After the World's End - Comments

I really do love this story. While reading the early chapters I started to get connected to Max and Arden. I love how you took an idea and made it into something we could some how relate to. This might not make sense, but I feel like you took a normal situation that could happen to any of us...or rather something going on right this momet, and exaggerated the idea and made it into this story. I don't know that just might be the medicine talking. But please, please, please update this story. I'm on the edge of my seat right now. I hate cliffhangers!

I love this so much. Its easy to read, but at the same time, your descriptions are memorable. But more so than the way you say things, I love what you're actually saying (which is far more important). You're throwing in our faces what could very likely happen in the near future, and you're not afraid to blame humans. A lot of people like to pretend that things like this could never happen, but who knows? Why couldn't it? No one could be at all certain. I adore this. I'm subscribing c:

Definitely have a much better feel for the characters now. (:

Okay, I like it.

However, I feel as though the characters haven't been given stable personalities. Such as with Max, he's such a paradox, but you tell us how he feels, instead of having a good description of it. Give us some quirks that make him Max, that make him the lonely boy. Give him a strange habit...anything. You want them to be dynamic and to be cool individuals. Have small talk, that is more then just small talk underneath it all. Allow for personality to come out through simple snarky lines, and rolling eyes. Or carefully worded lines with flickering eyes.

Make Arden easier to handle. It's too sudden how you change things. Show us how cold he's gotten, don't just expect us to take your word for it. It'll make a huge difference. Have a scene maybe when Max tries to talk to him, and he gives him the cold shoulder. Not just telling him that he made a mistake that sorry doesn't cut it, give them an actual scene. Set it up, give us a description of those around, of the area, of the sky...give us detail.

This is my own opinion but I feel that if your characters aren't completely interesting, it's difficult to keep interested in the story. I like what you gave us as the start. Perhaps I haven't given you enough time to make them truly dynamic. For that I recommend writing down a short story for each of your characters, as them as the main character. Give them little quirks that you can shove into your story when deemed appropriates.

I think that you gave Stasia a great beginning personality in chapter five. She was blatantly honest, but unique in her reaction. However, she has a conscience. That makes her more dynamic, because there is more than one emotion, more than one thought process with her. That's excellent.

Cohen needs to shut his whore mouth. Sorry, that was necessary, hahaha. Anyway, he's got a great personality, and you can tell he's interested in Caroline, but make it more obvious that it's his priority. Have Arden mention it with an annoyed expression and give us a background about the two, perhaps before the war. Have Cohen put himself between Caroline and Max maybe at some point, literally or figuratively.

I have nothing to say about Alexander yet, except we almost share a name. Anyway, I guess what I can say is I like the mystery you have around him.

Hit us with detail! You can (almost) never have too much detail! Use a greater variety of words. I'm more concerned about the characters, personally. There was a lot of conflict in these chapters. I recommend chopping 'em up and making them longer, give the reader more time to absorb the friction, to show us how exactly Max is helping them. Show their cold and angry reactions--don't just tell us these things.

Oh course there are going to be a few minor mistakes throughout it, I wouldn't worry too much about them. Fix what you can, and the rest is something we're here for. I love this concept, yet I want to more about the war. I'm sure that's going to come. Don't give the readers more in these past chapters, because it will have them sink deeper into your story.

I agree with "eight letters late" in the whole idea for don't explain right away. You want to hook your readers, and giving them all the answers immediately won't help you with that.

I'm so bad, I only got to chapter six before commenting. I might comment again after I finish catching up. (:

All right, I'm done. Love the concept, wonderful, wonderful! I am merely here for helpful criticism.

I don't think introducing the story by explaining everything up front isn't the greatest way to do it. If I were you, I'd just dive right in. Start with the boy, crawling out from his hiding place. This would gain the reader's attention and generate a kind of mystery about it. I'd be questioning what happened and why. Instead of giving all these answers right away, I'd hold them back for a while, and then fit them into the story gradually, instead of laying everything on the table in the first chapter.

I'd say you need to work on your flow, if anything. Sometimes this was a little redundant. Try to use a variety of different words instead of repeating the same ones over and over - try to use more synonyms and pronouns. I recommend giving the boy a name, instead of consistently calling him "the boy," or using more "he"s instead of always saying "the boy".

The thought the beginning of chapter two was wonderful. I love how you described him as so free, and he was just enjoying what his life had thrown at him. I'd also like to point out how much I love the fact that you're telling this from a young boy's perspective. It makes the destruction and hate seems even worse than it would otherwise. It's an interesting perspective on an interesting circumstance.

It's great that you've stuck some action in there, right away. I was hoping something interesting would happen to keep me on my toes!

One part I think you mixed up... in chapter two you say a piece of glass was held to his throat. In chapter three you say a knife. Realistically, I don't think the 18 year old guy would be so nice to Max at first. It's like you portray him as nice and then BAM he backhands Max for saying they're looters. Same with the girl, Caroline. She seems really nice when she talks to him, but Max thinks she's just being fake. I don't see it. All I see is nice words, not fakeness.

Arden's character just seems really all over the place. He wants to be friends with Max and gain his trust, but then he's with this group that is so seemingly evil, they tied up this boy and hurt him without a second thought. Which made me think, why would they do that? Why are they just dragging him around? It seems like too much of a bother. It seems like, using the rationale that you have set up, they should just kill him and move on.

There were a few grammatical errors that I caught. First of all "the" shouldn't be capitalized in the title.
"All of the evidence of humans, was still there." The comma isn't necessary.
"There was some problem that no one, but the government really seemed to understand." Again, no comma necessary.
"What these two countries didn't realize was everyone else was getting angry to." To should be too.
"The boy drug himself up the stairs," I believe it should be dragged instead of drug.
" To, him this meant that if there was ever any chance he wasn't going to be killed, it was gone now." You don't need the first comma.
"What's you're name, honey?" You're should be your.
"...but she hadn't staid a word to stop them when they'd tied him up." Typo.
"The young man across from him, shook his head." No comma needed.
"Max couldn't even protect himself, if the young man wanted to hurt him." No comma needed!

This seems like a good start, though I'd try working on your flow and using the right words in the right places. I thought this was pretty interesting! (:

This was...well, it was actually pretty good. I think you could do a little something with the layout, but it's really not a huge issue. What matters is the content of the story, which in turn was pretty good. You had great descriptions and word choices. I saw very few mistakes -a forgotten or misplaced word or letter here or there, but other than that it was okay. I loved the way you described what caused the war because it was easy to understand. I hope poor Mx gets away from the strangers on the highway... Keep this going, you're off to a great start!

I love the banner – it definitely sets the tone for the story. The brightness of the text box and all is kind of harsh to read on, but other than that, I like it. :)

In the summary, it said “a few survivors and endless chaos.” Honestly a brilliant line. I can't even put into words how awestruck I was just by a simple line like that. It's just small things like that that really draw me into a story and give me the reassurance that I WILL continue on to chapter one, haha!

Anyway, I absolutely love how this takes on the world's (meaning: human's) problems head on. People are extremely vain and rather miserable for no apparent reason; we bring the troubles onto ourselves. The idea that no one would give up in the war discussed in this story also just shows how incredibly forceful some people can be.

One little thing: in the summary, it said the third world war, while in the first chapter it said the war of the worlds a few times. I don't know if it makes a difference, but maybe just calling it one or the other consistently would be better. I don't mean to nitpick; just a suggestion :)!

But all in all, a very good story and an interesting storyline. I don't see many stories like this on Mibba.

This is a very intriguing story. Your descriptions are very good and your premise is very interesting; I'd like to see where you go with it. I noticed a few spelling and grammar errors, but in general it was pretty well-written and I'm curious to see how the boy's character develops.