What lurks in the dark

WHAT LURKS IN THE DARK!
(2,500 words)
By kslib...
........
In Africa we have types of scary stories but I am yet to read a vampire story, even if its just in a dream. Pardon my ignorance but your work

All iz not well my brother.

Spacing, I was like this before. I submitted my script without spacing and it was among the ones that ended in a trash bin. I was told plainly if I want to make it in writing I should go and read first.

I guess the climax is when Mike was bitten on the neck right? Your pesuasion didn't really do it for me. Somethings need to be believeable, how can a guy, go to another guy's house because he couldn't sleep

Description; Madam Ishi's lessons have really paid off, I doff my head when it comes to her descriptive prowess. Good job there.

Dialogue, please google how to do right by it, you are still lacking.

Repetion of words, its a no, no in one paragraph. I believe you can do better if you put effort and READ.

Search for Mona lisa

Sammyhoe

Can I call you BigEnglish? Like the one in Iyawo Nylon bag?

Your work potrays what this competition is about, your a great craft-man because you crafted your story well, took your time to give me something that helped to increase the level of my vacab.

Good job but bear in mind that most times if a reader is reading for pleasure, when s/he gets too many big words clustered in a paragraph s/he looses interest in reading the whole thing.

SOON TO BE MRS ADEBAYO

Rubyspice

Rubyspice: We spend the evening together and I feel so at peace and complete. As it grows dark, I knew she had to go home. I didn't want her to leave but she had to, so I steal a kiss from her lips to keep me going until I see her again.

This my dear killed the whole story. You mixed tense in a way that disappointed me, because I loved your work. But you couldn't maintain the tense choice, that's why I advice people to always write in past tense when narrating. Its easier that way.

You could have been in my top five but just one paragraph and I couldn't overlook the mistake. Hope you do better next time.

PINKY SNICKETS: SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS.


By Nuges11.


Romantic comedies always rank tops to me. Though you followed suit with the dream kinda thingy, which I had to admit got me yawning. You scored points with your prose, and you have already set high standards for yourself I hope you will maintain your position?

Please send me a link to your current story if there is any, your work makes me laugh which is good for my health.

A JOURNEY TO AKURE

By Nastydroid

My darling, go and read, actually if you want to make it in this wild, wild west, study literary works. Dialogue, a huge disaster. Plot, you did your homework and so was with the theme. The story was good but an epic failure in english literature.

Since the judges are analyzing the participant stories, let me also judge/ analyze the judges (NB: its just 4 fun oh! No pun intended)

@HBG - The way you judge the stories are similar to my high school english teacher, she used to take pride in using her red pen to circle and cancel almost the entire story all in the name of 'marking scripts'. Anyway, as more than one person has stated on this thread, try and cut down the length of your analysis na, you rewrote some stories all over again. Instead of correct same mistake in one story allover again, you could have just corrected one and advice the writer to make the necessary amendment.

Okay, am just saying trash and bullshi't , you doing a good job and its obvious you took your time to read each story. Frankly speaking, some stories were just impossible to read, I nearly fell asleep each time I attempted to read them (not mentioning names :p). #kudos!.

@Mazi - I fancy your style of analyzing, in contrast to HBG's style, they are short, simple and precise. You pick a story and summarize the faults in a few words, but, in certain occasions, I expected a little more since the errors in some stories couldn't possibly have been pointed out in a few words.

Nevertheless, I was actually able to pick some points from your analysis. Good job.

@the remaining judges - I'll be back 4 you when you post your analysis.

@the participants - the fact that you all were able to write something is already a plus in my book, over 20 people entered for the competition but less than that submitted their stories.
In summary, even if you aren't crowned the overall winner, just know you won in your own way.

And finally, @Foxy - my analysis won't be complete if I didn't mention your name. You weren't appointed as a judge but you some how seemed to be doing more 'judging' than the appointed judges, the way you stylishly criticize certain people some how do more good than harm so carry on , (but you dey over do am at times oh)

Bye 4 now.
#PEACe.

<Two wrongs >

By Sambroose.

You know what killed this great African work? You have a great theme, great persuasion and a theme that catched my fancy but your ignorance ruined everything. Please study literary works, that will help in improving and on how to write a short story. I felt like I was reading a poem.

MOMENT OF TRUTH
BY DAMEX333

I see some developments, even better than your current work. But we still have a long way to go hey, remember Rome was not build in one day, you will soon get it right.

The plot was catchy, lol and your theme potrait that of a Christian. However, you still need to work on your punctuation, your tense and your spacing. Good use of words too, you played around with them well.

Dark Chocolate

By t-flow

You young man, got it all right, except the points you might have scored with madam Ishi. Great piece there, dark chocolata....just the way I like it.

The Journey to greatness.

By Numero

Touching story Numero, however try working on tense and dialogue.

THE MAN WITHIN
Miss_Fibre

I loved the theme of your story. The first paragraph alone caught me. In the first paragraph alone, you made your readers know the tragic occurrence that had befallen the character and so I wanted to read more. I loved your use of the English Language and your descriptive style is ALMOST Excellent.
Your use of paragraph is wonderful, the dialogue is also very clear and understandable.

However, the end of the story was a bit confusing. - - - Was Ezegamba dreaming from the start?
- Why did he want to question his creator if he was only dreaming?

The man was face-to-face with himself at the end of his journey, meaning the creator is man as pointed out in your story and he had his destiny in his hands, what then was the purpose of his journey, or rather, why did he embark on the journey? That aside, the message was clear and I liked it.

I really, honestly can't fault your story because the organization and the content of the story was well laid out. You just need to improve on your illustrative skills and punctuation. And yes! You write in a poetic kind of way, ever considered poetry?

For a short story and with a fantasy theme, you nailed it. If you qualify to the next round, try and end the story in a not so confusing way.

MY TRAVEL ADVENTURE
Plainmirror

As a big boy then in SS2 [unity school no be beans naa], I banked my money myself. During ‘break’ periods, I would go to the school canteen with my guys [girls inclusive atymes] and consume some edibles courtesy of my regular sponsoring [ I am d generous type who loves to make people around me happy]. This earned me many friends both male and female; some non beneficiaries of my benevolence branded me a SPOILT CHILD maybe they thought I came from a very wealthy family and to cap it all, I was a title contender in my class [dat kind Manchester united for EPL] LoL .
Despite coming from a middle class family [ we dey chop three square meal daily],


The above put me off totally. In just one paragraph, you committed the following blunders:
- the blunder of adding unnecessary words in brackets
- the blunder of using pidgin in a very wrong way
- the blunder of using 'LOL' ..like seriously? What were you thinking? Did you think you were writing to yourself or for a blog?
The brackets were so not necessary. .
Your dialogue was very poor, I couldn't tell the difference between the dialogue and the narration because the dialogue wasn't punctuated. At a point, I was completely lost.

[ I wondered if dat was d mssg my dad sent but on a 2nd thought, discarded the idea].

Please and please, abbreviation in a story is totally unacceptable. .I might not know the meaning of 'mssg' and then become confused.
When writing in figures, write in words e.g. second, not 2nd, four, not 4. Fifty thousand naira, not N50,000.

It's obvious you don't read because the content of your story and the organization was way below average.
Paragraphing, spacing, narration and your use of english or rather choice of words were really poor. Please improve on your illustrative skills because you have the potentials of being a great writer.

Finally, the title of your story doesn't match with the content. I read your work three times just to know where the adventure was.

An adventure is an exciting or unusual experience; it may also be a bold, usually risky undertaking experience with an uncertain outcome.
It wasn't exciting to me and I really didn't see the outcome of anything. I was even more lost at the end of the story.
Honestly for me, there was no travel adventure.

Sambroose

Nice metaphorical story. I enjoyed reading it; sounds more like a beautify prose.

You needed to pay more attention to the paragraphs and spaces. It was clustered, making it a bit difficult to read. Your continuous use of the coma instead of a full stop cannot be overlooked.

Ms Fibre
Your work has already received lots of critique after you submitted it. I hope you learnt a lot from it all.

That's the much I can take; I will let other judges do justice to the stories.

Next>>>> My nominations.

THE HAUNTED ROAD
Royver

Content - Excellent
Illustrative skills - Excellent
Description - Excellent
Plot - Excellent
Dialogue - Very Good
Organization - Excellent
Suspense - Mind-blowing
Use of English - Classic
Should I go on?
Horror, Thriller, Suspense and Action packaged in one short story of 2,094 words!
My God, you are good. You just got yourself a fan. I'm looking forward to reading something else from you.
Do take note of what Mazi pointed out, the repitition of "She." I noticed that too. Asides that, I loved the story.
Can I get an autograph?

I try na

Mazi_Omenuko: My nomination in no particular order...

Royver, Nuges11, Plainmirror, t-flow, Ms fibre.

you copied my top 5

Foxy_Flow:



See, some people had to actually beg me to take it easy on the thread.

I am still your conscience though, and I like the stories you nominated

you do

When your happy my happiness level reaches ectasy I no forget the spelling o

WHAT LURKS IN THE DARK
Kslib

Quote me if I'm wrong. From what I read and understood in the first paragraph, Mike was on his way to Andy (his best friend's) house in the middle of the night...

Mike stepped out and swung the gate back to its position with reckless abandon,causing the gate to make a loud bang.
"Geez', he poked his bottom with his fingers, serving as penance for what he just did as the 'bang' echoed its-way up the sky and the street beyond.
"Hope i didnt wake you guys", he smiled looking left-right..
"Not my fault, folks, blame it on this loud mouthed gate", he said in a sarcastic tone as he raised up both hands in surrender to the air.


Where was he when the above conversation took place? In Andy's house already?
Who was he talking to?

It took me a while to understand that Mike was still within his compound, which made me wonder who he was talking to when he said "Hope I didn't wake you guys." Was he talking to himself? Because if he was, you didn't tell.

You constantly made the mistake of writing "Mike" as "mike". Try to proof-read your work before submitting next time.

He shook his head and made a 'yimu' mock with his mouth.


I laughed when I read the above. What is yimu? I might not know the meaning of yimu, some other person might not know the meaning either. Understand that you are writing to a larger audience, you should never leave them confused at any point in time. Instead of 'yimu', you could have used something like 'funny.'

The storyline is okay though. I would have really loved if it didn't end up been a dream. I already knew that was where you were heading to since Mike never got to Andy's house, so I wasn't disappointed when I got to the end of the story

This is your punishment for distracting my night's read, Martha teased as she(who was 3years older) gave her younger brother mike(who just turned 21, two days ago),"a tongue out"...
She winked at mike(who was now sobbing like a baby and looking like a scared rat).
Martha shook her head in victory-- she finally defeated the almighty mike who never admitted to being scared of the dark.


The above wasn't necessary. Fine, you wanted to give us details about your characters, you wanted us to know their age, but what significance was Martha and Mike's age at that point in the story?
I want to know...because I didn't get that part.

You could have just said:
Martha teased as she made jest of her younger brother, Mike who was now sobbing like a baby. . .

With a little push, you would do better. It was nice.

THE WISH OF THE GODS
BestLuv

It's obvious you rushed this. Your story was not organized at all and lacked depth.

You weren't bothered about your readers, you wrote as though you were saying a story verbally.

From the beginning to the end of the story, there was no paragraph, there was no meaningful dialogue, not to talk of it been punctuated.

Your characters and the plot were not well developed. There were so many typographical errors, I don't think you even read the story.
It wasn't your best, but I know you would do better with time

HumbledbYGrace: you copied my top 5

HBG, take note! There were two 4's in your nominations.

THE SEARCH FOR MONALISA
SammyHoe

I didn't understand your story, maybe because the 'English' was too big for my small brain, and visiting wikipedia to search for words you used became tiring so I lost interest.

I learnt some new terms though.

Next time, add a glossary or come down to our level.

OMA4U:

HBG, take note! There were two 4's in your nominations.

yes, those #4's deserved that position.

SOON TO BE MRS ADEBAYO
Rubyspice

I'm not happy with you Ruby. You were the first writer to write a romance story in the competition and you disappointed me.

You were writing in the narrative style but at a point you changed, and the change wasn't even done well. You should have maintained your narration in the past tense, but you couldn't. One minute, you were writing in the past, the next, the present.

I've read lovely stories where there were just two characters, so that isn't an excuse.

You need to identify your style of writing and work on it. Also, work on developing your characters and giving more information about them.
This is supposed to be a romance story, but I didn't feel the love/romance between the two characters.

SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS
Nuges11

Nuges, I'm in love with you!!!
Your writing style is so simple and straight-forward. I had a big smile on my face from the beginning to the end.
You were able to maintain your characters without mixing them up.
I don't even know what to say again, I'm short of words

"I know I came very late today sir but it wasn't entirely my fault. My neighbour mistakenly gave birth to a baby in her sleep at around 6 o'clock this morning. It was even the cry of the baby that woke her up and she called me to come and help her. So I had to rush her and the baby to the hospital sir", I spilled out as quickly as I could.


The above got me rolling on the floor

Infact, I'm not happy with you..
Unless you give me one good reason why I wasn't included in your list of characters, you won't be included in my top five

JOURNEY TO AKURE
Nastydroid

You had a good story but your use of english was very poor. I advice you read more in order to improve your writing.

HumbledbYGrace: yes, those #4's deserved that position.

Ayaf hear o. So where is your analysis of my story?

OMA4U:

Ayaf hear o. So where is your analysis of my story?

coming, will dish it out before I sleep

TWO WRONGS
Sambrooze

-Great theme
I loved the fact you were writing an African literature with a typical Nigerian setting. However, you didn't read widely before writing your story and I'm very sure you got confused at some point.
Your use of punctuation wasn't so good and your story wasn't paragraphed.

@omolola I liked †нэ way you criticised my work word for word. It is obvious you are not a fan of adventures hence ur unfavourable appraisal.
You said dat my story title doesn't relate to its contents. Now lemme ask you dis -
Is traveling without paying for †нэ fare not a risky venture to undertake?

Is it not an unusual experience?

Apart from †нэ way i summarised it, could Ʊ hv predicted †нэ outcome?

Yet Ʊ say my experience is not worth an adventure. Maybe Ʊ hv to search U̶̲̥̅̊я dictionary properly and find †нэ underlying meaning of 'adventure'.
Obviously, dis is a competition and Ʊ happen to be a judge and i respect Ʊ for dat. But let it not get into U̶̲̥̅̊я head.
Thanks