Young Writers Society

Just so you know, guys, I'm not that good at writing but I decided to give it a try anyway. This story is kinda based on the CSI TV show but it's set in Seattle, WA and it has, of course, different team members. The members are mostly based on my close friends.





Carrying my crime scene kit, I walked into the house and there were two bodies leaning against each other on the couch, seemingly asleep. But when I walked around to the front of the couch, the woman had a gunshot wound to the head and the man’s throat was slit. There wasn’t much blood spatter on the man so his death was quick and the woman’s was also quick. I could see that the killer had put the gun directly on her head and shot her. There was blood spatter on the couch and there was a postmortem bruise on her forehead the shape of a gun muzzle. Mark was already there, talking with some of the police officers. He looked at me and said, “This case is all yours. I’m working on another one with Anita. There’s another body downstairs. Dawn’s already there. Why don’t you help her out until the ME clears this body?”

“Sure,” I replied and headed to the stairs. Dawn came up the stairs, muttering to herself about me not being there and then she looked up and jumped, startled. I grinned and said, “Hi. I’m here now so you can stop muttering.”

“Sorry.”

“Well, what’s the situation downstairs?” I said.

She replied with, “Girl downstairs’ about 16 years old. Has multiple stab wounds. I’m still waiting on the ME to give me the C.O.D and T.O.D.”

“I was just talking with him and he said he’d be down shortly.”

“Good… Also, I still need him to clear it so I can move the body!”

“Whoa! What’s with the bad attitude?”

She glared at me and said, “I’ve been waiting for four hours for the ME to come down here! What do you expect?”

“Whoa, whoa. When did you get on the scene? At, like, 11?”

“Yeah, basically,” she snapped angrily.

“Wow. The ME’s taking too long with the bodies upstairs… Hmm. I’ll go have a little talk with him.”

I turned around and headed back up the stairs. When I arrived in the living room, the ME was nowhere in sight, so I asked Tatiana where he was. She replied with a roll of her eyes and then she said, “He keeps being called to other crime scenes where the cops thought it was homicide but only suicides or accidental deaths.”

I replied with “The ME’s supposed to clear these first, then go to those scenes… Oh, wait, he’s new right?”

“Yeah. I tried to tell him what you just said, but he just didn’t listen,” said Tatiana.

I sighed and thanked her. As I was going back down the stairs, I yelled to Dawn that the ME was new and he would be down soon. I explained to her why he had taken so long. “Well, in my opinion, he should be sent back to the Police Academy or wherever he learned from and retake the classes,” she said with an annoyed expression.

The ME, whose name was Gary, apologized for his mistake and looked over the body of the girl and he said, “The C.O.D is either massive external and internal bleeding or a stab directly in the heart. T.O.D is 12 o’ clock.” He looked up at us and said, “She was killed either before her lunch or shortly after. Only autopsy will tell us that, and I’m not looking forward to it.”

Dawn made a disgusted noise and commented, “I’m sure… Well, can we move the body now?”

“Yeah. That is, if you’ve got all the shots you need.”

She replied quickly with a sharp comment. “I’ve been waiting for you to clear the body for four hours! Do you really think I would just stand around here waiting? I’ve been collecting evidence from other rooms. And as for you,” she said, turning on me, “Why did you arrive late? Hmm?”

She cocked one eyebrow and waited for my answer. I gave her my best Mr. Spock impersonation and replied, “I was at the lab, finishing up a case and putting the evidence away.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

I told her, “It’s OK. I should have been here earlier anyway. But there is a good side to me being late… You were able to get all of the evidence we’ll probably need, and if I had been here, we would have been bored sooner.”

“True,” She shrugged and said, “We should be headed back to the lab anyway.” So we said our goodbyes to Gary and headed out to my SUV.

This is an interesting plot line, but there's a lot of outright telling instead of showing it through dialogue, touch...you get the idea... I think if you gave the narrator more insight in his head, then he wouldn't seem like a zombie. Also, since this is meant to be a thriller, you want to make it seem suspenseful. A couple lines here and there may capture my attention more. Also, some of the lines seem a bit cliche, if you just read it out loud to yourself, then you might find some little twerks in there that are a bit annoying that you can change. Good plot, but you're not presenting it well.

I finally got to it! Yay. Sorry it took me so long.

First of all, I'm glad you are attempting writing. From this point on, you can only get better. But lets get on with the critique...

Characters: Your characters are flat. It is not easy to make them compelling, it takes practice, but its alot of fun. You have to truly be able to SEE them. You have to know them. You said at the beginning that the characters were based off of your friends, and I'm sure your friends are loads more interesting then these people. Make them say things out of the ordinary, give them funny quirks, like a weird hand motion or an odd way of walking. It is these things that will grab the reader, and make them want to read more. What do Dawn, Tatiana, the main character look like? What are their mannerisms? What do they hate? What always cheers them up? etc.

Story-line/description: There is nothing wrong with the story, it just needs some elaboration. Add TONS of description. What does the house look like? What does it smell like? Does it seem creepy or is the main character too jaded to notice? How does it feel to be on a crime scene at three in the morning? Is it normal/annoying/fun/scary? Add something that will make the reader wonder. Have the main character ask himself questions that will get us interested. Make him curious or apathetic or egotistical or stupid. In a suspense/crime story like this you have to hold the suspense, so focus on asking ALOT of questions. Thats about it.

This was not bad for a first try. There were little or no grammar/punctuation mistakes (which I ALWAYS find in first stories) and the story was not worthless. I'm sure if you work on this it could be pretty cool.

Good luck and I hope this helps.

I agree that there should be a little bit more info or maybe just something about the characters, because it dives right into the story without saying much about them. It's like I stumbled into some strangers conversation. You seem to have the idea down and know what you're talking about so that's a plus. I think this reads better in script form...maybe you should try that out. Hah...I had to write a TV Show script for one of my classes based off a show we like and I did CSI...it was actually fun. But anyway this isn't bad at all for a first try. Maybe break up that large paragraph in the beginning though. Besides that, keep on writing.

Flame-
I have to agree with chernobillyinclined, the characters are really flat like super Mario bros paper!! i think this is a great start because i know you are not much a writer but like she or he said you only can get better from this point (i think ) but maybe add a bit more dialogue and more interesting sentences instead of the normal CSI words. other than that wow its a good book so far

Hi! I'm Jessica and I'd like to say first of all that I really liked it.

Flame11 wrote:Just so you know, guys, I'm not that good at writing but I decided to give it a try anyway.

NO!!! You're a phenomenal writer and don't you ever doubt that! That's probably the worst thing I can ever catch in a review, good writers thinking they're terrible. You're very good, just wanted you to know that.

Flame11 wrote:She replied with, “Girl downstairs’ about 16 years old. Has multiple stab wounds.

Try and write out your numbers.

Flame11 wrote:At, like, 11?”

Again, write out your numbers. But you probably got that by now. : )

- A lot of us don't speak CSI, at least I don't so, try and make it a bit more understandable.
- As said before, your characters are kind of flat. Really get into each and every one of their shoes and develop a personality, a look, etc. for each one of them.
- Explain the scenery and the back ground. You know what the scenes look like, right? So, show us what it looks like too!

Keep writing! : D

- Jessica