My overall impression: I thoroughly enjoyed your children's story! I think the message of peer pressure & temptation is an important one for children to hear over & over again. I liked that you ended it with the other children being impacted by Zaheer's final decision.
Suggestions: In your second to last paragraph you are missing punctuation in the sentences beginning "Wow Zaheer It....."
You may want to consider entering your story in the Write Now! contest through Avery Madison. (If you haven't seen it already.) Go to www.averymadison.com for more info. The winning story is published on their website and the author earns $1000. They are looking for children's short stories that offer moral lessons. I think it would be worth a shot!
My overall impression: As to your question about it being too ordinary or common. I didn't find that to be the case. I liked that you were succinct & consistent with the emotion through the poem. I don't feel it is overwritten. I think it is clear and concise as is.
Suggestions:
1. Depending on if you take this further: I feel that in it's current state the title should be Anchor Lost rather than just Anchor. When I saw the word anchor I thought grounded, firm, secure, unwavering - nothing of what this poem represents.
2. 1st stanza - doesn't match the next 2 stanzas. You have waves as being plural but ship & sea are singular. Maybe change it to A wave of loss etc.
3. 2nd stanza - I would switch the last line to read: That once could have been
Ultimately, I hope you don't alter it much. I am a firm believer in the saying:
My overall impression: My heart ached as I read the details of the loss of your friend. The most haunting section:
Electrical cords taut
Around your pale, slender neck, surrounding flesh
So offended, the mortician obliged
To employ concealing scarves.
My only suggestions:
I suggest changing the word "acquaintance" in your last stanza. Maybe try something like sisterhood, relationship, friendship, companionship, etc. Acquaintance usually refers to relationships that are more impersonal in nature. Unlike, your friendship with Donna.
My overall impression: I am not familiar with various forms of poetry, but I was intrigued by the form you have chosen. My favorite line Pictures of her are stained with my skin.
Since your are open to suggestions:
A few word ideas I had -
Embrace, face, erase
torment, moment
ache, make, take, awake
taunt, flaunt, haunt
heal, real, surreal, feel
chest, rest (for a lack of breath and sleep)
Explore where you want to take this poem. A few questions to consider:
*Do you want to explore more of the anger side of lost love? Does she mock or taunt your character with her presence. Does her action(s) fuel more hate?
*Or do you want to flip and explore the healing side of lost love? Does your character awake & begin to breathe again?
*Or both?
I hope this offers a little inspiration. If not, I find that if I set it aside and begin a new work my mind suddenly gets flooded with ideas.
My overall impression: Great job of staying consistent with keeping the reader only as a witness of your scene.
A few suggestions:
1. The format is hard to read with all the words lumped into 1 or 2 paragraphs.
Try breaking up the different thoughts and leave a space or indent to denote the new paragraphs.
You second paragraph starting with "The neat stacks..." is right on; but then I would start a new paragraph at the sentence "The box is full...."
The next paragraph could begin with "An announcement...." and so on, through the rest of your scene.
2. Your sentence "The little guy will be three soon, and his female siblings have always used him as a gopher, a prop, or a plaything." take out the "a's" before prop and plaything. The "a" before gopher is all that is needed.
3. Your sentence "Laughter comes from around the corner, and it reaches a creshendo when brother becomes visible from around the corner." I think you can end the sentence at the word visible. You already stated "around the corner" once earlier in the sentence.
4. Your last sentence ends without any punctuation.
These are all of my observations. Thank you for making me smile. My own nephew has done this very same thing with dress-up. However, he didn't have any sisters helping him along the way.
Great story! I thought you kept Dice's isolation that he created for himself consistent throughout the story. Even the dice in the center of his bowling ball was a great symbol of his isolation.
Just a few picky suggestions:
1. I would break up your 1st sentence in the 2nd paragraph into 2 sentences. It reads very long. I would place a period right after "hair" and start my next sentence with "He walked".
2. I try to follow the old rule: Don't end a sentence with a preposition.
The only time I stray from this rule is in poetry & dialogue. So I would rearrange the sentence with Dice's bowling shoes to read:
Dice walked over to the two center lanes and sat down to put on his bowling shoes.
3. Another sentence that reads long is in the bowling paragraph. The sentence that begins with "Breaking out of his stance" There are too many commas & it doesn't read smoothly. Maybe try:
Breaking out of his stance, Dice took his standard five step approach and released the ball. He watched it roll towards the pocket of the pins as if guided by a laser.
4. Lastly, the last paragraph lacks any emotion from Dice. I wanted more of a realization from Dice of his predicament. I would still leave the reader hanging about how he ultimately feels as the malevolent darkness (I love that!) closes in on him. It keeps your story very thought provoking.
However, I think the readers should see some range of emotions about everything that just transpired. Even if it is just confusion. He emitted emotions through the entire story so to leave them out at a crucial turning point just didn't work for me.
Well, that's all of my observations. Thanks for sharing your work! I can't wait to read more from you so............
My overall impression: Great premise for a teen sitcom. You have a solid premise developed for many comical/dramatic plot opportunities that you can turn into future episodes.
My suggestions:
1. Don't forget to use the spell check feature. I found a few mispelled words. You left the "n" from Duncan's name in the first paragraph & check the Lawyer's entrance for words with letters rearranged. etc.
2. Make sure to keep your writing system the same throughout. At first you used all uppercase letters and made separate paragraphs to denote Madison's voiceovers. Reading the episode further the voiceovers can be found with lowercase letters and one as part of a paragraph. It should read consistently throughout.
3. Since this is only the first part of an episode try not to keep jumping back & forth with all the flashbacks. The purpose of a flashback is to further the present plot. So far, the episode is the past.
Maybe try rearranging the pool flashbacks to all happen within the same scene. Or take out the flashbacks & use the material as the first episode.
You just want to avoid the viewer from being frustrated trying to keep up with your timeline. It will also allow you the opportunity to use another flashback in the latter half of the episode.
4. Last, try reading some of your voiceovers out loud. Some of them are very lengthy for what little action coincides with them. Either scale them back or add more action to give the actress more time to finish your dialogue.
Keep working at it because this is really good material.
Overall concept - Nice provoking tease for a spooky first chapter.
A few suggestions:
1. There are sentences in both paragraphs that are too long.
For example in your first paragraph, the sentence that begins with "I got lost in my thoughts..." should be broken into 2 or more separate sentences.
Try reading your story out loud to yourself or someone else. This can help you edit accordingly.
2. Don't forget to use the spell check feature. There are a few spelling errors. realized, storm, pretty
3. Also, there are some formatting issues. I use MS Word to write my stories & then copy and paste on Writing.com. I have found that the formatting doesn't always come out the same. I typically have to go back & re-format my paragraphs and sentences to be spaced correctly when I post. This could be the same problem here. You are missing spacing between your sentences and adding a space between the paragraphs will help your story read easier.
4. Lastly, you have a great beginning but you could really add more descriptive words to further set your spooky scene. Try adding more sensory descriptions in the story. Since your character ran inside from the rain maybe they felt a chill after the door slammed shut. Or maybe some dust blew in their eyes?
Go overboard with it - you can always scale it back later when you edit again.
A wonderful, touching story that showed a child's mind pondering our adult expressions.
Just one picky suggestion: Give Sarah more of an emotional response when she hears her daddy has died.
i.e. Her eyes brimming with tears, Sarah choked out "What about the dogs, Miz Collins?"
Since you aged her 6, Sarah would have an understanding of death & she would naturally have an emotional response. Not to mention it would add to the tug on the heart strings you are already giving your readers.
Thank you for the laugh! I enjoyed your family drama.
My only suggestion would be to slow down & build Mr. Dawes' first 2 outlandish stories. Maybe slow them by scaling back on some of the details or by interjecting some snide expressions/remarks from the teenage daughter in the middle. Reserve his non-stop dialogue just for the last story. That way, when she finally explodes it doesn't seem out of nowhere. Her frustration has been building as his stories continued to grow more outlandish.
Besides, I don't know too many teenagers that would listen that intently without interjecting some snide responses.
Don't get me wrong - I enjoyed the stories. They reminded me of Forrest Gump in a way, but I probably would've exploded during his first rant and I haven't been a teenager for years!
Oh, one picky thing, I found one sentence that seems to be missing a word. When Mrs. Dawes joins the family to buy the headband she says “Remember this is for her, Colleen, not for you. Are close to finding something?” That last sentence needs a "you" or "we" in there.
Thanks for a fun story from a Dad's perspective!
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