, a lot of my own poetry falls into this sort of thematic pattern, so I do know it can be difficult to break out of the pattern we set for ourselves.

Still, good poems. My favourite was 'Secrets', for what it's worth. The little pieces of dialogue from the others helped lift it out of the author's head-space.

I know this wasn't the greatest review, and I apologise. But still, good luck going forward.


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Review by s
Rated: 13+ | (4.5)
I quite liked this. A desperate man driven to do desperate things, and then sliding out of his desperation with a nice denouement.

Only 3 things stood out to me. Roaring a growl seems contradictory. And after mugging a stripping a man getting a "Christian" thought does not feel right. You might have been going after the juxtaposition, but in such a short word count (contest entry - I know), it feels odd. And, finally, wouldn't the women be curious as to what Burt had been doing down there and why wasn't the man, just standing up, calling out that Burt was a thief?

But, technically, it was great, and I liked the way the story went along.

Good luck in the contest.


*Gold* My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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Review of Socked In  
Review by s
Rated: 13+ | N/A (Review only item.)
This was an interesting read. An interesting premise, for sure.

Now, first, technically, I found virtually no errors. It's a clean work, well edited and with things how they should be. (One noticeable error: hemorage is spelt hemorrhage.) Well done. I see that so rarely on WdC.

Format-wise, it is fine, but old-fashioned. Modern editors/publishers use italics instead of underline, and the names of the magazines should also be in italics. Not mistakes, just old-fashioned.

The story carries along well. But it has a tonal dissonance. I wasn't sure if it was supposed to be humourous or serious. It felt like it jumped, and a reason for that is that a sock is not that scary. It's why Harding's Killer Budgies is written as a comedy - budgerigars are not scary. And it is one thing that lets King's The Shining down - hedges are also not scary, no matter how hard he tries. The tension is also not built up well in the language. It was very formal and we did not get a lot of the "show" of how the narrator was feeling or why. It all felt superficial. To up the tension, we need more of the senses involved in the description of the character of the narrator. This is a letter to a friend; I think more informality could have helped and been used to make things seem creepier than they were.

I really liked the ending as a police report. Nice way to tie off the first person narrative, and having the letter tagged as evidence is a very cool literary device.

So, the tl;dr is - I liked the story, but I don't think it quite achieved what it was going for.


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Review by s
Rated: 13+ | (3.5)
The reflection of self in this is well done. O[penness and honesty as to what creates the writing urge can help allow yourself to become a better writer, and this shows a desire to get those images out of your head onto the page.

Now, you express yourself well - you have the ideas and can put them down in a way that makes sense and follows on. However, there a lot of punctuation, grammar, and syntax errors throughout. You also occasionally drift from third person to first person voice and that is quite jarring. Looking at it from the POV of 3rd person, this works better as you can be a little more honest if living in the skin of another, something which not enough go for.

So, you have the ability to write and get these ideas down, but you need to work on the technical side of writing. This will also help make some of the vaguer ideas here become more concrete.

I will say here I only review works I like, so I did like this piece.

Good luck going forward.


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Review of Invasion  
Review by s
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
Nicely done with a little creepy tale. I know the limits of a competition word count, so the things I am going to mention I hope will remain within the allowed count.

I think there needs to be more focus on the first description of the weeds, and then the final assault on them. It should feel like a big cathartic release. There could be even more about how these weeds affect him. He sees them, gets angry, gets rid of them. If he is so proud of it, it would be like the weeds attacking a friend.

In the final attack, could he see more pop up, as if taunting him? Really push the envelope of these not being entirely natural?

To get word count, the dreams could be scaled back. They don't really add a lot. I am guessing you're trying to show his emotion without telling, but this way of showing does not feel like it works for a tale that could be really terrifying.

These are just suggestions. As it is, technically, the story is very clean. Couldn't find any mistakes, and it certainly works as a bit of a horror tale. I just think it could be amped up...

Good luck going forth!


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Review by s
Rated: 18+ | (4.5)
I liked the constant change in poem styles, and the story told over the course of the week through these differing styles and techniques. This would have been quite the challenge and you've come up to meet it really well.

I think you nailed the poetry styles well. There were a couple of issues with syllable count (particularly in the sonnet), some rhymes felt forced (last line of the acrostic, for example) and some lines were awkward with strange stresses (e.g. the sister talk between wed and Thu), but these are minor quibbles in what was a very entertaining long form.

Well done.


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Review of Failed Experiment  
Review by s
Rated: E | (4.0)
Interesting story, that made me smile. I do like the last line as well - I can see that.

Technically, there are a couple of missing commas, and the two scenes need a separator (it took me a second read to get that we had changed), but otherwise it was very clean.

I do know that flash fiction limits the word count, and I was going to suggest this could be the basis for a longer story, but the more I read it, I think you could actually reduce Buddy's speech a little, and turn the open scene with George into just a part of the conversation, leaving the dog revelation even later, and so make it even punchier. Of course, that's just my opinion.

It was still a good story. Enjoyed it.


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