Young Writers Society

Hi MyNameisRaven,

Mailice here with a short review!

This is a different kind of romance I'm reading here. And yet I like the approach you show here. I have the impression that you are mixing many different types into one construct. While at the beginning I thought it was about a possible murderer who might have killed his wife and is now haunted by her ghost/memories, the next text gives a new interpretation that it could also be a gardener who has a grudge against roses and loves and honours them but also despises them because despite their beauty they have thorns that can hurt him. In the end, I thought the text was more about someone who is a little mad and loves someone who doesn't love him or is just playing with him, and he knows that but wants it that way because it is the fulfilment of his life. (At times I even thought the story was being told from the point of view of a victim who has Stockholm Syndrome).

In general, with your cryptic yet beautiful descriptions, you manage to give your story a certain depth where the reader can individually interpret what they want. You use a lot of metaphors and use some flowers to perhaps say something through floral language. (Lilies = innocence, purity, virginity). This gives the line a much darker meaning and at the same time a kind of confession of a serial killer.

With the opening line you create something beautiful and yet painful. I had the impression when I first read it that it told of a death wish, a longing for the afterlife, but not in the drastic sense that the narrator is suicidal, but has a belief that after death he will return to where he came from; back to nothingness, or perhaps to his mother's amniotic sac?

It's hard for me to find a purely romantic / love motif here, with all the descriptions you've included. I like that there are more possible interpretations that lead the reader to think about this.

Another point that struck me, and I like it, is your style, how you make the sections shorter and shorter in the vast majority of cases, as if the narrator has no air left. I like your comparisons throughout the text, they usually start with something negative and then change to something positive, as if the narrator is suddenly afraid something might happen to him if he keeps talking like that.
The complexity of the text combined with the title continues to give me this spinning of gears in my head as to what you as the writer were trying to say and how far away I am from my theories. Nevertheless, it was a very successful text and I found the search for an answer very well staged. I like that in texts where you have to read more between the lines to come to a result.

Have fun writing.

Mailice

Hey, MyNameIsRaven!

Welcome to YWS! Firstly, welcome to the site! If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to a name in light or dark green. My name is Elinor, and I thought I would drop by give you a quick review. Thank you for your sharing your story with us. Like Plume, I thought it was unique and unlike anything that I've read. You have really great and vivid imagery. Overall, it reminded me of the song "Bleeding Love" by Leona Lewis, in that the song and your piece get at the intense feelings of a toxic relationship.

While I think the story works really well as it stands, If I had a suggestion it would be to expand the scope. Right now this story is pretty singularly focused on how the narrator feels about their partner. We get the sense that some of their doubts come from what other people have said about their relationship. I'd like to see your narrator address those other people and explain why they're wrong and why they are going to stay with their partner.

Anyway, nice work. I hope this helps and keep writing!

Elinor

Hey there! Plume here, with a review! And welcome to YWS!!

Oh wow. This piece was really beautiful, but haunting all the same. It was unlike anything I've ever read before. It's a bit like prose poetry, isn't it? Regardless of what the actual form is called, I think it was very captivating and impressive how you were able to weave such a beautiful piece together.

One thing that really stood out to me was your imagery. (I think that was kind of the point of the piece, but it was still really great.) I think my favorite line was "The lilies you kiss and the stars you’ve given are long dead, black-stained petals curling around my arms in poisonous tourniquets." There was something about it that was so varied and haunting. Honestly, all your lines really packed a punch, so it was hard to choose a favorite.

I also really enjoyed the ending. It was full of resolve but also a bit of doubt. To me, it felt like the narrator was coming to that conclusion but still having some harboring doubting thoughts over whether the relationship is really all that healthy. I think that your way of turning all these sinister phrases also serves as a sort of meta metaphor, if you will; it lets us see into the narrators mind on how they're twisting their partner's shortcomings into something beautiful, because they almost refuse to see what they're really like. I think that that also added to the multitude of layers in this piece, and it was really nicely executed. Great work!!

I also think your usage of punctuation and paragraphing really elevated the reading experience. I felt that most of your paragraphs cut off exactly where they needed to, and having each line as a paragraph gave it a more poetic, stanza-esque feel. I would note that I think it might be interesting to see how it would read if you tacked the second paragraph onto the first one and made them one paragraph. Since you've got an "or" there, you aren't really done with the thought when you move to a new paragraph, so it felt a little disjointed to me. I think it might read a bit better if you got rid of the pause there caused by the new paragraph. The way you use commas liberally also adds to that flowing poetry vibe this piece has, and they really serve to let the reader ingest this work as smoothly as possible.

I honestly have no overall criticisms. I think you did a great job in conveying exactly what you needed to convey.

Overall: really nice work! This piece was short but so impactful, and I really enjoyed reading it. I hope to see more of your work on this site in the future. Until next time!!