Endless Tears - Comments

The style is definitely very different I will give it that. It doesn’t really pertain to the story but all the excess and extravagant backgrounds actually may have taken from the richness of the story itself. I guess I am just old school but I appreciate a more minimalistic style. Some of the more “free verse” styles of structure and writing. As far as the whole critique thing goes, I would have to say that your descriptive introductions could use a little polishing. Though I definitely can appreciate a foreword to a story, sometimes letting the reader discover facts instead of writing them down forthright can be the most powerful element to a story. In a story such as this however that may not be as important. The most powerful descriptions in a story such as this lay within the characters emotions. However even emotions don’t have to be given up. Personally I like the mystery that lays within the writers mind, as the writer is the only person who really knows their characters.
But you know, it is all just blah blah blah, a story is yours and yours alone. No critique can really do a piece good.
It was a good read. Thanks.

The style is definitely very different I will give it that. It doesn’t really pertain to the story but all the excess and extravagant backgrounds actually may have taken from the richness of the story itself. I guess I am just old school but I appreciate a more minimalistic style. Some of the more “free verse” styles of structure and writing. As far as the whole critique thing goes, I would have to say that your descriptive introductions could use a little polishing. Though I definitely can appreciate a foreword to a story, sometimes letting the reader discover facts instead of writing them down forthright can be the most powerful element to a story. In a story such as this however that may not be as important. The most powerful descriptions in a story such as this lay within the characters emotions. However even emotions don’t have to be given up. Personally I like the mystery that lays within the writers mind, as the writer is the only person who really knows their characters.
But you know, it is all just blah blah blah, a story is yours and yours alone. No critique can really do a piece good.
It was a good read. Thanks.

I swear, I always get your stories from comment swap!! As always, love the layout. I haven't been on this website in ages, but I've really seen an improvement in your writing since I've last visited! Your descriptions have come so far, I feel like a proud mother! Keep up the good work!

I kind of wish this story started when the drama starts. All the stuff before is nice for world building, but I'm left wondering why I care about her family or Aphrodite and them because I don't get the sense of drama. I think, this is really just my personal style you can take it or leave it, you can side note these character backgrounds as we meet the characters instead of these descriptions at the beginning. It think it would give your story more of a sense of showing and less telling. Your layout is Boss! I think you're an awesome writer. These are just things I noticed kind of turned me off of your story.

With all Due respect,

Comment Swap~

I am absolutely in love with the layout. I find it unique and beautiful that fits with the story. Though it does cause a little strain to the eye. The summary, you don't really need to add all that. It nearly almost drove me away in honesty. The story however is unique overall. It's very interesting with all it's elements that can drive a persons mood. Your descriptions are excellent, it gives me clear images in the mind. Keep up the good work! You're doing great!

Comment Swap~

I am absolutely in love with the layout. I find it unique and beautiful that fits with the story. Though it does cause a little strain to the eye. The summary, you don't really need to add all that. It nearly almost drove me away in honesty. The story however is unique overall. It's very interesting with all it's elements that can drive a persons mood. Your descriptions are excellent, it gives me clear images in the mind. Keep up the good work! You're doing great!

This story is really emotional. It was very rough, sometimes very beautiful and sometimes very hard to read and understand (no, it didn't have spelling mistakes or anything) it was just a very difficult subject.
I loved the mental image of a young 14-year-old innocent girl who lives with her loving and caring parents. I also think it was great that one was Greek and one was Japanese. I like foreign cultures so it was interesting.
The way her life changed just like that.. It was just amazing. It made me feel so sad and desperate. I never ever expected her father to rape her, use her. I did expect that she'd start cutting, but the suicide was unexpected. This story maybe had a bit too much information, like all the clothes and make up, but it didn't really bother. The beginning felt a bit boring, as I thought that she would just live happily with Ramon and that's it. Luckily not, and this was an amazing short story!

First off, I don't really think all of that stuff in your summary is necessary. Put some of that in your author's note. It clutters your summary and turns readers away immediately. You definitely don't want that!

But from the start, I really enjoyed your writing style. I am a sucker for first person point of view and you wrote it well. One thing I'd say is write your descriptions a little better. I agree with everybody dies; when she says to make them less mechanic. It helps the story and leaves more room for your reader to have an imagination about the character, which we readers really enjoy. I also didn't see too many grammatical errors which is good.

But this was actually really sad. I almost felt empty at the end like oh.

God, this is such a depressing story! I don't know why I was stupid enough to think a little fairtytale happy ending was in store for her and Ramon based on the title but the beginning of their relationship was so cute in the beginning and then it all just went down from there. Oh this is so sad!!

Layout

I liked the layout but the banner in my personal opinion should be a tad smaller. I think the banner is beautiful though, fits well with the story.

Summary

You don't have to add all that stuff to your summaries. You can easily put it in your author's note to make it look less cluttered. Some readers don't even read that and go straight to the story, or see so much writing then click back. I do however applaud you from being very good with warnings and such.

Character Development

You build your character quite well. You make them literally grow too, which is great. The main characters you are amazing at developing. I have a sense on who they are. But the minor character who then become major character, like the father, he needs to be worked on more. I hardly exspect someone to just rape their child without warning signs. When a father rapes his own child that means there is something wrong with is brain. You could have wrote a few of his ticks. Like he always seemed to be angry when his wife wouldn't let him alone. Or his wife was always with their daughter. Something like that I guess. Because him just raping her, the brain doesn't work like that unless he himself was brought up that incest was normal. In modern society it's not though, which is why I'm bringing it up.

Chapter One

There was so much going on! I think this could have been longer. It would be a very good story about a girl who lost everything, if it was spread out. But the parts that weren't rushed was still beautifully written by a talented writer. You are talented you just need not to rush sometimes. Rushing as in putting so much infomation in at once and not letting it spread. I also found it kinda strange when you seemed to have rushed the story, until it got to the sex parts. The rape and her sex with her boyfriend was finely detailed. Which would be amazing if it was to the rest of the story too.

I like how you write, you know how. You have a marvelous talent and it shows so much! If you spaced this story out in like five chapters, I think it would be ten stars. It's a rather good story too, minus the rape, but the whole love then sadness. Very potent.

I think the concept for this is really good, but I don't think this should have been a one-shot. There was too much detail in this for it to only be one chapter. Instead of a one-shot, this would be great as a chapter story. That way you could go more in depth on the back story of the character and develop the characters a bit better. It just seemed a bit rushed to get all of this information into one chapter to me. I really did enjoy the overall plot though, your idea was fantastic.

I'm here to deliver a Valentines treat

I like the way that you use description to your advantage in this, it brings out the thoughts and feelings of Layla throughout the whole ordeal. You've added in a lot of raw emotion between the lines, and it really shows when you read. Your grammar and spelling are almost flawless, or I couldn't see anything when I was reading anyway.

The only things I could suggest is to try and make your description less mechanic. A lot of it is my hair was this or by eyes are blue sort of writing. Try and work on mking it flow a little more. Aside from that, everything else has been mentioned below. I enjoyed this.

I've been reading the comments before I decided to post my comment, just to see what everyone else thought. All I can say is that I disagree with most comments.

I believe that the background at the beginning of the story was actually nessacary, it need it to get in the swing of the story. It laid down that her life was simple, quite but enjoyable and happy. It also built a connection to all the characters and Ramon.

Secondly, I liked the complexity of what was happening as it made it more like real life. I admit there was a few blips (not being worried about the phone call and her father not being home even though he asked her to be) but when a close family member dies, your gunna need support.

Thirdly, you managed to trick me. This is honestly a rare occurrence for me however, there was a clue in your summary which I think you should remove. It the 'warning, incest' thing, it's not needed. You enter a NC-17 at your own risk and it takes away from your story. However, I managed to predict she kills herself and so I didn't connect with her instead, I connected to Ramon and now all I can think is 'why the hell didn't she tell Ramon and she could leave the abuse?'

Penultimately, there was a few minor issues that I wouldn't have spotted if I wrote this. There was a paragraph that was present tense whilst the rest is past tense, I believe this is mentioned in a different comment which indicates the paragraph. You made a discrepancy around Layla's childhood friend; you just need to change a few words to say she hangs with her less instead of not at all, so a really small blip. Your disclaimer is actually copyrights.

Finally, I've got bits that I reaaaalllly like but not long enough to make a paragraph so I'm gunna bullet them here.
- 3 words. (Calm, numb, beautiful) This is brilliant, exactly what I would think she would think and really adds to how stressed out she is about her life and adds to her dying without you saying it.
- Her dying without you going 'I died'
- Your banner, picture, title thingy.
- "I wasn't like this...but when he broke me, he took my soul with him." This line is a great sum up and adds the blame to her father. It's like she's saying, I could cope without mum but I can't cope with him. Sorry, I can't call him her father, a father wouldn't do that to their child.
- Your summary is concise and straight to the point, has all the info anyone would need if they wish for it.
- The story was very, very detailed and I kept the images of the characters in my head the whole time. I could imagine everything happening without any blank spots.

Sorry if I've written too much but you said 'constructive criticism is welcome' so I let loose. Feel free to reply and tell me off but honestly, I like the long detailed reviews, they are most helpful. (Geez, it looks like I've written my own story in your comments)

Thank you for sharing this beautifully tragic story.

(Comment Swap)

First of all, boring and hard-to-read layout, could make the width bigger and the font bigger too. You've got too much information going on in the summary that I got very confused. I know this is a one-shot but all of the information about the character is crammed in all at once, it could at least be spread out through the story a little more because it drones. On a more positive note; very well written with alot of description and imagery.

my main note for you would be about your timeline, here is the timeline of your story; very young, grows up, meets er friend, meets her boyfriend mother dies, father goes crazy, death. now here is my suggestion for a timeline; mother dies , dad goes crazy death. my version is based on the fact tat the story now starts closer to your, "inciting incident." in other words the thing that actually makes a story happen. the analogy here is to a scene with a party in the movie, the charecter always comes into the party when it is in full swing, not hours before it starts, people want action not back story, in the first 2.3 of your story you are really just giving background information about your charecters so that their actions will make sense after the death of the mother, you can simply fill in these details with greater attention to detail. now for two nitpicky comments. 1 it doesn't make sense for the dad to call the daugter and tell her to go ome when he is not home, he should eiter be home or tell her to go to the olice station where he is. 2. there is oneparagraph where you use the present instead of the past tense and that is very confusing. It’s been already two years since my mother died. I’m already sixteen years old and I’m still going out with Ramon. Ramon was my everything now. When my mother died, I and Ramon bonded. He was beside me as much as he could and he showed me his love in every possible way. It was strange how things changed after my mother’s death. My own father who was my best male friend, turned out to be my enemy and all of that because of my dead mother.

Comment Swap.

If I hadn't been in on a comment swap, I probably wouldn't have read it. But I actually liked it. It was really good. It was sad. My only critique would be that it's long enough that you could spread it out. Being that long might be daunting to some readers.

But it was really enjoyable. :)

Damn, I didn't want Layla to die. You made me cry. :'( Your sad/tragic stories always make me cry. It was really well-written and I loved it to bits. <3

Damn, I didn't want Layla to die. You made me cry. :'( Your sad/tragic stories always make me cry. It was really well-written and I loved it to bits. <3

@GoodGirl; You didn't comment on the oneshot itself though. As for the disclaimer, its about the cover which is Luis Royo's work so there is a need for it, its giving credit.

@GoodGirl; You didn't comment on the oneshot itself though. As for the disclaimer, its about the cover which is Luis Royo's work so there is a need for it, its giving credit.