"People. That’s the start of this entire story. Not so long ago in the streets of London. The year was 1888, people were as busy as ever trying to “evolve”. One of my prized children was out causing havoc. He has no name, but nowadays you know him as Jack. Do you know him now?"
"Yes, Jack walked the streets killing those slutty rats. He cleansed the streets of London. I never knew Jack personally. What about Him?"
"Jack was one of my favorites, the complete embodiment of lust. Killing lust, just to quench it. But he wasn’t like the ones he slaughtered and maimed, oh no. He had a lust for something more genuine. The thrill of it all. The adrenaline. Do you get what I mean?"
"Yes, I know the thrill. Especially when you can see the terror in their eyes as the last moments of their pitiful life drains away. But how did Jack become an embodiment of lust?"
"Well he wasn’t always. But then, after experiencing life he gained a new lust. One for blood, one for fear, and one for the thrill of the hunt. Eventually he went insane with it, tearing the humans to shreds. What a pity really, why he had to go and rip himself apart."
"Yes, it also made my job harder. As he became perfect, he gained the ability to not only tear the physical part of the victim, but their soul as well. It’ll take me ages to find all of their souls, until then they’ll wander the earth as spirits. His as well, I doubt I’ll ever find the rest of his soul. It’s been scattered for too long. Is he the reason you asked me here? to help find Jack, and bring him back?"
"No need, let him wander the earth. It makes my life all the more enjoyable. But don’t you want to hear the story of when I first met him? I swear it will make your soul quiver and your bones clack.
The year was 1880, London, very beautiful. The night was clear but those wretched cars would not cease to move. I was just by White Chapel. Minding my business, watching as humanity ate away at itself. I didn’t notice the boy until he came up close and out of the shadows. He asked me if I had anything that I could give a poor beggar as himself.
I was about to turn him away, but this boy had potential! So I gave him one of my eight prized possessions. You know my silver finger band that I always wore. Yes. Hands, the manifestation of lust in a human. He did well to wear it even to his dying day."
"I remember that band. You aren’t normally suppose to take material things with your soul, but it stayed with Jack. It must have bonded with his soul or something."
"Well of course. That ring was part of me after all, until I was split by that cursed girl into separate pieces. Now look at me. Huuuuh. That’s beyond the point. Where was I?"
Well it was eight years later when I met him again. This time he was a kind young man, wealthy enough with a good family to boot. He was well dressed and had flawless manners, but beneath it all, there was something different. His eyes, they had a strange restrained lust. Of course being me, I gave him a little shove in the right direction and awakened it."
Now, even to this day he is known world-wide. Jack the Ripper! Oh yes, and whatever did happen to those prostitutes he ripped to shreds? Did you find the bits of their souls? He hid them very well didn’t he?"
"Well, I managed to find all of Mary Ann Nichols' soul. I'm almost done with Annie Chapman’s soul, and I’ve already found most of Elizabeth Stride’s and Catherine Enddowes' souls. Unfortunately for Mary Jane Kelly, I’ve only managed to find bits and pieces. He may have stolen some of her soul, but I highly doubt it. "
"Remember, within him I bestowed lust, do not underestimate my children. But the others have not yet been born. Oh how I can’t wait to find a worthy enough child. Hopefully they shall be just as famous as little Jacky!"
End of chapter
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139,682 Literary Works • 672,648 Reviews
Creeeeeeeeeeeeppppyyy!! I love the darkness in this piece. It takes me back to last year when I lost my way in life, following satan down his dark and twisted path. I regret a lot of the things I did last year but at the same time I enjoyed them immensely. Jack reminds me very much of the evil part inside me. Reading this piece put a wicked smile upon my face. I don't know whether it's just me but I see a double meaning behind both of your words when you talk of how Jack took the prostitutes' souls and identity through his vicious lust. It's funny because last night I had a dream similar to this.
xx
The bold font you have used throughout the whole piece is a bit hard on my eyes. The italics was fine but having the whole thing in bold was too much. If you took away the bold font but kept the italics I think it would improve the piece and make it easier to read. I found myself focusing on where the italics were and where they weren't instead of absorbing myself entirely into the piece. The reason for this being because the bold made it hard to notice the difference between the two.
I absolutely love the writing descriptions you both used! The way you both used your words to visually bring the story to life was simply brilliant.
Some things I found were slightly unclear but not unclear enough to be worried about.
I don't know whether your style of writing in this piece was intentional or not but I felt the work could have used a little more actions and a little less dialogue, just to balance it out a little.
Overall I enjoyed 'Lust' very much and was thrilled by the dark and descriptive theme you created.
Please keep writing more I think you both make a great team!
Yeah, for some reason whenever I copy and paste from google docs it becomes automatically bold. I tried taking it off bold but for some reason or another it didn't work. I'll see if there is anything that I can do about that, thanks for the review! We decided that we would try to change the writing style with a little more description, but first we wanted to try it this way, give there characters character while keeping them shrouded in mystery. Love the review!
Sushi and Noel! My favorite writing duo!
I’ve just come from reading Sloth for the third time and Lust a second. I’m pleasantly surprised by the both of you. You really make the best pair. I can see you had an excellent start in Lust, and I would have normally stopped myself from reading a sequel before seeing the first – but in this case, I was powerless to withdraw at simply reading the first few words. Once you had me, I was helplessly absorbed, and there was no turning back. Luckily, it didn't ruin anything for me, and now I find myself craving the next installment.
On a few of Loose’s points, I don’t really care what you do with the formatting. I actually liked the alternating italic to bold as I said in my last review. It’s a unique way to distinguish the characters, since the identity of the speakers is not actually revealed. It leaves mystery, which I like. On there being no suspense, imagery, or interest, I think you’re definitely improving on that. Besides, I think you pull off an interesting dialogue even without the above mentioned things. It’s the style that counts, which brings me to the final thing.
I’m sure you both have a strong individual voice in writing. Together you are interesting. Together you are a powerful mixture of talent. You told me there’s some argument about what gets written. Well, whatever you discuss obviously works. The hard work pays off. I encourage more of it, not less. If you continue to write with each other, you will naturally adapt to the other person’s ideas and style, and you will just keep improving alongside each other. I don’t see any other epic duo’s out there doing what you do, so high five for originality!
I like many styles of writing for the simple fact that they ignite different emotions in me. This series of yours is exactly what I've been longing for. The dialogue is deliciously dark, designing sinister smiles that form on my lips. In turn, it forces me to question where that side of me came from, and also – to plead for more. It’s a feeling from the darkest corner of my heart; a thirst that cannot be quenched. It’s the title of the story, the body of it, seeping out for consumption. In a word, it is Lust.
Love you guys!
Kora
Yay! Thank you soooooo much, this really means a lot. Noel is planning the next plot and we hope that you enjoy it too, although the title must remain a secret until later. Hope you will like that one too!
You requested a review beyond grammatical points, and a review beyond grammatical points you shall get.
But, I have to say this first: ditch the formatting. The bold is absolutely unsightly. Even the italics gets grating after a while. I know why you've done the latter: to distinguish between the two writers (which I don't really understand. It doesn't work in your favour. It doesn't show unity in the writing). But get rid of the bold. There is no reason to use bold in a forum like YWS. In the same thread of thought, starting paragraphs with 'yes' and 'well' is putting forward the same message. It's not a unified text written by two writers. This is two writers competing for a voice in the plot. It doesn't read well.
Now, in my opinion, this piece isn't bad, but it has one distinct flaw. There's a cardinal rule in writing to show and not tell. There's little description in here. All you're doing is telling us what happened. That's the difficulty with a style as colloquial as this. You and your friend are competing to stand out, so this piece reads like you're exchanging letters. There's no suspense, no imagery, and, frankly, no interest. This definitely needs a proof read and a unity of writing styles. It's just lackluster as it is.
On top of all the grammatical points, this very much needs to be edited. It's a good idea for a piece, and it's great that you're experimenting with your style, but you're not quite there yet. Maybe you should take some time to develop your own writing voice before you try to pair it up with someone else's.
Actually this whole story is a conversation between two different characters, I realize the bold. I'll try on my next story to keep it un-bold. I really appreciate that you took the time to critique this text, next time to make it more clear that this is a conversation I'll use quotes. The italics sadly could not be helped, maybe I'll experiment a little more with this website. Thanks again
Oh,what a divine piece of work! Considering my severe mood changes as of now, this just gives my sorrow and push into insanity! I love it! Jack the Ripper is a very unknown character but this....a whole new outlook on him! How riveting! I enjoy it very much! Not a whole lot to improve, but there could be a bit.
Some of the wording is not up to full potential, so maybe put in some new vocabulary? Such as...
'Oh! How I can not wait to find another prodigy to live up to such an exceptional child! Ah, little Jacky, the infamous Jack the Ripper. One of my few trophies.'
and...
'Oh, where did my Jacky hid those souls after he tore there whorish bodies to shreds? Did he hide the souls well? He always did love to keep hunters on their toes!' hunters as in the person trying to put the prostitutes souls back together.
Other then that,I have nothing else to utter except that the piece was incredible and I wouldn't mind reviewing another! PM me or post if you ever need one
Cool, I'll make sure to remember that and so will Noel. I like the part about trophies, I'll try using that in the next story. Look forward to more of your reviews!
Here to review as requested!
I've always sort of wondered about cowriting something but thought I'd probably be really rubbish at it (very controlling, sure my ideas are the best, like to lead, not great at teamwork [so basically the worst writing buddy imaginable]). But I think this works really well, with having the two voices and stuff. It reads really nicely.
I'd like to know a bit more about these two characters. Why does one of them go round giving out weird gifts that have strange affects on people, and why does the other collect up bits of souls? I almost wonder if you've chosen some famous characters from mythology or something. If so make it clearer, if not I want these two to be characterised more.
All the stuff about sould and ripping self apart kind of reminded me of Voldemort
Nice story subject, too. In conclusion of this section of the review, this was interesting and unique and a really good story;D
I'll give you separate writing style comments:
Sushi (italics)- I really like your writing style. You wrote some excellent stuff here. This line was especially good:
"I swear it will make your soul quiver and your bones clack."
Your grammar and spelling were good. Sentence structure was pretty good for most of the story but your opening line was a bit faulty:
"People. That’s the start of this entire story. Not so long ago in the streets of London."
The third sentence makes no sense. You need to reorder this and run some of the clauses together and stuff.
Sugar (non-italics)- You've got a good style too! I loved some of your bits. I have three little nitpicks for you, however!
"slutty bimbos."
They were prostitutes. Call them slutty prostitutes if you will, but not bimbos. Plus, the word bimbo feels out of place.
" as the last moments of their pitiful life drains away."
Pitiful feels a bit over the top. Also, it should just be drain, not drains.
Also, possessive apostrophes! You got it right some of the time but not all the time. This is how your last paragraph should look:
"Well, I managed to find all of Mary Ann Nichols' (I take it her surname is Nichols? If not, the apostrophe should be before the s) soul. I'm almost done with Annie Chapman’s soul, and I’ve already found most of Elizabeth Stride’s and Catherine Enddowes' (Is her surname Enddowes? If it's Enddowe, it should be Enddowe's) souls. Unfortunately for Mary Jane Kelly, I’ve only managed to find bits and pieces. He may have stolen some of her soul, but I highly doubt it."
OK, I hope I've helped! Nice little piece. I'll be more than happy to review anything else either of you post!
Thanks so much. We were planning to reveal who the characters were a throughout the other stories. We'll try to work on the grammar, we're grammatically challenged. Your review was very helpful.
Oh yeah, we also have fixed most of what you said, thank you again!
hehe, yeah, i told sushi that it should be "rats", buuut, she didn't listen. but don't matter now, but i feel "prostitute" doesn't flow well, so yeah. probably don't want to go and name the synonyms for prostitute..... what am i talking about?
soooooooooooooo sorry Noel! hee hee... *ducks under desk*
Glad to have helped:D Lovely little story
Thank you, we do hope that you get to critiquing our next work "Sloth", it should explain a little more about the "gifts" that are given out.
That is a very interesting story (the ending is kind of creepy) and it makes you wonder about who Jack the Ripper really was. The part about the souls? Makes you wonder... Keep up the good work! I'll be looking for more by you.
I'm glad that the end is creepy, I was so worried that it wouldn't be creepy enough. I hope that the next one will be just as good, Noel and I (Sushi) hope you like it just as much when it comes out.
This reminds me of an Emily Bronte novel but about Jack the Ripper! Its awesome !!! Keep it up I wanna read more! So I'll stay tuned and I wonder if there is a way I could follow the story and I get alerts or something :/ ? But mehhh It's a really good story...reminds me of Sweeney Todd also :L
We shall do our best, hope the bar isn't too high that we can't jump it. Maybe we'll try researching Sweeney Todd and Emily Bronte, we have never read them before. Thanks.
this is a good version of the eyes of the one that created jack the ripper. there is a London novel that you should read. its called Perfume and it if from the perspective of a serial killer in the 1600'ish.
this reminded me of it. you can if you with to continue this storyline. might help. keep up the good work
Cool, thanks. We'll check out the book, might help the creative flow, but this was going to be the only one with Jack the Ripper. We'll try to continue the flow with previously unsolved mysteries.