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Message: <blockquote data-quote="BSF" data-source="post: 1650061" data-attributes="member: 13098">Taladas' Untitled 1st round storyOne of the first things I need to say is an echo of Berandor.  You really need to keep your tense consistent.  You have heard it, and I am sure the judges will comment on it, so I will leave it at that.  Let's jump to picture use.  I like a lot of the picture use.  The hat pic initially looks like a throwaway, but you use that as a setup and revisit it at the end of the story.  Nice twist and one thing I really enjoy when I read Ceramic DM stories.  The dunked pic is another that you use to build up some of the tension.  Using it as the key to Derek's vision is nice.  The picture of "Becky" wasn't great.  Still, with a little handwaving to focus on the overall feel of the picture, I can accept it.  The birdinthehand pic is interesting.  I get the impression you were having a hard time working it into the story.  But, you did a good job of making it important.  You have the image placed as a symbol, then you add in marionette strings and you have that tie back to the underlying tension and the relevance of the hats.  It was well-crafted and I really appreciate that.  However, you have a potential plot hole here.  The hats are the crux of the story.  But, somebody murdered Jared Mills, but left his hats there?  Becky is mysterious and forces Derek to guess that the hats are the key.  We don't have any resolution on why somebody didn't take care of the hats sooner, or why Becky feels the need to be obtuse about them.  The story has some nice tension, but it relies on a little bit of contrivance to keep it afloat.  A little more explanation on why nobody could/would do anything about the hats sooner, and why Becky just doesn't blurt out why they must be taken care of would help resolve these things.  Of course, this is a story done to pictures in a 72 hour timeframe.  It is hard to get all the ducks lined up in a row in that short a time.  Nevertheless, I enjoyed reading the story.  It has some great elements that help give it a little twist, but it ends on a hopeful note that *something bad* has been averted.</blockquote>

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