Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-29791712-20160807010304/@comment-28266772-20160810142727

I didn't really enjoy this. It laboured on and I struggled to finish it. Below I've offered a review of the first 1000ish words, but beyond that I wasn't able to go in-depth.

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It astonishes me how little people are aware of the phenomenon known as Astral Projection [I don’t think that should be capitalized]. But I can’t blame them for their ignorance on the subject, really. The first time I astral projected [also not sure you can use ‘astral projection’ as a verb like this], I had no idea what the hell I was doing.

It happened a week or so after my high school graduation. Returning home from work, I wanted nothing more than to just lay on my bed and sleep all afternoon. I worked at a convenience store name QuickShop. Ever since I finished high school, [no comma] the bastards that manage the place “requested” for me to begin working late nights and early mornings. As if I had a goddamn choice.

I closed my eyes even before my body landed on my bed. The early glimmers of sunrise shot through my curtains. The birds outside chirped and sang their morning tunes. I heard the garbage truck roar through my block, along with the workers talking among themselves. These were usually the sights and sounds I woke up to, not fall [fell] asleep into.

Even if a banshee screamed at the top of its lungs outside, I would’ve still fallen asleep. I took one last look at my night stand, and spotted my Xbox One controller coated with a thin layer of dust. It seemed like I barely had time to engage in all the hobbies I used to love doing.

Within seconds, I [was] knocked out.

I traveled through a variety of dreams as most people tend to do. Some came in orderly sequences, while others manifested out of the deeper layers of my subconscious.

Eventually, I woke up from my slumber. The drowsiness that possessed my body before departed, and I felt as if I drank [had drunk] a gallon of coffee. I sat up from my bed, and stretched my limbs. A full blanket of sunlight poured through my window, indicating that it was around the afternoon. With this in mind, I left my room to prepare for the evening.

I went into my kitchen in order to get something to drink. I spotted my mother watching her novellas in the living room. The volume was raised all the way up in order to compete with the whirling noise of the air conditioner.

“Hola, Ma,” I said, but received no response. She did crane her neck sideways, however, as if she thought she heard something. I thought about approaching my mother in order to greet her properly, but my lips ached to taste the sweet flavor of that orange juice '[you haven’t mentioned ‘that’ orange juice before so the wording comes off as awkward – plus the whole phrasing is just weird. Like a lame commercial for orange juice]'.

I stood in front of the fridge, but paused once I saw a colony of cockroaches skidding around near the cereals on the top shelves. Those damn bugs kept on eating our food and infesting our house with their disgusting eggs. My dad told me he was planning on calling an exterminator, but who knows when that would be. I thought about smashing the heads of those pesky little insects, but again, the orange juice demanded my attention. [as it so often does]

I glared at those vile critters as I reached to open the fridge. My hand, however, slipped through the handle.

I stood frozen, unaware and bewildered by what I [had] just experienced. I shifted my gaze towards the fridge once more. The handle looked intact, so what the hell just happened?

I tried to grip the handle again, but my fingers slid through the handle once more. Again and again '[so ‘again’ is repeated, but this whole section feels redundant. In the following order we have ‘again’ ‘once more’ ‘again and again’, ‘repeated’ ‘resulted with the same… conclusion’ – it’s a lot of repetition of, well, repetition] I repeated the same movements, but they all resulted with [in] the same unexplainable [inexplicable]' conclusion.

The outside world continued on in its placid and orderly matter [manner?]. But inside my own ruminations and emotions, panicked ceased [panic seized] controlled of my conscious in an instant. I opened my mouth to scream, but nothing escaped my lips except a hollow release of breath.

I grew dizzy. My feet stumbled backwards, and I lost balance. I tripped, and the moment my body made contact with the kitchen tiles, I opened my eyes to find myself back in my room.

This time I shrieked, but it disappeared just as quickly as it came. I jumped out of my bed as if the sheets caught on fire. An ocean of sweat drenched my body. My knees jiggled under my weight, but I prevented myself from collapsing.

<p class="MsoNormal">A horde of questions bombarded my mind that demanded answers. I jolted out of my room and into the dining room where I believed I once was minutes ago.

<p class="MsoNormal">I was rewarded with the same scene from before. My mother laid in the living room couch watching television. This time she noticed me, however, and whispered hello while blowing me a kiss. Too caught up in my own predicament, however, I evaded [doesn’t feel like the right word] her and dashed straight into the kitchen.

<p class="MsoNormal">My hands fumbled through the open shelves on top of the refrigerator. I found those fucking cockroaches crawling all over the cereal boxes, just like before. Everything was the same.

<p class="MsoNormal">I approached the fridge. Without a moment of hesitation, I extended my hand, and this time my fingers curled around the handle. I didn’t know if that was what I wanted to happen or not. Either way, I knew something very strange just occurred in my boring life, and it may change it for the better.

<p class="MsoNormal">Or maybe for the worse. It was too soon to decide which one.

<p class="MsoNormal">'[so far I have a couple of notes. First you seem to include a lot of superfluous information for the sake of it. Second some of your wording is odd. Third, people are quite well versed with astral projection – I don’t think you need to dedicate so much time to it]'

<p class="MsoNormal">Instead of studying for the extra college courses I signed up for, or reading away all of the science fiction novels I haven’t [hadn’t] touched in months, I spent the entire evening and night researching what just happened to me.

<p class="MsoNormal">Google helped within minutes of typing in the right key words, and clicking on the best links. I soon discovered a name for the miracle that happened: Astral Projection. [Do you really think the best use of your readers’ time is to describe a google search?] One website described it as an out-of-body experience that behaves in a form a telepathy, but reaches new heights and limits far beyond any psychic ability. A large scale of debates [large scale debate] populated the internet, arguing whether or not such a remarkable experience can be accomplished or not. Some people recalled their own stories and viewpoints on the subject matter. Others seemed quick to dismiss the idea as something psychological, and nothing to do with spirituality.

<p class="MsoNormal">I certainly believed it, however. Hell, I lived through it.

<p class="MsoNormal">Arriving to this conclusion, I contradicted myself on a completely large scale. Before going through with this bizarre experience, I was a firm believer that no such thing as heaven, hell, spirits, or an afterlife existed [there are easier ways to say that you were a skeptic]. I never called myself an atheist, since I still believed that anything in this world was possible. I approached life with a more nihilistic sense, since for some reason this granted me with [granted me comfort] comfort

<p class="MsoNormal">But the deeper I dug into astral projection, the more other opportunities of what to believe in opened up. The constant talk about spirit and body kept on popping up, along with the science that maybe the powers of consciousness extends farther from what we think possible.

<p class="MsoNormal">The unavoidable fact stood clear, however. I, somehow, found a way to detach my soul from my body, and wander through the physical world without the need of my actual body. I laid on my bed after finally closing my laptop, and I allowed my mind to cycle through that thought over and over again. I couldn’t even begin to imagine what I could do with this awesome ability.

<p class="MsoNormal">By the time I prepared myself for bed, it was around three in the morning. I had to go to my job in four hours, and I was still behind on a shit-load of school work. Not only that, but I wanted to investigate more about astral projection, and learn everything [that] needed to be learn [learned] in order to perfect the experience.

<p class="MsoNormal">I huddled into my blankets with only one precise thought in my head. I knew I wanted, no, needed, to astral project once more.

<p class="MsoNormal">I tried astral projecting every single night I fell asleep, but every attempt ended with the same failures. People theorized a laundry list of techniques and tricks in order to shift into astral projection, but they all seemed a bit skeptical to me. One article I read required you to force your body to sleep, but to keep your mind awake, a method similarly used in order to lucid dream. Despite the odds, I gave it a shot, and ended up trapping myself in a sleep paralysis. Never doing that crap again.

<p class="MsoNormal">As the days dragged on, I grew more desperate to astral project again. I hated work with every fiber of my being. I dreaded the long and dismal walks to the bus stop. I hated waking up early with barely any hours of sleep. My managers treated me with no respect, and they paid me shit for money.

<p class="MsoNormal">The worries of school also added to the equation of my anxiety. I had no clue what major I wanted to pursue, and because of this I decided to apply for a community college instead. I didn’t know if that was the right choice or not, and I contemplated every day if my life maintained any sense of direction or not. Both school and work took control of my life, and left me feeling caged and enslaved to my own horrors.

<p class="MsoNormal">Astral projection was the key to my emancipation. It offered a way to liberate myself. I only felt happy whenever I devoted my time into unfolding new secrets of astral projection.

<p class="MsoNormal">I read something unsettling, however, during my break at work one day. Someone asked in Yahoo Question if it’s safe to astral project, and if there are any risks whenever someone enters it. The comments consisted of its usual believers and non-believers, trying to prove one another wrong but delivering their typical vacuous comebacks. Among the pile of junk, however, one guy wrote something that almost made me choke on my sandwich.

<p class="MsoNormal">He claimed that there is a possibility that sometimes demons or ghost [ghosts] from the afterlife take advantage of those who astral project, and possess the bodies of those who left theirs while participating in this event [the last part feels redundant]. He talked about a thin white string that attaches your soul to your body. I read about this pale line in other articles, but thought it to be a work of other people’s imagination.

<p class="MsoNormal">This guy, however, stated that demons and spirits can cut that string from your soul, and that leaves your body vulnerable for any other soul to dominate it. He ended his comment saying that he doesn’t know himself whether it’s true or not, but that he discussed this with a lot of people who allegedly witnessed this happening.

<p class="MsoNormal">-

<p class="MsoNormal">So here are my main issues.

<p class="MsoNormal">1) Style - your use of English is odd. It doesn't flow, and you frequently use peculiar phrasings. There's redundancies and all sorts of weird little quirks. There is also a significant amount of basic mechanical errors. But the absolute worst part is that you don't seem to write with any sense of economics i.e. don't waste your reader's time. You have a pronounced tendency to just labour on and on and on and on about things that anyone could grasp in mere moments. Just consider the following -

<p class="MsoNormal"> "This guy, however, stated that demons and spirits can cut that string from your soul, and that leaves your body vulnerable for any other soul to dominate it. He ended his comment saying that he doesn’t know himself whether it’s true or not, but that he discussed this with a lot of people who allegedly witnessed this happening." -> I mean shit, isn't there a quicker way to just say "I read a yahoo answer that said sometimes you can get possessed"? There are way too many redundacies, and I feel like very little effort was put into streamlining your writing.

<p class="MsoNormal"> 2) Story - this brings me to my second point, which is that this lack of economics extends to the very plot itself. There are literally thousands of words dedicated to explaining ideas that are familiar to anyone who's alive in the modern world. Do we really need a demonstration of the guy struggling to grab his fridge? Do we really need to hear about his arduous journey across google? Everyone knows about astral projection, you're not giving a lecture on the idiosyncracies of MLP fanfiction to a theatre filled with amazonian cheiftains. For crying out loud it's basically the plot of insidious - you don't need to spend so much time on it.  Soul fucks off, other soul takes body. The end. The exorcist, insidious, rec, the matrix, the possession, paranormal activity, annabelle - literally pick a random movie and you have a 1/3 chance of stumbling across a possession storyline. There is simply no need to spend so much time explaining the basic premise.

<p class="MsoNormal"> Trust your audience and don't waste their time.

<p class="MsoNormal"> If I was you? I would cut the entire storyline out up to the point where the woman comes into play. You could fit it into a paragraph. "I was having an out-of body experience and I went back to my body and some other mother fucker had taken it for a joy ride" is literally all the explanation this needs. Everything after that point is golden. Enjoyable story with lots going on, strong descriptions, and good atmosphere. But I cannot stress enough that reading up to that point was an absolute chore.

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