Critique This, Please?
I am conflicted on this. Any opinions/suggestions/tips are greatly appreciated!
Whoever says dying doesn’t hurt is either lying through their teeth or has never been hit by a car before. All my life I’d been told “oh, it’s quick and painless and you’ll be in a better place.” So obviously I was expecting a nice peaceful death at the ripe ol’ age of 80 or so. I never expected my life to end so violently, bloody, and young. At least I made the front page of the paper. That was some consolation. It was a good article that made me seem way nicer and wholesome than I really was. They listed a whole bunch of activites I was barely involved in and got quotes from people who hated me when I was alive but now that I was dead they were “really gonna miss Sarah. I mean, she was so sweet.” I wasn’t crazy about the picture they used either. My mom had given them a crappy school picture from last year. It was taken when I still had braces and hadn’t discovered the magic of leave-in conditioner and contacts.
My mom took my death especially hard since we had a fight right before I ran out and got hit by a Rolls Royce. It was about the typical teenage stuff. I had a C in geometry. There’s something you have to understand about my household to fully take in this fact. We Michelsons simply do not make C’s. We do not make B’s (not even those of the high persuasion). We make A’s. Straight rows of them. And as a member of the Michelson family, I was expected to uphold this unspoken code. But to put it simply: I am no scholar. I do decent in chemistry and speech, totally fabulous in English and world history, and horrible in any form of math. Especially geometry. Neither my mom nor my dad could understand this. “It’s shapes, Sarah! Geometry is just shapes!” my dad was fond of sighing in exasperation. They’re the hardest shapes I’ve ever seen. My mind doesn’t work that way; all analytical and whatnot. Which is exactly why I made a C.
Hm, interesting. I suppose it would help to know exactly what about it was conflicting to you.
Interesting point of view. I think that first person works well for the dead person’s perspective. Writing from first person gives you access to the character’s thoughts, and I kind of felt like this was a stream of consciousness (not quite a ramble, but for example, the geometry thing seemed quite a digression — then again, there isn’t really much of a context for any of this yet). This works in first person — it’s almost like a monologue, or a viewing of her thoughts.
Your tone seemed appropriate and spoke volumes about the character. Within just a couple of sentences, I already guessed that the character was a teenager, probably roughly average, not too scholarly, but also not an idiot. This didn’t make the exposition in the second paragraph redundant though — it’s important to know that the character’s family is much different from her.
On the other hand, regarding the second paragraph, I’m not sure that it would be totally appropriate for the character to discuss her family’s disapproval of her mediocre grades. I’ve gathered from the first paragraph that she died in a car accident, but in comparison to the length and detail of the second paragraph, the incident of death seems a little glossed over. Not that you need to beat anyone over the head with it — there just seems to be a few things missing. How is she narrating a book, for example? Is she a ghost, a vampire, a zombie, a werewolf, or something else supernatural? Is she doing this from heaven or hell? Or is she just dead, and somehow narrating a book, because for existentially, nothing’s really changed? (ha ha, that sounds like something I would write)!
I like that it has personality to it, but you jumped from subject to subject in a matter of two paragraphs. One minute you have your character talking about her horrible death with no embellishment on how it was so and then she’s on about grades. The skip made me rather dizzy to be honest.
I loved it. I just wish that there was more to her death so that there could be an actual book written for it!
But you’re an excellent writer. Really. I love your frank voice; it makes me feel like I’m being spoken to.
That is pretty good I would read it. Might have included a brief explanation of who hit her and there name is if she knew if not you could have said that a total stranger hit her and could have included her age but other than that very good
Its good writing, it reminds me of the book Elsewhere (great book). The “I do decent” part in paragraph 2 could be changed to “I am decent” or something. Also it ends rather abruptly without a great conclusion but overall its better than I could do.
Awesome! Keep going, get it published. Can you give me more of the story? Please! I’m a writer too!toughbreak92@yahoo.com!
Really liked the first paragraph, it made me want to read more! And the second paragraph was really good as well, but i think there’s a couple of changes you might want to consider:
My mom took my death especially hard since we had a fight the last time I saw her before my death. The fight was about the typical teenage stuff; I had a C in geometry. There’s something you have to understand about my household to fully take in this fact. We, the Michelsons, simply do not make C’s.
Hmm I wish I could read the full text
You’re a talented writer. You do not go out of your element (which is what I tend to do, and it sounds like ridiculous pretentious rhetoric
), and your writing is simple enough for anyone to understand, whether they are of intellectual wealth, or poverty. I laughed out loud when you wrote about how the girl was hit by a Rolls Royce.