Young Writers Society

Hey GSLeigh!

RandomTalks here with a short review!

Its been a long time since I have reviewed a short story, so I might be a little rusty. But the concept of your story intrigued me and I really wanted to give this a read.

I can't say that I was disappointed. Although, I will have to agree with the other reviewers - I did feel that it went too fast. What you have done here is described an emotion. The main content of the story was this person's relationship with the stage - how it makes her feel alive and breathes back life into her after this terrible phase that she has just gone through. I liked how you metaphorically presented the journey to the stage as her journey back to her true self.

However, it does leave a lot to the imagination. I feel there was a transition that we missed somewhere in between the pretty words and metaphorical representations. For example, we start at a difficult point in the narrator's life when her world has lost all color and meaning. We explore the bleakness of this world, when suddenly we are once again plunged back into colors and lights. While the transportation was presented well, it came without a cause. We do not know what had caused the narrator's life into black and while, but even that would have been alright if you had portrayed the transformation of her emotions, her outlook towards the world as well. Since you haven't done that here, there is this lack of emotional connection and the readers don't know enough to care about this character.

Overall, this was a really good abstract piece. It has great potential, and with a little more brush up and addition of information, it has the potential to become something even greater. I do feel that you have achieved at portraying the main thing here - the narrator's emotional connection with the stage and the satisfaction she feels while performing.

That's all!

Keep writing and have a great day!

Hello, this is a very well written piece, although I think there's more you could do with it. It has a lot of potential. I would agree with the statement some of the other reviewers have made about the description of depression being too generic. Allowing yourself to be more personal and detailed will capture your reader's attention better than saying something they may have heard before.

Also, what about going through the audition process to be in a show while struggling with depressing? What would that be like? Allow the climb back into the world of colour to take a little more time and effort. As someone who has been and who still is struggling with depression, I find that describing my feelings in detail through writing helps a lot. It can be tricky at first, and I have no clue if you're writing from experience or speculation, but either way this was very well done.

Short version: Don't be afraid to be honest and intimate with your readers and to really pull them inside your experience as much as you feel comfortable.

I hope to see more from you in the future. Keep up the good work!

Heyo Leigh, Flite here for a review.

Ah so, interesting short story you have here, my review isn't going to be terribly long. I'm just going to point out a few key things that I think you can improve on. I think that this story has quite a lot of potential, but you didn't take it far enough. I understand that acting was what brought her to life, but you didn't elaborate on that enough. The whole thing felt rushed through, you glossed over a lot of the details of how she came back from depression but spent rather a large part describing what depression was like. Because this piece's central message is that her love for acting finally saved her. Shouldn't the piece focus on more of that transition then the actual depression itself?

Let's have a look at your first two paragraphs, they aren't bad descriptions of depression. But they're also rather generalized descriptions of what depression would feel like, the word loosing its colour and everything fading into black and white. Perhaps try adding in more personalized feelings about it? Something specific that only the narrator felt? Come up with metaphors and similes that haven't been used before to describe what it was like. I would also like to say that there is a lot of missing context in this story. What exactly was the assembly line, I realized that it could be a metaphor for several things however, you can make that clearer for us.

What are the sparks and why are they there? How did they make her feel? I feel like we didn't get a lot of insight into the character's internal emotions through this change. We see the action but we don't see the emotion behind it (which frankly what you're trying to portray here). It's a case of showing and not telling again.

I spun around on the stage, listening to the audience cheer and the music play, and as I took my bow I realized that the world had once again gained its color.

First of all I really liked you story. There are some grammar issues that I will tell you below.

The world turned black and white last year. The sky’s brilliant blue melted away into darkness, the violet walls of my bedroom faded into a prison gray, and the people around me looked like the pictures out of old newspapers. Music turned into noise, books turned into gibberish, photo albums turned into broken memories, and I turned into a quiet, despairing form in the corner.

(I really liked how you gave great details about the world turning black and white. I also liked it how you wrote that you changed as well.)

The days turned into starless nights, miss mashing (Mishmashing is one word) together into one endless, torment filled midnight, devouring me completely. School became a jail. It was only a place where I stood at an assembly line, cranking out whatever they wanted to see, whatever they wanted to hear, because that was what I had to do. That was what everyone had to do.

(I really like this paragraph because you are telling me what you life is about at school.)

It continued like that for quite a while. Black and white. Prison gray. Midnights and jails and assembly lines… But it couldn’t stay like that forever. At the end of the assembly line there was a spark, and it was bright yellow, cutting through the darkness like the stars that had been missing for so long. I followed it.

(I really liked how you still have courage that everything could change if only one person believes.)

One spark turned into two, and two into three, and three into four, then into hundreds of sparks, cheering me on as I approached the end of the assembly line. The midnight burned red as it lifted, being pulled by the newspaper people as they, too, turned to rainbow, dressed in brilliant costumes and make up. The assembly line shifted beneath my feet, lifting me up and placing me onto a stage, transforming me from the quiet girl in the corner to a shining star at the center of attention.

(I really liked it how the spark started with one person and then it started to spread.)

I spun around on the stage, listening to the audience cheer and the music play, and as I took my bow I realized that the world had once again gained its color.

(I really like your ending because since your main character never gave of hope so the world ended up getting it`s color back because of he/her.)

I really loved your story I really think that you should keep writing.

Keep On Writing!!!

~Rose