Hatrack River Writers Workshop: Eternal

This is topic Eternal in forum Fragments and Feedback for Short Works at Hatrack River Writers Workshop.

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Posted by Just Jo (Member # 2479) on :

Okay, let's give this a shot. This is the first story I've ever got to finish. Dissect it to your heart's content, just let me see which morsels you liked and what you spat out...

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I open my eyes.
The greenish light barely illuminates my room, instead it corrupts the soothing semi-darkness of this early hour into a sickening shimmer of poison hues. A foul grey muck oozes from a crack in the ceiling almost straight above my head, drip drip dripping in a vile puddle next to my pillow.
I roll over onto my side, looking out the window to my right. The same green light sketches a bleak outline of the city; a tangled mass of twisted buildings and torn-up concrete.
I blink for a few minutes, a habit I still practice every day at least a dozen times. Blinking. Opening and closing my eyes, over and over again, hoping against hope that instead of chasing away the last vestiges of sleep, I might at last wake up from this hellish dream my life has become.
I get up. Slowly. Always slowly. I break more easily with each passing year, it seems.
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Greetz

Jo (Just)

Posted by benskia (Member # 2422) on :

Hi.
Not bad. Too many descriptive words though. I cant tell you what they are called, either verbs or abjectives or something. I'm not that up on the technical stuff.

What I mean for example, if you look at the first few sentences....

greenish light
soothing semi-darkness
sickening shimmer
foul grey much
vile puddle
bleak outline
tangled mass
twisted buildings
torn-up concrete

Somebody who knows a bit more about this kind of stuff will explain this to you better than I just did.

Posted by RFLong (Member # 1923) on :

First off:
How long is the whole story? Are you looking for readers? What is the genre? (I know that's probably obvious, but I like to know these things up front).

I find it interesting, but not terribly easy to read. I had to go through it a couple of times to work out what was going on (but as I have small children and advanced sleep deprivation you might not necessarily want to read too much into that).

There is a lot of description and a lot of that description is qualified so you could cut down on that a bit.

That said, I am hooked but I had to make an effort to get hooked.

Posted by Just Jo (Member # 2479) on :

Whoops. Forgot all that stuff. First offence and all that.

The story is a dazzling 1289 words long (4 pages) and it's intended for an audience of people who like off-the-beaten-path things. It's rather bleak and depressing and I'm looking for people to read it and provide feedback on it.

That thing about the adjectives (that's what they're called) may very well be true. I'll work on that.

So, anyone who's interested, just let me know and I'll send the lot over for your dissective pleasure...

Greetz

Jo (Just)

Posted by Beth (Member # 2192) on :

benskia: adjectives modify nouns; adverbs modify verbs (and often end in -ly.)

this is dense with adjectives - I'd replace 95% of them with stronger nouns or just cut them altogether.

I'd also reconsider present tense - many editors hate it. I've seen more than one guideline that expressly prohibits present tense. If you have a really good reason to use it, then by all means do (and just avoid those publishers!) but if you're just using it because you think it sounds cool, well, I'd reconsider.

nevertheless, congrats on finishing your first story!

Posted by MCameron (Member # 2391) on :

All right, I'll take a look. Just send it to the email in my profile.

--Mel

Posted by NewsBys (Member # 1950) on :

I'd like to read more of it.

Posted by Jaina (Member # 2387) on :

I'll read it if you need another pair of eyes.