Talk:Into the Storm

Here is my official review for Echo1's entry for the Spring Writing Contest 2014, Into the Storm.

First off, the title for this story is spot-on. It really captures Amahain's rash, head-on nature; it just fits. The plot for this short story is pretty simple: the Great Cataclysm has just occurred, and the Brotherhood of Makuta's treachery is realized. This story is simple and has been done many times before, but this one still is written well. I would have liked to see a more theme-based story, not just a story that has one cool fight scene at the end. I would have expected a more unique, entertaining story from the author that wrote Quest for the Masks, which is still held in high esteem among the community today.

This 800-word short story is well-written, of course. I like the fact that a one-armed Amahain single-handedly takes out a Rahkshi and charges straight toward a sinister Krika, albeit recklessly. There were a few choices of words that sort of distracted me from the story, but nothing too bad. The most glaring one to me is this one:

Her armor began to pinch the flat area on her left shoulder where her arm had once long ago been.

I sort of dislike the choice of using "once" and "long ago" one after the other. I think I would have been less distracted if you had used one or the other, like "where her arm had once been" or "where her arm had been long ago". That may be just my own personal preference, but it distracted me nonetheless.

I don't have much else to say about the story, so I'll go on to the final verdict.

Final Verdict: From the author who wrote Quest for the Masks, Into the Storm is a short story that doesn't live up to expectations. The writing is good, and it would fit perfectly in a longer story, but as a short story, it doesn't work very well. It has some good parts, especially the beginning, where it subtly hints at the Great Cataclysm with out actually mentioning it specifically. My opinion that a short story should have more theme or extra personification may be tainting my judgement, but I didn't think that Into the Storm was very original or entertaining.

Score: C+

&mdash; Logan Woerner   (Blog) 17:22, February 26, 2014 (UTC)