Responses to Pieces: Workshop Pt. I (Week 9)

Response to Claire's "Michigan Smoking Ban: All Smoke and No Fire?"
I really liked this immersion-type piece. I liked how you would mention your pack of Camel cigarettes or yourself wandering a bar or cafe with your drink. I think these things made it believable for the reader to understand your point of view and see that you really put herself into the situations. One thing that threw me off at times was the transitions between locations. It just seemed to jump a little bit. As I read, I eventually understood the transitions but it took a second before I really felt like they flowed together. I also was wondering what happened with the Waldo's situation. Was there a bouncer or management member around to talk to? Did they say that they don't really enforce either? Or that they are half-assing it? I really liked the personal aspect that you put into the piece, so I was wondering if more of other voices could go in it as well? Or would that be too many voices? Overall, I really enjoyed reading your piece.

Response to Joel's "Meeting the Band Draft"
You can really tell that you spent time on your subject and invested yourself in them. I liked the quotes you put in because you really get a feel for the band. You did a great job of capturing the band's mentality and aura with the quotes and the descriptions. One thing that threw me off was the form/structure. You have a lot of longer sentences (lots of commas), so I would definitely rework them to make sure sentence structure is not too redundant. I really enjoyed the piece, but I was stuck when I tried to think of the exact conflict. Especially with the last few sentences at the end, I get a review/promotion type feel, trying to convince us to applaud them. So that threw the conflict off a little bit for me. Overall, I think this was a great draft and can definitely see your interest in the band.

Response to Jess'"Amidst Smaller Acceptance Rates, KAMSC Students are Still Getting In"
I really liked reading your piece. I thought the organization and flow of the piece was great--one section went to the next with meaning and purpose. You can definitely tell that you did a lot of reporting and really thought about how to structure all of it into the story. You included the information in a great way so it was easy to comprehend as a reader and apply to the story at hand. One thing that I questioned was that this felt like a very newspaper/news-y story. I liked when the student has a voice at the end but besides that it seems like a very straight-forward and news-focused story. I think the quotes definitely add to the narrative aspect of the story, though--because you get to hear Streeter's voice and you can tell he's a unique man. At times, the quotes did get a little confusing to read though (probably because of the conversational aspect of it). Besides that I think that your piece was well-organized and well-researched and that definitely impressed me.

Response to Anna's "Park Trades Center Draft"
I think that your piece was structured well--you gave good descriptions of each section. I wanted to see more of them tied together. I like when you mention the KBAC and Glass Center collaborating because that really adds to the sense of community in the Trades Center--so I think more of this feel would be great. Until the end of the last paragraph, it is mostly description of each section (which were great), and then we finally see what the conflict is/all of the different areas coming together. I think this could definitely be used earlier in the piece. You do this well with your physical descriptions (the staircase winding down and connecting all of the areas, etc), but I wanted to see more of the actual events that bring them together (like the two companies collaborating). Not to take away from the descriptions thought, because I thought they were fabulous!

Response to Myles' "Parchment's Abandoned Factories/Working Title"
I really loved all of your descriptions. I thought you did a great job of describing what you were seeing and how it was something that perhaps the rest of us have never seen before. I think that having these descriptions throughout the entire piece instead of mainly the beginning would be nice. In the first three paragraphs, you use a lot of semi-colons and em-dashes--so I would definitely rework sentence structure to break-up run-ons. All of your descriptions are so good that it would be a waste for them to get lost in one big, long sentence. I think that I would like more voices in the piece. Who is this affecting besides Curt Flowers. What about the people that live(d) there? Overall, I think there needs to be more conflict in the story: is it that the mills shut down? that Curt wants them back? both? I would have more of this conflict throughout the story and not just the end. I really like what you have so far, the descriptions are great.