Hey Dena,

Well done.

Since i have read your work i have felt that, like me, you have been searching for a style. This is the closest i have felt you have been to your style. To some a bit wordy and of course  a few things can be trimmed, but this is your way and and a few decent descriptions beyond the crisp, is most welcome. We all develop as writers and what is great about you is that you keep writing, learning. I try to do the same - its the best way to learn.

You have a decent sense of story, of character of tension and loss. Your stories have a ring of truth about them, earthy, real, personal. Never let go of that.

This story is dark, intense, deep and touches that sense that lurks within us all that things can go wrong, we can lose touch, whilst the world arounds us moves on. Could we be stuck in a place we don't want to be, what would happen if it did?

One idea with this would be for charlie to have a spade with him. Kill her, maybe with  last fatal overdose as she would want, then bury them together, since she can the without her. is it murder or compassion. The POV then changes to him - can he move on?

cheers

Wow Basket....killer notes! Thanks!

Gonna hack it up like a totem pole eventually and with the feedback ...I know what to slice off!

The title surely SUX ....will change it for sure Awesome notes...and thanks again!

And yes...I'd like a seasoned chicken leg better than a bone ... I think

d

Hey Dena,

I enjoyed this. Although confusing at first, I found myself loving the story. You told it with very little dialogue, which is always great to see. That's a rare thing to pull off effectively. This is my kind of story. Love to see writers tackling serious issues and you've done so with some amazing impact.

I have to admit, after reading the comments I was expecting every sentence to have an over-written part to it. I was pleasantly surprised to see (IMO) the over-writing only pops up a few times. You know about that, so I'm not going to dwell any further on the topic.

The thing that really bothered me with the script came with the descriptions. We need a little more IMO. There's no facial features for Charlie and Amber, nothing that distinguishes them from regular people. I'm imagining faceless characters. Don't know about you, but I prefer to have simple things like age and basic appearance traits covered. Keeping things visual is important. Having said that, I just realized that your intention with this could have been to leave it to our interpretation...?

Just a nit-picky thing... Kayla and her age. The first thought with a scene set ten years later would have been "Okay, so the baby will be ten..." Nope, not having that. Kayla was 11. Call me someone with no life, but I actually had to stop and think about this for a second. Not even kidding, I stopped reading and worked out whether it was possible or not. Luckily for you, it is possible, but I was thrown for a while. God, I have no life . Nothing to change, here, but I thought it was worth knowing that some weirdos such as myself will have to stop and think about it for a moment

POTENTIAL SPOILER!!

Another thing I thought I'd mention was the woods scene. May have just been the way I read it, but I completely missed the doll part. So, for the rest of the script I thought Kayla was alive. Maybe have the doll in CAPS to make it stand out a little more...?

Otherwise, some great stuff. Awesome writing and a story that was just utterly brilliant. Just wish my weird tendencies hadn't gotten in the way...

Great work!

Dan

Thank you Bill and Dan....

One of the things several have addressed was description for my characters and ages. Thing is...when I wrote this...I wrote it for a filmmaker. They already had the cast to work with so I left all that off to make it easy to fit their male, female and child.

I should've cleaned it up and made it look spec-ish but I didn't. It was a quick draft of maybe 45 minutes and when they said they wanted something a little different ...I just sent this to Don..since I took the time to write it

I need to look over things before I post them on here...but I dunno if you know what I mean, IF you are writing for a filmmaker that already has cast or you are writing something to film yourself....you just get the story out best you can. I just forgot to clean it up for spec type look will do better next  time...promise

Hey Dena. It's been a privilege seeing you develop as a writer. I think I've read all of your stuff this far?

As has been said, this clearly displays a sense of confidence of style. But then, so does putting your agent on the front page  


I wouldn't start with a passive:
Against a dirty wall of peeling paint, sits a worn out couch,

A worn out couch sits against a dirty wall of peeling paint.
-- is active.

Your '10 YEARS LATER' definately needs a super.

Bird song. Sun dapples through a canopy of foliage.
-- I liked this. Vey simply, but a very clear visual.

The flashlight beam bounces on the ground as his steps hurry
-- I liked this as well.

I agree with Bill - I really think a spade would 'suit' this. I don't think they'd have a gun - it just doesn't work with them. If they had any spare cash, they'd have doped on it.

You're not going to move away from dark, I know that, but you are doing it better. There's an accomplished feel to this.

Regarding the axe and the over-writing -- I'd be cautious -- there are times when the over-writting detracts, but there is an equal number of times when it enhances. Maybe a penknife will do?

Title? Yeah - please change, I have to agree on that one.

Hey Dena.

I know I've seen you around a lot on the boards before, and I always make notes in my head to check out something of yours whenever I see it posted up, but I never remembered coming across any.

So I got excited when I saw this posted earlier today.  (Trust me, if I hadn't seen this, I was going to send a PM soon for you to shoot some links on over to me for your stuff.)

And wow, am I glad I read this.  I loved loved the dark visuals and the sadness of the script.  (Yes, I did mean to put 'loved' twice.')

And not once while reading did the thought of overwriting pop into my head.  Sure, you have a lot of descriptions, but that's because you're telling a story with very little dialogue.  (You're telling a story with images.  Don't hold your head down for that.)  That may be why a lot are accusing you of overwriting.  Your descriptions are pretty sleek, actually.  I think only a few times did you have to resort to three lines to describe what's going on.

Maybe you did repeat a couple things over and over, (the peeling paint, for instance), and those could probably be cut back a bit, but I see no other overwriting infractions from you, really.  If you do any chopping, don't lose the mood you've set up.

All right, now for the parts of the story that really stopped this from being totally absolutely great.  Don't get me wrong, this is great, but there were two things that brought it down for me.

One, the title.  It's a small nitpic, I know, but it just doesn't fit in my opinion.  I think you might be able to find a title that's a little more dramatic and sentimental, and not so late-1980's thriller.  (Fatal Attraction and Basic Instinct come to mind.)  I'm not saying to go all artsy fartsy with it, but it could use touched up, in my opinion.

All right.  Now, the ending.  I loved loved loved her coddling the corpse at the end.  I was excited.  I was thinking this might be my favorite short I've ever read.  Disgusting, but still sentimental and sad.  All my favorite things I've loved reading in stories since I was little.

And then he shoots her.  My stomach actually hurt, because that two seconds of screen-time, actually ruined the story for me.  It was a literal WTF moment for me, and I hate using abbreviations.  (Except Lol.  I like using lol a lot.)

You had this great set-up, you had a beautiful, disgusting, sad, all-powerful moment working, that could've been made all the more powerful by Charlie mourning for her and understanding her sadness and trying to help her put the bones back in the ground, but instead, after all these years I'm sure this has been going on... he shoots her?

I still loved it, but that moment brought it down for me.

Then I read that you wrote this for somebody to film.  (I remember seeing his post not too long ago.)  (I mean, posts), and then I remember he had a revolver or something to use.

That revolver just took the power out of this great story.

Anyway, I'll stop harping on that now and take the time to say that I like the idea Brett brought up, about actually having the baby help them tie off the tourniquet or something.  (Damn, Brett, what happened to your family-friendly approach to things?  :-)  That would add another sick dynamic to the story, although I'm not to sure how you'd approach fitting that into the story.  It might take some playing around with and more than most likely a couple extra pages.  But you've definately got something in my opinion to try and make the most out of it.

Anyway, thanks for posting it.  I enjoyed it a lot, (even with the ending I complained about.)  I'd definately enjoy reading some other stuff of yours if you want to PM some links over to me.  I'll be looking forward to it.

- Mark

Mark ....

Man killer notes and again the dreaded ending. Yes the revolver was a prop they had to work with...I will def change it ...and the ending...Plus they wanted VERY little dialogue. So I tried to have the least dialogue possible. NOW though that it is mine to play with...I can make the end a lot better. After all these suggestions.

Thank you a ton for reading it and I appreciate the great suggestions.

dena

Quoted from Pale Yellow Yeah Pia...I did--wasn't what he wanted tho ...and then wrote a better one called She Comes At Night....cuz they wanted real life scary. Did they begin production on yours??

He wanted me to make changes to the script, I told him I didn't have the time and I never heard back after that. So, in short. I doubt it.  Good luck with yours though.  

I think this would definitely make a good short.

I like your style of writing. It may be a bit wordy, but it paints a good picture.
Clear, but also slightly cryptic.

It kept me reading.

Good job!

Thanks Steex ...appreciate the read.

dena

Hi, Dena.

This was interesting. Was there a message behind this, like "don't do drugs?"

My only criticism is that the ending--the very end--was too violent; it was out of context with the rest of the script which was quiet and somber.

Best regards.
rmaze