Young Writers Society

Hey Embers!

I'll have to be honest, it was really hard to read because it's all just in one big block paragraph, and mostly it was just describing the pain. I understand if you want to describe it as an intense shot of emotion and the physical sensations and all of that, but it's the: "Say it once, say it right!" writing rule.

Nether is totally right when he says that the pacing is completely off -- that's one reason you want to be as concise as possible, the other reason is that if your reader feels as though they keep reading on and on, and no progression to the story is being made, then they will skim through the piece, or they will stop reading.

You want to make sure that you are actually showing progression. Part of that can be that time is passing, part of that can also be revealing information. For example, I'm still not quite sure why this girl is feeling so much pain. This seems like this was written as a snippet of a novel or in the middle of some short story or something, and I'm not sure about the context of it. I'm not sure who is speaking in the beginning/or who she's addressing there at the end. There are too many names and too many characters and it's all in one block of text and therefore difficult to refer back to who's who. I'm not sure who all these people are who she is referring to, so clarifying and expanding on the actual story-telling aspect of this would be nice.

That being said - what you do well is staying in the mind of the character and to be able to be in her world so well that you can pull out her emotions, feelings, and thoughts is pretty cool thing to do!

Keep writing!

~ as always, Audy

Hey Embers! Black here for a Review Day Review!

First off, it appears that another impressive piece has crossed my path today! Your use of emotions, your wording, and your pace all mixed together here to make the perfect feel. Your emotions were extremely - I must stress the extremely – good. I'd guess that you're not overly familiar with writing things like this, but you still did a great job! A+

However, you do have problems, like all of us! Your main weaknesses, in my view, are in your grammar, spelling, and pace. Important things. Not the most important, but still critical. I'll do what I can here to knead them out of your work, but I must tell you: If you want to improve you have to take it upon yourself to act and solve your problems! I can't do everything!

So I'm going to start with Pace .

What exactly is your problem? Simple: This is an 800 something word section of a story (Mind you, that is incredibly small, just over 3 reg pages when properly spaced), in which you cover somewhere along the lines of 20 seconds of time. In these 800 something words you feed your readers pretty much nil as far as information (Real, solid stuff) about your story goes.

Look, every paragraph of your story should somehow advance the plot along some lines. Otherwise it is a failed piece of writing. In this section you repeat things a LOT, you put in information that really isn't important (Showing the same things in different ways mostly). I'd advise you to try to speed things up a bit. Don't explain how much she loves Harry. Show it. You can give us the basics, but let the more advanced details shine through in the actual actions and thoughts of the characters.

Next I'm goin to move on to Grammar and Spelling :

For some reason I'm feeling nit-picky today so I'll be mainly focusing on that type of thing. But to generalize your problem a bit, I'll see what I can do. First off, this piece is practically all 1 paragraph . . . That doesn't work. Ever. You HAVE to cut it down a bit. I used to write like this, years ago, so let me tell you, to save you a lot of grief, to cut the paragraph size down to preferably under 15 lines. Always. Also, something I'll add in about ellipses!

There are two types of ellipses and two ways to use them. Here's the first type using the first way 'txt ... txt' (No spaces between the periods) and the second type using the first way 'txt....Text'. Then here's the first type using the second way 'txt . . . txt' (With spaces between the periods) and here's the second type using the second way 'txt. . . .Txt'. Note the capitalization! Apply to your writing.

Now for that nit-picking! (Note: I'll take down what mistakes I can, but mind you that you have a good deal more than just these! It's up to you to get a grammar/spell checker and then read through it (out loud) and get the rest!

They all turned expectantly towards me, Alanna’s eyes met mine, there was pure terror in them that reflected my own. Say something <> they screamed.

I opened my mouth but nothing but a strangled cry escaped. I struggled to drag a shaky breath into my collasping lungs. It was if the splintered shards of my heart were sticking painfully into my throat.

This roaring pain, it was swallowing up everything, enveloping me, a tsunami of despair. I wanted to get out, to escape, I didn’t want to be me anymore, I didn’t want to be anyone anymore, the pain... the pain, the drumming it was growing louder.

Love and hate rose up inside of me like vomit and they intertwined, mixed together, and I couldn’t stand it.

They were filled with so much pain and lies and disgust and I love him and I love him and there were crows digging their claws into my chest and ripping it to pieces and I was falling and falling and it was all black and I couldn’t hear anything but the sounds of voices screaming and screaming and it was me, I wanted to s claw out everything, gouge out everything until there was nothing left.

Alanna’s full of worry and Annabel’s full of hate and Harry’s... Harry’s eyes.... I love him, I love him so much I wish I could give him the universe.

It was as if, they were both playing some cruel game, <> let’s see how many pieces we can break Cecily’s heart into before she breaks.