CommentsThank you ever so much for this critique!
And I'm glad to hear you are enjoying my short story a day challenge. It's tough but I'm enjoying doing it! And I'm so glad I've got back in my writing groove Once again - thanks so much |
As this is a critique, and you are a friend, I am going to be ruthless and hope that you take more from it than if I was to be a kind stranger! I will begin with your grammar; after reading your writing and studying your progression, I have to note that storytelling and orthography are your strong points, but there is a chink in your armour when it comes to sentence structure. Here, I noticed a few mistakes. In the first paragraph, your sentences were long-winded and there was a flood of commas; I felt it would have read more cleanly if you had chopped up her description.
In the third paragraph, a particular comma stood out where there should have been a period after "Come in, come in," as the continuation describes the man's actions independent of his dialogue. Further on, when he asks Carly to open up to him - "Carly, please just open up to me." - this sentence, I felt, needed to be emphasised to set the scene of the conversation, and so to pace it correctly a period may have also done better than a comma after 'Carly'.
Then in the eleventh paragraph, I noticed a misuse of a semi-colon. In the sentence, "...she was red in the face; from effort and embarrassment, and took a big gulp of her lemonade..." should have read, "...she was red in the face from effort and embarrassment; she took a big gulp of her lemonade..." or, of course, you could remove it altogether and swap for another period to break up the paragraph a little (I read it back and both sound good). It's your call! Finally, like the 'come in, come in' comma incident, there should also be a period rather than a comma after the man says, "One thing I must insist is on this contract," for the same reason as before.
With regards to the story, again, I enjoyed the build-up and was gripped by the twist. Are they about to have sex, or will she merely give him a cup to masturbate into? I like how you have left this completely open-ended. I might have liked a little more tension in the atmosphere to compliment the climax, however, such as more descriptive body language or more insight into what she was thinking, or feeling.
Otherwise, this is a great piece and I'm enjoying reading your 'short story a day' efforts. Keep up the great work.