Young Writers Society

I always found Christmas break, well, boring. Maybe it's because I hate the snow, the cold, all the lights and why the hell is everyone so damned cheerful. These may very well be words that you'd hear from a grumpy grandpa that has passed his bed time. But these words come from the mouth of a fifteen-year-old girl, moi.

"Lexi! Hurry your ass!" I called back to my sister who was having trouble slushing her way through the snow.

"Hold on!" she said pushing up her glasses. "I don't have long legs like some people."

Me and Lexi weren't full sisters. We shared the same mother, we look totally different. She has light blue eyes were as I have dark brown. She has straight hair I have freakin' curly hair. She wears glasses and I, well, I'm supposed to wear them too. But I 'lose' them.

I rolled my eyes when she caught up to me. "My legs aren't that long. I mean your almost as tall as me....almost," I hated being so small.

I used to be one of the tallest girls in my class, it was great being asked to reach high things. However high school came along and turns out everyone suddenly took a hole lotta growing pills and towered over me. I was still the tallest in my household, that counts for something, right?

"Did we miss anything out?" Lexi looked back at the small piece of paper that our mother had given to us, before making us bare the hard task of grocery shopping.

"Don't think so. They were all outta semi-skimmed milk so I just got normal," I said holding up the bag that carried the milk. "I only use milk for breakfast so I don't really care," seriously how can people just drink milk. It's horrible.

"Did you get the hot chocolate?"

"Yes, Lexi. I didn't forget your damn hot chocolate," I snarled through my teeth. "How come I never get shit like this?" now it was Lexi's time for her eye roll as I went on another one of my pointless rants. "I mean, your allowed to get hot chocolate, but I'm not allowed to have a poster in my room." sucks to be me.

"Neither am I though."

"That's different!" it always was. "Hurry the bus is about to come," I said looking back and seeing the bus that dropped right around the corner from our house. Then breaking out in a run. "Move it, Lexi!"

"I'm movin', I'm movin'!" she said huffing.

We got on the bus and ploped onto the seats at the back. Letting out a breath of relief as we got out from the cold and harsh snow and into the heated bus. I yawned now feeling tired. The sun had set a while ago but it was only half five. All that was left was a purple sky lit with street lights, along with more spots of snow softly making its way to the earth. I pressed my head on the bus window. Lexi pointed and laughed at someones drawing on the bus window of a male reproductive organ.

"They forgot pubic hair," I giggled causing Lexi to giggle more.

"School tomorrow, eh," Lexi said and I groaned.

"Don't remind me," I said rubbing the bridge of my nose.

"School isn't so bad," she said taking out her hands from her gloves and rubbing them together.

"Easy for you to say," I scoffed.

Lexi was still in junior high, next year she'd have to face the man eating monster that is high school.

The bus rolled into our street and we jumpped off thanking the driver as we went. The icy cold wind stabbed at my face. I made a whimpering noise and told Lexi that we should run. She sighed as I ran off without waiting for her to answer.

I turned the knob of our front door to mysteriously found it to be locked. Mum must be out I guessed so I grabbed my spare keys and unlocked it. We shook the snow from our cloths. We then headed for the kitchen and dumped the shopping bags on to the floor.

"You turn the heating on," I commanded my little sister who nodded epically.

I slumped to my room shivering. I pulled off my coat and hung it up to dry. My bottoms were completely dripping with water. So I striped from my snow covered jeans, wet shoes and socks then pulled myself into fluffy bedtime socks with even fluffier pj bottoms. I sighed happily know feeling dry.

"Hey, Abbie!" Lexi called from down stairs. "You wanna let the dogs out from Mum's room!"

"Sure..." I grumbled knowing what was waiting for me.

I heard the creak of my mums door opening. The next thing I know I had two Border Collies jumping all over me.

Lexi laughed."Lucky we didn't take the dogs out with us or you would be in serious trouble."

"Shut up!" I said wriggling while those two mutts licked at my face. "And get these dog off of me!"

"Okay, okay," Lexi giggled. "Here! Pride! Joy!"

I got up and ran my hands over my face making a sickly expression. "Gah. 'Smartest dogs' my ass! More like freakin' 'most annoy dogs'. Or 'dogs that never seem to pee in the back yard but shit in the neighbor's yard all the freakin' time'," I huffed.

"Yeah, yeah," Lexi agreed nodding her head while petting Pride's head.

That's right, my dogs name are Pride and Joy! Well if you think those names are weird you should hear the bi-

"Duck!" Lexi yelled bending her knees a little so the multi colored bird could fly over our heads.

Joy barked at the thing and just stared at it. That would keep her amused for, well, ever.

"Birdy Birdy!" Lexi said waving her hand.

Yup! Birdy Birdy. What its a simple name. I think it did have a name when we first got it but that was thrown out and replaced with Birdy Birdy. I forgot what its real name was. Something beginning with an M, I think. We got that freakin' bird about a year ago. I hated the little fucker. When it first broke out from its cage I locked myself into the kitchen for about an hour. However I soon got used to it flying around the house. At least it did go in it's cage to do it's 'business'. Oh, and guess how has to take care of it, freakin' me. Its a pain. And why do I have to feed it, change it's water and clean out that bird poop infested cage. I didn't want that bird in the first place. But Lexi just had to give Mum those big eyes and she melted.

"Shit! Lexi don't do that! It'll go my room!" I snapped, slapping down her hand and going over to shut my room door. "Come on. I'll make dinner."

The only thing I made was a phone call to the pizza place. Our pizza's arrived just as I was enjoying watching Will & Grace - is it just me that still watches this awesome show. I grabbed salt and sprinkled it on my pizza. I gave Lexi hers and she stuffed her face. All we did was eat and watch T.V.

"I'm home!" said our mum. "God, its cold out there. Hey girls."

"Hi..." we droned still keep our eyes onto the T.V.

Mum was a small woman with a bad temper on her. She had curly hair - like mine however she had red hair. I always though Lexi looked more like mum than me. The only thing I really inherited from my mum was my hair. But then again I don't really look like my Dad.

"Is this all you guys have been doing?!" she yelled at us. Great here we go. "Just sittin' on your arses! Is that it! Have you took the dogs out?!"

"Yeah 'bout an hour ago," I lied.

"Then why is there no snow!" shit!

"We dried it up," I lied once again. "Did the same to the dogs."

"Hmm. Have you at least had something to eat?" she sighed rubbing her forehead.

"Judging my the pizza boxes," I chuckled try to make her laugh - which didn't work.

"What have I told you about saying stuff like that." she went on. "It just makes you come off as stupid."

Whore...

We went to bed early that day as school started tomorrow. I so wasn't looking forward to it. However I did manged to roll my eyes and fell asleep.

Beep! Beep! Beep!

"Nah...fuck..." I grumbled pulling my arm out from my warm, cosy covers and slamming it onto my stupid alarm clock.

My mum most of been out I knew this when I passed her room the door was open and she wasn't in her bed. I passed my mothers room and burst into Lexi's. She slept soundly. I ripped open the curtains thinking that the light would wake her up. I forgot it was winter. The sun wasn't up yet making me feel all the more exhausted. So I resorted to plan B.

"WAKE UP!" I screamed and jumping onto Lexi's bed.

Lexi groaned and kicked me. I laughed and grabbed her dark glasses. Lexi rubbed her eyes and sat up snatching her glasses from my hand.

"Oh quit being such a baby," I playfully smacked her head and she snapped at me like a dog. "Come on, get ready then come downstairs." I told the zombie like Lexi.

I quickly jumped into a random outfit and headed down stairs for some breakfast. Now I'm not really the type of person that doesn't like to eat, but today, I just couldn't be arsed. So I grabbed a breakfast bar and a juice box. Lexi stumbled downstairs about ten minutes later. She made herself some toast as I went up to the bathroom. I came out of the bathroom and picked up the house phone and dialed the number to call a taxi.

"Taxi should be here soon. Go grab your stuff," I told my little sister.

"Don't tell me what to do," she said doing what I told her.

I grabbed my coat and slumped on my dryish boots. I never wore cloves, I just let my hands be painful. Lexi came down holding her black Kicker's bag slung over her sholder. I grabbed my black and white backpack.

"Got you keys?" I asked Lexi, who patted her jacket pocket. "Good!" I grabbed mine that were hanging on a hook.

We opend the door and was greeted by a strong gust of wind that made my eyes weep. I pulled up my hood and rubbed my nose.

Hi! I don't usually crit novels, but I've got experience writing them so I'll try to help you with this first chapter.
First off, the spelling and grammar errors are a little hard to ignore, but it's a draft, you can clean this up later.

I always found Christmas break, well, boring. Maybe it's because I hate the snow, the cold, all the lights and why the hell is everyone so damned cheerful. These may very well be words that you'd hear from a grumpy grandpa that (who) has passed his bed time. But these words come from the mouth of a fifteen-year-old girl, moi.

"Lexi! Hurry your ass!" I called back to my sister, who was having trouble slushing her way through the snow.

"Hold on!" she said pushing up her glasses. "I don't have long legs like some people."

Me and Lexi weren't full sisters. We shared the same mother, but we look totally different. She has light blue eyes were as (whereas) I have dark brown eyes. She has straight hair, I have freakin' curly hair. She wears glasses and I--well, I'm supposed to wear them too. But I 'lose' them.

I rolled my eyes when she caught up to me. "My legs aren't that long. I mean your (you're) almost as tall as me...almost," I hated being so small.

This kind of stuff. go through your chapter and prune these out.

This is an okay place to start for learning about the characters. I like to start with a back-and-forth between main characters just for fun, since writing arguments is easy for me. However, the problem is that you take it too far here. I liked the title and it drew me in, but I read the whole thing and was disappointed in that nothing related to the title whatsoever. This is important, because a first chapter has to satisfy to get someone to keep reading. You have so many tools at your disposal--foreshadowing for later chapters or the ending, providing intriguing glimpses of secrets, giving the characters something to hide--that you can use to make the first chapter a blast to read and the reader want to read the next one. However, this chapter feels just like a sequence of events, and at no point did I feel any plot or character-driven stuff going on between any of the characters. Also, why does the narrator have to complain so much?
This is a big one. It's okay to have your protagonist be a jerk, but not at all times. Something has to be cool or funny or interesting about him or her so that the reader actually cares. Your protagonist might have character, but it's buried beneath layers of angst that make her seem really not that unique.
You don't need to show every second of someone's life in a novel, in sequence. You can montage, slow down, focus on one thing or the other, or skip the boring parts. This is important. This is why people divide their novels in sections and chapters.
Why is the novel called this title? Focus on that, and bring more of this plot or character driven story into this chapter. Cut or shrink the scenes that aren't any fun, and add more that are. Maybe toss something spontaneous into the end of the chapter. In Nanowrimo culture, we call them plot bunnies that hop into your novel. Something unexpected, like a boy throwing a snowball against the girls' window, and the main character getting mad and running out after him? Or the dogs having turned into Christmas zombie dogs overnight? Then end the chapter just as the unusual thing has been realized, so that the reader is like WTF christmas zombie dogs i gotta find out what happens!!!
Hope this helps, don't give up. Writing novels is tough, but rewarding. I've written them for years.

I always found Christmas break, well, boring. Maybe it's because I hate the snow, the cold, all the lights and why the hell is everyone so damned cheerful. These may very well be words that you'd hear from a grumpy grandpa that has passed his bed time. But these words come from the mouth of a fifteen-year-old girl, moi.

I so agree. I hate Christmas, too. I don't see a reason to work out your ass at tidying, cleaning and cooking, just to have a dinner with your family? C'mon, I hate my family. They underestimate me. And forget about me all the time. Why would I possibly want to spend time with them? Okay, I'm shutting up now.

were as

Sure you didn't mean 'whereas'?

She has straight hair I have freakin' curly hair.

Put some 'and' there, it doesn't make sense this way.
freaking* (Theoretically, you shouldn't use the word in the literature, but those are practically your character's thoughts, so it can be, but it must be written correctly.)

I rolled my eyes when she caught up to me. "My legs aren't that long. I mean your almost as tall as me....almost," I hated being so small.

You're*
as me... almost*
And I hate being small, too Highfive, girl!

However high school came along and turns out everyone suddenly took a hole lotta growing pills and towered over me.

However, then*
turned out* (Don't mix the tenses. Ever. Using present tense to speak about past is a practice common in informal language, but it's a bad mistake in literature.)
whole lot of* (Again. Unless you put it in your character's mouth, you shouldn't use informal language in literature.

before making us bare the hard task

bear*

"I only use milk for breakfast so I don't really care," seriously how can people just drink milk. It's horrible.

Put a dot at the end of her line and start "seriously" with the capital "s". It is because "seriously..." doesn't describe the way she spoke, but is her autonomous thought. So it shouldn't be joined with the speech. Also, you should put a question mark at the end of the sentence ("Seriously, how can people just drink milk?"--notice the comma), because it's grammatically a question, so the punctuation should be appropriate to it.

your allowed to get hot chocolate

YOU'RE*

I'm not allowed to have a poster in my room." sucks to be me.

Again, "Sucks to be me." should be started with capital letter as it's an independent sentence.

"That's different!" it always was. "Hurry the bus is about to come," I said

It always was.* (independent sentence again)
Hurry,* (missed a comma)

Then breaking out in a run.

Then I broke out*. It's not a part of the previous sentence anymore, so it should have it's own subject and proper predicate.

"I'm movin', I'm movin'!" she said huffing.

she said, huffing* (missed a comma again)

We got on the bus and ploped onto the seats at the back.

plopped*

I yawned now feeling tired.

I yawned now, feeling tired.* OR I yawned, feeling tired now. (See how much depends on a comma?)

Okay, I stopped here. You keep making the same mistakes all over and over again. Maybe you should proof-read it yourself? Try to look for the ones I pointed out above and correct them.

Now, about the plot. The mistakes weren't the only thing that kept me from reading further. The plot is simply boring. There's nothing interesting enough that would make me want to read the whole book. And it's most certainly not an action/adventure novel. At least, not yet.

People don't want to read books that speak about things they have themselves on a daily matter. School? I know how it looks like, I don't have to read about it. Pets? Shopping? The same. The protagonist's thoughts and opinions kept me reading for a while, but those are about everything that's interesting here. And when I got to the bus drawing part, it got just distasteful.

As for the fifteen-year-old, Abbie curses way too much. When you create such a character, it might be more real, but it doesn't make the reader like her more, just the opposite. So you might want to work on that.

My advice? Edit that chapter. Put some real action in there. Some things that are so real, but don't usually happen, like every day. Surprisingly, the chapter starts good as it is, but it gets worse later. Maybe, just maybe, you should make Lexi get hit by a car as they run to the bus. She could end up in the hospital, unconscious, and Abbie would feel guilty about being so jealous for her and the fact she gets more attention from their mother.

Or. I suppose their fathers aren't living with them. Maybe you should one of them come back and mess up with their peaceful reality? There are thousands of options. If there weren't, there wouldn't be any books.

Think about it. Maybe look for inspiration? Take some random novels you have around and look at their first chapters. Just the first chapter. Get a grasp of how the book should be started like.

Nice try, but you can do much better. Keep on going!
--Eve