Office Beauty (150 words)

Susan stared into the mirror. Wearing just her underwear, her body was goose bumped in the morning air.
She’d work and they’d leer; “You’re beautiful, stay that way”, trapping her as a glittering bird to decorate their office. Each day she took care to paint her lips the colour of fire hydrants, her skin coloured to milk. She’d learned a smile that hid the frustration so the make-up wouldn’t crack; no-one was interested in what lay underneath. Short tight skirts drew attention, even if her work went unnoticed her legs would not.
Susan of thought the day ahead and grimaced. Her hand swept over the table, painting the floor the colours of her face. She nodded once, stepping over the mess to her husband’s dresser.
Today Susan would wear pants; loose, unflattering pants. She wouldn’t wear makeup, or be decorative, she'd work.

I’ll be me. They’ll notice me.

Spoiler

Hey guys! This is a piece I wrote for the 150 words contest, and any critiques are welcome! My topic was "challenging gender roles", and I've been watching far too much Mad Men, so... here we are! Rip it to bits.

This was well written and amusing- very enjoyable!
It's amazing how much you told us about this certain character in so little words- nice job!

Hello, I'm going to be reviewing you post now

This is very short and I'm a bit confused as to where you're going with it and what its purpose is.

Susan stood in the mirror and stared back at the woman across from her.

I know it's easy when using reflections to descrive the reflection as a different person but it can be very cliche depending on how you put it.

Her body was prickled and goose bumped in the morning air.

Isn't "prickled" and "goose bumped" basically the same thing? I may be wrong but if I'm right you basically just repeated yourself in the same sentence.

When she had started work

Where does she work? I'm guessing in an office but what kind of office?

Her work went unnoticed, but her legs did not.

I like this sentence; it gives a very strong image of what kind of person she is.

Today Susan would wear pants. Loose, unflattering pants.

Why? I can think of some connotations but it would help alot if you were more speciafic here.

This is really good and I'm definatly intrigued. Please continue the idea you've got here becasue I really want to know what's going on. PM me or post something on my wall if you have any queries, Midnight x

Hiiii Julien. 8] I'll get to this straight away, and I won't bother with a line by line crit because this is incredibly short.

I noticed a few things about this you could stand to edit. For example, you need to cut down on the be verbs, and to cram in more information in less. "Was" is one word you can't afford in flash fiction, given just how restrictive its word count is.

I'll use the first paragraph as an example.

Susan stood in the mirror and stared back at the woman across from her. Her body was goose bumped in the morning air. She was standing in her underwear; she wouldn't want to get foundation or blush on the front of her tight dress.

You could stand to combine the first two sentences, and the bit about her underwear. Plus, you could cut out the part about staring at the woman in the mirror, because it's generally understood that if you're standing in front of the mirror you're staring at yourself unless stated otherwise.

On another note, you hardly ever use biased words that are loaded with connotations. These are good for the purposes of flash fiction. You'll want to use fled instead of ran, collapsed instead of lay, trudged instead of walked, and the like. Each of the first words contain much more information than the second word they replace, and so you gain the advantage of having released more information in less words, which in turn leaves you with more words for more important things like conflict and such. (Plus, it makes the prose tighter. Everyone wins~) 8]

In the next two paragraphs, you spend some time talking about her, how she gets noticed, and etcetera. What you didn't say was how she arrived at the decision to wear pants, not the tight dress I assume she was going to wear. The second paragraph? It's all backstory, and you can allow the audience to assume it by themselves as opposed to telling it to them. Flash fiction requires thinking on the part of the audience. Let them make more connections by themselves. They'll survive.

As for how well you hit the gender roles thing, I'm on the fence. It's there, but it's not at the same time. I would hardly call wearing pants challenging gender roles, because it's not really so much challenging now as it was years ago. Perhaps if you cleared up the setting, this would make much more sense and make a stronger impact. Right now, it's a little weak on that part.

Sooo that's all I have right now. 8] Just remember: more information, less words. Every word must teach the reader something new. Use connotations to your advantage. Focus on more thoughts, because that's where the conflict is. I hope you'll find this useful, Julien! You know where to find me if this review made no sense. ^^"

Sincerely,

Jae

Hi, I've entered the same contest, different theme. So I know, 150 words... It ain't easy

What I like to do is make sure I have much more "powerful" words than filling words like "as, in, the, of, and, etc..." Use semi-colons and be creative with sentence structure while still keeping it readable and understandable. Also, as much as you can don't waste words. Sounds obvious right? But it's hard to catch when we're not used to it.

Susan stood in the mirror and stared

For example. You can save two words here by saying: Susan stared into the mirror. It's pretty clear what she's doing just from that. "Action-y" words are also much more desirable than passive, bland ones. Substituting "In just her underwear" with "wearing only underwear" serves the double-function of providing an action and saving one word in the process.

Each day she took care to paint her lips the colour of fire hydrants, her skin coloured to milk

Try this sentence without the qualifier "each day," and see if it sounds as natural to you. It's an author's preference I think. Also, I'd like to see a bright red color that is "sexier" than fire hydrants. Lips as red as a fire-hydrant may be attractive, yes, but in flash-fiction each available word should contribute to the theme if possible. Her skin the color of milk, represents some desirable quality of women's skin, but milk is also food. Describing her lips the color of some deep red, delicious food would also say something about how the men in her office see women in general. These kinds of double meanings and connections will take your flash-fiction from good to great.

Her hand swept over the table, painting the floor the colours of her face.

This is the kind of sentence I really enjoy reading. The reader has to do a bit of thinking to realize that the colors of her face are her make-up. These types of suggestive sentences are great in flash-fiction.

She nodded and turned to start rummaging through her husband’s dresser.

Here, you can leave things up to the reader. When she decides to wear pants, the reader can infer that she rummages through her husband's dresser. It's almost unnecessary and it would save three words to just say: She nodded and turned towards her husband's dresser.

All in all, I can see where you're going and I think you're getting there. A little more condensation and strengthening of the message at the end will do wonders. Hope I could help

Woah! Stupidly, when I read the title I hadn't actually stopped to consider how long one hundred and fifty words actually
was.

I've only found one nitpick that nobody else has pointed out (at least I hope they haven't; I didn't look too carefully).

Nutty wrote:Susan thought the day ahead and grimaced.

Even though this might mess up your hundred and fifty words limit, I think you missed out a word between 'thought' and 'the'. Shouldn't it say 'Susan thought about the day ahead and grimaced.' ?

Other than that, this was nicely done and enjoyable to read. Keep writing!

Other than slight grammatical errors, this is great. It preaches feminism in the workplace, instead of the ordinary objectification of women. I love it.

Great work Nutty.

P.S - Go the All Blacks!

Hi!

I really liked this piece. It was short, simple, and had a great message. I only spotted one error:

Susan of thought the day ahead and grimaced.

I think you meant to say something like "Susan thought of the day ahead and grimaced."

Overall, I really liked it! Keep up the great work!

It's not the most original of tales, I feel like I've heard this idea a few times before. I don't really consider the idea that women dressing down in order to placate men as as a victory for feminism, she should get herself over to HR, lodge a complaint and continue to look stunning. Maybe reach for something a little more marginal next time to demand the judges attention.

In terms of the style, it's well put together, as some people have indicated there are a few editable bits but I not have many suggestions for improvements.

Good luck with the contest!

I would cut off the last two sentences. The rest of the story kind of implies them.

Nutty, your story is really fascinating! Personally, I love that type of short-stories (150 words), they are short, simple yet very meaningful, and your story covers all those.
I had some comments on the punctuation and grammar error written in blue.

Susan stared into the mirror; wearing just her underwear. Her body was goose bumped in the morning air.

She’d work and they’d leer; “You’re beautiful, stay that way”, trapping her as a glittering bird to decorate their office. Each day she took care to paint her lips the colour of fire hydrants, her skin coloured to milk. She’d learned to smile carefully so it wouldn’t crack, [b]while[/b] no-one was interested in what lay underneath. Short tight skirts worked too, even if her work went unnoticed, her legs would not.

Susan [b]thought of[/b] the day ahead and grimaced. Her hand swept over the table, painting the floor the colours of her face. She nodded once, stepping over the mess to her husband’s dresser.

Today Susan would wear pants; loose, unflattering pants. She wouldn’t wear makeup, or be decorative, she would work.

I’ll be me. They’ll notice me.


The ending sounds too mysterious, like I wished to know why she had changed, when ( instead of just saying today,...). Other than that, it is simply great! Good luck with the contest.

This was extremely beautifully written! I enjoyed reading every last bit of it and I'm going to enjoy reading every last bit of it again... and again! The way you used sweet, simple, and to the point sentences really brought out the emotion. I really enjoy your style of writing! It's very interesting! Also I really liked how you didn't use the standard first person, but you used third person. It made it even more intense Lastly I really liked your last line:

Nutty wrote:I’ll be me. They’ll notice me.

It was beautiful and wrapped the whole story up perfectly! It gave me goosebumps as well Once again, I really enjoyed this piece! I hope to see more of your work on the featured page! Keep writing! BRAVO

Hi there! So, I love the premise of this and the writing style, but felt like a couple of things were missing. Where is the build up emotionally to this? What caused this sudden change? You spend the majority of the time describing how she usually is visually, without going much into HER. Yes, we get that she's used looks to achieve professional status, but where has the crack begun that will eventually lead to her changing how she works and looks and acts. It seems too out of character if she's been doing it a long time, especially if she's been doing it intentionally, which is how it seems.

On the upside-- you've definitely managed to capture a story in these few, limited words. Nice diction, nice voice, nice piece. :3

Let me know if you have any questions.

Hey there! I really liked the writing style of this short fiction. The way you build up a character, her behavior and the struggle of the story in these limited words really is very strong point about it. It has got nice flow, nice voice and a nice thesis of the fiction. However, I think there are some cons too. In the fiction, it seems that the urge of being original and leaving her previous chores seems to spring out of nowhere. There is no exact trigger of Susan taking this action. If there was a short description about what brought her the change, it could've been more interesting.

But overall, nice work Keep it up!