20131125 - andyk - Straight Poker

[andyk]

A break from my Rome novel this week, and a jump aboard the weird western bandwagon for a flash fiction story. What can I say, I love a western, and reading other people's gave me the itch to head west myself.

 

Looking forward to seeing what you make of it.

[jParker]

Off-topic: super glad that me and yankorro got you on the Western train. Less glad that you wrote it better than either of us (no disrespect yankorro). 

 

On-topic:

Holy rust this was good. While I didn't quite understand the rules behind the game (diamonds versus spades, etc.), it worked perfectly. There seems to be a logical system behind the devil's games of poker. There was steady buildup, great tension, good stakes. The only thing that didn't work for me was why Rick wanted to go back east. But frankly, that doesn't really matter to me. It was a strong piece and I look forward to a sequel, if there is one.

[yankorro]

I was always terrible at cards. Either I didn't get the rules when I played or didn't really care if I won or lost in the first place. Or maybe I just just had other things I wanted to throw my money away on...

 

That having been said, I can agree with jParker that this little story works all right. Thought I must say my eyes glazed over a bit at the end with all the blow by blow card flipping. And I got the feeling that something more could have been made of the bit with the Indian dying mid-game. The way I read it was kind of like, "Yeah, so, then like the Indian dude dies. Moving on..." Maybe paint the picture more vividly, stretch out the subjective time so that the man's death takes on a little bit more weight in the narrative, make the stakes seem a little higher.

 

Not much else to say about this one--I hesitate to write a critique that's longer than the actual piece--so I'll stop here. Not bad stuff, not at all. 

[Two McMillion]

This was a strong and well-written piece, but I believe the ending weakened it substantially. You built up the horror of the situation well- the trap in the game of cards in which there was no escape, the other players dropping off one by one, but when Rick won it almost seemed to come too easily. So it felt a little like the horrible unearthly power wasn't so horrible after all, and became something of a letdown. The ending was also very sudden, without a lot of fanfare or even sweet relief, which probably contributed to that feeling.

 

As a prologue to a longer piece, I think this could work. It's interesting enough to draw me in and make me want to read on. But as a standalone I think it feels like a lot of buildup and very little payoff.

[Mandamon]

Very similar comments to the others.  Tight writing and very engaging, and you managed to put a lot into a short story.  It feels like there's a lot behind this, even though you don't have room to talk about it.

 

However, like the others, I was sort of confused by the logistics.  Were they were playing poker with the regular cards?  Some of the alternate names threw me.  

 

also, why did the old lady's spell take the Apache, if he won the hand, but the Rick beat her in the end?  I wasn't completely clear on what she did to set the spell in place.  Did it require her to win, or make certain plays?

 

Overall very engaging, but you might want to a few more sentences or words of explanation, at the risk of making it longer.