/lit/ - Literature

>>5801915
Hey pal, that was actually me. My last thread didn't really stay afloat so I hadn't started another.

If you post something of yours, I'd be happy to critique it, in the mean time:

http://pastebin.com/8raSw42z
This is a rough section of my work, I haven't gotten around to polishing it yet, but I'd like to know how it stands as is.

It's someone trashy genre fiction so the scene is set in a medieval-esque city

>>5802012
Hopefully this thread works out. It might set a precedent. As for me, I'm just critiquing because I have time right now. Here goes.

Your story is interesting so far, and your style is at times weirdly unique, like with
>polished marble chipped from inebriated accidents
>The tavern past crowded with the sober, the present thinned by the leaving drunk.
These keep the reader's attention, or at least they kept mine.

But in general your writing is hard to get through. You don't always use tense very well, for instance, and you also tend to confuse your frames of references. For tense,
> "This is our station!" A guardsman shout, his armor creaking from silvers scales
a guardsman shouted
>I noticed an abomination. The guard's partner attempted to defile the alter
partner was attempting to defile
>The man squint his untrusting eyes, picking one up and opening it to toll the coin.
The man squinted
>I wondered to myself, exactly, how much time had I wasted cleaning up that wine cellar's disarray?
This bit is spoken in retrospect, so it should use present tense. "I wonder to myself, exactly, how much time have I wasted..."
>I tried counting the minutes
I try
>memories of those moments I could recall
I can recall

As for reference, you refer to the bartender as "the woman", "the bartender", and "Ariolda" without introducing either of the latter two names. As a result, at
>The bartender called, reaching out in disappointment. "Stop! That ain't—"
you confuse the reader

http://pastebin.com/aZAgi6QG

>>5802329
Thanks, I appreciate your thoughts.

Yeah this is a rough section. I somewhat abuse the tense because I really focus on the flow of each sentence. I'll see if I can rework that.

>>5802329
Continuing with reference, at
>It slid across the counter as I tossed it off. ”So, do you have anyone to help you carry in the barrels?"
>Each step creaked
you suddenly change scene without introducing the change. It's disorientating. You do the same at
>"Tell me, where do you keep your rags?"
>I wondered to myself, exactly, how much time had I wasted cleaning up that wine cellar
And at
>Ariolda shook her head
you give the bartender a name without introducing it. It's acceptable here, because we've seen the bartender long enough to assume that Ariolda is her, but introducing it doesn't hurt.

Aside from these two points there are a few minor issues in your piece.
>creaking from silvers scales gliding together
"creak" doesn't really go with "glide", although that's a creative choice on your part

>alter
altar

>Of course, the gods would not allow such a thing and only splatters of the liquid would leak.
tense here is unclear. I presume you mean "the gods would not allow such a thing" (general rule) "and splatters of the liquid leaked" (what is happening)

>I withdrew my weapon—a chalice that rest on a windowsill.
"withdrew" contradicts the meaning of "draw" you invoke here. Also "rested" not "rest"

>wooden beams that have seen better days
that had

>Three weeks, you crone. You are consistently late
"consistently" is too high-register for an angry brew merchant to use

>"And he tried to take yours too!"
Maybe "but not yours too, at least" would be clearer

>>5802352
...Holy shit

>>5802381
This should be my last post on your piece.

> "Here, let me ta—"
"Here, let me—" is better

>trailing off until sounding nervous and dejected
until she sounded

>A boot propped in a chair and what's concerning is that it was tied.
"A boot propped on a chair, tied" might be better. If the fact that it was tied is as concerning as you say it is then the reader should be able to pick it up.

That seems to be it. Otherwise, though, your writing is very creative at times, to its benefit. Keep it up.

>>5802329
>>5802381
>>5802396
Thank you much, I didn't expect it to be so in depth. Can't say I disagree with any of it, best I can do is say it's stylistic choices.

I'll drop by and critique somebody else's work when I get the chance later today. Good luck with your thread!

>>5802352
This is a lot to process. I'll start with general impressions.

Your writing is very complex, and that is not a bad thing, but a lot of it, especially the the alliteration and rhyme and damn sesquipedalian words you put in, feels forced. It's as if you're deliberately trying to sound professional by throwing in long words. As a result, it doesn't read as naturally written. And when you use a complex style like this you run the risk of turning readers away. I would not have read through this had I not been running this thread.

Aside from that your clauses run on one another a lot. Most of it remains grammatically correct, but it's difficult to read. And there are instances when you do actual comma splices, like
>Laughs can be heard, clearly Frederick is the preferred seller in this room, not Jim.
Fix them.

Finally, your narrator is unbearably obnoxious. Cut down on the swearing and give him an actual reason to hate everyone around him, unless you want the readers to hate him too. This is the big problem here. The narrator's voice already predisposes me to dislike him; add to that the forced complicated style of the piece and I just feel like dismissing it as shit before getting even halfway through. You should tone them both down. And not just the narrator's unjustified hate either: he goes on this paragraph rant about Adam Smith. I like Adam Smith too, but there's no need to include that bit unless it is relevant to the story later on.

>>5802581
Sure, yeah the narrator is a character in the story, I don't necessarily want the reader to like him. He loves Adam Smith, and will be converted to a better philosophy based on this later on in the story, but yeah he's not necessarily supposed to be well liked.

Kind of like Patrick Bateman.

And that's just the way I write, I mean it's all off the top of my head.

>>5802581
>>5802613
Although your piece is generally correct I did also notice you using
>it's
to mean "that which belongs to it". The correct form is "its".

A few more issues:

>Central compunction is confounded
This line might sound nice but it literally does not make sense.

>"Haha I'm doing fine" that passive-aggressive draw to his tone. I fucking hate that shit.
>"Well, can you tell me how it is you make a sale?"
Separating these two lines even though they are by the same speaker causes confusion.

>the obvious, intractable truth: he's bilingual.
I don't think that's a correct using of "intractable", although of course you are free to be creative and call it style. Or were you looking for something like "ineluctable"?

>The room immediately is in approval, we've sold short-term medical before
More comma splicing

I personally feel the over-the-top style you use is detrimental to your work, but despite that there are moments when you style really is very nice. For instance,
> like an elegant bull in a china shop, completely noticed
>Don't drop the soap. I drop the marker and pick it up
>the verdant leas and garden P's

I highly suggest using a simpler and more direct style. And cut down on the swear words and the immaturity of the narrator. For all that it is competent work, and if this style is not forced but natural for you then, well, keep using it.

{1}

Jonathan put down the copy of Dorian Gray and sighed. He felt himself stuck in a time that was no longer the same as his youth. He felt now, since he started working as a dishwasher, he was in a different dimension, than say, three or four years ago.

Now he was paying his way; paying his rent; paying his drink; in one way, he had become a man. He's doing it. He would look in the mirror and say, "Look at me, I'm a man now; I can take girls out; I can afford premiums for health insurance; I can start a Roth IRA."

He did this mostly at noon. He worked a shift that started at four in the afternoon and ended, usually, around midnight - though on less busy days he may come home around eleven-thirty. This enabled his nocturnal life-style; a life-style he was already, seemingly genetically, predisposition to. He would look at himself, his reflection, and think these things. He would think of his mom, whom he could now send nice gifts over the internet, for her birthday, by using his US bank account to pay for a flower delivery service where she lived - and he grew up - that included balloons, a stuffed bear, and a box of the nice chocolates. This fulfilled him; made him feel well; he looked at himself and said, "This is what it's about; I'm doing it; look at me world, I am unstoppable."

But something was wrong. Something had changed. He found himself, while scrubbing away the Teriyaki sauce out of the endless supply of ramekins, musing over his childhood, his friendships, past and present, and his current living situation - he began planning a move from his already clustered rented room (an old fraternity building that was bought out by an old Chinese man, who sublet the rooms separately) to a more professional two-bedroom just down the street. He thought of the girl - Sam - whom he would move in with. Sam being a lesbian - albeit they had hooked up a few times by now, and he feeling, despite their long friendship, that maybe there was something romantic there, and that possibly he was entering a sort of "danger zone," - he didn't want to corrupt their intimate friendship or the day-to-day telling of their lives. Here he had a friend that was loyal, and whom he could be himself around, and he feared, that by moving into a space together, maybe, this could complicate the relationship - especially now that they had been engaging in very prolonged, bitter, angsty sex, that left both parties with scrapes (some choking, and certainly clawing.) He valued their friendship, and was very worried about sullying the relationship they had curated.

{2}

One other thing bothered him, was his back. His horrible posture had always been a sad point of insecurity he would struggle with. Though not awful, his back was noticeably arched. He felt this gave him a sort of Jewish look, which appealed to his liking of Allen Ginsberg. He felt at one time he looked more of a slick Bob Dylan (his hair usually somewhat long and curly) and now he saw himself more as a Charles Bukowski, coming home, arching over a keyboard, drinking a beer, covered in food from the night of dishwashing. But it was an awful thing, and it seemed to grow as the years went by. It was almost like, how you hear, when someone is bulimic / anorexic, they have delusions of weight when seeing themselves; he felt this may be the case with his mirror brooding. Long looking into the reflection, noticing a steeper arch than before, his butt popping out, he felt he had womanly curves, because of his drastic posture. He would hold his shirt forward, causing the thread to tighten around his spine, further accenting his back.

On Monday, his day off, he met a friend, Daniel, that he would usually buy Adderall from. He enjoyed taking it liberally though it was always under the presumption of completing a task. "Productive," he thought, in justifying its use to himself, "Always productive." His plan of action was to pick up from Daniel, head home, work on his current writing project for at least a few hours, and, if it wasn't too late, see if Sam was still up. He met Daniel in downtown Seattle in Pioneer square after taking the 48 bus from the University District. Daniel was off, Jonathan could feel something strange going on, like something wasn't right - Daniel was bug eyed, he was chomping away at some invisible fruit, kind of twitchy.

"Dude, John," Daniel said.
"Man do I have something you gotta try out, you know what we've been talking about? - consciousness; tapping into the either; feeling the people around you; becoming receptive - this is it, I've found it. I'm the goddamn Ubermensch."
"Wo," Jonathan said.
"What's going on? - what are you on? - you look crazy, if I didn't know you already I'd guess you we're a regular around here."
"No, John, listen," Daniel said.
"I bought some Meth. It's Adderall, but, like, beyond that. It's the real deal; the bee's knees," Daniel shook his head back as if he had suddenly been startled. "My God," he said. "Do you realize that the freckles on your cheeks reflect your zodiac sign?"
"What, the scales?" Jonathan said.
"You're out of your mind."
"No, no, no, John, look, I'm honest here, come with me. Hurry!"

Daniel took Jonathan by the arm and lead him to a parking garage a block away. They waited by a wall and watched a security guard walk past them and disappear down the street. Daniel shushed Jonathan as the guard walked by, putting his index finger over his lips. "Alright," Daniel said. "Let's head for the bathrooms."

{3}

In the bathroom Daniel pulled out a bag that contained five rocks of what looked like salt.
"Check it out," Daniel broke up a piece off of one rock and put it in a small glass pipe that looked as if it may double as a small, personal, flower vase. It was a long tube with a bulbous bowl, and, a small hole adorning the bowl. He put a small bit of flower in the vase-like pipe and handed it to Jonathan.
"Alright man," he said. "I'm going to have to light it for you - there's a trick to it - but as I light it, you're going to drag - very, very slowly - and, I mean, you're going to see the smoke start to swirl around in this little bulby part - it's gorgeous really, some of thickest smoke you'll ever see - and you're going to slowly drag and notice this swirl like you're a vacuum and do it for like a few seconds and exhale. Do not hold this in your lungs. This isn't like weed," Daniel leaned forward to Jonathan.
"Seriously," he said.
"Do not hold this in for long."
"Why?" Jonathan asked.
"It'll crystallize your lungs," Daniel said.
"What? - what does that even mean?"
"Honestly," Daniel said, holding the pipe up to Jonathan's mouth, now prepped and ready, "I don't know, but, I've been told it's not good, probably really, really bad - so, you know, just try not to do it, alright?"
Jonathan nodded and took the pipe.
"Ok," Daniel said.
"I'm going to light it, and as I light it, you'll see the smoke come up; after the smoke comes up I'm going to turn it ten-to-two like, like how you're suppose to drive, you know, and you just pull slowly, OK?"
Daniel lighted the pipe now in Jonathan's mouth and proceeded to turn it as he said. The smoke started to swirl and Daniel gave Jonathan the kind of go ahead to start pulling. Jonathan pulled for almost ten seconds and Daniel pulled the pipe away, "Alright, let it go!" Daniel said, "Let it go! Let it go! Let it go!"
Jonathan exhaled a large cloud of smoke and saw the curiosity and excitement in Daniel's eyes, and instantly felt a head change and had a strange feeling of courage. He felt like he was a video game character that had just uncovered a potion and was receiving full health; but, most of all, he felt an awareness and sharp perception of life he hadn't experienced since he was a child.
"Wo," Jonathan said.
"What is going?"
"Welcome back John," Daniel said.
"You're alive again!" And Daniel gave Jonathan a big hug and gripped him real tight-like. Jonathan looked in the mirror at the two of them. They were both really young, early twenties, and the bathroom looked so dingy, but still, picture-esque, in some awful, avant-garde, bohemian kind of way. He felt rebellious and edgy; he felt a surplus of motivation and vigor - a surplus of morale.

{4}

"Daniel," Jonathan said.
"I feel like I can do anything. I feel like I could complete the project I've been working on; I feel like I could write an entire book right now.
"Yea man," Daniel said.
"It's like tapping into the Entropy, and converting it, instantly."
He looked instantly into Jonathan's eyes.
"We've found free-energy, John," Daniel said.
"We're goddamn Nikola Tesla," Jonathan said.
"We're Don Quixote," Daniel said.
"We're Kerouac Jack and we're not coming back," Jonathan said.
"We're Ken Kesey, and we're taken it easy," Daniel said.
Dude," Jonathan said.
"Go tell it on the mountain, I'm James Baldwin."
"What," Daniel said.
"You're black and gay?"
"Only when I'm debating if the American dream is at the expense of the American negro against the late William F. Buckley Jr. - at the Cambridge Union, of course."
"The last chance of the right," Daniel said.
"You know his son is the guy who wrote Thank You for Smoking?"
"You're welcome," Jonathan said.
"Jesus," Daniel said.
"This is too much, I might have a heart attack."
"American history is longer,"
"Uh, seriously,"
"larger, more various, more beautiful,"
"God bless America,"
"And," Jonathan said, lighting a cigarette in the bathroom, "more terrible than anything anyone has said about it."
"Is that so, James?"
"It may well be," Jonathan said, taking a long puff off his cigarette, "I gotta get out of here, I have to meet up with Sam. What are you going to be doing?"
"Can I get a cigarette?" Daniel said.
Jonathan pulled a Marlboro 27 from his pack and handed it to Daniel, who then lit it quickly and exhaled, "I don't know, I'm probably going to go to the park and look at the Sound."
"It's nice there," Jonathan said.
"That'll be a good place to think about some of this."
"I won't ever read him," Daniel said.
"But call me Jonathan Franzen, cause I am Freedom."
"OK, Daniel," Jonathan said.
"Are you going to be alright?"
"Yea man," Daniel said.
"I'm about to go run with the bulls."
"Alright" Jonathan said.
"I'll call you later tonight if you're still around, don't get into any trouble."
"Yes sir," Daniel said, with a salute.

******

That evening Jonathan walked over to Sam's. On the walk over he found himself sweating profusely and feeling slightly uncomfortable. The sharp brightness of his reality when he was with Daniel was slowly mutating into a distortion of color and sound. He could feel the eyes of the people he passed, while walking, and he felt, possibly, that he could also hear their thoughts - "This must be what it's like," Jonathan thought, "To suffer from psychosis."

{5}

Sam opened the door to Jonathan's knocking and let him in. He instantly sat on the bed in her room; she shared a two-bedroom with someone she met over Craigslist who was their age, and asked inappropriately personal questions such as: "Are you happy with your life?" - "Do you feel embracing the darkness inside you makes you a stronger person?" - "Are you afraid you won't know what love is like?"
Sam took one look at Jonathan and said: "You look tired, are you alright?"
"Yea," Jonathan said.
"I took too much Adderall I think. I'm going mad. Had a mad conversation with Daniel."
"Oh, really." Sam said.
"What about?"
"I don't remember," Jonathan said.
Jonathan then kissed the bottom of Sam's lip. She moved close to him and he found himself below her.

******

Jonathan was laying in bed with Sam when he had an uncompromising thought. The thought was that he was slowly degenerating into some awful man-child that he had feared becoming - because of, of course, his father, whom he had never really known, but only heard stories; this awful father had caused a lot of emotional hang-ups for his own relationship with women; him, thinking he would inevitable become the person of the stories he heard, had decided to become a sort of eunuch, until recently. Sam was well asleep when he moved silently out of the bed, slipped on his shoes, and walked to the bathroom. He peed swiftly, though ferociously, and certainly with a strong satisfaction; he flushed the toilet and moved to the sink, washing his hands.
His shoes were untied, so he bent his knees and tied them, and when he came back up and looked in the mirror, he noticed a different creature altogether.
"Oh, no," Jonathan thought.
"This isn't good; this is the anti-good."
He noticed a reptilian creature - black eyes; thick skin; an awful mouth; cat-like eyes.
"No, no, nope," he thought.
"This is in my head; I'm imagining this; it's not real."
He turned around, facing the shower. After turning on one faucet, the sprinkler started; he stepped into the tub - clothes on - and let the water run down his face.
"This will wake me up," he thought.
"This will bring me back."
After a minute or so of his eyes closed, and in the sanctity of his own mind, he opened his eyes and found himself once again fixed on the reflection in the mirror - he saw his back; he saw himself; he was like the hunchback of Notra Dame; his spine looked like it may pop out at any moment.
"Jesus Christ," he thought.
"I look like an old man. I look decrepit. What's happening to me?"
His reflection seemed to plea is agony, "Please, end this," it seemed to say.
"What do you want from me he thought?"
An answer came - "I want to prolong suffering, it's the only way."

******

The next day Sam woke up, by herself, in her bed. She checked her phone, stretched, put on her clothes and went to the bathroom. What she saw will haunt her for the rest of her life.

>>5802709
>>5802711
>>5802714
>>5802723
>>5802731
OP here. Sorry, but I'm going to have to put these on hold until next morning. I will definitely critique them though.

>>5802709
>>5802711
>>5802714
>>5802723
>>5802731

I'm not OP.

So I'll say some good things first. When you started this off and were describing things it was surprisingly good.

From
>Now he was paying his way...
Till
>...and a box of the nice chocolates.

The narrator sounds confident in their craft, going through the mundane, it is focused and concrete. It is slowly building up a world.

What isn't great here are the reflections the character has about himself. However.

The short of it is you say too much. There is no mystery involved with this story, and I never had the feeling of "I don't know what is going to happen next and I care about what is going to happen next".

Sure, the setting was odd, especially when the drug was introduced, and so I didn't know what exactly was going to happen next, but nothing really surprised me, or felt urgent or at risk.

There are probably a few reasons for this, but one is that the narrator is very heavy handed. This isn't unique to you whatsoever, nearly everything I've read on /lit/ is like this. What is written is clearly from a writer who enjoys writing what they are currently writing, which is fine, but what is also clear is that the writer never gave one good damn about the reader, never thought, maybe I should hack away at this thing to create some mystery, some ambiguity, maybe the reader likes to figure things out on their own rather than being told this is how it is.

Continued..

>>5803041
What I first want you to consider is this.

What is the one thing you wanted the reader to feel, to consider or to "get" from this story exactly? Sure. There can be a few things you can get from a story, but what was the main thing? Why exactly is this story important? Why did you choose to write about this, rather than say, what Sam did that day? Think about that, because I honestly got nothing from this story except, "I don't know what i'm doing with my life" very poorly told.

Ok, so why is it poorly told, besides what I already said about the writer caring about his reader? It's the presentation, like I mentioned, one aspect of this is that there is no mystery. I'm not going to go through every aspect of your narrative and presentation, so i'll just stick with using absence to say more than just laying it all out there. One note before this, the ending is a flat cop-out and you probably already know this. Change it. (I could also go into the dialogue which needs a shit ton of work, but I won't)

Let's look at this line:
>But something was wrong. Something had changed. He found himself, while scrubbing away the Teriyaki sauce out of the endless supply of ramekins, musing over his childhood, his friendships, past and present, and his current living situation -

Why the fuck are you telling me this? Do you honestly think that just telling me, he is nostalgic, is going to do the job? Don't tell me how this guy feels, make me realize through my own reading how he feels.

Maybe he is working and notices he has a missed call from a long lost friend that he hasn't talked to in years, and its already been days since he saw he had a missed call and didn't answer it. You then give a brief, but revealing, comment about how this makes him uncomfortable.

Bam. Why is he uncomfortable? Is it an ex? Why didn't he call back immediately? Does he have a bad personality, does he dislike the person, is he anti-social, is he just too busy? The revealing comment you make about how he reacts to this will do A LOT more work than you just telling me hes's just nostalgic.

And guess what, you get to have more fun writing about what is SPECIFICALLY going on at his job, which is way more fun for me as well, and you have a knack for it. So fucking do it.

I mean, couldn't we condense this whole damn story into a 10 minute scene while he is working?

He is already on the drug (this is not directly told to the reader, only alluded to. Maybe he constantly goes to the bathroom to check if the other guy has called, and we never get told why he is so anxious). Maybe Sam comes into his work. Maybe he has a hicky from her and you can make a brief comment about that. Maybe a coworker of his makes a comment about her. Maybe she or the drugdealer are his coworkers.

This will help keep the story in one place, not dance all over the place, and still keep everything you wanted to get out of it.

Still wouldn't see the point of the story though
/end

>>5803041
>>5803088
Oh, and keep writing. The part I said was good was actually good. I'm not just saying that.

Last note, keep the narrator out of the main character's head. The fun of third person is we don't know everything that is going on in other people's heads. If you wanted to describe everything from the main character's perspective so much, just do first person.

>>5803041
>>5803088
>>5803100

Thanks for the generous critic anon. You're spot-on about the show-don't-tell and I really appreciate having someone take the time to do something like this.

I always copy-paste when I recieve feedback as well thought out as this kind so be glad to know you'll be sitting in my folder for whenever I feel like I've strayed to far.

Thanks anon :)

>>5803240
No problem anon, glad to be of some help.

I am curious though, what exactly made you write this piece? Were you trying something out like a style, or did you actually want the reader to get something specific out of the story?

>>5803278
This was for a WAR style writers contest. The limit was 2,500 words - hence the cop-out at the end. Myself and one other person had a writing prompt: "he became fixated on the mirror."
I didn't make it to the next round unfortunatly, almost did! - but the other writer beat me by a few votes. As for the style itself that was more experimentation on voice; you're write about third-person. I think I'm naturally a third-person writer; it's a shame though, because all the people I admire, would like to write-like, are of the first-person auto-biographical fictional variety. It's a tragedy, ha.

>>5803357
you're *right.
jeeze

>>5803357
>>5803365
I know what you mean. I was caught up for a while in trying to imitate Buddy-Salinger's witty/charming voice.

Anyway, good luck. Nest time you are writing a piece that is limited in size, try to stay in one place and not wander, and keep the actors to a minimum, and try to maximize whatever effect you are trying to give to the reader throughout the piece, even if that means that your characters will come out a bit more extreme.

Again, good luck.

>>5803389
Thanks again,

good luck to you anon.

Warm regards

Dear world,
The interest I am taking to write this letter to you, dear world, is that I am genuinely intrigued by what you hold for us in your distant future. A future I wouldn't call it immediate for us, though, simple inhabitants of your perpetually revolving body, since your lifespan is replete with years that makes our life look only ephemeral in comparison. But still, however, the question holds itself, because my troubles are the same troubles of people in complexion alike mine, ones which inhabited you years back and, I confidently think, years to be. So tell me, if with a mere secret whisper of the wind, nature's speech through the beauty that you see simply in boughs and their irritated, rustling leafs, what pain will pierce the hearts of people yet to be? What anxiety will preoccupy the individual's mind?
Now, as far as my eyes can see and my mind can infer, the days are still as preoccupied with individuals' rights as they were in the ages past. New movements are constantly brought up about the freedom of the oppressed, now shaped as feminism, now as Swedish extreme toleration. French revolution, it's true, brought the world into state of profuse art, but how much further the freedom can go without losing such thing as an art ? I tell you I am very concerned when some of these movements try to ignore nature's foundation, ignoring things what masters of art for hundreds of years made worthy for our appreciation. Nevertheless, in anxiety of doubt that people won't be able to appreciate art, that its virtues will dissolve from people's minds, we can look back at history in the search for an elucidating answer. We can discern, then, a hope, a prevailing disposition of dedicated people to keep this art, save it, and remind people of it, the virtues of human life it tried to exalt. But fear still keeps its rock upon my chest, for I don't have a prescient knowledge of what's next
There is of course a chance for you, dear world, to prove the opposite of these ominous ponderings, not only to make art prevail, but to lift peoples' minds to greater lengths than ever before. There are, looking to my closest approximation, bright Lithuanians seeking for a clearer understanding of the world, their minds seeking knowledge like birds soaring for a clear sky. And I hope that none of them forgets their part in the world, won't sell their culture, their peculiar identity, for a more shiny country, and won't get lost in some temporal electric transitions what computer games are. That they will keep themselves in a close unity, not to sell a congruity that is consensus of common feeling, prove to be different than the people in Baranauskas poem "Anykščių šilelis". But, for the time being, enough questions, we need more actions. Time is short, so we should make questions that matter now, that make actions. (one final sentence that didn't cut 4chan restrictions)

>>5803448
This is purely abstract. This has nothing for me to latch to. It was not fun to read. Stop preaching to the reader, if you want them to get your message, create a situation that will make them embrace the very thing which made you want to tell them all of this.

Even if this were some character's dialogue, I still wouldn't dig it.

All of this pertains to you, only maximum.

>>5803041
>>5803088
>>5803100

Sorry if that was harsh, but there isn't anything worth saving from that.

>>5802709
>>5802711
>>5802714
>>5802723
>>5802731
OP here. The other anon already posted general impressions, so I'll start with specific issues.

>Sam being a lesbian - albeit they had hooked up a few times by now,
“Albeit one with whom he had hooked up” or “though they had hooked up”

>and he feeling, despite their long friendship, that maybe there was something romantic there
I suggest not using this gerund tense form for “feeling”. “Sam was a lesbian… he felt, despite their friendship, that maybe there was something romantic there… but he didn’t want to corrupt” might work out better. Also, as it currently is your sentence goes “Sam being a lesbian… and he feeling that there was romance… he didn’t want to corrupt.” I’m not too sure that’s logical, since romance with a lesbian to me would corrupt the relationship.

>”danger zone”
Doesn’t need inverted commas

>Here he had a friend that was loyal… curated
Sentence is very long, not too easy to read with all the clauses you put in. Maybe split it into two sentences?

>sad point of insecurity he would struggle with
“sad”, “insecurity”, and “struggle” all almost overlap in meaning. Only one of the three is necessary.

>It was almost like, how you hear, when someone is bulimic / anorexic
It was almost like how you hear that when someone is anorexic or bulimic

>he felt this may be
This might be

>it was always under the presumption of completing a task
Were you looking for “pretense”? “Presumption” works, of course, but it’s a little more unnatural.

>"Productive," he thought, in justifying its use to himself, "Always productive."
Too many clauses in one sentence here. Either go “he though in justifying its use to himself, “Always productive.” Or “he thought, in justifying its use to himself. “Always productive.”

>>5804676
>Daniel was off, Jonathan could feel
Comma splice. Also, “Daniel was off” is ambiguous and could mean “Daniel had set off.” If, however, you make “Daniel was off” a separate sentence the ambiguity is lessened.

>like something wasn't right
It’s clear that something isn’t right, not just it seeming not right. “something was going on, that something wasn’t right” is better.

>"Dude, John," Daniel said.
>"Man
No real need to separate his dialogue on two different lines. Keeping them on the same line would also make it clearer who was speaking. Same with “’Wo,’ Jonathan said/‘What’s going on?’” and the rest.

>but, like, beyond that
“beyond that” is too refined for a meth user to say

>took Jonathan by the arm and lead him
Led him

>a small glass pipe that looked as if it may double as a small, personal, flower vase.
Repeated “small” - doesn’t sound too good. “May” is present tense - should use “might have doubled”. Finally, “looked as if it might have doubled” could be replaced with “could have doubled”.

>Do not hold this in your lungs. This isn't like weed
“Do not” is full form but “isn’t” is contracted. Stick to one form. If you deliberately went “do not” to give it emphasis, consider saying “now listen here. Don’t hold this in your lungs” instead.

>“This isn't like weed," Daniel leaned forward
“weed.” Daniel leaned forward

>Daniel lighted the pipe
Lit the pipe

>Daniel pulled the pipe away, "Alright, let it go!"
Pulled the pipe away. “Alright…”

>saw the curiosity
“Saw curiosity”. But I’m nitpicking here, so keep it if you want.

>He felt like he was a video game character… but, most of all
Logical issue: with only one alternative, that of being like a video game character, he can’t “most of all” feel an awareness. Replace “most of all” with “more than that”

>looked so dingy
“so” as a modifier for adjectives doesn’t work alone. Either cut it or replace with a different modifier.

>>5804685
>"I feel like I can do anything. I feel like I could complete the project I've been working on; I feel like I could write an entire book right now.
This line feels very wooden, in contrast to most of the dialogue you’ve written so far. It sounds like a written script, not something someone would actually say.

>who then lit it quickly and exhaled, "I don't know
Lit it quickly and exhaled. “I don’t know…”

>Franzen, cause
Franzen, ‘cause

>"Alright" Jonathan said.
“Alright,” Jonathan said.

>he could also hear their thoughts… Jonathan thought
Repeated “thought” sounds somewhat bad

>You look tired, are you alright?
Comma splice. As a matter of fact comma splicing in dialogue is probably accepted, and you do do it a lot in your piece without any problems, but here it stands out as being bad. Say “You look tired. Are you alright?”

>Jonathan was laying in bed with Sam
Common mistake. Say “lying in bed”.

>The thought was that he was slowly degenerating… until recently
Don’t use semicolons in this sentence: use full stops. It’s too long and complicated

>he would inevitable become
Inevitably become

>He peed swiftly, though ferociously, and certainly with a strong satisfaction;
Literally what is the point of this line?

>"Oh, no," Jonathan thought.
>"This isn't good; this is the anti-good."
This response is too understated, to the point of being comical. I’m guessing that isn’t quite your intention.

>black eyes; thick skin; an awful mouth; cat-like eyes.
Use commas, not semicolons. You also repeat “eyes”. It comes off as redundant.

>his spine looked like it may pop out
Looked like it might have

>I look like an old man. I look decrepit.
Redundant

>plea is agony
Plea in agony

>”What do you want from me he thought?”
“What do you want from me?” he thought

>What she saw will haunt her
What she saw was to haunt her

>>5804690
That said, there were moments when your writing came off as funny or interest. For instance:

>day-to-day telling of their lives
>(some choking, and certainly clawing)
Nice
>head change
Doesn’t sound natural but weirdly nice.
>sullying the relationship they had curated
Very nice
>"Wo," Jonathan said.
I laughed

So onto overall impressions. As the other anon said, your story is too much told and not enough shown. It's dull. I'll also have to question the narrative choices you make throughout. Nothing in the opening ties back to the end, except the humpback motif and maybe whatever existential crisis the character is going through, and as a result everything you've written before the drugs bit comes off as obsolete. On a more positive note, however, the half-ironic voice of the narrator is works well in this story. I also think that your dialogue, or most of it, is great. It's casual and swingy enough to be real, and the "Nikola Tesla... God bless America" part is really quite funny. I'm just a stranger on the internet, so don't take me too seriously, but I think you could try writing a more dialogue-focused piece next. That seems to be your forte, from what I've seen here.

Anyhow, this piece shows competent writing, so keep practicing. And listen to that other anon's advice. He basically said everything else I was going to say, and more besides.

>>5803448
OP. I'm not sure I see the purpose of this piece. You've basically delivered a long, abstract speech at the reader without much context to make it relevant or interesting. I'm hoping that it's character dialogue in a much longer story, with a good basis for all the ideological issues you raise here.

Onto style.

>A future I wouldn't call it immediate for us, though, simple inhabitants... Since your lifespan is replete
"I wouldn't call immediate for us simple inhabitants... , though, as your lifespan... " is clearer, as the "though" doesn't separate "us" and the "simple inhabitants" that "us" is.

>But still, however
Cut the "however"

>my troubles are the same troubles of people in complexion alike mine
First of all, "alike" isn't used like this. Secondly, this sentence is very roundabout - you go from yourself to other colored peoples then back to yourself. Just say "my troubles are the same troubles faced by people of a like complexion".

>if with a mere secret whisper of the wind, nature's speech through the beauty
Where is the verb in this sentence?

>French Revolution, it's true
"The French Revolution, it's true"

>without losing such thing as art?
You've already introduced art in the last sentence, so just say "without losing it?"

>things what masters of art... made worthy
I like the regional/archaic way you use "what" here, but bear in mind that other readers may misunderstand and call it a mistake.

>in anxiety of doubt that people won't be able to appreciate
Did you mean "if we worry that people won't be able to"?

I haven't really covered it here, but the biggest issue with your style is that you use convoluted structures and complicated words which you don't sound entirely familiar with, like you're forcing yourself to sound intellectual. It's not terrible, and certainly does contribute to the serious-intelligent image of the narrator in the piece, but I'd still suggest cutting it down. There aren't many things expressed in long words that short words can't do just as well or better.

Overall, it's a decent piece, if a dry one more suited to academia than to a story.

The first thing that he notices when he opens the door is that it's all too quiet.
All too quiet. No sound of Sarah and Ben play-fighting in the den, no dishwasher, no dryer, not even Ashley's punk rock in the upstairs bedroom, he can't hear anything. All he hears are his own heavy footfalls on the wooden floor; he turns the brass key in the front-door lock; the minute click normally drowned out by household din now sounds immense against empty, yawning silence.


Not completely sure where I'm going with it. Either his family is going to be dead, or simply gone- Try to critique what I have, I may or may not be able to complete this story.

>>5801915
http://pastebin.com/auUhLq29

"No poetry.", he says. "No poetry" and I'm close to taking my fondue fork and stabbing it into his eye. But instead I take out my murderous desires on the piece of meat set on a plate before me. I dip it, first in marinade, then in small pieces of bread. Looking at my work, I put it into the fondue goblet. Goblet, funny word, really.
"Because, let's be honest, poetry is dead.", he says, mouth half-filled with cow-carcass.
I have this thing, where whenever someone says something I disagree with, I begin ignoring that person completely. Now, at the dinner table, it won't show that much. There'll be always someone to reply, someone to hand over the salt.
But eventually he'll realize he has ceased existing in my eyes. I've done this a couple of times now, the effect: always devastating.
You'd think they'd just get over it. But...

>>5805424
This isn't a lot to work with. It's good. I'm interested. I want to read on. The clause
>he can't hear anything
after the stacked clauses "not... not..." is particularly effective

But here
>All he hears... yawning silence
I'd suggest separating the bits with full stops, like
>All he hears are his own heavy footfalls on the wooden floor. He turns the brass key in the front-door lock, and the minute click normally drowned out by household din now sounds immense against empty, yawning silence.

Ah, right
>against empty, yawning silence
"an empty, yawning... "

And if I wanted to nitpick I'd say that your first line could be more sudden, although it is quite effective as it is now.

>>5805466
>No poetry
You got me: I laughed. OP here. I'll assume you want serious critique on this. Overall, it's clearly meant to be a fun little piece, but small issues in the writing prevent it from reaching that goal. It's essentially a problem of style. Everything else, story and narrator voice, are fine, so I'll move onto specific changes.

>"No poetry.", he says. "No poetry" and I'm
"No poetry," he says. "No poetry," and I'm

>But instead I take out my murderous desires... I dip it... I put it in the fondue goblet
This dipping does not sound particularly murderous.

>Goblet, funny word, really
You need to give a reason for it being funny, or make the fact that it's funny relevant in the story later on.

>"There'll always be someone to reply"
This line is clumsy. I suggest "There'll always be someone who will reply, someone who'll pass the salt when asked."

>I've done this a couple of times now, the effect: always devastating
Comma splice

Nice post, anon. I enjoyed critiquing this.

>>5805448
that feel when no critque

>>5806422
I'm sorry. I saw your post this morning but I didn't have the opportunity to sit down to a long piece. I'm actually about to start now, though, so don't worry.

>>5806448
Just woke up myself. Thanks in advance.

>>5805448
>>5806422
All right. I've finally finished. Your story is pretty good, and your style does have its moments of brilliance, such as

>Blood and creamy humor leaked from the man
>democratic republic of sewerdom
>tendency to collapse into dictatorship
>so smooth, like butter, but in the microwave
>Checked her smile: still lit.
It's something about the irony you use, and the humor too. Really lends a lot of character to your piece.

>accidentally waterlogged words of a printed email dripped dry aphorisms
This is brilliant too, but “aphorisms” not “aphorisims”


Two issues prevent your piece from being amazing, however. First of all, your story, while interesting, lacks cohesion. The past section doesn't seem relevant to the present. I don't see any strong thematic links anyway, unless the point you're trying to develop is just that there was a conspiracy behind the Vietnam war and that conspiracy was money. If there was a deeper meaning there, which I hope there was, you need to put in more clues for it. And if there wasn't then the story still lacks cohesion.

The second involves a shift in your style. You start of nicely serious in your Vietnam bit, but once the letter from Polyglot arrives your style dips into the casual. That isn't bad by itself, only that the way you do it - inserting parenthesis when you had none before, using a lot of dialogue made immature by improper punctuation - really hurts the smoothness of the text. The spell breaks, if that makes sense. Fix both of these stylistic issues and fluency should be restored.

A smallish, third issue is that your sudden interruptions
>–A quick rumbling pain in my stomach, a brief rise in my underwear
didn't seem to be paragraphed properly. Maybe it was a formatting issue from the transfer to pastebin. You should be aware, however, that the jump is disorientating and if there aren't enough formatting cues to tell the reader that something has changed he/she will be quite confused.

>>5806735
Your piece was pretty long, so I managed to pick up a lot of suggest changes. I've got them in a pastebin so I won't to have to deal with the character limit.

http://pastebin.com/ynXe3y2C

I think I'll have to add to my general comments that the idea of a conspiracy or a cabal in control of the world is laughably cliched if not handled well, and your story, with the casual latter half, skirts that line of good and bad too closely for comfort. If you're up for largish edits I'd suggest you try adding a bit more irony to the Spillane's mission. Right now he comes off as sincere in his desire to "stop the cabal". If it fits in with what you were planning when you wrote this, either mock him or have him mock himself for working to expose the conspiracy. It doesn't have to be obvious. It just has to be there.

I really have to say, though, that your style is great. It's very creative and fun to read. For all the issues with grammar I quite liked this.

>>5806735
First off, outside of the Vietnam bit, none of the characters were supposed to be that sympathetic, aside from maybe the desk clerk. Not that they were stupid, just barking up the wrong tree. The actual conspiracy is about vampires. The Vietnam section was supposed to provide context for why Raymond was so convinced of conspiracy. I know my style is super fractured, and my last few stories have been attempts to rectify and or work it into something more palatable. The stream of consciousness interruptions are me having fun. I should probably lose them. This was also the result of me refusing to delete anything in order to defeat writers block, hence the tonal shifts.

>>5806751
This is amazing. Thank you. It's been a few years since latin. I'm probably wrong, but I believe iaculum is the term for the nets used by gladiators. Comma splices are my major fault. I've been subconsciously addicted to them since middle school. Thank you!

>>5806752
>>5806763
I thought vampires was metaphorical, and that the economy for blood was a euphemism for organ donation or blood donation or just some nefarious government scheme. Looking back, "pale" and "coffin makers" should have made it clear. But the vampire idea isn't really an obvious or clear one. Maybe it's the war genre and the resulting expectations for plot that the reader comes to carry. I think you could make it a bit more obvious.

As for the stream of consciousness bits, well, you know best. I can only say that while they don't hurt the piece they don't add anything to it either.

And you're welcome. Hope I helped.

>>5806768
I was trying to sort of subvert the usual metaphors by making it literal, while simultaneously subverting the conventions of the genre by mashing it with everything. Or at least that's what I'm saying.

>>5801915
It's been 24 hours. Thanks for posting here, if you're still around to read this. I enjoy critiquing almost as much I as enjoy writing.

I have one small request: please read a story of mine and give me feedback. Anything is welcome, from the briefest impressions to the most pedantic point-by-point coverage.

http://pastebin.com/hEkBVn3w

If you are new to this thread, feel free to keep posting, and I'll do my best to keep providing critique.

>>5802012
This guy here.

>>5806967
I'll be happy to go indepth with your post, I've just got to finish up something real quick and then I'll get back to you.

>>5807246
Thanks in advance. I'm off to bed; take your time.

>>5806967
>>5807371
Alright, so when I gave my critique in my threads, I always hoped that someone could return the favor, so the least I can do is do that for you.

I'm no editor, I'm not even a published author, take everything I say with a grain of salt. I don't have time to get everything done now, so I'll do this paragraph by paragraph then give you my thoughts at the end.

(1/??)

>The words were printed in a font neither block nor cursive, displaying immediacy and elegance in the straight, upright lines that arched high up and tilted, just at the end, into little serifs side by side, millimeter gaps in between that to read the mind first had to leap.
49 words in one sentence to describe the font,

>but far from being dwarfed by them
this feels out of place, the entire rest of the sentence is about rust, but this line is about size and scale, I'd cut it especially since you mention it later.

>then his cigarette smokes and the mirror is gone.
I like this imagery, but its very sudden it doesn't tie in with the first half. You use then, which implies he does A then B, but A in this sentence is description.
I think by 'his room' you mean he sees himself in it, in which case, a quick fix is to change 'then' to 'until'
>His name is Ames and this is his room, until his cigarette smokes and the mirror is gone.

Petty shit
>in the straight, upright
the isn't necessary here

Compliments
>churned spring snow
I liked this imagery.

>>5807514

(2/??)

A personal preference, but I didn't much care for
>Now someone was walking up the untrafficked street
It clashed a bit tense wise with the rest of the paragraph. It also doesn't tie in with Ames

Petty shit
>I would be better off
maybe 'I would rather' makes more sense, just in my opinion.

>a beggar from the street
>a beggar off the street

>in indiscriminate
Really petty, but 'in - in' flows like ass, especially since you cut 'an' here.

Compliments
>limp step limp stop
I liked this, subtle repetition.

>crisp crack of cologne
>self-styled Sherlock
Good alliteration, the syllables are even matched.

>>5807519

(3/??)

>He turned: the latch yielded with a silent squeal, and as he entered there was nobody to see from outside.
Maybe I'm an idiot, but this sentence stumped me for a bit for a bunch of stupid reasons. After a minute I understood it, however, I've still got two gripes with it.

>He turned:
Isn't immediately obvious, did he turn away?
>Nobody to see from outside
This doesn't nessicarily mean there was nobody in there, and it doesn't fit. he's no longer outside, so why does he describe things in terms of 'being outside'?

My suggestion:
>The handle turned, its latch yeilding a silent squeel. As he entered, empty as he thought - there was nobody to see from outside.
'The handle turned' makes it instantly obvious what happened, the latch segment flows nicer imo, and the end turns more personal, making 'there was nobody to see outside' as insight to what Ames thought before he entered.

>There was only the poster, and his reflection in it - but even that was fading, like melting frost, and already his name was gone and his shape was gone and there was only the door, the sign, and the words of the poster.
This sentence, while I liked the idea behind it... it's very long winded and a little convoluted. I also didn't like the repetition of 'gone'. It didn't feel natural.
This would be my revision:
>There was only the moster, his reflection in it fading like melting frost. His name was gone and his shape had vanished. All that remained was the door, the sign, and the words of the poster.

Petty shit
>into it he saw
>into it, he saw

>alluringly round
Cutting 'a' from 'around' here, doesn't change anything at best, at worst it makes the sentence awkward. Read it outloud, you'll find yourself trying to say 'around'.

Compliments
>The motorway stretched impossibly long to the front and impassably thin to the back
I liked this, rythmic to it.

>>5807524

(4/??)

I don't believe the repetition of 'darkness' does anything.

>this was a darkness which held its breath, soft and deep, dreaming of promise and mystery in the same outstretched palm.
I like the poetry of this sentence, but I believe it loses its focus, it doesn't fit with the context, and it also doesn't make much sense. The darkness held its breath? You imply the darkness dreams of promise and mystery. While that's interesting and all, it's just poetic bullshit. I like it, but its useless.

Petty shit
>It smelled of darkness inside the store
You can cut 'it' here, that would be my preferrence. You can also exploit alliteration while cutting repetition.
>Inside the store smelled of shadow

>not dust nor shelves nor clothes never worn:
I think 'no' would be better, also could use commas
>No dust, nor shelves, nor clothes never worn:

Overall, I think this paragraph is way too long for what you describe.

- - - -

While it's not as bad as 'darkness' repeating 'the figure' only hurts the paragraph. I would suggest reworking your sentences to suggest 'the figure' is feminine, then referr to it as 'her', or replace it with a metaphor/synonym/something creative. (Shadow/silhouette/spectre/other terrible examples)

Petty shit
>adjusted he picked
>adjusted, he picked

>left, and then a figure
>left and a figure

Imo referring to the figure as 'it' feels wrong, perhaps just:
>on its desk.
>on the desk.
>right infront of it / towering over its tools
>then he was right infront of the table, his shadow towering over its tools.
The last example is especially bad becuase you refer to 'the figure' as she near the end of the sentence.

>and motion and say
I'm lost here, I'm not sure what you mean.
>and motioned to say
Perhaps?

I noticed a pretty big change in your writing, these last two paragraphs have been a little off. One had poetry that didn't hit the spot, the other somewhat bland.

>>5808498

(5/??)

> The poster, he began; the job opening: but already the shopkeeper had swept the tools off the table and replaced them with a clean printed sheet, one dotted line in a sea of white.
I get the majority of this sentence, but a little of it feels convoluted.
>The poster, he began; the job opening: but already the shopkeeper
What I think is happening here is Ames brings up the poster to the shopkeeper, but its so nonsensically written I honestly second guess that.
>He brought up the poster and its job offering; but already, the shopkeeper

>There are no conditions and no fine print, she informed him as she put a pen in his hand. Just sign here and we’ll be ready to start
Here again, I'm not sure why you're avoiding dialogue. You're writing narrative as if it was anyway.
>She informed him that there were no conditions and no fine print.
Why not say that? I understand if it's a stylistic choice, but it's one that, in my opinion, has no merit. I also have a problem with the subject matter. Why would she say there is no fine print? That would be a visible thing; Ames should be able to see that, this is also a squandered opportunity to put some character/exposition into her/the story, why not have her list some of the conditions that are NOT applicable?
>You don't have to do XXX, or XXX. We stopped with XXX and ever since YYY we are XXX free."

>then the form was whisked away from under his hand and she was leading him,
The tense kind of broke down here, you either need a transition or keep it uniform. You also have a great opportunity for repetition here.
>then the form was whisked away from under his hand and she lead him,
>then the form was whisked away from under his hand, and he was whisked away,

Petty shit
>his hand
Is repeated twice in the same sentence

Because you avoid dialogue, you're stuck with lackluster sentences and little characterization
>he managed to blurt . . . that he had no experience in being a boyfriend.
>She nodded. It's all right, she said, . . . Nobody's going to be able to tell
Just as two examples. Your narrative breaks down, it's no longer emotion and descriptive. Your characters aren't even saying things, the narrator is saying that they said something. Your telling and not showing.

>>5808586

(6/??)

>as if she were elevated a dimension above those clumsy beings who were able to act only in their atavistic ardency for her.
I'm not sure how I feel about this. I like the sentence but its 3deep5me, a little edgy. You basically just said a sex doll is more complicated than a human being. I mean, to each one's own, but, there are other ways to show Ames's wonderment at the thing.

Petty shit
>But something was different
This should probably be tacked on to:
>and he kissed it without thinking.

>past/past/past
I want to like this, I like the structure, but I don't like the repetition of the word past. I think it'd work if the sentences were shorter. (over/beyond/above/other awful synonyms) would be better in my opinion.

Compliments
>Hers had been soft: this hand was hard. Hers had been warm: this hand was cool.
I liked that, back and forth .

>plastic and thus perfect.
Again, I appreciate the alliteration here.

- - - -

Alright, the next paragraph I find a genuinely amusing, I didn't understand it the first time I read it because I'm a moron, but now I do.
>and immediately he was swept away again, this time to vistas fantastic and fey where roses took root in the sky, where the only time was either dawn or dusk, where a doll was as tall as a man and they could stroll beneath the flowers, hand in hand.
Lol. It's so cliché and poetic, its perfect.

Now that I've complimented you, I can be an asshole.
The second half of this paragraph, while I like the subject matter, is boring. This is enhanced by the fact you just had me enthralled.

As an example:
>The shopkeeper had retreated behind the counter by the time he left the store.
Wouldn't he notice her behind the counter as he left, anyway? Why not say the shopkeeper disappeared, and he saw her sitting behind the counter on his way out? Regardless, this sentence is lackluster.

>He had arrived here, lost and with no destination to take; though he had no destination still, here at least was a path he might begin to walk.
I like the subject matter here, but it's long winded, and that takes away its impact. Also, while it makes sense both ways, maybe:
>here at last was a path

A suggestion:
>Alice in his ears, Alice in his head.
>Alice in his ears, Alice in his head, and Alice in his heart.

I haven't read ahead, so when I got here I thought this was going to end up some back alley porno. I mean, it's still at that level of wtf, but its more interesting.

>>5808714

(7/??)

I had hoped to be able to do more, but I don't have the time tonight, perhaps I can go through it some more tomorrow. Instead of being as in depth as I was with the previous parts, I'm just going to read through, give you my thoughts, and point out any major stuff.

Also heads up, I've made spelling mistakes and grammar errors in my critique, I'm sure the part gets across nicely though.

Alright, so to start, I take back what I said here:
>>5807514
The description of the poster gave Ames character. A few of your choices made much more sense with context at the end.

Now, as I said in the last few posts, the first 3 paragraphs were impressive. I felt like they had inspiration and were given a pound of polish per word. Very poetic without being cliché and cheesy, dramatic without being edgy
That being said, the rest felt lacking, especially in comparison. Don't take this too harshly, but it feels like you just sped through, writing what you thought would be good and then fixing it up later. I recognize it because it's exactly what I do when I'm uninspired.

As an example, look at this section:
>There was a gate between the fire escape and the corridor: small was the gate, and narrow the road that led down to his squalid apartment front.
>The door was flecked and faded, its patience wearing visibly thin in several places, and the doorknob cheap alloy not much thicker than the paint on the walls.
>The letterbox was unchecked: . . .
You're stating things with almost no flair. I liked 'not much thicker than the paint on the walls', but its surrounded with 'this was that, that is this'.

Compare it to this:
>It might have appeared, to the eye, larger than the wall itself - its margins, once metres, now measured in minus - drawing the rare or nonexistent passerby closer, closer, tempting him in beyond the Tyrian drapes and the slanted walls they conceal, until he stands before the words and sees his reflection in them.
Look at that god damn sentence, I mean, you only say that the poster is large, its attention-grabbing, and that Ames had a reflection in the shop window, but look at how detailed it is! The worst is mentioning the drapes and walls, but everything else has an invisible obscurity that really gives it flair.

It felt a little strange because you had these very moody moments, and then you had a few which were stupidly amusing. You transitioned a lot between emotions, after he had Alice, the shifting felt a little unsettling, which is a good thing.

>>5809302

(8/??)

Now, overall impressions of the story.

I found it interesting; it kept me guessing what was going to happen next. At first I thought it was some high school girl thinking advertising for a boyfriend is a good idea, then I thought it was going to be back alley porno, and finally I thought a guy was gonna' go home and pork a sex doll.
Eventually, it turned to a hopelessly lonely guy getting attached to a doll pathetically instantly to the point where I felt pity, and of course in his own mind, it betrayed him. I honestly think you should expand this, especially near the end, really drag out the fact that his 'love' is drifting away from him, make that drive him nuts.

I would read more, especially the beginning. Remember, I'm not an editor/publisher/published author, so feel free to discard what you think I'm wrong with. Hopefully though, I've helped you improve somewhere, somehow.

Now to be a shameless cunt, if you would like to critique more of my work:
http://pastebin.com/Gym1bnzX
Be warned, its trashy Genre fiction. This is the first chapter that I've finalized, I've read through it twenty-thirty times and can't find a way to improve it. There isn't any context to know since it's the start of a story.

Bumping this so the thread stays alive until you see it.

>>5807514
>>5807519
>>5807524
>>5808498
>>5808586
>>5808714
>>5809302
>>5809308
>>5810239
Woah. Thanks. This is far beyond anything I had expected or hoped to get. Really - thanks so much. I'll get to your story in a bit.

I really have to say I'm surprised you saw it as sex dolls. I was in fact modelling the dolls on these here >>>/jp/12680914. But interpretations are free for all, and I shouldn't be expecting all my readers to be otaku.

A lot of your criticisms were very helpful, especially those about lines without tension. But there are some points I feel I must explain. One issue at the start seems that the scene isn't clearly described, causing problems with
>"He turned" isn't immediately obvious
>"Nobody to see from outside"
See, the poster was supposed to be across the street from the store. The MC walks down the street, looks at the poster, 'sees' the shop in the 'reflection' in the words. Then
>He turned: there was the door
that's him turning toward the shop
>He turned: the latch yielded
and that's him turning the handle. As for
>why does he describe things in terms of 'being outside'?
It's not him describing. The narrative camera has just stopped recording things from his perspective and split off the stay outside the door. But I see how the reader might mistake it for the character narrating 'from outside'.

I'm considering making the setting description a little more concrete. Would that solve this problem?

>>5811446
Continuing on, I cover >>5808498.

>"this was a darkness which held its breath". I like the poetry of this sentence... [but] while that's interesting and all, it's just poetic bullshit
It is! Well, my main goal was to establish a sense of softness to the atmosphere, but I did go a little over-the-top. Does it need to be cut? The promise and mystery does tie into the main character's desire for 'promise' as escape.

As you say,
>this paragraph is way too long for what you describe.
I'll hazard a guess and say that this is because the two sets of listings with
>Not dust nor shelves nor clothes never worn
>Silk sashes, he suddenly thought. This was a darkness of satin webs and stockings.
are pretty much redundant and hampers the paragraph from achieving full impact. I'll do some necessary cutting there.

>repeating 'the figure' only hurts the paragraph
I was trying to create a sense of no-gender and no-identity, until right at the end when the protagonist is up in front of the figure and finally realises that it's a she. But, well:
>The last example is especially bad becuase you refer to 'the figure' as she near the end of the sentence.
How bad?

And just to clear things up:
>"and motion and say". I'm lost here, I'm not sure what you mean.
"Motion" as in wave at him to go away.

The change in writing - well, I'll explain that later. I know it's a problem of my piece; I was just hoping it wasn't that much of a problem. But I'll talk about that later.

She seemed relieved when the waiter came. I was.
"The lady will be having the Snapper Ceviche, and I the Quail"
Her blue dress hung off her shoulders and draped low across her chest. I looked into her eyes appearing to see the candles reflecting back into mine. I couldn't do it, she was too beautiful. Taller than me too. I don't know if she had noticed yet, I stayed behind her on the way in, but she was sure to going back to the car. Transfixed by her figure, tactically walking behind her, I hadn't even checked whether it was the heels. I don't even remember the noise of the shoes, not enough to offer any clue.
"So, what sort of music do you like?"
It was enough, I watched her eyes and mind return from their journey across the restaurant and the ends of the universe, and back to the table.
"Oh, I dunno, everything. I like the Beatles"
"The fact that.."
I stopped myself
She looked up at me expectantly for the first time, blue eyes matching the dress.
"The fact is... The Beatles are a great band. Yes, a great band." I said with more conviction the second time.
"Do you like the album Magical Mystery Tour?"
"I'm sorry, I'm not sure I've listened to it. I mean, I'm sure I've heard it, but I can't remember the songs"
"Oh"
"Um, so you teach at the University?"
"I guest lecture sometimes, but I mostly write at the moment"
"Oh really? Like, an author?"
"Sort of. I write articles, music reviews, poetry"
"Oh for like the paper? A journalist"
"For my own website"
"A blog?"
"More like a knowledge base. It's quite good, it has been written about in newspapers before. The New York Times, actually"
"That's so... interesting!"
She really stressed the last word, interesting, raising the tone of her voice, childlike, or as if she was asking a question.
"I thought that your profile said that you were a professor?"
I suddenly felt sick. This was not my gorgeous restaurant, and she was not to be my beautiful wife. I looked out for the chef, Luigi, or even the waiter, for comfort, solace in our empathy, both in the restaurant under false pretenses, with false hopes, for something that was never to be.

>>5811478
Now for >>5808586
>What I think is happening here is Ames brings up the poster to the shopkeeper
You're right. Is it the lack of obvious dialogue markers that's confusing? Would it be better as
>"The poster," he began; "the job opening": but already
or if I had used italics to mark dialogue?

>I'm not sure why you're avoiding dialogue
>Why not say that [instead of just narrating her informing him]?
>Because you avoid dialogue, you're stuck with lackluster sentences
The bulk of this post addresses issues with dialogue and narration. I chose to use dialogue without marking it as dialogue to achieve a sense of characters interacting, but at a reserved distance. Something of a middle space between narration and full dialogue/action/description. A lot of the surrealism of this piece is created through narration, and I feel that moving too close, into dialogue, would take the magic away. So here, with
>Your characters aren't even saying things, the narrator is saying that they said something. Your telling and not showing.
The point is for them not to say things. It's all the narrator. The dialogue lines do come off as lacklustre compared to the description before, yes, but as I don't have much dialogue it doesn't hurt the piece too much.

R-right?

Ah, and:
>Why would she say there is no fine print?
The idea is that she's pushing him to sign. You're right: no one just says "there's no fine print." In making her say it, I was trying to make the reader feel some suspicion about the shop there. That's part of why the signing process happens so quickly as well.

Which leads me to
>"the form was whisked away... and she was leading him". The tense kind of broke down here, you either need a transition or keep it uniform.
I was trying to convey speed with "whisked" and progression, like he was already on the move, with "leading". Your suggested repetition of "whisk" is extremely nice, but I want to keep meaning. I don't really see a grammar issue.

>>5811544
Continuing with >>5808714
>"as if she were elevated a dimension above". It's 3deep5me, a little edgy
You're right. It's edgy. I'll tone it down a bit. In truth I only wrote it like this because I was trying to be clever and use words starting from "e" to "a", in order.

But, well, along with
>"hand in hand". It's so cliche and poetic, its perfect. I find it genuinely amusing
What I wanted to convey here was a sense of sincere, fantasical wonder. The reader should be able to understand or empathise with the protagonist on some level even as he/she denounces him. Of course, your mileage will vary - you probably saw that sincere wonder as being excessive for a sex doll. On the other hand, I find it reasonable because I personally understand that fascination with the ideal that forms part of the Japanese doll, and also the otaku, culture.

I guess your laughing isn't a bad thing, unless it prevented you from having an ambivalent view on the protagonist by the end. Did it?

And moving on:
>The second half of this paragraph, while I like the subject matter, is boring
Reading through it, I can see that you are totally correct. I'll see what I can do here. Thanks.

Same for here:
>"He had arrived here, lost and with no destination to take..." It's long winded, and that takes away its impact.

Incidentally, I was trying to assonance-rhyme with
>lost and with no destination to take
>here at least was a path he might begin to walk
>he told himself that it was fate
>nodded once at the store and set off
As you say, it's long winded. Did you notice them, the half rhymes? I'll work a rhythm in those lines. It'll come out better that way.

>>5811615
Final response, to >>5809302 and >>5809308

I gotta say at this point that the main character's name isn't Ames. That was just for a reference to the Ames room, an optical illusion: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ames_room.. I guess that clears up
>The worst is mentioning the drapes and walls
Tyrian drapes refer to purple curtains; slanted walls, to the Ames room. The royalty (from purple) is a delusion.

Right, onto the issue with style. You're right about the sudden drop to prose which is lacking. I can feel it myself. However, you kind of picked some bad examples to illustrate it, because
>small was the gate, and narrow the road
Matthew 7:14: "But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life"
>its patience wearing visibly thin in several places... paint on the walls
Patience wearing thin used to mean paint wearing thin. A half pun on the similarity between the two words.
>letterbox unchecked
Unchecked as in not read, and also as in not ticked. A requirement unfulfilled.

I intended these sentences to be more than just
>this was that, that is this
Well, it's also possible that these plays on language are either not obvious enough or not strong enough. Do you have any other examples of dull language, or do you find these dull even after I've explained them?

And about the better-written first few paragraphs: I was actually thinking of toning that first paragraph down. The difference in quality is so great that I'm worried readers won't see cohesion in the story. Do you think there are places I can cut? Or do you consider it good enough to be untouchable?

And, again, thanks for all the effort you put into critiquing my piece. I'm still a little excited over finishing it, and your comments are truly very much appreciated.

>>5811516
>but she was sure to going back to the car
Did you mean "sure to be going"?

>It was enough, I watched her eyes
Try not to comma splice, although this is barely just acceptable

>"Oh, I dunno, everything. I like the Beatles"
>"The fact that.."
>I stopped myself
Is the punctuation here, the lack of full stops, deliberate? You do it a lot more later on.

>Yes, a great band." I said with more conviction the second time.
"Say" requires an object. Use "spoke" instead. Otherwise it's a simple but nice line.

>"Yes, a great band." I said with more conviction the second time.
>"Do you like the album..."
I suggest having them in the same paragraph so the reader will know they are the same speaker.

>final paragraph
Woah. This really is quite nice, suddenly pulling the carpet out from under the reader's feet.

Your style is clear, and the story is quite nice. It all sounds nice at the start - or not really, with the hints of something wrong you have. And that ending is a great reversal. My only problem is that your hints might not be strong enough to be picked up in one reading. When I first read this and got to the end I liked it for the style but questioned the logic of the protagonist suddenly feeling sick. Then I read the piece again and spotted the hints. It might be better if I had gotten the hints on my first reading. I don't know, it really depends on how you want the reader to read this piece. Either way it's a great piece of short fiction.

>>5811446

Anytime, hopefully it's helped you. I'll explain some of our conflict in understanding a little more.

(1/2)

>>5811446

>Would this solve the problem?
Right now, you've got a story that doesn't make sense without full context. Reading it twice, a lot of your choices make plenty sense; just in the moment, they didn't. Part of the problem was that I read it over ~7 hours or so and not in one go.

>>5811478

>Does it need to be cut?
It's not the line per say, it's the fact you give personification that doesn't make much sense. Instead of saying the darkness is 'dreaming' why not make it say it INVOKES thoughts of longing and mystery? that would still be poetic, and make sense.

>How bad?
>I looked up at the monster, the beast, it was strange, almost animatronic in the way the puppy lapped his water.
Exaggerated, but I think you see my point here. It's a personal preference to not like the word 'it' for living things, but in that sentence, Ames never even notices that it was a woman, there was no transition.

>>5811544

>It doesn't hurt the piece too much
In the grand scheme of things, it doesn't; but a lot of little things can really bring down something amazing. I would suggest that because you are using the narrator, you exploit that.
I would suggest just going overboard and just be straight up narrative. Not the exact like but I'm too lazy to find it:
>Ames managed to blurt out that he had no experience in being a boyfriend.
>Ames mumbled his worried thoughts, concern for his lack of experience as a boyfriend.
This takes away the fact that its dialogue and puts it entirely into narrative, maybe you WANT it to be the middle ground, in which case discard this, but, I've got no experience with that sort of thing and I wouldn't know how to improve it.

>Don't see a grammar issue
There honestly isn't one, it does make sense, but with 'whisked' you already implied a past tense and then you suddenly changed it. I couldn't think of an example for a transition but here would be one
>The paper was whisked away and now she was leading him . . .
Awful example, too tired to think of something better, but using 'now' brings the reader up to speed. I don't know how to explain it much better, it just reads as if a sudden change in tense.

>>5811615

>Did it?
Well, I suppose I didn't get the feeling you meant me to have, but I actually got attached to Ames with it, it really gave him character.

>did you notice the half rhymes
I actually didn't, so that's my fault, I would have liked it better if I had. I think because you have the first two as part of the paragraph, and the last two as separate, it makes it a little more obscured... bullshit, I know, but visual makes a difference when reading.

>>5811674
>Main character's name isn't Ames
Ooooh, I'm a few IQ points short of a double digit number, my bad.

Yeah, I didn't quite get the references, I definitely appreciate them a lot more now that I see what you were getting at.

You know you have too much to say when you're commenting on somebody else's posts and you get past 3000 characters.

(2/2)

>>5811674

>letterbox unchecked
This is a stretch at best, yes it can have two meanings to it, but 99/100 times, its the first one. You don't make it obvious you meant both, so it never even crosses the mind.

As for a dull example:
>The details blurred even if the shapes did not, and he could not see the writing for the wall.
While I like what you're trying to say here, where he's basically getting tunnel vision, it doesn't feel strong, 'even if the shapes did not' takes away a lot of impact.

If you've read my work, I did something similar here:
>The distance behind her eyes and beneath my feet was blurred, empty, a mix of foreign colors in a scene I fail to be part of.
We know simply by common sense that it both scenarios it isn't the character going blind, it's their emotions consuming their vision. We can infer what they see is still somewhat representative to the scene they are in, so saying something like 'but he could still make out these colors' only takes away the dramatic effect.

As for the prose change, I've got the same problem with my work. It starts out so strong, that the rest is meh. Its serviceable, but it doesn't touch the genius at the beginning. It definitely needs to be edited a bit to feel more uniform, especially in a short piece.

>>5809308
Okay, finished reading yours. Your opening paragraph is amazing.
>Gardens chilled with gentle winds that rushed the vale as I would sprint, vaulting over hulking roots scattered across the forest floor.
That internal rhyme, those patterns of stress. Holy shit. I'm sold. But then you get to the final sentence of that paragraph, and it suddenly drops dull. I'd suggest changing it, but there's obviously no way you can stop narration from being plain. I don't know.

The effect you do of hypersaturated description is brilliant at the start, but once the main character wakes up from the flashback of his past and continues to go around speaking like a sage it becomes somewhat strange. Moderately ridiculous. Unfortunately laughable. You have this narrator who happens upon this girl of marriageable age and goes "Ah, Sophia, I was lost without you." He watches children play and admires their innocence, the fact that they had grown closer, and feels "a glimpse of joy". And later on he understandingly pats the wagon man's back, imparting to him the wisdom of the ancients: "Better to have an embarrassing moment than a memory that ends poorly."

It's - I really am sorry to have to say this - it's all very silly. Kinda sucks that we can't all go around being literary and deep, but that's shallow modern culture for you. That is really the biggest issue with your chapter here. The style also dims somewhat from its awesomeness at the start, but that can't really be helped. I can see how you've tried to keep up the level of description, but now it doesn't come off as being saturated; it comes off as being overdescription, and try-hard. See, as examples,
>stresses of a nameless hardship
>mine beamed with an effervescent smile
>An immortal itch tormented his scalp

But even near the end your use of unconventional syntax such as sentence fragments, like
>Rigid guilt of an unknown nature.
They're great.

Random point, but
>jealous moon
Wherefore art thou Romeo?

>>5812285
Thanks, I appreciate the critique.

About the sage thing, the character is 8,000 yeas old, so, you know. Wisdom n' shit. It tones down later, as you saw in my first post in this thread.

And yeah, I can't live up to how good my start was, it really sucks.
[the first sentence was a fluke :(]

I'm just not good enough to keep it up yet especially in time constraints. I wrote that chapter in 2 days because I've got a deadline, the whole novel it's apart of is an anniversary gift.

>>5812285
Really, I guess, make the tone less sage-deep-wisdom-of-the-ancients, especially after he wakes up. The tone works for the child bit but not after; waking up provides a nice transition point. And trim your prose to be more direct, a little more minimalistic, to avoid the issue of overdescription.

But hey, it's pretty nice. And that opening, god. Amazing.

>>5811824
>>5811848
Well, thanks for this. You've pointed out for me a lot of things I need to change. Thanks, and good luck with that story you're doing too. I like the jokey tone of the narrator in your first post here more than the sage wise tone of your first chapter, if that helps.

>>5812397
I'll be sure to tone it down. Most of the story goes back and forth between moderately funny/lighthearted to disgustingly dark.

I don't know if you saw my first critique service thread, but the chapter I asked for criticism had 6-7 people commenting on how genuinely funny it was, If you'd like to read that I wouldn't mind posting it.

>>5811721
meant sure to notice (the protagonists height on the way back to the car)

the punctuation is absolutely deliberate, it's an attempt to recreate the awkwardness of the conversation. i just wrote this for the flash fiction and could do with improving it, I might play and resubmit it here some time as an excersise. maybe smoothen up the build up to the last lines.

thanks very much for your critique, i really appreciate the advice - and the fact that you took the time to read it, and seemingly enjoyed it

"You always find such curious things on your travels, Wanderer." slurred Athja, the old chief's wife.
Mjur lit the old man's pipe and nearly dropped it when he discovered that inhaling smoke was not so easy. With trembling hands he tried to pass it along to Frig, who rejected it by instead giving it to the blind woman beside her.
Wanderer's remaining eye peered into the fire with a distant gaze. To Frig he could have been admiring the future. Wanderer was a strange man who could speak in tongues that were not of Rune, yet when he did, he did not sound like the others. The chief had earlier claimed that because his home was in all villages yet none of them, each dialect was of no matter. Frig mistrusted this however, the chief's wisdom wasn't particularly great. In fact, he diverted more focus to the hilarity-herb itself rather than its origin.

"Yea. Such is why I live on road it, or field. But verily the things I find are half a reason, only." He leaned his head backwards and the moonlight revealed how unkempt his long beard was. Frig could see leaves, dirt and crumbs hiding in the hairs. Wanderer had no name but Wanderer, because the villagers did not know what to call a man, a creature like him. With only one eye, a wild tongue and beard almost as tall as himself it was difficult to find a name as dignified, or mysterious as him. Although Frig and Mjur had on many occasions tried, but decided that names like Darsa, Völkyr or even Mad Bushman just weren't apt.
"Where, actually, where did you find this?" Mjur sat up again after slouching in a smokey haze. "I've not seen a leaf like't, and, well, spring only just came."
Wanderer chuckled (though one would rather say he hissed). His one eye catapulted towards Mjur. "Why boy, over ocean it! So, I embarked to an island with a steaming, whistling mountain..."
The mood fell quiet. Surely, some knew, he must've meant the island in the far north with the fyr called Manteyja, but there was not an ocean between it and the mainland shore...

Frig broke the silence. "What is there across the ocean?" Her curiosity hadn't been spoiled like that of her elders. To Frig, it was clear that there must be lands on the other side of the water.
Wanderer smiled at her and looked up into the night sky again. "Ocean it. Smallpaw, there's not one a ocean." He breathed in the cold spring air. "Rather, most of them are not even on this Earth."

I'd like some critique on this one.

>>5813285
>slurred Athja
type out the way she slurs phonetically, or ditch the concept. reading 'slurred x' afterwards does not have the desired effect.

>Wanderer's remaining eye peered into the fire with a distant gaze
I understand the image you intend to convey but you way want to reword this. More specifically I think it is gaze that is causing the problem. My initial thought would be to say appearing to look far beyond or something of that nature


>Frig mistrusted this however, the chief's wisdom
remove however

I think the more pressing issue is how similar it might be to staples in the fantasy genre - I am certainly not well versed enough in it to critique this within the necessary context. Generic advice is always to differentiate yourself from the typical. like in music, the greatest albums from x genre (eg shoegaze, post-punk) are all very different, yet all the imitators and revivalists could have their songs on each others albums without any interruption in flow.

Hips and ass swaying like waves from the girl, only hips and ass, and a peek of pussy every now and then from the cloth. The room seemed to shake with great energy in her presence, with a voluptuous push and thrust and up and down, and the chains trailing from her ankles, almost as if the dance and rhythms of the cave not only freed her from physical constraint but also put here in control, and what an empowered girl she was, but at that moment, and as sad as it was, tits and ass were what took my mind, and 20 years of patriarchal conditioning had me at moments looking for a club.

Soon enough came the "torture," with close to 15 young women chained by their wrists, kneeling in front of the wall, as well as 15 shy, willing young men ready to take the whip. Then insults and demands screamed from the wall and the boys took heed, with their heads eventually wrapped around legs, eating, being crushed, being slammed and twerked and hands and fingers and mouths and cocks following every girls whim.

>>5814703
There is a shift at the beginning from the present to the past tense, which I am not sure makes sense. Beyond that, I do like the imagery of waves that you generate, and of course the thought of women engaged in willing bondage is compelling. My biggest critique is that it doesn't seem sexy enough. Maybe you're not trying to make it sexy. But it seems like its goal is eroticism, and it's just not doing it for me. There isn't enough wetness and warmth and stickiness to really get me going.

Meanwhile, here is a short story of mine that could use some critiquing.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1IhYC9XFnnuTPch6tZAbfKHhzQxxMOGZ1OXVbW63EwNo/edit

>>5814804

I would say you have some potential, but the story is a long way off (possibly irredeemable?)

there are occasion flashes of inspired writing, and the tone of the dialog is fair, but the rest is too sloppy:

- too much mixing of direct (i.e. showing) and stylized metaphors which makes for very uneven writing e.g. She was six months pregnant and she looked it, her belly bulging up against the fabric of her dress. Her black hair fanned about the powdery blue cushions like a bank of kelp within the sea.
- plot isn't great. to be fair I started scanning once Rex pointed out/joked that Seth was Seth
-weak characterization: none of the characters are really fleshed out, and just given one attribute. Seth is pretty much nothing.
- weak ending, which is probably the most important part of a short story. particularly because it jars (and not in a good way) with the tone and themes of the earliest text

also just in general the story seems very superficial. if you have done research about egypt, egyptian gods, traveling in egypt in the past (50 years?), it doesn't really show. the sense of setting is ok, particularly at the beginning (probably buoyed by the dialog)

anyways, this is readable by /lit/ standards, although still bad in general, but keep writing

Once again, Billy found himself in the principal's office. He kicked his legs nervously as they dangled off the edge of the chair, and in his mind he
rehersed his excuses and played out the scenarios in his head. He had some time to prepair as his mother was still talking to the principal just outside
the office. He listened intently to the muffled voices and watched the slight movements of the shadows on the floor below the door. He was nervous,
because no matter how shrill his mother's yelling would be, it's nothing compared to the wrath of his father.

It was the fourth time this month billy had been sentenced to detention. No matter how hard he tried to do well, no matter how many times he promised
himself he wouldn't get in trouble again, boredom drove him to his distractions. In his efforts for mental stimulation, He would talk back to the teacher, pick on
other kids, draw a penis on the board when no one was looking. Sometimes just trying to make his friends laugh, but usually out of frusteration. It confused him that it
was so easy for everyone else to sit there quietly and do their work. He wished he could do that too, but trouble always managed to find its way back to billy.
Alone in the school basement during lunch hour while everyone else was outside playing, an hour of detention felt like a two week stretch.

As he was driving home with his mother, he stared out the window and tried to block out her vocal barrage. He focused on rainwater sliding down
the window being pushed about by the wind. At the collage of autumn leaves on the streets and in the trees, making his passenger seat window look
like a living painting. Sometimes when they'd stop at a stopsign, he'd look at the scene through the window and try to take in every detail he
could in the moment before they'd start moving again. He noticed every stop showed a unique picture, and he'd never see that exact view again. To him,
that made them precious and beautiful. He never missed an opportunity to see something no one had ever seen before.

They finally arrived at their destination and his mother pulled into the driveway. He walked to the house with a forward lean as his full
backpack weighed heavy on his shoulders. His mother slammed the car door and walked ahead of him in piercing silence.
Billy's eyes never left the ground.

>>5814960
Billy sat motionless on the floor in his room, staring into nothing with glazed eyes, his imagination ran wild with scenarios of when his father would get
home. Infront of him were the toys he'd been playing with scattered across the ground, untouched since that morning before he went to school. His eyes
began to wander and his short attention span became preocupied with the lego spaceship he had been building sitting on his dresser. He had dissasembled
several other lego sets and combined them into this, his opus magnum. Normally he wouldn't waste his time colour coordinating the peices, but anything less than
perfection just wouldn't do for this project. He picked it up and sat on the ground next to a pile of legos. He grabbed another bucket and dumped the
contents on the ground. With a sense of professionalism, he picked through the fresh pile and began the finishing touches on his project. He became lost
in his work and forgot that soon his father would come home.

Suddenly, the loud thud of the closing front door jolted Billy upright. Like a startled jackrabbit he sat still and wide eyed, all of the emotions he set aside
came flooding back with the memory that he was in trouble. There was about a minute of silence, and Billy tried to listen over the sound of his beating heart and rapid
breathing. Then came the familiar sound of slow, methodical footsteps coming up the stairs. The steps grew louder and closer as they came down the hall,
and with every passing moment billy wished with all his heart he had just five more minutes of peace. Billy gulped as the door finally opened, and there was his
father standing there, staring at little billy like a viper. He was a short man with glasses and a receading hairline, and he was wearing his work suit with his
tie loosened and his jacket in his hand. He may have been unintimidating to other men, but he had the power and authority of fatherhood over billy.

Billy sat crosslegged in a heap of lego, and looked his father up from his shoes to his head. Billy made eyecontact with his father, and saw his face was stern and
lifeless like a statue. His father started walking towards him, and Billy's head immediately lowered. He stood infront of Billy, towering over and engulfing him in his shadow.
Billy couldn't bring himself to raise his head, and just looked at his fathers shoes infront of him.

His father let out a deep sigh and said "If I have to have to go for one more meeting with that cunt teacher. . ."
Billy was still frozen and he felt a burning feeling in his chest.

>>5814966
"Nothing to say for yourself?"
His father waited for a response, but there was none. There was only peircing silence and the feeling of his father's eyes burning holes on the back of his head. His father looked
around the room, noticing all the toys on the ground.

"...I come home from a hard day of work to find out that you're making us look like bad parents at school, and what are you doing? You're dicking
around up here, making a mess of MY house, with the things I buy you? Does that like something a good person would do?"

Silence.

"Billy I asked you a question."

"I'm sorry"

"That's not what I asked. Does it make sense to you that I have to work for everything around here and you can't even keep your god damn room clean?"

"No."

"Well, I'm glad we're on the same page."

He looked down at Billy, sitting cross legged with his head lowered, looking so small and weak. He looked at the clutter of lego encerciling billy on the floor, and noticed the lego spaceship sitting
beside him. He reached down and picked it up. He looked at it for a moment, turning it around and examining it while nodding his head in admiration. He then wound up and violently threw it against the wall
with the power and skill he learned as a pitcher. It made a loud smash and pieces of lego went flying all over the room. The sound jolted billy's whole body and he winced in fear.

"'Helluva spaceship, Bill." He quipped as he strolled out of the room and gently closed the door.

Billy collapsed into a ball and cried as quietly as he could. When he exausted himself, he crawled over to the bed, cleared away some lego for a space to lay down, and slept.

>>5814960
>>5814966
>>5814969
Can someone give me one review for my dumb story so I can stop thinking about it?

>>5815029

it's pointless

there is not an original thought, theme, or line in the whole thing

it's just so whatever

the whole thing is so surface and artificial that there really is no point to it

maybe a talented writer could have rescued it with really poignant prose, but you are not that talented writer

>>5815047
that's... all I ever wanted

We’d been digging for the better half of the morning. The weatherman said five below, and the thermometer said about the same. We went out insulated, in our coats and boots, and John had a red balaclava with a wool cap on top of it. “Keep fuckin’ haulin’, boy,” he’d say if I looked up at his face, then, when we were clearing snow out of his driveway. The flurries that kept on past dawn were spiteful and they chuckled their way down. The most of it had come overnight, when I was asleep and he was mending the split kitchen chair. He grunted sadly over it. He never quit work. He slaved on the mountain like a dog, and he wanted me to know this. The oil-lamp glow spilled under the door and shifted as he displaced light. Grunting and hammering his broken chair past midnight with his glasses low, in the silence. He was seventy by this time. His house was down the road from a radio tower you could see from the bottom of the mountain, and he listened to news alone, when he wanted it, in such a clear sound you thought there was a man suited in the other room telling you the weather. A proper young anchor leaning against some angle of the counter, informing you of the same weather each day. Above the wood stove, on the wall, were the heads of deer and small game. In the corner were a pair of old skis that read ‘Watercrest Alpine Club’ in faint black. On weekdays, before sunrise, he would wake and dress in long johns decades old, and put a white shirt down over his chest. In this alone he would open the front door, and go to the mailbox at the head of the snowed front yard. And when he stopped and lowered the tin hatch and peered into the dim emptiness that awaited, he'd look up into the sky for a while. I was related to this man, and I wondered what he saw in those clouds.

I’m moving fast. Very fast. Very, very fucking fast- 80, 85, 90, the dial goes up on the gauge, the wind whips past my face, blows my hair. Blood rushes though my veins, past my eardrums, and it’s all I can hear as the adrenaline gives me a headrush and the engine roars. Not playing any music tonight- don’t need any. At this speed, the music’s in the vibrations of the machine, rubber against asphalt and greased mechanics working, balancing, metal trapeze and acrobatics turning wheels that scream in protest when I hit the brakes. But I’m not hitting the brakes- so they move smoothly, powerfully, in assent to my momentum, my force, purpose, power.

There was a man who worked for a small music blog and he was called Editor. He was tasked to produce a list of the 50 greatest guitarists of all time. Editor did not like guitar music, no one else did at the blog which he wrote for, but Editor was bound to this task, for he had the least seniority.And though Editor did not care or guitar music he was not ignorant of it and so he composed the list diplomatically, in the spirit of fairness. He had no favorites and there were no controversial pick. When Editor posted the list there was a great rage in the comment section like Editor had never seen before. The comments demanded the list be rewritten or reorganized or all-together thrown out. And Editor was perplexed at this but also greatly saddened for he believed himself good at his craft. He thought well into the night what he ought to do and then he went to sleep and had two dreams.

Editor in a lab somewhere in the future, surrounded by scientists building a machine. They were making a super computer, something that would simulate the world from beginning to end so they could catalogue every guitarist. They turned on the machine and ran the program and in a moment imperceptible to Editor it played out every event that ever was all-the-while recording guitarists known and obscure. In that same moment it caught up to the present and bloomed, flowering forth, birthing a thousand million manifold vining paths of probabilities, and playing out every potenial future, newborn brother and sister Earths contingent on some mother variable, all containing speculative guitarists, whether currenty in utero or just nowhere at all. And in some of these worlds the Earth was destroyed in some calamity and in some rare few Man propagated the stars and other dimensions, but all had guitarists. And all the guitarists that were or are or ever would be were recorded by the machine, collected in a well of knowledge incalculable, an endless array.

And there was a man sitting in a chair next to the machine, fat wires snaking from his skull that connected to a port in the computer. He was one of the people who commented on the blog and he was called Commentator. They hit a button on the machine and it hummed. And Commenter reeled as he was filled with every string pulled from the boundless pool of guitarists, the whole spectrum overlapping, no distinction, complete democratic Guitarist Monad of pure Guitarist Form, each was each other all together. And the machine stopped humming and the man got up from the chair, quite shaken.

The scientists were celebrating, for their machine had worked perfectly. Someone shook Editor's hand and another patted him on the back and mentioned that there was nothing to worry over. They were just about to pour the libations when Commentor spoke up.
"You have mingled Jimi Hendrix with Kirk Hammet as a pig would mix pearls with his offal," he said, "Were I your employer I would have you forswear all writing on music forever."
And Editor felt a great sadness in his heart and he looked at the scientists and they just shrugged. And there the dream ended, and as if a veil had passed before his eyes he slipped into darkness before finding himself in much older times
walking around an island in Greece.

He weaved through the muscat groves and over the hills above the Aegean in the calm and cool of the day. And then a man known as Pythagoras (all features blurred beyond his beard, Editor knew Greeks had beards) was at his side and the man took Editor by the hand and led him. There in the clearing on the soft grass was a a monochord which stretched out across the island in both directions. Editor looked past the trees and saw it stretching over the ocean and then up into the air. A dark sliver arcing up and disappearing into a cloud. Editor knew it went well beyond the sky reaching forever into space.

Pythagoras knelt and plucked the string. Editor heard nothing but saw everything being shook from its dimensions, the world shuddering past its bonds and constraints and it shook and slurred into one shape. And the string seemed to vibrate in every conceivable position and frequency and then also not at all. Pythagoras looked at Editor and then palmed the board and everything fell back into place and the string was still. The mathematician cleared his throat and spoke "The song cannot be heard all at once," he fretted the string and stretched his arm out and fretted the other side.

"It's quite taut now, give it a pluck, hear it sing," he said to Editor. Editor approached and knelt and he ran his finger across the string and it rang out. The string sang in the clearing loud and crisp and they sat there and listened to it linger and fade. Pythagoras shifted his hands up and down the board, and Editor plucked again, and they played music in the clearing.
Editor twisting and turning in bed at the threshold of sleeping, waking, the liminal space, alternating between darkened purple morphic shapes dancing under his eyelids and the green hills where Pythagoras looked up and said "Editor, this is but a dream."

Editor rose from bed and checked the comments again and he reflected on what the Greek had said to him. Editor sent an email to his employer and informed him that he was quitting to make music of his own. And he decided he would form a cover band, a cover band for all times and places, a cover band that would play any music, a music cover band. And soon Editor found others to play music with and in time they built up the courage to create their own original music covers, and Editor saw the interplay between all and the particular.

>>5815029
I think >>5815047 is a little harsh. Your prose is plain and the story is unexceptional, but if it were placed within a compelling plot it wouldn't really be hard to read. I agree that it's whatever, but while that means it isn't good, it also it isn't bad.

>>5814128
Thank you, those are some good points.