Improving our 75 Word Stories -- READ FIRST POST

[Mith]

SevenStars, I thought the imagery in your piece was striking, I'd love to be able to put something like that on paper

I just think it seemed more like an introduction to a story, from my view anyhow. Sorry if that doesn't help any.

 

[BigJ]

Nope. I liked the nakedness. I loved the writing. I loved the naked Ice Witch gliding through the snowdrifts. Fabulous.

I just -- I don't know. I'd have liked more of a twist or something in the end. A surprise or something? It was a fabulous set up and then... it kind of didn't go anywhere very much -- it almost didn't really end (I know that makes no sense -- sorry. Maybe someone else will be able to say what I mean!)

Well, it didn't end, just kind of stopped. The real ending comes out somewhere past 75 words after some sort of conflict resolution, but with only 75 words I opted to chop it where I did.

That, for me, was the big problem. But also, we get almost nothing from the narrator. The big second paragraph is a description of what he sees, but apart from him drawing his sword and making his declaration afterwards, we have no idea how he reacts to it. "A vision of beautiful temptation" tells us (or suggests) he is tempted, but doesn't show us, and it provides none of the special details that make a story stand out. Also, it's her eyes that are longing? That makes her seem less in control than the rest of what you'd given us, which confused me.

What you really need here, in my opinion, is a twist or some complexity. What the plot of your story boils down to is this: a man seeks an enemy, the enemy appears, the man declares that she is his enemy. There's nothing unexpected there, and it's a snippet from a story, not a story in itself. If you look at the stories that got votes, they suggest quite a lot more going on, either in terms of story events or in terms of the characters' inner lives.

Hope that doesn't sound too harsh. You write well enough; perhaps you'd benefit from thinking about what a story needs to do. Though lord knows that can be a tricky one.

I would much prefer you be harsh and honest than reserved and nice, and I much appreciate the detailed feedback. The intent with her eyes doing the longing was it to be a deliberate attempt on her part to manipulate the hero, perhaps as she did to the fallen heroes by her side, though I can see how that may have been lost on the cutting room floor.

In any case, I'm going to have to track down my muse and have a chat about being more twisty, and perhaps, as you said, do some thinking about what a story needs to do. Though once you've figured out that tricky business, you then need to squeeze it into 75 words . . .

 

[HareBrain]

The intent with her eyes doing the longing was it to be a deliberate attempt on her part to manipulate the hero, perhaps as she did to the fallen heroes by her side, though I can see how that may have been lost on the cutting room floor.

Ah, I see that now. I think the reason it didn't occur to me was that for that to come across, we'd need to be in a close-third POV, whereas because the rest of the story isn't really right in the character's head (as I suggested by the lack of the character being present in the second para), it comes across as being told more from an external narrator, and so "longing" comes across as external objective truth (she really is longing for him), rather than the character's internal subjective truth (she appears to be).

I hope that makes sense. (If you don't know what "close-third" means, it probably all sounds gobbledigook, but the term is worth googling.) But I do appreciate how crafty you have to be to get stuff like that to come across in so few words. Much easier in a novel!

 

[chrispenycate]

Sorry to butt in with mine Kylara. I also admire that you went for a poem, but poems can put people off if the flow is not perfect and a clear point is not made by the end.

I'm putting mine out to be ripped apart so that you can all show me its insides... My feelings are that it wasn't really a story as such? Perhaps the structure isn't right? Please also show me my grammatical errors, I must learn. Thank you.


The Boreal Grasp

You will never see vapour billowing from his dark blue lips.

You will never smell the odours of sweat and toil.

Neither will you feel warmth from his hand upon your shoulder.

Yet, you may hear. Creaks and cracks in his gait, a relentless glacial march.

Slow is his path in your pursuit, but tireless. Vironix, the man of ice.
His embrace always comes, firm and frigid. Until his icicles exude into your frosty finality.

You've written this in poem form, you know. Oh, perfectly natural – rhythm, music, dance, mnemonic reminders of oral tradition. A warning message would be set in rhythm, the better to maintain it down the generations (and yes, had it been me, in rhyme, too. But it does render it a bit childish.)

So, I don't touch poetry, but nearly poetry? I've intensified the rhythm, removing or adding syllables, and I think maintaining it within the seventy-five limit. I got rid of "dark blue" partly because the rhythm stumbled, but also it doesn't sound as cold as – ice blue?

I'm not claiming I've generated great verse; I've attempted to change as little as possible, which is always more difficult than starting from scratch. (And never generate anything significant in poetry anyway).

Chrispy

The Boreal Grasp​

​

You will never see vapour abillow from blue lips.

You will never smell odours of sweat and of toil.

Nor feel any warmth from his hand on your shoulder.

Yet, you may hear. Creaks and cracks in his gait,

Relentless glacial march.

Slow is his path in your pursuit, but tireless. Vironix, the man of ice.

His embrace always comes, firm and frigid. Until his icicles exude into your frosty finality.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Sevenstars, I really liked yours but didn't get the sense of a story from it. Big J, Ratsy - as others said it perhaps lacked something extra to make it stand out.

 

[Remedy]

Hey Chrispy, thank you.

I prefer your version. The difference in pace and flow is so big for so few changes. I pondered that "dark blue" when I wrote it and thought: Nah, it'll be fine like that. And now you are the second person to pick up on it. Funny how certain combinations of words can become like gravel in your shoe.

Thanks for that. I will spend more time sanding next months down

 

[Parson]

Goodness!! Some months we don't even see one story here and this month we have a plethora of stories. I'll take a small shot at these, as a not accomplished writer I can hardly do more.

An Alpine Inquisition

A sultry whisper on the fierce north wind beckoned me as I slogged through the mountain snow. Through my armour, I felt the runes on my sword burning with divine fury.

Then I saw her. The Ice Witch of Bala’Thoth, gliding nude through the snow drifts, a vision of beautiful temptation flanked by fallen heroes astride daemon steeds. Her longing eyes reached out for me.

I drew my sword.

“This soul shall not be yours!”

One of the few rules I know about story telling is that there needs to be a beginning, a middle, and an end. This story felt like the middle without a beginning or an end. The picture of the nude Ice Witch was riveting, but I wasn't sure of the reasons behind the confrontation. The ending with the sword draw and declaration is probably okay, but I would have liked to have seen a conclusion like, "But his soul was forfeit that day."

Payback

Bells rang in the distance, alarming the city of the approaching army.

The defenders covered their faces with cloth to prevent frostbite from the ceaseless wind. Snow fell heavily and when Basil closed his eyes he saw an image from his past.

He held her small body as it bled; a red painting on a fresh white canvas.

He opened his eyes.

If it’s blood they want, blood they shall get

“Hold….Attack!!”

I was mostly confused by the last line. "Hold," I understand as to stand firm, as in "Hold that bridge until I come with reinforcements." So when that's followed by "Attack!!" I'm not sure what's going on. I also wasn't sure who the Basil was. Was he leading the attack on the fort, or was he one of the defenders, who had lost his daughter? wife? someone else?

FADING

Breath frozen inside, in time. Cold beats forcing my heart to squeeze against the emptiness,
Before all that's left is grey, unfeeling reality.

Brought to nothingness. All in circles.

Stalled, numb, waiting.

Eyes closed. Dreams open.

Red to blue to black; withdrawing, causing pain.

One thousand eyes, all unseeing as a shadow falls through the bleakness and bleeds its soul.

In shades of ice the fates whisper through an echo,
Quietus from perfection.

You remember that I liked this and even gave it a short list. But since you are putting this up here for critique here is what I would say about your entry. Wonderful, graphic, and poignant scene setting, but where's the story? In the end is a description. There is no action to speak of. But with ability to write descriptions like this, a cracker jack of a story can't be too far away.

 

[ratsy]

Yes Basil lost his wife to the enemy years ago and now he is defending against them as they bring a full assault on him and his city. Again, he was just saying Hold..as in wait for it, wait for it...and Attack, when the moment was right...ie rushing out to meet them in the snow covered field.

 

[TheDustyZebra]

Yes, Parson, with the voting so clustered among so very few stories, I think a lot of people are feeling the pain!

Ok, what the heck, I'll join the club.

I'm not sure I hit the genre at all, as I'm not too familiar with it as a category -- it may be that I know it and just don't know it, as far as that goes.


Rebearth

The egg takes up my whole freezer.

It's all over the news -- let the eggs be.

Some people destroyed them, and their houses are encased in ice now,
with eggs visible through every window.

The prophecy is unearthed:

.....When climate change is in perfect balance,
.....the Ice Dragons will come, to save the planet.

I look at my egg, my neighbor's house of ice, the news from around the world, and I wonder:

For whom?

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Ok, I loved the title, it made me blink and enjoy working it out, and I liked the concept. But it didn't, perhaps, stand out just enough. Also, possibly, the meaning was laid on a little thick? But it was just outside my short list.

 

[TheDustyZebra]

I'm going to double-post here so my comments don't get lost with my story, sorry.

Kylara, I didn't understand what was going on, and I couldn't quite decide whether I liked the poem's format or not. I like a structured rhyming scheme, but that one was so small (lines) that it kind of jarred. And as others mentioned, "I lost a head" was out of place.

Remedy, I didn't feel there was a story, exactly. I liked "frosty finality".

Mith, I did like your story, but in the end I guess it just got overshadowed. The end, as Hex mentioned, might have been improved with a few words from the lady. That's a possibility.

BigJ, just what Hex said, as well. It was lovely, but it didn't do much. I couldn't make out that anything in particular was happening, despite the imagery.

Ratsy, there was story there, given the background imagery, but still kind of in the middle of things for the most part. I'm sure it's just me, but "alarming" in that context pulled me out for some grumbling. And the "hold...attack" at the end was confusing to me in the same way as it's been mentioned. I do think you could have saved yourself a lot of words in that second line:

The defenders covered their faces with cloth to prevent frostbite from the ceaseless wind. Snow fell heavily and when Basil closed his eyes he saw an image from his past.

He held her small body as it bled; a red painting on a fresh white canvas.

I know this is the part that gets the cold across, but I'm not sure that "covered their faces with cloth" is necessary, and the rest could be more efficient.

Heavy snow threatened the defenders with frostbite. Basil closed his eyes against the relentless wind and saw an image from his past: her small body in his arms, blood painting on the fresh white canvas.

Or something of the sort. I'm a bit blank today. But that would take that part from 46 words to 35, or, if you left the last line alone, 38. Something along those lines would leave room for more at the end.

SevenStars, once more I'm in agreement with Hex. We should go into the business together, or something. It was lovely, but I didn't follow it.

Ok, not quite a double post, as springs got in between, there.

Ok, I loved the title, it made me blink and enjoy working it out, and I liked the concept. But it didn't, perhaps, stand out just enough. Also, possibly, the meaning was laid on a little thick? But it was just outside my short list.

Ahh, titles and laying it on thick -- two of my specialties!

 

[Remedy]

TDZ, I really liked yours (you were on my shortlist), so the only thing I can say, is that I wanted to know how the eggs got there. Did the ice dragons just fly around plopping them in peoples' gardens willy-nilly? What came first, the ice dragon or the egg?

But then maybe I missed something, I do that.

... you would've needed more words. But on the plus side, I definitely would have read them

 

[TheDustyZebra]

Actually, the "which came first" question was one of the inspirations for the story -- I was going about it from the "egg came first" side. They just kind of appear, like the little cubes in Doctor Who.

 

[The Judge]

TDZ, I also liked your writing and your story (as is usual!), and I came close to short-listing it, but yours was one of those I didn't feel did quite enough to qualify under the Dark Fantasy genre. It might just be my skewed take on it, but I wanted to see something darker, ie nastier/more depraved/more agonising, than "ordinary" fantasy. At the time I didn't get the title, either, which didn't help.

That lack of real darkness crept into some of the other pieces put up here, but I'd also echo the others' thoughts that some of the stories, for me, weren't satisfying as stories, no matter how good the prose (and, as an aside, I'd agree that SevenStars's piece was excellent descriptive writing). To my mind, the beginning and the end are the most important parts of the 75 worders, and the end in particular needs to do something. Look at TDZ's -- that ending for me is perfect. Short, sharp, to the point, causing you to think about what you've just read and perhaps re-appraise it, but also giving you an insight into the dilemma of the narrator.

I love to write a twist in the tale/tail, as Remedy kindly noted in the Discussion thread, so I often spend time working out how I can subvert the reader's expectations. So taking ratsy's story, for instance, I might have had the dead wife appear as the leader of the attacking ghost army, which generates conflict in the narrator.

But a twist isn't necessary, as long as the end moves things forward/resolves the story -- HB's, for instance, shows that not only does the narrator not get warmer/better, but he's infected someone else so the horror will continue, and Hex's shows the agony of loss and despair.

It's that conclusive ending which I think is missing from some of the stories raised here. Perhaps as an exercise it might help to analyse the endings of the various different stories this month and see how/why they did or didn't work.


Sorry about that excursion into the Judge's Theory of Short Stories, but I thought it might help if I explained how I look at things.

 

[Ursa major]

Perhaps as an exercise it might help to analyse the endings of the various different stories this month and see how/why they did or didn't work.

It's very kind of you to offer....

 

[ratsy]

Thanks Dusty for the thoughts, they were great. It's funny sometimes. One can write a story and in their head it makes total sense but when others point out why it didn't work, it totally makes sense.

And TJ, that idea is great and that is why I bow to your entries every month

 

[Remedy]

It's funny sometimes. One can write a story and in their head it makes total sense but when others point out why it didn't work, it totally makes sense.

Haha ratsy, I have been thinking that recently. As writers we must remember that the reader does not have our thoughts and imagination. We have to show enough to generate the desired picture and understanding without telling.
I found it funny and quite interesting that a couple of readers pulled a rapey / sexual vibe from my entry. I had envisioned icicles spiking out of my monster's body (from everywhere - arms & torso) like a reverse hedgehog. But I think the term "icicles exude into" - I used, may have created some mildly phallic images for some

 

[chrispenycate]

Haha ratsy, I have been thinking that recently. As writers we must remember that the reader does not have our thoughts and imagination. We have to show enough to generate the desired picture and understanding without telling.
I found it funny and quite interesting that a couple of readers pulled a rapey / sexual vibe from my entry. I had envisioned icicles spiking out of my monster's body (from everywhere - arms & torso) like a reverse hedgehog. But I think the term "icicles exude into" - I used, may have created some mildly phallic images for some

A reverse hedgehog? That sounds uncomfortable (for the beast).

And 'exude' for me is always fluid. You exude sweat, or fear, but not spikes.

 

[TheDustyZebra]

Aww, thanks, TJ!

I had a feeling it had gone too modern and probably not exactly Dark. But it was all I had, with time running out, so there it was. As I mentioned, I'm not sure precisely what makes up Dark Fantasy -- even after looking it up -- although I may have read plenty and just don't realize that's what it was.

 

[Parson]

Aww, thanks, TJ!

I had a feeling it had gone too modern and probably not exactly Dark. But it was all I had, with time running out, so there it was. As I mentioned, I'm not sure precisely what makes up Dark Fantasy -- even after looking it up -- although I may have read plenty and just don't realize that's what it was.

Which is the problem with the esoteric genres we have been moving into. A less widely read person (in terms of fantasy at least) like myself hasn't a clue as to the differentiation between some of them, and even the definitions often sound nebulous at best.