I’m here as the new judge for the ‘My Worst Nightmare’ contest.
I know this is a bit personal for you as the premise of the contest was to fictionalize a terrifying nightmare you’ve ever had, but I’ll still say that the concept of this was so peculiar and startling. That makes it sound like it was a bad thing, but it really wasn’t. I was definitely interested in this whole man in the mirror thing, and the twist at the end with him taking into the mirror and replacing her with something else. I also liked how you went into the details of the narrator’s feelings so I could connect.
To be honest, though, I do feel like you could have… uh, fictionalized this better? I know that’s such a strange thing to say, but I’m not sure how much you added and used to fill out to meet the word count. It’s just that a lot of the monolog had a really awkward and unnatural feel to it. None of it really flowed together because I couldn’t believe that it would take someone as long as it did to realize that their reflection wasn’t there, or would still be so concerned about that in a situation where this looming creature has come to life that they’d still be looking to make sure. As I said, I’m not sure what all you added to pad the word count—because you’re definitely right, it’s hard to write about a nightmare like that—but I do think it could have flowed more, been a little more natural in narrative and even dialogue. I feel you have some wiggle room what with this being a fictionalized version.
But overall, I was definitely intrigued and this was definitely a terrifying idea. Good job!
I know this is a bit personal for you as the premise of the contest was to fictionalize a terrifying nightmare you’ve ever had, but I’ll still say that the concept of this was so peculiar and startling. That makes it sound like it was a bad thing, but it really wasn’t. I was definitely interested in this whole man in the mirror thing, and the twist at the end with him taking into the mirror and replacing her with something else. I also liked how you went into the details of the narrator’s feelings so I could connect.
To be honest, though, I do feel like you could have… uh, fictionalized this better? I know that’s such a strange thing to say, but I’m not sure how much you added and used to fill out to meet the word count. It’s just that a lot of the monolog had a really awkward and unnatural feel to it. None of it really flowed together because I couldn’t believe that it would take someone as long as it did to realize that their reflection wasn’t there, or would still be so concerned about that in a situation where this looming creature has come to life that they’d still be looking to make sure. As I said, I’m not sure what all you added to pad the word count—because you’re definitely right, it’s hard to write about a nightmare like that—but I do think it could have flowed more, been a little more natural in narrative and even dialogue. I feel you have some wiggle room what with this being a fictionalized version.
But overall, I was definitely intrigued and this was definitely a terrifying idea. Good job!