your feedback apreciated

[silversword]

My second story was posted on lit over the weekend. It has received higher numbers of views and votes than my previous story. However its score is lower, but it has also attracted a amount good feedback from readers.

A little bit of background. This piece was not really written as a story with lit in mind. It started as more of an exercise in writing. You see I wrote alot a number of years ago but haven't written for about 5 years, so this was a bit of a warm up, I however decided to post it just to see what response it got.

I would however greatly apreciate your honest, comments, criticism and general feedback.

Silver

Is this what you want?

 

[Octavian]

feedback as requested

It is already a short story, but it is not short enough!

No I am not being flippant at your expense. In dialogue between two people you need not keep writing ‘he’ or ‘she said’. That is the point of the new paragraphs; they depict a change of speaker.
There is some repetition in the text too.

'Taking the bottle from her he placed it to his lips. Breaking eye contact he threw his head back taking a long swig from the bottle. He gasped as the harsh vodka stung his throat.
Wiping his mouth the back of his hand he placed the bottle back down on the side. Again they both looked at each other. She looked at his face, his dark hair cast shadows over his features in the dim light.'

In the above example you have used the word ‘bottle’ three times in quick succession. You also used the word ‘looked’ twice in six words. You need not say he ‘placed the bottle back down on the side’ either. When you think about it, ‘on the side’ is extraneous information.

Why not have written it so:

Taking the bottle from her he placed it to his lips. Breaking eye contact he threw his head back as he took a long swig, gasping as the harsh vodka stung his throat.
Wiping his mouth on the back of his hand he put the drink down. Again they both looked at each other. She noticed that his dark hair cast shadows over his features in the dim light.

Hope this helps.
I particularly liked the wistful ending.

Octavian

 

[silversword]

thanks

Thank you for your comments, they are much apreciated.

I think perhaps it is best to leave a story for a while having written it before going back to edit it. I have another story which is considerably longer, like I said this was really only an exercise, and I finished it about two weeks ago and haven't been back to it since.

Hopefully this will correct some of the errors and points of criticism that my posted stories have attracted.

As they say, you live and learn.

thanks again

Silver