One Hairy Night by Mike Jones (mgj) - Short, Young Adult, Horror - An ancient curse haunts a small town.  Things are about to get hairy. - doc, format

This story was written very well technically.  I think the story needs just a little more "meat" in the ending...I get the very end with Ms Crenshaw...but it al seemed just a little too "tidy" for the beginning and premise of the story.

Agreed.  Very well done in the early going, but it comes to an end too quickly.  From barn dance to werewolf battle, and then, very nonchalantly, they have to go home, seemingly unconcerend about what just went down.

It seems to play it straight up until the last few pages adn tehn the tone changes to somewhat of a comedy.  I don't like the shift.  Also, the ending is a bit odd as well.  Seems to be going for a laugh.

All in all, I did like this. It is well written for sure and reads easily and quickly.  Just wish the tone remined in tact and there was a bit more near the end.

Good job though.

If I was going to write a simple werewolf story for kids this would be it. It has all the elements from similar werewolf stories, the description of the young man tearing his clothes off, howling, hair and claw marks. Nothing new. The writing was good, the story all too familiar. Cheers Walford

This was nicely written.  It had its share of suspense and humour.  It was well rounded.  

Two things that bugged me, though, and they are really nits.

The first was the snappy one liners during the battle, they kind of got old - I was waiting for things to escalate and they kept holding you back.  

The second was when Alison told Sam this is the country and people leave their doors open. Sam lives there too - he should already know that.

And even though werewolf movies aren't my thing, I'm going to give you high marks.  

I had a few problems with this one.

First, the dialogue, especially at the start, was very expositional. I know you have to fit a lot of background in to set-up the story but those characters wouldn't really say those things.

Second, I felt they overcame the werewolves a bit too easy. Why would two werewolves fight when they had two defenceless children in front of them to feed on. I don't know whether the end suggests the teacher is the one who saved them or if she is just a werewolf and that's it.

I thought in general this was well written and had a decent amount of horror. I just think it lacked a bit in suspence.

The end is a really good twist. You’ve got some exciting action in here. Some of the dialog sequences go on too long and the whole thing has a children’s adventure feel about it. You are at the low end of the 12-18 range, somewhere about 9, but hell everybody needs their scary stories!

I like this story. The writing is good and the dialogue flows well. However, I don't think a pair of 14-year-olds  would think of themselves as kids. But the main problem I have with the story is the motivation for Alison and Sam's involvement in the "case." It should be personal (perhaps a family member's body was swiped from the cemetery) in order to justify risking their lives.

A minor point: why are the kids so nervous when Alison entered the classroom at the end? Sure, Miss Crenshaw's face is messed up, but how do they know this has anything to do with Alison?

Interesting, I really liked this one. The dialogue between the two main characters was kinda cheesy but overall this one did a much better of achieving the feel of a young adult script than many of the other OWC entries.

The hoax angle could've been played up a little more and it didn't seem the two of them had much time to try to convince everyone at the dance the hoax was real after they discoverd the werefolf. Maybe they escape from him early on, go tell everyone in the barn they're in danger and that they should all leave immediately, only to be laughed out of the building. Then as the two of them walk home together the wolf attacks again, and Crenshaw is there to save the day.

Nice story, you're a very good technical writer, though the story could've used more originality before the ending. Overall a nice script for one week!

Story wise I liked this one a lot, I'm a sucker for Werewolf stories, but the dialogue did not work for me at all, it felt very unnatural, that was the weakest part of the script.  I liked the scene where the kid throws a stick at the Werewolf, that actually made me chuckle.  I think this fit the challenge and I liked the story, I just feel that the dialogue needed to be worked on a bit more.

This was a good little read. It worked for the young adult genre. I liked how you worked with Alison trying to sneak in the class and then you had the same thing with her being late again at the end.

I'd stay away from camera directions like "Angle On".

The display referred to isn't introduced properly.

The nice thing about this I thought was that you showed that you weren't trying to be too serious with Alison saying "Well, it looks like another danger averted. This town is safe again- thanks to us". Even though we've got this little nugget of a cliche thrown in, it's meant to be fun.

Good job.

Sandra

I actually liked this one. I know I'm a little late here, but if I had read this during the OWC I would have voted 4 stars.

I liked the characters and you had my attention throughout.

If I had to gripe about anything it would probably be them not really trying to warn anyone... wait, I'm not even sure that was a requirement.

Anyway, of the once I've read, I thought this was one of the better ones.

Characters, dialogue and story all worked for me.
Good job!