"Remember I told today will be special?" Mary paused to let Sara nod; her head moving like Noddy's. "We’re at the Bazaar."
"They’re selling colourful cloths everywhere! There's cotton like your frock, satin – on your hair, wool like your warm blanket. There's red, the colour you see when you're angry, when you have an adventure. It's the music your confidence dances to. And yellow, the taste of butter, of happiness and sunshine. It's the warmth of the sun that tickles your face, the heat that leaves you thirsty. This shawl you wear is a papery powder-blue. It's the peace and calm that floods you. The lights above are bright, like the glow that pierces you when you step into the mornin-"
A giggle erupted.
"A fern tickled you! It’s of the softest green, the feeling when you lie on the lawn. Soon you'll grow taller than those ferns into a beautiful young woman." Mary paused.
"Will I get a new cape?" asked Sara.
Mary smiled. "Of course! It’ll be a majestic, swishy purple cape shimmering with gold specks. You can dazzle everyone around and they’ve to shield their eyes."
"Then, I can attack them in their blackness and order them to obey me.” Sara's curls bounced with imagination.
Mary was overwhelmed with love for Sara sitting in front of her, sipping tea. Her own tea was getting cold.
“This day feels so golden. Can we come often?" asked Sara.
Mary nodded, not blinking away tears; Sara couldn't see it anyway.
~
A/N:
Nitpicks and comments appreciated!
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137,702 Literary Works • 672,063 Reviews
This line. This line cut me to the quick. I was reading through, forming my critique of the overly flowery and descriptive dialogue in the beginning, going to talk about how that isn't necessary and just seems kind of grating. And then... that line. And I felt like a horrible person.
I did really like this when it all came together. You seem to do that a lot in the writing I've read: I start out rather unimpressed (not disappointed, just sort of "meh" with low expectations) and then suddenly I'm hit with some detail that makes everything before it come about in a different light. It's amazing.
I do have to warn about those beginnings though. This was short, so it was only a few paragraphs before the twist that made things make sense. Also, I'm reading the whole thing with an eye to improving it. A casual reader might be put off by a boring beginning and just give up on it before the twist comes. Not that you have to give away the twist earlier, but some kind of hook other than mundane action/description might be nice. Just to keep a reader going so that they care when they come to the twist.
For example, this story. I would have been put off by the description in the beginning. This is highly subjective, so take whatever I say with a grain of salt, but I might have stopped reading if I weren't interested in reviewing. I didn't care all that much and I found the excess of description a bit grating. And when I got to the revealing line, well, like I said, I felt really guilty. It wasn't a good feeling, like I felt sorry for the girl. It was more like I was beating myself up for having been so critical. Not sure if that's how you want your reader to walk away from your story.
I did like this though. The twist was quite well-done (from a reviewer's perspective anyway) and the description, even if it did wax on a bit long, was really nice. It was short, so it didn't suffer too badly from the purple prose. I really did like it.
I wasn't too harsh, was I? If you have any questions or comments, please please please drop me a line, 'kay?
~Gryph
Overall, I liked this. The length constraint obviously makes it more difficult to get in everything you want to put in there. I was a little bit confused as to why she was crying in the end. You say she is overwhelmed with her love but I'm not really sure why Sara's excitement towards the fair causes Mary to cry. I think you want to draw more of a "so what" out of the story. Other than that, I loved the color imagery, nice work. Happy reviewing!
Yo. It's me. You didn't think I'd come, did you? Diiiid eeeeewww?!?!?! I did. In case you haven't noticed that yet. I'll shut up now. Well, not really; I need to get on with the review.
I really loved some of your descriptions here! Awesome job.
Okay, so I suck at writing flash fiction, and I'm even worse at reviewing it, so prepare yourself. I really love this overall, Lava. What you did at the end was very clever and original, methinks. Sara's blind, right? That's what I assume. If I am right, I love the way you have it so that Mary makes Sara feel as though the different colours all have different aspects to them. It's really sweet, methinks. I could ramble on about why I love this for ages, so I better stop while I'm ahead. xD
One thing I will suggest is for you to actually post the picture this is based on. I know the picture you're thinking of, but the majority of members around the site won't, so I think posting it would help them understand the story better. Plus, they'll see where the story actually comes from. Make sense? It's not 100% necessary, but so long as you're happy to do so, I reckon you should post the picture for us guys to see.
I suppose I sort of agree with what the others have said about this ending a little abruptly, although I'm not talking about the last two lines: I loved those. I think you could have eased into it a bit better. Taking the word count into account (lol, I rhyme), I think what you could do is maybe cut some of the descriptions out of the beginning (when Mary's first describing the colours). There are quite a lot of them, so I don't think there'd be any harm in cutting a few of them out. Obviously though, this is completely up to you. It's your story, not mine, and you may not feel comfortable taking out any of those descriptions. I don't think this is a huge issue anyway.
An awesome job overall, m'buddy!
Keep writing,
xoxo Skins
I think I actually remember having to write something like this for a school piece once, or at least, something along these lines. I feel a little pointless, having got here later but I'd still like to offer an opinion.
Did you have a word limit with this? Only, I feel as if the ending was a little too abrupt for my liking. You could have pulled it out a little more I think, and continued until you found a more natural end. I'm awful for doing that, truly. I know where I want to get to with a story (how I want it to finish) and after a certain amount of words I begin to condense things. The trouble is, even if you're getting a little tired of writing and want to get to the end it doesn't nessecarily mean that that is true of the reader too.
Keep it up!
Hey!
I won't go into the spelling/grammar schtick, since although that was my main nitpick it's mostly fairly obvious. However!
This reference seems a little out of place. The second clause could probably go altogether, really, and you could put something more generic in there, so that it's easier for readers to understand. Perhaps a comment about her enthusiasm, or something of the kind?
This extract is beautiful, I love the way it suggests that Mary has a long experience of doing this, and how she manages it really is very sweet. There's already kind of a hint here that it's very painful for her, and it made me invest a little more in the character.
I really loved this, too. The step between fantasy and reality is beautifully smooth and had a real effect that was just lovely.
The only thing that really confused me to begin with was the relationship between Mary and Sara, at first I thought they were sisters, and that could be smoothed out a bit. Also, I'm not sure if this is completely imaginary, or if they're actually at the bazaar? The tea comment kind of threw me off a little there.
Other than that, a very lovely piece, really effective and emotional, especially for a flash. I really enjoyed it, and I can't give you anything more that would be remotely constructive. So, toodle-oo!
Hey Lava, I''ll start reviewing your story by spotting the grammatical and punctuation errors then I would give my opinion about it. (You might find my comments similar to the others' reviews because I don't have enough time to read them first.)
Overall, your story is quite interesting. I really enjoyed reading it. I love the paragraph where you've placed all the colours and relating them to girl's clothes. I was feeling so curious why you had this detailed description of mentioning all the colours but that amazing, yet sad ending had answered my question. Well done!
This is a very ungrammatical sentence. If you meant to make the person sound like that, my apologies, but if not, definitely fix it.
That was really my only nitpick, so:
At first I was wondering why Mary was speaking the way she was - describing everything so thoroughly, until I got to the end. It's a really interesting story, the way Mary described colours by using other senses. Sorry that this review wasn't entirely helpful, but well done!
Hey, Lava. o.O
So I think I kind of see what you were doing with this, but stories like this always seem just a tad bit too short for me to escape that feeling of a vague or abrupt ending. Overall though I like to think you did a nice job with the word count thing and painting a scene for the reader.
I noticed one of your characters seemed to be a little over imaginative with the way she talked and described things. It made for an interesting character. The other seemed to be a little less serious and very fun-loving. The contrast between characters was also pretty distinct, so good job with that. Though, the only real thing that got me, again, was the way this ended. To be blunt with my guess, I was thinking maybe one of the other characters wasn't going to be around for very long? That this was supposed to be a special day due to some sort of limited time? This was just what I gathered from it.
My only nitpick I think that bothered me:
This sentence here doesn't sound as smooth with the double use of the word nod. Tweak it just a little
Anyway, nice job I think. Good luck with the contest, you!
-Smylin'
I’ve always thought that color associations were interesting. Like how something can feel like magenta or grey or something like that, so it was enjoyable reading the description of the market materials there. At first, since most of it’s just dialogue, it took a little while to figure out what was what, but after rereading it a couple times I could better realize the voice and surroundings.
You should put the word “you” in that first sentence. A few non-dialogue descriptions aren’t very smooth. For instance, “bouncing with imagination” doesn’t quite sound right. She might be bouncing, causing her curls to bounce as well, but her curls bouncing on their own seems odd.
I probably sound like a dolt asking this, but what/who is Noddy?
Also, at the last there your character should actually say something. Sara’s blind, after all, and can’t see her nodding, just as she can’t see the tears.
This was good. I don't have time now for a full critique. One thing did strike me however
they've is they have, abbreviated. So the mother talks all in future tense about what the girl will be like with here new cape then she switches to present with this line which is all a little jarring. As it stands it reads:
like it's happening now. when really it should read:
There is more to be said about the story itself, but I don't have time now. I will ask though, is this a competition on the site? would you mind PM'ing me a link to the competition page, as I have already reviewed two works for it and don't have a clue what the instructions/prompts are?
Thanks and I hope that wee nitpick helps!