Broken Ties (finale)
The ending of my second short story11 total reviews
Comment from CAT•FISH²
dragonpoet,
Well done! Even though this story was the finale to the end, I enjoyed reading it all the way through. First of all, I would never be able to listen to my parents sit together and lovingly go through their story about how they fell in love. Quite frankly, I don't think they even fell all the way in love. They got divorced instead. The other thing that interested me was the part about the soda. I rarely ever drink any soda. When I was ten years old, I drank it all the time. But as I got older and started playing more sports, I stopped. When I go to a restaurant, I always just order water. At home, I don't even drink the stuff. It isn't the sugar that gets me, it is the acid. In fact, that is what I wanted to comment on.
The great thing about fictional writing is that you can say something and very few people will comment on it even if it is technically incorrect in real life. When we engage in a story, we allow our minds to enter into a different world. Every once in a while though, you will find someone who catches something a bit off. The sugar is not what the biggest problem is in soda. It is the acid. Sugar comes in nearly everything we or drink, whether it be natural or artificial. The teeth can endure this so long as we brush regularly. However, acid is what wears away and tears at the enamel. Acid can be found in all sodas, including the diet brands.
Anyway, that has nothing to do with the story except for a bit of fun facts. You don't need to change anything, I just thought I would pop in a few factoids of my own.
While this was wonderful on a whole, I do have a few suggestions for you. The first are just a series of minor typos I found when I ran this through a word document. They are very small things and easily fixed.
""Same to you, Sean. And please call my Tommy." he returned while shaking his hand surprised at Sean's firm grip."
There should be a comma instead of a period at the end of the quotations.
"Sean and Tommy both immediately scolded, "Don't get up."
There should be closing quotation marks at the end of this.
"Sean smiled slyly and added, "Not, really. I snuck some regular pop at a friends house and found it too sweet so I let someone else have it.""
In the quotations, "friends" should have an apostrophe.
"When they both nodded, he turned to the door. Before he closed it he yelled over his shoulder, "See you tomorrow afternoon then""
A period is need at the end of the quotations.
"Together the both echoed, "Bye, see you tomorrow""
A period is needed at the end of the quotations here as well.
"Her ankle on a pillow on a deck chair across from her."
This is an incomplete though, there should be a verb following this phrase.
Now, the main point that I think needs work is the multiple unneeded scenes. I really thought that the slow pace was good, but eventually it became redundant, because the scenes repeated each other over and over. There were small differences, but it wasn't enough to describe the full day. A lot of it could actually have been explained in a summary. I am pretty sure that they played cards three times, had fish twice, and Tommy knocked on the door almost four times. Below, I have written an example of how you could shorten this.
Over the next few days, their routine followed the same basic pattern. Tommy would knock on their door in the early morning with friable foods in hand as he and Sean did their best to keep Katie off of her ankle. When they had finally finished of having fish fillets each night, they switched over the hamburger patties Tommy had brought with him. Each visit was passed with customer care service to Katie and a pack of cards played across the table...
You could finish this paragraph in any direction that you would like it to lead off too. I think that of all the scenes you have repeated, you should get rid of two them that add nothing to the plot of the story. I would keep the one when Katie wants to go outside, and the first one about Tommy arriving at the house in the morning, but after that, I would summarize. Otherwise, you are showing the reader a rewinded image. I did notice that you did do a bit of summary for this once, but then there were still multiple scenes that came before and after this that could have been in the summary as well.
What would be even better in my opinion, is to have just two of these visits described after the discussion about the soda pop. Then, instead of spreading all of the details out, load them all into these two distinct scenes. Spend a bit more on packing all the really important and necessary information in there.
Anyway, I hope this was helpful. Let me know if you can get those tiny errors fixed and I can rate this again. I still recommend work on the multiple scenes, but it isn't absolutely necessary if you feel they need to be in there. Well done on finishing the short story!
CAT•FISH²
This rating does not count towards story rating or author rank.
The highest and the lowest rating are not included in calculations.
reply by the author on 23-Dec-2010
   |
dragonpoet,
Well done! Even though this story was the finale to the end, I enjoyed reading it all the way through. First of all, I would never be able to listen to my parents sit together and lovingly go through their story about how they fell in love. Quite frankly, I don't think they even fell all the way in love. They got divorced instead. The other thing that interested me was the part about the soda. I rarely ever drink any soda. When I was ten years old, I drank it all the time. But as I got older and started playing more sports, I stopped. When I go to a restaurant, I always just order water. At home, I don't even drink the stuff. It isn't the sugar that gets me, it is the acid. In fact, that is what I wanted to comment on.
The great thing about fictional writing is that you can say something and very few people will comment on it even if it is technically incorrect in real life. When we engage in a story, we allow our minds to enter into a different world. Every once in a while though, you will find someone who catches something a bit off. The sugar is not what the biggest problem is in soda. It is the acid. Sugar comes in nearly everything we or drink, whether it be natural or artificial. The teeth can endure this so long as we brush regularly. However, acid is what wears away and tears at the enamel. Acid can be found in all sodas, including the diet brands.
Anyway, that has nothing to do with the story except for a bit of fun facts. You don't need to change anything, I just thought I would pop in a few factoids of my own.
While this was wonderful on a whole, I do have a few suggestions for you. The first are just a series of minor typos I found when I ran this through a word document. They are very small things and easily fixed.
""Same to you, Sean. And please call my Tommy." he returned while shaking his hand surprised at Sean's firm grip."
There should be a comma instead of a period at the end of the quotations.
"Sean and Tommy both immediately scolded, "Don't get up."
There should be closing quotation marks at the end of this.
"Sean smiled slyly and added, "Not, really. I snuck some regular pop at a friends house and found it too sweet so I let someone else have it.""
In the quotations, "friends" should have an apostrophe.
"When they both nodded, he turned to the door. Before he closed it he yelled over his shoulder, "See you tomorrow afternoon then""
A period is need at the end of the quotations.
"Together the both echoed, "Bye, see you tomorrow""
A period is needed at the end of the quotations here as well.
"Her ankle on a pillow on a deck chair across from her."
This is an incomplete though, there should be a verb following this phrase.
Now, the main point that I think needs work is the multiple unneeded scenes. I really thought that the slow pace was good, but eventually it became redundant, because the scenes repeated each other over and over. There were small differences, but it wasn't enough to describe the full day. A lot of it could actually have been explained in a summary. I am pretty sure that they played cards three times, had fish twice, and Tommy knocked on the door almost four times. Below, I have written an example of how you could shorten this.
Over the next few days, their routine followed the same basic pattern. Tommy would knock on their door in the early morning with friable foods in hand as he and Sean did their best to keep Katie off of her ankle. When they had finally finished of having fish fillets each night, they switched over the hamburger patties Tommy had brought with him. Each visit was passed with customer care service to Katie and a pack of cards played across the table...
You could finish this paragraph in any direction that you would like it to lead off too. I think that of all the scenes you have repeated, you should get rid of two them that add nothing to the plot of the story. I would keep the one when Katie wants to go outside, and the first one about Tommy arriving at the house in the morning, but after that, I would summarize. Otherwise, you are showing the reader a rewinded image. I did notice that you did do a bit of summary for this once, but then there were still multiple scenes that came before and after this that could have been in the summary as well.
What would be even better in my opinion, is to have just two of these visits described after the discussion about the soda pop. Then, instead of spreading all of the details out, load them all into these two distinct scenes. Spend a bit more on packing all the really important and necessary information in there.
Anyway, I hope this was helpful. Let me know if you can get those tiny errors fixed and I can rate this again. I still recommend work on the multiple scenes, but it isn't absolutely necessary if you feel they need to be in there. Well done on finishing the short story!
CAT•FISH²
This rating does not count towards story rating or author rank.
The highest and the lowest rating are not included in calculations.
Comment Written 23-Dec-2010
reply by the author on 23-Dec-2010
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Thank you for the positive comments and the very detailed review.
I will reread it and see if I can make the changes you recommend and maybe some of my own. I will message you when I am done editing and see if it is any better.
dragonpoet
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You are welcome, and sure thing.
CAT•FISH²
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I have done some serious editing on this and I hope I corrected all the errors and didn't create new ones with the changes. Please reread and see if it is any better.
After all this trouble, I think I'll stick with writing poems.
dragonpoet
