The Soldier - Comments

hahaha thanks I <3 constructive critisism

Alright Dustin, I took it amongst myself to read your story and give you come constructive critisism. First off, I think I like this story so much because I adore a military man. I'm not sure why but I think its the hard body, skills, uniform and unique personalities. Not saying I like the military though by no means- I don't like the men being put into danger nor do I like the moving around aspect so much. However, you aren't reading this comment to read about my view's on a military man, so on to your story:

I only saw a few things I think you need to work on. First thing is grammar. You have to make sure your words are "don't" not "dont". I'm also big on description. I know it is written as a journal but I think you can put more description in there. You're good at describing scenery but try to appeal to all the senses (taste, smell, feel, hear and see). Also, if you want to make your story stand out from the rest, you can make your own layout. I like doing that because it makes me feel the the whole thing is customly made. I'm not saying the lay out you have selected is a bad choice because it's not. I rather like it.

Keep writing on your story love. It is really good, I enjoyed the two chapters I read. I hope he can find other soldiers to help him find the perpetrator is. Good luck, keep up the good work.

Alright, you asked for some feedback, so here goes:

1. Summary:

The summary is good- nice and short. It gives me a clear idea of what to expect without going into too much detail, and so I wouldn't change anything about that. The only thing I did notice was that there were two small typos:

"This is his story and how h e copes with this new America." (h and e spaced out.)

"This journey makes him see all that he has done, and he;ps him become a better person." ('he;ps' should be 'helps'.)

These are quite easy to spot and fix, and it really helps attract readers if you make your work look polished.

2. Chapter One:

It's like you say, this chapter is very short. That's not necessarily bad if it's an opening, but it does go against what readers on this site will expect. I have to say, I really like the idea of building a story around a soldier wandering around a post-apocalyptic wasteland. In terms of storytelling and building the plot, though, there are a few questions that immediately spring to mind and that you could answer in this chapter if you wanted to flesh out your character and his purpose a bit here.

Firstly, when the missile hit, why couldn't he believe it? Was it mostly that it was an unexpected attack, or did it take out a large part of America? Was this what destroyed the whole country, or were there other missiles like it? You also have a chance to present us with some gripping imagery when your character remembers a moment like this. Tell us what the blast looked like, as viewed through his eyes. This is not only an innately interesting thing to read about, but will give us a better insight into the character by letting us know why he was there, what he was doing, and what his immediate reaction was (did he run from the blast, or hide, or try to save somebody?).

Secondly, what does the soldier mean when he says that he is the only salvation? Does this mean that everybody else is dead? Or does it mean that he already has a plan in mind about how to tackle the conflict here? Maybe go into greater detail about why he is heading out, what he is heading out to, and what he expects to find there.

3. Chapter Two:

By this point, your story is starting to read more like a diary. It occurs to me that that's something you could actually utilise rather well, since you seem to have a very matter-of-fact style of writing. Maybe put dates and locations at the top of each chapter, if you wanted to emphasize this.

There was also one thing I noticed with your dialogue here:

'I see a shadow of a person, I raise my rifle to my shoulder. " Thunder or I will fire on you!'. '

Technically, when you place dialogue as part of a sentence, it should be done with commas rather than fullstops, and only one mark of punctuation at the end, like this:

'I see a shadow of a person, I raise my rifle to my shoulder, "Thunder or I will fire on you!' '

I think that in this context, you could also explain to the reader what 'Thunder' meant, as not everybody will be familiar with this, and it helps readers who are new to soldier stories to immerse themselves better.

The only other thing I will note about your writing generally is that you tend not to leave a blank line between paragraphs. I think Mibba prefers that you do that, and it also makes it easier to read.

4. Layout:

I realise that this isn't really about your writing, and it shouldn't matter how a story looks. However, if you're having trouble finding readers in the first place, making your story stand out from the rest with a background that isn't the default one, and maybe even a title picture, can work wonders. There are people on this site who specialise particularly in making layouts for stories, or, alternatively, you could just mess around in the layout maker yourself- it's pretty straightforward, and doesn't require any knowledge of coding.

Good luck with the rest of your story!