Young Writers Society

Thump, thump, that is the sound Katelyn’s heart made when she made her horse speed up. Katelyn and her sister Holly were running from the Dalen’s.
The Dalen’s chased Katelyn and Holly for several miles when one of the Dalen’s risen up there bow and shot an arrow at Holly’s back. The arrow got stuck in Holly’s back. Katelyn looked back and Holly was about to fall off her horse then she all of a sudden sat up and kept on riding until they reached a sand dune and she fell of her horse and rolled down the sand dune and the arrow broke and she laid there in the river. Katelyn stopped her horse and ran down the hill to her sister. She got to her sister and she was lying in the river at the base of the sand dune. Holly handed the book of counted shadows to Katelyn and said “find the seeker and defend him with your life!”
Katelyn stood up and got on her horse and rode to the barrier and held up a glowing necklace and the green barrier opened up and she passed threw but before it could close 3 Dalen’s passed threw also.
Richard was chopping down a tree so he could make a bridge so he could earn a couple of extra gold pieces. It took him thirty minutes to complete it. He finally finished it and a boy named Tommy and his cow walked up. Tommy was nervous at first but he wasn’t scared anymore when richer hopped onto his horse and pranced across. So Tommy went across with his cow.
Then Richard went and picked two apples from a close by apple tree. He gave one of them to his horse and ate the other. Right before he finished his apple he heard the sound of running in the woods. Then he heard a girl yell “get away from me!” then he heard three men’s voices yell “after her!” Then one of the three men yelled “stop the confessor!”
Then Richard jumped up and followed all of them as quietly as he could so they wouldn’t notice. They stopped at a rocky cliff and one of the three men raised there bow and was about to shoot Katelyn when Richard jumped out and hit the guy with the bow. The Dalen fell to the ground. Then Katelyn grabbed one of the Dalen’s necks. All of a sudden Richard herd a silent thunder and the Dalen’s eyes tuned as black as coal so did Katelyn’s irises. After Katelyn let go she fell to the ground. The Dalen she had her hand around turned around and started swinging his sword around and he stabbed the one with the bow. Then the leader of the Dalen’s stabbed the Dalen that was attacking everyone else. Then Richard jumped up and pushed the leader of the Dalen’s off the edge of the cliff. Richard turned and looked at the woman and asked her “are you all right?”

Hi Sweeney! I'm Rach, and I'm reviewing today!

I like the idea you have here. It's got a different edge to it than I'm used to. And you've also got the right idea with this chapter (?) itself. Instead of a boring scene, you dropped us right into the action. Chase scenes can be hard to pull off early in a novel, but it can be done. And they're exciting scenes, too--fun to write and fun to read.

I have one major problem with this chapter, though--and that's what you tell us everything! You've probably heard that "Show, don't tell" rule before, I imagine--and you just did if you hadn't heard it before--but this is the main area you need to expand on for your writing. Instead of just telling us what happens--Katelyn did this, Holly did that--show us.

This entire piece could be five times longer than it is if you described what's going on. By that I don't mean to start writing thick paragraphs of descriptions about what the air feels like and such, but to describe the events, really put us (the readers) into the scene.

Let's look at your second paragraph:

The Dalen’s chased Katelyn and Holly for several miles when one of the Dalen’s risen up there bow and shot an arrow at Holly’s back. The arrow got stuck in Holly’s back. Katelyn looked back and Holly was about to fall off her horse then she all of a sudden sat up and kept on riding until they reached a sand dune and she fell of her horse and rolled down the sand dune and the arrow broke and she laid there in the river. Katelyn stopped her horse and ran down the hill to her sister. She got to her sister and she was lying in the river at the base of the sand dune. Holly handed the book of counted shadows to Katelyn and said “find the seeker and defend him with your life!”

Each sentence here could become its own paragraph, with more sentences and details added. In that first sentence, all you do is tell us that the Dalens (no apostrophe, by the way) are chasing Kat and Holly for several miles. Why not talk about, I durno, how the hooves are tearing up the grass or the mud or whatever? Is the ground moving past in a blur? Do they keep looking over their shoulders to see if the Dalens are getting nearer?

Show vs. tell is a complicated thing to explain. Maybe here's a clearer example.

You tell us that Richard's chopping wood, and that he makes a bridge out of it. But how does he go about doing that? Is he heaving the ax up and bringing it bearing down on the wood? Are the cracks from splitting wood ripping through the forest? Does he take each log and bind it together with rope? What does he do? What's going on? I dunno--you, the writer, have to show me!

Perhaps the easiest way to explain it is with an example outside of your story.

So, you've got a scared character. Saying "Joe was scared" is telling. But saying, "Joe's fingers shook. The sweat trickled down his face and he had to take long, shallow breaths. When he reached out toward the skeleton, goosepimples rippled over his skin" is showing.

Does that make sense? If it doesn't, I can try to explain some more.

But basically, what I suggest you do is to go through and instead of just saying, "This, this, and this happened," describe what you see... pretend the entire scene is a movie in your head, and go from there. And don't forget the other senses, either. It's not all just about what's happening visually.

All right. Best of luck, Sweeney! Let me know if you have any questions or want me to explain any more. Also let me know if you post up a revision!

Rach

Thump, thump, that is the sound Katelyn’s heart made when she made her horse speed up. Katelyn and her sister Holly were running from the Dalen’s. The first sentence sounds awkward. Try "when she convinced the horse to speed up" and is holly a little sister or big sister??

The Dalen’s chased Katelyn and Holly for several miles when one of the Dalen’s risen up there bow and shot an arrow at Holly’s back(try straight towards Holly's back). The arrow got stuck in Holly’s back. Katelyn looked back and Holly was about to fall off her horse then she all of a sudden sat up and kept on riding until they reached a sand dune and she fell of her horse and rolled down the sand dune and the arrow broke and she laid there in the river(this sentence is a run on, try sectioning it out). Katelyn stopped her horse and ran down the hill to her sister. She got to her sister and she was lying in the river at the base of the sand dune. Holly handed the book of counted shadows to Katelyn and said “find the seeker and defend him with your life!”

Katelyn stood up and got on her horse and rode to the barrier and held up a glowing necklace and the green barrier opened up and she passed threw(comma) but before it could close 3 Dalen’s(3 of his what?) passed threw also.

Richard was chopping down a tree so he could make a bridge so(the so sounds weird alone alone, try a "just" before it) he could earn a couple of extra gold pieces. It took him thirty minutes to complete it(chopping down a tree takes more than an hour, how big was the tree?). He finally finished it and a boy named Tommy and his cow walked up. Tommy was nervous at first but he wasn’t scared anymore when richer(miss spell) hopped onto his horse and pranced across. So Tommy went across with his cow.Why was Tommy so scared?

Then Richard went and picked two apples from a close by apple tree. He gave one of them to his horse and ate the other. Right before he finished his apple he heard the sound of running in the woods. Then he heard a girl yell “get away from me!” then he heard three men’s voices yell “after her!” Then one of the three men yelled “stop the confessor!”

Then Richard jumped up and followed all of them as quietly as he could so they wouldn’t notice. They stopped at a rocky cliff and one of the three men raised there bow and was about to shoot Katelyn when Richard jumped out and hit the guy with the bow. The Dalen fell to the ground. Then Katelyn grabbed one of the Dalen’s necks. All of a sudden Richard herd a silent thunder and the Dalen’s eyes tuned as black as coal(and) so did Katelyn’s irises. After Katelyn let go she fell to the ground. The Dalen she had her hand around turned around and started swinging his sword around and he stabbed the one with the bow. Then the leader of the Dalen’s stabbed the Dalen that was attacking everyone else. Then Richard jumped up and pushed the leader of the Dalen’s off the edge of the cliff. Richard turned and looked at the woman and asked her “are you all right?”

I really like the story but there are alot of things you could do to improve..But good job

Wow........I love this story its a great story I like the plot a lot....I hope to see more of your work You should read some of my things sometime a give me a review......See you around....

*******Jessig833*******

Great plot! It's really good. There are some mistakes though.

asweeney1919 wrote:Thump, thump, that is the sound Katelyn’s heart made when she made her horse speed up. Katelyn and her sister Holly were running from the Dalen’s. You should change it to "That was the sound Katelyn's heart made" When you wrote "were running" I thought that KAtelyn and Holly were actually running, not on horses. You might want to reword that. You could change it to "Were being chase by the Dalen's"
The Dalen’s chased Katelyn and Holly for several miles when one of the Dalen’s risen up there bow and shot an arrow at Holly’s back. The arrow got stuck in Holly’s back. Katelyn looked back and Holly was about to fall off her horse then she all of a sudden sat up and kept on riding until they reached a sand dune and she fell of her horse and rolled down the sand dune and the arrow broke and she laid there in the river. Katelyn stopped her horse and ran down the hill to her sister. She got to her sister and she was lying in the river at the base of the sand dune. Holly handed the book of counted shadows to Katelyn and said “find the seeker and defend him with your life!” There are lots, lots of run-ons here. Cut them up to smaller sentences.
Katelyn stood up and got on her horse and rode to the barrier and held up a glowing necklace and the green barrier opened up and she passed threw but before it could close 3 Dalen’s passed threw also. "Threw" should be "through". And again, this sentence is a run-on. If you want, you can use semi-colons: ";"
Richard was chopping down a tree so he could make a bridge so he could earn a couple of extra gold pieces. It took him thirty minutes to complete it. He finally finished it and a boy named Tommy and his cow walked up. Tommy was nervous at first but he wasn’t scared anymore when richer hopped onto his horse and pranced across. So Tommy went across with his cow. You might want to put a bigger gap between the Richard, because you're talking about a different person. Also, "richer" is "Richard"
Then Richard went and picked two apples from a close by apple tree. He gave one of them to his horse and ate the other. Right before he finished his apple he heard the sound of running in the woods. Then he heard a girl yell “get away from me!” then he heard three men’s voices yell “after her!” Then one of the three men yelled “stop the confessor!”Lots of "then"s. You don't need "then" to show that the thing is happening after.
Then Richard jumped up and followed all of them as quietly as he could so they wouldn’t notice. They stopped at a rocky cliff and one of the three men raised there bow and was about to shoot Katelyn when Richard jumped out and hit the guy with the bow. The Dalen fell to the ground. Then Katelyn grabbed one of the Dalen’s necks. All of a sudden Richard herd a silent thunder and the Dalen’s eyes tuned as black as coal so did Katelyn’s irises. After Katelyn let go she fell to the ground. The Dalen she had her hand around turned around and started swinging his sword around and he stabbed the one with the bow. Then the leader of the Dalen’s stabbed the Dalen that was attacking everyone else. Then Richard jumped up and pushed the leader of the Dalen’s off the edge of the cliff.

Again, lots of "then"s. I hope I didn't sound too harsh ^^. I like the plot a lot. It's very interesting. You might want to describe Katelyn and Richard since they're your main characters, I think. The last paragraph was a little confusing. Did one of the Dalen stab their own comrade? Try clearing it up as much as you can.

It's great! Keep writing and you'll get better!

This is going to sound extremely harsh, but I couldn't read beyond the first paragraph- hardly that much. I'm sorry, but your use of words is... is almost elementary. ): You need to word your sentences better.

"The arrow got stuck in Holly's back." How about something more along the lines of, "The arrow stuck in the small of Holly's back." It's a bit more descriptive and runs better.

A lot of your sentences tend to be this way, and if you want to improve your writing, I suggest consulting a thesaurus.

I realize I sound mean, but I'm only trying my best to be helpful. Please, keep writing, improving.

~Panda;;