# Literary Maneuvers December 2018 "Moon Landing" Scores



## bdcharles (Dec 19, 2018)

Hot off the press, we have the only thing that matters this time of year - it's the December Literary Maneuvers Scores!

Writing's a never-ending process. Underpinning every hit is a venerable stack of writing that, while it may not smash the glory heights of your standout piece XYZ, provides the author with experience, feedback, and the results of sheer time, thought and effort accrued over the weeks, months and years. It all counts. Counting up the scores this time round we have your two judges:




[spoiler2=J.J.Maxx]

*Author: SueC**
Title: *The Woodstock Moon

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*Overall: *13/20

*Review: *Thank  you for your entry. I read this a few times, trying to get a sense of  what the story was trying to do. It is a very ephemeral story,  interwoven with nostalgia and not without a large helping of rose-tinted  window dressing. You set the scene quite well, and that may have been  the issue at play here. Woodstock is such a well-known historical event  that the majority of people, myself included, have seen the footage and  pictures, watched the specials and the grainy visages are iconic. When  you describe the scene, it becomes difficult to replace the well-known  images with the scene you are trying to portray. My mind, as the reader,  fills in the blanks too fast and your imagery does not receive enough  purchase to hold its ground.

As I said, this is an ephemeral piece and  as such it lofts about, almost meandering. Technically, it's sound and I  couldn't find much in the way of technical issues, save for an  over-abundant use of commas. The prompt is woven into the story in a way  that seems genuine and is very unique. 

Overall I didn't resonate with this story. The effects of the story  elements were muted, as it became more of a soft remembrance than a  fully-formed story. It lacked the punch and interest that these stories  require. Still, a very well-written piece and a somber look back at  simpler times. 

*Author: *Fatclub*
Title: *Lack of Practice
*
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*Overall: *11/20

*Review: *Thanks  for this entry! I must admit, being a rebel from the colonies, I was  unfamiliar with the term 'pillion'. Still, I made sure to catch up on my  old world vocabulary. 

I liked this story. It is a endearing  coming-of-age story involving two brothers. I think it worked well. One  of the issues that struck me is the story is made very impersonal by the  lack of names and the nickname for the big brother I think detracted  from the story. I think if you were to get us closer to the two boys,  give them names and perhaps a little more description would work well.

Technically, there were some issues with tenses and there are some  errant spaces lingering around. But other than that, the structure is  good.

While I think the first sentence of a short story should be powerful and  should draw the reader into the rest of the story, I think yours was a  little soft. If you had perhaps mentioned something about spending his  18th birthday in jail, or the hospital, or both. I think it could've  been made more effective.

The overall effect of the story was lost a little as it feels like it  was written to the prompt. I think the ending didn't quite have the  final _oomph_ that I look for in short stories.

*
Author: *Arachne*
Title: *One Giant Leap for Barbara
*
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*Overall: *15/20

*Review: *This  was very well done. Your opening sentence was fantastic. It is the  perfect opening to a short story. It made me want to read more and gave  me the hook to keep reading.

I don't really have much to say about this. It has excellent structure,  rising action, background, climax, resolution. All the pieces work.  However, perhaps there was something that could have pushed this story  just a little bit more. The abused housewife cliche is a bit overdone  and I think once you had the bones of this story, you should ask, 'Okay,  now how do I turn this on it's head and make it different.' Even the  feminized husband abused by his wife has been done, although to a lesser  degree. Still, this would be the only thing I could say about this  piece, and that is a good thing. 

Finally, I find myself slightly put off by your use of the more Old  World single quotation marks. Oh, I'm not saying it's wrong, not at all.  I didn't dock you any points for it, just my own stubbornness showing  through.

Overall very good job. 

*Author: *epimethius*
Title: *Plucking the Eagle
*
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*Overall: *10/20

*Review: *Thanks for this entry, epimethius. I enjoyed reading it, and re-reading it. 

Here we have an alternate-reality or futuristic piece of writing, where the moon  and its detritus have been turned into a tourist trap. I really like  the idea, however I feel we weren't given enough background. There is  something to be said for allowing the reader to fill in the blanks, but I  think there's too many blanks here. Is this in the future? Is it the  actual Neil Armstrong, or a clone, or a holographic projection? 

I think a story needs to grab you from the first  sentence. I am a firm believer that it needs be strong. Your beginning  introduces us to random people and there's nothing that makes the reader  want to know more. Something that sets the stage and makes us go,  'Whoa, what?'

As an example your story could've started with something like this:

_Tatiana watched as a faded traveling brochure fluttered across the lunar surface._

I never really felt connected to the characters. They were very  two-dimensional to me. they needed to be fleshed out a little more. I  think that's the issue with the whole story is that it seems very  superficial, like I'm reading a story from 10,000 feet away. 

Now, I think the story is a smashing idea. I really like it. I just  think it need to be distilled and tightened up, fleshing out the scene  and the characters and making the ending stronger.
[/spoiler2]



[spoiler2=velo]*SueC, The Woodstock Moon
SPaG: 3
TaV: 3
Effect: 6
Overall: 12
*

SPaG- Mostly good but with some awkward constructions.  I did try and  read with the perspective that the narrator was in a state of altered  consciousness, but it didn't seem like that's the voice you were trying  for.  

"varying degrees of nakedness. A virtual sea of humanity." Needed a  semi-colon instead of a period which makes the second part is a  fragment.  

"Out of the corner of my eye, I caught movement and then the actual  realization that simply everything was moving, made me feel sea sick for  a moment."  The comma use here is awkward.  The part between the commas  feels like a sentence jammed into the middle of another sentence.  

TaV: Overall consistent but the voice felt a bit clinical for the topic. 

Effect: The clinical tone really jarred with the topic for me.  I will  admit to a very specific bias- I blog regularly about  psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy for treating trauma.  I really  enjoyed the idea of the story, a vignette about a trip at Woodstock, but  I didn't *feel* the experience.  Adding the date and location at  separate points, especially the first sentence, really stood out and  detracted from the impact.  Given the title, the second sentence is the  perfect opener but the first is more like a travelogue.  I would have  loved a more introspective and abstract writing style.  

All that being said I did enjoy this.  I smiled at the idea of looking  up at the moon whilst tripping on LSD and seeing Neil or Buzz waving  back.  Brilliant imagery, that.  Last night I just re-told the story of  how I met Neil Armstrong about a year before he died so this story made  me smile.  


*Fatclub, Lack of Practice
SPaG: 3
TaV: 3
Effect: 3
Overall: 9
*

SPaG:  Overall consistent.  The way you used "BigBro" as a proper name  means you did not need a comma to call out a shortened version of  'brother.'  

"I took my gloves off and pocketed them, then took out the squeezy  bottle, filled with water"  The second comma here was unnecessary and  changes the meaning and flow of the sentence.  Read it without and  you'll see what I mean.  Being filled with water refers to the bottle  directly but the comma offsets them.  

TaV: Overall consistent, conversational and appropriate to the age and maturity level of the PoV character.  

Effect:  I never connected with the story.  In addition to there not  being much emotional impact it felt like a lot of 'tell' and less  'show.'  The punny ending of some backside road rash (moon landing) just  didn't feel like much of a payoff.  

"BigBro’ beeped the horn, throttled back and we lurched forward." As a  rider this stood out to me as being indicative of an inexperienced rider  vs one with the skills you ascribed to BigBro.  Same with the hitting  the throttle too hard at the end...though that could have been  deliberate to shake the PoV character off which only the author can  answer. 

This looks like your first entry in the monthly challenge.  Thanks for  entering and I hope you try again next month!  Remember that this is all  subjective and meant constructively.  :smile:  



*Arachne, One Giant Leap for Barbara
SPaG: 3
TaV: 4
E: 6
Overall: 13
*

SPaG: Overall consistent and steady.  The first sentence needs a couple less commas and bit better flow toward the end.  

"On second thought, she covered the sink..."   'On second thought' is  more of a first-person perspective phrase than a third.  Maybe "After a  moment's though" or something like that wold have worked better.  

TaV: Consistent, I read a slightly lighter tone at the end which worked well.  

Effect:  I really hated the utter twat of a husband and I got a good  sense of Barbara as the long-suffering wife.  Her 'snap' was pretty  subtle, more of a decision than a snap really, and I wanted a little  more delineation between before and after for her but that's small nit  I'm picking.  I liked that you didn't go into too much description of  the flat/house but I could completely imagine a London walk-up in 1969  with a ratty couch and a telly just a bit on the blink.  



*epimethus, Plucking the Eagle
SPaG: 4
TaV: 4
E: 5
Overall: 13
*

SPaG: The punctuation around quotes bothers me still.  Maybe I'm too  rigid with that but it takes me out of the story.  Other than that it  looks like it would have been a 5.  

TaV:  Consistent, if not overly engaging.  

Effect:  This was a good, clever story.  I really liked the way it only  became obvious over the course of the whole story that Neil was an AI,  at first I was wondering just what part of history we were in.  

This is another clever entry but I have to be frank that the meat of the  story, being engaged and involved emotionally, was missing for me.  The  setting and scene and concepts were brilliant but the only thing I ever  felt was a mild distaste for the two characters who would so blithely  mar, for selfish and petty reasons, the site of what may be human kind's  greatest single achievement.  But I didn't feel about either of them in  any real way.  

​ 


[/spoiler2]

To summarise:



*Author - Title
**J.J.Maxx
**velo
**Total
*SueC - The Woodstock Moon131212.5Fatclub - Lack of Practice11910Arachne - One Giant Leap for Barbara151314epimethius - Plucking the Eagle101311.5



Meaning that taking home the big trophy this month is first-time winner (I think?)


*Arachne*
with
_One Giant Leap for Barbara

_
​
Close behind, we give you


*SueC*
with
_The Woodstock Moon

_​
Closing out the podium, it's

*epimetheus*
with
_Plucking the Eagle

_​
So there it is. Congratulations to the winner and the runners up. Thank you for all your entries, judgings and reviews and thank you for reading. Keep writing, keep trying, keep dreaming, keep imagining. From LM towers, have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, and I'll see you all on the other thread.


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## Arachne (Dec 19, 2018)

Well done everyone, I really enjoyed all the stories. Thanks so much to the judges and bd for getting that back so quickly, I feared being in a page-refreshing limbo for Christmas so that was a lovely surprise!

Arachne


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## SueC (Dec 19, 2018)

Everyone did a really great job here. Thanks to the judges for being so prompt and all their good work. Congrats Ararchne!! Whoo Hoo!


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## epimetheus (Dec 19, 2018)

Nice one everyone, especially the judges.

It's funny, i thought Lack of Practice was the best and would win easily.


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## Fatclub (Dec 20, 2018)

Thanks and well done arachne and everyone else. My original story was 760 words and it took longer to cut that down to under 650 than to write the original!


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## -xXx- (Dec 21, 2018)

accolades all round
from one of the lurkers
that enjoyed learning
from each of you

seasons best


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