Young Writers Society

I remember that first time that I’d ever let you get close to me. My skin was on fire as you peeled back the layers of my clothes, my soul. You made me hate my body, the skin that I’m forced to wear. Your hands would grip the flesh on my arms, my chest. Your teeth would leave gashes on my palest of skin. I’d pull blankets over me, trying to cover myself as you’d continue to plow your way into my life, tearing the blankets away from breast and belly to lay claim to your prize...

And during it all, I’d ache to please you. Some way... Did you want my body? I’d give you my corpse. Did you want my heart? It’s in that empty carcass somewhere. You’d love me until I couldn’t stand to move. Your love was always harsh... with your hands ripping out my hair and digging canyons into my back. You’d bruise my mouth and I’d try not to throw up as my eyes left pools of tears on your stomach and legs. I’d wipe away the bitterness afterwards along with the salt beneath my eyelids.

You don’t remember it like that... You think that your love was sweet and tender, with your hand gently caressing my body and making my skin tingle with want. You didn’t see the hair stand up on my arms... or feel the acid curling in my stomach as I laid down for you time and time again.

Tell me I’m not the only girl that was weak enough to succumb to you... tell me I’m not the only girl that’s ever lied down for you...

I’d bay at night. What you thought was the sweet sounds of love was my attempt to escape, to exhale all of the bitterness that had laid claim to my soul. I’d wretch afterwards... after you’d left and gone home for the day. I’d lay in my own vomit thinking of how pointless my life was, when all you ever needed from me wasn’t love, but someone to lay waste to, to mangle and destroy with each lustrous squeeze of my arms, my legs, my chest...

I look at myself in the mirror now and still see faintly where your mouth had been on my skin. The blood isn’t there anymore... but when I run my fingers down my arms, I can see you there for just a moment, with your head bent over my breasts. I never knew if you were smiling or snarling...

I see this shell, this ugly, withered shell and don’t know what to think of what I’ve become. I push away the thought of you, only to have it curl up with me at night, sidle in next to me and dig in its talons. Because I honestly can’t say I wouldn’t do it again... it’s so easy to lie down with dogs...

Wow! That hit hard for sure.

I'm actually a little scared that that piece was "real" as you say... However, it was wonderfully well written and made its point well. I'm sorry this is such a short review, but there's not much to critique grammar wise, and your flow here is wonderful. Good job!

Wow. You never cease to amaze me with your gut-wrenching talent. Your words are real and relatable and just altogether beautiful, even though the subject you're writing about in this piece is the farthest thing from beautiful. I'd like to hope that not all of this happened in real life, but if so, I'm so sorry it did. It seems as though you've found writing as therapy, though (I can relate, it is for me too). So, even though I've said this a million times already-- keep writing because you're brilliant!

~Jess

Hey,
Thanks for requesting a review. Most of my review will be grammar mistakes, but I will try to give you an overall impression of what I think of your piece.

I remember that first time that I’d ever let you get close to me.

The first that in this sentence should be the because the repitition of that makes this sentence sound awkward.

tearing the blankets away from breast and belly to lay claim to your prize...

I don't see the need for the ... at the end of this sentence.

And during it all, I’d ache to please you.

Never start a sentence with a conjunction: For, And, Nor, Boy, Or, Yet, So. They are for combining complete sentences together, and when you start with one you make your sentence sound like a fragment. Take it away and capitalize the d in during.

Some way...Did you want my body?

'Some way...' This doesn't benefit this sentence at all. I suggest taking it out.

Your love was always harsh... with your hands ripping out my hair and digging canyons into my back.

I don't see why you keep using ... It's not needed in this sentence either. Just replace it with a comma.

You’d bruise my mouth and I’d try not to throw up as my eyes left pools of tears on your stomach and legs.

There should be a comma after mouth because you are combining two complete sentences together with the conjunction and.

I’d wipe away the bitterness afterwards along with the salt beneath my eyelids.

There should be a comma after afterwards.

You don’t remember it like that... You think that your love was sweet and tender, with your hand gently caressing my body and making my skin tingle with want.

Replace ... with a semi-colon (;), and lower case the y in you.

You didn’t see the hair stand up on my arms... or feel the acid curling in my stomach as I laid down for you time and time again.

Take away the ...

Tell me I’m not the only girl that was weak enough to succumb to you... tell me I’m not the only girl that’s ever lied down for you...

If you decide on keeping some of the ... for effect please don't put as many in your sentences it ruins your effect and just becomes annoying. Replace the ... with a semi-colon, and replace the second ... with a regular period.

I’d bay at night.

Should that say I'd lay at night... If it's suppose to be bay, what does this sentence mean?

What you thought was the sweet sounds of love was my attempt to escape, to exhale all of the bitterness that had laid claim to my soul.

The word was after thoughts is suppose to be were.

I’d wretch afterwards... after you’d left and gone home for the day.

Repalce the ... with a comma

I’d lay in my own vomit thinking of how pointless my life was, when all you ever needed from me wasn’t love, but someone to lay waste to, to mangle and destroy with each lustrous squeeze of my arms, my legs, my chest...

Replace the ... with a regular period.

The blood isn’t there anymore... but when I run my fingers down my arms, I can see you there for just a moment, with your head bent over my breasts.

Replace the ... with a comma, and the comma after moment isn't needed.

I never knew if you were smiling or snarling...

Replace the ... with a regular period.

I push away the thought of you, only to have it curl up with me at night, sidle in next to me and dig in its talons.

I love this personification!

Because I honestly can’t say I wouldn’t do it again... it’s so easy to lie down with dogs...

Take away the word because, because it turns your sentence into a fragment. Replace the first... with a semi-colon. Leave the second ... there; I think it fits well at the end.

Overall I think this piece was amazing. I'm kind of confused as to whether this is assault or not, but your work is reviting and mesmorizing. If you have any questions or need another review feel free to ask.

Have a great day,
Tiffany

Hi! Apologies for the delayed review, but NaNo stole my life last month!

Line-By-Line

I remember that first time that I’d ever let you get close to me.

[Alright, let's look at your first sentence. You're a little overly wordy here which takes away from the dramatic tone that you build up nicely afterward. I'd suggest something like: 'I remember the first time we touched' or 'I remember the first time I let you close to me.']

My skin was on fire as you peeled back the layers of my clothes, my soul. You made me hate my body, the skin that I’m forced to wear. Your hands would grip the flesh on my arms, my chest. Your teeth would leave gashes on my palest of skin. [Maybe not skin, you've used it once before and it's a vague, almost cliched phrase when you start talking about pale/ ivory skin. Make it a more specific description instead, but try to avoid choosing the neck! Maybe collar bone or shoulder or even arms?] I’d pull blankets over me, trying to cover myself as you’d continue to plow your way into my life, tearing the blankets away from breast and belly to lay claim to your prize...

[Why do you have an ellipsis here? Don't use them at the end of a paragraph; they're to suggest a pause within a sentence, not a gap at the end of one. That's what paragraph spacing is for ]

And during it all, I’d ache to please you. Some way... Did you want my body? I’d give you my corpse. Did you want my heart? It’s in that empty carcass somewhere. [Too vague. All the power of 'corpse' is lost when followed by 'empty carcass somewhere'. Make those descriptions concrete! Where is it? In the hollow of the old violin case? Crammed between the radiator and the wall? I don't know, but you should!] You’d love me until I couldn’t stand to move. [Again, poor phrasing. This is too generic and too cliched. It's one of those phrases that gets thrown in as filler but here you want something stronger. Why couldn't she move? Build that picture. Is she chained by the love, smothered underneath it?] Your love was always harsh... [A comma would be more effective here.] with your hands ripping out my hair and digging canyons into my back. You’d bruise my mouth and I’d try not to throw up as my eyes left pools of tears on your stomach and legs. I’d wipe away the bitterness afterwards along with the salt beneath my eyelids.

You don’t remember it like that... You think that your love was sweet and tender, with your hand gently caressing my body and making my skin tingle with want. You didn’t see the hair stand up on my arms... [Again, a comma would work better here. Maybe research how an ellipsis is used. They're most effective in dialogue so if you played with voice more, there would be some stronger opportunities.] or feel the acid curling in my stomach as I laid down for you time and time again.

[There's some more generic phrasing at the end there, 'time and time again'. It's not something that belongs in a dramatic piece. In novels you'd get away with it, but this is a much shorter mode of writing, it's more of a 'dramatic monologue' and with those you have to choose every word carefully. Here, you could have something along the lines of, '...laid down for you on every satin sheet you owned, on every household counter top. Like I was part of the furniture. Like I was part of the bedding, aired with the duvets and plumped with the pillows.' An extended example to show how you could keep the repetition, but use it more effectively.]

Narrative Voice

I think you've got the start of something here, there's a nice bitterness going on and you've got a good grip on how she feels about herself, how low he's brought her. However, you're not pushing it to the limits. Where's the occasional relapse that shows the reader she's weak, shows the reader she's bitter and she hates him but is on the cusp of going back. Even if it's just a line here and there where she backs down or remembers something nice he once did for her. We need those little positives to ballance the negatives and make them more realistic. If you just have the negatives alone, it's a very flat image and there's nothing to compare and contrast with.

Also, take another look at your sentence structures, they're very sloppy in places. You need to get more variation going on. Sometimes you have a whole paragraph of sentences which are almost all the same length so read through and make some longer, building up the tension and the images. Then cut in with a short one to pull the rug out from your reader's feet.

My last comment on voice is that you need to choose your words more carefully. We want to know who your narrator is and every time you choose a word, that's showing us another piece of her personality. There's a fun game that can help with this. Use your friends or a group of your characters and think of a question. It can be anything, such as: 'What's a sewer?' Then write your answer first. If someone asked you that, what would you say? The reason for this is that when we write, it's instinctive that we want to fill the gaps with our own answers and personalities, but those have to be moved aside for our characters.

If I was asked, 'What's a sewer?' I would say 'It's an underground tunnel thing where the waste goes. They're usually filled with yucky water and people are always walking around in them in TV shows like Angel or in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, when they lived in the sewer. That was a cool show, yeah?' Now, how would one of my characters respond?

I have Sebastian who's more intelligent than me and he would use the word 'conduit' instead of tunnel and he'd probably laugh at me or shake his head at my ignorance. He's like that.

Anyway! Off topic but hopefully that gives you an idea of how important every word is. Remember: you need to ask, 'what would my character say?'

Overall

I thought this was good. You have some well thought out descriptions in there and you build the situation up nicely, giving a clear idea of the past and the present, a few nice hints of the future. It's a well constructed story, really the only thing that's letting you down at the moment is your use of narrative voice. If that's an area you struggle with, don't worry about it, just take some time to practise.

I hope this helps and keep writing!

Heather xxx