Oliver Twist is a sham

Characters are wooden and two dimensional. The book imbued with Victorian hypocrisy. Oliver Twist, far from shining a light on inner city poverty and crime, is voyeuristic and nauseatingly sentimental. In the end, Oliver is plucked from London's 'wickedness' only to join his benefactor in a life of rural privilege.

O ~ 0 ~ o ~

My first Vocal Media runner-up prize, Yay! I am so pleased to have made the mark for the first time and super grateful to the lovely Vocal team for choosing my little literary critique. I am also grateful for all the support I have received from various other Vocal creators for this and other work. I am particularly pleased to have won a 50-word challenge, as 'ultra-brief' is one of things I love to do. If you would like some hints and tips about how to write a complete story/article in 250 words, 100 words or even 50 words, you might like to check out:

How to write a story in 100 words (or less)

I am also glad to have had my reviews recognised in this way. I have been writing book and other reviews for some 40 years, professionally for 10 years when I was a business journalist back in the 1980s/90s. I still write occasional book and other reviews. For example:

• What we fear most (book about forensic psychiatry)
• Lichtenstein: Whaam! (the pop-art painting)

Not to mention....

My "Art for our sake" regular roundup of Art community gems.

Despite the many non-fiction articles I have written and posted on Vocal, my main ambition now is to make some waves in short fictional story writing. Please check out some of my short stories, perhaps by starting with this little WWII story of one determined woman shining her own heroic light in what was very much a man's world of aviation.

Thanks for reading and 1,000 thanks again to the Vocal curation team for providing us all with some fantastic and inspiring challenges!

Congratulations to all the winners!

Ray