Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-33470154-20180611012533/@comment-9041013-20180612100737

Yeah, there is a hell lot to fix here still. The whole thing seems still rushed. The narrator feels like a child on high sugar, the way he expresses himself is so hyperactive. Bleh. The phrases seem a little forced, I felt as if you were purposely trying to make the text feel smoother and classier than it is. This is just weird to me.

The whole story feels very rushed, like insanely rushed. The whole thing seems like a mass of deus ex machinas. The supposedly volcanic stone was made volcanic only because it made sense to the story. The ending was insanely obvious once you mention "As soon as he started making that coffee, I knew exactly what he was going to do. I tried to stop him, but he was planning to be a geologist. No way was he going to pass this opportunity up."

I don't even know how I feel about this.

Also, if the narrator was deemed, even if just by his peers a possible murderer, he should've been in police custody. Not in a mental ward since neither his insanity nor his guilt was ever proven.

My suggestions to fix the story;

Make the climax about them being in the lake only for the phenomenon to blow up on them bringing forth the death of James, possibly, still maintaining the theme of silence. It also does make sense, since people can and do from time to time fall asleep or completely idle inside inflatable boats in lakes. It all makes sense.

Get rid of the closing "Im an insane man" statement, post trauma does not include constant visual hellucinating. Usually people don't really hellucinate. Depression, edginess, anxiety, survivor's guilt (in these cases) and so on are more common, along with the obvious nightmares and night terrors.