http://madimonstermassh.deviantart.com/art/barn-52287993

Nice picture, but old barns freak me the hell out.

haha, the ones that are about to fall…

haha. “it keeps what it finds”

hey this is pretty freaky.
i likes it.
I likes it good.

I like this!

Well, you freaked me out.

Added a pencil for good grammar & paragraph spacing.

With respect to the picture, a barn that’s been left alone for a hundred years would be in much worse condition than that. Poetic license, though, right?

With respect to grammar, I think there are a number of problems, mostly to do with punctuation. For example, I’d remove the commas around “itself”, change the full stop after “But the barn” into an ellipsis, and where you’ve got quotation marks I’d use italics instead (because it’s a paraphrase, not a direct quote). And so on.

I’d definitely rephrase the bit that says “Except for the screams, any who dare enter the barn”, because it sounds like you’re saying that the screams enter the barn. While we’re on that sentence, I’d delete the word “though”.

Towards the end of the story you suddenly switch from past to present tense.

Grammar me good no, but cool.

I am unaware of the italics versus quotation rule, but I didn’t take any writing courses in college. Zerrakhi is right about removing the commas around “itself” (in “The house, itself, was fine.”). Take it from somebody who, during High School, was practically a professional comma over-user. I also agree with Zerrakhi that you should remove “, though,” in the third to last sentence. I have no problem with the tense change, those last couple of sentences definitely don’t have the same impact in a past tense. Besides, we need to know that the barn is still dangerous, right?

I don’t think a tense change in a ficlet (that’s what we’re calling individual stories, right?) is really that important unless it’s completely inappropriate or otherwise takes away from the story. Mistakes aside, this story is downright eerie.

I think that Zerrakhi makes a good point about increasing the subtlety to ramp up the intensity. The barn might keep “what the frigid December winds” bring to it as a solstice offering."
Instead of saying nothing would grow you might say that “life was vacant in the vacinity of the barn.”

I love rural stuff. Walked in many an old, spooky barn.

To be honest, I was only moved to comment after Alexa complimented the “good grammar”. While I think the story has its merits, I wouldn’t pick grammar as one of them.

Re: the tense change, the contrast between tenses implies that statements like “you could only hear the screaming during the winter solstice” and “nothing within an acre … would grow” are no longer true, yet it’s still true that people who enter are never heard from. I don’t think that’s what you intended, mostly because I don’t see how it makes sense.

Moreover, because the story in general is in the past, the present tense bits must refer to the time when the story is being written. This means that sequel writers are forbidden from ever making the barn safe again (though they are allowed to make the grass grow).

I’m not saying the solution is to put everything in the past, but as it is I don’t think the tense change happens in a coherent way.

I don’t know what Stargazer is referring to – I never said anything about subtlety.

First off, everyone here has made valid points; but the question remains should they be said. There comes a time when critiquing crosses the line from ‘helpful’ to ‘harsh’, and I think some of you might want to keep corrections to a modest amount – remember this is not our challenge to judge.

Honestly, Blossom, I don’t mind the comments, even though some may view them as “harsh”. One simple reason: I don’t think this is my best work, and I’ve been pretty harsh on myself about it.

Especially the comments about grammar. I try my best to use good grammar, but sometimes… :-)

I liked this!