Universe
I liked the idea behind this story. It reminded me a bit of the kind of ideas BlackJesus used to write about back in the day. Shocking subject matter can be incredibly gripping if executed well. The elements of this story were all well constructed. The beginning and the ending of the story were both strong. For me, the middle of the story, while well written, was the section where I felt the line limit come into play. The brother's assault of his sister was handled very quickly in this piece, and given that the piece relies to a certain extent on its shock value, it could have benefitted from a more uncomfortably detailed description. Similarly, there is a time jump right after the assault, given that the sister had an abortion, and it left me wondering what the sister was doing in that time. Obviously your story is from the brother's point of view, so that is a personal nitpick. In all, I always enjoy a good piece of storytelling, and I found your story to be engaging. Well done.
dead man
This piece was less of a direct story than Universe's, and more of an overview of the journey into adulthood of one person in the company of his best friend, or possibly his love (the verse never said this, only mentions the companion as the 'best friend', but who knows). For me, this topical was made up of two distinct halves. The first half was a nostalgic trip through the childhood of the two main characters. By namechecking many of the objects that hold a symbolic link to childhood for many young adults you were able to evoke strong feelings of nostalgia while being quite economical with your words. I found the second half of the verse, when you moved from age 12 to age 21, to be a little more obscure. To me, it seemed like the main character and the girl he was best friends with while growing up, had gone their separate ways. And after that, the boys life had gone downhill somewhat, and he now had a feeling of quiet desperation. That somehow everything had fallen apart for him after the girl had left, because she was the one who kept bringing him back to the path. But I'm not sure that I'm reading that the way you meant it, because I did find it a little more obscure. It also seemed stylistically different from the first half, which I found a little jarring. But overall, this was an evocative piece of writing. Nice job.
This was a good battle. Both of you dropped strong pieces. I thought dead man had a strong first half of his verse, while I did not connect with the second hald so much. While Universe had a strong beginning and end, but the middle felt a little rushed. In the end I will go with Universe, for keeping me more engaged with the verse as a whole. Both great pieces though.
Vote - Universe
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