Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-28420405-20160509180152/@comment-28420405-20160509201849

Thank you very much for your constructive criticism. I'm sure it was a pain to nose through this long entry, but I really wanted to give it a shot. I hammered this out at work, which may answer the question as to why it bounces so much. With continued reviewing and reworking, I'm hoping this will get out there for someone to read.

Thanks again! I've taken your hard work into consideration while reworking another draft. I've edited my story. I look forward to more help in the future :)

EmpyrealInvective wrote: Starting with the basics, it's good to see you corrected the indenting errors. that being said, there are other issues present in the story that led to its deletion. I would suggest breaking up some paragraphs into much smaller paragraphs. A typical paragraph is five to ten sentences. Any longer and it makes the text appear blocky. While these can be corrected easily enough, the mechanical issues also were a problem.

There are also quote a lot of punctuation (punctuation missing from dialogue “The forest will provide for you, if you’re willing to provide for it”, "And I’m sorry that it has come to this”, "They are ravenous…but so was I", etc. Punctuation missing from sentences "Another staggered inhale and exhale"), capitalization ("so was I” a (A) heavy breath struggled to leave Frederick."), grammatical ("It hard (sic) grown to be much longer than her own hair", " The creature(')s eyes. The person’s eyes." Additionally that should really be combined and formed into a complete sentence rather than a fragment.), wording issues ("Because the appearance of this forest dweller was such a mystery, the village began warping the rumor to suit their own needs, just like any urban legend." What time span are they actually in? etc. I would suggest looking over the story as I likely looked over a number of issues while focusing on the larger problems. However the major reason why the story was deleted falls on the plot itself. There are quite a lot of issues here so you may want to get more feedback if you intend to revise and submit an appeal.

Story issues: I would suggest reading this guide on OC/CPC characters. While your story changes a lot of the scenery/age, it still falls into a lot of the pitfalls of this genre. (A large focus on the character with minimal focus on plot, tendency to not really given insight into characters, characters pointlessly needling the protagonist, etc.) It spends a lot of time introducing the character but not a lot of time building a driving plot that engages the audience. Take for instance the forest. There is little content/explanation given to the forest's intent. Why does it need sacrifice? Why has it only now just started and how is it selecting its proxies? This makes the forrest feel like an afterthought when in reality, it drives a large portion of the plot.

Story issues cont.: You also tend to gloss over key plot points. Little to nothing is mentioned of the parents' death. ("Ten years ago, when both of the children were still young, their parents had an accident while acquiring new supplies.") For shaping the entire plot/characterization of Fiona, the fact that there is no detail/focus on this makes the story feel anemic. This becomes even more evident when Frederick disappears and very little focus is given to the circumstances. Since it has such a large impact on Fiona's disposition, it comes off as awkward that those two large driving plot points wouldn't get more than one or two sentences, none of which explain details surrounding the events.

Story issues ongoing: The protagonist shifts wildly and it really weighs down the story. She goes from wanting to run the store at any cost: "Someone had to run the store. Someone had to be accountable for her family. If she could not return, the village would struggle even more." to abandoning it to be a proxy for the woods. Fiona goes from loving her brother: "All this fear, all the trials and years she had put in to find Frederick, only to have him die at her feet." to coldly killing him "Standing in front of her fading brother, she smiled, a smile of malice. Plunging the knife into his jugular, she watched as the life faded from him." without any real change occurring. This needs more focus, maybe the woods is exerting its influence over her?

Story issues: There are also quite a number of plot holes here. "Creature seemed like the wrong descriptor, now that she saw it. It looked more like a person, thin and tall, with what looked like long dark hair." How does the village not recognize Frederic when they grew up with him and such a focus is given during the story to explain how the store is a fixture of the community? Even larger of an issue, How does Fiona not recognize her brother? Lines like this also highlight the lack of explanation. "We were separated, I tried to find you. I looked everywhere. Before I knew it, night had fallen. I had been searching the woods for you, but I never knew how much time had passed." Earlier it only mentions that Frederick disappeared and doesn't explain that Fiona and him were separated. Additionally, how many months has Frederick been wandering the woods and his inability to find Fiona who somehow manages to stumble across him in a day? You mention earlier that he went missing years ago, how large is the forrest and how unlikely is it that Fiona would instantly stumble across him now?

Story issue final: These temperamental shifts I focused on above really highlight that there isn't a lot of character development here for the protagonist. She is sad at losing her family then she decides to murder people in the woods. It makes her seem one dimensional. Additionally this gives the story a feeling that you're using it as a vehicle to introduce your character and aren't focusing on telling an involving plot. There are other issues in the plot here, but I think that's enough for now. If you intend to salvage this story, you have quite a lot of work ahead of you.