Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-31532017-20161101085537/@comment-28266772-20161102172058

Looking at this the basic gist of it is that the hook just doesn't work. It's a nice exercise but it's too easy to explain the twist away. It's just not scary enough. First thing I thought? A gust of wind shut the door. Another problem is that you establish that you live alone after the initial twist. You should establish the rules before you break them i.e 'the door cannot be shut by anyone other than me, ergo when the door is shut by not me, it means there is someone else in the house'. Not 'the door is shut, but it couldn't have been shut by anyone other than me. There must be someone else in the house'.

@Parapraxis: typically it's not convention to rewrite someone's story for them, instead it makes more sense to either post the story with annotated notes or to just post your suggestions on their own. However, I have to admit it's kind of hard to give notes on a story this short, so I appreciate that you thought it would just be easier to rewrite it.