Title: The Tale of the Pie-Rats
Genre: Fiction (I'm not sure what the sub-genre is)
This is a short story about a group of Pie-Rats (Pirate rats who eat pies) that are on a ship searching for buried treasure.
“Hoy, Squeaker, what’s the matter with you? You look all giddy and out of sorts. Has Bulky been teasin’ you again?” Thomas said as he sat down next to a small, skinny rat.
“Oh…no Thomas…it’s just a little bit of indigestion…I don’t do so well with all these seafood pies…you know…sets my stomach all a ‘tumble’, thinking about fish…” replied Squeaker in a small, quavering voice which matched his small stature. All the rats were eating supper in the dining room below deck, after a hard days work.
“Well, I wouldn’t be surprised. I’ll be mighty glad when we reach Shell Island and can stock up on some meat. I hate all these salty, fishy, pies.” Fusser said from across the table. He was the kind of rat who was very particular about the taste of his food.
“Shut up and quit complain’ or I’ll use my fists to quiet you down. You need a good beating what with all your pickiness and complain’,” called out a rat in a deep voice; everyone knew him as Bulky, the strongest, biggest, meanest rat on board the Star-Sail.
“Now, now Bulky, lets not be too hasty, I meant no offense. I’m just a little tired of tasting the sea in everything I eat, that’s all,” Fusser replied quickly, suddenly afraid of the idea of Bulky harming him.
I liked this. It read like a good short story, and was pretty delightful. It needs some tightening, things like using the word "complainin'" twice in the same bit of dialogue. That sort of thing.
ReplyDeleteAlso, this sentence: "called out a rat in a deep voice; everyone knew him as Bulky, the strongest, biggest, meanest rat on board the Star-Sail." -- is a little on the confusing side. If you tighten it, maybe break it in to two separate sentences, it will read more smoothly.
Good job, though. And good luck with this!
Haha! This is the cutest idea ever for a story. Kinda makes me want pie. I agree with Lizzy about that one sentence, though, it could use a good edit.
ReplyDeleteIn all of these paragraphs, your dialogue tags need to go after the first break in speech. For example, in the first paragraph, "Thomas said" needs to go after "what's the matter with you?" and not at the end. This entire excerpt will read much better once you make this change. It would also provide more variety in your structure if you put some descriptions before they speak, some in the middle and some at the end.
ReplyDeleteThis sounds like the genre of an excellent children's novel - with an interesting plot line. Well done!
ReplyDeleteJust a small suggestion or two - you could vary your sentence formatting. Rather than having similar tags etc at the end, you could do something like this every now and then,
“Hoy, Squeaker, what’s the matter with you?' Thomas said. 'You look all giddy and out of sorts. Has Bulky been teasin’ you again?” He sat down beside the small, skinny rat.
And something like this, pulling a sentence from the previous paragraph ...
“Now, now Bulky, let's not be too hasty, I meant no offense. I’m just a little tired of tasting the sea in everything I eat, that’s all.” Fusser was suddenly afraid. After all, Bulky was the strongest, biggest, meanest rat on board the Star-Sail.
Hope this helps - it's always good to vary the sentence patterns. And always helpful to read aloud your own writing to hear if the patterns are working well.
Another little thing: watch words like 'lets' - if it's the shortened form for 'let us' you need the apostrophe = let's. And also the apostrophe in 'hard day's work'.
Apostrophes trick most of us up occasionally, and when misused constantly, they bug editors.