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58 Public Reviews Given
108 Total Reviews Given
Public Reviews
1
1
Review of Ain't she my kin  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (4.5)
I like the rousing jazzy language, rhythm and energy of this.
I feel that the last few words could be more powerful, though.

Incidentally, it can't be your intention to put a space on each side of the apostrophe in the word "ain't". There's a glitch somewhere.
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Review of Forever, Timless  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (4.5)
I found this poem very moving. A story of loss and fidelity in a very demanding format.

Why have you stopped writing? Not to mention reviewing? You were my most encouraging reviewer. I guess people like me didn't respond enough. Sorry about that; I hardly review at all these days.

I do hope all is well with you.

Bill
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Review of ~I'm Coming Home~  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
Hello Web-Witch,

I enjoyed reading this drama. The idea is great, and it progresses very well.

I have a few minor difficulties.

Annoying superfluous mention of the car is avoided at the beginning by speaking of wipers moving. You might similarly drop "rainy", "from the recent turn of events","my husband", "emergency", whimpering "sound",and perhaps the sign announcing Mexico.

The woman must be temporarily out of her mind. I don't know if she would know that she is "depressed", if that's what she is. She sees dead parents as mere "occupants", a miraculously live child as bearing "no visible signs of injury", and then kidnaps the child without a further thought. But her lack of affect is contradicted by "a sweet little cry" coming from a "beautiful" baby girl, crying "with fright".

Again, unless she is a real monster, she must be feeling something three years later. So she wouldn't simply say, "I have no regrets". There would have to be very strong emphasis or repetition, since she is, herself, the one she is trying to convince.

I really do like the story, or I wouldn't be reviewing it.

Keep it up,
Bill
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Review of Forgive Me  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 18+ | (4.5)
I especially liked the powerful opening, Annie. And the ending too, as a matter of fact.

The dialogue is very good. Just one thing, perhaps. Words like "teased" and "quipped" are a bit out of style for introducing dialogue. Most authors nowadays seem to use "said", or, if possible, avoid these words altogether by making it obvious who is speaking by what is said.

Keep on writing,
Bill
5
5
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: ASR | (5.0)
Dear Skye,

For a piece written in hospital, under the influence of drugs, this is amazing. It would be very good even apart from the circumstances. It doesn't read as rambling, despite your fears. On the contrary, it seems to me very well organized.

Spelling errors, sure; but the drugs are responsible for that, so I shan't bother with corrections.

I don't like the last sentence, though. I am trying to figure out why. Partly, perhaps, because I don't like to be addressed as Dear Reader. Not just because it is terribly old-fashioned, but also because I don't like to be addressed at all, except in a letter. I remember that Suzanne Langer says somewhere in Feeling and Form(I think) that Peter Pan's turning to the audience to ask whether they believed in fairies broke the spell.

Most people don't agree with her, but I do. I would like a final sentence that stays with you. No matter how personal it is, it's not a personal letter to me.

I understand that you need an ending. I believe there's someone on TV who ends (or ended) with something like "That's the way it is." I would prefer something like that. Sorry to take so much space to say so little.

If you could get to a computer more often, this would make an absorbing and instructive blog. Could you write the entries, and post them later? That would be so vivid. I know that nothing just flows effortlessly, without any editing, but it starts from there, doesn't it? Even if you had to wait weeks before getting to a computer, that wouldn't be a problem, if you could get something down earlier.

You know all this, of course. I just want to tell you how much I appreciate it, and to encourage you to continue.

Another thing: I don't know what FYI means. You have a world-wide audience here; that is probably local (US?).

I very much liked your saying what you have learned about looking down on people whose position you now find yourself in. Whether you really did or not, that was well worth saying, and very well said.

Thank you very much for this. Please go on in the same way.

Bill
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Review of Night's Solace  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (4.5)
This is a powerful and interesting story.

I have only one criticism. The level of language varies.

The narrator usually speaks with the vocabulary and occasional errors of the petty thief that he seems to be; but he keeps slipping in words like "inhalation" and phrases like "cloudless beauty", "insurmountable loneliness", and "deranged despair" that seem out of character.

A very good story, well worth reading.
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Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (4.0)
This is basically a nice poem, Sarlynn. I have problems with the form, though.

You do say that it is "made up as I go ... giving a tiny bit of art". This review will not say much more than that it shows.

Since the rhyming shows that it is made up of nine four-line stanzas, I don't know why it is not presented that way.

The meter is accentual, like a ballad, depending only beats, regardless of the number of unaccented syllables. However, it is often difficult to know where to place the accents, since it is far from clear how many there are suppose to be in a line, since this seems to vary from stanza to stanza. It is not clear whether this is intentional, and if so, what purpose the irregularity would serve. It would help to cut out as many of the unimportant words like "it's" wherever possible.

The line, " We must grow wings! We must escape!" is given two separate lines, to make things even more confusing.

The theme is very good, and the emotion is sincere.

Please tighten it up a bit. It would be a pity not to.

Write on.

Bill
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Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (4.5)
I came to this piece through the review by Prosperous
Snow.

I wrote a public review of it, but the system lost it. Can't do it again; not at 2:30 a.m.

My eyes not longer permit me to read huge blocks of text online. Could you break it up a bit? (Lots of people have this problem; not just old guys.)

Reading here and there lets me concur with Prosperous Snow's rating. There are quite a few typos (or errors) that she didn't catch, though. "Dependant" for "dependent", "me and my mother" for "my mother and I", and otheres that I forget. (Don't make the common error of writing "my mother and I" when it really should be "my mother and me"! I'd rather you stuck with "me and my mother" all the time.

It is a moving memoir. I liked it. Thank you.

Cheers,
Bill
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Review of The Pendant  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (4.5)
Hello Blanche,

I have just reread this story, and have pushed my rating up, as I said I would. It seems much more readable this time round, and the content was always great.

I did see a slight contradiction: "KU was and still is their joy ...." I don't think it still is.
There's a typo in the last line: "may" for "many".

Great story.

Bill
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Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (4.5)
Hello ponygirl!

I see you wrote this poem more than a year ago, when you were only twelve.

I like the poem very much. The image of sadness and happiness as places that we visit is very imaginative. You may have taken that from somewhere, but that is not important; poets borrow from each other all the time; it's what you do with it that counts.

The way you cut up the lines is very effective. You have placed all the important words at the end of their lines, which is a very important position. I can read just the last word in each line and understand what the poem is about. Did you know that you can do this at the beginning of lines too? That wouldn't work in this poem, but it might in another.

The meter is very good indeed. Did you notice that, if you put two or three lines together, like, for example:
"I've been to the land of the sad; it's quite a bore",
you get the sound of 5 de-dahs. The next two lines together do the same thing. Then the last three lines do it too. (I mean the basic rhythm; there are variations in your lines, but you can feel the rhythm underneath. I don't mean that they should be written together; they are much better the way you have written them, but I believe that the rhythm is part of what makes this a good poem.

That's the same rhythm that Shakespeare uses in all his plays, called iambic pentameter (meaning 5 de-dahs.) I'm only just beginning to learn how to use it at seventy-six, and here you are doing it spontaneously at twelve, probably without even having heard of it! You amaze me.

However, I notice that the line, "Because everyone's sad" doesn't quite fit. To me, it seems to break the rhythm. You may prefer it that way. After all, it has the right number of beats (stresses), so why not? It would be smoother as, "Everyone's so sad", but maybe you don't want that line to be smooth, since it's about sadness.

I probably shouldn't be bothering you with all this. You have written an excellent poem, and I'm very happy about it.

So please write some more, so that I can stay happy!

Cheers,
Bill
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Review of AGNOSTIC  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (3.5)
This is a sincere, and even heartfelt piece. I believe it is rather confused, though.

Considering the thought, the title is "Agnostic", but the content contradicts that. An agnostic is not simply one who does not have a proof of God's existence; who does? Anyone who believes that there is "something out there", whatever one wants to call it, and that there is a reward in an after-life for living well, is a not an agnostic, but a believer.

Whether a person accepts the teachings or the authority, of any particular denomination, or finds its ministers morally respectable, is another question. One can believe even without being a member of a church, and even without being too clear about what one believes.

In any case, the distinction is made by some schools of theology between faith and belief. I think I referred to that in the poem you reviewed. Some people express it as "believing in" as distinguished from "believing that".

In literary terms, the piece seems to me to lack organization. It needs a central theme to hold it together. It has the unity of a blog entry rather than that of an essay. In fact, it might be a good idea to turn it into a blog: in a blog there is no objection to a person reporting his or her thoughts in whatever order or disorder they happen to arrive.
You can use a blog entry as a source for something more ambitious.

Formally, I don't know why the lines are so uneven. It's billed as an essay, not as a poem. I don't mean that you should bill it as a poem, obviously. It is good that the paragraphs are very short; long stretches of uninterrupted prose are unreadable on the screen.

There are a few typos, and words here and there that don't appear well chosen:

-- "applied science". That is more or less "engineering"; can one "believe in" engineering?

-- "the religious faithfuls". I think you mean "believers".

-- "faithfuls are prayful" ---> "prayerful"

-- "Religious god used to enough"--->"A religious god used to be enough."

-- "people that doesn't believe" ---> "don't"

-- "idealogy" ---> "ideology".

Finally, it's very long.

To sum up: I think that, with a bit of cleaning up, it would stand a blog entry. Possibly two or three entries, separating the thinking from the biography, and perhaps the science from the religion. Later you can do more polished pieces with that material.

I read this because you asked me to. I would have been much more comfortable reviewing a short poem.

You asked me to be honest. (Nobody ever means that! Personally, I want people to be nice.)

Also, I presume you noticed my former profession in my bio block.

I hope you don't find this too negative. I try to keep away from reviewing opinion pieces (and blogs) because they bring out the prof in me.

Keep on writing.

Bill
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Review of The Pendant  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (3.5)
I would like to rate this higher, because it obviously comes from a very talented writer. Probably a young one, I should think, because the work shows great creativity but a distinct lack of control.

The content is fine (that's the hard part). Probably the structure too; it's hard to tell at present. There is a great deal of editing to do. Mostly cutting or substituting.

For example:
"item" should be ?
"picked up" should probably be "packed"
"isolated"....................."separated"
"repelling"...................."repulsive"
"presence"......................?
"look to"......................."look for"
"thrilled" ....................."loved"
"popular".......................?
"escaped..to the jaws of time"...."escaped my memory."
They both ....together".....Omit "both".

And so on, all the way through. I have glanced at a

couple of your novel chapters, and see the same thing

there: immense talent, but needs editing. Words and

sometimes metaphors slightly off.

My suggestions are impromptu. This is a review, not a

presumptuous attempt to edit. The point is that these

words and phrases etc. don't work as they stand.

Your writing is basically very good. I wish I had such apparently spontaneous creativity. But it needs editing.

Then I'll come back with the excellent rating it should have.

Do keep on writing.

Bill
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Review of Thanks Dad  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (4.5)
I just wrote a long public review of this great story, but it lost in transmission. I can't do it all over again.

However, I remember remarking on a brother who was mentioned only once, and a ten-year-old whose only function was to have his name forgotten, which seemed improbable for someone who had become "close" to his brother.

These things tend to happen when there is a basis in reality (not necessarily the writer's, of course.). Things get left in because they actually happened; but in a story everything has to be used or cut.

I recommend this story. I intended just to glance at it, but got caught up in spite of myself.

Bill
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Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (4.5)
Came to your site to learn who was reviewing me, as I always do. Haven't acknowledged the review yet.

Thanks for reminding me of Edgar Allan Poe, though I think I might have realized by the third line.

This is a hilarious, clever poem.

Lucky you, to have taken a course in writing! In my time, they didn't exist!

I'm deducting a half from "Perfection" only because the meter troubles me here and there. I'm sure you are aware of this already. (I hope I'm not lowering your average rating. I hate to do that!)

My difficulty starts in Line 2, where the first foot is an Iamb when you have led me to expect a Trochee. This happens several times in the course of the poem.

(I don't remember Poe doing this. I almost bought a selection of his poems today. I'll do it tomorrow. If he does, I'll come back.)

This was intended to be a private review, but what the heck!

If you like poetry, you should read this, folks!

Bill
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Review of Roses In Winter  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (4.5)
Very nice, Mrs. H. (great handle!),

I have trouble with the meter in a couple of lines, though.

You want me to stress the first "I" in "I am sure I saw one". It doesn't come naturally. Maybe "But I"?

Same thing with "Well" in "Well, that's what they said". How about "Well! That's ...)
Actually, I think you could repeat the phrase, "At least" here.

I find meter so tricky.

Good luck in the contest!

Bill
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Review of Moon  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | N/A (Review only item.)
Hi Turtlemoon,

She-Wolfe's rave review sent me here.

It's a lovely poem. It may even be perfect, as she says, but I have a very slight reservation.

Something in the last line. Not the content; that IS perfect. Something in the form. Is it that the rhyme of "face" and "place" has prepared me for something? Dunno!

I've put you in my list of Favorites, so I'm sure to visit your site.

Bill
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Review of Vacation  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (5.0)
This is wonderful, Lobelia! A genuine tour de force!

And so original! I can't remember ever seeing a poem entirely in monometer. Trochaic too --- the hardest.

It was the subtitle that led me to read it. Only afterwards did I check the real title, upon which I burst into laughter.

There are a couple of technical things about which I will email you. Here, I just want to congratulate you, and to recommend this poem to all lovers of verse.

And, of course, (as if you could stop,) write on!

Bill
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Review of Seasonal Haze  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (3.0)
You've got something here worth working on, Christopher.

However, your first line seems odd, as if it were constructed just to rhyme with the second.

The verbs of the several lines vary in tense for no apparent reason. The fourth line doesn't contain a verb at all; this seems to make it the object of the verb "exhausted" in the previous line. I doubt if
that is your intention.

The last line is fine. Could all the others be in the past tense?

I'm sure it all means something, but not to me. Could you make it a bit more communicative?

Keep on writing!

BIll
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Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (5.0)
Isn't it great when someone puts a universal feeling into perfect words? Universal on this site, at least.

We not allowed to analyze it unless we are eating an ice cream sundae with all the trimmings.

But who wants to analyze it, for Heaven's sake? Personally, I just want to recommend it.

One word critique: Gosh!

Bill
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Review of The Janitor  Open in new Window.
Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (4.0)
Dear HiHow,

Welcome to Writing.com!

I think you are a talented writer, and you must keep on writing.

A couple of remarks concerning this "first draft":

Huge blocks of text are extremely hard to read. Break up your text every few lines with a space, as I am doing here. You can worry about paragraphing later.

The second remark is that you are writing in a dialect of English that sounds strange to this British/Canadian. The syntax and punctuation seem odd. Occasionally, the vocabulary surprises. The whole style is reminiscent of the English of British India, but somehow different.

One dialect is as good as another, so this is not a reason to change your language. But it might be a good idea to find a way to give international readers some clue right away, so that we can see the language as culturally different rather than mistaken.

As for the story itself, unless your character is destined to commit a crime, I don't see why he should be making a "confession". He seems to be a sympathetic character; why can't he just tell his story?

If he IS a criminal, I should warn you that the "pathological first person" is very tricky. Readers don't like it; editors hate it. I've done it; lots of us have; but not twice. Especially not after reading Rust Hill (Google) on the subject; he calls it amateurish. (He would have rejected Agatha Christie's "Roger Ackroyd"!)

I'm not a very experienced writer myself --- though I've been reading for several generations --- so don't take my remarks too seriously.


There's a lot of good narrative material in your story. Don't stop now.

Bill
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Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: ASR | (4.0)
Bonjour Kare,

J'aime beaucoup l'atmosphere romantique et mysterieux de ton poeme. (Comment tu fais pour ajouter les accents?)

Je n'y comprends pas grand'chose, pourtant. Peut-etre parce que le francais n'est pas ma langue maternelle.

Pourquoi la reponse 'bonne nuit' a 'bonsoir'? N'est-ce pas comme repondre 'adieu' a 'bonjour'?

Que veut dire 'en vue de la lune'? Il me semble que 'en vue de' signifie 'dans l'intention de'.

Pourquoi 'repondais' en reponse a 'm'a dit'?

En reponse a ta question sur 'la Ville des Grecques', au Quebec on dit 'a Ville Saint-Laurent', par exemple. Avec un petit 'v', ca irait peut-etre: 'en dessous de la ville des Grecques".

Je ne connais pas le mot 'fleure'. 'Fleurit', peut-etre, s'il s'agit d'un verbe au present.
On dit aussi 'couverts de glace'.

Il me semble que le verbe a la derniere ligne manque de sujet. N'est-ce pas 'elle nous a chante'?

Il se peut que je me trompe sur tous ces points, bien sur. Ne te fie pas sur moi.

Je repete, si necessaire, que j'aime beaucoup ton poeme. T.S.Eliot nous a bien dit qu'un poeme peut communiquer avant d'etre compris.

Comment dit-on 'Write on!' en francais? Continue?
De toute facon, 'N'arrete pas!'. C'est bien beau!

Bill
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Review by Bill Kinahan Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (5.0)
Dear SpookyMaster,

You are a Holy Terror when you get started, aren't you? Justifiably so, in this case, I may add. Maybe the following will mollify you a little.

After 3 years of extremely useful and enjoyable "writing practice" a la Anita Goldberg(Writing Down the Bones), I had finally overcome a lifelong block; but was still unable to do the slightest creative writing.

Seeking help on the Web a few short weeks ago, I was fortunate enough to stumble upon Writing.Com. Amazingly, I was invited to become a member FOR FREE! Naturally, I registered at once. Soon I discovered that I was now in a community of writers, some of them beginners like me (mostly generations younger), and others extremely accomplished, but ALL WRITERS. I"ve already had a career; I don't need to sell: I just want to write. I could not conceive of a more select readership, if only I could manage to produce something at last.

Reading around, I realized that I had nothing to fear from all these nice people, and I suddenly broke through with a story about something that had recently provoked my indignation. Immediately there were readers, some of whom were kind enough to leave R&R's.
I was emboldened to write a review or two myself ---a lot easier than creative writing, let me tell you---and received the most friendly responses. Within a week I had actually made friends with a first-rate writer who lives thousands of miles away in another country. All this without being asked for a penny!

I didn't need a larger portfolio; I had written only one item, after all. But I felt I had to say, "Thank you" somehow, and I didn't want to do that for free too. So I upped to Basic Membership for a very small fee. That didn't seem enough, so I bought 100,000 GP's for the cost of 5 bus tickets, and can now distribute largesse like Lady Bountiful.

The free-and-easy acceptance of this community of writers(Writers! Imagine! And I'm one of them!)---for whom I felt and feel enormous respect, and now affection---somehow encouraged me to try a poem. Within a few minutes a review arrived. I was so delighted that I replied at once, and got a most friendly and encouraging reply. So I let myself go again a day or two later, with similar results. I can't believe this place! After a couple of times, when the first review of a poem arrived, I expressed my gratitude to the reviewer---telling her of my trepidation---and she replied, "You done good, Bill." I'm ready to burst into tears.

I have still written only 5 things; but I've only been here for five minutes, for Heaven's sake! And I'm WR-I-I-I-TING!!!!(Pause to remove moisture from eyes.}

Very Dear and Much Respected SpookyMaster, please pay no attention to those who do not appeciate you. I do! We do! I implore you not to abandon us now!!!
I enclose 50,000 GP's as a peace offering.
Please don't be mad any more.

Your humble and most grateful disciple,
Bill
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