NYLA by Marcus Walton - Short, Family - The youngest out of the bunch require more care then given by these young adolescents. 4 pages - pdf format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

"NYREE (30) gives herself a mesmerizing look at herself in the mirror." No need for the second 'herself'

"The kids are charging down the steps full of energy."  


"James (13), Jesse (12), and Jasmine (10)" Because you have introduced these characters for the first time their names need to be in capitals. After that, just regular lower case.

Nice fun banter between the parents and kids. you're doing a good job of establishing their family dynamic.

"Jasmine has the controller at the moment and turns to a scary movie." No need for 'at the moment', because you wrote she has the controller thats all you need.

"Jesse is already in position making a dog face as well as James riles him up." The sentence is incorrect....should be - Jesse gets into position and makes a dog face as James riles him up.

!SPOILERS!

Oh no not a gun..... so at this point I'm enjoying the fun egging on and dialogue between the kids. I'm caring about them. So when that gun falls out of the bed I'm thinking great, irresponsible parents, irresponsible gun owner. Leaving the kids alone without an age appropriate person in the house too. These parents  aren't horrible to the kids but they are incredibly irresponsible with their actions.

The ending was not surprising, but having the youngest get shot is powerful. The older people who are suppose to protect her let her down.

I felt the ending could be extended, because it is expected, it's not knew, maybe this triggers off something more when the parents come home... seeing the kids reactions would be very powerful especially if you are wanting to show people the horrific effects of this type of thing happening... but of course thats all up to you and what you want from this....

Is this family from the South or are they African American? Either way it needs to be stated somewhere in the beginning to make things clearer, because the dialogue confused me. You used she, instead of she's a lot and I'm not sure if it's intentional or part of the speech.

Anyways, not bad, just needs a tidy up and maybe extend the ending...and put a Fade IN at the end so we know for sure the story is finished

Keep at it.... never give up...

There's a couple of issues here with establishing things ... first off your first slug states we're int, then goes Smith Home - we need to know where we are in the Smiths' home, kitchen, lounge etc.

Next line, 'two parents' doesn't mean much, better specifying names and actions.

Your next sentence goes passive; you could start with Nyla and state what actions she carries out.

Nyree then goes: 'Nyla how mommy look?' Commas help. Then Nyla responds, and Nyla responds again; second response should be Nyree's.

Needs some attention to detail.