Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-26112985-20151113225617/@comment-24466828-20151114185407

SnakeTongue237 wrote: BrianBerta wrote: Since you helped me fix my story a few weeks ago, it's only fair that I help you with this one.

To be honest, I'm not sure why this story was Marked For Review. It's not perfect but I wouldn't describe it as mediocre or bad. Did an admin tell you why this was Marked for Review? If an admin didn't tell you why, you could always message the admin who put this story under "Marked For Review" so you know exactly what to fix.

However, there were a couple things that I think should be fixed.

1) I don't think you should include the scene when the main character finds the newspaper which reads "Female Infant Stolen From Orphanage." It didn't give away the plot twist at the end instantly but after the main character discovered a girl chained up, I grew very suspicious and I felt like the plot twist was ruined.

Here is what I think you should do. Firstly, have the main character discover the girl chained up and the eaten corpse of the main character's uncle. Secondly, he could then go up to dial 9-1-1 and Aunt Clarissa could run away. Thirdly, you could have him run downstairs and then he could see the newspaper headline. Finally, after that, you should include the 7th and 8th last paragraphs in this story. I think that would reveal the plot twist in a more 'relaxing' manner and it would make the ending more enjoyable.

2) Grammar is very good but there was one short paragraph which didn't make any sense. Here it is.

"Using that method they had beat me time and time again until I eventually tired of hide and seek and proclaimed that we should play tag instead."

I think this is what you meant to type: Using that method, they had beaten me time and time again until I eventually grew tired of playing and proclaimed that we should play tag instead." Also, note the comma I wrote after the word "method". Remember that you should always include commas after transition words and transition phrases.

Here are 2 examples of commas you should put after transitions.

Transition Word: Furthermore, I believe that we should do this. Transition Phrase: After you do this, make sure that you do this.

3) Some paragraphs are unnecessarily short. You have a few examples of paragraphs which are incredibly short. I'm talking about the ones which are only 1 line long.

For example, the paragraph "Her precious little twins had to be perfect and untouched." could probably be combined with the paragraph above it. There were a few of these paragraphs in the story and I recommend that you fix them. Hell, you could even combine some of the 2 line paragraphs.

All in all, however, this was a pretty good story and I recommend that you fix these few issues and see if the "Marked For Review" template gets removed. Thanks for stopping by and looking at this! A favor for a favor eh?

Mikemacdee posted some pretty legitamite criticisms of it in the comments section after this was nominated for PotM. It was then marked for review by LOLSKELETONS, who suggested workshopping it.

I'm currently having trouble deciding what to do with the scene in which our main character finds the newspaper article. I know that it is something I need to cut out, but I'm not entirely sure whether I should replace it with some other kind of clue as to what is going on, or just cut right to the chase of finding what is underneath the stairs. What is your opinion of this?

I'll fix the error with transition words.

I must agree, the fact that some paragraphs are too short is a problem, and probably a bit of an annoyance as well.

Thanks again for your help! The refined version of this story should be up sometime soon! Thanks for reading my suggestions.

As for the newspaper section, I'd say that my idea would make it better. However, if you do have an idea for another clue, I'd be interested in hearing it.

By the way, make sure you fix this paragraph if you haven't yet. "Using that method they had beat me time and time again until I eventually tired of hide and seek and proclaimed that we should play tag instead."