Story: "Summer Dreams"

Author: missAminor

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Title: 15/25 points

The title wasn’t a turn-off, but it wasn’t really a hook, either. It’s a bit on the plain side, and it sounds like something that many people would use. Also, it doesn’t really fit the tone and mood of the story. “Summer Dreams” gives off a very relaxing and peaceful, almost blissful feeling, whereas your story is a very melancholy, angsty one. People usually associate summer with lots of sunshine, but your story was filled with imagery of storms and rain. In order to represent your story better, you should choose a weightier title.

Description: 6/10 points

You used an excerpt for your description, which is fine. It doesn’t hook people that much, but that’s understandable since the story itself isn’t supposed to be exciting. The best part of it is that it leaves the reader wondering what regrets the narrator has. You do have some errors in the grammar, though.

Foreword (if applicable): 0 points added or taken away

Your foreword doesn’t do anything to turn readers away, but it doesn’t really add anything meaningful to the readers’ understanding of the story, so you won’t get any bonus points.

Presentation: 9/10 points

The presentation looks fine except for the little bits of color at the end of the foreword and in the author’s note. You should leave the author’s note in black since the color is distracting. You don’t want the author’s note to be more eye-catching than the story itself. The story should be the focus.

Spelling/Grammar/Usage/Mechanics: 12/20 points

You only had one spelling mistake. It's corrected later in this section with additional remarks about the same sentence.

The most common mistake you made was switching between past and present tense.

Original: It's raining outside.

Correction: It was raining outside.

Original: The dark grey clouds seemed to understand what you're feeling inside.

Correction: The dark grey clouds seemed to understand what you were feeling inside. “You’re” is only a contraction for “you are” and not for “you were.”

There were also problems with fragments, wording (particularly choice of prepositions), and parallelism.

Original: Sitting by the window seat with a cup of hot coco and a comic book, laughing the tears and fears away. 

Correction: “Coco” should be “cocoa.” Also, this sentence is a fragment because it doesn’t have a subject or a verb, only modifying clauses and phrases. Although fragments are allowed in writing, it doesn’t really make sense for you to put one here. Instead, you should probably say something like “You were sitting by the window seat with a cup of hot cocoa and a comic book, laughing the tears and fears away.”

Original: The endless drop of rain wets over the window, clouding your view of the great blue sky.

Correction: This is both a tense problem and a wording problem. Your verb is in the present tense, and it’s not how you would normally use the word “wet.” My suggested change for it is “The endless drops of rain dotted the window, clouding your view of the great blue sky.”

Original: Letting out a heavy sigh; you wished you could turn back the hands of time, make a change, even the slightest act, for hoping it would've at least alter the fate that had been sealed.

Correction: Letting out a heavy sigh, you wished you could turn back the hands of time, make a change, even the slightest act, that that could alter the fate that had been sealed. Semicolons are used to separate two independent clauses. Since “letting out a heavy sigh” cannot stand alone as its own sentence, it should be set off using a comma. The other corrections I made were for meaning and wordiness. Hope applies to things that have yet to occur and that might occur. You can’t hope for the past to change.

Original: Now, it's all in the past. You're now looking up ahead, to an endless road. Nothing was in sight.

Correction: Now, it was all in the past. You were looking ahead to an endless road with nothing in sight. I fixed the verbs so they’re in past tense, and I think it would better if you combined the last sentence with the second one because “Nothing was in sight” sounds awkward. If you don’t combine the two, then you could say “There was nothing in sight,” which is the usual wording.

Original: It is full of surprises, some you'd anticipate and some you would dread.

Correction: It was full of surprises, some you would anticipate and some you would dread. You should make your sentence components parallel. You used “you’d” in one place and “you would” in another. You should change them so that they’re the same.

Original: You and I, playing tag with the rest of the gang.

Correction: I know this is an intentional fragment, but since it’s a continuation of “I dreamed of you,” it should say “you and me” rather than “you and I” since the original “you” was an object rather than a subject.

Original: As much as you hated it, you've submitted to fate and the failure of the medical institution that promised words of miracle.

Correction: As much as you hated it, you'd submitted to fate and the failure of the medical institution that had promised a miracle.

Original: You kissed his lips one last time, careful not to let a drop of your tear touches his skin.

Correction: You kissed his lips one last time, careful not to let a drop of your tears touch his skin.

Original: You breathe in deeply, your body trembling for holding in the emotional ruckus inside.

Correction: You breathed in deeply, your body trembling from holding in the emotional ruckus inside.

Original: You felt a cold drop of water touches your face, the palm of your hand, your arms, your shoulders...slowly then, your whole body, wet; drenched in the cold afternoon rain.

Correction: You felt a cold drop of water touch your face, the palm of your hand, your arms, your shoulder, and then slowly, your whole body grew wet, drenched in the cold afternoon rain.

You misused semicolons, put commas in inappropriate places, and left out commas where they were needed. Also, you had problems with ending punctuation.

Original: "Hey, it's me. I hope you're listening. Sorry for being late, I'm always late aren't I? I had to lie to my boss; he won't let me off the hook. Well, work can wait, as if work would ever end now would it."

Correction: “Hey, it’s me. I hope you’re listening. Sorry for being late. I’m always late, aren’t I? I had to lie to my boss; he won’t let me off the hook. Well, work can wait. As if work would ever end, now would it…”

Original: You whispered in his ear; gently caressing his hand, holding them in yours.

Correction: You whispered in his ear, gently caressing his hand, holding it in yours. Again, you used a semicolon instead of a comma. Also, since you said “his hand” and not “his hands,” it should be “holding it” rather than “holding them.” Otherwise, if you don’t change “them” to “it,” you should change “hand” to “hands.”

Original: You smiled looking at his serene face. Not a sign of worry, tense....nothing.

Correction: You smiled, looking at his serene face. Not a sign of worry, tension…nothing.

Original: We even planned to finally go for that bungee jumping that you've talked about......

Correction: We even planned to finally go bungee jumping like you talked about…

Usually, when you use ellipses, you put three dots. If there is another sentence after the sentence with the ellipsis, you put four dots. Never use more than four.

Original: "Why???? Why you'd have to go???”

Correction: “Why? Why did you have to go?” Avoid repeating question marks and simply use one.

Note: These are not all of the errors I saw but rather examples of common ones or particular things that I thought I should comment on.

Writing Style: 20/25 points

I was impressed with your word choice. You communicated the sad feelings without actually using the word “sad,” and the imagery of the rain definitely contributed very well to the mood. Your writing has a poetic expressiveness to it. You did  pretty good job of varying sentence length and structure for pacing purposes, but I think you did overuse the ellipses a bit.

Flow/Pacing: 20/20 points

The different parts to the story seem a little bit disjointed, but this makes sense since it is a dream, and the flow of dreams is different from the flow of conscious events.

Characterization: Omitted

Since the idol was not specified and the main character is intended to be a self-insert, I can’t really make any commentary on this part. The idol’s personality didn’t play a big role in the story. It was more about the narrator’s attachment to him. Also, this little snippet only reveals what the main character is like when experiencing loss and depression, so the readers only get to see one facet of the character. However, this is understandable since it’s a very short story.

Plot: 43/55 points

• Comprehensibility/Believability: 18/20 points

I didn’t find this confusing or nonsensical. The character’s emotions and responses felt very realistic. The only problem I can see is the part that says “The endless drops of rain dotted the window, clouding your view of the great blue sky.” If it’s raining, then sky won’t be blue, unless it’s one of those uncommon sun showers where it’s raining while the sun is still out. The only way it would make sense to use "blue sky" would if you said something like "the normally blue sky."

• Originality/Creativity: 10/20 points

It doesn’t fit the definition of a “typical AFF plot,” but at the same time, a lot of people write stories relating to death and loss and the associated emotions, so it’s not very original. I suppose embedding the dream counts as a more creative twist.

• Unity: 15/15 points

Since it was so short, it was difficult for you to stray from the main focus. Everything fit together, and none of the parts felt unnecessary.

Emotional Reactions: +1 bonus point

I haven’t really had any experiences with very close loved ones passing away, so I probably can’t relate as well to this kind of situation as someone who has gone through such an experience. However, I found your writing moving; I didn’t actually cry, but it was sobering to read.

Overall Impression: 7/10 points

Although your story was fairly well-written overall, I think it was a bit too short. Sometimes being shorter and more concise is better, but in this case I think you could have added more to increase the emotional impact. Because the audience knows so little about the guy, it’s harder for them to feel a strong emotional connection to the situation. The sadness readers feel is more likely to be a distant, mildly sympathetic one, like the sentiment you get from hearing about a stranger’s death on the news.

Total: (132 main + 1 bonus)/175=76%

I hope this review was helpful, and good luck with your writing!