Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-26286557-20160722030043/@comment-28266772-20160722140453

The darkness made it difficult for me to fully make out the figure '[this wording is somewhat awkward. While the darkness makes something difficult that’s not the same as the darkness making something impossible. So what does that really mean? Can you fully make it out? Or not? Does it take a while to adjust and see? Or is it just that what you’re really saying is that the darkness obfuscates some of the detail, so that you cannot fully make out the figure. Try not to dance around the obvious. Make each statement clear. Also ‘fully make out’ is just awkward as hell to say out loud, and would work best as a piece of informal dialogue]'. It [<- bear in mind that by using this word you are saying to your audience “this is not a human, it is either an inanimate being or a monster” and by saying that in a first person narrative, you are also saying “the main character is completely aware that they are NOT looking at a human”] was sitting on an old rocking chair [I think it should be clear why I made such a big deal of you using the word ‘it’ considering how this clause makes things needlessly vague], consumed by the black [as opposed to white darkness?] hollow darkness. I haven't [hadn’t] kept track of how long I was [had been] staring at it, but my ears [eyes; FYI you are setting the expectation of tiredness with this sentence] could barely stay open.

Even though the darkness was clouding my vision, I was still able to see that the figure was human '[so you’ve diverged from assumed normality by here. Most people who see a human figure say “that’s a human” instead of “that is a human shaped thing” because, well that’s not a very common thing to see. So why has this person seen a human outline and assumed it’s not just another human?]', or at least looked human. It was gripping very tightly on the arm rests [awkward; it wasn’t ‘gripping tightly on the arm rests’ it was ‘gripping the arm rests tightly’]. It's [its] glasses was [were – plural] covered in cracks and scratches, suprising [surprising; also who is surprised?] how it's [its] glasses wasn't [plural – in English it is a pair of glasses so all the verbs should be plural] broken yet [but they are broken…they’re cracked?]. It wasn't doing anything, it wasn't even rocking back and forth. It was just observing me. It was just staring right at me, observing [redundant] me like a sculpture. However, it wasn't staring at me with any particular emotion. [Just how clearly can this guy see this thing?] The face was just expressionless, completely emotionless, [redundant] just bland.

I slowly move [moved] my hand up the wall, trying to reach the light switch. However, [why ‘however’?] I continued to stare at him, just in case anything happens [happened]. But the lights wouldn't turn on. I tried fiddling with the switch, but it just wouldn't turn on [redundant]. I reached for the lamp besides me. It also refused to turn on as well. When I gave up and looked back, the figure was already gone, vanished out of thin air. What [had] took [taken] it's [its] place though [<-I’d just flat out get rid of the ‘though’] was a noose, hanging from the celling [ceiling]. It was rocking back and forth like it was caught in the wind, even though there was no such [<- get rid of the ‘such’] breeze in the room.

I felt a hand grab hold of my left shoulder. It came close to my ear. I heard something talk to me in a deep, raspy voice. It said; [<-comma, not a colon]

"Welcome to Purgatory."

-

So here’s the gist

1) proof read your stories and use spell check. Either MS word or spellcheck.net

2) read through and remove redundancies. Darkness is always black. An expressionless face is inherently emotionless.

3) avoid unnecessary vagueness (vagueness and ambiguity is not the same thing. Vagueness is when you have too little information for something to make sense. Ambiguity is when you have too much information for something to make sense). An ‘it’ should not wear glasses, sit in a rocking chair, and talk. That is a ‘they’. If it behaves like a sentient human it should not be designated with an ‘it’ because it just leads the audience to expect one thing and they will only be confused when you say something else. You say the glasses are cracked, but then say it’s surprising they haven’t broken. If darkness makes something difficult to see, why can you tell its wearing glasses and expressionless.

4) Purgatory is – by default – the bottom of the barrel. I’d try to come up with something scarier. Also the image of a noose, on its own, isn’t particularly frightening. It’s just a noose. In a micropasta you normally have one image to freak people out and a noose just isn’t gonna cut it for the same generation that lived through The Human Centipede.

5) Your story lacks cohesion. There’s a guy in a rocking chair, a swinging noose, and purgatory. None of these three pieces seem to click together.

