United Kingdom • 60 y/oReviews Given
Your protagonist isn't the first person to want to save or reform someone they love. Its a common theme in stories and it can happen in real life. The would be saviour doesn't always succeed but it shows a good heart if they're trying. They need to be careful not to get dragged down by whoever they want to save, but its an interesting subject for a story,
I like your descriptive style and the scenario is convincing, keep it up.
'Thoughts of her would keep me up through the night' reads better than 'her thoughts would...etc.'
Nevertheless its a sharp and disturbing twist in the final lines. You handled that well. You do right in bringing smell as well as sight into your descriptions. Keep writing.
If social media had existed back then, Jesus and the Apostles probably would've used it. So too would Socrates, the Buddha and Confucius had it been available to them. People wrote propaganda and biased accounts long before the first computer or the first smartphone.
Perhaps you could say 'at first he didn't realise the door was ajar,' as he clearly does realise eventually. Nonetheless its good for a first attempt. Your protagonist and his feelings are totally convincing.
Interesting account of how people view animals in different ways. We often impose our prejudices on many species, but we're not always right and it won't change the creatures in question. Both rats and snakes do what they must to survive in what can be harsh environments.
As a walker I can relate to this. Only yesterday I tried a path that was new to me. Perhaps I should think more about the people who went this way before me.
This is a vivid and plausible evocation of a build up to disaster, also of a man torn between two cultures. Well done.