To read this story or to participate in this writing event, you only need a free account.
You can
To find out what this event is about click here
Trench Warfare for Kids
How It Rates
Description
For Country, for honor, for the fading memory of home. Some chose, most were chosen. Take the land, inch by inch, that is how this war will be won. At least, that's what they tell us.
Comments
Very nicely written. Had me hooked, waiting for a bit of a reveal at the end. Would have liked a clearer end, felt a bit cut off. Who was the nonhuman character?
I think you got caught in the descriptions a little too much. I liked the interations between the kids, and wish you would do a little more world-building with that.
i agree with paper junkie. it was good, but not very engaging at the end.
That was ... surreal to say the least. You submerged your reader in a sea of metaphors and jargon that kept me completely off balance the entire time I was reading. Without the clue in the title, I doubt that I would have been able to build any picture of the environment you were describing that was more than a continuous blur. As it was, every so often I could picture something with a few features between near formless snippets of motion. If your goal was to keep the reader as off balance as the characters, you succeeded!
The use of jargon and metaphor also threw me for a loop. I think it might have been used consistently throughout the story but I was unable to get a solid definition of what the jargon words meant. The metaphors, especially in the first two paragraphs derailed my reading and kept me that way for quite a while into the story. I had to re-read the opening sentences several times before I could get past them.
Your ending also seemed a touch weak. It felt like you hit a transition point in the story and just stopped writing. There didn't seem to be a build up or culmination of previous events. It just happened and then nothing more.
I was also bothered by the reference to the robots that brought food. It feels tacked on without anything really tying it into the rest of the story. Maybe if the robots were the ones pushing them forward or they were fighting robots or something along those lines. Not sure.
There's potential here to work with but I'm going to have to down vote this one.
Keep at it!
Having read your story, "Dolly" from Scare US, I think I have similar thoughts as I did then. Interesting imagery--but lacking in plot. A story needs a beginning, middle, and end. I really feel like you have only a middle here. The story immediately becomes more interesting the second your characters start conversing. Before that, it's an onslaught of peotic prose that probably confuses your reader more than entertains them. It's certainly okay to start your story zoomed in on metaphors and poetry, but when you pull the camera back, the reader is going to expect something concrete to hold onto (at least this reader did). It's not enough in the end to reveal what you did--we need to understand why that's important.
I like your main idea. Set that puppy in a story, and I'm there with you all the way.
I'm not sure what I think of this really. I read and sometimes enjoyed it, but I need something concrete to hold onto. Give me a clear picture so I can understand what I'm reading about. I was never sure what was metaphor and what was real.
There's some lines in here that really spark and connect. Your proses can be great. Now tie it to something grounded and you might have something.
You certainly have a flair for poetic imagery, and a lot of the narrative here is very well written and enjoyable to chew over. I must admit that when I see a story start with a simile it tends to put me off, and I was on the lookout for more, putting me in a slightly more negative frame of mind. It won me over very quickly though. This kind of writing instantly reminded me of The Thin Red Line, and there is a tradition of war writing which your piece touches on well. It’s almost Wilfred Owen-like at times in its poetic descriptions while downplaying the usual heroism of the Boys Own style adventures. This isn’t about plot, and I like that you had the balls to remove that from the equation to the extent that you have. This is all about the imagery, and it’s pretty much mission accomplished in my view. The ending is so low key, yet very fits perfectly with what has gone before. It leaves us with a fantastic final line, and a fair few questions, which I’d warrant was the point. I’d rather ponder why the children are fighting than have it explained to me (I’m going with enforced population control). Very well done!