TheThing 2009-10-08 22:34:36

Very solid story. Not the best I've read, but very good. A few things I saw as I was reading (done mostly when I came across it):

"The golden retriever-now stained brown with dirt and other unmentionables-stared into Sam's eyes"

Take out the dashes, and put a comma after "retriever" and add a "who was", then another comma after "unmentionables". Actually, "unmentionables" to "indeterminable filth". Unmentionables are underwear. Anyway, although the dashes might work, they break up the flow, which isn't needed here.

Give some more emotion to the reunion. Obviously they were friends/lovers/related, and they are ecstatic and shocked to see each other alive. Throw in some adjectives and adverbs that express this.

"Everything-absolutely everything-was in ruins"

No thank. Get rid of the "absolutely everything". It just sounds stupid. Leave it as just "everything...". Like above, try not to use a dash unless you want to put particular emphasis on something. You did it here, but it doesn't sound good. The rest of the paragraph is nice though.

"force of nuclear explosions casting inanimate objects at breakneck speeds into them"

Reword this. It sounds awkward. Try taking out "at breakneck speeds". I imagine if something wasn't incinerated by a nuke, it would be going very fast. Also, nukes don't char people; they get disintegrated and leave their outline on the wall behind them or on the ground, so talk about that. Of course there will be charred bodies from the resulting fires, but not too many. Most people understand fire is hot.

"his body-what was left of it-fall the ground and walked away in tears"

Finally, good use of the dash, but it doesn't make sense; if he was pinned under a van, how could he fall to the ground? And who walked away in tears? (I know that Sam did, but It's a bit confusing)

"After finding another messenger bag, this one an olive green"

I don't care what color it is. Either say "After finding an olive green messenger bag" or nothing. If it isn't vital to the story or characterization, use as few words as possible, if any at all.

"We need to round up some known survivors before we head to camp"

What? Since when were they heading to a camp with survivors? You should have said something while they were packing up to leave Chucky's house. It could have been as simple as "ready to head to the survivor's camp?" or something with a little more character, like "why weren't you ready to go to the survivor's camp?"

Like I said, this a pretty good story, and I think it would be great if it was made longer. By the fact that I was really only helping you with the mechanics shows that you have the ideas and ability, but you're just not there quite yet.