Choices by Ronald Pergola - Short, Dramedy - Step brothers must decide what to do with the body of the bully they have just killed. 5 pages - pdf format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

Some notes.

This one reads like the author's choice.  Louis heads out from a party and happens upon a rape.  OK, but there's no setup for that.  And step-bro happens along with a baseball bat, and there's no set up for that.  It reads  as if the writer wanted these things to happen and wrote it that way.

I would suggest that you set up the conflict earlier.  Skip the chat with Billy since he's fluff and write in Wayne as the bully and antagonist.  Write in the waitress as teasing for tips.  Write in Ricky, and god's sake find a way to put in the baseball bat.  How many young men carry around a bat?

Once you've set this up, you can pay off with the bat and the death of Wayne, although burying him alive might work as well.

Best
Richard

Ronald,

Not wanting to sound harsh but story-wise this lacks cohesion.  There's little by way of payoff to round it out or leave a lasting impression.  What you have is two brothers casually murdering a would be rapist before burying him in the woods.  The story is called ‘Choices’ - I guess in reference to Rick and Louis’ decision to hide the body and crime.  But without consequences (or a hint thereof), apart from Rick being impressed with little brother’s swing, the ending is left to fall flat.  That the victim is the son of a local cop is never explored; nor is leaving the girl as a potential witness to the murder or trying to help her in any way beyond the initial killing.  

Not saying it can’t be done, but you have to create a credible situation and reactions to pull the reader in.  There’s little logic underpinning events or characters’ actions which makes it all the more harder to connect with the story.

Writing wise:

Do you need to take nearly half a page to describe the inn?  It’s not the main setting of the story and the decal doesn’t play a part so I’d consider scaling it back.  Do we need to know everything is varnished pine?  Or that the chandeliers and wall sconces don’t match?  Think about what’s necessary to give us a flavour of the setting and let the story/characters take over from there.

Same for the random words appearing in caps - DRAUGHT BEER, BUSY, NOISY etc.  I’m not sure what you’re aiming for with these?  Not a format style I’m familiar with outside of capping certain sounds or perhaps items/objects for the reader to take note of within action lines.  

You could pretty much describe this same opening scene in two or three lines - less even.

Elsewhere:

Louis searches for Rick; weaves around cars.

CALLS OUT

LOUIS
Rick! Oh, Rick... Mr. Rick. Ricky Boy?

Could be:

Louis weaves around the cars, scanning the lot.

LOUIS
Rick! Oh, Rick… Mr. Rick. Ricky Boy?

The context (not to mention exclamation points/dialogue) pretty much negate the need for the CALLS OUT and ‘searches for Rick’.  If you really feel the need to let the reader know he’s calling out then better to save yourself some space and put it in parenthesis:

LOUIS
(shouts)
Rick! ...etc.  


At least cap the YOUNG WOMAN on intro.


Hope this doesn’t sound harsh.  As a story it needs more meat on the bones to go the distance.  Keep at it.  Hoping this helps.

Steve