FIVE

[Tikhung]

It was a sunny day in Ohio. William, a retired 80-year-old man was sitting on chair with a smoke on his lips, wondering how he got there. Suddenly, a mysterious guy came along and shot William in the head. Right in that moment, his life flashed before his eyes...Apparently, every billionth of a second is an eternity to William. 'I'm not ready to die! There's still hope...I guess.' - Will said to himself as he was witnessing his high school graduation. He could see his mother and father clapping. 'Damn you Lord! You cursed me with this meaningless life and when I already got so used to it, you decided to kill me off?' - He could see his wife...She was there waving at him with a beautiful smile on her face. 'If only I could spend more time with her...' - Wait a minute! Who was this guy? I mean, who was the guy that shot Will? What did he do? What did Will do exactly to deserve this?...'It didn't have to be like this. I'm still young. Eighty is the new thirty, right? Lord, give me another chance...'

The bullet got really close to his forehead at this point. For a moment, a tiny little moment Will thought that he could avoid this. He couldn't. He accepted the ugly fact that he had to go right now.

'Goodbye' - BAM! William was shot. The mysterious guy put his gun into this coat, played along like nothing happened and whispered some word...'FIVE'.

 

It was a cloudy day in Paris...

 

 

 

Hope my story wasn't too pretentious. First time posting in this section

Edited May 1, 2015 by Tikhung

[Ziggy455]

Okay, I’m back after a little R&R and I’ll dive right in with this. You’re new to these parts so I’ll explain as best I can; I like to break down the work on story and form, one after the other. So at first, I’ll hit story.

 

We’re greeted to a man named William who is sitting, smoking. He is shot in the head, and then in those brief moments of lucid mortality, he realizes he is dead. Somebody whispers “Five,” and then we’re told it’s a cloudy day in Paris. As a story, we’re not really given much into who William is, or anything of sort. As a small opener it’s okay because it’s alluding to a bigger story (who is the killer? What does FIVE represent?). Also we go from Ohio to Paris, which sort of makes sense if you’re swapping us to another scene but you sort of end it there as if it’s up to the reader to make some sort of comparison or link. It’s not pretentious, but just sort of unnecessary?

 

Form-wise, there’s a lot here that could do with some tweaking. Let’s take a look at this line:

 

One of the biggest issues I find with up and coming writers is the rule which seems to outweigh many others. It’s that you must show not tell! What does this mean? Well, looking over your work you might not understand but from my viewpoint you haven’t shown me a story; you’ve explained the bare, core minimum of what a story is.

 

Some guy is thinking something. He is shot. He thinks about it. Boom: done. For example:

 

 

a retired 80-year-old man was sitting on chair with a smoke on his lips, wondering how he got there.

 

 

You’ve told me about this man, how old he is, and what he is thinking about. I, and all readers want to be shown. For example, you could describe what the man looks like, what he is doing, and offer some internal thinkings of his mind that relate to the story. Like so, which readers better?

 

 

a retired 80-year-old man was sitting on chair with a smoke on his lips, wondering how he got there.

 

 

OR

 

The man sat perched on the porch, his loose, wrinkled skin showed its age as he sat, letting the smoke slip from his mouth from a lit cigar, like he had done a million times before. He looked up towards it, his thoughts going back to the first time he smoked, and how it had reminded him of better days, before everything had happened.

 

 

My example is showing us something; I’m letting the reader imagine what the man looks like. I haven’t told you he is old, I have alluded that he looks old and that he must be to have smoked a million times.

 

Whenever you’re writing, just look back and ask yourself if you’re telling something simply, or showing us to the best of your descriptive capability.

 

 

'Damn you Lord! You cursed me with this meaningless life and when I already got so used to it, you decided to kill me off?'

 

 

Don’t use apostrophes for speech, it runs the risk of annoying some people. Quotation marks are there, and you know how to use them. Don’t slip into the habit of mistaking apostrophes for anything else.

 

Another thing I have noticed is you tend to use the – symbol after a quotation. It’s not really necessary and an easier way to let the reader know somebody has said something is to space dialogue –for the sake of forum presentation—as it’s a lot neater.

 

Beyond that, if you take what I say into consideration and implement some stuff, I’d be more than happy to read anything you write. You have skill, and right now it’s about finding the right way to use it!

 

Zigs.