Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-5726907-20160912095508/@comment-28266772-20160912141309

Another late night, held over for some forced overtime. You'd think someone that works third shift wouldn't have to deal with this shit, but lo and behold you did [took a moment to realize you’re writing in 2nd person]. You check your watch as you pull into your driveway. 5 a.m. [the punctuation here feels off, but I’m not sure] Oh well, there's nothing you can do now except get some sleep. You turn your car off and get out, the door creaking a bit as you swing it open. This thing really is a piece of junk. As you stand there examining just how horrid the rust bucket you drive is, you notice someone just off in the distance, up your street.

   A man paces back and forth, back and forth, back and forth [I appreciate the stylistic flourish of repetition here, but it feels cheap]. He cuts right across the road, doesn't even look. He looks [repetition of ‘look’] rather old, maybe he has a problem? You wonder if it's dementia. God, what a terrible disease. As you shudder at the thought, however, you notice something. The man has stopped pacing, and now stares at you. He stands perfectly still, not moving a muscle, his gaze locked dead on you. You think it'd be best if you headed inside, sometimes people with dementia are dangerous right? You walk up your stoop '[stoop!? I have to be missing something right?] and head inside, but not before taking one last glance at that pacing man, who still stands [well then – he’s not a ‘pacing man’, is he?]', staring.

"Well that was creepy." [Well that was creepy,” You…] you think to yourself. What a weird old man. Maybe it'd be better to lock your door tonight, and your windows. As you change out of your work clothes your stomach begins to grumble, your food schedule has really been messed up ever since getting this job. Cereal seems like it might hit the spot right now and you could swear you have some Lucky Charms left. It would turn out, you do [switched tense here from present to conditional]. You turn on the television while you eat, maybe watch an episode of that show you were watching before you head to bed. But then, something catches your eye.

Right outside your front window you see him. The pacing man. He is walking across the street, on the sidewalk. Pacing back and forth, back and forth, back and forth [this gets worse each time you come back to it]. His eyes dead-set on your house. You could swear he is still staring directly at you, his eyes locked with yours. Instead of crossing the street he now just paces right in the parameter of your window, walking just outside your gaze as he crosses. Back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. He disappears on the right side, then the left, then the right. The look on his face is one of fury.

   You shoot up and immediately pull down the blinds. My God, will you have nightmares tonight. You can still see him through the slits, still feel his gaze boring down on you, burning a hole in your head. Back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. Disappearing to the left, right, left, right. Then, all of the sudden, as he heads out the left side of your window, he is gone. He doesn't cross back over. Maybe he's moved on. You breath [breathe] a sigh of relief. Time for bed, you just need some sleep. But first, you double check the locks. [It’s hard to imagine that someone wouldn’t phone the police by now, or at least investigate]

You collapse in your bed, pulling your blankets up. Light streams a bit through the blinds in your bedroom window but you're used to this. Working this shift for so long made you immune to being kept awake by light. Lucky for you, your bedroom window faces away from the rising sun anyway, so the light is kept at a minimal. As your eyes flutter and you drift off to sleep, you notice something weird.

A shadow falls over the light of the sun. Back and forth, back and forth, back and forth it crosses over. The shadow of a man. You flip off your covers and back right up against the wall next to your bed. Peeking a bit out the window you can see him. The pacing man. His face almost against the glass as he passes, you can hear him brush up against the side of your house. You almost scream when you realize that he is staring right at you.

You scurry out of bed, running to the other side of the room. You need to call the police. You grab your phone and spin around, but he is no longer there. Where the hell did he go? You walk into your living room and check the front window. No one. You check your kitchen window, no one. You decide enough is enough and open the hall closet. Inside are those golf clubs that your cousin bought for you on your birthday. You take out the heaviest ones and head to the side door.

You call out to him, clutching that heavy 9-iron as you do. You make your way around the house, but you find nothing. No one. Letting out a sigh of relief you go back inside, making sure you lock the doors once more. You take a deep swig of the apple juice you have left in your fridge, yawning and heading back to your room. It's already 5:30. You fall back into bed, but you lay there with your eyes open. It's going to be very hard to fall asleep now, your heart is pumping. Perhaps you should watch T.V. some more to calm down. Maybe you could work out. THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP. '[try to avoid all-caps, at all costs. Find another way to work this into your narrative a la “suddenly you hear a loud noise, like ‘thump thump thump’” '

Heavy footsteps echo through your house. A shadow passes over you, coming from the living room. Back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. From the left, right, left, right. THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP. You scream and shoot up. But your nine-iron in [is] in the closet, past the man. How the fuck did he get inside the house? You can see him, illuminated by the sun as he passes back and forth, back and forth back and forth. He stares directly at you, rage seeping from him.

"Get the fuck out of here!" you scream. "I'm calling the police! I've got a gun! The cops are already on their way!" You desperately try and think of something, anything, that might make him leave. But he moves back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. From the left, then the right, then the left, then the right. THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP. "What do you want!?" You finally scream. That makes him stop dead in his tracks. He stands there, staring at you, and slowly, so very slowly, a smile creeps across his face.

   A twisted smile, one that a disturbed young child gets when he tortures a puppy. You stare at one another in silence for what seems like ages before you hear him. A gasp, a wheezing and underused voice. Crackling and hoarse he utters a single word.

   "You."

He immediately sprints, faster than you've ever seen anyone run before. You have no time to react. The man has his hands around your throat in seconds flat. You struggle, you put up the best fight you can, but you are no match for him. Your vision blurs as you stare into his face, only now noticing the bugs. Dozens of small insects and spiders scurry across his face. Dirt cakes various spots, even clinging to his teeth. Suddenly, he releases you. You gasp for air as he laughs.

   "Fun. Now we play a different game." He wheezes, then stands. You begin to pass out, the last thing you see is him pacing. Back and forth, back and forth, back and forth.

-

Mechanical issues – nothing major. I’ve noted what I found. Try to catch some yourself with a re-read and a spellcheck.

<p class="MsoNormal">Style issues – Biggest issue here is repetition. You need to find a better balance between overuse and reinforcing a stylistic choice (back and forth etc.) Also you don’t always convey your actions in a clear way. I don’t think you set the scene very well, and consequently it isn’t always obvious what’s happening. An example of what I mean is you reference the golf clubs, then have them leave and return and suddenly they’re defenseless but you only ever imply they’ve put the clubs away. It’s important to know that the protagonist has disarmed themselves. There are other examples too.

<p class="MsoNormal">Another big issue is that you squeeze some moments too hard. The moment before the strangling is a clear example of this – you’re a little ham-fisted by there. Plus, you struggle to create atmosphere beyond the basic tool of repetition

<p class="MsoNormal">E.g. your description of The Pacing Man is hardly frightening. It’s explicit, but is not emotive or empathic. Below I’ll contrast your sentence with another sentence from one of Toadvine’s stories.

<p class="MsoNormal">Dozens of small insects and spiders scurry across his face. Dirt cakes various spots, even clinging to his teeth. – out of all these only scurry, cakes, and clinging, offer any sense of feeling and atmosphere.

<p class="MsoNormal">Cinching down the tourniquets on the bloody stumps of my Marine's legs, cowering under a mud-brick wall while the rounds snapped overhead. - this sentence isn’t necessarily interested in functional imagery (though it pulls it off) it’s just about grabbing you and pushing you into the mood of the scene. That scene is painted with words like cinching, bloody, stumps, cowering, mud-brick, and snapped.

<p class="MsoNormal">You show us scurrying insects and clingy mud – it’s basic in comparison.

<p class="MsoNormal">Plot issues – I appreciate that this is an exercise in abstract horror so I’ll let it go that the plot at times feels a bit… aimless. I guess the major issue is that while this story relies so heavily on atmosphere it needs to do a lot of work to make that atmosphere work. In other words, a basic plot like this needs plenty of mood to ease the reader through the aimless sequence of events.

<p class="MsoNormal">-

<p class="MsoNormal">In summary - your writing is functional, and pretty good. But your clearly struggling to create a moody scene. You seem to have relied on repetition when you need to be more willing to use language itself to craft mood. I have a blog post (shameless self-promotion here) on this topic, but a simple way to improve this is to just read a shit load and critically assess a scene that you feel achieves a strong atmosphere. An obvious stop is Lovecraft, but Poe is also an absolute pro at mood/atmosphere.