My first attempt at writing, would love if people were willing to take a look and offer their feedback

[Craighalbert]

I've been browsing this site on and off for years, but only in the last few weeks have I been bit by the bug and wanted to try writing myself. This is a quick story about a couple dealing - in their way - with the after effects of one of them sleeping with someone else. Like most first efforts, I imagine there's a lot of room for improvement, and I'm not shy about hearing it. As a heads up, there isn't any sex in this story, I'm still working up the confidence to try it on that front.

https://www.literotica.com/s/i-still-believe-in-us

Appreciate anyone who takes the time!

 

[Voyeurkenneth]

Hi Craig, I think you've got the juice! Really, I think your writing reads smoothly. You've got a good sense for prose. I'll pull some things I enjoyed reading.

Teaching students raised on 10 second video clips and 280 character limits to enjoy James Baldwin or William Faulkner was sometimes an uphill battle, but so far there've always been enough who are truly interested to make it worth it.

^ It's easy enough to just say short attention-spanned kids, but you spelled it out more cleverly, which personally keeps me invested as a reader.

Although she'd cut down on her drinking considerably since we started dating, after she stumbled while taking off her Uggs boots I decided letting her get up the stairs alone was a risk not worth taking, so I scooped her up bridal style and carried her softly up to our room.

^ Similarly, something descriptive like this makes for a fun, easy read. Made it easy to visualize while not sounding rote.

A half dozen sentences started competing with each other to get out first,

^ I thought this was a cool way to describe the chaos of the situation.

Overall, great first effort. I think it's a heartwarming story with a happy ending. I saw the score but I don't think it's indicative of your ability. I'd guess it's more a reflection of your content (cheating) relative to the category. I'd say don't get discouraged and keep on writing. I gave you 5 stars and a follow. I look forward how you'll handle longer efforts with beefier plots.


If I had to provide some feedback, it's only more punctuation/grammar related:

"I stared at her a while before smiling sadly. "Don't make promises you can't keep." "But honey-" "It's okay. It is. I've thought this through." Actually I hadn't at all. "I love you Holly, I do, and I know you love me. And if you can keep this... this... this part of you... this need of yours, if you can keep it out of the house, if we can manage some kind of don't ask, don't tell... I don't know. I don't know, okay? I don't know how I'll feel tomorrow, or a month, or a year, or in ten, but I want to try. I want to give us a chance to have the life I thought we did."

^ Combining dialogue in the same paragraph. I think I see the intent here. It's an exchange that conveys the quick back-and-forth on the same line. As a style choice, perhaps it's okay. I'll just say it threw me off on first read because I'm used to reading each character's dialogue on separate lines.

"We're gonna try" I said,

^ There are a handful of instances where you're missing the comma before the end quote that precedes a dialogue tag. Interestingly, you'd nailed it down in other places. Doesn't detract from the story, but maybe focus on these little things when you're doing your final edit.

 

[Nynah]

I agree with all of Kenneth's technical commentary above, it's spot on. The only thing I'll emphasize is the dialogue and paragraph structure. You have exchanges between them that are easy to read because you give each speaker their own separate line, but then you follow that up with a large paragraph that gives us insight into their thoughts peppered with additional dialogue. It's hard to parse what's being said by the character because there's so much interiority and exposition around it. I found parts of the story difficult to read because of that alone, so I would suggest decoupling your expository paragraphs from dialogue.

Your vocabulary is diverse and your prose, outside of the parts I mentioned above, is easy to read.

I get the feeling you wanted to go with the "nerdy guy meets party girl" trope and have them work out but I couldn't find myself connecting with either character for a few reasons. Tim is entirely passive, seemingly uninterested in being more than just Holly's stable partner. I found it a little hard to swallow when he chalked up her infidelity to "she has bad impulse control". Him telling her "don't ask, don't tell" as a resolution also seems a little incongruous as this reads like he's okay with her cheating as long as she doesn't let him know (which he's clearly not okay with but is perfectly fine with smothering that feeling just to stay with her). The last line of the story when he says "because you also drive me wild" doesn't really hit because his actions throughout their relationship are anything but.

Holly seems vapid and shallow and I don't feel like her character really progresses past that. I suppose there is a bit of growth when she spends the six months after the incident still partying but not sleeping with other people... however, that seems like the bare minimum. She is still characterized as barely tolerating him during the course of their whole relationship so by the end when they declare their love for each other after hashing it out feels hollow and forced.

Please know that none of what I've said here is meant to discourage you from writing; I'm only trying to offer an honest assessment of what I think are the major shortcomings in your work. I think that you have a good grasp of how to write a compelling narrative between characters; I feel that examining their motivations for doing what they do needs a bit of work but that comes with practice so please keep at it! I hope at least a little of what I've said has been helpful.

 

[Craighalbert]

Overall, great first effort. I think it's a heartwarming story with a happy ending. I saw the score but I don't think it's indicative of your ability. I'd guess it's more a reflection of your content (cheating) relative to the category. I'd say don't get discouraged and keep on writing. I gave you 5 stars and a follow. I look forward how you'll handle longer efforts with beefier plots.

I really appreciate it, both the kind works / effort you put into highlighting what you thought particularly worked and for your letting me know some areas to watch out for if I want to improve. Your support means a lot.

Please know that none of what I've said here is meant to discourage you from writing; I'm only trying to offer an honest assessment of what I think are the major shortcomings in your work. I think that you have a good grasp of how to write a compelling narrative between characters; I feel that examining their motivations for doing what they do needs a bit of work but that comes with practice so please keep at it! I hope at least a little of what I've said has been helpful.

On the contrary, I found this kind of feedback very encouraging. You're right that I need to remember not to take it for granted that certain motivations or emotions that might intuitively make sense to me will be as apparent to readers, and it's something I'll keep in mind going forward. Thank you for taking the time to write this!