Between Comfort and Compromise [Feedback]

[Chase]

Well. Have at me.

[GotWala]

Hmm, I really like the choice of first-person narration for this particular short story! Being able to see into the thoughts of Nona is very helpful for conveying the exact message that this writing is attempting to say.

As for that message, it is a very real one, if that makes sense. In fact, I would hazard to say that between comfort and compromise is exactly where every relationship is located, haha. The circumstances that surround our lives prevent us from having the perfect experience, so we must make do.

Anyways, I look forward to what comes next in any of your writing endeavors, Hilda!

[Amethyst]

All right, let's start with the purpose here. I don't know if you were writing to a specific style but given the length I'll assume traditional flash fiction. Now, the purpose... to me is not entirely clear. GotWala says it's a real message, but I don't see one. In fact, I don't think we even have a clear conflict or character arc here. Purpose aside, the conflict/character arc is somewhat universal, so let's start there.

So character arc is kind of important. By its very definition, a protagonist has to change throughout a story. The story is then a narrative frame for how that character changes. It doesn't have to be good, or bad, but it should be linked to the central conflict, and it should be tangible. The motivation and change of the character is what keeps a story interesting.

So how does Nona stack up? Well, in the first place in order to have clear growth, one has to have a clear starting point. We need to know who Nona is at the beginning of the story so that we can compare her to how she is at the end.

Nona's narration is very distant; she has to manually decide to smile. She thinks about how she's supposed to act rather than how she actually does. We see a character who is stuck inside her own head, and just about as detached from the world around her as a character can practically be. This is very well done for establishing this kind of character trait.

Now we get down to the line ...however, my eye doesn't catch my knight in shining armor on one knee. Once again, she is describing her senses rather than experiencing them as part of them, but this 'knight in shining armor' business... I can't tell if she's being facetious or what. On one hand, she consistently sounds pretty ambivalent to this guy, if not annoyed by him, by the Again near the start. After this line, I am completely confused as to how we're supposed to understand the relationship between her and David.

This upcoming line does little to help that:

I lied, flawlessly shelving my disappointment of there being a reservation ...or was I even upset at all? Whatever, my pain wasn't important at the moment..

So, on one hand she's disappointed enough to call it pain, but on the other she's not upset? This doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

Then end in the end, we have some kind of dawning moment that seems to break through Nona's complete and utter detachment. This has to be the emotional climax, when she realized the mother allowed the ring to be passed onto her. So ideally, it should be at this point that the character changes. For better, for worse, but it needs to be a visible change. What is the effect this episode had on this person's life?

I don't see anything clearly to answer that question right now, but if I had to pick something out I would say that it makes her a little bit less distant? On one hand the closing Touche is a fairly pointed and involved remark. That's the most energy we've seen her express in the entire writing, which for an ending note, is a good thing. On the other hand, we continue to see her distantly deliberating on her action in I had to allow him to ramble while I decided if I was really sorry for his loss. Contrast this against a slight rephrasing such as, "I allowed him to ramble as I decided if I was really sorry for his loss." In the first, she continues to act out of obligation-- nothing has changed. In the latter, she is acting clearly of herself.'

So in summation I don't think I can say we have a clear character arc. We start with a detached girl, with a questionable relationship, who has a revelation about this bitchy old woman... and then continues to be somewhat detached.

We can do better. Allow me to take some creative liberties here for the sake of example.

Let's say our goal is to make this a well-defined arc. We'll start with a girl who's distant. She'll get a ring indirectly from a woman who hated her, which will cause her to change to be more engaged with the world around her. I'm going to continue this critique operating under that as a presumed goal.

Now, as much as it is a result of the climax that changes the protagonist, the climax only occurs because of a certain conflict. Therefore the conflict needs to lead the character to that change. This works out nicely because conflict, along with liking a character, is the best way to get a reader involved in a story.

So here's our problem, and I alluded to it earlier: you don't actually introduce any tangible conflict until about a third of the way through your text's length. I would say the it isn't until the line ...however, my eye doesn't catch my knight in shining armor on one knee that we as readers actually know for a fact that something is wrong. We get the impression of it before from Nona's general attitude, but this is where it becomes clear.

...The thing is, if you wait until a third of the way in to introduce your conflict, you don't have as much time to develop it. More important, conflict is the hook. You need that conflict immediately to keep readers interested. On the internet most people won't read more than a sentence if they aren't immediately engaged. If you get into more traditional writing fields then it's a market necessity. You have to grab reads right away.

So let's look at your opening paragraph.

The rain hammered the adobe-styled dwelling continuously that Christmas Eve. It never was common for it to rain here in the first place, and when it did, it was usually just cause for dropping whatever the hell you were doing and running out into the middle of the street with your arms outstretched as if one was to embrace God in thanks. If I were spending the holiday alone, like I normally did, that's probably what I would have done too.

We get the rain, we get the day, we get a taste of the setting and culture, and we are told that the narrator is not alone when she usually is.

To be frank, none of these things are particularly commanding. In fact, the rain, and the common lack thereof may as well be completely worthless; they aren't relevant to the story after this. In flash fiction, every word counts; there's no room for useless details. Even in any fiction or writing, the same is true for the opening. Capture the reader immediately; you don't have time to waste describing running out into the street-- if that's important, which it doesn't seem to be-- then it can come later.

The take-away is this: Start with the conflict. It's your best chance for a hook. In this case, let's say that in a sentence you're able to pain the picture of a guy presenting a ring to a girl without proposing. Right there, we know something's weird. That's all it takes to make a conflict. If you start with that scene, you're going to be able string a whole lot more people along.

So we have an arc for structure, and we've set our conflict at the start and our reader is interested. Now that you've got them hooked, you can tease them a bit. Step back and give them whatever exposition is necessary. I still would not include the details about the rain or standing in it. They don't benefit the story, but this is where you put the things they need to know. For instance, you might introduce it as Christmas Eve still (which, by the way, does not actually seem like a good choice either-- proposing on Christmas Eve may be cute and all but it subverts the intensity of the situation. Getting a felt box on Christmas could still be just a Christmas present; getting a felt box on September 26th or whatever has a lot more immediate pressure to it) or describe the revelation of the said box leading up to the point of the opening disconnect.

Or, even better, trail into some story about David's mom immediately. Let's take a look at your apparent climax.

"No Nona, There's nothing I want more in this world than to spend the rest of my life with you...It's just...I didn't buy the ring....It was given to me by my mother...who...died this morning...."

David's mother lived a very a rugged life. Drank, smoked, cursed, beat the living tar out of the man when he was a kid. She definitely fit the bill of the "evil in-law" that I wasn't sure I wanted with how many insults she hurled at me. All the same, it was David's mother's ring... A woman that hated my guts allowed him to use her very own engagement ring to propose...to me...

So David drops this huge bomb that OH this person just died this morning WOW.

For one thing I question why he continues to choose that day to propose. That seems a little odd.

More importantly, so he drops this bomb, and then the action comes to a screeching halt as you have to stop the action and explain what kind of mess the mother was. This is a huge speed bump in your mood.

So now we have a convenient solution. So you have a window to provide your exposition in, and you have exposition that needs to be provided. Let us learn about the mother well before we need to. Put that gun on the table so we can fire it later. Let the tension in the story develop so that we as an audience feel this looming threat of the mother's disdain throughout the text so that, when we learn she's dead, we at once celebrate with Nona, and are taken aback that she would do something that we've come to learn is clearly out of character with her.

At that point, this moment will feel impactful enough that we believe it changes Nona. Follow through and show us that change, and then this will feel like a cohesive narrative and worthwhile story. There is a bit more I could say, but the least, there are some key points to keep this, or any future work, on task and it is important to iron out the structure before building in the details.

[Chase]

Now that I've thoroughly been exposed, I suppose I should give the whole purpose of the work in some sort of organized detail.

- I don't usually write flash fiction, and it's been a considerable amount of time (years) since I've illustrated any kind of fiction work at all. This work was also not put through the typical writing process, and I was absolutely not equipped with any sort of plan. I woke up, and regurgitated the words as they hit my brain. I wasn't expecting a work that made much sense at all, and when I finished it, I was satisfied not with my output, but with the scenario having some semblence of story quality. If I were to pay 100 percent more attention to detail, plan beforehand, and check the progression of my story multiple times, I -know- I can do better.

- Nona is a character that I intentionally decided to remain "distant". Ame, after reading and re-reading several of your points, I get the feeling that I did so in a manner that wasn't satisfying from a reader's perspective, and as a writer, I can assure you that many things about the story -at this point- are not up to snuff on my own end, but it seems you as a reader expected this story to make some sort of progress - in the form of character development. This largely didn't occur because I didn't want Nona to change. I can definitely see a reader being disappointed if they hold that expectation. I was going for sheer suspense, I ended on the pointed phrase "Touche..." not because I wanted her to show a little bit of her personality, but because it felt like the perfect cliffhanger to me. There were several other things that made the story hard to follow in your case, and that certainly detracts from the effect of a sudden ending with no resolution, because I didn't do a good job of throwing the reader a bone beforehand. I just don't think I had to make Nona into an epic hero or give her character a climax or pivot in the process, as well as I really didn't want to, regardless of it helping the work as a whole.

- GotWala, I think you may have read a little too much into it, as opposed to Ame struggling to understand it much at all. There wasn't a moral to the story. I just woke up and threw whatever was on my heart on the page. Don't be afraid to lay any qualms on me either, but thank you for your praise.

[Commander]

(Looks at Ame's comment) I never knew anyone could write criticism longer than me.

I guess I stand in the middle on this one. It's not bad, but I just couldn't get into it kind of like Ame. Thank you for posting that comment because I had a feeling it was something like Flash Fiction the moment I read it. Probably my biggest gripe would be that it isn't fleshed out enough and just kind of halted. I'm not going to go super detail like Amethyst did, but there really wasn't much of a conflict, or at least one that felt resolved. Guess I'm one of those people who don't like stories that leave you on a cliff hanger.

[Chase]

Sorry to disappoint, but a lack of resolution was definitely something I was going for as an author, Commander. Thanks for stopping by and speaking up though! I appreciate it.

[GotWala]

Oh, I see! I always end up trying to find something like that, haha. But I feel that even if there isn't a moral of the story, I'll usually try to think of one for the sake of growing from an experience.

I'll also admit that I'm somewhat "useless" as a critic since I have a hard time telling people what I don't like about their work. I know that's what I'm supposed to do in order to help them grow, but I don't consider myself worthy of making those statements.

That's enough about me; this is your feedback thread after all, haha! I really like how Ame pointed out the idea of Chekov's Gun(?). Basically, the practice to have no unnecessary elements within a story, which goes double for shorts. I think that brevity of the piece and the lack of words to convey this story may have led to some of the confusion on the part of character development. While I think that character development might not be necessary for a single chapter of a story, there needs to be something within a short, having less time means the dynamic change has to be prevalent if one is to get readers attached to the struggles of the characters. Now let's say you didn't want to develop Nona beyond her detachment; well, that would be entirely possible, but we' first need to explore the rest of hers and David's characters first. With the removal of unnecessary elements like Ame suggested, you could actually have more room for the important details such as the significance behind the ring (Which also could use that adjusted emotional timing) and maybe more of David's shortcomings as a partner for Nona. Perhaps the ending could've been something involving Nona showing us, the reader, just why she was even committed to David long enough to get to this point. In other words, what part of Nona, while detached, still received something from David.

While it's rather unfortunate that you can't cover an entire character arc all within such a short time, the goal is to cram as much of that detail and dynamic change in there as possible. I think the story of Nona and David might be better suited for a longer work if their changes are meant to be slow like you said. This was still enjoyable for me to read, and I can only ask that you consider our criticisms. After that, you can do with them what you will, haha.