What a relief that she’s out and not so very shell-shocked any more.
Loved this para: “As a kid, Johnson had believed being a police officer would feel systematic, rote and procedural … -> …. ordinary people who made poor choices.” This feels profound in the scheme of the story.
I also think your amendments and additions will add a lot of…[Read more]

Hi Hannah,
I’m reading your last two scenes in quick succession, so just a short note here:
“But, laying on the cot without no one to hold me except my own arms, I sobbed.” – there’s a double negative in this sentence (without no one) and I’m highlighting it only because I think you can make something special out of it.
E.g. it might have…[Read more]

I’ve heard theories that he was neurodiverse (or bipolar?). What an amazing worldview it must have given him.

Beautiful and unsettling indeed. So many masks worn for so long that the truth gets too confusing to bear. Well done.

It’s a brave thing you did, Cathy, to choose something this famous, that has already been the subject of further art. Putting your voice out there with all those great names puts you in conversation with them and in their company. Well done!

Oh, those last two lines… They tug my heart right out of my throat. The loneliness and loss expressed by this poem throb with pain. And it is such a heavy moment when that realisation dawns that you, the child, are their legacy. Beautiful, Megan.

Earthy and visceral – signature Christian Donovan. I adore this, just like your other poems. And you made me wonder what it would be like to hear this poem from the POV of the Bull!

Hi Sue – a delicious line this: “not yet clear yet not / obscured”
I love this symmetry and the paradox rolled up in it!

“I trust you! It’s just sometimes if you think it’s something I want, we get it whether you want it or not. For once, I wanted it to be about you.”
Reading this, I can’t help thinking that old Leslie has quite a strong manipulative streak. 😉
She so, too, wanted to keep it a secret so that she could get all her ducks in a row and overpow…[Read more]

I love these people! The way they lace their adventure with the everyday ordinary. Where they’re talking about taking the boat out to go spy for pirates or drug lords, then this couple comes back in with their conversation whether they should buy the farm. Entertaining.
You know, someone once advised me that an MC should never be older than 34,…[Read more]

A nice spin on the old story! Well done! I think you should give us a line early in the story which suggests that the narrator is prone to self-destruction. So that the choice in the end, even though unexpected, is entirely believable.

Hi Nina!
A really believable scene – it struck me how much of the modern woman’s conundrum is wound up in this scene where the undercurrents are about going “back home” “to your roots” “where you are needed”, and how all of those expectations rob Annie of the hard-won freedom that generations of women before her had trailblazed for her. No…[Read more]

Ja, sorry Nina, I had to go back to the previous scene to sneak him in, as I’m going to need him in Act 3 for the court scene. So I thought he could fulfil a secondary function of making Daniel a bit jealous.

Lucky you! My grading has just come in. 🙁

Hi Tereza,
came looking for you but I can’t find your May submission?

wow, Jenny-Mae went to a lot of effort for this crush! Fun story!

Nice combination of crises here. The beginning had an echo of a goldilocks kind of story to it – biggest bed in biggest room and all. So the pressing “dead”line and the “ghost”writer – lovely play on words there.
The other thing I liked was Suzie’s voice/diction – well done.
I’d imagine the ghost with a much more archaic turn of phrase though -…[Read more]