GFF Literary Workshop: Week 5

Week 5: Closed

Welcome to the rotating literary workshop here at GFF. Each week will feature a new piece of member-written literature for you to critique and constructively criticize. Download and read the work at the bottom of this post, and offer your comments! The event will continue as long as there are submissions in the queue, so be sure to nominate and participate!

Comment Rules
There are no rules per se, but all comments are expected to be mature and within the bounds of common decency. The key is to be as helpful as possible to allow the author to improve their work.

Each work will be open for comments for one week, starting on Monday and ending on Sunday.

Submission Rules
The workshop is open to any and all GFF members; simply post in the thread and ask to be added to the queue. New participants are automatically placed at the top of the queue to allow them a week to prepare a submission.

Please send all submissions to orion_mk2@yahoo.com. Be sure to include your GFF username, preferably in the subject line. Submissions can be sent at any time, and will be held until your next turn in the queue.

Length
Submissions are limited to prose (stories) for the time being. They should be no less than 500 and no more than 5000 words long.

This is just a guideline; submissions slightly over the limit may be allowed. Sections of longer works are also permitted.

Format
Submit work in .doc, .txt, .rtf, or .pdf format.

Submissions don't have to be written especially for the workshop; feel free to submit anything you've got lying around already.

Queue:
Dark Nation
Lycanthrope
Pyromaniac
Matt
RainMan
orion_mk3
Acro-nym
Ozma
Phone
The Wise Vivi
Ayos
Helloween

People in bold have submitted work for their week. If you have not submitted anything by the time your week begins, you will be moved to the bottom of the queue and the next participant who has submitted will go.

This Week's Submission
Beautiful, Depressing, Gray by Helloween
Prose, 1500 words

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Before this takes off (if it actually does) i would like to offer my motives behind this piece.

I wrote this the day after i broke up with my last girl friend, and is sort of a manifestations of what was going through my head at the time. All of this is exaggerated, and interestingly enough, none of it involves the break up. It's almost an examination of various girls that I've been in relationships with, or thought about trying a relationship with. All names have been changed, and yes the main character was inspired by, and based off of myself. I have trouble doing otherwise with my protagonists.

As for content, i don't care if you think it's just a stupid mess of lingering teen angst that i haven't been able to shake yet, but i think emotions are an important part of writing, and i'm pursuing this project to explore my abilities in conveying emotion, environment, and love, as those are three things that i struggle with on a nearly constant basis in writing. So please, comment not just on content, but style of content, and the quality with which it is presented.

It's by no means a finished polished work, this is only the first three sections of about 8 that i have written. The story is meant to be non-linear, and yes each event is connected in a continuous plot line that falls into place as the reader continues. So if i makes no sense now, perfect. I look forward to any and all comments.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Read it over once. I'll read it some more later on. I won't type my impressions because I don't like first impressions.

Though, I should say, I've learned something fundamental from you so here's a thanks for that. Not learned as in never known before but learned as in more fully understood.
Aye, I'm rambling. I'll type a proper review once I read this a few more times.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

I'm dying to hear your comments neus. And i'm curious to hear what you've learned about me.

How ya doing, buddy?

Well, after my inexplicable month's absence, I'm amazed to see my name still on the queue. Second, too.

Unfortunately, due to the mass malfunction of my life, I don't have anything to show for my week. I did, but it's... gone. So I don't think I'll have anything up to par for my week, and I'll probably have to be dropped.

Sorry...

I was speaking idiomatically.

I have to say I was pleasantly surprised by this piece. It's difficult to pull off the non-linear effectively, but going into it with the fact in mind that what's presented isn't ALL of it, I was able to accept the disconnected feeling of it all, and fill in the blanks myself with what was presented after.

Your writing conveyed a great deal of emotion, though I'm not sure if what was conveyed to me was what you meant to convey. I saw a lot of what I call "prickly numbness" - the constant enigmatic state of mind where you can't be sure if you feel happiness, guilt, pain, or anything at all. Hopefully that's what you meant to get across. If not, still, kudos on conveying that much emotion. Your environments, too, were excellent in enhancing the atmosphere of the story - they worked very well.

Other than a few disjointed, awkwardly worded passages, I feel this has been one of the strongest pieces that have come through here so far. I would recommend reading a handbook on writing and style. If this was revised with proper punctuation and grammar, I'd have no complaints.

Most amazing jew boots

I learned to write about what I know. Woke up the other night, had an urge to write something, started typing, wrote about two pages three times and erased all of it and spent a few hours learning bash scripts.
Struck me, when I read your piece and especially your foreword, to write about experience I've had myself.
Haven't done it yet, but it's a good understanding to keep at the forefront whilst writing. Makes the dialogues seem more realistic.

But as for the story -- I couldn't stomach it. I dislike, with a passion, men moping about girls. I like terse protagonists, most all else gets my fists in a murderous rage.
You've had a few long sentences with awkward structure. Try to keep it simple. Write shorter sentences, say less, and write better similies/metaphors. Examine your sentences critically (what is hapening, how does it tie into the last sentence) -- last phrase is you standing on a sidewalk, next sentence is you being "encased" by wind. That word makes no sense, for one, and there is a slight disjoint there. Mention walking before moving on to the wind. It's what you'd experience in real life, anyways.

Solid writing but I'm not particularly impassioned to critique it because the content doesn't appeal to me. Unjustly put, there's no spark in your writing. It hasn't moved me -- it's annoyed me.

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by Lycanthrope

Unfortunately, due to the mass malfunction of my life, I don't have anything to show for my week. I did, but it's... gone. So I don't think I'll have anything up to par for my week, and I'll probably have to be dropped.

If by "dropped" you mean "dropped to the bottom of the queue." You'll have a chance later on, no worries.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

This is my comment.

"Depressing Grey". First I thought that the story will go on with something concerning about the title. But in fact, it isn't. Maybe I'm being a bit subjective, but the title don't actually fit with the story.

As for the story, it's good and compact. I am amazed with the solid storyline and the richness of emotion and details in it. Although in my mind, I don't actually like stories about loving several girls at the same time, I found myself reading this twice to find out the real conflict and resolution. The story twist is good and turns out to be a bit unexpected.

The problem, however, only lies in one part. Your sentences sure are rich and detail, but in the other hand, it is too complex and some sentences even have a structure which don't really fit in. The vocabularies are somewhat colourful in a negative way; I imagine it to be typing a normal story and then replacing some words with its synonyms with Thesaurus tool, since some words are not used effectively.

Besides, some parts seem to be connected roughly. For instance, paragraph two and three seem to be unconnected at all since it takes a huge leap between the timeline. For one big part to the other, they suffer the same problem. And what's with the poems anyway? The truth is they are awkwardly disturbing and ornamental. Some proses don't need poems to be inserted, and this one is one of the examples. You may want to expand those short poems into a whole functioning paragraph telling events in a better way than:

Quote:

Upon the alter
before the front door
I made my sacrifice
One kiss, to appease my other love.

Quote:

I remembered yesterday
Afloat in the heavens
When we whispered
Our loves, our fears, and tears

Quote:

Liquid sin, draining my thoughts
Filling my soul past the social limit
With the power between us
Embodying what we did that night

The story has a good style; don't let these ruin it.

You may want to try writing a bit simpler structure, since a good story don't have to be a complicated one, but simply one which tells a good story with appropriate words, even though that means to let the words be simple.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

I'm not sure if you read my explanation of this piece or not Ozma, but i explained that the story is supposed to be non-linear, and that everything will connect in the end. It's not even close to the whole thing yet. I haven't finished it, and i have many other sections to it so far.

Also, i rarely use a thesaurus, and i haven't yet for this one. Just thought i'd put that out there.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Just a friendly reminder:
We need submissions!
The queue's looking kind of empty.

That said, here's my impression of Beautiful, Depressing, Grey.

There are some nice descriptions in the piece, especially at the beginning of the first and third sections. It gets a bit ornate and obtuse at times (e.g. "frozen moguls"), but generally the description is a strength--I think that some more of the same might help, espeically as it seems to be mostly absent from the later parts of those sections.

I'm not sure how well the second section, which is virtually all dialogue, fits in with the other two--there's a lot of contrast there, though that may have been intentional. On its own, the dialogue is well-written but a little jagged--there's a realisitc (if inconsequential) give and take before an enormous plot dump. I think that things would work better if you could mix that information into several lines of dialogue, with some give and take in between.

The story itself is very emotional, and reminds me of several things that I've written myself (or read on behalf of my students or classmates). While that does lend a certain rawness to the work, it also means that it's likely got more resonance for the author than readers. As such, I didn't really feel as invested in the characters as I might have. It's a tricky balance to strike, and I don't really feel I can offer any concrete advice there.

At the end, I was entertained and I think that the author has a solid base for revision. Mix the descriptive passages more thoroughly with the rest of the work, integrate the dialogue (unless its isolation is especially important), break up the plot dump, and do what you can to draw readers further into the psyche of your characters.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by orion_mk3

Just a friendly reminder:
We need submissions!
The queue's looking kind of empty.

I've been busy, what with starting a new job and all.

I'll try to get something to you soon.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Originally Posted by orion_mk3

Just a friendly reminder:
We need submissions!
The queue's looking kind of empty.

Mine's getting ready. Don't worry.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Okay so I just read your submission, Helloween. I'll try not to echo anyone else's opinion too much, so my impressions might seem choppy.

I did enjoy the non-linearness of the story. I thought it was great to see the narrator reflect on past events during his walk through that cold wintry day. It was as if the gray sky and dirty snow sparked the memories that transpired. So I liked that.
I also enjoyed the flow from the one girl kissing the narrator, to the present, to the MSN conversation. It was unexpected but welcomed, and seemed to juxtapose things in a way that fit the story.

My problem with the story is that even though it seemed to be an emotional story, I didn't feel any of it. Maybe I would have to get in the right mood to really do that, but I wasn't feeling it. So every part that tried to express emotion, at least to me, fell kind of flat.

But I have to agree with Ozma about the poems interspersed in the prose. They don't really fit the rest of it all. I think that if you really wanted to put poetry in the story you should have done it throughout instead of just at the end. As it sits now it's kind of awkward and doesn't read well with the rest of it.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Ok, i might as well answer some questions

Orion: the only thing i have to respond to in your response is the isolated dialouge of the second section. This was inspired by a situation i found myself in during highschool. The entire story will be fleshed out more as the story goes on. My intention with that line of the story is for the narrator to feel incredibly seperated from this girl, and so any and all emotion, description, everything comes from what is said on msn, as nothing else can really happen between the two characters. When they meet up for the first time in the story, this changes.

Ozma and Matt: I'll admit, the poems i'm having second thoughts about. They don't really serve this peice all that much. They're actually there to further another piece i'm working on. The narrator i've decided also has a flare for the poetic, and i think i'm going to revise those lines, and possibly do more. I'll decided whether or not i'm going to keep them when i'm satisfied with how they sound.

Thank you for all your feed back everyone. It looks like i'm more or less, or at least on my way to accomplishing what i set out to do. Also to orion, i have several pieces that i dig up and submit, if i'd be allowed to go again so soon.

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by Helloween

Also to orion, i have several pieces that i dig up and submit, if i'd be allowed to go again so soon.

Please feel free; I'll hold onto them until your turn comes.

Good turnout this week, and thanks to everyone who submitted or promised to. I didn't mean to seem overbearing in my request--heck, CHz uses a much larger font when the SotW nomination queue is getting thin

Additional Spam:
The creation of this week's thread will be a little delayed; look for it later tonight or tomorrow morning.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?