Young Writers Society

Co-written with the fabulous ToritheMonster, check her out guys.



Reviews and likes are greatly appreciated.

Rated for strong topics.



She was thin and delicate, like any butterfly should be.

When she opened her wings, they were eager to rip them off, to pin her down with their corkboard glares, robbing her of the right to fly. They found fault in everything, pounds of imperfection; they picked her clean until she was a skeleton, vultures stealing cartilage and marrow with just stares. And slowly, the idea of flesh began to scare her.

After that, it was easier to put on a Chesire Cat smile with tiny porcelain teeth and politely accept the nectar, to allow it to disgustingly churn down her throat and bubble up under her skin. Later, once the vultures with hungry eyes were gone, she would empty it from her body, expelling ugliness with a scarred finger and a single heave. It was easier to pretend the sour acid that shot up her throat didn't exist, even though it burned the soft tissue of her mouth and rot her teeth from the inside out. Her attention was sharper with pain and soon, she stopped getting headaches at 10am, 2pm and 7pm respectively.

It came to be that it didn't matter. She was pinned, dead to the world. Mold grew on her bones but onstage- in the light- she looked like she was still flying. She would wear a mannequin smile, with dainty, jutting hips and a sharp collarbone, skin stretched taut over wooden bones. Lies were told, yes, i've had lunch. no i would not like a piece of cake thank you excuse me i need to use the bathroom but for some reason, Pinocchio's nose never grew. It's said that puppets have no mind of their own, but she was learning to see through her strings.


The mirrors were critics, too. Her eyes were once blue, flecked with stardust, but now they seemed empty: they longed for more than the universe could ever give them. As she stared, her reflection became something new. What once had wings was skin and bones; what once danced on the verge of perfection was finite. What was left was no longer beautiful. She was determined though, and reflections were nothing more than shining glass.


sometimes though, she would get so god damn hungry and she would cry because she couldn't eat she just couldn't if he was ever going to love her because she'd get fat and he would say with broken glass eyes : i don't love you the way you want me to and she, a fragile wingless butterfly, would die all over again and she'd ache to be prettythinstrong;

She was beyond living, beyond striving for anything but perfection.



Next chapter!

Hello Jas (and Tori!) -- I got your PM!

As this is so short I think I'll just write what I feel about it rather than try and divide up my points. Hopefully this will make sense to you.

My first impression was that this was rather confusing -- the butterfly metaphor wasn't as clear as the images you've used in "2.5", and so I felt myself glossing over it because it didn't make much sense to me the first time I read it. On the second read-through I figured out that the butterfly (beautiful yet fragile) being pinned down (trapped and helpless) is a great idea, but I don't think it worked in this draft.

I think the main reason, for me, is that it is so far divorced from the real story you're telling. The butterfly is a girl (probably anorexic/bulimic by the end of the "strikeout" paragraph) but it seems that the narrative is so caught up in the wonderful image that it forgets to make that link distinct.

Secondly there are no names used. This isn't a big problem, really, and I'm sure that if you want these "interludes" to be general nameless snapshots then that could work. But I think the expense is that you sacrifice the emotional link between the reader and the character. It's impossible to connect with the Butterfly Girl because she isn't really a character yet -- she's just an image or a metaphor. That's another reason I didn't enjoy this as much as "2.5".

As usual your ability to string words together is excellent. Your writing is fresh and engaging, and I particularly like the part about "puppets". It's really not worth me commenting on this -- you've got a flair for writing and there certainly isn't anything I can teach you.

I'm not entirely sure about the "strikeout" paragraph. I'd understand if this was written as a diary entry and the character wanted to scrub out a section, but here it just seems a bit pretentious if I'm honest. It's kind of like it's trying too hard to be "poetic". And, funnily enough, I actually thought that section was the most interesting because it has character interaction in it! So why the "strikeout"?

Ok, I'm running out of things to say now, so I'll pull this to a close. Main points: I didn't really connect with the Butterfly Girl; and I worry that the extended metaphor detracts too much from the person that the reader is looking to engage with. And, because I just noticed, I saw a "onetwothree" word near the end. I think my point in "2.5" applies -- if you're going to use them then please make them a little bit more common so the reader isn't too surprised by them.

Goodness me. Hopefully that ramble helped -- if not then you know where to find me!


Charlie

Hey Jas and Tori, Stella here! First of all, I love that cover and it's inspired an anecdote before we start the review. Basically in maths class about a year or a year and a half ago, our maths teacher started talking about "infinity squared" (I can't do symbols on a keyboard because I'm stupid like that). My friend and I asked, "Can you have infinity squared?" A couple of minutes later, the incredibly good looking German boy whom we admired from afar tapped me on the shoulder and said, "Here, have this." It was a piece of foolscap paper with the symbols for "infinity squared" written on it and even though now I shudder at the mention of him, I still have the paper. SO. A fun little story before we get down to the nitty gritty actual story!

I. NITPICKS

When she opened her wings though, they were eager to rip them off; to pin her down with their corkboard glares, robbing her of the right to fly.

Also of the right to live. Why is the "though" here, you're not contradicting anything?

pounds of imperfection,

this took me several read-overs to understand.

It was easier after that, to put on a Chesire cat smile and pretend the sour acid that shot up her throat, burning the soft tissue of her mouth and rotting her teeth didn't exist.

The punctuation here seems off but I'm not sure how to fix it xD

to allow it to disgustingly churn down her throat and bubble up under her skin,

disgustingly is a little weird just here.

Her eyes were once blue, flecked with stardust, but now they seemed empty-

Firstly this is a totally gorgeous image, secondly, I think it could be framed just a little bit better.

But she was resiliant,

resilient.

and he, with broken glass eyes would say: i don't love you the way you want me too

Last too should be "to." Also, again, that comma looks out of place or lonely or something.

II. IMAGERY

Don't get me wrong guys, you have some absolutely beautiful images in here and yet you don't overload us. So good job on that. My only concern is the way in which they're presented. They're bleeding into each other and while it's seamless and I'm impressed that for a cowritten piece it's impossible to tell who wrote what, the metaphors are mixing in a way that's not entirely good. I'm assuming it's about Nina, right? If you're going to compare her to a butterfly then I think try and stick to the butterfly images. You mix those with skeleton ones and it just doesn't quite fit together. For describing the bulimia in itself, well, that's a separate thing. But I'm mostly concerned that we have these two different images of her and I don't know which one we're supposed to believe- that she's a butterfly or that she's nothing but a bag of bones.

III. OVERALL

Very lovely writing. I'm a little concerned about how it fits in with the rest right at this moment in the story because I'd like to see some plot in the real frame! But overall, nicely done

Hope I helped, drop me a note if you need anything!

-Stella x

Jas and Tori,

Charlie said it all and expressed it better than I could.

I was confused about this interlude. It could've been its own separate piece, because I don't see how it connects to your story at all (which is the point of an interlude). It did read like a bunch of metaphors or a quick character sketch - and I wasn't sure if this was Chloe? Is this her thoughts, her perspective? Is it some omniscient narrator who crosses out Chloe's thoughts? I'm not sure.

The writing was beautiful. Very poetic, very prosy, well written, images in the right place.

But WHY is the most important part, the more interesting part of this entire piece crossed out? This bothered me!

Sometimes though, she would get so god damn hungry and she would cry because she couldn't eat she just couldn't if he was ever going to love her because she'd get fat and he, with broken glass eyes would say: i don't love you the way you want me too and she, a fragile wingless butterfly, would die all over again and she'd ache to be prettythinstrong;

Seriously, the best part out of this whole thing. Throughout, I was wondering, where's the conflict, where's the characters, the story? Where did all of that go? You talk of a bulimic girl, her bulimia, the cause of it. So what? Why should we care?

Then we get to this part. Ah. She's afraid of rejection. Afraid of rejection from her love. For him she wants to be nothing short of perfection, and I think that little part right there is what makes her interesting. I think I'm starting to care very much. Now, you just have to go deeper. Why does she think this way? Why is she afraid?

Though, let it be known, if this was Chloe - these thoughts could have been hinted before in the previous chapters, little by little instead of interluded chunks, but that's just my opinion. EDIT - maybe cause it's not Chloe...? Ahh, please add a name to this! xD

Well good luck, happy writings.

~ As always Audy

I haven't read the reviewers before me and accept the risk of reiterating what they've said, and I suppose - since this is my first time reviewing something other than poetry, which can go line-by-line - I'll start off in paragraphs and "chunks".

The first chunk - I don't think this deserves such a clunky term as that. The first sentence gives an idea of slimness and prettiness. The syntax is a bit fragile, like it'll fall apart if I poke at it, but poke at it I will. The first sentence alone is powerful - coupled with the second, it creates... something. The second sentence feels off for some reason. Maybe it's the semicolon. If you replaced the semicolon with a comma and created not a stilling pause but a slight uplift to the way the sentence would be read and the intonation, it would carry better. As it is, it creates an uncomfortable pause between the butterfly metaphor and the people trying to rip her wings off and pin her down. If you created a calmer and more "loving" style with that comma, it would create more of a relationship between them, and "they" would sound more like the madmen they come off to be from this beginning perspective.

"Corkboard glares" seems a bit of a silly phrase. Perhaps "pin her down to corkboard with their glares" would be more accurate. Moving on, though, to "They found fault in everything". This sentence feels a bit stilted compared to the first couple - soften the syntax, treat it like a baby, and eliminate the semicolon. "They found fault in everything, pounds of imperfection: They were vultures who picked her clean, stealing cartilage and marrow with just stares" would, perhaps, create a sharper image of the vultures in mind. Also, "just" sounds like an odd word to use to signify the singularity of the stares, making them sound like "lawful stares" instead of simple or "only stares". Even the word "stares" alone would work better than adding "just" in front of it.

The last sentence of the second paragraph - "And slowly" - seems very heavy. Not a bad heavy, but a good heavy. It signifies character, plucks a feeling out of a crowd and shows you, this is what we need to say, this is what we need to know. The little I would say is add a comma after "And", to slow the sentence down and make it seem like it was a slow realisation and onset, not a quick lightning-dash of words.

Third paragraph. "It was easier after that" should be modified with "After that" in front of the independent clause. Starting the paragraph with "it was easier" strands the reader, making them ask "why was it easier? When was it easier?" If you wait to start your independent clause, you can abandon the awkward-looking syntax as well, and come out to say "After that, it was easier to put on a Cheshire Cat smile..." instead of wondering about where to put the comma (after "that"? after "easier"? both? where?) Also, "cat" in Cheshire Cat ought to be capitalised, since it's the full name and title of a well-known fictional character, and it's referred to as such in the original work.

"[A]nd pretend the sour acid..." This part of the sentence seems a little strained, not to mention incomplete-complete parenthetical phrases and a bit of a mixed message. A suggestion for editing, though my say is definitely not the know-all-end-all of poetic thought:

After that, it was easier to put on a Cheshire Cat smile and pretend the sour acid that shot up her throat didn't exist, even though it burned the soft tissue of her mouth and rotted her teeth.

The next sentence, "It was easier to politely accept the nectar" - I like this. I like most of this sentence, which brings up a distinctly separated and isolated feeling and evokes emotion. Not that the parts before it didn't; this was just a strengthening and a realisation for the reader that the subject doesn't publicly want out of this predicament: She doesn't show the sorrowful face. What I don't like is the part of the sentence that begins with "then later". This feels like it should be a little separate - perhaps "...bubble up under her skin. Then, later, she would empty it from her body." The edit I've suggested feels a little awkward, but I'm trying to keep your phrasing and the spirit of the piece there.

"Her attention was sharper..." Okay, I'm not sure why, but I don't really like this sentence as much as I liked the previous one. It's too quantitative, too objective for me to incorporate it into the rest of the piece that's so subjective and feeling and emotions and then - boom. Times. Realism. This happens during the day. Yes, it is a bit of a reality check, informing the reader that "this happens in the real world", but it doesn't feel right for the piece. Perhaps change it a bit to something like:

Her attention was sharper with pain, and soon she stopped getting headaches after mealtimes.

It's not too hard for the reader to jump from the mentioned times to "after mealtimes", but the times themselves jolt the reader out of the little world they've been allowed to stay in before that. "The time is out of joint," Hamlet said, and I'll twist that quote for my own usage - the time is out of place, it doesn't fit in as well as it might in a different piece.

The fourth paragraph doesn't start off on a good note. Paragraphs generally don't when they start with conjunctions - get rid of that "and", and fast! "It came to be that it didn't matter" stands sturdy enough on its own, no need for wishy-washy things like beginning conjunctions. I allowed that for "And, slowly," but I won't allow it for this. The second sentence hammers in the syntax errors: That comma ought to be a semicolon or a colon. "She was pinned; she was dead to the world" or "She was pinned: dead to the world" come off much neater and nicer than the sentence that's there now. Even taking the colon example I gave you and saying "She was pinned, dead to the world" might come off more eloquently.

In the third sentence of the fourth paragraph: I like the idea. I don't like the way you went about stating it, to be frank. "Mold grew on her bones, but onstage - in the light - she looked like she was still flying." I'd like to borrow a phrase from one of my favourite people on tumblr ever (Reasoning with Vampires) and say that "starting sentences with 'but' makes you look [silly]". Phrase edited slightly for language, as there are people who would stumble across it. Conjunctions aren't the important thing, dear, they aren't the main idea or the subject or the verb or the predicate or the reason you're writing the sentence. Don't emphasize them, for your own sake. You can feel free to use that parenthetical in any way you like, by the way - "in the light", that is, which you originally separated from the main sentence using commas. (Parentheticals aren't the main sentence; neither are conjunctions. Don't give them all the praise when the other bits of syntax are doing all the hard work.)

I like the last sentence of the fourth paragraph, but I think it could use a bit of work distinction wise. Perhaps a different phrasing or punctuation to show that she really was learning, and it's not just a bit of a sentence thrown in there with other bits of sentences to make a kind-of-sort-of wonderful poetic idea.

Fifth paragraph. I like the opening, but there needs to be a comma after "critics". Absolutely needs to be; it's not a piffling personal trifle. Other than that, it's perfect. The second sentence needs a bit more work - perhaps separate the two clauses with something more permanent than a dash. A colon or a full stop would do nicely here. "[N]ow they seemed empty: They longed for more..." would be a nice descriptive touch, instead of the in-place-of-a-colon dash which one might get away with in poetry but not in prose. The third sentence is absolutely lovely.

The fourth sentence I have few problems with. It's beautiful - it's got ideas, and it knows how to express them. What I might say is that it ought to be "once", not "one" in the independent clause after the semicolon: a simple typo. "Finite" doesn't seem like the right word, either, but it's not one I like to get acquainted with at all. I don't like boundaries, you see, and that's what the word is all about. Perhaps a different descriptor for the once-perfect being - I can't think of one myself, at the moment, but I'm sure you could come up with something a million times better than "broken", "ugly", or - or "finite".

The fifth sentence I have a bit of an issue left. It kind of ties into the fourth sentence, especially the latter clause, but it doesn't have an unerring tie to it. It's a floaty sentence. Cut out "something" - "What was left was no longer beautiful" - or say something along the lines of "That which was left was [something?] no longer beautiful." Sixth sentence, eliminate the beginning "but". "She was resilient" emphasizes her strength, not the prominence of the conjunction. Also, it is resilient with an E and not an A. (If it helps, the adjectives are -ENT most of the time and the nouns mostly -ANT - think "independent" versus "contestant" if you must; that's how I got through middle school spelling things correctly, though there are exceptions.) I especially like "reflections were nothing more than shining glass", not only as an idea, but as a phrase. It is completely tied up within itself, it loves itself, and it loves the rest of the work, as well. It fits.

To the crossed-out section. I do like that you cut down on the punctuation and the grammatical bits, and I love that it's struck out, showing how those thoughts are thought in relation to the subject, and how she feels about them. It's that "I have to hide it" feeling, isn't it, the one where you know you've done or thought something wrong and everyone knows about it? I have a few little problems - like "he, with broken glass eyes would say". Perhaps "he would say with broken glass eyes" or "with broken glass eyes he would say", eliminating the need for that comma (and the missing comma that ought to have closed off the "broken glass eyes" parenthetical). "i don't love you the way you want me too" - that needs to be "to". They are homophones, but it looks better to have the second on the page under the struck-out look, quite simply, not to mention that it's purely grammatical.

"and she, a fragile wingless butterfly, would die all over again and she'd ache" - could that be "and she would die all over again as [or like] a fragile wingless butterfly and she'd ache"? It would also eliminate that parenthetical of commas and give the piece a more simplistic look as a whole, taking that struck-out bit on its own.

Beyond that, the end is wonderful. Overall, I love this piece and hope that love doesn't fade - I hope you do like this review and I know it's unbearably long, but every time I looked back at the piece I saw something else I could-should-would comment on, and this is the most consolidated that I can make it. In short, I love it, but it does need some improvement - but now you've got me hooked!

Wow, I just typed this in pretty font but then forgot all about the fact that this is going to go into the forums just like everything else…silly me.

Anyways, it’s time Jas!

So, I will make it very clear I did definitely enjoy this as an independent piece because I can’t really see just yet how you plan on twisting this in with a story. I won’t worry about nitpicks but I will say that I approve of the scratched out bits being scratched out. It doesn’t blend well into the rest of the piece. The writing style as a whole seems to have shifted for that paragraph. Without that chunk, you have a much cleaner chunk of writing here.

Overall, there isn’t much I can say about all of this. The main reason for this is the fact that what you have here is a very clean extended metaphor. Your focus with this piece is clear and, instead of getting distracted or trailing away from the metaphor, you’ve kept your focus reigned in tight which I have to applaud.

She was beyond living, beyond striving for anything but perfection.

In fact, I only have one nitpick and that is with the word “but” because it doesn’t seem to have enough toughness points to carry such a heavy word like perfection.

Otherwise, I feel compelled to push that little “like” button up there.

Anyways, thanks for asking me to read this. I enjoyed much so.

Hey Jas!

I really enjoyed this as its own piece, it's a lovely metaphor that I'm assuming involves Nina (who is described as stick thin and corpse-like) and an eating disorder. I don't know whether this was supposed to be more "hinted at" or not, so maybe the fact that I guessed it (or perhaps I haven't guessed it at all xD) will affect how this interlude is presented?

My only concern is how this will be woven into the story as a whole, but perhaps I'll just have to wait and see how the next one functions (as I had similar concerns with the first letter, but now there will be a pattern of letters and so forth). I don't really have any nitpicks,this was beautifully written and elegant. Just make sure to take care in how it's worked in with the rest of the story.

Keep writing!

-Lauren-

Hmm.

Very interesting.

I'm very curious as to what you plan to do with this. I can guess, actually, and if I'm right, I find this to be quite pleasing. But I'm probably wrong. Just have to wait and see, I guess.

I really liked this. It's incredibly vivid yet, as a result of the style, blurrily vague. Rather like the vision of a nearsighted person--limited with most parameters, but perfect with some.

As I've already said, I really liked this. It was a nice break from the story at hand (though I do hope it becomes relevant later) and it wasn't, in my opinion, off-putting in the least. I think it fits quite well, actually. I also like the style--but I'm biased in that respect, because it's one I favor and try to mimic when I write.

But that's just me, and because I have no complaints other than petty comments on connotation, syntax, and the like, I want to talk about this style for a bit. Hopefully, it'll give you a wider perspective when you edit this.

Think of this as if it were the beginning of a movie: the camera centers on a thin, delicate girl, beautiful, probably, timid--we might even get the sense she's scared, weak, or both--and then she smiles at us and we see the ugly inside of her, we see what she does for her beauty. The camera pans out and we see the world around her; we see mirrors that tell the truth with lies, we see the people that made her crave beauty, like a drug, really, one that kills someone from the inside out while they only want more and more.

It works, I think, for a movie.

I think you can see, however, how it could be troublesome in writing. Starting so close to your subject means you have to build from there--your foundation is reduced to the first thing you introduce. It's different depending on the way you introduce it, and I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that your beginning was very well done.

Essentially, I'm trying to get across the idea that for something so brief, a wider perspective would have been excessive. However, you have to be careful not to begin too close. I've made that mistake too many times to count. For something longer, you probably want to begin farther away.

The shorter the piece, the less you should pay attention to that. This was perfect for the length. But it's just a warning.

sometimes though, she would get so god damn hungry and she would cry because she couldn't eat she just couldn't if he was ever going to love her because she'd get fat and he would say with broken glass eyes : i don't love you the way you want me to and she, a fragile wingless butterfly, would die all over again and she'd ache to be prettythinstrong;

Also, I loved the above. I also believe that it should remain struck-out. If I'm thinking what you're thinking, I can tell you that it had the effect you intended, and the strikeout added to it.

Actually, let me amend that statement. I loved it except for the he. It almost sounds like the only reason she's doing this is for a guy, and he sounds like a pretty sh**ty guy at that. Which really made this character lose a lot of my sympathy. Either show that he's a part of something bigger or show why (she thinks) he's worth starving for.

Hi Jori! (What a fail of a portmanteau)

I'm just gonna do a basic review and not bother splitting it up as it's going to be quite short:

Comments This is weirdly cool. What is it? It definitely grabbed my attention and it was vague and a bit confusing, but in a nice way. I'm beginning to think that maybe Tyler and Chloe's relationship isn't all great as it seems. I love the style and how confusing it is. Did she commit suicide? We learn loads from this. I love the metaphors too.

Even Better If I agree with Thatoddkid. I think the struckout paragraph should remain like that as it gives an insight. 'He' just makes him sound like a complete jerk, so I'd change that, unless that was your intention.

I hope this helped! Off to Chapter 3!

Keep Writing,

Mac

I thought the piece was great. There was a lot of beautiful imagery. The butterfly scene caught me off guard but still I was engaged. I figured out what you were talking about ( a girl who is bulimic and cannot see her inner beauty) but, it needs a bit of organization.