Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-26970607-20160207143914/@comment-26970607-20160207234125

EmpyrealInvective wrote: Starting with the basics, this line of coding is on every paragraph "Once upon a time, there was a small kingdom filled with wonderful, beautiful people. " I suggest using source mode when posting it as it can cause some pretty nasty formatting issues and almost always needs to be removed.

Awkward lines: "She stole as much money as she could find from her father before she went into town and buy (bought) dresses and beauty products." The story is being told in past tense so make sure you're making the tenses agree.

The story also feels more like a fable/fairy tale than a horror story. For the first two-thirds, I actually was wondering if this was meant to go on another site. When it does transition into the horror section, it feels very rushed and lacking. ""Yes, but I am no longer a sweet, young princess, and that boy is the root of my aging!" "James?" "Yes!" Rita stormed off before her husband could try to soothe her. When everyone in the castle was asleep, Rita picked up a weapon and murdered her own son, using his blood to write "I am young again"."

The ending especially feels off. "she wrote a message on the wall for her husband to read. "King, don't get comfortable; you're not safe."" I looked over the story again wondering if I missed a section, but really couldn't find adequate explanation for Rita's final message. All in all, this really feels like it doesn't have the impact you wanted it to. You definitely have a unique premise here, but a portion of it feels like you're trying to shoe-horn horror elements into the story. I'm sorry, but this story needs a lot of work and judging from your blogs, I think you might need to let this one go for the time being and return to it with a fresh set of eyes.

You're probably right. I'll come back to this story in a few weeks. So many rewrites though...