• Opening line: okay. Gives me a conflicted portrait of the narrator, in a believable way. It’s the next line that does the conceptual heavy lifting with regard to the premise.
  
• Little bit of “As you know” going on here.
  
• PRESENT TENSE AAAA I knew I forgot to ban something.
  
• Weed and refuse (poo poo), of course; goons will be goons.
  
• Yes you can’t make up this stuff where everything’s easy for me and we gloss over the fun details I swear.
  
• Why does a fully automated ship need a galley?
  
• Drugs, poo poo, sex slavery, unhealthy eating habits; this story has it all.
  
• Your crime isn’t fun, your setting doesn’t pop, and I’m not smiling.
  
• Your protagonist largely succeeds because everyone else around him is incompetent, which is seldom satisfying to read.
  
• RANKING: Low

• Opening line: functional, but workmanlike. Least I know you’re taking your flash rule seriously. In a vacuum though, this does tell us something pretty important about two of our characters.
  
• ...And our narrator, whose very detached from the proceedings. Worrisome start.
  
• ...Ah, one of those superior to their surroundings types. Prospects grim.
  
• Sex exploitation and defensive vomiting, we are just cruising along.
  
• Thanks for throwing in some last minute detail on that casino after spending the whole story in a dingy office with an unwashed man; a casino that’s both noisy AND loud? It’s like I’m really there.
  
• A thing happened, the end. I hate this kind of thing.
  
• Your crime isn’t fun, your setting doesn’t pop, and I’m not smiling.
  
• Your protagonist is unengaging and uninteresting. Greg is the only person in this story with any real personality and he’s a overbearing gremlin, the type of which are a dime a dozen.
  
• Your flash rule gets only the bare minimum amount of lip service but you don’t do anything interesting with it.
  
• RANKING: Low

• Opening line: pretty okay! Delivers an immediate premise that catches my attention and suggests the character of the speaker, a Miss Oakfield. An older woman, I’m assuming.
  
• The following bit gives some nice follow-up, though the dialogue is a bit stale. We’ve got a pair, our protagonist, and they’re in over their head, whatever it is they’re up to. The first aside was really more than enough to clue us in though; the rest are frivolous.
  
• Loyalty, loyalty.
  
• Gaudy, in a good way. I know where we are at least (take note, previous submitters).
  
• Hmm okay so it’s a mystery in the center of her mind. Not sure what this means for the legitimacy of the mystery since this is likely all an allegory, but we’ll see where this goes.
  
• KNOX’S THIRD, DIE THE DEATH, GREAT EQUALIZER IS THE DEATH
  
• Gross crown bro.
  
• “And then there was lights.”
  
• The dialogue in general is not very strong in this piece.
  
• To the Moon AF
  
• Your crime was confusing, your setting popped, and I’m not smiling, but I’m not frowning either.
  
• Your protagonist, Elizabeth, gets the most love here (literally and figuratively). The thieves are fleeting specters, and inserting their backstory in this way does more to hurt than help.
  
• You kinda write around your flash rule by making everything a metaphor, but whatevs.
  
• RANKING: Low

• Opening line: functional. Lays out the board, sets the mood, puts some description in there.
  
• A little telly, but there’s some good character work here. I know who everyone is and what they’re after, and how they mean to get it.
  
• Who’s Marcel?
  
• Had to google “Cosh.” Could’ve just said club.
  
• Also I gotta be honest I keep reading Beatrica’s name as Beatrice. It’s a bit of a distracting change.
  
• Ha ha okay that was a fun little romp. A mite confusing at points, but I got the jist.
  
• Good use of the flash rule, though it’s a little less clever without foreshadowing - unless I need to reread the piece again
  
• Who’s Marcel!?!?
  
• Ending is mostly satisfying but feels a little rushed. It’s obviously supposed to be a conclusion and not a continuation, but it raises certain questions about the back-half of the job.
• Additionally, Beatrica selling off the tower for scrap kinda dampens the feel-good nature of the crime since it makes her a bit more self-serving.
  
• Your crime was mostly feel-good (take that Japan, but poor France), your setting popped, and I’m smiling.
  
• Beatrice and Seamus were a fun pair, and basically the protagonists. Some confusing blocking, a too-quick ending, and a few nitpicks keep this from being a cleaner sweep.
  
• RANKING: Mid-High

• Opening line: pretty good. We’ve already got a personality for our narrator, a relationship, and a tone.
  
• If you’re gonna “Tell, don’t show,” this is the right way to do it. I feel like the narrator is telling me a story, like I’m at his place and we’re chatting and he’s going on about that one time the way real people sometimes do.
  
• I like that your protagonist has a life outside of crime, but also that his family’s in on it. The small town, small business husband-and-wife dynamic adds a mildly hilarious yet wholesome air to the whole affair.
  
• On that note, having your protagonist turn down the job to prioritize his employees and customers is was a great way to signal he’s a criminal, sure, but not a scumbag.
  
• Good use of the flash rule, respect.
  
• Solid ending. The whole thing’s a little low-stakes, but deliberately so, and it works. Likewise, the setting doesn’t exactly “Pop,” but it wafts into view and lingers, which for this story is just as good.
  
• Your crime was feel-good, your setting popped (in spirit), and I’m smiling.
  
• I would read more of this guy’s low-key adventurers, or a sequel where he meets the Swan for real. For that matter, you do a good job characterizing the Swan, who only ever actually appears in the margins.
  
• RANKING: High

• Opening line: functional, but a bit generic. It tells us something about the speaker though, so that’s cool.
  
• Fields of what now?
  
• Alright, I’ve got a good sense for your protagonist. The yellow suit’s a nice touch. I understand why he speaks the way he does, though at the same time - as a reader - it’s a bit irksome.
  
• Your knock-off Ministry of Information has a very Seussian vibe to it; not that I’m complaining.
  
• Spending a lot of time on the particulars of this bulb-car I don’t really care about.
  
• Some lip-service toward the guards being armed. Hope it’s relevant.
  
• A single long hair!
  
• “Archaic writing implement.” It’s okay for your character to talk like this, but having the narrator talk like this is a bit weird. Just say it’s a pen or a quill or whatever it is.
  
• Laslo’s a bit...dramatic.
  
• I guess everyone in this story’s a bit dramatic. And metatextual. Hmm.
  
• Laslo’s risking a fair bit more than the story seems to want us to think he is.
  
• Getting a lot of info just now that would’ve been nicer earlier in the story as build-up. The mystery doesn’t serve you well here. The whole heist comes off as high-stakes, but faceless. Why was this a secret in the first place? Who benefits from keeping it secret?
  
• Your crime was whatever, your setting popped, and I’m not sure how to feel.
  
• The hardest part of your protagonist’s job was already taken care of off-screen, which makes the whole caper feel very low-risk, low-effort. Even the token resistance of his enemies feel empty and lacking.
  
• You scratch at the flash rule without really grasping it. Your protagonist comes off less like a pacifist and more like someone who just prefers to manipulate people, and the bad guys are armed to the pinky. He does announce his crime, but to no real effect.
  
• RANKING: Low

• Opening line: getting right into the action, okay.
  
• Prose, thy name is purple-ish.
  
• “The rogue spun a high kick into the officer’s right hand,” yeah, but who’s who?
  
• Bad guy doesn’t waste any time establishing he’s the bad guy, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
  
• The two characters introducing themselves “Off-screen,” as it were, is super telly and doesn’t gel well with how this story’s going so far.
  
• And then you keep doing it. Ain’t a great look, man.
  
• Dude check out where they clipped me.
  
• Is he an admiral or a captain? I know the guy in charge of the ship is always the captain, but still…
  
• Ah, the old “Hero has a secret solution to the problem he never shared with anyone, least of all the viewers” trick.
  
• Your crime was feel-good insofar as the goal was noble and the victim deserved it, the setting didn’t really pop, and I’m not smiling.
  
• Your protagonist’s kind of a generic plucky rogue with nothing especially interesting about him, much like the generic ship he finds himself on that you don’t bother to describe much cause it’s pretty much like any ship you can imagine.
  
• The flash rule’s here so I guess you’ve got that going for you at least.
  
• RANKING: Low

• Opening line: ha ha, okay, I like this. I have no idea what’s going on yet, but the mere concept is intriguing by itself.
  Patently charming beginning.
  
• The overall direction of this story is a little vague, but I know who our protagonists are, what they’re looking for (in broad terms), and why they want it, so that’s good.
  
• Like the rest of the story, the Heap is both vague yet distinct. This might be a problem.
  
• I like the twist where the narrator, one would assume the de facto expert, has an area of weakness his companion has to compensate for. Characterizes both of them and makes the team more meaningful.
  
• Feels like it took awhile to get our narrator’s name.
  
• You hinted at the narrator not having legs earlier (“She still had her legs”), and confirm it here, but somehow I wish you’d been a bit more forthright about it.
  
• Also around here’s where the vagueness starts to run a bit dry with the old man. Before it felt like you were trying to leave more to the imagination, but here it feels more like a bare minimalist school play.
  
• Confusing dialogue attribution.
  
• Wait, they’re leaving? What did they find that was worth a healer’s services?
  
• And the problem solves itself; meh.
  
• Your “Crime” was feel-good, your setting popped, but I’m not smiling.
  
• Your protagonists are charming and there’s something appealing about the bizarre world they inhabit, but it doesn’t amount to much in this story. You sacrificed a lot of potential flavor, I think, trying to facilitate the story’s completion within the allotted word count, when you could’ve start started a little bit closer to the ending (maybe right when they arrive at the Heap) and added a few more personal touches.
  
• Flash rule is there and functional, but not much else to say about it.
  
• RANKING: Mid

• Opening line: short and snappy. Functional, but actually better than that implies.
  
• Alright, we’ve got our key players introduced in quick succession, and probably the most well-defined setting thus far this week in terms of sheer “Pop.” I’m down.
  
• “She took a few steps...her target.” This sentence is wonky and feels clipped.
  
• I’m not sure exactly what’s going on, but that’s okay. I mean, I know it’s a wedding ceremony of some kind, but there’s clearly more going on. To put it in movie terms, this is the scene following the bit where someone has a plan they don’t elaborate on, and now we the audience get to see how that plan unfolds. It’s a good feeling.
  
• Functional bit of backstory here. There might have been a better way to drop it in, but this is fine.
  
• “Looked at her a bittersweet smile.”
  
• I accept that magic is part and parcel of this universe, but the phrase “Counter-spell” still seems video gamey.
  
• We anime now.
  
• ...Well that was easy.
  
• Jack kinda feels superfluous here. He basically exists to open a lock and dress Carmen’s wound at the end. Carmen and Wendy are both fuller characters.
  
• Alright, all’s well that ends well.
  
• Your crime was pretty feel-good (if, ultimately, a bit to easy), your setting popped, and I’m smiling.
  
• Excellent job reading into your flash rule, by the by. This is more-or-less exactly the sort of thing I was hoping for.
  
• RANKING: High

• Opening line: wordy, but sets a tone and half a scene.
  
• Might just be the time of day on my end (late), but am I reading this right? Preparing for three years in this country for a thing they didn’t know would happen in this country until this year?
  
• Your three protagonists feel kinda...bland?
  
• Confusing dialogue attribution, and the dialogue ain’t great either.
  
• Lots of telling.
  
• Fighting as a distraction’s a nice touch, but it feels a bit limp.
  
• Ah, fighting, language, I see where this is going. Dad tricks will save the day.
  
• Yep (though “Snakes only” is a hilarious aside).
  
• It’s weird to have a narrator who’s a character in the story, then jump to another character with an omniscient narrator backing them up.
  
• And they get the thing...for whatever reason they needed or wanted.
  
• Your crime was a crime, your setting feels forgotten, and I’m not smiling.
  
• I like your use the flash rule, Bertrand’s impressive skills falling by the wayside as his more modest abilities save the day, but beyond that this piece is just plain kinda dull. I don’t really care about anyone or why anything is happening.
  
• RANKING: Low-Mid

• Opening line: functional. Puts us in the action.
  
• Chaavi, Chhavi
  
• Gonna need to know more about this Diamond Plague before I can evaluate how much of a problem it is. Similarly, you kinda just casually mention your protagonist catching it off-world, which is a heck of a detail to just throw out there into the cold open.
  
• Your protagonist gets lucky, then unlucky, then the story ends.
  
• I get she’s got some kind of crystalline growth, but shouldn’t that be obvious to other folks? Less of a tell, more of a condition. Not sure why she folded, unless she showed her cards.
  
• No real crime (feel-good or otherwise), setting doesn’t pop (really this could be anyone’s space casino), and I’m not smiling.
  
• Competently written, for the most part, but feels like only part of a story, and Chhavi’s not really interesting enough for me to care what happens next.
  
• RANKING: Low-Mid

• Opening line: some respectable set-dressing.
  
• Okay I like these losers, though I’ve only met half of them. Narrator’s pretty matter-of-fact, but with a knowing tone that fits. Hopefully we get to meet the other guys soon.
  
• Consider your setting well and truly “Popping.”
  
• The paragraph where you describe Leonard’s many treasures could probably have used another scan before submitting.
  
• Nice introduction for the inspector.
  
• Okay, I really like this setup where his long-time rival is here, but not for him, but she’s still a problem, but he’s also seeing her as a person (perhaps for the first time), and then she hits the button. It’s all very good.
  
• You do a lot with a little, regarding your protagonist’s accomplices. They’re bit parts, but they play them fittingly.
  
• I kinda don’t like how the plan basically goes off without a hitch once the button gets pressed. Yeah, the inspector offers some token resistance, but it’s quickly swept by. This is a strong piece that largely deflates with how easy the ending is.
  
• Your crime was feel-good, your setting popped, and I’m nodding appreciative after almost smiling a few times.
  
• Everything’s groovy up until the lights go out. I could see another version of this story with a modified last act winning handily; but this iteration? I’ll need to think about it.
  
• RANKING: High

• Opening: killer, though I’ve never liked the use of # in prose.
  
• Your protagonist’s casual exasperation sets a good tone and voice for the piece, but it’s also a tone that feels very familiar coming from you. I know what to expect, I think, and that’s both good and bad.
  
• There’s a fair bit of background information here, but again, you ease into it by virtue of the delivery. Now that everything’s on the table though, we need to get to the action.
  
• Hmm, well, that makes things simpler.
  
• Everything seems way too easy, unless you’ve got one heck of a curveball on deck.
  
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqZMlSZzUu8
  
• Yeah, so, no real curveball except for something that made an already easy job even easier. Yawn. The tone kinda bottoms out here as well. Once you get past the initial concept of an interdimensional switcheroo, there’s not a whole lot of meat to this story, or to anyone (or anything) in any of the universes featured.
  
• Your crime was decidedly neutral, your setting was...an ambiguous palace and some guy’s office, I guess? If you haven’t guessed, I’m not really smiling.
  
• Competent prose, but your story’s pretty hollow. I’ll admit I gave you a real humdinger of a flash rule, which you more or less did justice, but the story and characters still aren’t that interesting or captivating.
  
• RANKING: Low-Mid

• Opening line: action-packed, not bad.
  
• “I thought I had heard a shatter I traded paint,” what?
  
• I wouldn’t be sure, what?
  
• Your first few paragraphs feel a bit...faceless? You have a narrator who’s doing things, feeling things, and has a reason for being there (being a gin-runner), but it comes off as kinda distant.
• You focus on the particulars of the car chase itself but I don’t feel invested since I don’t know enough about the people - even though you are trying to tell us something about the people.
  
• See, now we’ve got dialogue, now we’re getting to know these people.
  
• I can kinda believe these guy’s friendship, even as adversaries, but something feels like it’s missing. I can’t put my finger on it.
  
• More blow-by-blow car shenanigans. My eyes are kinda sliding down the page, honestly. Prose isn’t a great medium for trying to convey an extended range of motion. If you’re gonna have fight scenes or chase scenes, you wanna keep ‘em short and snappy. The particulars of the characters are always going to be more interesting than the particulars of the action they’re performing.
  
• Assuming this is America, Prohibition ended in 1933. We had TVs then, but not in the same form we’d have TVs later when they exploded in popularity after WWII. Radios would’ve been more common then. It wouldn’t have been impossible for a restaurant to have a TV, but it’s odd enough that I stopped reading your story to double-check whether or not they would. Obviously if this isn’t America, you can disregard all this, but it’s one of those little details that’s gonna make a lot of people stop and go “Wait, did we have TVs then?” On a rewrite it’d be better to go with a radio…
  
• ...except then you’re kinda sorta doing that thing where the radio/TV/news ticker immediately starts harping on about whatever it is the protagonists are talking about, thinking about, looking into it, and it feels a bit convenient. Might’ve just been better to have the narrator say “I heard-
  
• More driving, ho-hum
  
• It was a setup...a practice setup! Yeah, that kinda sucks the wind out of a lot of this story.
  
• No crime was committed, if I understand this correctly, the setting is a modestly defined restaurant and a bunch of big city streets, and I’m not smiling.
  
• Feels like you were trying to be a bit clever here, in the name of incorporating your flash rule, but the cleverness backfires in this case. Your car chase reads like a lot of stage direction.
  Your human interactions are a little better, but mostly passable. Give this one another shot, chief.
  
• RANKING: Low-Mid

• Opening line: Hoke Remington is a badass name and the juxtaposition of this dude doing cool stuff while some kid is whining at him is quietly hilarious.
  
• “Puh-lease, Uncle Hoke,” ugh, I can hear it.
  
• I don’t usually mind when the narrator speaks to the reader but I kinda mind it here.
  
• You’ve done a good enough job showing me this guy isn’t good with kids that calling attention to it (twice) feels weirdly distracting.
  
• Ha ha okay this might be my favorite “Treasure” this week.
  
• It’s, uh, Winnie the Pooh, friendo.
  
• Okay the woman holding the turkey got a solid, audible chuckle out of me.
  
• Cherube.
  
• Wait so he was in it for the money, then he wasn’t? Also, dude concinved those kids to give him what he wanted way too easily. Lots of criminals this week just getting their way, though here it’s at least balanced by everything he had to endure up to this point.
  
• The revival thing’s an interesting John Carpenter-esque last-minute twist, but it raises a few questions about Hoke’s motivations that don’t go down easy.
  
• Also he left the kids behind holding the bag, 0/10 babysitting.
  
• Your crime was feel-good, your setting was iconic enough, but that ending dampened my smile a bit.
  
• I like stories where there’s one character who’s essentially the only sane man surrounded by a bunch of ridiculousness, and you delivered on that front. I just wish you’d hit a home run instead of a three-baser with the ending.
  
• RANKING: Mid-High

• Opening line: Bulwer-Lytton presents…
  
• For real though, you communicate a fair bit here, including a certain tongue-in-cheek pulp sensibility, so it mostly works.
  
• That’s the second fist-sized ruby of the week.
  
• Yeah, definitely playing up the pulp here, though I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop.
  
• ...Okay, yes, that would be a shoe. The hunter has become the hunted.
  
• Honestly the best thing about Lightning Jack is how unfazed he is by this whole turn of events.
  
• Not a bad scrape, though I’m left feeling a little unsatisfied. That’s it? It’s not a story where a thing happens, the end, but it’s not far from one either. If you’d toxxed and spun this story a little longer, I could see it hanging with the big boys.
  
• Your crime was feel-good, your setting popped, and I kinda get it.
  
• What I will say say is I can tell you had a lot of fun writing this, and I wish a few more authors this week had your enthusiasm. Unfortunately, the story itself is just okay.
  
• RANKING: Mid

• Opening line: I like this line because it starts off mundane only to end with a little lemon twist. In this case we have a time-period established, but also something that clearly breaks with that period. It’s nice.
  
• I like this setup, but now I’m not sure why the carriage is unfolding like this. I had to go back to see if I missed anything, and I don’t think I did, but now I’m not sure why this is happening - why this conversation couldn’t just happen in a regular train car.
  
• Okay now I get it.
  
• That said, considering this is between WWI and WWII, this Dragon dude must have some major league clout to have the entirely of the Japanese Greater East-Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere eating out of his hand. I’m not sure if I can quite believe that level of power from a single crime lord.
  
• I like this little seated action scene.
  
• A bit showy at the end for an allegedly secret operation.
  
• Also if she had a convincing fake why didn’t she just give them the fake. I’m also not sure why ‘Henry’ doesn’t ask for the gem back either. America and Japan aren’t exactly chummy at this particular time in history.
  
• Your crime was feel-good, your setting popped, and I’m smiling...but a little confused.
  
• Your characters all have a nice air of confidence about them, and it really makes this click as a kind of larger-than-life heist with the fate of nations on the line.
  
• RANKING: Mid-High

• Opening line: functional, but surprisingly robust. Gives us an immediate sense of time and place and what’s about.
  
• Very cozy so far, light and airy, snack-sized.
  
• And there’s the pitch...halfway through the story. Oh dear.
  
• Though this sort of clash usually bothers me, I like how your villain breaks the charming, light-hearted mood of the piece.
  
• “Yeah, my enzymes are going to be all over you,” kinda clashes with the rest of the piece.
  
• Another ultimately easy crime. Positive feelings abound, but I’d hoped to see Jeannine have to figure something out. The skills described in her flashrule don’t ever really come into play either, beyond giving her an excuse to meet the mark.
  
• Your crime was feel-good, your setting expressed itself humbly, but I’m not smiling.
  
• I described your story as snack-sized and, really, that’s kind of all it is. A snack between meals.
  
• RANKING: Low-Mid

• Opening line: good. Introduces the protagonist, the antagonist (presumably), sets the scene, and gives us an action to focus on.
  
• And just like that, you’ve neatly laid out the backstory, the stakes, the presence of magic (or something like it); this is a very well-compartmentalized story.
  
• Ha ha her so it’s that kind of setup. Good use of the rule.
  
• The mundane family drama does a lot to elevate this piece, and of course Robin’s useless. It’s a bit cliche, but it’s almost the better for it since everything else is so extraordinary.
  
• I like that Puck seems more upset about being replaced (by a centaur) than by the potential loss of his treasure.
  
• Pretty good ending too, sans the typo, though the escape being so easy deflates it.
  
• Your crime was feel-good, your setting, hmm, well, parts of it popped - all the fairy stuff; Puck’s place was kinda just there - and I was smiling.
  
• Your protagonist is likable, their problem is both fantastical and painfully normal (again, good use of the rule), and the whole thing is just generally well polished. Most of my problems are nitpicks, though at the same time this is well-worn ground.
  
• RANKING: High

• Opening line: a bunch of gobbledygook. What’s more, a bunch of gobbledygook in need of proofreading.
  
• [Don’t] do this. [Never] do this outside of research papers and the like.
  
• Purple, purple everywhere.
  
• Ellipses...I see…
  
• I forget who it was who said “Readers tend to look for people,” but it’s true. You could’ve skipped the first three paragraphs entirely and started with Poltrot.
  
• Some pretty low-key tyranny here.
  
• This dialogue is pretty clunky. These names are too.
  
• Armendariz is the name of my Red Mage on the Yggdrasil server.
  
• You “Use” a lot of “Unnecessary” quotation marks.
  
• For a guy who is active on the scene, Armendariz sure doesn’t feel like a character.
  
• A lot of this reads like someone trying to emulate Shakespeare based on hearsay.
  
• And it just ends in what feels like the middle of the story. I can’t say this was particularly satisfying.
  
• Your crime wasn’t feel-good (we didn’t even get to see it happen), your setting gets forgotten, and I’m not smiling.
  
• I can’t say I really have a strong impression of anyone or anything in this story. They’re just all there, doing things.
  
• RANKING: Low

DreamingofRoses fucked around with this message at 18:05 on Feb 3, 2018