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Welcome! Feel free to start at any time...Yes, we encourage new people to critique as well!
 
I will take a close look at each of the writers and try my best to put together a critique. As I said, I am pretty new myself, don't have any formal writing experience and don't know how much help I might be in my responses to authors, but I will do best!
 
We're down to two more weeks for commenting folks! Wednesday is the day that I will reveal the next month's story idea....So let's keep commenting!
 
Okay folks! Here is the subject for October!



A Costume Party!





what exactly do I mean by that? It could just be a simple costume party...or perhaps Venice's version of Carnivale, or a grand ball in France or whatever. It could include intrigue, suspense, diplomacy, espionage, or a mixture of all of them....
 
Sounds intriguing!
 
One more week until I reveal this month's authors! So those who have been dragging their feet to post their critiques....you'd better get on it....For those who wish to participate need to PM me soon. The slots will fill up quickly, I think. The submissions for Costume Party will need to be done and sent to me by September 29th!
 
I'll be revealing our authors for September during the weekend. I still need some writers for October's GtA, folks! I thought I'd already have them all by now, but I only have one so far! So there is still time and still slots available!
 
Here are our September Guess the Authors! I want to thank them all for participating this past month!

Author 1:

ComradeOm!
Check out his AARs!

Such as So Far From God AND Les Journals d’Artois


Author 2:

Comagoosie!

Check out his Ink Well Spot


Author 3:

The Yogi!
Check out his AARs!

Such as The III Reich in WWIII AND Empier of Fu Manchu



Author 4:

Fiftypence!
Check out his Ink Well Spot!


Author 5:

IamWhoa!

Check out his Ink Well Spot!




I would also like to thank those who commented this month as well.

Miral
The Yogi
dharper
comagoosie
ComradeOm





Thank you to all of you.

October's entries look a bit puny in comparision. I only have one committed author for it. Not sure what happened, but I may have to cancel October's GtA with such a small offering.....Hopefully some others will step forward.
 
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Ack Amric, you beat me to it. I've been meaning to do this review for the past fortnight but real life concerns... well you know the excuses. Anyways, apologies for being late and thanks to all the authors for providing me with some interesting reading over dinners

Although are we missing an author? There were six entries...

Author 1: Well seeing as this is my piece there's no real point in doing up a mock critique. I will say that in hindsight I'm disappointed that I took this approach. I know that I can make a decent fist of descriptive writing, although the feedback was certainly useful, but I wanted to stretch my narrative muscles. This piece had no progress, little dialogue, and, most annoyingly, I failed to get across de Valera's character as I'd wanted

Still, those who noted that it didn't work as a standalone are perfectly correct. When the assignment was posted I was toying with the idea for an Ireland AAR. It would start in 1966 as a sort of cold opening with the rest of the story advancing from flashbacks. This would have introduced the history of most of the characters mentioned, including the crimes of the deceased

And Miral, I have no idea why I don't use periods at the end of sentences. It seems to be a written tic that I picked up somewhere. It might be an aesthetic thing :p

Author 2: An odd piece this in that it read as more of a history book than a work of narrative. These didn't entirely mesh together. The story itself I don't mind (even if the Dutch Pope was somewhat jarring) but I did find the burial elements more unbelievable. In particular the boy telling the legend about the uncovering face didn't really work for me. This was one example where the writing, which was generally solid, could have been tightened up and streamlined somewhat. On the plus side though the history segments worked well as a vehicle for exposition

Author 3: Now this was interesting. A daring approach that did a good job of marrying the past and the present with both being vividly painted. There were plenty of small details peppering the internal monologue and the twist at the end caught me entirely by surprise. The last line did seem slightly melodramatic but then I can't imagine how I'd close out a similar scene

Author 4: I'd have to admit that this piece was my favourite. There may well be plenty of holes in the plot but the tone of the writing, and the characters, were enjoyable enough for me to ignore these. Even the necessary exposition at the funeral was well worked by contrasting the stuffy official sermon with the humorous running commentary at the back. Overall a very enjoyable read that left me with a smile on my face when I put it down

Author 5: I have to admit that I'm not a fan of horror stories but I read enough as a child to recognise the tropes. When two shady and unwanted characters appear at a funeral then something odd is going to happen. When it becomes clear that the deceased was/is involved in some sort black magic... well the ending became pretty obvious. This was somewhat signposted by the eulogy - I've yet to hear one that begins by noting that the mother of the deceased had turned her back on god ( ;) ). That said, I did very much enjoy the writing and the descriptions were excellent. In particular the dead body ("an unrecognizable collection of shredded tissue and broken glass") and the heart pounding final paragraph helped me forget the obviousness of the story

Author 6:
This was another very well written tale and one with considerable emotional pull. The characters are vivid, the details memorable, and the story well told through dialogue. My only possible complaint is that it ended somewhat abruptly. I kept hoping for an event or revelation but in the end all we're left with is a grieving family leaving a fresh grave. Which is a powerful ending in its own right
 
Quite true. Author 6 did not want their name revealed. This author preferred to be completely anonymous<and no, not anonymous 4401>. Thanks for your reviews, ComradeOm.....You are now on the list of those who contributed comments.
 
Hmm I have always thought I have when-I-write-an-update-I-think-it-is-perfect-but-the-second-after-I-post-it-I-think-it-is-a-shoddy-piece-of-work. It seems you guys confirmed it :D

Now to correct that problem...
 
Hmmm... this has been dead for a while now, which is a pity.

We even had a subject chosen - A costume party. What happened, nobody sent in any submissions?

Amric, if you need a break from this maybe I could run it once or twice?
 
There were indeed no submissions, Yogi....If you want to take a stab at this, I'm all for it. I've been waiting for someone to notice this was missing, and you're the first one who has, believe it or not....
 
That's disappointing. GtA has always been one of my favorite off-topic threads.
 
There were indeed no submissions, Yogi....If you want to take a stab at this, I'm all for it. I've been waiting for someone to notice this was missing, and you're the first one who has, believe it or not....
I don't believe it, for the simple reason that I noticed it was missing sometime in December, and I'm sure others noticed as well. Yogi is merely the first one to comment on it.

GtA has a history of being inactive as often as not, so I merely assumed a temporary pause due to people being busy. :)
 
OK, I have cleared my message box and I'm going to take a shot at running this once or twice.

Since the last subject, for some reason caused very underwhelming interest (although I found it quite interesting) I'm going to pick a new one;

A duel
"A duel" should be interpreted broadly, and could include anything from two hidalgos settling accounts with rapiers and daggers to a one-on-one aerial dogfight. Or something else entirely. Get creative!

Now we just need four vict... writers to step forward!

PM me if you want to be one of them!
 
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There were indeed no submissions, Yogi....If you want to take a stab at this, I'm all for it. I've been waiting for someone to notice this was missing, and you're the first one who has, believe it or not....
No, I bet a lot of people noticed this, but didn't have the courage to pluck up :)
 
We got writer #1 ready to rrrrruuuumble!:D
 
Still only 1 interested writer. :(

Come on,we don't want this fine institution to fall by the wayside again.
 
I'd contribute, but I've only just started a new job and it's taking up all my time. But surely someone else could think of something...