Eddie Whorl by Rob Barkan - Short, Horror - An ailing truck driver slowly discovers that the hitchhiker he's picked up on a desolate mountain pass is not human. 12 pages - pdf format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

Rob

A few thoughts

1) There's a few bits where I think it's overly specific in the script, e.g. Allegheny peaks
2) Some unfilmables, e.g crippled, uncoordinated by brain disease, or maybe both - you can't see brain disease (there's a balance of course, so it's just making sure it's not overdone)
3) Mats - Matt (pg 9)

Other than that I thought this was really well written, formatting's good, felt a little King-esque (a good thing) and I was hooked start to finish.

Great job

Anthony

I have mixed feelings about this one.

SPOILERS:

On the one hand, if I take it as is and don't look too deeply, I really enjoyed it.

I think the formatting needs work personally, and I feel it reads awkwardly in certain parts.

You have several passages of time where you don't use LATER or MOMENTS LATER, essentially turning it into one massive scene.

Then you do use one Later but in your action.

This is not a contraction "they're's", you need this "there's".

On the other hand, if I dig a little deeper this kinda falls apart for me.

So you have a guy in his 50's who is worn out and has heart issues who takes out your villain.

I'm not feeling too afraid at this point, I'm a healthy 35 year old male, I'll take my chances walking past a pile of leaves. At best, if one of these things pops out, it might inconvenience me for a few moments before I get on my way.

In the end I like where you went with this, just needs a bit of a tidy up and a bit more guts.

I think turning your protag into a slightly more worthy opponent will fix this up.

Good luck.

'I was New York City bound eighty miles out of Pittsburgh hauling a full load on a windy nipper of an October night.' That needs some commas. There are other places where commas are needed.

Sometimes you repeat words, soon after each other, like 'scrawny'. Try to find different words.

Apparently you should never write 'finally', in your descriptions.

It took a bit of time to get going, but it was still interesting.

Rob,

Some notes.

Good job. I was an enjoyable read with a nice little story.  I don't think you need to voice over in the beginning.  You can share that info later while Matt is trying to converse with Eddie (love the name).  The rest works for me.  You might look for some other mechanism for Eddie to use on Matt.  What else can leaves and twigs do?

Best
Richard

Thanks everyone for your kind words and advice.

Rob Barkan