Frail justice (Please tell me what you think!!)

"HOT DOG! GET YOUR FRESH HOT DOGS”... yelled the hot dog stand man.
The streets were buzzing with rhythm and life, foot steps symbolizing heart beats. Roasted hot dogs withered into the cold crisp air, hollowing beneath my nose. I licked my lips in agreement, digging into my pockets I find nothing, but my pockets hug, while my stomach growled for vengeance. I walked it off thinking "I needed to lose weight anyway ..." wondering how that hot dog would taste in my mouth. The sweet bitter taste of ketchup, oozing mustard on my cheek, how something I see everyday seemed so delicious right now. It was a cold fall day for the streets of Toronto. The piercing image of the streets painted in my mind. My gaze for some reason fell to my feet, watching them slowly progress from a walking pace to a jogging walk. I tilted my head thinking it might fit the queer situation, but then, I noticed, I wasn't controlling my feet. My heart knocked against my chest continually, questioning myself if this pain was even possible; yet still I kept on running. A sleek white noise brushed my ears, leaving a breath of silence, my eyes without even blinking still on my feet. A cold whisper danced down my spine, it felt as if a brick was placed upon my inner skull, violently accusing me not to lift my head. A pulsed scream crawled through my throat, exceeding my limit of euphoria. A sick amused smile playing on the crease of my mouth. My neck snapped a critical crunch turning, awakening a hidden pain while I searched unknowingly for no one. My enthusiastic legs, yet, were still running. An endless pain swelled through my body, a crowd surrounded me, unnoticing my actions. No one was chasing me. I stopped on my tracks smiling to myself wholeheartedly indulging in my pain. Sorrowfully closing my eyes, I awoke into my true adventure the hospital. Staring, pale as the white ceiling I turned to look at my exhausted mother who sat sleeping with bags under eyes, tear stains still left on her cheek. Breathing itself was journey at this point, fighting wasn’t even an option, yet I only knew this. I smiled at her one more time inhaling a grimaced slowed breath. As stale as the hospital food, as still like the curtains, I returned to my dream. Waiting to see who would notice me running from no one.


Hello Forum! i produced this short story, believe it or not less then 5 minutes. I won an award for it, weirdly enough. I typed this story not even knowing what it was about, i just let my fingers type, and produced this wonderful peice. I'm sixteen now, and wrote this peice in grade seven. Surfing through my documents i saw it and read it over and was overwhelmed in tears because i dedicated it to my teacher in grade seven who's daughter was battling cancer, and sadly didnt make it. So i want some opinions! please and thanks, just curious

Hi there. As promised, a review. I may come across as a bit harsh, but I really am trying to help. :D

First things first, I feel I have to point out the spacing. Right now, except for the first line of dialogue, this is one giant paragraph. This makes the story visually intimidating, and it also makes it difficult to read. First impressions are very important to readers, and right now, this story gives a very bad first impression. Breaking your story up into several paragraphs of around five lines each will make it easier to read.

Paragraphing is a bit of a tricky thing to get down, but the general rule of thumb is that every time you talk about or focus on a different subject, you start a new paragraph. When you switch perspectives (such as from a general description of the scene to the specific descriptions of a character, or when you switch between characters), start a new paragraph.

For example:

The streets were buzzing with rhythm and life, foot steps symbolizing heart beats. Roasted hot dogs withered into the cold crisp air, hollowing beneath my nose. I licked my lips in agreement, digging into my pockets I find nothing, but my pockets hug, while my stomach growled for vengeance. I walked it off thinking "I needed to lose weight anyway ..." wondering how that hot dog would taste in my mouth. The sweet bitter taste of ketchup, oozing mustard on my cheek, how something I see everyday seemed so delicious right now.

It was a cold fall day for the streets of Toronto.

The first paragraph revolves around the character thinking about hot dogs. The second would talk about the streets of Toronto. And so on.

Spacing aside, you had a number of grammar issues, especially with regards to misused words, run-on sentences, and sentence fragments.

As far as run-on and fragmented sentences, they can be used wonderfully in stories, but sparingly. Right now, you have too many run-ons and fragments, and so they look more like a case of bad grammar than anything else. Coupled with the misused words, this makes this story not fun to read at all.

Some examples of misused words are "symbolizing", "withered", and "hollowing", and these were just in the first two sentences. First impressions will determine if your readers will keep on reading, and misused words give off a bad impression. In the future, I suggest you check word meanings with a dictionary (there are a number of really good ones online) to check that you're using words properly, instead of just relying on a thesaurus.

You also had at least one misspelling: "stopped on my tracks" instead of "stopped in my tracks". Be more careful. It made that particular phrase very confusing.

As far as emotional impact goes, I didn't feel any. The formatting, grammar mistakes, and misused words made this difficult to take seriously. I kept getting jerked out of the story as I tried to figure out what you were trying to say, and that really took a lot away from the story.

Now, while I realize that you wrote this while you were much younger, it still doesn't excuse the poor formatting and grammar. Don't be afraid to go back and edit the things you wrote years to make them better. Now that you're older, people will be more critical of your work, and they will expect that your writing is grammatically correct and properly formatted, especially since you're of high school age. Take the time to proofread your work carefully, and your readers will be more likely to stick with you and read your story through.

You have a good base here, and an interesting take; I think, if you rewrote this and edited this, you could have a very moving and thought-provoking story.