Activity

@vivian-grant

First off, I enjoyed your story -thanks for letting me read it. 🙂

I do have a few suggestions:

#1 I feel like your story could benefit from more showing and less telling. For example, when Wendy is in the woods, instead of saying she’s scared, you could do something like: “Wendy’s breath became strained as they rushed further into the woods. A frigid wind swept over them as sweat dripped down her forehead.” Daeus Lamb has a Show Don’t Tell Course that’s really helpful.

#2 I read a book about writing by Stephen King where argued that it’s better to have a very small amount (or no) adverbs in writing, and I’ve come to agree with him on that For example, instead of “Wendy inhaled deeply and sighed blissfully, ‘I love this café.,'” even something as simple as “Wendy inhaled and sighed, ‘I love this café,” gets the message across faster and smoother.

#3 The scene where Wendy is in the woods and hesitates to follow the creature as it runs towards her child, seems uncharacteristic. In the past, she willingly ran into danger to save her daughter? Why did she suddenly change?

#4 Like Taylor Clogston said, it kind of seemed like Olivia disappeared. Maybe you could mention that she visited the hospital. Or you could end the story with a brief conversation between her and Wendy, so that it mirrors the start of the story.

Things I liked include:

#1 The plot. It was intriguing and scary (but without making me feel paranoid after reading it). 🙂

# The characters were well-done. I especially like how you did the monster. I like how he seemed dangerous and creepy to begin with and then misunderstood and virtuous at the end. I also thought it was cool that he couldn’t hear adults or be understood by them, but he could communicated with children. Creepy and cool.

One last note: this totally isn’t necessary, but I was curious about how some of the supernatural stuff worked. Like, who was the monster?  Was he a full-on shape shifter who was actually her father, Aaron? Is he from another dimension? Of course, if you want to leave it mysterious, I can see some value in that. I’m just one of those people who likes answers. 🙂