Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-25170312-20150912042159/@comment-26030957-20150914172607

Excellent pasta.

You have done what more pasta writers need to do, take a spooky story and use it as a means of exploring characters. I found your characters very human. Sharon's hesitancy to divulge all the facts about Lily's father and the fact that Lily was both excited to have a magic closet and horrified that it was a suicide house showed her complexity and depth. This is the way people are in real life: complicated and full of paradox, multi-dimensional. It is the definition of a round character.

I also like that they weren't good guy/bad guy and that the ending was rather ambiguous and not some good vs. evil ridiculousness akin to, say, Stephen King's dark fantasy rubbish. Real horror should be ambiguous and thought provoking, devastating and soul searching. Lily's need for understanding versus Sharon's urge of motherly protection is much more poignant than any angelic good guy vs. some evil bad guy. I'd think about having Lilly shut the door on the both of them, it seems to say something doesn't it? It would also be the ultimate nihilistic statement.

You could perhaps go into even more depth with them, more exposition and dialogue, but you don't want to slow down your pacing. And remember that your creepypasta audience is easily distracted and you don't want to bore them. Think of it like herbs and salt and pepper, you want just the right dash with your meal, not too much as to overload and ruin it, and not too little as to have it too bland (nice metaphor for pasta--lol)

I would personally lose the epilogue. It just felt too over the top with Sharon appearing out of nowhere with an ax. Perhaps just leave Sharon out of it and have something subtle like having the couple notice some scrape marks on the floor and the hidden wall and simply commenting, "No wonder the house is so cheap." --I loved that refrain by the way. Sometimes ambiguity and subtlety can be much more powerful and creepy than any fireworks display climax.

This reminded me of the cult classics The Cypher by Kathe Koja and House of Leaves by Mark Danielewski. If you haven't you should read these classic horror novels.