Thomas woke to the sound of a tree falling near by. He didn't think anything of it due to the fact that him and his girlfriend have been living in the middle of a lush, green forest for awhile. He gets closer to Thalia and places his toned, muscular arm over her soft, smooth sleeping body, and just as he starts to drift back to sleep, he hears the horses whining. He groans as he gets up to see what’s bothering them. In doing so, he stirs his girlfriend from her sleep; “What... what are you doing up?”
“Going to check on the horses, be right back,” he simply replies. Thomas walks out of the room into the hallway, passing by all of the pictures that hold so many memories in them. Memories like the first time he took Thalia horseback riding, the trip they took to ice castle in Canada, and a picture of them at his brother’s wedding. He runs his hand along the wood walls he built for himself and Thalia four years ago, as he walks into the living room and over to the gun case. Thomas grabs a shotgun, pulls on his boots, and walks out the door.
He stands on the porch in the moonlight where Thalia and him sit to watch the stars on most clear nights. He looks up at the hill that is bare of all trees and grass, except the one tree that has their initials encircled by a heart that they carved seven years before when they first started dating. He inhales the night air but stops suddenly, “Smoke.”
Thomas climbs to the top of the nearest tree and looks around. He sees the fire and how fast it’s spreading, coming closer and closer to the house. “Shit,” he thinks to himself as he jimmies his way back down the tree. He grabs his gun that was resting against the base of the tree, and as he runs inside he yells out “Thalia, get up! Forest fire! We have to get to the top of the hill! NOW!”
She jumps out of bed, her blood ice cold with fear, as she quickly grabs for her pack that’s filled with emergency supplies and an extra set of clothes. Thomas rushes into the room and grabs his pack, handing it to her. “Go get the horses ready. I’ll be right behind you, I promise!” Thalia scurries outside at full speed, passing that blank spot in the hallway where she hoped one day would be filled with a picture of their wedding day, and gets the horses ready to go.
Thomas stops at that empty spot on the wall, and pushes a hidden button. The secret compartment opens and he grabs the ring box out of it. The ring box that has the engagement ring he was going to use to propose to Thalia tomorrow, on their eighth anniversary. He slips the box into the pocket of his shorts and closes the secret compartment.
When he gets outside, he takes his pack from her, placing it on his back as he swings himself up onto his horse. They ride up to the top of the hill, dodging trees and running from the fire that follows close behind. Once at the top they dismount, tying the horses’ lead lines to the tree.
As the flames engulf their house and the forest around them Thomas gets down on one knee. Pulling the ring box from his pocket, he says “Thalia, I have been in love with you for what seems like forever. And now we have practically lost everything we own, but we still have eachother. Will you marry me?”
She throws herself onto him, tackling him to the ground, “Yes, I will marry you! It took you long enough to ask!”
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141,367 Literary Works • 674,382 Reviews
Heya! TriSARAHtops here for a review!
This was a short but sweet story. I've found a few quibbles to point out, then I'll get into a more holistic critique.
Just quickly, most of the story was written in present tense, except for the first couple of sentences (you've switched between past and present in the middle of this one). An easy fix but it does jump out at the reader. I also felt like this sentence was a bit longer and dragging than it could have been. Maybe get rid of 'due to the fact' and chuck a semicolon after 'anything of it'. You should also have 'he' instead of 'him' - at the moment it isn't grammatically correct.
Think you meant 'the ice castle' or 'an ice castle'
It just feels like the wording is a bit iffy here. Also you should say 'he and Thalia' rather than 'Thalia and him'. Perhaps you could split this sentence up a bit with some punctuation, reword it or make it into two sentences. It's up to you how you do this.
You've been writing from the male character's perspective for the rest of the story, so it felt kind of weird that you switched to Thalia's here. It made it a bit confusing. Maybe describe how she looks instead of feels in order to show that she's scared.
The '-ay' sound is really repetitive here, maybe reword it?
This felt a bit rushed. I know you said you wrote this for school, and maybe you had tim restraints, but this really did feel like it was rushed, which was a shame, because it's a lovely moment, and at the moment it feels forced. If you plan on going back to this story, maybe stretch this part out with some description. Also, 'each other' is two words.
Now that they're out of the way, this was quite a good story. To be honest, it felt a little rough and unpolished at times, but nothing that couldn't be fixed with editing. You've done an absolutely excellent job in terms of pacing, and aside from what I said above, it didn't feel rushed, which can be a trap when a story is as short as this.
You included some good characterisation - not so much in terms of personality, but certainly in terms of the characters' relationship and histories. The fact that you were able to convey that in such a small space of time without info-dumping was really admirable. Their relationship seemed believable from very early on.
If you plan on sticking with and expanding on this story, let me know, because I'd be glad to look at it. Same goes if you have any questions. Keep up the good work!
Thanks so much for the great review! I really appreciate it, and shall take your advice into consideration. ^_^
Hi! Here to give you a review on this cute (but short) story! First off, the only grammatical mistakes that I noticed were with the words he, himself, and him. You mixed those up a couple times, and once you put himself in front of Thalia, which should have been the other way around. It's the silly courtesy rule... Anyway, I really liked this story, it was simple and pretty. And the secret compartment? So cool! It's awesome that you put that in there in the middle of all the fire drama. Well, this is a really short review, but it's so great, I have nothing else to say! Keep writing!
PeanutPhoebe
Thanks for your opinion, it matters a lot to me what people think.
RoyalHighness has arrived to review!
Nitpicks
"Nearby," should be one word.
"Him and his girlfriend," should be "he and his girlfriend."
You changed your tense. "Have," should be "had," if you're going to stick to past tense. And if you're going for present tense, then, "woke," and "didn't," should be "wakes," and "doesn't."
Need a comma between "smooth," and "sleeping."
Did you mean "horses whinnying?"
You put a semicolon after "stirs his girlfriend from her sleep." Did you mean to put a period or a colon? I don't understand that punctuation, but maybe it's just you using your poetic license. If that's the case, leave it alone.
You need some dialogue attribution here. It's really confusing to go from description, description, description to suddenly just, "Smoke." Give me some details: how does he say it? What does he do while he says it or after he says it?
Also, you always need a comma on the last word before dialogue. Example: He yells out, "Go get the horses ready."
You need to put a paragraph break every time someone talks. That separates what the person is saying from what the person is doing, and makes the dialogue a lot easier to read.
Okay, that was a lot of nitpicking, but never fear! It's better to have lots of little problems than a few big ones.
Other Stuff
So, after reading Stephen King's book On Writing I've hated using adverbs to modify dialogue attributions. So things like, "simply replies," or "says quickly," grate on my eyes. Just putting that out there: if you have to spell it out to the reader how the person is saying something, your dialogue is not powerful enough. Your job is to show the reader how they're saying it rather than just telling them.
As for the story itself, it's cute. You do a good job of keeping the ball going, but you don't make me really care about the characters much. I mean, if Thomas died in the fire I wouldn't have even blinked. I know it's for school and it's only supposed to be 600 words or something, but make some of those 600 show us why we should care about Thomas and Thalia, and why we want them to survive.
You need to kind of break up the proposal speech a bit. It sounds a bit too robotic, if you will. And let me know how Thomas is feeling when he proposes to Thalia! I mean, they've been waiting to get married for eight years! This is a big deal! What's he feeling? What's she feeling? Nervous? Excited? Scared? That'll tie into making me care about them: the more I see them feeling, the more I want them to continue feeling. Does that make sense?
Overall
So overall, this was pretty good. Like I said, you did really well keeping the story going and not letting it flop or stop to take a breath, which was good for what's happening. Don't let the nitpicks bog you down; the story is what matters, anyway, and the story was adorable! I'm a sucker for a good romance. I like the repetition of the walls and the pictures, too. That gave me an insight into Thomas and Thalia's life together so far. And the details, like how Thomas built the house himself and how Thalia is saving a place on the wall for their wedding, those things showed me how invested these people are in each other, and it made me care a little more than I did in the beginning.
Overall, good job. As per my usual reviewing style, I'll rate your story on a scale of one to ten stars, and I give your story six stars out of ten! Good job!
**Keep Writing!**
Thank you for the awesome review! I shall definitely take your advice into consideration!