h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Adoption - A51166938
Author: MysticMusician - U13803922

This was my first attempt at writing a kind of sci fi short story on-line so am feeling a little raw. I don't want to write anything factual at the moment and prefer fiction. Hope I've picked the right venue as I still find the process of submitting fiction on this site quite confusing. I would be grateful for feedback if I've got something wrong.

Here is the right place for short-story writing.

My crit goes like this:

This doesn't work as a short story. But it works well as an outline for a short story. Now go back and 'flesh it out' - figure out where to start the reader, how to describe the character so that she seems to be a real person, how to engage our sympathies, and how to tell the story so that we figure out what's happening and get the point as you unfold the story.

For instance, you might start with the interview. You might describe the place where they keep the kittens. You might describe the kitten the main character wants to adopt.

If you do it right, you can reduce the critics around here to tears....

They love kittens, you see. (But mostly they don't like science fiction, take it from me...)

I agree with Dmitri that this is a good outline for a short story.

But I also agree that you need to develop the characters, build up a picture of the heroine going to look at the kitten etc.

I've just read PD James's book 'Children of Men', set in a world where no babies have been born for 25 years. Here, women distressed by their childlessness adopt kittens.