Special Mission: The Five Stages of Loss (debrief)
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mission debrief
operation mama
mission requested by: tender rose writing competition for
Illicits
length
1 chapter
completed
20/03/16
flame rating
white hot
agent dispatched
agent ERIS
a credit would be lovely
archive
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Coded by vigour / TRXSH
Special mission: the five stages of loss
This review covers the description and first chapter of the fic and is a prize for the Fast Track: Readers' Choice Award category of the Tender Rose writing competition and was the readers' favourite in the Silent Love theme.
Description
There's not very much that can be said about the description since it's so short, but short descriptions tend to be a better fit with short stories than long ones, and this one packs a punch. All the information we need is there: the character (the girl), the problem (he's lost the love of his life and needs consoling) and the stakes (the five stages of grief). They aren't stakes in the conventional way you might see them on a long story where there's the threat of the end of the world or some rich dictator trying to kill or imprison everyone, but they are the challenge to overcome in this story and that's clear from your description. People might quibble about your choice to capitalise Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance, but this is one of those rare occasions where I'd say it's not a problem, since they're more or less titles given to each stage.
The title is also succint and works well. It doesn't need to be particularly elaborate, especially when the story itself is very direct, and the title captures that atmosphere.
All in all, a simple, yet very effective description. Well done.
Chapter 1
My first point is an aesthetic one about the chapter's title: it's the semicolon. I'm pretty sure it's there for aesthetic purposes, but the first few times I saw it I found it a bit odd. It's not necessarily something that needs changing, but it leaves the chapter title feeling somewhat incomplete to my mind. The chapter titles aren't capitalised, which I think is okay with the semicolon there. I was wondering if perhaps the semicolon was
Description
There's not very much that can be said about the description since it's so short, but short descriptions tend to be a better fit with short stories than long ones, and this one packs a punch. All the information we need is there: the character (the girl), the problem (he's lost the love of his life and needs consoling) and the stakes (the five stages of grief). They aren't stakes in the conventional way you might see them on a long story where there's the threat of the end of the world or some rich dictator trying to kill or imprison everyone, but they are the challenge to overcome in this story and that's clear from your description. People might quibble about your choice to capitalise Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance, but this is one of those rare occasions where I'd say it's not a problem, since they're more or less titles given to each stage.
The title is also succint and works well. It doesn't need to be particularly elaborate, especially when the story itself is very direct, and the title captures that atmosphere.
All in all, a simple, yet very effective description. Well done.
Chapter 1
My first point is an aesthetic one about the chapter's title: it's the semicolon. I'm pretty sure it's there for aesthetic purposes, but the first few times I saw it I found it a bit odd. It's not necessarily something that needs changing, but it leaves the chapter title feeling somewhat incomplete to my mind. The chapter titles aren't capitalised, which I think is okay with the semicolon there. I was wondering if perhaps the semicolon was
Please log in to read the full chapter
Special Mission debrief reviews for the Tender Rose competition (FT) are here!
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