Thank you for submitting to xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx. We have decided not to publish your piece, "Xxx Xxxx". Some reader comments:
"This was funny. Amusing. I know it was a build up for a punchline, but I liked it. It made me laugh. I can picture the over-dramatized man, struggling with this terrible 'burden', only to find out it's a lawn mower. It's clever. I guess I like that it starts out super-dramatized, but it's all for a laugh."One out of four liked it, I'll take that as a win. It was only 200 words long, their comments run 198 words.
"I'm not charmed. I felt this relied on narrative tricks to get readers to like the piece. A lot of space was wasted on describing heat; that bored me. The piece doesn't go anywhere because there's no story here."
"The setup didn't interest me, and I didn't find the joke reveal at the end funny."
"There's no story here for me to emotionally invest in, because the whole piece is just a setup to a punchline. I almost never enjoy twist endings because I feel they deliberately mislead readers. Essentially, they set up a situation in which the joke is on the reader. I prefer a narrative style that takes readers into its confidence and treats them with respect. I say: put aside the cheap-twist gimmick and just tell me a good story with solid layers of humor and depth."
Best of luck, and please feel free to submit to us again in the future,