Oct 14, 2023
Hey, not bad! The story kept me moving along from one paragraph to the next. The foreshadowing was excellent ("However, the weekend never arrived," for example). I'm not a good judge of short fiction, but I thought that the way you presented the quandary that Akaru was in was engrossing. I did have some difficulty with some of the sentences (e.g. when Thanatos said "I must not answer to that," I wasn't sure if he meant he couldn't answer or shouldn't answer) but these are minor quibbles.
Finally, the ending paragraph was a complete surprise (good job there!). But was Akaru really a psycho, without motivation for his actions? Or did the news story (I'm assuming it was a news story) try to paint him as one? Or did something else compel him to do what he did, maybe one of the gods in the story? I don't think the flash fiction format allows much room for exposition, though, so I'll just have to guess. 😀Overall, I felt that this story was well-written and compelling. Best of luck to you in the competition! 👍👍
