Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-36815674-20181014182908/@comment-35711173-20181015030130

NoTimeCreepy wrote:

--- I can feel the tightness of my shoe laces as my feet hit the concrete underneath me. The smell of food carts makes my stomach rumble as I pass by each block. I can feel myself getting closer and closer, with every step I take. I can't fight the urge inside my head, I scream.

I can see my reflection out of my peripheral as I pass by the shop windows. My head feels like its splitting in two, I scream once more. The smell of her perfume hits my nose, as I splash into a puddle. I'm getting closer. I can see her.

Her glowing red hair bouncing with every step she takes. She looks back at me. I think she noticed me; she's within my grasp I can feel it. I inch closer and closer with every step. The smell of her floral perfume and her bright red hair rips into my soul, she's mine.

She trips over the curb, grabbing the trash can to help break her fall. She tries standing up but falls right back down. Her foot is broken. She's mine. As I'm approaching her, I pull a six-inch knife from the band of my sock. I slide it into her stomach, pulling it up to tear her flesh.

As she lays on the cool pavement of blood, the Manhattan moonlight shines on her face, and the urge I had is now gone.

Alas, we don't learn as writers by only receiving gentle compliments.

First sentence, "shoe laces" -> "shoelaces."

Her glowing red hair bouncing with every step she takes.

The verb form isn't correct. It should be "bounces."

That's just basic English, and I must admit that having two obvious errors in that much story isn't that bad. Your problem is that the story is very ordinary.

We have an unknown protagonist who has a completely unknown motive to kill females. Not rape and kill, which is the most common pattern. Not kill and then mutilate, which is the next most common. Your protagonist just plain kills and then abandons the kill.

"Guy sees a pretty girl. Guy kills the pretty girl.  The End." This is boring. We have seen this story over and over. We need MORE. You could spice it up with Jack The Ripper type mutilation, but even that seems cliche.

Let's try a minor rewrite here.

-

Phoenix Moonlight

I can feel the tightness of my shoelaces as my feet hit the concrete underneath me. The smell of food carts makes my stomach rumble as I pass by each block. I can feel myself getting closer and closer, with every step I take. I can't fight the urge inside my head, I scream.

I can see my reflection out of my peripheral as I pass by the shop windows. My head feels like its splitting in two, I scream once more. The smell of her perfume hits my nose, as I splash into a puddle. I'm getting closer. I can see her.

Her glowing red hair bounced with every step she takes. She looks back at me. I think she noticed me; she's within my grasp I can feel it. I inch closer and closer with every step. The smell of her floral perfume and her bright red hair rips into my soul, she's mine.

She trips over the curb, grabbing the trash can to help break her fall. She tries standing up but falls right back down.

Her foot is broken. She's mine. She clutches her purse nervously. As I'm approaching her, I pull a six-inch knife from the band of my sock. Too late for me, I see her pull a Glock 19 9mm from her purse and empty it into my chest and stomach. I feel my chest absorbing the shock waves. It's like I have been kicked by a mule. I collapsed backwards, dropping the knife. I feel like someone had run a red-hot poker through my chest and was twisting it around inside of me.

As I bleed out on the hot pavement, the Phoenix moonlight shines on my face. The urge to kill that I had is now gone. I can feel myself detaching from the pain, the world and everything around me as the world turns grey then I am gone.

She lays against the trash can in a daze of pain, shock, and revulsion, crying. In a few moments, Phoenix's finest arrive and see to it that she's safely transported for medical attention and questioning, and then advise the DA that in their view this was self-defense.

OK, at least this has some element of surprise. It suffers from the problem of the untrue narrator - the would be killer starting the story is dead before the end. It also offers some sensory detail, which is far more interesting than non-descriptive slicing.

It's your story. Consider it.