Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-32704469-20170728054054/@comment-32461413-20170728123431

Interesting concept.

I think your prose feels a bit stiff. Part of that is because your writing is pretty literal. For instance, " her father was cooking when Lucy ran out the door." There is no flair to that sentence. Some ways to help out is to add more description and be more colorful with your diction choices. When thinking about verbs, try to think of other ways rather than the first impulse. "Ran" for example is the most obvious choice of a verb for someone moving fast. Try something different like "scurry" or "scamper," words that are less obvious and have dual benefit such as more description and are more interesting in a general sense. Adding some more flair to your writing would make it an easier read. Stiff prose and literal language can make even the most interesting story drag on. I find myself while reading those stories to look over it a thousand times and simply gloss over the words because I cannot become interested in the story. Sure it may be a good, even great concept, however the writing is so stiff that I lose interest.

The problem with stories as short as this one, is that trying to keep a "slim profile" often leads to having a story without any description at all. This leads to critical plot holes and some moments of confusion.

What was the motive for Lucy to run out of the door into the neighbor's house? She kind of just did it randomly. I mean, she spent eight years on the planet and never had a problem before of randomly dashing out. At least, there isn't a mention of this. What would help is if you (even just a little bit) offered some character building. Perhaps after her mother passed away, she would act out more which is why she ran out the door. Maybe she is a really good kid and did something completely out of character (you would need to have a motive though). Some people try to write a mysterious element in so readers can develop their own theories. That is okay, however even when doing that, you need explanation and clues to go off of. Lucy ran outside into her neighbor's house for no apparent reason and it just seems off.

I think mentioning how Lucy's father took care of her and she took care of him is sweet. However, it almost feels like some sort of foreshadowing that never happens. Specifically the "she took care of him" as it seems like that notion would be carried out at some point in the story. Unless you have a reason to mention this or to build upon it at all, I would suggest removing it. How exactly does she care for him? By reading the story, she had done nothing for him.

I get the father was desperate, but even so, why would he break the neighbor's window? That is a bit unrealistic. Yeah, he wanted to see if his daughter was there, but he had no reason to vandalize the house and break in. Lucy was in there, so perhaps he heard a scream. That would be a motive to break the window. Not just looking for his daughter and smashing the window just to see if she may be in there (what if she wasn't? He would be in huge trouble). There needs to be a motive for something so drastic as breaking into a stranger's house.

I find "ask for her" to be distracting. It almost comes off as he knows that she is in there. How would he know? I would change it to more "ask if he has seen her."

I feel the whole climax of the story is stiff. The dad breaks in the house randomly, some guy is holding his daughter. Stands completely still while the father runs to get a knife, does absolutely nothing when he stabs him. Father escapes with his daughter without calling the police. With your lack of description here, I just picture the father going in and the guy is holding his daughter standing like a statue. No words, not even a blink of an eye. There needs to be description here. Also, why was he so easy to take down?

More importantly, why would the man have his daughter in the first place. How did he lure her into his house? What did he do to her? Why would he just hold a kid randomly without any reason to do so. This is why character building is important.

"Lucy was still crying so her father took a piece of cloth" what is the piece of cloth? What did he do with it? Was it like a tissue so she can dab her eyes with it? Description is important. I just visualize him picking a piece of cloth and standing with it.

How and why did she pass out? In context of the last sentence, it seems like the cloth had chloroform on it or something. While I've said this many times by now, description is important.

"Dinner was very tasty that night." I simply don't know what you mean by this. Did they eat the neighbor? Did they just resume normal life? Did Lucy pass out and her father ate her? You can see that my conclusions are all over the place. What happened to the neighbor who was injured/murdered in his own home? So many loose ends that need to tied up.

I see the term "her father" excessively throughout the story. It gets redundant.

I almost feel like mentioning her mother is pointless. By reading the beginning, I'm expecting to hear more about the mother but never do. She died of mysterious causes, I'm expecting to hear more about the mysterious cause and if that is some sort of mystery that would be solved throughout the course of the story.

I think overall you need to beef up your description. Not only would your word choices be better making for a smoother read, but your readers can have sense of what is going on. There are so many unexplained events that it is distracting. I think you have the beginning of something here, but it either needs a lot more description than now, or it needs to continue on more.