Jonesy_0

Peter woke up to the same stench. The morning sun was just below the horizon. His eyes burned while his body ached. It was going to be a long day.

After breakfast and showering, Peter collapsed on the couch and turned on the morning news. His cell phone was charging on the coffee table. He picked it up while an attractive blonde on television told about another bombing in the middle east. Three missed calls from the night before. One of them was Jennifer, a fiery red head he had met the night before.

“Hey, what are you doing this morning?” Peter asked, hoping it wasn’t too early. He didn’t remember much from the night before, but he did remember her telling him that she had to work early.

“Oh, just getting ready to go to work. What are you doing?”

“Nothing. I’ll probably get something to eat and then go for a morning run.”

“Sounds like fun.”

Her voice was soothing and supple, with a bit of depth to it. Sultry and sexy.

“I really had fun last night.” Peter said with a smile Jenn couldn’t see.

“Yeah, me too.” Jenn said, and Peter could hear the smile on her face.

“What are you doing this weekend?”

“I’ll probably go out again.”

“Well, just give me a call, okay babe. We’ll hang out.”

“I definitely will.”

They hung up. A weatherman was telling Peter that the temperature was already into the low eighties at only eight ten am in the morning just as he turned off the television to start contemplating his conversation with the beautiful Jennifer.

Peter did his quick morning workout of pushups and situps and then walked out the door, keys in hand. He turned on the music to hear a bubbly bursting radio personality ranting about something that Peter didn’t care about, but he left it on anyway.

By the time Peter had parked in front of the sandwich shop fifteen minutes later, the obnoxious personality was telling about the possibility of degrees into the one ten to one fifteen range. Times like theses make Peter wish he would have never moved to the desert.

The man inside the radio was cut off since Peter stabbed the car key in the off position.

Peter’s mouth watered thinking about the lightly toasted bread and succulent chicken breast. A blast of cool air pushed him back as he opened the door to the restaurant, stifling heat all around him. Peter thought a miniature storm might develop there in the doorway and rain on his shoes. They made his sandwich and he sat down.

Part way through his meal as the fans above slowly turned, with the fierce desert sun low in the sky, sending light horizontally over the terrain, cascading through the windows and glancing off the empty seats, Peter’s mother called on his cell phone.

“Yeah?” Petey asked, knowing she would call.

“When are you going to come by and help me plant those flowers?” She asked in a brittle, stale voice.

“Soon. I just have to finish my mid morning snack and then I’ll be over.”

“Okay. Can you pick up some milk for me?”

“Yeah, I guess I can pick some up.”

“Okay, I’ll see you in a bit.”

“Buh bye.” Peter hung up and continued his meal.

A few moments later, the heat pounded Peter once more as he stepped outside, hopping into his Pinto. The morning was dry and hot, the air was dusty and rusty. The mountains in the distance looked like a painting as the wind rushed through Peter’s hair. Out on the highway Peter pulled up to his mother’s avenue, but instead of turning right, he turned left on to an old dirt road.

A strange feeling came over him just then. He knew he would be running into a beautiful big breasted brunette, jogging, with ear buds in, listening to music. Peter could see the tight red short shorts in the distance. It was her all right. Same as always, out for a morning run.


First a long scream that shook the ground mixed the air escaped the woman, then her head rocked back as a river of blood muffled her scream, giving a watery choking sound as it rushed out of her mouth. Peter just smiled as he continued to stab her over and over again, his forearm burning, stab after stab. Her body was now soundless, her face pale, except for the puddles of blood, which nearly matched the soil, on both sides of her gaping mouth, cascading across her cheeks and spilling down her throat. Her front looked like a messy black swamp with everything in disarray. Peter picked the woman up, tossed her in the back of the trunk, then got back into the drivers seat.

Now, off to mothers to plant some flowers.

eggo

Hey Jonesy,

The story had a good twist. It was a well thought out piece that was well diagramed. The dialog was crisp and not awkward.

redundant, the morning is AM.

Quote:

personality was telling about the possibility of degrees into the one ten to one fifteen range

Degrees doesn't work in this structure. Tempratures might work.

Quote:

The man inside the radio was cut off since Peter stabbed the car key in the off position.

You would twist or turn a key. You could stab it into the ignition, but not stab it off.

middle east = Middle East

Quote:

Sultry and sexy.

Fragment, consider revising.

Quote:

Times like theses make Peter wish he

Quote:

would have never

Quote:

moved to the desert.

he had never

Quote:

The morning was dry and

Quote:

hot,

Quote:

the air was dusty and rusty.

The morning was dry and hot; the air was dusty and rusty.

Other odds and like this. I didn't like the stop in the action between the time he was driving and killing the girl. It seemed like there was a bit missing.

Thanks for the read.

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Jonesy_0

THANKYOU Eggo for finally giving me a thorough feedback. I haven't gotten much so far. I agree with you on the "am in the morning". After reviewing it I was gonna take out "in the morning".
I agree with you on degrees. I see what you mean on the "stabbed the ignition off" but I wanted to show that he sort of turned it off hard, and I think it foreshadows the end. I don't like the rhyme dusty and rusty. And I agree with you that there's a skip in action from driving to killing, but I did that on purpose. There's actually supposed to be a break in there, but when I was copying and pasting, it obviously didn't transfer.

THANK YOU SO MUCH AGAIN!

gohn67

Hey Jonesy,
Read the story twice.

I hope this is not too harsh, but you seem like someone that can take harsh.

You write with with very simple consice sentences. Mainly noun verb sentence structures. Those are usually the clearest senctences. Sentences are short. Not much comma use. You don't use many adverbs. Your dialogue uses little to no tags. This is just my obersvation of your writing style and is not mean to pass jugdment of whether it is good or bad. Just to make you aware of what you are doing.

The story seems really vague to me. There are parts where their could be stronger more specific word use and description. Mainly your adj use is kind of weak and leads to unnecessary telling

A few examples-

What stench? Of flowers? Of beer? etc

attractive? Describe what she looks like, so the reader knows what kind of woman this man finds attractive. It gives insight to his character. Attractive is subjective. Does he like 400 pound hefers? Does he like the innocent librarian look?


Obnoxious. Show us why the radio guy is obnoxious. How does his voice sound? What kind of stuff is he talking about? Is it stuff that peter hates/ doesn't agree with?

Describe how the heat affects him instead of telling us.
Also the use of dusty and rusty at the same time is a bit awkward. Adv should usually be avoided.

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The other thing I noticed is that he you make him do all these mundane things that have nothing to do with the story. He wakes up. He does push ups. He watches the news. He goes gets some food. It seems like you vaguely narrate every little thing he does and we don't really need any of that. It doesn't affect the plot or his character. None of the things he does tells us about his character.

The dialogue while it is easy to understand is also vague and mundane. Too ordainary, generic.

And then in the end you have him kill some jogger, who I think is Jenn, but am not sure. It could have been some ordainary jogger. Since you don't give a name. And also it can't be Jenn if she is working, plus it seemed like they just met at a bar, so how would he know that she jogged there.

Why did he choose today to kill her? It seems like he has been stalking her for a while. It wasn't like it took much planning.

The transistion from when he sees the jogger and then starts stabbing her is very awkward. First he is looking at the jogger, then suddenly he is in mid stab.


There wasn't much of a plot. He wakes up, talks to Jenn, eats, and kills some random woman. There's no real progression, none of the previous actions add up to why he kills this woman, unless she is Jenn, which is a bit better, but then we need motivation. There's no real conflict either.
--
I guess what you were trying to do was create a very mundana seemingly ordainary person, who seemed normal, but was really a killer.

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I think everyone has doubts about themselves as writers, so it's kind of natural.

It's natural for you to like your stuff. There's a bias and ego involved. The hardest thing is to look at one's work in a nuetral way, so that you can see your own errors and mistakes.

It's not a problem that you don't like the work of others. Find authors that you actually like and read other people that write similarly. If you want to be a writer you should at least enjoy reading something, imo.

As for the work that is posted on here. For the most part we are all amatuers here, and most casual readers will probably not enjoy them very much. And that's okay. The big thing is for you to able to understand WHY you don't like them and also the stuff that you like about them. You learn a lot that way, but it takes time.

I hope I'm not totally discouraging you or anything. I hope you don't quit. You can defintely improve.

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