Promises Not Kept (Part Two of Three)

JFW1415 - I had a nice, long critique typed up, but the wham. And as there are no batteries in my laptop… Yes. Well. I’ll try to repeat what I wrote, though I don’t remember half of it…



Quote:
I think Matty notices, because he takes longer to respond than usual.
Strictly speaking Matty is not the only one who notices. The narrator does too, no? That is why I’d add “too”, or something like that.


Quote:
I raised the phone to my ear and prepared to dial,
Consider cutting out “phone” and placing a substitute there. You have the word in the sentence before, and it does stand out.


Quote:
“I don’t know, you guys.”
While it is (up to a point!) clear who is saying that, consider adding a tag there to shatter my opinion of it floating around in midair?


Quote:
It was the first guy again. I recognized the voice that time.
Perhaps merge those two, and say that “I” couldn’t place a name to him. Basically, avoid repeating “the voice” at all costs.


Quote:
There was a pause as he debated what to say,
Brendan, my brother, etc., not “him”. “Him” was above.


Quote:
“Yeah.” His voice was strong then. Determined.
Smoother transition needed, e.g. “became”.


Quote:
The second guy finally spoke again. He knew that Brendan was convinced, that he could no longer mess it up.
Could - would, though I think I dislike the sentence… “could no longer mess it up”… Hmm.


Quote:
The moon stretches in attempt to illuminate the hall, its rays like long fingers inching closer to me, but it can’t quite reach.
“but not quite able to reach”? I don’t know, rephrase my suggestion too, but the last part of the sentence above has to be.




The Unearthly Is Earthly

Meaning, the retrospection. Here I am for, I think, and cannot say a word against it. T’was a nice addition to the well-written story.


The Omnipresent (in this case) First Person

I, I, I - I (heh) think you managed well with cutting the unnecessary “I” from the text, and I cannot be nitpicky about that in anyway. What I’ll have to echo, though, and what was already on my mind when reading the first section (I can’t remember if I said something about that or nor) is that yes, the MC characterizes others quite well, describes them in a way that we can relate to them, but what about herself? That, I feel, is a bit left out. We knew about her grief (and her way of expressing it) in the first installment, but what was her role in, e.g., today’s breakfast? That is my main issue, since later on, obviously, it’s taken care of. Nothing like exaggeration, no? But, generally, do add a comment about her here and there.

As to the omnipresence and knowledgeableness (which usually go hand in hand, but if I added that then I the title’d be too long for my taste. So I didn’t…). During the retrospection, or, more specifically, the phone conversation. Oh, and I’d like to also say that I have an extreme dislike for speakerphones in stories - it’s hard not to get mixed up with who exactly is saying what, since one cannot add proper tags (just voice descriptions). Yours worked out fairly well, I suppose, since that second voice spoke only twice. But, go back and read first sentence, and then the following (which should have come after, but I was side-tracked):

Quote:
“Yeah?” There was a smirk in his voice – he knew he had worn down Brendan.

Quote:
“Then when?” He wasn’t about to relent. Not when he was so close.

Katherine probably didn’t exactly know that, did she? She though she did, she perhaps sensed it, she might have heard it - but she didn’t know, know. Did she? (That stood out, at least to me, though I spent some minutes on figuring out what it was).


Well, that is everything I have to say at this point. I’d like to see more of the mother’s reaction - “yesterday‘s” was quite emotional, wouldn’t she bare traces of that today? Is her face haggard? Is everyone’s face haggard? Those kind of little details can prove very handy at times. Other than that - well written, interesting piece.


Cheers,
Esme

This was so annoying! You wanted to me to be harsh, so I'm prepared to do my worst. There is absoloutely nothing wrong with this piece (from my point of view) besides the fact that you dash your sentences five billion times more than necessary.

I'm off to read the third one! Maybe I should have been a bit harsher with the commas, but I let you off. I was to submerged in the story - except - for - the - fact - that - there - were - seven - thousand - of - these. Not that there's anything wrong with those dashes. You wanted me to be harsh, and apparently this is the harshest I can be with this piece.

Adios!
- Sara

I liked this piece, with a little work it could be really good. I'm not gonna repeat all the typos since everyone else already did. I agree though, when I read this I was really confused between present and flashbacks, you may want to find some way to make it more obvious that they are flashbacks, so readers don't get lost. Other than that, this is shaping up to be really good. PM me when part three comes out.

Holy crap that made me want to cry! In a good, sad way though, not a "OMG I can't even finish this sentence I need to print it and burn it" way.That first first flashback got me a little confused; at first I thought that there was another brother that we weren't introduced to yet, and I had to reread it. So maybe make that a little easier to read. Overall, though, I thought it was awesome--some people really have to go through that, too. It's rather sad, really. Keep up the good work!

[s]This has been edited, and has a new title.

Please critique! This is due soon.

~JFW1415[/s]

Edit: I edited once more. The version that is posted now is the one I turned in. I am still planning on fixing the emotions, hospital scene, etc. - all the content suggestions you made that I didn't have time to do before.

Thanks everyone!

~JFW1415

Ooo! No time for a nitpick now, but one suggestion right away: could you please label these three sections more specifically? It took me ages to get to Day Two. Very good juggling of the time-line. I was a little confused, but not too much, and some confusion is inevitable when you're dealing with stuff like this. The one place I think you might want to be a little more clear is the phone conversation she overhears--for awhile I thought it was Matty, that he was responding to the pain of his brother's death, and it took me a long time to remember that Brendan was the name of the dead brother. Maybe if you could just interject something like "my older brother" or such, it might help.

Anyway, thanks for letting me know! Overall, this one is definitely better than Day One, darling, keep it up!

Oh, this is so good. (too bad that I knew the ending before I read the other two parts! )

But anyway, I didn't find anything wrong in this piece. You have a good story with your three pieces and I find them to be complete.

My only advise is for you to Keep Writing!

Here I am again! Sorry if I repeat anything! ^_^

I think Matty notices, [no comma] because he takes longer to respond than usual.

Jumping onto my bed, I grabbed my phone.

He must have, [no comma] because the next voice to speak had an echo to it.

I half-expected Brendan to storm into my room after that, to demand an explanation as to why I was snooping, but it never came.

My bag falls to the ground beside me, [no comma] onto the patch of wood floor Brendan’s bag used to occupy.

There are black garbage bags lying around, [no comma] half-filled with his stuff.

Mom told me it was fine, then mentioned to my seat.

I refused to look at him, [no comma] and stuck to one-word sentences the whole night.

I rolled my eyes, [no comma] and for a moment everything was normal between us.

“Yeah,” I repeated. [comma instead] “[s]But[/s] but if you leave the house, I’ll tell.”

Okay, it's good up until the part with the brother speaking here he says, "I don't know, you guys." I can't tell if he's on the phone, or the friends are in another room? It'd be good to clarify that.

"Mom told me it was fine, then mentioned to my seat." Should it be "motioned?"


“Yeah,” he said. He didn’t think I noticed, but I did.

He didn’t say ‘I promise.’ He agreed, but he never said the words, so he still could break it.
I think that should be one paragraph? The "he didn't notice" part doesn't make sense on its own.

"... the moon illuminates my form." How would she know? Wouldn't she be more likely to nitice it illuminating the room first?

Very good! I love your dialogue. Can't wait for part three! Keep writing!

~Yoyo

In all honesty this moved too fast... You have no indication that it's flashbacks and I just had to force myself to keep reading. I also thought the main character was a boy. Really this peice just largely confused me. Jumping about here, there and everywhere. It's all just... so... mad. Overall: Unlike the others I didn't like this, it was too odd, my head just couldn't go around it.

----------------
Listening to: Propagandhi - A People's History Of The World
via FoxyTunes

Hey again, JFW.

Another completely fabulous chapter. I really do love this story--it's one of my favorites in recent memory. I'm excited to see how everything comes together.

HIGH SCHOOL CONFIDENTIAL

The one thing that kind of irked me in this chapter was the predictability and stereotypes surrounding the "druggies". Put them together with Brendan and you could tell which ones were smoking something and which ones weren't--and that was simply because it sounded a bit like a health movie ("There's nothing like riding the high!" and so forth.)

How to fix this? Put yourself in both sets of characters' shoes. Is Brendan trying to please something? Do the druggies think they are doing the right thing? Making both characters have motives is something that is going to make things a lot more realistic. Often, people will experiment with drugs to make someone else happy, or because it is a "diagnosis" for their problems. Something like that could be going on in Brendan's life. I don't know--you're the writer, not me. XD

__

I don't have a lot else to say! Simply make sure that the difference between flashback and present day is made clear. I would put it in italics or something such.

But, yeah. This story is beyond awesome sauce. I'd venture to say it's awesome soup.

Azila: I keep doing the beginning with a pronoun thing! URGH! I hate it. Anyways, yes, it's the same family as my 100 stories, but only because I'm lazy. ;P Brendan doesn't exist in them - yet. So yes, some of them are the same characters, but try to forget that? They have nothing to do with each other...though they do have the same personalily...Oh, well, they have a different last name here! Ha! (It's the boy's last name.) I just hate making new characters.

Alianna: Yes, my brother is very odd and father-like, so that wouldn't be too odd coming from him if I was really upset. I'll edit it, though, so it's more general. I always forget that others don't have such awesome brothers. ;P

I can't believe everyone thought Katherine was a boy! Urgh...now I need to find a way to slip her name in earlier...

Thanks! Anyone else out there feel like ripping this to shreds? ;P

~JFW1415

Heya, another good part to what is an intriguing and well thought out story. I'm really enjoying this.

A few things that I caught:

I think we should ask people to bring something for the party.

Yesterday afternoon I was desperate to get on the phone. I was supposed to call Sarah – we still had to plan our outfits for the dance.

He knew that Brendan was hooked, that he could no longer mess it up.

He got down on one knee and put his hand on my chin, forcing me to look up into his eyes.

But what do you do when the one who could have stopped it, the one with the opportunity, was you?

Hello! I'm back.

-Nitpicks-

Jumping onto my bed I grabbed my phone.

I quieted my breath, and I listened, all thoughts of indulging in teenage gossip gone.

“Just try it, man!” someone said. I could hear someone in the background telling him to put it on speakerphone.

It’s the first guy again.

He knew that Brendan was hooked, that he could no longer mess it up.

I half expected Brendan to storm into my room after that, to demand an explanation to why I was snooping, but it never came.

I slam the door shut as I walk in the house after going for a walk, but there’s no one around to hear it echo.

Inside is the phone he used to plan what would be his death.

I plan on going straight to my room – blasting the radio, doing my homework, forgetting about what was going on around me – but I don’t.

He’s digging deep into the corners, discarding all the stuff he considered junk.

Mom told me it was fine, then mentioned to my seat.

That was his nickname for me, and I hated that he said it – it made it so much harder to be mad at him.

I thought that would keep him safe.

Very, very nice.

I liked this bit more than I liked part two. The flashbacks were interesting, espcially as they gave away everything, yet didn't ruin the story.

“I think we should ask people to bring something for the party. That way they won’t bring over casseroles.”

Yesterday afternoon I was desperate to get on the phone. I was supposed to call Sarah – we still had to plan our outfits for the dance.

Brendan was hooked

I wish I hadn’t stopped in the hall.

Brendan did confront me later on.

“What took you so long, Katherine?”

When I close my eyes, I dream of flashing lights and blaring sirens.