Thank you for your critique. I want to know what you meant about the starting with an dramatic event. Like you mean like sorta like an intensely real dream that causes her to wake up? or something along those lines.
Sci Fi & Fantasy / *~*Untitled*~*
Beginnings of Chapter 1
The sun peeked faintly through the slit of the coal black shades that drooped lazily to the black tiled floor. Quiet rays tiptoed across the room until they reached the young girl’s porcelain white face. Her eyes, the color of Nigerian blue green Tourmaline, danced cautiously behind closed eyelids. Leisurely, those very same eyes opened and a stifled yawn escaped her dry, rosy lips. Her left hand crept out from under a black coverlet and then receded back in.
“Kalila, you have to get up for school,” a calm, yet driven and determined voice called from downstairs.
Kalila, reluctantly, slipped out of her bed on to the icy floor and slid on a black silk robe over her emerald silk pajamas. She crossed the room to her oak wood vanity and picked up a silver brush. Delicately, Kalila brushed her black below the shoulder length hair, divided it into two and then pulled it up into two buns on either side of her head. Next, Kalila brushed her lavender left side swept bangs and the shoulder length strands of purple on the left and right sides of her face.
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CSNS reviewed Version 1 -
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I like your description at the beginning, when the sun rays wake her but “danced cautiously behind closed eyelids.” sounds a little weird, danced cautiously? Maybe change it for danced slightly. Even the word dance bothers me a little because I only imagine erratic movement of the eyelids when you say that. Maybe moved slightly, to show that she is waking up but had yet to open her eyes.
I like the whole black and emerald color theme. A little short of an extract to really get a feel for your story, post more please but a good beginning overall.
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OresteseViera reviewed Version 1 -
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left side swept bangs / awkward and hard to follow. I haven’t an idea how to make it easier to read, but I know it can be done.
her black below the shoulder length hair / this also could be phrased better
I would suggest black hair that fell just past her shoulders.
I particularly enjoyed the first paragraph, very unique and the wording is very skillful. Excellent work. and I can picture Kalila perfectly. Keep this up!
trismugistus reviewed Version 1 -
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Not a lot to go on, but I would mainly offer one suggestion – start as close to your ‘main event’ as you can. Introducing characters is good and necessary, but introducing them in the midst of a crisis or on the point of a decision is far more engaging for the reader. After all, we’ve got the whole rest of the story to really get to know them, so languid character intros aren’t really necessary.
I’d especially say not to open with your character waking up. It’s too obvious and too easy: you’re introducing the character, so they’re ‘waking up’ in the writer’s imagination and hopefully in the reader’s imagination. But this is too obvious for that reason.
I’d say if they must be waking up, it should be to some starting revelation – something happens that causes them to wake, or something needs to happen that breaks the ‘usual routine’.
Alternatively, you could start with a part that details what the threat/conflict is going to be and then have this scene. That way you can impart a sense of dread in the reader – this poor girl who is going to face the challenge.
On a more technical front, it’s a little passive and descriptive. Try to liven things up by mixing the descriptions. So you have a statement that the floor is icy and you have a statement that she walks across the floor to the vanity.
Perhaps she could ‘hop across the icy wooden floor to the safety of the small square rug by her vanity’ or perhaps ‘an involuntary squeak escaped her lips as her bare foot touched the icy wooden floor’.
I hope that makes sense and is useful.
FrakKevin reviewed Version 1 -
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So far you proved that you know how to write. I liked the cool dark room she had and could picture it. Plot wise I dont know what’s going on but that’s understandable. I look forward to seeing a full chapter.
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