Young Writers Society

Hi Sunny-duckling! Welcome to YWS! I saw your second chapter in the Green Room and wanted to leave one here too

So, I wanted to leave some general comments about writing that might be helpful for your as you continue practicing and writing your story.

The first thing is about tense. As another reviewer noted, there are a couple of times in this story where the tense flipped between present and past, but it looks like the majority of it is written in present tense. You likely know that you want to be careful not to switch tenses in the middle of the story, but what you might not know is how your choice of tense can affect how it's being read.

For instance, a story written in present tense really emphasizes the here and now of it, as the reader is reading the events as they happen. I personally find it more difficult to write in present tense because it can limit your ability to play with time (ie if you have a second character perspective, you want to make sure everything stays chronological) and it can make pacing the story more difficult. By contrast, a story written in past tense gives it a more story-teller feeling, with the reader in a more passive role. It gives you a lot more space to explore the setting and the characters and the world because you don't have to worry about keeping up with the action. This is definitely something you want to consider when choosing your tense, because it's all up to the type of story you want to tell!

As I mentioned in the previous paragraph, one of the hang ups with present tense is it can sometimes make setting the pace difficult. I felt like this showed in your piece, because the pacing here felt very fast, and added to the fact that it was written in present tense it made it difficult for me to follow. In the first four paragraphs, an entire day passed, and by the fifth paragraph, Ashley was already finished with school. To me, this feels way too fast. Most scenes are several hundred words in length and each paragraph is only minute apart so that you can slow down and focus on details like setting, appearances, characters, etc. I really felt like a lot of that set up was lost and we were rushed into this plot about a shadow that we had no idea about.

My suggestion here would be to take a step back and try to challenge yourself to write out at least one full scene. Take the first paragraph, for example. Ashley sees a shadow out of the corner of her eye. But what was she doing? You say that she was walking down the hall, but what else? Does she have books in her hands and she's worried about her homework (to show us that she is studious/intelligent)? Is she walking with and talking to some of her friends (to show her charisma/popularity)? What is her internal thought process just before and right after she sees the shadow? Take a little bit more time to flesh this out and characterize Ashley so that we, as readers, can start to identify with her. That will help out later on when you're trying to build suspense and fear, since this is a horror story.

Plot wise, I'm interested in this strange phenomenon that Ashley is seeing and what that would mean for her. The main issue I have is that the pacing (which I talked about before) makes me not really know about Ashley as a character. What are her motives? Why does she care? This makes me wonder why I, as a reader, should care. I want to be invested in her, to get scared when she's scared, so giving more details would really help with that!

The other thing that I had a slight issue with is that Ashley just decides to sleep in the woods, and no one comes looking for her? Does she not have a cell phone that she could call someone? Did she not notice that it was getting slightly dark out or even think about how far in the woods she was going? If these are intentional things, it would help to bring attention to them and maybe Ashley brushes them off because she doesn't think it's important, or she's just that impulsive. Make these discrepancies seem intentional!

Let me know if you have any further questions, and I apologize if this came across as harsh. I did like your idea and I'm interested in reading onwards (since I'll go look at the next part now!), I just wanted to give you my thoughts as I read through your story.

Best of luck writing ~
-Wolfe

Good Morning/Afternoon/Evening/Night(whichever one it is in your part of the world),

Hi! I'm Knight Hardy here on a mission to ensure that all works on YWS has at least two reviews. You will probably never see this but....Imma do this anyway.

First Impression: So this sounds like a pretty interesting concept. So far I'm loving the stuff that's happening in it. This shadow figure is very mysterious and she's reacting to it very realistically and all of that's great to see. But I do have nitpicks.

Anyway let's get right to it,

Ashley walks down the hall of school, and in the corner of her eye she sees a shadow run the opposite direction. She jumps a bit from the random shadow. “What was that?” she questioned as she continued her way down the hall. Off she goes to her favorite class! “Hm what should i read today, horror? Or fantasy?” she chuckles to herself of course she knew her answer! “Fantasy of course”

She smiles as she sits down at her spot greeting her english teacher “good morning Miss Woods!” she smiles happily. Miss woods chuckles “now good morning Ashley, as happy as ever huh? And you seemed a couple minutes later than usual. Is everything alright?” She looks at her a bit worried. “Oh im well Miss Woods, I just swore I saw something in the hall, and I looked and nothing was there, gave me a little spook is all!” she smiles. Miss woods chuckles “oooh maybe it was a creature of a night life” miss woods knew about the past of this world. She also enjoys fantasy as well, so she finds that type of humor quite funny.

As kids began to run into class, right before the bell rang, then class started. It is now hours later, she had just finished her last class of the day “woohoo! I lived through another day!” she giggles to herself, and starts to make her way home.

It's quite hard to tell if she sees something if it's really there or not, because most often. She gets the feeling she's being watched, it's very uncomfortable. But she just ends up rubbing it off. She gets to her street, and again in the corner of her eye an even bigger shadow at least two times the size of the other one, and she sees it from inside her house! She quietly walks to her front door and swings it open. To once again find nothing. Nothing at all as she walks around looking for anything. “ what is happening to me”

The next day seemed quite normal, nothing seemed crazy. She was still surprised by what she saw the day before “Should i tell mom?” she begins to question herself and what she's seeing, or how she can sometimes feel like she's being watched. Maybe it's all just in her head? But how could she know? “Next i see something, im following it, i don't care what i'm doing i need to figure all of this out” she says to herself in art class her 5th hour class. “I can't take this, i can not question myself now, i must just figure it out for myself”

After school she sits at home reading, like normal. As she is also on the side, she begins to just rant on paper. This time it's just too quiet for comfort, she gets the feeling to look around, as she does so she sees something. Then she hides behind a wall but is still looking around the doorframe to see if it is still there, it's slowly becoming less visible, so she just goes with her gut and follows it closely. Making sure she doesn't get seen she has to stay distant anyway from it so she can still see it but it doesn't see her.

She watches it as it literally looks like someone walking around. But weirdly it looks like it's frantically trying to search for someone. Or as if they are lost, she chuckles a bit. Not knowing or understanding what it's doing. It very quickly turns its head back. She jumps back to hide herself from its sight “oh my goodness that was so close” she breathes heavily and talks quietly to herself.

At this point she has gotten deep in the woods, of course somewhere she has no idea about, very far from home. “Well, the no going back choice, happened a long time ago” she whispers to herself again, and continues to carefully follow it.

She ends up standing right in front of a huge boulder with leaves covering it, she looks up and down very confused as for this is where the shadow went “where am i” she looks around. “ that “thing” walked straight into this thing, it's not like there's anything here, it's just a big rock” she kicks it a little aggressive “ah! That kinda pisses me off” she grinds her teeth, looking around in the woods, having clearly no idea of where she was “crap, now i gotta make a place to sleep here its getting dark, and no way i'm gonna get lost in the forest again” she begins to find tree branches and makes a shelter “ ah this was all me “ i should find out for myself” she mocked herself, as she started to drift off.

She wakes up to the feeling of eyes being on her, as she jumps out of her poorly made shelter, soaking wet “ Who are you? I can hear you!” she yells a bit shaking, as she quiets down “ gosh dang it, it was raining all night, i hated that, i got like no sleep” she starts to rub her eyes as she sees the figure of a person standing almost right in front of her, and she jumps back.

Hello! Here are my thoughts!

She jumps a bit from the random shadow.

She smiles as she sits down at her spot, greeting her English teacher, “Good morning Miss Woods!” she says happily.

Miss Woods chuckles. “Now good morning Ashley, happy as ever, huh? And you seemed a couple minutes later than usual. Is everything alright?” She looks at her a bit worried.

“Oh, I’m well Miss Woods, I just swore I saw something in the hall, and I looked and nothing was there, gave me a little spook is all!”

As kids began to run into class, right before the bell rang, then class started. It is now hours

Then she hides behind a wall but is still looking around the doorframe to see if it is still there, it's slowly becoming less visible, so she just goes with her gut and follows it closely. Making sure she doesn't get seen she has to stay distant anyway from it so she can still see it but it doesn't see her.

She watches it as it literally looks like someone walking around. But weirdly it looks like it's frantically trying to search for someone. […] It very quickly turns its head back.

she starts to rub her eyes as she sees the figure of a person standing almost right in front of her, and she jumps back.