The official towered over me like two black pillars. The history of my life in two plastic carriers were stored away. I now was only a name and number: TOWERS 3215.
"Stand up I say!" bawled the man. I will never forget his face, those cold, cruel eyes. Was I to be treated like this? Me? What had I done? I was a mere victim of circumstance.
It had all started in Hampstead, London. I was about to sit my "A"levels when someone came into my life to change it forever: Liam. He was my mother's lover, tall, dark and handsome like a prince from a fairytale, his wasn't a fairytale ending though.
My parents had separated when I was barely ten, my dad left suddenly one day never to return, leaving a vast gap in my life. My mother had never considered marrying again that is until she met Liam. His words dripped compliments but also lies. He was dangerous but being with him was addictive.
Shortly after he moved into our house I realised Iwas falling in love. I saw no ill in him, I could tell he was flattered by the fact, Icouldn't hide my feelings. One night mum had gone out, we were alone. I felt guilty, terribly guilty. My mum deserved another chance, another chance to be happy. He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me towards him…I had no choice but to submit, my heart dictated that. My mum sensed my unease:
"What's the matter pet?"
"Oh, nothing mum, I'm not feeling too good that's all."
"Do you want to lie down?"
"Yes, I think I will." I felt unwell each morning, then I knew: Liam was going to be a father.
Of course I couldn't tell mum the truth, but he knew and let me carry the weight of my conscience alone. His sickly sweet words were used on mum. She had no idea, no idea at all. My hormones made me feel fuzzy, at times I couldn't think straight and I knew that soon I wouldn't be able to hide the child that lay inside me. My actions before had been fuelled by an intense desire to please Liam but now the feeling had mutated to something much more destructive. He had no time for me now.
It didn't take much time to tip me over the edge. Jealousy, a raging fire in me led me that night. I could hear them giggling in mum's bedroom. I turned up the radio to drown the sound but I couldn't stop thinking, thinking about him. I put on my favourite baseball boots and the flat cap with the flower on it. The bedroom door opened easily.
"What do you think you're doing?" Liam demanded
"I've come to tell mum…"
"Get out of here!"
"What are you talking about?" my mum asked pathetically
"Mum, it's…" He leapt at me but caught his foot on the rug, the sound was like a pumpkin splitting…
I will expect no visitors. Now I am only a name and number: TOWERS 3215
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125,018 Literary Works • 672,861 Reviews
Hey Shell!
I guess I should start off by welcoming you to the site! I hope you'll enjoy yourself here.
Alright, it's been quite a while since I've been doing any sort of reviewing, so I felt I should tackle some sort of short story.
Your story confuses me though. Especially because I'm unsure whether or not it's a short story or not. If it is, I'll come forth and say it's not that good, and if it's instead some sort of start to a longer work, then I'll have to say you've caught my interest.
That is, if it is a short story, then it's very unclear, confusing, and it's lacking a whole bunch of storytelling elements, such as connection to the characters, the world, and its overarching plot. If this is the introduction to some longer work of fiction, then it's...interesting.
First off, I like your title. It catches your attention.
And you start the entire piece off with this. We're immediately treated to some mystery as to what on earth has happened to this person. Why TOWERS? What does that mean?
Then you follow this up with a personal account of an event of some sort, which ultimately then sends this character on the path to becoming TOWERS 3215.
As I said, if you're setting up some larger story here, I'll have to give you some points for at least tickling my interest. I want to know more. Which is essentially what I'd recommend for this piece. More. Write more for it. Give us more information. Expand more on these characters and give your main character more personality. Write more of her thoughts as these things are happening. As of right now, I don't really care about her, I just want to know how she ends up where she is.
And adding more could really only help. The piece is very short as it is.
I'll more on to some negative sides issues I'd work on in it:
Your dialogue is very stunted. It doesn't flow naturally, and it feels as if I'm just reading lines, not characters interacting with each other. In addition to this, you make no use of dialogue tags, which would really breathe life into your dialogue and essentially help a lot with your initial dialogue issues. They wouldn't be as stunted.
Another thing I'd love for you to add would be some more descriptions. Describe these scenes more, the house, the bedrooms, all of it. Write enough in there to make the reader feel like they're in the world, like they can picture it in their head. Add familiar things to the house, describe smells, feelings. We need more!
This is an odd description. Wouldn't one pillar suffice? I know the 'history of my life' was stored away in two plastic carriers, which could indicate the two pillars, but they were stored away, right? If not, with the man holding them or something to that effect, wouldn't it be three pillars? Either way, it's awkward.
Edit
There are several times in your piece where you should easily put in a semicolon. Not too necessary here, but I'll just use this first one as an example. Love the semicolon.
This line is messy. I'm not exactly sure what you mean when you say 'about to sit my "A" levels'.
Edit
Quick edit and suggestion for this line. It read a bit off. Added a semicolon (it fits even better here!), and changed up the final line a bit.
Edit
Added a quick semicolon again.
Edit
Added a comma.
There needs to be a space between 'I' and 'was'. This recurs several times.
Suggestion
I'd replace the comma with this short word.
This all sounds terribly convoluted. She wants her mother to be happy, yet she does this? And I'm not a fan of the 'I had no choice but to submit' part, especially when it's directly followed up with 'my heart dictated that'. But then again, I guess you're setting this character up to be not too good.
Really awkward way to enter into this dialogue between them. Add more to it and remove the need for a colon.
Edit
Added a comma. I would also really suggest that you include dialogue tags into these. They have no flow.
I'll actually leave a great link here to a Writer's Digest blog concerning dialogue tags:
"Read this!" He implored.
I really like the way you wrote this. Simple, but easy. I can picture this small scene pretty well.
Edit
Missed a period at the end. This scene really demands (hah!) more description. He just demands this? What does he do? Does he flinch up from the bed? Does he yell? Is he imposing? So much we need here, and all we get is 'Liam demanded'. Moooore.
Uuuh, what?
You have some more missing periods. A lot of descriptions are needed, especially to be put into dialogue tags, which are often empty, and the dialogue itself is as I said earlier, very stunted.
I bring up a lot of smaller issues, in addition to the larger issues mostly because I've always felt repetition and hammering in details is among the best ways of improving your writing. It certainly helped for me. And when I mention things like you forgetting a period here and there, I mostly just do so because in the end, I'd urge you to proofread anything you write and publish. It will often yield huge, glaring errors that you didn't notice before, as we're often excited to get what we've just written out there.
Okay final line. I'm not sure whether I like the fact that we never learn her true name. In a way, we don't connect with her through her real name; we don't really get to know what she's lost. On the other hand, I kind of like the idea that if you continue this, we might never hear her real name. It's a mystery to us. I'm torn.
I see a lot of potential in your writing, Shell! You have a lot of issues you need to work out and your writing can improve a whole bunch. But, I get the impression that you might be fairly young. Which is good! Either way, you've found your way to YWS, and your writing is only going to get better and better.
Lastly, I'm sorry for rambling on in this review. It feels as if I haven't reviewed something in ages. It'll probably be a few before I get back into it again.
I hope you continue this story, Shell. I'd definitely want to read more of it.
Keep it up, Shell!
Cheers,
Birkhoff
Birkhoff, thanks for all your input and the time it must have taken you to write. Do you have stories posted here?
I think the strongest part of this story is your inner monologue; your character's thought process is clearly defined in an intriguingly captivating way, it creates a very powerful narrative that's fun to read. You have an interesting mind for coming up with unique similes as well, such as "like a pumpkin splitting". I'd like to see you incorporate more of those...I think the concept is interesting, your main character has a sympathetic backstory and interesting relationship with the other characters.
The actual dialogue sort of falls flat, because it lacks emotion. I'd like you to better describe how these characters are saying these things, what their faces look like, what their emotions are. I hope you would better describe what happens at the end, I found it a bit confusing of what was going on.
Thank you so much for your review. I'm sorry the ending wasn't clear.The stimulus for the writing was actually an image of a young teen crouched on the ground with a plastic bag. She is flanked by two darkly dressed policemen. Her mother is devastated at losing Liam so chooses to blame her daughter for his death and she ends up just being "TOWERS 3215" as she is in a juvenile institution for young offenders.