Novel Treatments / turtleish. helen's garden.

The passage you pointed out. I’m having a lot of trouble seeing what it is you’re saying here. WIth the exception of “imagine”, it’s past tense, and imagine is intentionally not past tense.

Can you further what you’re trying to show me?

Incomplete sentences, ahh, such is the beauty of style.

I’m an editor and used to complete sentences, too, yet many times thoughts are best expressed in incomplete sentences.  I looked at the content and not the sentence structure or grammar.

Imagine now, yes. That’s present tense. The ten of us talked to her is written in the same tense as Helen took a tour. My correction would be a layer:
“She and friends had taken a tour…the weeks she had watched them slowly rot.”

I only suggest the layers because it’s the same paragraph. If you wrote each set of tenses in different paragraphs the time would be more cohesive in the reader’s mind.

Well, as she’s dead, I think past perfect is unnecessary. The entire paragraph apart from “imagine” is past… Thanks for responding. Comment response is not what it should be.

I understand the division between past and present in the piece, but you also have an incident in the past where they talk about the further past. It is not stable to clump them in the same tense.

Thanks for your thoughts.

Hey, my review was three times as long as DC’s. He’s too fixated with that cush to expand. Poor man.

I find I’m often preoccupied with cush.

Cush is brilliant. Live it. Cush.

Thanks, mister.

if they all (not are) I need to trim my fingernails. :)

Maybe “just graduated” doesn’t even need to be there. Don’t know. It clunked a little. Reminded me of my syntax. Yikes. Maybe stretch that first part and let it breathe before the donkey ride.

It started as the year, barely twenty, she and…

I just wanted to show her young, and I didn’t feel like pin curls was enough.

Maybe it’s starting the sentence with The year that bothers me.

I have a cold, and I just had a cold. What’s wrong with me?

I have the plague, and I recently had the plague. I blame stress. You can use that. No one can dispute stress.

The year... Huh. I’ll think about it. I don’t know how to change it right now.

Thanks, lady.

This is my first read of the turtle stuff.   I wish I had gotten on board in th e beginning.  You can really write.

I just wish I had noticed Marvin’s review first.  I always end up saying similar things as him.  I could just add ‘ditto’ to his review in the comments.

Well, you are kind of at the beginning. I keep revising what direction I’m going to take, so I have three several-chapter chunks of turtle…

I have random reviews off, you wouldn’t be able to see his review anywy—but it’s ok, I’ll pay for genuine thoughts.

Feel free to poke my turtle in later chapters.

I’ll keep my eyes bugged out for them.

The summer bit.. it’s an actual season. I lived with her for one summer. Or, rather, she and I found ourselves in the same residence for one summer. Three months, maybe.

Sigh.

Thanks, mister.

An afternoon snack story: Picture this, you’re at a memorial, everyone is telling stories, youngest member pipes up. “She always made me snacks after school.” AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.

okay. i get it. it works. i can dig it.

hey, what’s this?

<000D

you guessed it. it’s the worst rendition of a turtle. ever.

Oh wow. I didn’t guess that at all. It is the worst rendition ever.

I guessed it was some kind of corrugated poop.

You can dig it: really? Does that work or is it awkward?

is what awkward? corrugated poop?

...well, I can kind of dig it. “baseball games” i can immediately relate to but “afternoon snacks” is kind of like saying…well, “afternoon snacks.” when i first read it, i thought it was “over afternoon snacks” and then i hit a wall after “baseball games” looking for more. two details is good, though. the comedic rule of threes could be applied, but the two fits better with the “rhythm” of the piece. to me, anyway. would you consider putting in “afternoon snacks after school?” still spare. gives me just a drop more so i don’t feel like a total dummy. up to you, glitterbug.

or just “snacks after school.” right. afternoon would be implied. unless you were home-schooled and classes were over at 10a.m.

“stay for a summer” ??

mebbe?

I was thinking the same, “snacks after school”. I likes it.

Of course you can relate to baseball games.

You’re not dumb. Did I just call you ugly? No no. I love greasy overalls almost as much as giant beards.

Summer I’m keeping, I think.

Quit responding to my comments while I’m typing responses to your comments. Sheesh.

Loaf.

if you keep “summer” the entire piece goes down like the Hindenberg. Ball of flames.

no. it’s fine.

What? No way. It’s fine. Like: I invite you to stare at me middle finger.

Or, my middle finger, anyway.

STOP DOING THAT!

you’ve been punked.

...

Oh, are you done now?

...dick…

gun shy now?

pull the trigger. i dare you.

Ah wheel hucklebuck you square un the eye if’n you’s not curful.

oh! i’ve been punked now!

biatch.

HAHAHA.

Triumphant in something-something… mumble..