The American Munich: My Great Uncle's Heroic Act

MP I wanted to email you but notice you have emails declined. I've been looking through your work generally, and there's a couple of things I wanted to suggest. Now I'm no expert, but I think there are some broad points you should think about, mostly grammatical. To me, a sound knowledge of grammar is essential because when you know grammar, you can begin to decide how you wish to use / abuse it. I still make many mistakes, I still pick up on new ones when I re-read pieces I wront months ago, which I thought I had right. But generally, I do what i can to have the grammar perfect. The thing that I picked up in your work is incorrect grammar on speech. For instance: "Munich be strong, your plan is perfect. The guards are being taken care of as we speak and Hanal is loading up the trucks." He replied. The way speech should end is as follows: "Munich be strong, your plan is perfect. The guards are being taken care of as we speak and Hanal is loading up the trucks," he replied. It's a comma before the final speechmark and a lowercase letter that follows (if it's an exclamation or question, the following letter is STILL lowercase). I would also recommend paragraph breaks between speech, rather than putting a whole load of different speakers in one paragraph. What you have done is done by some authors, it features in books like, "The electric kool-aid acid test" (I believe) for instance, but it takes a hell of a lot to get away with it. Regardless, correct punctuation (the comma and lowercase following letter) is essential. Now I know what you probably want it a comment on your stories themselves, and you are less concerned with the grammar / structure, but I assure you that stories become a hell of a lot better when they are laid out appropriately. I really recommend that you google "English Grammar" or something similar and have a read about how these things should be done. Or pick up any book you own and study the form. Please don't take this as a criticism, these things are a learning curve. As a fourteen year old, I think you are writing well above your age; you certainly have a wonderful imagination and grasp of storytelling. I just think you should slow down a bit, and focus on perfecting what you have. Rewriting and editing is crucial. For instance, in 'The American Munich' you have: "His words were cut of by..." This should be "cut off". It's a small point, but I believe it's important to get these things right. Keep up the writing, you're good, but work on the presentation on it to get it just so. I hope that's useful. Enzo.. www.thedevilbetweenus.com

Please excuse my own spelling / grammar errors in the above! Enzo.. www.thedevilbetweenus.com

Your teacher is correct, IF you are not adding a person-tag (I'm sure there's a 'correct' word for this!) on the end of the sentence, such as: "My cat just crapped in your tomato plant," remarked Prunella, drily. "I will avenge the death of my father, after I finish this piece of pie," Rufus drawled. Otherwise the correct format is, "I dread Christmas parties at work." Which I do. Enzo is right, though. Your stories are quite good, but can be awkward to read due to the punctuation/grammatical issues. If you can get these things licked, then we will be able to better comment on the -content- of the stories, all of which, as Enzo points out, are written to a level well above your (typical) 14-year old. So, don't get discouraged. We're here to support you.