Hiya! I didn't have many ideas for my assigned image for the contest, so I decided to write something atmospheric and drenched in metaphors. Enjoy!
Two Rabbits / Discussion
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"Feburary"
February
"no where"
nowhere
"fur shown auburn"
in context I think you mean 'shone'? It doesn't really make sense for fur to 'show' anything.
"closer together choking"
closer together, choking
There were loads of repetitions of 'I continued forward' and 'It got colder,' making no effort to switch up the wording so it felt really monotonous to read. The sentence structure is also very simple, making this quite a dull read in general. You hardly use commas, semicolons, colons, em dashes, conjunctions, etc. to break up the sentence structure and make the prose flow in an interesting way.
Moreover — and I think this is even more problematic than the prose — there is really no story here. A person chases some rabbits, sees some fire and feels some cold, then finds out these rabbits are magical. There is no narrative, no real buildup, climax — no emotional journey or character arc. This on its own isn't a problem — stories come in all shapes and sizes, but for a story relying solely on atmosphere and descriptive imagery, I'd really like to see something more than some fire, plants and rabbits if I'm being honest. It's also possible to make these things interesting through the narrator's perspective, but the narrator here only really expresses simple emotions like 'I felt happy' or 'cold' or 'compassion', rather than any real wonder or personal investment in the setting surrounding them.
Apologies if this comment sounds harsh, but I can't in good faith upvote this because I think it could be vastly improved. I don't know how much time you had left when you wrote this — it could easily be a product of running out of time in the contest — but in my opinion, it definitely needs a second look from you and also more crit to get it to a good place.
Thank you for the read and input! I've implemented the SPaG corrections. As for narrative and other revisions, I'll revisit after the contest when I do heavy revisions to the narrative. For context, read my response to Maxyfran73.
Agreed with LAN. While I didn't mind the word choice issues as much, I definitely felt that this leaned substantially more into atmosphere than it did story. Which is fine — it is a dream, after all — but the atmosphere wasn't really ENOUGH for it to stand entirely on that leg. There were Vibes, for sure, but I didn't register how those Vibes made the author feel, or what greater theme or meaning they amount to.
I assume the lack of a narrative is because this is meant to emulate what a dream is like, and the prose is meant to mimic how a person who just woke up would describe their dream. I think dreams are very cool, so I really respect stories like this that try to capture that strangeness. However… I think the style of the prose is to its detriment. Like LAN says, it's very monotonous to read; I found myself struggling to pay attention at points. I think it's still possible to have interesting prose and good word flow while also invoking this sort of "half-woken up" narration, but as it is now, it's a downvote for me.
Thank you for the read and feedback!
I assume the lack of a narrative is because this is meant to emulate what a dream is like, and the prose is meant to mimic how a person who just woke up would describe their dream.
Correct! Reading your (and so far all y'all's comments) input I realise now that it doesn't have to be realistic and attempting to do so was at its detriment.
In regards to narrative, please see my response to Maxyfran73 below.
Hmmm. I dunno. I kind of have to agree with the previous comments. There's something interesting going on here, but it's shrouded in metaphor, and past that, there really isn't much more to it. It feels very pointless, this chase that just leads to a 'and then they groomed each other and I woke up'. It feels like an unearned read because nothing really happens in it. While some of the writing is good, the ending just makes me feel disappointed; like I didn't really read much at all.
I understand that dream logic has, well, no logic, but there just isn't enough here to make the story feel substantial.
-1
Howdy! Thanks for reading and your input!
I had a dream last night about two rabbits. I remembered it a few hours ago and wrote a quick note down. It gave me clear insight on the ending and sadly this insight came AFTER the contest posting closed. The ending is that the two forgive each other. The lead into to flesh this out is drawing more parallel's to "masculine/feminine" symbolism. The dreamer needs to comment on some of this symbolism in reference to their own life.
I chose Leo and Cancer as symbols to represent this instead of the colloquial symbolism. The narrator is show that they can be at peace with both of their "masc/femme" sides.
I realise this won't change your vote at the moment and that's valid. Thanks again for reading!
The last sentence of that spoiler is such a wonderful thing. 🥺
Having read the other posts, I'm just gonna say that I like what you did and >90% of the way you did it. It works well for me.
And as someone who used to document my dreams, I enjoyed the mention of the heater turning on and really enjoyed the narrator's statement before bed. The latter was relatable as hell. +1
/forum/t-15211599/two-rabbits#post-