261 Reviews

[Violin]

There were some great short stories in the Times this week. I'm glad I thought to read it. Here are some reviews...

The Hall of Mirrors by dan4884

I really enjoyed this story, especially the introduction and the ending. The first couple of paragraphs built my antipation for what lay ahead. I liked the main character, Charlie. You have to feel sorry for him, because he just seems to keep making bad choices. The ending was great, and I kept wanting to scream "Don't do it! Don't do it!" Good story. I'm glad I read it.


The Island by nimras23

I had no idea how this story was going to end up. The opening was good; I like how you depicted Marcus and showed that yes, even knights can be seasick. I liked too how he wasn't cocky, maybe even a little unsure of himself at times. I thought portions of the story could have maybe used a little more detail, like around the middle. At times I was somewhat confused about where the charcters were, though I'm not sure how much more detail you could have used without turning it into a series, and I think this story really needed to be a short story to work. I like this line:

His nerves were strung like violin strings, ready to fight at any moment.

That's nice. Intially, the ending surprised me, and I didn't really like it. But then I felt it was perfect for the story! Overall, I enjoyed reading it.


Some Kind of Sandwich? by ishmalian42

This story had me smiling from the beginning. I just love the thought of Turmac Roll being a sandwich! The concept was orginal and the humor was consistent all the way through. I did notice a couple of minor typos. "Of" should have been "off" in one place; that's just not something spellchecker would catch.

My Whinny (I cleverly named him Whin)

I liked this; it reminded me of how I name my petpets. Lots of good humor in this story. I enjoyed it!

[Deleted]

Short stories! After I do my series reviews, I'll try to review the single article as well...but I can't make any promises.

Some Kind of Sandwich - Ishmale
This was such a fun sort story!
The speaker was quite sarcastic...and slightly dimwitted, but had it not been for either, this would have had little enjoyment to it, I think.
The irony at the end is perfect and ft flawlessly.
This was really fun and really nice! I liked it.

The Hall of Mirrors - Dan
Quite an interesting story, Dan. I enjoyed it. The opening was just what was needed to draw the reader in, though you mentioned the moon's color, then quickly described a storm, which, to me, would cause the moon to be unseen. Though, I guess there's not much need for the moon to actually be seen in the story...

The story itself was very nicely written and easy to read. I found the twist at the end reminiscent of Fj0rd's short story from a while ago...Captain of the Ship, from issue 248, if I recall correctly. However, it was executed in quite a unique way, a way I had not seen coming.

Overall, a really nice job!

The Island - Nimras
I have to admit, Nimras, I felt lost and confused during the first bit of this story. It seemed to have changed time a few times without myself realising it before I became confused. After I got a bearing on it, though, it was quite interesting and enjoyable.

The bit at the end...well, to say just a little, it gave me goosebumps.

Very nice, indeed.

[Psycho]

FIVE YEARS OF FOOD CLUB - BLACKCAIRN

The Good:

Professional tone. At last, an interview that isn't (completely) a comedy act. Humor in character, but it is not forced.
Choice of questions. Still professional - no prying into the personal life while still maintaining some degree of familiarity.
No stated actions. The semantics, the word choices, speak for the characters. I can just imagine Tailhook pulling off a wry, annoyed face as he says, "If ye cut the act." The curtness speaks for itself.
Staying in character, and maintaining character uniqueness. Three cheers for Tailhook!

The things that made me pause:

There were a few places where I would have used different wording, etc., but nothing major in that aspect.
I thought the first line could have been better worded without the introduction of "you", "as many of you probably do not know". So instead it may have better been read, "As many Neopians probably do not know," or even starting it off with "Symol Day.... marks the beginning of the sixth year of..." In that way I feel it would seem less... insulting to the reader?

My biggest vice was with pirate accent. My impression is that Tailhook was originally a VERY well educated Scorchio who had too much of a love for adventure, danger, raucous company and, well, food. So therefore, given his background, I don't expect him to speak as a pirate should. However, his attempt to speak like a pirate made it difficult to read. It would seem that sometimes he'd go three or four words of vowels only. In that sense the accent was very unrealistic.

The pirate accent is, in actuality, southern British english (originating from around Bristol, I believe). My suggestions to you would include a) instead of omitting "v"s, substituting them with "f"s, except in the case of "over" (o'er) and when the beginning of the word begins with "v"; b) replacing "there" with "thar"; c) allowing tailhook to speak in incomplete sentences by omitting some of your "he be"s; d) taking after the french by omitting the "h" at the beginnings of words; and the rest goes on. The key is to speak what you've written to see if it would be realistic for someone (especially one who omits syllables for ease of speaking) to speak.

Overall:

This is a very well written piece, as is expected from you, Wisdom I thoroughly enjoyed reading it, and my having played Food Club before only added to my enjoyment. It was interesting to see Tailhook's perspective of the other Food Club contenders and how you wrote in some of the real allergies and favorite foods of Gooblah, etc. You offered a lot of insight into the workings of Food Club, which is another one of those little-known Neopian treasures. As I wrote before, I was amused by this piece because the humor did not seem forced - there were no places where I felt you were holding up that "LAUGH HERE" sign.

There be too many o' 'em. Maybe add a Jetsam or two. Nay, Peophins, Peophins and Flotsams.

<3!

[Psycho]

SOME KIND OF SANDWICH? - ISHMALIAN

I saw "Turmac Roll" in the excerpt and the title made more sense to me I thought that was a rather clever title, if not JUST simply amusing.

Quotes and specific comments:

What an extremely odd place. Besides the extreme weirdness, it seemed like a pretty cool place.

This annoyed me. The second sentence would have seemed less repetitive and less like the first sentence had it simply read, "Besides that, it was pretty cool."

Needless to say, I found myself a couple days later in Meridell

I think it would have read as, "I found myself in Meridell a couple days later."

I decided to check the food court

I just think "food court" and "Meridell" make perfect sense. I just thought it was amusing - royal court, food court, get it? Anyway...

I didn't need some Whinny doing better than me.

laughed out loud. The image I have in my head of a Whinny rolling is a little painful, though. Does its legs bend in the right way? 0_o. Nevermind.

I needed to take my mind of things, so I began to work on the second part of my Turmac Roll quest.

"I needed to take my mind OFF OF things," just a minor typo there. My main comment with this is, isn't the speaker supposed to be taking his mind off of Turmac rolling? Maybe you should have specified that he was going to take his mind off of the ROLLING part of Turmac rolling...

Overall:

I grinned throughout this entire piece. How entertaining and refreshing your tone was! I had to keep reading, I enjoyed it so much. I especially love the ending. The speaker is so frank that it's hard not to love him. I am delighted and significantly in a better mood than before I read your piece. You started off with a short introduction and I appreciated the regretful retrospectiveness. I did think your piece ended a bit abruptly, since I saw the entire "learning how to roll" and "making the turmac costume" part as building up to an ultimate climax (which ultimately turned out being a single paragraph about a failed first run down a hill). Your last lines compensated for that, however.

WELL DONE!

[Deleted]

Needed Adventure pt 8 - Tdyans
Though I did not find this as...exciting or as fast-paced as other parts of this series, it was still just as wonderful and I loved it nonetheless.

Yet again, however, I can't seem to think of much else to say...

Beauty of the Snow pt 5 - Fj0rd
This, by far, has been my favorite part! It seems to have had the most action, which was a pleasant change after the slow nature of the rest of this series. The ending, enigmatic in every aspect, has a nice ring to it, a meaning not quite meant to be understood.

I like it, I really do.

I really, truly enjoyed reading this series, Fjord.

[Tashni]

The Island by Nimras - I needed a few minutes to absorb this story before writing a review. I was NOT expecting the ending, but I conratulate you on getting this kind of subject into the NT! I really like the whole idea. Now, if you were a "normal" NT writer, I'd end there. However, because I know how good of a writer you can be, I'm going to give you some pretty tough concrit. Okay? Okay.

First a minor little thing:

He'd been worried that the damp sea air might damage his stuff, but a careful

"Stuff" sounds like a modern teenager and kind of disrupted the mood you created. Maybe you wanted it there to sound like a modern teenager, but I wasn't crazy about the word choice.

Now the major stuff:

The end caught me totally off guard. I know you want a surprise ending for a story like this, and it's best to have a surprise ending. But at the same time, you want to prepare your reader for it with the tone of your writing. That way, even though the reader is stunned in the end, after reflection, they say, "ooh, I get it."

If I were you, I would have tried to make it a little more destiny-oriented. I want to see more of Sephonie and why Marcus loves her so much. Show me how sweet and kind she is--I want to care about her too! The only thing I was interested in was MARCUS's happiness. That's not too good because in the end he is not happy. If I cared mare about Sephonie, I would have been more proud of Marcus for giving his life to save her.

I want to hear more of his desperate internal dialogue. I want to be completely wrapped up in the emotion of the story, not just the action. If you had done that, the end would still have been a surprise, but I would have been prepared for it in the sense that I recognize this was destiny. Make sense? Sort of?

[Tashni]

The Locker Room by keng200 - I remember this from work reviews. But I like it! Very original, and a distinct art style.

[Psycho]

THE ISLAND - NIMRAS

As always, Nim, you are an eloquent and visionary writer. I was swept away as I read the story but I must confess that I was disappointed with the way it ended. First of all, I love tragic stories. This, to me, was tragic, because very obviously Marcus dies and fails to save his lovely Sephonie. I love it. I could tell the story was building up to a climax but then it just sort of just went limp (along with Marcus). I agree with Tashni that, to further strengthen your choice to end the story as you did, you should incorporate more inner dialogue, more conflict within the character, and perhaps make the characters a tiny bit more complex. I'm a very loud writer, in that I like my stories to go out with a BANG. So I would have built more suspense and action into the search for Sephonie.

And while I was disappointed, I thought the ending was clever. I noticed that Kait was pink, and once you introduced the ghost lupe I knew exactly what had happened. I was a smidge confused by the whole change in scenery - as I said I was expecting the climax to be something more - but I adore the little five year old pink acara. It may be just me, but I could imagine that scene so vividly and it made me feel really... happy. You know, it was like one of those portraits that come with the picture frames you buy - some happy family on the beach, or blue skies and tropical water... anyway, if you know what I'm talking about. This was a perfect ending to your story - I would not have wanted the plot to have come out any differently. It leaves a lot of questions but they're not the sort that beg to be answered. It's sort of like, "Oh, well this is the way it turned out." I don't know how to describe that feeling - happy but sad. A sad smile would describe the ending, would you agree?

And I am a romantic at heart - I am absolutely charmed by your descriptions of Marcus and Sephonie.

Anyway, BON TRAVAILLE!

PS - I do disagree with Tashni with one thing, however. I thought your use of the word "stuff" was appropriate (though maybe a little - oh what's the word - not for the right time period... I'll think of it later). It just seemed to me that "stuff" made it seem that Marcus was very familiar with his possessions, and, well, possessive of them. It's his STUFF. Don't touch the STUFF, man!

[Deleted]

nimras23 said:

Five Years of Food Club
by blackcairn

I must confess… I’d completely forgotten that Food Club even existed. Oops. So it took me a second to figure out exactly what you were talking about.

Halfway though, I remembered why… I can’t follow the dratted thing to save my life. (Not the article, just the whole eating competition thing.) Though there were times when I had to re-read some of what Tailhook was saying, pirate talk is one of my hard to comprehend things.

I do like how you kept Tailhook in character throughout the entire thing -- Characters like him are tough, at least they are for me. ^^

It is rather hard to follow. I found it difficult to pick up after leaving it alone for several months. Thank you, Nimras.

phsycoticdancer said:

FIVE YEARS OF FOOD CLUB - BLACKCAIRN

The Good:

Professional tone. At last, an interview that isn't (completely) a comedy act. Humor in character, but it is not forced.
Choice of questions. Still professional - no prying into the personal life while still maintaining some degree of familiarity.
No stated actions. The semantics, the word choices, speak for the characters. I can just imagine Tailhook pulling off a wry, annoyed face as he says, "If ye cut the act." The curtness speaks for itself.
Staying in character, and maintaining character uniqueness. Three cheers for Tailhook!

The things that made me pause:

There were a few places where I would have used different wording, etc., but nothing major in that aspect.
I thought the first line could have been better worded without the introduction of "you", "as many of you probably do not know". So instead it may have better been read, "As many Neopians probably do not know," or even starting it off with "Symol Day.... marks the beginning of the sixth year of..." In that way I feel it would seem less... insulting to the reader?

My biggest vice was with pirate accent. My impression is that Tailhook was originally a VERY well educated Scorchio who had too much of a love for adventure, danger, raucous company and, well, food. So therefore, given his background, I don't expect him to speak as a pirate should. However, his attempt to speak like a pirate made it difficult to read. It would seem that sometimes he'd go three or four words of vowels only. In that sense the accent was very unrealistic.

The pirate accent is, in actuality, southern British english (originating from around Bristol, I believe). My suggestions to you would include a) instead of omitting "v"s, substituting them with "f"s, except in the case of "over" (o'er) and when the beginning of the word begins with "v"; b) replacing "there" with "thar"; c) allowing tailhook to speak in incomplete sentences by omitting some of your "he be"s; d) taking after the french by omitting the "h" at the beginnings of words; and the rest goes on. The key is to speak what you've written to see if it would be realistic for someone (especially one who omits syllables for ease of speaking) to speak.

Overall:

This is a very well written piece, as is expected from you, Wisdom I thoroughly enjoyed reading it, and my having played Food Club before only added to my enjoyment. It was interesting to see Tailhook's perspective of the other Food Club contenders and how you wrote in some of the real allergies and favorite foods of Gooblah, etc. You offered a lot of insight into the workings of Food Club, which is another one of those little-known Neopian treasures. As I wrote before, I was amused by this piece because the humor did not seem forced - there were no places where I felt you were holding up that "LAUGH HERE" sign.

There be too many o' 'em. Maybe add a Jetsam or two. Nay, Peophins, Peophins and Flotsams.

<3!

Thought I fixed that "you" thing last year. Shouldn't let stuff sit unfixed.

I splashed with the pirate accent. I tried removing some of the omissions and adding a few words to make it more-than-halfway coherent. (The original was a dicey E I E I YO at best, but I suppose it sounds better than FE FI O UM.) I'll take your recommendations into consideration the next time I speak to or with a pirate.

Omission of the v-sound, although some slipped through, was supposed to be his voice but not the pirate part. I just can't picture him saying every or efery.

Thank you, Psycho. I toned down a few of the in-jokes and esoteric references, but I suppose you weeded out your favorite one.


I can probably get around to a few reviews tomorrow or on Monday.

[Psycho]

scorchian said:

Thought I fixed that "you" thing last year. Shouldn't let stuff sit unfixed.

I splashed with the pirate accent. I tried removing some of the omissions and adding a few words to make it more-than-halfway coherent. (The original was a dicey E I E I YO at best, but I suppose it sounds better than FE FI O UM.) I'll take your recommendations into consideration the next time I speak to or with a pirate.

Omission of the v-sound, although some slipped through, was supposed to be his voice but not the pirate part. I just can't picture him saying every or efery.

Thank you, Psycho. I toned down a few of the in-jokes and esoteric references, but I suppose you weeded out your favorite one.


I can probably get around to a few reviews tomorrow or on Monday.

Oh right - You can't put an "f" in "every", but you can take out the syllable by going, "ev'ry". Technically, that's the way everyone pronounces the word, but you can draw more attention to the fact that he's speaking quickly or with less enunciation with the omission of that "e".

Weeded it out? You couldn't have made it more blatant!

[Nimras]

Thanks Gen, for the review! *beams*

.........
Violin:

At times I was somewhat confused about where the charcters were, though I'm not sure how much more detail you could have used without turning it into a series...

That actually was a big problem... I cut out a lot to keep it that short, mostly inner ramblings of Marcus' thoughts and emotions. Unfortunately, most of it related to each other, so I had to take nearly all of it out to keep it moderately coherent. Continuing arguments with himself, I suppose you could call them, it was a whole sub-plot.

.........
Wolf:

I have to admit, Nimras, I felt lost and confused during the first bit of this story.

Aww, I'm sorry... I tried to keep the time jumps from afternoon to bedtime to the middle of the night as coherent as I could. Guess I need more practice.

........
Tashni:

"Stuff" sounds like a modern teenager and kind of disrupted the mood you created. Maybe you wanted it there to sound like a modern teenager, but I wasn't crazy about the word choice.

Oh, how I struggled with what word to use there! "Belongings" was just so... off there. Impersonal, maybe. I tore the thesaurus apart... and still ended up using 'stuff'.

Now the major stuff

I'm sorry, I just had to laugh when I saw those two one right after the other.

If I were you, I would have tried to make it a little more destiny-oriented.

I'm the first one to admit that I have a very hard time writing 'destiny' stories. Probably because I don't believe in it.

........
Psycho:

This, to me, was tragic, because very obviously Marcus dies and fails to save his lovely Sephonie.

And who says he failed? He stayed around didn't he?

.........

I should explain that the reason Marcus' part of the story ends where it does is because it's from his point of view, and he quite simply doesn't know what happened.

There might also be a sequel -- I've got a rough outline for it. That's one of the reasons it ends where it does. I could either split them into two short stories, or make it one series. I liked it better as two separate short stories -- but I have the nasty advantage of knowing what happens in the next one.

Thank you so much for the reviews! *gives cookies*

[Dan]

The Island-Nimras

I'm sensing a bit of an influence from Pirates of the Caribbean. Nevertheless, it was great. Good story, didn't lag, consistent action, had me drawn in. Your writing is wonderful as always, you are truly one of the best authors, if not the best. I envy you so much.

A few minor errors, mostly writing though instead of through. Also, I was a bit confused when Marcus was describing splitting up the men. That probably could've been written a little less confusing.

I liked the ending, though I do wish there was a way to find out what happened to Sephonie. Perhaps a sequel of sorts? ^^ *hopeful*

EDIT: Judging by your last post, that's hopefully a yes! DO IT!

[Fj0rd]

nimras23 said:

Beauty of the Snow: Part Five
by extreme_fj0rd

Lia fell silent, pondering the implications of 'terribly nice'.

….Yes….

Aww, I don’t like that Kacheek. *glowers*

…and you still didn’t explain anything! Another person wanders off into the snow and I don’t know why…. *whines*

Still love the imagery.

Because she wanted to be the spirit of the snow, of course! -/inadequate answer-
... yeah, I know that the ending was sort of weird, but it was that way because the first time I wrote it, Inga found her lying dead in the snow. So, um, I changed it, 'cause it got rejected for violence/death. ^^

But anyway. Thanks for the review!

micrody said:

Beauty of the Snow pt 5 - Fj0rd
This, by far, has been my favorite part! It seems to have had the most action, which was a pleasant change after the slow nature of the rest of this series. The ending, enigmatic in every aspect, has a nice ring to it, a meaning not quite meant to be understood.

I like it, I really do.

I really, truly enjoyed reading this series, Fjord.

Why thank you. XD *might have spoiled the mystery for you now with her reply to Nimras's review, sorry* Anyway, yes. Thanks.

[kamikatze24]

A Spooky Halloween, pt 2 by ghostkomorichu

Great smooth art and a funny joke, as always, just...
... where did the pumpkin go?? ;D

[Nut]

[glow=blue,2,300]The Island[/glow]
You’re an excellent writer, Nimras, and your lovely use of description and dialogue shows in this piece. I really like the conversations in the beginning of the story. Marcus is a very charming character. You feel his anxiety as he finds Sephonie and tries to save her, yet the battle scene feels quiet and almost inevitable as he drifts away.

The ending was definitely a surprise. You managed to tie in several aspects of the Ghost Lupe legend throughout the story, yet we don’t think of any of it until the very end. As soon as I saw the Ghost Lupe at the end, I knew exactly what had happened to Marcus. You have to feel sorry for him, yet I think he’d rather have died for Sephonie than lived without her.

Now I’m going to dive into critique.

Stories like this usually work out best as short stories, as surprise endings tend to work better if they come quickly rather than at the end of a string of weekly parts. However, you mention so many elements in this story, many of which aren’t fully explained, that I can’t help feeling that spreading it out a bit would be less confusing to the reader. But then, you lose the punch of the surprise ending, so it’s a bit of a tricky situation. Why couldn’t the word limit for short stories be just a couple thousand words higher?

My biggest nitpick with the story is how you deal with Sephonie. She seems sweet when we get a glimpse of her at the beginning of the story, but we never get to know her better than that; she gets kidnapped before we have a chance to see much of her character. All we have to go on is Marcus’s love for her, which admittedly is very touching and is almost good enough.
For some reason I wasn’t sure what Sephonie was to Marcus. Obviously at the end, I had to infer that she was his bride, but I was halfway convinced that she was his niece or something. … I’m slow today, don’t mind me. For some reason I kept thinking that she was a little girl. And when Katie showed up at the end, my first thought was that Sephonie had been adopted by natives and given a new name. … … Yes, I’m really slow today. Blame it on this fever that came back yesterday. It took me a couple of reads to figure out what really happened at the ending. It all makes sense to me now, of course. ^^;

The story was confusing to me the first time I read it, but I seem to understand it better the more I read it. As far as specific phrasing goes…

"Only because you were afraid it would come right back up," Sephonie teased. "You have no idea what you've been missing; this island's fruit variety is amazing."

As the brown Lupe finally turned to his bed much later that night, Marcus was forced to concede that Sephonie was right, the fruit he'd sampled was delicious. He hoped they didn't feast like that every day, otherwise he'd never fit back into his armor.

I think I would’ve separated these two paragraphs with a * * * * * break. It’s a bit of a sudden jump in time as it is. I like the wording though.

As far as “stuff” goes, I noticed the word—maybe because it doesn’t seem of the time period, as Psycho pointed out—but it doesn’t seem wholly unsuitable; it feels personal. You can tell how much Marcus loves his stuff.

His nerves were strung like violin strings, ready to fight at any moment.

… I got this mental image of violin strings armed for battle. I don’t think “ready to fight at any moment” belongs in the sentence, because the subject is his nerves, so is it his nerves that are ready to fight?

All in all, though, this was a wonderfully written story, in spite of the things I’m nitpicking on. I enjoyed it very much. ^^