Young Writers Society

The stars light helped the girl look for a clues of her whereabouts. Within her surroundings she saw a steep hill. A closer look showed that hills structure has been tampered with tire marks. The tire marks reached from top of the hill, and turned into a large skid mark, as it grazed towards the bottom and into a demolished car. She stood up and walked, only to be crushed by the realization that it’s hers. Her legs collapsed; she held tighter to her stomach and sobbed loudly,“My parents are going to kill me, my parents are going to kill me.”

A sharp stab ran through her spine as she stared at the car. All she could think was, How did this happen? Her car was upside down, caved in on one side, and all the windows were shattered.

She shut her eyes and a memory of a heart necklace flashed against her eye lids. The warm summer night couldn’t control the low shiver that descended down her whole body, as she remembered the arguments from before. It bound itself to her memory and sucked up all her energy.

Shouts of torment filled her ears, “I don’t need you,” “It’s all your fault,” “Now we're your friends?” All those different voices crushed upon her, and pulled her closer to the dark earth floor. Everything was to much for her to register, to much to hold. Every memory, every heartache ended and disappeared, and left her as lost as before.

There she sat and waited, but expected nothing. No clues, no help, or anything to comfort her.

Flashing lights filled the night air. With eyes blank the girl gazed out towards the car, and watched as the two men pulled her body out of the wreckage.

There she sat outside, and looking in. The pain went away, as the darkness caved in.



© July 27, 2011 J.A.L

Hello, SkullCandi!

A fairly brief beginning, I see. Not that short is ever bad. It almost makes me a bit disappointed only because of the scene you were describing. I felt like you could have definitely elaborated in multiple places to both thicken this up a bit as well as give the beginning of your story a sturdy backbone. It's important for the beginning of any story to have a strong start. Some like to foreshadow events or give some decent back story that'll help to carry out the weight of some future plot. Some simply like to paint a calm ready-to-go picture. Whatever the choice though, there isn't always the necessary need to be simple. Especially with miniscule details.

In particular, (not to be all nitpicky!) there was a part in here where you wrote about a heart necklace. It was the only thing the character could remember, but to the reader, being on the outside looking in, what significance does this hold really? Surely you meant to place some level of significance toward it, you just weren't precisely clear on what. Why did it make the character shiver? Did someone who unsettles her give it to her? Was it something that someone else wore? Why is this detail significant? There's no need to be vaguely suggestive with the little things. An audience wants to be able to take in all that you'll give in regards to every slice of information making sense, and be enlightning to the reader.

As for setting a mood here, I'm not sure you quite had it. This could definitely use some more spicing up. In particular, I guess I would like to see more of the atmosphere being paid attention to. All I gather from the setting of this is that: 1.) It's at night, and it's cold 2.) It's summer and 3.) The MC has just been involved in a car crash. She's also just died, I believe.

To brighten this up, look at the components you've already vaguely described. It's nighttime and it's chilly outside. Does this make the character feel more anxious? Especially after having been in an auto accident? How does she react to her environment physically? Emotionally? These are things you could have elaborated on a bit. It's summer. By context of the narration I already know that the MC is young. Was she on her way somewhere? Or was she perhaps fleeing from someone? My thoughts as a reader are really up in the air. You can give a little more for me to cling onto here I feel. And as for the accident, It might have been interesting to see you inject some flashback imagery at the entire scene of what had just gone down. That way the reader at least has some incentive to want to learn why this all came about. But as for now you give out nothing. Try fluffing things up a bit. Get creative with it.

Emotionally, I think the key thing you had trouble with on this piece was channeling the proper feelings of grief. And it's unique because it's a character grieving over herself. I'm sure most are quite use to being exposed to characters grieving over other characters, but not always their own character. I think what'll help you best is by taking advantage of this unique approach to character grieving. It might be a bit more involved seeing as it may call for you to be more intricate with your own feelings, but try not to go for the obvious 'She cried until they wheeled her body away'. What are her reactions! Make this tangible to your thoughts. Connect what you feel in the narration to what the character feels. Otherwise it's quite obvious to tell you're disjointed with the personality of your own story.

As for a much smaller note, I noticed some of your sentence structuring was rather simple.

In the dark she sat, until flashing lights were around her.

Sitting and thinking a bit on it, I know there are so many ways sentences like this can be improved. Things like catching images tend to pull the reader in in general. Or perhaps that's simply my own opinion. xD Either way it can't hurt to consider.

Anyhow, I suppose I'll try and wrap this up here. All in all, I think what you have here makes for a great first draft, but it can obviously go a bit further. I hope anything I mentioned in the length of my review may be of some help to you! If you have any questions, concerns, or simply get around to editing and would love someone to take a second look, feel free to get back at me with a PM.

-Smylin'

It's a good start.

Sitting the girl waits for a sing, but expecting nothing.

I think you meant to say "sign" instead of "sing."
I'm assuming the girl is actually dead, and I can't wait to read more.

This has the potential to be an amazing intro, but it needs a little work. The title you have is perfect! Titles are more important than the entire book, if the title is boring, then the reader will assume the novel is boring, but the one you have here hooked me right in. The description you have is good, maybe you could explain a little more in the heart area, instead of just focusing in the head. It's fine the way it is, but it only explains the head with what she's thinking. But, what you don't clearly tell us is her heart broken. That way with the ending you have it would be clearer for the reader to understand why darkness has settled in. As a fellow writer I can tell you are trying to say that she is heart broken, that she feels guilt for what she said to the people in the car before they died. I can also see that her heart hardens when she sees the body, but what id don't understand is why the sight of the body has hardened her heart? Maybe that left out info can set you up for the next chapter. Now, the mood you had, was very powerful, but you had some holes, maybe that was from not describing what she felt in the heart. When these holes are filled I promise you this piece will leave your readers in tears! Overall, this piece is a very good start, and I can't wait to read the next part of this novel! Keep on writing!

This is pretty good. I like the description of the setting. It paints a vivid picture in my mind's eye, but I still feel really confused about what's going on this brief first chapter. It seems like one girl is searching for another, but the confusion the reader feels because of the unexplained details doesn't help grab his or her interest, although I'm sure, with some work, this could be a very captivating beginning. Maybe, in a flashback, you could go into more details about what happens? I'm wondering how the characters got there, and who the friends and voices are. Other than that, good job!