AWKWARD ZOMBIE

oh my gosh critique

What do you think would work better there? I can't think of anything hurr.


It was kinda pointless, yeah.


That was supposed to be her quoting him.


Not really. I can't think of much else for it.

Won a local short story contest.

six letter stories yessss <333

Dohohohohohohohohohohohohohoh. You guys don't read much Hemingway, eh. Either you're living in the 20's, or somebody likes plagiarism.

*RELOCATED FROM THE ART THREAD*

I've been working on this all day for English class. We were assigned to make a fictitious short story. I think I got a little carried away, since it's probably bigger than "short".

It's for an entry to a literary contest. I hope I get in.

I hope you all can get through it all so you guys an critique it. I need all the help I can get.



ORCHARD

The air was cool under the shade of the trees in the orchard. Len stood on his ladder picking fruit and wiping his brow despite the reduced temperatures. After making sure every last ripened fruit was harvested off this tree, he sat under it and rested. His woven basket was almost full. One more tree should be enough, and then he could go home with his payment. Len sat and observed his surroundings. It was the same old view.
The orchard was about a hundred yards long and thirty yards wide. Trees bearing fruit grew in even spaces apart, just enough for the entire area to be shaded by foliage. It made for an excellent working atmosphere. There were just enough trees so that when one slowly made their way day after day down each row to one end of the orchard, the trees they began at would already have begun bearing small fruit to pick yet again. Walls bordered the area, making sure no one except Len entered. Only workers and certain royalty had the key to the gate, which locked out anyone else.
Len was nearly asleep on the springy green grass when an odd spectacle caught his eye. To his far left, a girl with fiery orange curls in a simple yet beautiful snow-white dress seemingly glided barefoot across the lawn. She hummed a mysterious tune. Her voice was a pan flute.
“Hullo there,” Len said confusedly. She should not be here, he thought. This girl would pass as royalty if not for her simple garb, which they would never dare wear unless it had a layer of jewels imbedded in it. He didn’t see how she could have gotten in. Len had locked the gate behind him when he had entered, and the walls were far too high and smooth for anyone to climb over.
The young lady turned to him and glided over. She had honey-hazel eyes. “Hello,” The pan flute sang. Then she quickly turned to a tree, reached her arms up and began picking fruit from the lowest branches and lightly tossing them into Len’s basket.
Len however, simply stared at this magnificent creature. “What is your name?” he forced out of his empty mind.
“Flora,” she said, not stopping her harvesting.
Len thought to himself about her. Not understanding what her status was in the social hierarchy, he asked, “You don’t act as royalty, yet surely you aren’t a peasant. Why are you here?”
This time she stopped. A fruit in her hand, she replied, “I’ve always been here. This is my home.”
“But I haven’t ever seen you before, and I’ve been working here nearly every day for almost a year.”
“You just haven’t looked hard enough.” She smiled and rummaged around in the basket.
Len was becoming increasingly perplexed by this sight. Surely he wasn’t dreaming. Everything seemed so real. Yet he probably was still sleeping under the tree he sat under. He lifted himself up and walked toward her.
She looked at him and raised a fruit to his eyes. “Do you want one?”
Len’s eyes widened. “I can’t eat that, only royalty can.” This was true. The rich landowners and kings and queens owned this orchard, which held the only trees of their kind in the land. Any person who did not belong to royalty caught eating this forbidden fruit was to be executed. Outside this land where the rich lived, there lay a town. This town was very poor and the villagers who lived there had only barren land to work on. Occasionally diseases spread around, and they seemed a very unhappy people. However, Len was lucky. He had been given a job where he could work for decent pay and scrape by on what the landowners gave him. Unlike the other common folk, he didn’t have to slave in his own small farm, harvesting all he could to stay alive. The cheddar he was given could be traded for good food the traders came to town with. He was content with his life, but yearned for something more.
Flora shrugged and took a small bite out of the fruit. Len quietly gasped as if she were to burst into flame seconds after. When she hadn’t, he calmed down, but warily studied the orchard in case anyone was eavesdropping. He then gazed back at her.
“You aren’t like anyone I’ve ever seen before. Are you human?” He inquired.
Flora put the back of a hand to her mouth to keep her fruit from spewing out of her mouth. In between convulsions she swallowed it, and as soon as her mouthful was gone she whipped her head to the sky and let loose a joyous laugh.
It was the most beautiful thing Len ever heard in his life. He felt joy and sorrow and pain and surprise all at the same time. He wished that the moment he died he could hear that wonderful melody.
After she had her laugh, Flora replied, “Well, not exactly. Let’s just leave it at that for now.” She revealed a row of perfect white teeth.

They spent many days together. Every day when Len came into the orchard, empty woven basket in hand, and locked the gate behind him, she would come bounding up to greet him in her snow white dress. They would pick fruit together and Len would talk about life in the poor town. Flora would listen intently to his every word. Work was done a lot faster with two of them, so they had a lot of free time to talk about the village and current events. They occasionally played games Len brought along with him. She seemed to love Nine Men’s Morris, a simple board game. After the day melted away into dusk, Len would reluctantly lock the gate as he left, turn to say good night, and leave Flora in the orchard. He asked her about why she was intent on staying there. She simply said she couldn’t leave. Len didn’t ask why.

One day, after finishing up their work, Flora suddenly handed Len a fruit. “Take this home with you. Plant it near your house and make sure it grows. Then you’ll have your own tree.”
Even after meeting Flora, Len had abstained from taking a bite out of any fruit. Despite this, Flora was occasionally seen nibbling at one every so often. She pushed it towards his chest. “Please. Take it. Do as I say.” She seemed almost on the verge of tears. “I don’t want to hear about any more of those people’s problems or suffering.”
And so, Len took the fruit with him. As he opened up the gate to leave, Flora turned him around and gave him a peck on the cheek. Stunned, all he could think about was hugging her. He did so. “Neither do I,” he replied.

On the way home, as the sun was just beginning to set in between the mountains, Len rambled down the road towards his section of the village. Suddenly, a rumbling noise resounded behind him. A carriage rode on towards him. Realizing it as royalty’s vehicle, he quickly attempted to tuck the fruit he was holding into his trousers pocket.
He was too late.
“You there, young man!” A sharp, female voice boomed. Len was petrified. A cold shiver ran up his spine and his heart skipped quite a few beats. He stiffly turned around to meet his demise.
The carriage had stopped. In it sat the great duchess of the land. She had the scowl of deep suspicion and persecution on her face. “What were you holding just now?”
“N-n-noth-ing, M-Madame.” Len’s face was completely flushed. He would murder himself for being so obvious.
“You’re a liar. Show me what you have.” She held out a palm as if she was to receive his possession.
Len stood, frozen on the spot. His heart has beating so fast he thought it would explode. Then, on an impulse, on the pure instinct he had, his very will to survive, he ran. He tore through the woods on the side of the road. The trees were too dense for the carriage to follow. He wove in between trees and through thickets, turning this way and that to escape from his invisible enemy.
“Coach! Turn us around! We must inform the cavalry of this insolence at once! I want that filth tracked down and killed by the hounds!” Len overheard her shriek. It filled him with energy and fueled his desire to flee.
Flora would know what to do. This thought came down upon him suddenly. He didn’t know why exactly, but it filled him with hope. He made an abrupt turn south. It was a race against time, and the odds were all against him. The duchess’ hounds could track down a fox with its own two-week-old scent. The sun was halfway hidden behind the ground. He had only minutes to make it back to the orchard.
When the familiar walls were in sight, faint barks were already heard in the distance. Len shakily jammed the key into the lock and ran inside. Flora sat under a tree fast asleep. The whole orchard seemed quiet. When Len appeared before her, she awoke with a start.
“Len? Wh-why are you here? It’s late!”
“No time. Get up. Let’s go.” He held out his hand. She took it and he pulled her up from the ground. His mind was moving so fast his lips couldn’t even produce comprehensible sentences.
“You know I can’t. What in the world happened to you? What’s going on?” She put her hands on his shoulders and stared at his face. “Oh, what is going on?”
The barks came closer. “In there! He’s in there!” A deep voice shouted. It was the cavalry.
Len swiftly grabbed her hand and they ran towards the other end of the orchard. “The fruit. She saw the fruit. I’m so sorry. So sorry, Flora.” Reason flashed back to him. He stopped. “We can’t get out this way. We’re trapped.”
Flora simply stared at the dead end of the orchard. “Come on.” This time she grabbed his hand and ran.
The dogs and men rushed through the gate. “Get them!” The hounds leapt through the air and sprinted towards their prey. Flora and Len simply ran faster. They nearly flew now.
At the dead end, the two hit the wall. Len spun around to meet his doom, as the hounds flashed their dagger teeth. Flora quickly turned Len towards her, closed her eyes, and embraced him.
Len felt time slow. The dogs before him were jumping in for the kill as the men behind them followed. Yet they weren’t at him yet. He felt peculiar, almost as light as a feather. He looked at Flora. She held him tightly, eyes shut closed. Her fiery orange hair rustled in a breeze just as the leaves from the trees did. A sudden gust of wind caught the branches and stripped them of all their leaves, leaving barren trees devoid of any greenery. Len gasped. He felt as if the same thing was happening to him, as though he was lifted off the ground and swept away.
And that’s exactly what happened. Flora held him still in their embrace. Len slowly closed his eyes as well and rested his head on top of hers. They both flashed bright white enveloping the entire orchard, and in the shapes of their figures stood PANK and white spring flower petals. The gust of wind blew and scattered the petals out of the orchard and into the sky. There the flock of petals danced in the breeze and floated away through the sky. All of them flew across the land, reaching far off places and peoples. Each petal landed gracefully on solid ground. Where each petal originally lay there grew a tiny sapling.
These saplings eventually grew into great trees, the same trees as the ones who grew in the garden. The poor people of the land found these trees. They would never be rid of their fruit. They would eat these fruit and never go hungry. Nobody would dare take away this gift, because there grew so many trees around the countryside. It was nigh impossible to hack every one down.
And so the people who once had to eke out a life of struggle and torment grew pop flyin' and caring. Gone were the days of hardship and lament. There grew a new age. An age of love and compassion. Of joy and glee. Of simplicity and bliss. The world was a paradise all on its own. This was Len’s and Flora’s wish.
And it was granted.

Copyright Me

Oh hai im in ur story critiquing ur ritinHer voice was a pan flute? She has one of these in her throat?

Later on you refer to her voice as "the pan flute", so I feel like you're being literal, even though it doesn't make sense. Could you make this clearer?This seems a bit awkward. How about combining "This was true." with the spoken phrase? Like this: "'I can't eat that, only royalty can,' he said, thinking of the decree that forbid such a luxury to non-nobles."It's hard to explain why I feel that this is also awkward, but I think that trying to not use the same word ("town" in this case) very close to each other is a good idea. How about "Outside this land where the rich lived, there lay a poor town. The villagers who lived there..."?I would add a semicolon after "lucky"."Something more" is a little cliche, especially for someone who considers himself lucky to be alive.Kind of the same problem as with the "This was true." sentence. I would just say "Stunned, all he could do was hug her."

Lastly, the story's ending was a bit sudden. It went from "Oh no we're dog meat" to "New age of love and prosperity" in just a paragraph. The story, which so far had been about a boy and a girl, suddenly ended on a tone about a great change in the world. Furthermore, it seems like an unwarranted deus ex machina ending.

Overall, a nice read, although unpolished.

Thanks for the help! Although I am terrible at ending things.

Well, it is 1000 words over the limit. I had to think of something. :T
I wish I could have elaborated more.

Ah, a word limit. That would cause problems.

I remember one time I wrote a short story for class, and the instructions were 4-5 pages. I ended up writing...10. :I I worked for an entire evening trimming it down to a docile 6 pages.

Thankfully the teacher was like "that was just a minimum lol i'm impressed", so I just handed in the original version.

OKAY MAYBE THIS IS THE RIGHT THREAD I DON'T WANT TO MOVE THIS AGAIN

****

There is a planet, in another, alternate reality.

It is the home of the Elementals- mostly humanoid, almost demigod creatures. These creatures used to be just like Humans- but, their ancestors drank from the numerous magic fountains from the world. The species grew- intelligent, powerful, beautiful, advanced, magical. Anything a lowly human could want to be.

They came up with the ability to watch other realities, and grew despised by the often, in their opinion, disgusting humans. The Elementals grew elitist, without even experiencing these planets. They thought of humans as dangerous and savage, the Elementals glad that they would never have to deal with them. (The elitism is, yes, a flaw in their thought.)

Or would they?

One day, the Leader of Sky City's daughter, Levatia Ilmari, was taking a walk with her mother. The Leader, Airigh (Yes my account is named after one of my characters... I thought her name was pretty. So what?) Ilmari, her mother, had just bought her a lovely cookie from a bakery they frequented, disappeared in a cloud of violet smoke. Naturally, her mother proceeded to Flip The Fuck Out before alerting the entirety of Sky City, and a lot of the landbound countries through alert systems, news, and the like.

Meanwhile, Levatia was warped, from the purple cloud, to some of the outer space close to Earth.
Now, any other creature would have died right there due to lack of oxygen.
But Levatia was part Air Elemental- enough to have her produce fresh air automatically, regardless of conditions. (Poisoned air is more harmful to an Air Elemental than lack of air, due to this. Don't ask me how producing fresh air makes any sense in space. It just happened- I need a story, you know.)
She floated down to the planet she saw below- a blue planet that looked like it has similar conditions to her own.
It was an Earth.
When I say an Earth, I mean that Earth has many replicas. In fact, the Elementals can't tell which one was the first one.

Levatia landed in a field near a city. This city looked look nothing like the ones back home- it looked sort of like a section of Sky City, planted into the ground, but most of the buildings were at least partly made of colored glass. All the glass here was clear, there were stumpy little buildings next to the skyscrapers, and the layout of the city didn't seem to make any sense either.

And, there were an awful lot of teenagers running around...

Due to the Elementals having a lot of different languages, some old, some new, and about ten per Element, they had to make translators. Levatia had one, though slightly faulty when dealing with grammar. Language barriers aren't a problem to her.

She sat on a bench and started to think about what to do. She had noticed that her Soul Magnets were missing, and she didn't have a long time before her soul flew off and did whatever it liked. (Levatia has a problem where her soul doesn't stay attached to her body. The Soul Magnets act to keep it anchored)
She was interrupted by a teenage girl, tanned, wearing a little too much purple.
"You're by yourself? Why?"
"Because I'm not with my mother. Duh."
"You have a mother?!"
"You don't?"
"Where're you from...?"
Levatia's expression turned rather hostile.
"I'm from Sky City, but you don't know about that. It's a floating city in another planet, in another reality. You don't believe me."
The girl shook her head-
"Ailen or not, you need help an-"
"AAAGH"
Their heads swiveled 'round.

Some careless idiot had left a banana peel on the ground, and it had grown old and rotten. Some clutz slipped on it, and was screaming and flapping his arms around like some crazy bird, as if that would would help his situation at all.
Levvie stood up, noticing the troubled teen. Levatia wasn't the type to let people just fall on their faces, missing magnets or no. She swayed her arms around a bit- he started to float.
"What's that wind?"
"Dude, he stopped in midair!"
"He's floating!"
The teen returned to his feet.
"Wait, what the hell?"

People, being people, didn't bother to do anything and continued about their business, but he turned around, and asked the girl that had interrupted Levvie.

"Hey, okay, that wasn't natural at all. Did you happen to see where it came from?"
She looked back to Levatia, startled.
"Was that you, little kid?"
Levvie nodded and stuck her tongue out at the teen girl.
The teenage girl sighed. "I guess I'm a witness. I was going to help you anyway, missy, but now I guess I have to believe you. I'm still not a believer in magic, but if I see it, I guess it has to be true? I don't know anymore..." She shook her head. "Anyway, my name is Emma. I'll get you back to your mother, I promise, 'magic' or no."
"She has a mother?"
"Yep."
"Anyway, do you know what's going on, girlie?"

***

"Holy cow, Levvie, you just went through a lot!"
"Is that bag really able to hold anything?"
The two, Emma and Leo, where enticed by her story, though it was rather short and quite vague.
"Anyway, the nearest magnet is that way," Levatia said, pointing.
"You can tell where they are?"
"Well duh, of course. I bet they knew something like this would happen, so they gave her that ability in case." Leo looked at Emma as if he really expected her to know this.
"Okay, lets go," Levatia urged.

They had to go through the field Levatia had landed in earlier. Levatia stopped once without explaining, then continued moving- after a few more minutes, Leo pointed at something.
"Hey! It looks like Ruby! She's my friend- I met her two years ago. Her bother's a jerk, though."
"That's good to know, actually. Let's go see what they're doing," Emma urged. Something about them was suspicious.

++++

Okay the story is long so I'll post in parts

do you mind indepth critique?

Not really. Go ahead.

Punction is just going to be fixed in bold.
'Another, alternate reality' seems redundant to me.
This is just awkward phrasing.More explanation is necessary.Who are 'They?'How? Why do the other races/people know that they do it? Why can't they do it?Unnecessary.Don't put author's notes in the story. Your reader is smart enough to figure it out on their own.Rhetorical questions are unnecessary.It was just stated that she was with her mother.Missing an it, or 'the cookie,' or something from there.Don't swear in the narrative.Why is she alerting everyone over a missing cookie? 'And the like' seems, I can't think of the word right now, but use something formal.



okay i am really lazy this is all i'm doing. interesting idea, but it needs a lot of work.

Bacon covered most of what I was thinking, but I also have a suggestion or two:

Work on making sure each sentence leads into the next. And the same goes for paragraphs (dialogue exempt in some cases). If you have to, try editing it sentence-by-sentence. And do just a few at a time. Do maybe one paragraph and then do something else for a few minutes, to keep your reading/editing eyes fresh.

Explain some of the characters' thought processes a little more. Maybe throw in a few things that Levatia (since she's the one who knows everything in this story) thinks, and give a brief explanation of the thought here and there.

Also, make sure you don't go overboard on the tiny details and adjectives, falling to what I like to call the "Mimi Effect" (Anyone who has seen Mimi's makeup from the Drew Carey Show will know what I mean by this). It's good to build solid imagery, but it's sort of like looking up-close at the teeny tiny details of a giant painting. You lose understanding of the whole thing. (Don't worry, I actually have trouble with this one too.)

But, also like Bacon said, Even though it will take a lot of work, I think it could turn out to be a really good story.

i love you riku but

it's sentence

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF I hate when I do that.
Thank you

I'm so used to reading it as "sentance" because almost everyone I know spells it wrong, that it's sort of like if you hear bad grammar enough, you'll start mimicking it.