Published January 2, 2008
David and he spent their whole life together. Since they were twins it was difficult for the system to put each of them in separate foster homes. They began in foster homes after losing their mother at the hands of their father.They found Paul, their father, beating Carol, their mother, to death. Carol was trying to leave the drinking and trying to save her children from the hands of her husband. He found her sneaking out the back door, and flipped. David and Jay walked outside to meet their mother, to find Paul covered in her blood. The last of either of them knew was sitting there, with both his and their own blood on themselves.
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Help please. I just cannot write this paragraph so it flows. This is my fifth time trying to make it sound reasonable. Help. Can you help me find a way to make everything flow together? It's supposed to be more gruesome. I just don't know how to add more detail to it.
P.S. What rating should it be?
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139,365 Literary Works • 672,540 Reviews
I completely understand, I hate info dumps.
The short story I am writing is about is David and Jay. I don't want this paragraph to dominate the story. I am trying to explain what shaped the characters to be cold hearted and distant. With having Paul beat their mother to death after she tried to leave him.
Where I'm going with this story is that David looses his wife, and she leaves their children alone with him. He is scared he will turn out to be their father, beating his own children, because she is not there anymore.
I suppose I can turn it into a dream, but am having trouble finding a way where David is laying on his bead wallowing is self pity and grief and when Jay comes in to talk to David about the lose of his wife.
I think the easiest way to write this would be to make it a prologue, with the childrens' innocence at the time portrayed, and then shift forward to wherever the main meat of the story is, with the kids later explaining how they felt and where they are now (in the foster home).
Hi geek! The rating is good at about PG.
put a space after the period.like everybody else said, Info dumps are annoying. Here are the rest of my comments:
try: walked outside to meet their mother, but instead, they found Paul covered in her blood.
I don't understand this sentence.
Those are the only mistakes I found, I don't see how this could be a story, not even a short one. What I mean of that is you put a story together in eight sentences, that can't even be a short story. Good luck with this piece, I bet you could turn it into a real story.
Firearris
Hey Geek, Just to offer my wise advice (lol, yeah right). Anywho, hmm, yes this is an info dump as many before me have mentioned. The sad part is that you do have interesting things going on here. The sentence in bold can definitely be turned into an actual scene, packed with action of course. It would just have a bigger impact on the reader when they can see how Paul is beating Carol. Emotionally, it would evoke sympathy and thus, form a connection between Carol and the audience. Not to mention, hatred for Paul. I don't think you should remove but definitely expand on the subject matter. Hope this helped.
Cheers,
--starry.
Yes, this is something of an info-dump, but chocoholic's suggestion to write this as a dream is an excellent one.
You could ty witing it a different way. Blog, journal, a news report or in a dream.
That sounds rather odd. How do you mean it goes into another scene?
Well then you have one of three choices: A) write out the scene B) tell the scene and be a not-so-well off writer (I only say this because telling is looked down upon by many, not just myself) C) cut it out all together.
Best of luck!
You see, I can't do a scene with this one. Because it goes into another scene.
I agree with Suzanne...info dumps are annoying. Why not do the whole scene? It's much more fun (and more informative) in the movies when they do a flashback rather than a verbal explanation.
You might also work on mixing up your sentence structure. You don't have to always go subject-verb, as in, He did this, She did this, etc.
Good luck.
-Colleen
If you can, I would just suggest rewriting the whole thing. It is one big huge info dump, which is nasty. Why not write the whole scene out rather than tell the scene? Show the scene, you know? It could be a great scene if you would just show it.
The only way this would work through telling (as you have it) is if someone was telling it, through dialogue.
Best of luck. ^_^