Forums » Writing Workshop » Read Thread

Hey guys, I've been working on this zombie story on and off for a while, and I was gonna give a sneak peak, and to see what you guys think of this page. Tell me what you think!

You go through the door, and it leads to the basement of this supposed gas station.

"Wow! There's tons of supplies here!"

There's food, water, guns, ammo, and gas. These are all quite important in an apocalyptic situation like so.

"It's too good to be true!"  Sadly, it was too good to be true.

You feel a gun being put up to your head, and you are forced down to your knees.

"Who the hell are you?"  a un-recognizable voice says.

" I-I don't want any trouble!"

" Who the FUCK are you?? You have 3 seconds!

Turn around and Bitch slap him.

You get up, and use your whole body to slap him in the face, but he reacts faster than you and hits you in the side of the head with his gun. You wake up blindfolded, and hear quiet voices talking. Seemingly about you.

"Is he infected?"

"No, I don't think so, his eyes seem to be fine."

"Alright. Should I untie him?"

"No, not yet. We need to question him first."

"Well ok. If you think that's what is best."

They stop shining the light into your eyes, and you take a few seconds to adjust your vision. You see a figure staring down at you. The figure gets face to face with you, and it's a man. He is African American, and quite tall with a great build. You should not mess with this guy. 

"So." He says mockingly 

"You comfortable?"

"Quite comfortable, actually. do you have any pillows for my neck? It's getting a bit stiff." The man smacks you with the meat hook he calls a hand.  And "Loosens" your neck for sure. And whatever brains you had left. 

"So, want to tell me what you were doing trying to steal our supplies?"

"Well, first of all, I wasn't stealing anything. As you can see, I got nothing. And second of all, is this how you treat all of your guests?"

"Normally we just shoot all of our "Guests" in the head for good measure, but as I see you make a bit of a difference. You haven't tried to bite my face off today. So I'm going to untie you. Sound like a plan?"

"Well it's about damn time." The man rolls his eyes and unties you. Man those ropes were tight. You grasp your wrists in pain, and eventually get over it. 

"So, what's your name?" You look at him hesitantly.

"John. And yours?"

"Matthew. Most people call me Brick though."

"Well, Brick. Mind if we get out of this dark place? It's a bit depressing."

"Oh, um. About that. The others won't like you as much as I do, so try to be nice. When you're ready to come up, come up.

"Well alright. I'll be up soon."

Give me some feedback on this page!

... Do you just want a "yay or nay" generalized opinion, or do you want me to give you one of my real reviews where I point out any and all possible flaws, offer in-depth critique, ideas for improvement, and whatever good points I can find?

Yes, the dog is nice but the dingbat's too stiff to comprehend fully while coated in trees. A Mexican semicolon could do wonders for the poppytoaster.

Kifflom.

Ok steve, I have no idea what you meant by that, and I want your opinion, and tell me the flaws please Kiel.

@Kiel_Farren

A lot of complaints directed at newbies (and you don't have a single published story up, so it still fits) can be summed up in four bullet points and they are as follows: "Poor spelling and grammar," "too short," "too linear," and "not enough description."

I can't judge whether or not your story is linear -or- short from an excerpt, but I can tell you that it lacks in-depth description. You don't have to be obsessive about detail, but I'd like to know more about the world around "me" and it doesn't take that much more effort:

"You feel a round, cold, metal object pressed against your head. 'A gun,' you realize, before you are forced down to your knees onto the hard, concrete floor."

Also, instead of just an unrecognizable voice, what kind of voice is it? I mean, is it literally unrecognizable, not just as an individual person, but as a human being? xD Or as male or female? Gruff or soft? Gravelly? Low or high pitched? So, yeah, more details pl0x.

Next, the corrections list, in order of errors found:

1: It would be "an" unrecognizable voice not "a"
2: It's "unrecognizable" and no hyphen necessary.
3: You do not need more than one question mark for any question.
4: You do not need a space between quotes and the first letter of the sentence.
5: You DO need a second double quote after the exclamation mark for the sentence "You have 3 seconds!"
6: ... Please do not use actual numbers, it looks much better when you just write "three."
7: Why is "Bitch" capitalized? Is that a style choice?  
8: You do not need a comma after "You get up" (and I'll admit the idea of being bitch-slapped with someone's entire body is rather funny.)
9: You do not need a comma after blindfolded.
10: "Seemingly about you" is a sentence fragment. You might want to try this instead: "You wake up blindfolded and hear quiet voices talking--seemingly about you."
11: You should put a comma after the word "Well," in "Well, ok. If you think that's what is best."
12: You do not need a comma after 'eyes'
13: You do not need a comma after 'you'
14: You do not need a comma after 'American'
15: I'd advise putting a comma after "quite tall"
16: It should really be: "So," he says mockingly. "You comfortable?"
17: You need to capitalize the "D" in "Do" in the main character's response.
18: You do not need to capitalize the "L" in "loosens"
19: "And "Loosens" your neck for sure. And whatever brains you had left." -- Those are both sentence fragments. Try: "The blow loosens your neck, for sure, and whatever brains you had left."
20: I'd advise a comma after "doing" in the interrogator's sentence.
21: The "g" in "guests" does not need to be capitalized.
22: The sentence "Normally we just shoot all of our "Guests" in the head for good measure, but as I see you make a bit of a difference." does not make sense. >_> I can't understand what the guy's trying to say. I mean, the first part is perfectly clear, but "as I see you make a bit of difference"? Think about that for a while and ask yourself if you'd understand someone saying that to you.
23: You should put a comma after "So," because it suggests a 'turning point.'
24: ... Every time "well" starts a sentence, you put a comma after it, period.
25: You should also put a comma after "man" when it starts a sentence.
26: In the sentence "You grasp your wrists in pain, and eventually get over it" you should probably replace "and" with "but."
27: "So, what's your name?" This is not a flaw, this is a point of reference. See, the comma here is not necessary as an indication of a turning point. "You've worked hard all day long for months. So, let's go out tonight and get some drinks!" However, it works as a good indication of a pause, which is nice here because you have two people gradually getting comfortable with the concept of not killing each other. A comma = a brief pause.  
28: "So, what's your name?" ... Ok, I lied. Please make it clearer who's talking. You're avoiding "he asks", "you ask", "you snark," and so on, like the plague at this point. It'll confuse people eventually.
 29: "Matthew. Most people call me Brick though." I'd put quotes around "Brick" in that.
30: You could just put a comma instead of a period after "Brick" in the next sentence. It's up to you, but it's a little weird to imagine the protagonist pausing for that long. (A comma = brief pause. A period = long pause.)
31: You forgot the double quotes after the second 'come up'
32: Comma after the word 'Well', dammit. xD  

I'd recommend reviewing this: http://www.grammarbook.com/punctuation/commas.asp

Anyway, my over all opinion is that it sounds like a zombie apocalypse story, which ... I've seen a lot of, frankly, and only a handful were ever my cup of tea. It doesn't sound bad and I'd be willing to give it a shot, but I don't see anything unique or distinguishing about it yet.

I like how the story tells you you shouldn't mess with the guy, then the first thing your character does is mess with him.

By the way, I'm not a newbie. I've published stories on this site and have been here for two years. ;) My stories were just god awful so I deleted them ^^

*sigh* You really need to fully read posts before you reply, M, and quit replying to other peoples' posts when you're responding to me or I will miss your response. >_> If Swift had not tagged me before, I wouldn't have responded at all. 

I said it applies to you because you do not currently have a single published story. I am not calling you a newbie to this site, I am saying you qualify as a newbie to writing CYS games at this point. I do not count previous failed attempts. Get a story you can keep posted and I won't call you that.

Ah, thanks. Yeah, I've had a lot of time to correct this story as it's a lot longer than you'd think. Thanks for the feedback on my story and I'll make corrections. And, my game is different from most of the other games for sure. I have a story that's funny, but not completely random/retarded like most zombie stories. I've spent a lot of time on this story.

Question. Would this be correct? or do I need another double quotation?

"Well, you do now."  you say to 'Re-assure' him. 

It's not correct, you need quotation marks to indicate using the work ironically. Also, use a comma not a period between "now" and "you." Reassure isn't hyphenated.  

It should look like this:  "Well, you do now," you say, to "reassure" him.

But:

The American Medical Association Manual of Style (9th ed, 1998) calls misused quotation marks like this Apologetic Quotation Marks and says:

Quotation marks used around words to give special effect or to indicate irony are usually unnecessary. When irony or special effect is intended, skillful preparation can take the place of using these quotes. Resort to apologetic quotation marks or quotation marks used to express irony only after such attempts have failed, keeping in mind that the best writing does not rely on apologetic quotation marks. (p 220)

^ What Seth said.

I am special!  :D

It looks really good so far, but grammar and spelling aside I think that one thing you could improve is the character Brick. He seems to change his views and attitude towards you rather hastily, and doesn't really maintain his 'tough guy' attitude so much. What are the reasons behind him suddenly accepting you into the group? I mean he already knew you weren't a zombie, you just had a coherent (if brief) conversation with him. 

Depends on Brick's tone of voice.  Maybe he's trying to be sarcastic, or just blatantly truthful and that's how much the others will "hate" him.

Whatever the case, it isn't very clear. Although it's not like a big part of the story or anything, so I don't see a huge problem with it. 

Yeah, this is a tiny segment of the story. I am fixing grammar, spelling, and the reason that brick so hastily let him go is because he realized that he was wrong. Your character wasn't  stealing anything at all. Oh, and just in case there is confusion, he doesn't "Accept you into the group." I probably should have stated that, but he's just letting you go. Thank you all for your reviews! They were really helpful!

>> Oh, and just in case there is confusion, he doesn't "Accept you into the group."

o.0 Why do you keep doing that? You keep capitalizing words that don't need it. That part, "accept you into the group" is not a new sentence, but you did the same thing with 'Reassure' by capitalizing the R when you did the sarcastic quotes.

Why does it matter, exactly? Half of the people on this site don't spell right, or use proper grammar. Please don't get on my ass for stupid things like that. 

"Stupid things like that?"

If you think proper spelling and grammar are "stupid things" that don't matter, then there's no way your story is going to be any good.  Yes, even if you had decent characters, or an okay plot- if your writing skills are subpar, then the story will be 4/8.

Are... are you serious? This is a writing site. You've asked for an opinion on your work.

I don't even understand how you can get upset that someone is trying to correct you when you asked him to.

What does it matter? Because literate people can't read your illiterate work if you decide that grammars aren't important, that's why. Unless you're writing just for 10 year olds, then in that case it's fine. 

I'm not talking about the story, I'm talking about my post. He's correcting my grammar on one of my posts. I accidentally added a capital "a" to a part of my sentence, and he's being a grammar Nazi bout it, and I am thankful for the constructive criticism on my story, but not when I reply to someone.

If you're typing like that in your post, then it's likely that you'll do the same in your story. He's just correcting you before that happens. What's wrong with that? If anything, you should be thanking him.

It's a simple grammar error, and I'm sorry if i made anyone mad. Apologies. 

Grammar-nazi, huh? >_> I didn't say "hey, wtf, don't do that, that's stupid and wrong!" I asked you about it. You did the same thing in your story example that you specifically asked me about before. I did defer to Seth's answer, but that was the one part he didn't really address. Anyway, I was wondering if you did it as a style choice or if you genuinely did not realize you had that habit. I happen to know from experience that habits you have while posting WILL effect story writing, but I was being nice. You think that was me "getting on your ass"? No. Not remotely. 

I did, however, put a lot of work into critiquing your story example to help you because you asked ... but I guess I won't be doing that again, since I've been told that nazis do not make a point of being charitable.

Just take the critiques and move on while you're still slightly ahead..