Flash Fiction / Original Sin

Well, it’s clear you saw Sin City.  To whom is your narrator narrating?  In the present tense, how is the priest able to narrate?  Why is the Padre’s spoken voice not his internal voice?  Why does his internal voice speak in broken sentences?

no, must be calm… calm.
[Why?]

That doesn’t work, a serial killer stalks their victim.  You have this kiler suddenl compelled to kill a child.  You have an obsessive compulsive killer.  It is a complete, working story but it is ludicrous.

Even out the priest’s voice with his internal dialog.

Add the scenery between sitting and strangling.  Get up, grab him, stop him before he can get away.  Have the priest get up, go around the confessional to the confessor, slide back the curtain or open the door, reach into the dark and grab at the kid.  Without this the beginning of your last paragraph is real muddy.

I really enjoyed this actually. I wasn’t sure what I was going to think about it at first but it turned out well. I think the part I was most impressed with was the fact that it’s first person and you didn’t use “I” to describe anything. It was easy flowing with quick thought blurbs that wound up telling us what he did and what was on his mind. Good work on this one, definetly strong.

Interesting and twisted. I liked it!

I don’t know if I like this particular style of writing, though. All we have here is simple dialogue and the thoughts going through this man’s mind. And by the end, it turns out that all we had was the singular perspective of this one man. So outside of the dialogue, if it still qualifies as such, reading about his exact thoughts as quickly as they enter his mind doesn’t do enough for me. Maybe that is the criteria for “flash fiction”, which I am admittedly not really familiar with, but I would’ve liked to have more to read than just simple ‘flash scenes’ going through the man’s mind.

Awesome. Reads kinda like a Terry Brooks piece. Same sort of content anyway. I did however find the stop-start of the Reverend’s thoughts a little irritating. Perhaps if the sentences flowed better, the whole piece would read easier? Or is the choppy sentence structure intentional in that it conveys the stuttering, faltering profile of the Reverend?

I love the structure of the dialogue. I think it would be clearer if the inner monologue was italised; that makes it easier for me to distinguish the conversation addressed to the boy and what “father” is running through his head. The ending was superb; the incomplete sentences show the speeding thoughts.

When sin says “figured we could have a nice little discuddion. A debate.” it sounds out of character, to soft for a character who’s tongue is otherwise sharp and harsh.

Also when sin says “make me” it sounds childish, which is good for the ending but bad in the beginning because it makes the beginning less effective. I think something not so childish and sassy could make this little piece better.

Okay, this was weird. Intriguing in a way, yet weird none the less. It was a little unclear as to who was speaking at times because it jumped around a lot.

this so powerful, it kept my attention and made me shiver at times. great work. i like the way you write this, how your write down the characters thoughts. one suggestion: instead of …, maybe a – would work better. good work though. very powerful.

I don’t usually do flash fiction; in fact, I never have. I picked this one because the choices were skimpy and I thought I’d give myself a lesson in what truly short fiction looks like. I must say this proved an object lesson in art. I note how cleanly you developed both a character and a theme in such a short span of words. The character progresses from ordinary joe to challenged hero to fallen beast with a smoothness I wouldn’t have thought possible. The theme of fallible man v. evil is not only described and illustrated, but turned in on itself. You used limited tools to do double-duty in order to get your story told. Good job.

So here’s the thing. The dialog was really remarkable, very realistic, well put together. Some things I think could use some work however, don’t touch the dialog. THe thoughts of the father, they move very quick, that’s good, but they aren’t descriptive enough to understand fully what is going on. I barely understood the end (last paragraph) for that reason, what the hell just happened kind of thing going on. Another thing, in the beginning I understand who is saying what because the “kid” kept saying different words that meant father, or something or other. SO i knew it was him, but it stopped later, and I wasn’t sure who was speaking and things got mixed up. Please change it to be more effective. I really like this entire piece, and when you perfect it, I would love to read it again. Keep up the good work.