Some Say The World Will End In Fire

Hi all! This is my entry for the 'On Fire' contest, and I could really use some help with it, feel free to be as harsh as you want please. I'm not sure if it makes much sense, it was sort of just a random outburst of frustration on my part. I'm also not sure about the format near the end. Anyway, critiques would be greatly appreciated!


And it was burning, smoldering, suffocating in the hands that engulfed it in their grasp of translucency, their grasp of ascendancy and vehemence. The hands that danced, mocking their victim’s astonishment at the strength in the actual fragility of their appearance. The hands that flickered mendaciously in delicate, smiling, half-shadows.

And it was dying. Crumbling from something beautiful into a pile of charred and broken bits of coal, where it would lie forever, until it finally disintegrated to fluttering little gray butterflies of Death, tiny particles of ashen paper. Fragments lost once more to the world from whence they came, from whence everything came for that matter.

It was a story. It was a world. Broken, like so many other things, by a force that came within its own self.

It began, of course, at the beginning. It was a story born of the impossible; the sound sadness makes when it slips suddenly away, like a veil falling to the ground, and the pure ecstasy radiating off of a star. And it grew, bit by bit, fragment of story by fragment of story, word by word, and page by page. It was a short story, considering that it did not know why it existed. That it did not know what, or how, or why it was written.

For some, the story was a thing to be hated, to look upon as something ugly to be despised, killed, and abandoned like the fairy-tale dragon lying injured in a field of blood red poppies. For some, it was something to feed upon, something to suck and drain all the juice out of until it was a mere shell, dried out and pale. But for others, it was a thing of beauty. Like the figure of the fairy-tale princess, flitting in and out between the trees, it was something they could not quite grasp, but only wonder at.

For the story, was a mystery. It was a romance. A comedy, a classic, a fantasy… a tragedy. It would disappear without a trace, lost to the land of ‘just a dream’. Poisoned by an apple that had sprung from a seed within the very core, the very cardboard and glue binding that held it together. And the apple had been red as blood. Or as a flame, a flame that swelled and thrived on words. A flame growing higher…

And it was burning, smoldering, suffocating…

And it was falling, crumbling, dying…

And it was lilting, flitting, flying…

And then,

Quite simply,

It was dead.

Strangled by cruel and hungry hands. A fire. The book lay, a mere pile of inky, melancholy soot. A few trembling slivers of ash drifted sullen and defeated to the ground. A last glowing cinder brightened feebly for an instant before diminishing. The crackling of sly, red hot battle-arms had grown silent. And still.

Ashes to ashes, and dust to dust.

Wow, well done. I really liked this and can't give much advise at all. It flows well and doesn't have any grammatical mistakes. Overall, I liked it (especially the ending with dust to dust and what naught). Good job.

feel free to be as harsh as you want please.

Ah HA, the Piranha's favorite bait!

I kid. ;) I never try to be deliberately offensive. On to the critique!

And it was burning, smoldering, suffocating in the hands that engulfed it in their grasp of translucency, their grasp of ascendancy and vehemence. The hands that danced, mocking their victim’s astonishment at the strength in the actual fragility of their appearance. The hands that flickered mendaciously in delicate, smiling, half-shadows.

Not just any hands, but THE hands! In all seriousness, why are these hands so special that they need to be preceded by 'the'? Unless they belong to someone omnipotently important (and later revealed at some point) there is no need for such special designation. Try

And it was burning, smoldering, suffocating in hands that engulfed it in their grasp of translucency, their grasp of ascendancy and vehemence. Hands that danced, mocking their victim’s astonishment at the strength in the actual fragility of their appearance. Hands that flickered mendaciously in delicate, smiling, half-shadows.

You could even get away with substituting all the periods with semi-colons and making this a (very) compound sentence.

hands that flickered mendaciously

Def of mendaciously; untruthful, false. Based on your sentence structure, you're saying that the hands are flickering falsely, i.e. they're not flickering at all. I doubt that's what you mean to say. Perhaps you should word-substitute with maliciously, which means cruel(ly) and evil(ly).

Hands that flickered mendaciously in delicate, smiling, half-shadows.

There should be no comma after smiling, and here's why; when you're making a list, if all the objects are of the same classification, each should be separated by a comma for as long as the list goes on. What I mean is, lists can look like

noun, noun, noun

adjective, adjective, adjective

adverb, adverb, adverb

but the moment you change from one to the other, they're going to modify a different part of the sentence structure, and the comma rule is going to change. So in your sentence 'delicate, smiling, half-shadows' you have adj, adj, noun. The preceding adjectives are modifying that noun, so the comma after 'smiling' is dropped.

hands that engulfed it in their grasp of translucency, their grasp of ascendancy and vehemence.

An ascendant grasp? Good. A vehement grasp? Nice. A translucent grasp-- wait, what? A grasp that is clear, see-through, and/or easily understood? This is doesn't work.

from whence everything came for that matter.

Is there a reason why you bother mentioning this? Is it going to come in to play later? Is it important for the reader to know that everything comes from the same place? If not, this is superfluous; drop it.

It was a story. It was a world. Broken, like so many other things, by a force that came within its own self.

Within its own self? Were the hands that you were speaking of earlier its own hands (the story)? This is where I start to get a bit confused.

It was a story born of the impossible; the sound sadness makes when it slips suddenly away, like a veil falling to the ground, and the pure ecstasy radiating off of a star.

When sadness suddenly slips away from what? When does sadness make this sound, exactly? Sadness doesn't make a particular, recognizable sound. Stars don't radiate pure ecstasy, either. I understand you're not trying to be literal, and that this is meant to be a metaphor, but it doesn't relate to anything, and isn't based on characteristics found in reality (as metaphors, despite being abstract in nature, often have roots that can be traced back to observable characteristics found in everyday life). I like the imagery (a falling veil, and the astral, otherworldly quality of stars that you try to draw upon) but this doesn't quite work as it stands. I understand what you're trying to do though, and I see the raw potential, so I encourage you to try to re-work this section.

That it did not know what, how, or why it was written.

It's generally never a good idea to start a sentence with 'That.' Scrap it and start with 'It,' or something like

'Neither did it know what, or how, or why it was written'

or blend it with the preceding sentence, like so;

It was a short story, considering that it did not know why it existed, or what, or how, or why it was written.

For some, the story was a thing to be hated, to look

Semi-colon instead of comma between 'hated' and 'to look.'

For the story, was a mystery. It was a romance. A comedy, a classic, a fantasy… a tragedy.

Speaking of lists, you could classically list this, i.e. change it to For the story was a mystery, a romance, a comedy... etc. If that doesn't suit you, as least omit the comma between story and mystery, and the 'It was' before a romance.

For the story was a mystery. A romance. A comedy, a classic...

It would disappear without a trace, lost to the land of ‘just a dream’.

I love this line! I would italicize 'just a dream' instead of quoting it, though. Again though, I have to say I really like the idea behind and the mood of this line. I think it's my favorite line of the whole story!

Poisoned by an apple that had sprung from a seed within the very core, the very cardboard and glue binding that held it together.

I think you mean 'its' very core, referring back to the story, and thus indicating that the apple came from the story's core, and not THE core of legend!

And it was burning, smoldering, suffocating…

And it was falling, crumbling, dying…

And it was lilting, flitting, flying…

I would scrap the And it was from the last two lines. You're listing again here, and I wouldn't weaken your list with unnecessary wordage.

I love your ideas and I like the idea behind this story. I especially love the way you describe the death, and the metaphors (the apple, the flames) that you used to do so. They're so visually powerful! I love the ending line, too! Nice twist on a well-known adage. There's a lot in this piece that I love, despite all the crit. I critique because I care. ;P

I hope this helps you as much as I enjoyed the read!

mikedb1492: Thanks so much, I'm glad you liked it.


Piranha: Wow, thanks this really helps! I can understand the places where you got confused, sometimes I have trouble with writing confusing pieces because I forget that just because I know the story, the reader obviously, does not yet.

Not just any hands, but THE hands! In all seriousness, why are these hands so special that they need to be preceded by 'the'? Unless they belong to someone omnipotently important (and later revealed at some point) there is no need for such special designation. Try

And it was burning, smoldering, suffocating in hands that engulfed it in their grasp of translucency, their grasp of ascendancy and vehemence. Hands that danced, mocking their victim’s astonishment at the strength in the actual fragility of their appearance. Hands that flickered mendaciously in delicate, smiling, half-shadows.

I think you have a good point here, but actually, they are special and belong to someone important who is revealed later... as I did not yet mention that it was really the fire. But still, I think I like it better your way. Thanks for the suggestion.

hands that flickered mendaciously


Def of mendaciously; untruthful, false. Based on your sentence structure, you're saying that the hands are flickering falsely, i.e. they're not flickering at all. I doubt that's what you mean to say. Perhaps you should word-substitute with maliciously, which means cruel(ly) and evil(ly).

I was aware of the definition , and used it because of this: when you look at fire, it seems so fragile and delicate, yet really, it has the power to destroy so many things seemingly stronger than itself. So by , 'hands that flickered mendaciously' this was what I was referring to .

hands that engulfed it in their grasp of translucency, their grasp of ascendancy and vehemence.


An ascendant grasp? Good. A vehement grasp? Nice. A translucent grasp-- wait, what? A grasp that is clear, see-through, and/or easily understood? This is doesn't work.

I used translucent to hint at what the hands actually were. And also as a sort of irony, because yes, fire is see-through, but it is also 'mendacious' and the two are contradictory.

from whence everything came for that matter.


Is there a reason why you bother mentioning this? Is it going to come in to play later? Is it important for the reader to know that everything comes from the same place? If not, this is superfluous; drop it.

Yes. The story, as I hoped would be understood by the end (although I can certainly understand why it wasn't... I have quite a few things to work on ) is not just any story. It is our story, everyone's story, it is life itself. Which is what, of course, everything in the world comes from: life.

It was a story. It was a world. Broken, like so many other things, by a force that came within its own self.


Within its own self? Were the hands that you were speaking of earlier its own hands (the story)? This is where I start to get a bit confused.

No, the hands are the fire. By 'the force that came from within its own self' I mean that it brought about its own destruction. This was sort of a metaphor for how we ( the people of the world) actually cause most of the problems in it.

it was a story born of the impossible; the sound sadness makes when it slips suddenly away, like a veil falling to the ground, and the pure ecstasy radiating off of a star.


When sadness suddenly slips away from what? When does sadness make this sound, exactly? Sadness doesn't make a particular, recognizable sound. Stars don't radiate pure ecstasy, either. I understand you're not trying to be literal, and that this is meant to be a metaphor, but it doesn't relate to anything, and isn't based on characteristics found in reality (as metaphors, despite being abstract in nature, often have roots that can be traced back to observable characteristics found in everyday life). I like the imagery (a falling veil, and the astral, otherworldly quality of stars that you try to draw upon) but this doesn't quite work as it stands. I understand what you're trying to do though, and I see the raw potential, so I encourage you to try to re-work this section.

I know sadness doesn't really make a sound, but as I said, 'it was a story born of the impossible.'
When sadness slips away from what? Simply from whatever carried it before. And again, I do know that stars don't literally radiate pure ecstasy (although for some they may seem to) and it wasn't meant as a metaphor, it was 'the impossible'.

I absolutely agree with you on everything else. And your probably right about most of what I re-commented on above, I do know that because the piece it for the reader, it has to be seen form their point of view. Well, I'm off to do some corrections! Thanks so much!

At this point, I'm really really really hoping that you have a broadband connection. Why? Because I have a present for you. :3

Despite my modish appearance, I am actually an instructor as well, and I was honored to have your story chosen as the one I would critique for the "On Fire" contest. Because of this awful weight, I decided to give you a slightly in depth critique, just to make us Instructors look good. But! I have absolutely no time to write such an in depth critique. So... I recorded myself critiquing your story!

The recording is slightly long. Like... as in 25 minutes long. And it's slightly big as well. As in, 14.6 MB. So it's monstrous. HOWEVER! It is very in depth.

Download it at:

http://www.snoink.com/me/voice/writing/onfire.mp3

~14.6 MB
.mp3 file
~25 mintutes

I hope this isn't too inconvenient. ^^ Tell me if you have any problems downloading. And good luck with the contest!

Um.... When I click on the site it says your pig ate it!

Goodness gracious! This will not do.

Try it now. I apparently spazzed out and put it in the wrong directory. xD Sorry!

This had a nice flow--it was excellent. I just have a couple of nitpicks...

Don't Repeat Yourself! You use the phrase "red as blood" twice. Try changing it the second time or not using it at all--writing is much better when you don't repeat yourself like you have a limited vocabulary. Which isn't what you did, of course. Just a little nitpick of mine.

Vocabulary! A friend told me this: "Don't put so many big words in your writing. It confuses your writers. Explain things simply and add big words just for effect. It makes your writing really pop. Otherwise, it's like some professor wrote it in Latin!" And I hated her for her at first, but it was the truth. You used big word after big word in the beginning, which messed with the flow of words. I knew what they mean, but that doesn't mean everyone else does. Towards the middle and end of your writing, however, the amount of big words diminishes and your writing really pops and really flows.