Not Quite Right features discussions that are unfiltered and uncensored,
and may include themes that are inappropriate for younger listeners.
Also, I swear a lot.
Something doesn't seem quite right.
Welcome to Not Quite right.
My names Ed and I'm Amanda.
We're back ******* with our third Daredevil for the April round of the Not
Quite Right prize.
And Daredevils are people who have signed up to be our little playthings for the
episode to have their stories critiqued on the air.
So we will read the story, we'll talk about the story,
and hopefully all learn something in the process.
Sounds good.
Now I feel like we need to start renaming our rounds of the competition because
it's like it's not April anymore.
Do you know what I mean?
Gets a little confusing.
Well, now I'm confused because it is the April
round.
What?
No, but it's been a long time since April.
It has been what I'm trying to say.
April.
Yeah.
It would be more confusing, I feel, if we changed the name of the round
halfway through the round.
Anyway, that's a subject for another day.
Today's brave daredevil is Andy Blakely Sterling.
And Andy's actually extra brave because it's his first time entering the not
quite right prize and first time being a daredevil.
And Andy is writing for Team Ed this round.
And big mistake.
And my team's prompts were the word disco, the action of freaking out.
And your story must include a disco dancing move.
So this is our first taste of Andy's writing.
So let's get straight into it, shall we?
Sounds good.
I'll be doing the reading.
So here is Metamorphosis by Andy Blakely Sterling.
I always thought Kafka was a bit dramatic, but I get it now.
I poke my belly with a white tipped paw to confirm that I'm not dreaming and I am
in fact, now a house cat.
I remember stressing about my master's thesis and making rent to stay with my
best friend in the city, wishing life was simpler.
Microeconomic research could wait.
My advisor could stop complaining about my flamboyant style,
distracting scholars even for a little while.
I remember enjoying the Daydream.
I do not remember wishing to become a cat.
Squirming in my spot on the couch I see 4 paws with a swipe of one.
I've confirmed cat ears.
I curl forward more flexible than I was before and check my parts.
It's weird to be furry everywhere, but I'm still a guy or male I guess.
This is either the craziest dream or my life is ******.
The door opening in the Jingle of keys interrupt my thoughts.
Caleb, are you home?
I know we said we'd cut back, but I really need Thai tonight.
Dean yells from the kitchenette.
I freeze, unsure what to do.
He'll worry if he thinks I'm missing.
We've looked out for each other since we were 12.
Being the only two gay boys in school is a bonding experience.
Caleb, I see your keys and I've had too much
work drama today for a prank right now.
Just come out, please.
Dean's tone sounds stressed and my heart breaks for how much worse it's about to
get.
Meow is all that comes out when I try for words after landing on the floor closer
to him.
What the ****?
Dean practically leaps off the floor in shock and spills his bag of Muesli all
over the floor.
He backs away in panic.
I rush forward to trace my paw in the mess.
I manage a high D before he comes up back to shoo me off the food and I pray he
sees my genius.
Wait, you know my name?
Dean looks at me in shock and I nod my furry little head.
Holy **** Caleb.
He half stutters in shock.
I nod again.
I can't believe this.
You can't be Caleb, you're a cat.
He shakes his head in disbelief.
I think of the only thing Dean would know that only I know to prove myself.
With a huff, I stand up on my hind legs and start.
2 paw claps a turn 2 disco finger points, then leave up my one paw for the high 5.
He stares, eyes filling with tears and laughs.
**** Caleb, I can't believe you remember that stupid
handshake.
It's almost less believable than you being a cat.
He scoops me in a tight hug and talks into my fur.
We'll figure it out, OK?
I purr in relief.
He leans back to give me a smirk.
Actually, your career outlook might be better now.
We'll cover rent with YouTube.
So thank you, Andy, for your story.
And Andy hasn't left us a message, but he has sent us an email.
So I'll read that now.
All right, for reasons I don't understand but my
high school teacher would love.
When I read the freaking out prompt, I immediately thought of Kafka.
Unfortunately, I couldn't stop thinking about Kafka,
so I had to abandon any ideas for break dancing and hustle.
I usually like to play with humour in my writing rather than pure trauma **** so I
ran with the idea of what if Metamorphosis wasn't a depressing story
of strife and isolation, but instead somehow it turned out OK.
And what creature somehow works with disco?
Naturally this is what came out, so I'm sorry or you're welcome depending
on how you like it.
I'm definitely a bit more sorry about the title,
but it seemed to match the absurdity and made me laugh so it stuck.
I would love your thoughts on if the human lands well and also if it places
well with the overall story.
Would also love to hear if you felt the emotional impact and story arc flowed
through clearly in the short word count.
Thank you.
Cheers, Andy.
Well, thank you, Andy.
I'm interested in what the connection this is.
Maybe something I'm missing, but what's the connection between a cat
and disco?
When I think about disco, I think disco duck.
OK, well both of those are new to me.
So the song disco, duck, disco.
No, I don't.
The song disco duck.
Am I hallucinating that?
I'm not sure I'd associate any animals in particular.
Maybe like a cool cat.
Like a cool.
OK, All right.
That's more a jazz thing, though.
Yeah.
I don't know.
Interesting to research that one.
And so, yeah, Kafka's metamorphosis ends with the
protagonist dying and everyone being really happy about it.
So this was a different ending, much happier ending than that.
So I think you've you succeeded in that goal.
Andy, this is the answer to the question.
Would you still love me if I were a cat?
Yeah, exactly.
And Dean doesn't even bat an eyelid in this story.
Oh, he bats an eyelid.
He bats an eyelid, then he and then he bats an eyelid.
You know what I'm saying?
MMM.
He's into it.
So seeing as you mentioned the title, Andy, let's cover that first.
And the title is Metamor for Sis with a couple of hyphens in there.
And I actually think that's a great title.
Yeah, it works.
It references the story, obviously gives it A twist, It's relevant,
fits the tone.
I think it actually ticks all the boxes.
Yeah.
And you know, I get what you're saying.
It's a like, it's a bit of a pun, but it's fun and it works and the stories
like that.
So it fits exactly.
Yeah.
So before we get into the words of the story, let's just talk about higher level,
the concept and our thoughts around that.
What do you think, Amanda?
Yeah.
So I, I love it.
I mean, I love the fun idea.
I love that you've gone with what was sort of playing on your mind and run with
that.
And I like the idea that you were trying to challenge, you know,
the ending of Metamorphosis, give something positive and of course,
hear it not quite right.
We do appreciate both humour and trauma **** and both are more than welcome in
this competition.
So I do feel like you need to write what you want to write and that's really
important and we're here to receive that, whatever that might be.
And so all of that's great.
Now I do have a challenge though, which is that I felt like there was a few
confused ideas here in this story and that for me,
there wasn't kind of 1 cohesive sort of theme or point that our attention was
being drawn to.
So we have this idea of metamorphosis, we have this idea of turning into a cat
instead, and of course cats being quite joyful and
that being, you know, a joyful version of metamorphosis,
which I love as a concept.
But then we have some other stuff going on in here that I guess for me,
started taking me down these other little paths and I wasn't quite sure where the
story was headed.
So it's a student who's talking about his microeconomic research being too
flamboyant, you know, at uni or wherever it might be,
who suddenly finds themselves as a cat.
Now that's the setup and that's fine.
But that doesn't really ever get paid off that detail.
So we're, we're given this very specific detail of
microeconomic research, but it's not sort of really paid off at
any point in the story.
Later we have of course, this relationship that's going on.
We have Caleb coming home and wanting Thai food,
like at that sort of casual thing of your partner coming home and and whatnot.
And then we have this random disco handshake,
disco themed handshake between them, which is I guess the proof that Caleb is
the cat.
And then ending on that note of the career being on YouTube instead of
presumably microeconomic research.
So that's kind of the thread of the story.
And while that's fine and follows a line thematically,
I'm not really sure what we're supposed to take from that.
It's sort of just here and there and these things are happening and I'm not
really sure what the pivotal moment or like, let's be blunt,
I'm not sure what the point of the story is apart from just entertainment,
which is fine.
I think the the idea of him struggling with his position as a student and what
his future looks like, it is paid off in a way that the final
line takes us to a point of, well, we have an alternative career.
But I will, I will agree that these themes that run
through it and these ideas maybe do need a little bit more fleshing out for them
all to really point the reader in the same direction, as you say.
So we get to the end and we are like satisfied on all of the lions.
And that's what I think I'm talking about.
If you go back to, you know, my best friend Poe and what have you.
And but also just this idea of threads, of a story,
weaving all the threads together into one piece.
Now at the moment we have a story, but there's a few things going on and
they're not necessarily building towards a climactic moment.
And I think they can.
So the YouTube thing at the end I think is fabulous actually.
And I think that does pay off the opening of the story and does give us that
satisfying kind of loop where we've now arrived at somewhere better.
And I think it's funny and I think that fits.
And what I would have liked, I suppose, is the whole middle of the story to
really be pointing towards that ending and setting us up for that ending.
Whereas what we have is this domestic scene where he's hiding,
waiting for Dean to notice him for quite a huge chunk of this story without that
really having any bearing on the outcome at the end.
So what I would have liked to have seen is perhaps some more relevant conflict.
So if we start out with that, he's a struggling student,
we need to see that.
We've said he's worrying about money and that sort of stuff.
That's sort of set up, but it's not played out in the action of
the scene.
I don't know what I would suggest, to be honest,
for the action here to lead into that ending, but I think there are options.
I think we can think it through as we go.
Yeah.
So I've got some more high level thoughts.
And this is just from the perspective of, like, you know, me,
I love an absurdist story.
But I've also issued this kind of warning before that sometimes if you start your
story in an absurd situation, it's difficult to develop from that.
And that is, in my view, not enough to carry a story.
Like, you start with a premise that's absurd
and fun, but then you have to take it somewhere.
You have to take it somewhere interesting and surprising.
And I'm just reflecting on Kafka original Metamorphosis and the fact that everyone
only remembers the opening line really and the premise of that story.
And most people, even those who've read it,
don't remember how it ends and don't really remember what takes place in that
story.
To be fair, not a whole lot does take place in that
story.
It really is.
It's the, it's the premise.
But that story, given the fact that there is longer,
you know, more word count there, obviously there's a exploration of a lot
of those themes of like alienation and and so forth,
that kind of flow out of that, that premise.
I feel like when you start with an absurd premise, you need to think very carefully,
like, can I take it to a more absurd place?
Can I take it to a surprising place or even like a mundane place?
But it has to warrant the journey because if it doesn't justify the journey,
then you've told your story in the opening line.
Yeah.
So I think maybe the challenge for this story,
and I would say it's probably a story that has a great beginning,
a great ending, but perhaps the challenge is in that
middle and in that development of the concept.
I think part of that challenge is, is that we've set ourselves this almost
impossible goal of within 500 words, having a couple come to terms with the
fact that one has turned into a cat in a way that feels resonant,
and that's almost impossible.
Like, how are you going to do that?
Even reading it as it is, I think, well, wouldn't you be a little bit more upset
that your partner change into a cat, a little bit more incredulous,
a little bit more alarmed or doubting, like all of these things that are real
emotions.
And of course, it is just a story.
So we are able like, we can get to a situation where we
suspend disbelief.
I don't know that I did suspend disbelief enough to find this story resonant,
speaking for myself.
So that's the challenge, right?
And so we spend so much word count now working on the back and forth between
these two characters to try and get that acceptance up up to a level of it sounds
believable enough.
Yeah.
And I think to be honest, I don't think that's the best use of that
word count.
Yeah.
I was actually going to say the same thing,
that that a lot of the interaction in this story is Dean coming to terms with
what's happened with Caleb and Caleb trying to prove to him that it's happened.
As the reader, we know it's happened because it's been
told to us.
So this is for us as an experience, is not really that fulfilling.
Yeah.
Because we're already on board.
Maybe one of the things that makes Kafka's original interesting and
different is that the family don't really need to be convinced.
And the family are just like Blase about the whole thing.
And in fact, they're disappointed in him, which is which is the fun twist on it.
It's not like he has to prove it.
They're just like, oh, here we go again.
Like you've, you've more of his ********.
More of his ********.
Exactly.
So I think, I think if you wanted to make it
interesting in this in the same way, maybe not have the whole trying to
convince your flatmate that it's him and trying to think of like an equally
ridiculous way to move the story forward.
I will say at this point that throughout the story, I've viewed them as a couple,
even though it's very clearly stated that they're best friends.
And I think in that case, like you would be a little bit more upset
if your partner turned into a cat.
So that's my error there, but here's what I'm thinking.
OK, so you've started with this very absurd
premise.
Love it.
What we need to do is have Dean immediately accept it or almost
immediately one moment of conflict that we just flip.
And this comes back to that idea that we well,
that I learned about on this podcast some time ago about hanging a Lantern on
something.
So in your story, if you are going to do something that is
absurd, or if you're going to do something that
someone needs to suspend their disbelief for,
then you need to shine a light on it basically,
and say wink to the to the reader, I know this is wrong,
you know this is wrong.
We're accepting it.
Let's go.
That's what I'm talking about here.
So we need that moment and we need it fairly quickly.
And then what I would like to see is the delivery, like the promise of the premise,
if you will, the fun **** that this story should
deliver.
Yes, right.
So we've got moments of cat like behaviour.
But if we're going to do this, let's go hard.
And if we're going to talk about now having a career on YouTube,
what are the cute, funny, amazing things that Caleb now does that
he's a cat?
And how is that playing out in the scene and causing conflict and chaos that will
lead us to the climactic moment of realising he can be a YouTube star?
Because I do love that as an arc, right?
I do think that works, especially if your whole thesis of your
story is to have a happy ending for Metamorphosis.
I think that's perfect.
But what you need to do is have it almost be terrible, which may be hard,
like you're wanting to keep it at that fun level.
But in fact, I think if you make it so that he nearly
fails, then bring up that happy ending.
That's the more satisfying journey from a reader's perspective.
At a very high level, how I see that working out is he's a cat
now.
He's doing cat things and it's causing even more problems.
So we were broke already.
We were a student struggling with making ends meet.
And that was the setup at the start, the challenge.
And maybe he was like ready to get his job.
Maybe he's about to go to a job interview.
Like, let's really set up that premise strongly.
So he's meant to have a job interview that day actually.
And it's for this really important job.
He's going to finally have money after all this study and now he's a ******* cat
and now he has to deal with that.
And sure, his flatmate can be there, his best friend and we can have it play
out in that way.
But throughout the story, what I think would work is we're trying
to get to this job interview or we're trying and maybe it's a Zoom interview or
something.
And he and then he swipes the mouse off the desk when he's trying to log on.
Like all of these things that stand in conflict to his scene goal,
which is to make money.
Then to end with now you're going to be a YouTube star would satisfy that arc from
the beginning of needing money, Struggle, struggle, struggle, struggle, failing,
failing.
But actually being a cat, Now I'm going to be even more rich is
kind of like the arc of a story that you would expect to happen.
Yeah.
Because at the moment when we get that final line,
we do put the pieces together that initially he is struggling,
but it also does come out of nowhere a little bit like we're kind of hit with it.
It's quite sudden.
I also think just generally speaking, I would have liked to see the choice of
going with a cat a little bit better paid off.
And I think in the metamorphosis, like the idea of a cockroach or a vermin
is paid off because that's the kind of thing he feels like,
like the most lowly creature, the most lowly creature,
the thing that you'd like step on.
I don't feel it is paid off as well with the cat choice.
We do get obviously some moments of cat like behaviour but it could have been a
cat, it could have been a duck, it could have been like whatever to go
with the disco theme and then.
This is a general thing when we have a theme, like, we get it,
but it also has to work for the story.
So maybe if the cat is the choice, then somehow that has to be a little bit
more relevant, I think, to the story.
Yeah.
I mean, maybe it comes back to this moment in the
second paragraph where he's saying, I remember stressing about my master's
thesis and making rent to stay with my best friend, wishing life was simpler.
Microeconomic research could wait, my advisor could stop complaining about
my flamboyant style, etcetera.
I remember enjoying the Daydream.
I do not remember wishing to become a cat.
Well, that's your moment where the actual cat
reasoning and connection should have been made.
So what is it about your current circumstances that result in you waking
up to become a cat?
And I would suggest, for example, just as an example,
because there are other options, but like you're lying in the sun in a
sunny patch in the window, stressing about your life and feeling
like maybe you fish something out of the bin to eat it because you're that broke.
Like there are options that you could have that would make that make more sense.
And so that when you wake up as a cat, you're like, OK,
like I've gone so far now I really am like an alley cat kind of thing.
You can do it.
You've just got to be creative.
All of this is to say that I think the one major challenge that this story had
was plot development sort of thing.
And so I would say as like a piece of advice,
because this is a problem that people have all the time.
Like I've got this idea and it's gnawing at my mind,
but how do I turn that idea or or sequence of ideas into a satisfying story?
And I think it does come back to on a very simple level.
And of course, there are many, many other things to think about.
But in this case, coming back to what is the character's
scene goal at the start of the scene?
How is that character going to struggle and fail throughout the scene to get what
they want?
And then where are they going to be?
That is a changed circumstance at the end, and usually you want some sort of irony
or some reason why we've ended up in a different place.
And I think that's what we have here.
We have the scene goal kind of, but it's not that clear.
And then we have the ending, which is to me funny and a great ending
for this story that now he can make his money on YouTube.
But what we don't have is that clear link and that clear thread that goes
throughout the story of the conflict, the attempts to get that scene goal
throughout, attempt and failure, attempt and failure, the push and pull,
cause and effect, Domino's, whatever you might want to call it to
arrive at that ending.
And all of that is possible.
I think in this story, I think there's really fun ideas and I
think all of those ideas work.
It's more about how do we weave that into that satisfying and and yes, predictable,
but for a reason kind of story structure.
OK, so let's get to some of the lines.
We'll look at the story.
We've spoken a lot about the high level things and I think those are the most
critical when we're talking about this story.
So I don't want to get too caught up in all of the lines,
but we will go through the story and start with the opening, which is,
I always thought Kafka was a bit dramatic, but I get it now.
I poke my belly with a white tipped paw to confirm that I'm not dreaming and I am
in fact now a house cat.
So this opening I felt was quite effective that we get that relationship,
that reference to Kafka straight up, and it's in the title and it's in the
first line.
So we kind of know what we're in for here.
We know that we're going to get a Metamorph of a kind and we also get the
tone, the story being quite light hearted and
and comedic.
So it's all in there.
I don't think there's anything missing from me in terms of like scene setting.
I feel like I just assume, yeah, we're in a house.
No, I agree.
I think it's got everything you need.
And I think it was also the right choice to start with it having already happened.
You know, it's only a 500 word story, so we don't want to watch the whole
metamorphosis.
That would be too much for us to handle.
And so to to begin there where it's already happened,
I think is a good choice.
So yeah, good start.
So moving forward, there were a few lines in this story
which I stumbled over a little bit just because they were a little bit long and
contained a few ideas.
And so I would encourage maybe just reviewing those and seeing how they can
be streamlined to read a little bit better.
So one of those was, I remember stressing about my master's
thesis and making rent to stay with my best friend in the city.
So that's quite a mouthful.
We've got the master's thesis.
We've got making rent and staying with my best friend in the city.
So trying to introduce a few concepts fairly quickly, quick succession,
but it's a bit of a stumbling block for me.
Yeah, no.
And I think that's a good piece of advice generally,
especially in those opening paragraphs, is to kind of keep each sentence to just
one idea.
And it's not a rule by any means, but it's about not how you are guiding
the reader into your story.
So we talk about dropping us into the scene.
And if you hit us with too many things at once, it can be overwhelming.
Like you don't want to necessarily ease us in.
It doesn't.
You don't want it to be slow.
So that's not what I'm suggesting.
It's more a case of just give us the chance to process each piece at a time
and it's really as simple as breaking it up into different sentences.
I mean, the other challenge in this opening
paragraph is that there are quite a few things that aren't ever really paid off
anyway, so potentially not needed.
We've got master's thesis, we've got microeconomic research,
we've got making rent, best friend, flamboyant style,
all of these sorts of things.
Now, all of those are character features that
could be used in the story and could build towards a more satisfying
conclusion, but because they're not really expanded
on as the story progresses, they fall away a little bit.
So I would suggest just picking kind of one or two things and focusing on those
rather than trying to cram too much in.
So if it's microeconomic research specifically,
why and what does that tell us about this character and what does that mean by the
end of the story kind of thing?
If it's just more the fact that they're a student and, you know,
struggling with money, I think that works based on what we've
discussed already about some ideas about where you could take this story.
But you know, the flamboyant style thing, that's something that could work if
you're linking that to why this person's becoming a cat.
But I think that that link needs to be much stronger in terms of character
development.
I think if you're going to have these things,
you need to actually develop them and pay off why they are relevant in this story.
Otherwise you can probably just skip over them and get to the things that are
important.
Yeah.
And there's there's quite a few things additionally introduced in like the
dialogue between the two characters.
So we have Caleb, I see your keys.
I've I've had too much work drama today for a prank right now.
So we've got like cutting back on expenses, but I really need Thai food.
And meanwhile, Dean's got work dramas, like there's a few details that are
coming in, which is great that we we get like
insights into their situation and their relationship,
but especially in 500 words stories, they do need to really all point us into
a, a direction and and be paid off.
An additional challenge here, which we probably should have mentioned
earlier, is that not only does Dean have to come
to terms with it, but Caleb also has to come to terms with
it first.
And and he does seemingly quite quickly.
But all of that is not particularly exciting or interesting as elements of
the story.
And so I guess I'd be looking for ways to avoid that.
Now, in in my hypothetical example of how the
story might play out, if you were like trying to get to a job
interview, for example, then you might not have Dean at all.
And you would have the interviewer.
And then the conflict is with them.
And you know, there are other options for how you could
take it.
But if it is going to be like a domestic scene and it is going to be with Dean,
then you have to think specifically about why their relationship is relevant in
this story.
Otherwise, you're adding this whole character who is
not particularly like contributing to the message behind this story.
So I want to call out a couple of other lines here.
And there are a few lines that I felt were a little bit head hoppy,
a little bit telling.
Maybe head hopping is not the right words.
But we are often getting Dean's perspective told through the eyes of
Caleb.
And one thing that stood out to me with that perspective is that the emotions
that Dean's feeling often get named.
So we see Dean's tone sounds stressed.
We're naming an emotion.
Dean looks at me in in shock.
He half stutters in shock.
He shakes his head in disbelief.
So there's a lot of emotion naming there.
And Andy, you're doing the right thing and tying
that to an action and not simply just stating the emotion the other characters
feeling.
But what we would recommend is simply describing the action and let letting the
reader infer the emotion from that.
And I think often times you can just get rid of the emotion and it'll do the
talking already.
So he shakes his head.
Well, you know, if he's, if he's saying something that expresses
disbelief and then he's shaking his head, that's enough for us.
We don't need any more.
But sometimes it's worth describing the action in more detail.
And one thing that I love to see in flash fiction is very beautiful,
evocative description of an action that feels very true and real,
but which I've never thought of before, you know?
And it's like, wow, they express something there.
I've never thought of it that way, but that's exactly what that facial
expression looks like, or that's exactly how someone behaves
when they're embarrassed, or that's how that's like the gold
standard.
And I think we strive for that.
Not in every sentence, right?
But not everything needs that level of care.
But moving away from naming emotions to showing them in such a way that it's
clear to the reader and satisfying to the reader,
and they can picture that in their mind's eye and get it immediately.
Because that is how at least neurotypical people understand each other in the real
world.
They look at facial expressions, body language,
they listen to what people are saying and that tells them how the person is feeling.
They don't need to be told necessarily.
I am in a state of disbelief right now.
So there is a line here.
What the ****?
Dean practically leaps off the floor in shock and spills his bag of Muesli over
the floor.
All over the floor.
And I think you almost get there because you can just remove the in shock, hmm,
from that sentence because we do understand that he's in shock.
Yeah, exactly.
And I think that's a good example of where that description is sufficient.
And so just as a piece of advice for all writers is to look,
anytime you name any emotion or feeling, that's an opportunity to either just edit
it out and let the dialogue and the action speak for itself,
or to find a more evocative way of describing something so that the reader
can experience it.
And the reason that's important, this isn't just like a dumb rule for the
sake of it.
The reason it's important is because it is far more satisfying for readers to
almost watch the scene in their mind and be able to interpret all of that action
and have in their own head a view of how that person's behaving and what they're
thinking or feeling as a result without needing to be told.
It's an extension of the whole show, don't tell thing.
And the whole point is to just make it more satisfying for the reader,
make it more immersive and make them feel like they are doing some of the work.
And another writing rule that you'll hear often is avoid all adverbs.
And, you know, I don't necessarily think that you need
to avoid every single adverb at all times, but there is one adverb in that sentence
that I think could be cut.
And that is Dean practically leaps off the floor in shock.
And I think that practically can be cut in that because it really just waters
down the fact that Dean is leaping off the floor in shock.
And even if that is a bit of a exaggeration,
I feel it's better to just have him leap off the floor.
It's more dramatic.
We get what you're saying.
And what does practically leaping look like?
It leaves this kind of?
In the reader's mind of like, how do I imagine someone practically
leaping?
So I think it's just a little bit more clarity,
a little bit more drama and more direct.
And you get to save a word as well.
I've just done a little Google, right?
So it it is of course an adverb, but you can also be described as an
intensifier or a down toner, these words that either serve to modify a
verb by making it sound more intense or less intense, right?
So practically, virtually almost nearly all of these
types of words.
And it's something I see a lot and agree.
Like in flash fiction, we want to avoid watering anything down
in that way.
Just give us the Max.
Like if it's an element of character voice, you know,
you might use it or if it's relevant, like for a time period, you,
you might need to modify the time period to be more clear.
There are reasons why you might need to use it, but more often than not,
it's like, no, just give us the full impact.
Like why are you trying to be more realistic?
This is a story, you know, so absolutely look out for words like
that and search and destroy basically most of the time.
So I have just one final little point, just one of those little tidying up
things that I will mention now.
And that is, and I've talked about it before and that
is describing action in the order in which it occurs in the story.
And this can be something that helps streamline sentences as well.
So Ed, you mentioned that a couple of these
sentences felt like mouthfuls.
I think this is probably one of them.
It is meow is all that comes out when I try for words after landing on the floor
closer to him.
All right.
So nothing wrong with that sentence.
It's a clear sentence.
But from a reading perspective and a reading flow perspective,
you want the reader to picture the part where he lands on the floor first before
he then says meow.
Because otherwise that we're just doing this very brief little flip back in our
minds.
And it does interrupt our flow and it's subtle, but it is important and it's very,
very easy to fix.
So in sentences like that, I would say just flip it around and
describe it in the order in which it happens.
And I think that's an easy fix.
And so one more, again, a minor thing, but this is one thing to look out for in
editing is normally on a paragraph, what you want to do is have one
character's actions and dialogue, right?
And if and if someone reacts or has another action in response to that,
you'd put that on the next line.
It just makes it, it's a clarity thing.
And there are a few instances here where you have 1 character doing something,
then another character doing it on the same paragraph.
One example, a very short one.
We'll figure it out.
OK, I purr in relief.
So Dean says we'll figure it out.
OK.
And then our protagonist purrs in relief.
The second action would go on a different line just so we can pass that a little
bit easier.
Yeah.
And it's again, a subtle thing, but when you want to be clear to the
reader, it does help.
Basically, it's as simple as saying to yourself
every time the actor, IE the person doing the action or the
speaker changes, you break onto a Now, from an editing perspective,
what can sometimes happen is that you find you're going back and forth and back
and forth and it's a little bit too much.
And if you do find that that's happening, that is also a cue to just simplify
usually the action.
So if it's going back and forth too much, can you tie two of those actions together
or some action and dialogue together in one and then just have one response and
move on?
If we are back and forthing too much, that suggests we're also kind of staying
in the same place potentially a little bit too long.
There's absolutely nothing wrong with like a dialogue only story, for example,
where we're one person than the other.
It is something that can exist, but generally speaking,
you want to avoid that and you want to just keep that flow going.
So that takes us to the ending, which we have already spoken about and
mentioned that we we did enjoy.
And so yeah, overall I thought this was a great
concept.
One of the tropes in the Flash Fiction Tropes article on the website is animal
POV, and this one is definitely A twist on
that animal POV and made it not trophy at all.
So this wasn't a story that stuck out to me as being like, oh,
another animal POV story.
It was very unique and different and great concept.
Yeah, I agree.
I think it was really fun.
And I think maybe that's a little bit of a reflection of the prompts this round as
well.
I know a lot of people struggled with those dancing prompts.
Yeah.
But what they did produce was a lot of really kind of crazy stuff,
unexpected stuff, which I love of.
And this is a perfect example of that.
I guess I don't know if I'm being defensive here,
but I just wanted to talk about the prompts for a second and about that
dancing prompt.
So in Team Ed, it was prominently feature a disco
dancing move.
And in Team Amanda, it was prominently featuring a break
dancing move.
Now, I'm not sure how clear it was in the
communications we sent about that, but that did not need to be an actual
dance move.
So in the case of disco dancing, for example,
there's a move called the bus stop.
I don't, I don't know how to do it, but it's a move.
And it's probably simple.
Most disco dancing moves are.
But yeah, you could have just set your story at a
bus stop and been a little bit ironic with that.
And I think what did happen was we ended up with some jarring situations where
like disco dancing is trying to be crammed into another story.
And in this case, I would say that's a little bit the case.
You know, we suddenly have this cat getting up and
doing this disco move, and it is comical, but it didn't sort of flow from something
prior in the story where disco dancing was made relevant.
And I guess I just want to say to people, like, when you get those prompts,
I absolutely welcome you to take them to, like, a crazy place.
Absolutely love that.
But also just think about how it actually works within the context of the whole
story and make sure that it's feeding through and that it's serving the story
and not the other way around kind of thing.
But yeah, I love this concept of trying to make
metamorphosis positive, especially in the world that we're in at
the moment.
You know, like, I feel like every single day I wake up a
cockroach, honestly.
And the idea that you might wake up a cat instead and get a YouTube career is a
little bit more appealing, I have to say.
So I do like that you embraced your positive mindset on that.
It's good fun.
So thank you so much for your story, Andy, and we hope this experience hasn't been
too painful for you and that we've given you some useful advice.
I mean, I think as a new writer, it's like pretty daunting to come up and
do a daredevil, right?
But this is what writing is.
If you want to get good at it, you have to be able to take critique and
you have to be able to say, I'm going to use this and get stronger
and I'm going to come back harder.
And I'm like, I'm finding my voice.
I'm finding the things that work for me, what resonates, what doesn't,
to build yourself up to be exactly what you want to be as a writer,
as much as we'd all love to just put words on the page and for them to
miraculously work like this editing process is crucial.
So hopefully, Andy, you've got some friendly beta readers who
can help you with your next story as well and, and just give it that final Polish.
But you know, in terms of writing style, I mean, it all flowed and everything.
So it all just comes down to delivering that impact, I think.
And that's what gets you long listed and that's absolutely,
absolutely what gets you shortlisted is that impact.
But look, if you did survive that, then we hope to see you again in the July
round, which as of the time of recording is
shaping up to be our biggest round yet.
So I'm very excited about that.
We have our prompts brewing away, hopefully inspiring some more wild,
crazy ideas.
And yeah, if you haven't signed up yet, make sure you head over to Not Quite
right prize.com and grab your ticket.
We'd love to see you.
We would.
So thank you, Andy, and thank you for putting yourself out up
there and helping everyone learn along the way as well.
But we'll be back in a week's time with our 4th Daredevil this round.
And until then, right on, right on.
We hope you enjoyed this special Daredevil episode of Not Quite Right.
If you have thoughts on this story, follow us on social media and join the
conversation.
And if you'd like to participate in the next round of the competition,
head over to ourwebsite@notquiteright.com.
That's WRITE something doesn't seem quite right.