Well I had a 'short' story due for English class today. I honestly had nothing down, so last night I pitched something together in a matter of a couple hours. The attached is rather raw, not really edited. The 'final' copy it at school but I might grab it later. Feel free to leave comments and/or critiques. This was a pretty weak attempt, and I was limited by word-count (no less then 800, no more then 1,200) even though I think this one hits almost 1,500. It was un-planned, just written, I hope you guys enjoy.
~Bryan~
EDIT: My 420'th post...errr, brb, I got some stuff to do

not bad, not bad at all, in fact a dam sight better than a lot of driving passages in books written by authors that should have known better (alistar maclean - the way to a dusty death being a good or is that bad example)

Thanks for the comment. I'm actually not even a driver, have no license, never been behind the wheel on a public road, never even been in a car accident. So if my examples or descriptions are whack, feel free to let me know
~Bryan~

Nice job there, I got all cought up by the story!

reminded me of me :sorry:

Only thing I'd comment on (a personal observation) is the level of technical detail actually put me off the narrative - although I'm familiar with the subject matter, if you were talking about something like genetic experimentation maybe I would have been more interested in details as I have no knowledge of that.
Some styles of author love to cram details (almost like reading a manufacter spec sheet) and they have a loyal fanbase, some would present technical information in an acurrate, but understandable-to-anyone way.
Your teacher may look at the 'tech speak' and conclude that the techincalities add to the target-audience experience without detracting from the context, or they could deem that because they don't follow it no-one will.

Other than that personal critique I wouldn't complain, as has been said there are much worse in actual print.

Nice! At the beginning it looked like a classic initial D style scenario but at the end it had a total different than the usual message to pass.

No offense, but this piece is not very good. Just in the first paragraph there are numerous spelling and grammar errors. You have several sentence fragments, at least ten instances of a punctuation mark where it shouldn't be or lack thereof when one is needed, and at least four unnecessary hyphens. You skip a space between paragraphs and they seem to have been decided upon randomly. A new paragraph indicates a slight shift in the topic or someone new speaking. There are more spelling errors and awkward sentences in the later paragraphs, too.

C-


The story itself is decent, but serious editing is needed.

Monkey Mike, I understand what you were saying. That in particular bugged me a little because I had to make a choice of going full-out automotive language, or keep it relatively simple for the normies I really should have spent more time figuring out that situation.

Lateralus, I appreciate you commenting on my grammatical inaccuracies. Although I was aware of most of my mistakes and my layout, I didn't change any of it until today, we got time in class to do any changes, and I re-worked and merged a few paragraphs. Like I said I'm my first post I honestly had nothing down, so last night I pitched something together in a matter of a couple hours.
~Bryan~

Quote from squidhead :

reminded me of me :sorry:

sadly...me too

Quote from dropin_biking :

Monkey Mike, I understand what you were saying. That in particular bugged me a little because I had to make a choice of going full-out automotive language, or keep it relatively simple for the normies I really should have spent more time figuring out that situation.

The thing is that if you can capture an audience with the terminology in, then it's no bad thing - you can't write something that pleases everyone (not even the god-awful Harry Potter is universally loved). A couple of people have shown appreciation for your piece, which in my opinion indicates you have made a connection with them.
If you get downgraded for this aspect of the content or the theme (provided there was an open scope when you were handed the assignment) point the teacher here to those comments. Regardless of their academic background they liked it. It won't protect you from the kind of points that Lateralus raised, but it does go some way to justify your choice on the tech-speak.

Something like this is also horrible :P i had a go at one of these stoies a while ago but abondend it because well i suck at that stuff then again i have a whole folder full of half finished stories.

Drift Capital abondend it because i couldnt get into the mood or explain what i wanted.

Hungarian blade, current WIP but has had a major flaw that i need to re-write.

Sorry that i took this off topic to my stories, i did like yours but the talking is like "Hello" Jeff said "Hi" i replied ect. it kinda has to go down.
"Hello" Jeff said to me as i was standing there.
"Hi" i replied.

Ect i mean sure thats a crude explanation but still good.

Not bad at all. You really capture the 'feel' of the drive and the complexity of the road. Just needs tightening up in places and the grammar tidying.

Nice work.

I'll have a look at your stories, and come back with some ideas to continue them. I don't think I left my dialog boring, or are you talking about the actual formating of the piece? If so, I did correct it before handing it in, the dialog is properly spaced and formated. I was just in too big of a rush to do it with that 'draft'
~Bryan~

Good job, I always find it hard to make car stories interesting but you managed it. The level of technical detail isn't too much imo. Tidy up the spelling/grammar and you're there.

I liked it, nice work. The only thing I found was I didn't like (apart from some of the grammar, but that's been covered...) is that you gave it away a bit early by saying "If only I bothered to check the dash for that little red light in the corner." I would rather not know anything is wrong, because then you are feeling the same emotions as the people in the car. As it were, we knew the guys in the car were having a good time, but as a reader we're concerned. What do you think?

Wow...it may be because I'm really high right now...but I completely agree. Letting the reader know the light on the dash (later found to be ABS) was lit-up. It doesn't bring the surprise that the reader should feel when they crash.

I just wrote something right now, about my feeling about WOT (yes, wide open throttle, the actual word we use) I think it's pretty cool, but again, I'm fried.

Quote from dropin_biking :

Wow...it may be because I'm really high right now...but I completely agree. Letting the reader know the light on the dash (later found to be ABS) was lit-up. It doesn't bring the surprise that the reader should feel when they crash.

I just wrote something right now, about my feeling about WOT (yes, wide open throttle, the actual word we use) I think it's pretty cool, but again, I'm fried.

Perhaps you could word it something like this:-

''As I surveyed the wreckage in shock, I noticed something flickering through the drivers side window..''

Quote from Origamiboy :

Perhaps you could word it something like this:-

''As I surveyed the wreckage in shock, I noticed something flickering through the drivers side window..''

Thats Gold right there.

Wow that really is, the only downside would be either nothing would be on, or a crap load of lights would be flickering.
~Bryan~

Quote from dropin_biking :

Wow that really is, the only downside would be either nothing would be on, or a crap load of lights would be flickering.
~Bryan~

Nothing wrong with using a little poetic licence for the sake of a good story though..

Sorry to bump an extremely old thread, but I was looking over my interm-report last night and realized I got a 46% on that story. I'm rather pissed off about it, TBH. I know it had a few grammatical errors but still! Anybody think this is fair for grade 10? I won't really be able to 'take it up' with my teacher untill tuesday
~Bryan~

Quote from dropin_biking :

Sorry to bump an extremely old thread, but I was looking over my interm-report last night and realized I got a 46% on that story. I'm rather pissed off about it, TBH. I know it had a few grammatical errors but still! Anybody think this is fair for grade 10? I won't really be able to 'take it up' with my teacher untill tuesday
~Bryan~

You sure that it wasn't out of 50 and you didn't realize it?

What were the specific requirements for the paper?