All Comments on 'The Garden'

Well worth the read. The only criticism is that the ending seemed overly abrupt and final and at odds with the build up.

For your feedback.

This is the first story of yours I’ve read and I’ve just checked your other stories to see what font you’ve used with them and it’s the same. I don’t know whether it’s that I’ve not seen anyone else use that font (except to highlight a character’s thoughts as against their speech) but it would put me off reading another of your stories. I can’t remember ever seeing a mainstream author using it. Perhaps it’s just me personally and because it’s not the usual plain font I find it off putting.

I can’t really give a critique of your writing because I skimmed over a lot of it. I began reading as normal but after the first few hundred words began missing out big chunks. That’s because so many of your paragraphs are so long. Far too long. There needs to be much more “white space.” Writing for Literotica needs a different layout than elsewhere. Many readers, like myself, read the stories on a smartphone and long paragraphs don’t work in that context.

I agree with the previous comment about the ending being very abrupt. It’s as if you ran out of ideas as to how to finish the story.

I’m sorry if my comment seems callous but, if you read comments I’ve made on other stories, you’ll see I’m genuinely trying to be helpful.

but just some advice, if you’re reading a story and you dislike it so much that you can’t fully read it or give useful feedback maybe just do us both a favor and don’t comment at all.

Also, I have no idea how it works in other parts of the world but I’m in the US and I have no option to change font as far as I know. All font shows up the same on my web browser.

First things first. I did not dislike your story. I actually did enjoy it apart from the abrupt ending which someone else had already mentioned.

I cannot understand about the font. I’m sure when I read the story initially, and checked your other stories, it was in Quintessential Italic (or something similar) but on looking just now it’s in Ariel. That I can’t explain. I may have got confused about the font with another story I read just before yours (and I can’t remember the title of the story) in which case I apologise.

I write using MSword and as well as changing the size, embolden, italicise and underline you can also change the font. I’ve assumed you can do this with others but perhaps I’m wrong. As a fairly new writer (I’ve only had twelve stories published so far) I’ve found I could usually get the answer to any uncertainty by asking in the Author’s Hangout on the Forum.

As I said I didn’t feel I could critique your writing style because I basically “speed read” the story but that doesn’t mean, as I’ve already said, I didn’t like it.

As regards the paragraphs and the “white space” I’ve read a lot of comments in Author’s Hangout, made by writers with many years of experience and far better than myself, giving exactly the same advice as I’ve given you about paragraph length.

Any advice I give, to any fellow writer, is genuine and meant to help. I spend hours over days/weeks trying to write stories that readers will enjoy and I assume the case is the same with everyone. So I would never make a comment to deliberately dishearten someone.

One thing I would like to applaud you for is you didn’t delete my comment because you didn’t like it but answered it. People commenting in Author’s Hangout (sorry for banging on about it) have said about writers deleting comments they don’t like and I’ve gathered it’s quite common. Although I’ve personally never deleted a comment I can understand if someone deletes a deliberately nasty comment. Nasty comments are like 1-bombs. The person who has done it never goes back to check. Although you will now have gathered I go back because if I don’t I don’t know if the writer has responded to my comment.

A long response but I thought it necessary. Whatever you do about any comments, or 1-bombs, don’t let it deter you from writing more stories.