Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-29637859-20160815105857/@comment-24101790-20160815121131

We typically leave things like the link to quality standards, the guide on how to write creepypastas, etc. as a way of explaining. Your story was deleted because it didn't meant quality standards. There are quite a lot of issues here. Starting with the basics, a lot of your paragraphs are joined together because they are not properly spaced. Paragraphs without a complete space between them get combined due to wiki format. Additionally while indenting is correct in literature, due to the wiki format, it causes those white boxes. Onto the mechanical issues:

Punctuation: You forget to add question marks to questions. “Do we have to(?)”, “Where has he heard that story(?)”, etc. "“Dad! Dad! Have you ever heard about the Pale man? Duncan was tell…(Quotation make missing. Additionally interruptions are handled with hyphens as ellipses denote a pause in dialogue.)

Punctuation cont.: You forget to punctuate a majority of your dialogue. “Stop being a killjoy and just listen(comma missing)”, "and then…EAT THEM ALIVE(./!)” Duncan made", "“Anything scary or mysterious you try to debunk it, have some fun for once(.)”", "“Nope. Talking crap. As usual” I replied swiftly.", etc. There are a lot more examples of this so I advise proof-reading your story carefully.

Capitalization: "this is where my story of the Pale man (Man) began." "“Do you think it's true, about the pale man?” My (my) brother squeaked", "“What on earth is all the racket about?,(comma unneeded) you've (You've) had your tea."

Awkward wording: "“You're such a kill joy” Duncan complained at me.", "I (I'll) go in, take a look around, leave.", etc. A trick I use to catch awkward wording is to read the lines aloud to myself and correct instances of clunky wording. Redundancies. "My little brother George was also with us and I told him to come with me back home, or else our parents would go crazy if I was late home. (avoid using words multiple time and re-stating things)". "This is where the (sic) Mr McPherson must have died, the poor man", "The smell was horrendous, (it) smelt (smelled, to smelt is a blacksmithing process) like rotten flesh."

Story issues: "Before you begin to read this story I would just like to clarify that it is indeed a true story." The "This is true/I was a skeptic" are two points that are overused in stories. This is a bad opening to use because multiple people have used it and it's become synonymous with poorly written stories. Using lines like that really make the story come off as cookie-cutter.

Story issues cont.: Speaking of cookie-cutter, the plot feels extremely generic. The story of a skeptic investigating a spooky house where they see something has been done a lot and there really wasn't a lot to keep the audience interested. Combine this with the fact that the protagonist writes this: "I began to roll my eyes as it sounded like a generic horror story was about to be begin." and it feels like you're calling attention to the fact that the plot itself has issues.

Story issues cont.: You really need to build on the final scene in the house a lot more. A majority of your story is directing them towards the house so when the description really doesn't pay off, it feels disappointing. Take this for example: "what I saw haunts me to this day. The chair that was underneath was now behind the rope with a naked, shrivelled up man sat on it facing the back wall. I just froze. He began to stand up, still facing the wall and began to clap, aggressively.". The protagonist recounts how that sight haunted him, but the scene he describes feels very anemic due to the lack of imagery. Using your descriptions, the protagonist basically sees an naked, old man who claps at him. The lack of description/action here makes this feel anti-climactic.

There are a few more issues, but I feel like that is enough for now as this story is going to need quite a lot of re-writing if you're intending to appeal the deletion. The numerous punctuation, capitalization, awkward wording, and a number of plot issues really resulted in the story being deleted due to our quality standards.