Hey look, reviews!

[hider=Prisca Glover]First I’d like to say that I loved the way you managed to take a component that was originally intended to produce light-hearted, comedic entries and turn it into a fairly serious topic. Definitely wasn’t what I expected, and I love to see that in WOTM. That said, there were a few elements in this story that I found to be a bit unrealistic. Not that I can’t see a person afraid to leave their home – that makes sense to me – but the fact that Elliot lived so close to Prisca this whole time without her ever knowing seems a bit out-there to me. How long has he been helping her? I don’t think it was really specified, but if it was long enough for Prisca to develop such a dependence on him, then it should’ve been long enough for that detail to come up at some point. It’s a plothole I just can’t quite get over. Other than that, though, I don’t see much to critique about this entry. It’s rather well put together and a creative idea.[/hider]

[hider=Itta]I’m sorry if I don’t have a lot to say about the specifics in this story, but I just had a really hard time following this one. It just didn’t keep me interested, and I had a hard time focusing on the story. The writing style just moved too fast; I had no time to really understand the emotions of Itta, or really take in the atmosphere at any point in the story. Things just moved so quickly from event to event to event, making it hard for me to really picture any of it in my head as so many things seemed so glossed over. 

One example of this, even if it is a small one, is the way you opened with a narrator telling the story. Ordinarily this technique can be really good for creating atmosphere, but in this case, there is none. I have virtually no idea who’s telling this story or in what context. Is it a campfire story? Did a traveler in the area come across a native who wanted to tell him about a local legend? I have no idea, and without such an atmosphere to immerse myself in, the technique serves virtually no purpose. You could’ve removed it entirely and nothing would be changed. 

Additionally, this story suffers from quite a few technical errors. Grammatical mistakes, for one, come up in a few places. For example in the phrase, “the man shaken his head”, you want to use the word “shook” instead of “shaken”. I feel like a lot of such errors could’ve been fixed with a good proofreading. In fact, as I’m typing up this review in Microsoft Word, the program is trying to tell me that “man shaken” is incorrect and wants me to change it to “man shook” like it should be. This gives me the impression that this entry was quickly typed up in the Guild post box and sent in without being looked over much.

Overall, this entry seems rushed – both in terms of how quickly the story’s moving and how quickly it all seemed to be written. I recommend slowing down – firstly in terms of your narrative, by taking time to focus on the characters’ emotions and the intended mood, and secondly in terms of your writing process, by giving yourself time to proofread and consider where your story could be revised.[/hider]

[hider=Thursdays]I suppose I should start by saying that I found this entry really hard to get into, for reasons that really weren’t your own fault. Stories with this sort of theme kind of anger me for personal reasons. I suppose you could contact me after voting ends if you wanna know more about that, but in this review, I’ll try not to dwell on it much. I just thought I should start out by saying I wasn’t exactly moved by the message. 

That said, I feel like this story doesn’t have enough content to stand as a story. There are really only two scenes here: the girl has a problem, and said problem is resolved. We don’t get any time to get to know this girl or the details of why high school is such a problem for her, so her plight is hard to sympathize with and doesn’t come off as much more than teenage angst. And worst of all, we don’t know how this conflict was resolved. At all. There was no buildup and no climax; our main character went from a tough spot to clear blue skies in literally no time at all. I suppose it’s nice to know that things worked out for her, but I’m dreadfully curious as to how. For example, how did she convince her parents, who were so opposed to her choices before, that this path was the right one for her? How did she get over all those other problems that were never explained in detail? I guess I can’t say that there’s no conflict to follow; there is one, I just don’t know how everything played out. 

I understand that you’re trying to make a social statement. Even though I don’t personally agree with it, I can at least give you points for what you tried to do. Problem is, though, the commentary isn’t very convincing without a captivating story to go along with it. Those who agreed with you probably had an easy time stepping into the shoes of the main character, which I imagine was your goal. Those who disagreed from the start, though, not only can’t relate to her but also don’t care much about the character and can’t relate to her struggle, because you’ve given us no time to get to know her. Those who started on your side would be more likely to like your entry, but those against you wouldn’t be convinced. And to me, that’s just not a strong commentary, or a strong story. Sorry.[/hider]