Chapter 1. Arrival

This is the story of me, Alex Lioh. I’m a fourteen-year-old girl who just moved from Florida to North Dakota. We couldn’t afford our home with just the money my mom was making from her full-time job, and my dad had recently died in a car accident, so we moved to North Dakota and bought a small house. Since then, I had been saving up my money for years, hoping to be able to help our small family when it was needed.
My father, Gregory Lioh, had life work that was very private, but he would sometimes tell me about it.
“Alex,” he would tell me in a hushed whisper inside his secluded study. “There’s a secret country that only I, and those who live in it know about. And now, so do you.”
“What’s it called? Where’s it at? Can we go there?” I would shout excitedly as a little girl.
“Calm down, little one!” he would chuckle. “It’s called Ranna, it’s fairly north and a long ways out. Maybe some day you and I could visit, oh to visit Ranna again…” He trailed off, not finishing his sentence.
In the proceeding years of then, my father would draw maps to Ranna, and its neighboring countries. He would write down many facts about the landscaping, history and weather. He had species profiles on all sorts of creatures I had never heard about. He was almost completely finished with them when he died. When we were packing to move, I snuck into my father’s secret study and took whatever was there about Ranna. When I was examining the map and some of the papers with it, I noticed it looked like the bright, sunny, and warm country was in North Dakota. I didn’t see how this was possible, because North Dakota was so cold, but I trusted my father.


“I’m going miss you…I love you.” my mother, Lauren, told me. Mom thought she was sending me off to summer in Florida from the airport, as did my best friend Vanessa’s mom. “I love you too.” I said back, feeling guilt in the pit of my stomach. I had told Vanessa all about my father’s work, because I knew I could trust her.

[center]"You can't tell anybody this," I told her as we huddled under our "fort" made of bedposts and blankets.
"I won't. I promise!" She had cried, lenaing in for the juicy secret.
I leaned to her ear and whispered "My daddy knows of a secret place, a country. He's been there, and he's goning to take us some day."[/center]


We’d dreamt of going to Ranna and meeting all sorts of creatures. So, we went out and spent all of our savings on a trip from Marshall, North Dakota. It was 250 miles from Marshall to New Rockford, North Dakota.
“I hope you have a lot fun sweetie,” Mom said.
“I will, Mom,” I said.
I normally wasn’t a very good liar, but I’d practiced this one.
“Do you have enough money to buy your tickets? And do you have enough clothes?” She asked, pulling a stray lock of black hair out of my face and tucking it behind my ear. I liked it better over my eye.
“I’m pretty sure. I’ll go by my ticket now, ok?” I said pulling Vanessa by the hand as I spoke.
We got to the counter, purchased 2 two-way tickets to New Rockford, stuffed them in our bags, and returned to my mom.
“It’s too bad your mom couldn’t come to see you take off, Vanessa,” Mom told her.
“It’s ok,” Vanessa assured her. “Mom had to go to that job interview.” This was true. Courtney, Vanessa’s mom, had a job interview to go to and wouldn’t be able to make it to see the plane take off, which was actually good. It makes one less person to lie to.
I heard the sound system announce our plane was boarding. “Okay, we go to go, Mom. Florida’s waiting. I love you.”
“Love you too, sweetie.”
She sounded so sad… I hated adding lying to the list of things she would be upset about.
We went through the gate, and had our heavy hiking bags -which held food, water, blankets, heavy jackets, extra hats, coats, and socks, scarves, clothes, and other living necessities- checked. We were quiet most of the plane ride.
Once arriving in New Rockford, we hiked as far as the map would take us, and a little further. We walked for what felt like hours, and it very well may have been, but we still had not found the warm, sunny country my father had told me so much about. My ears were numb from the stining cold, and my legs felt like gelatin.
“Maybe… maybe my dad was wrong… maybe there is no Ranna,” I said quietly.
Vanessa paused a moment. “There has to be. We’ve come way too far to turn back now.”
“No, face it. There’s no Ranna. My father was wrong.”
“There’s got to be. We came all this way.”
“No, come on. Let’s go back to the airport and head home...” I said, turning in the other direction.
Suddenly, there was a craaack noise coming from beneath our feet.
“What was that…?” Vanessa asked in a frightened whisper, stopping in her tracks.
“Don’t move,” Was all I responded with. We watched as the ice beneath us cracked where we had been standing. It slowly spread beside our feet and kept on proceeding ahead of us until we couldn’t see where it was going anymore.
“What do we do?” Vanessa whispered, careful not to move and jostle the ice, but before I could respond, the ice we were standing on collapsed, and we were falling. Down we fell. I was expecting to fall into the water and die a slow death of hypothermia, but I was very wrong. If anything it was the opposite! As we fell it got warmer and hotter until finally –thud. We landed at the bottom of a mountain, it appeared.We stood up and looked around. I craned my neck up and looked at the sky. There was no evidence that we had just fallen from an impossible vortex in the sky.
Vanessa took out all the maps, handed them to me, and watched as I studied each of them closely.
“This is it!” I shouted excitedly.
“This is it? We’re here? We’re in Ranna?!” Vanessa asked hopefully.
“Well, no we’re not in Ranna, but we’re in the Diminutive Desert, which is just south of Ranna!”
“Oh, that’s great! How far till town?”
I examined the map intensely again. “Hmm… quite a ways, but there should be some creatures called Noones that will give us a ride.”
When we reached the Noones (which looked to be part human, part horse, part lion, and the size of an elephant)we were baffled to see them TALKING amongst themselves! My father had never mentioned anything about them talking before! One was in the middle of a sentence when it noticed us.
“Hello… who are you?” he asked in a deep, curious voice.
“I’m Alex, and this is Vanessa. My father was Gregory Lioh.”
“Ah… Lioh. I haven’t heard that name in a long time.” The Noone said, appearing to be deep in thought.
“You knew my father?”
“Well not personally, no. But he is greatly known here…”
“What is your name?” I spoke up, asking the Noone.
“My name is Obel but you can call me Obe. Now, what can I do for you?”
“We would like a ride, if you would be so kind.” Vanessa asked quietly.
“Of course! Grab my tail.” He instructed us.
We grabbed onto the creature’s bulky tail and he pulled it up and set us gently onto his back. We traveled at a slow pace, the large creature slightly bouncing with each step, but it was interesting to learn about Noones and other creatures in Ranna, and the humans as well. Finally, we stopped outside of a forest.
“This is as far as I can take you, young ones.” Obe said serenely.
“That’s okay, Obe. We can walk from here.” I responded.
“Farewell children.” And with that, he set us on the ground and changed direction.
-----------------

Comment and Critique Please!

-Rach

Hello Nick101 here reviewing for the first time.
here we go

iRandomRLN96 wrote:“I’m pretty sure. I’ll go by my ticket now, ok?” I said pulling Vanessa by the hand as I spoke

It would be better if it were put this way

Pulling Vanessa by the hand, I said,

By the way you wrote buy wrong.
This is

iRandomRLN96 wrote:“It’s called Ranna, it’s fairly north and a long ways out

Is 'long ways out' right?

iRandomRLN96 wrote:"I won't. I promise!" She had cried, lenaing in for the juicy secret.

[quoteShe cried[/color. [color=#000040]leaning[/quote]

iRandomRLN96 wrote:I leaned to her ear and whispered "My daddy knows of a secret place, a country. He's been there, and he's goning to take us some day."[/center[/quote

I leaned in and whispered in her ear,

I have to leave so I can't give you a full critique. Sorry!
But I love the idea of the story!
Can't wait for the next installment!

Here we go random!

I loved the preface, their are a few things here I noticed though.

Nit Picks

This is the story of me, Alex Lioh.

Is the story actually about Alex or is it about Ranna. I understand that she is the main character, but would it make more sense to say "This is a story about (a wonderful, magical etc. place)"

We couldn’t afford our home with just the money my mom was making from her full-time job, and my dad had recently died in a car accident, so we moved to North Dakota and bought a small house.

This seems out of place, maybe it is just the "and". It seems like more could be added here to build up to the fact that "dad" has died. Adding filler here would bgin more emotion into what has happened.

My father, Gregory Lioh, had life work that was very private, but he would sometimes tell me about it.

This really stuck out to me, again it just seems to lack depth and emotion. Possibly breaking this into a larger 2-3 part sentence, rearanging the words a bit.

“Alex,” he would tell me in a hushed whisper inside his secluded study. “There’s a secret country that only I, and those who live in it know about. And now, so do you.”

I don't mean to pick everything apart, as you can see most of what I'm Quoting is purely cosmetic. More depth and emotion would surely fix most of this!

When I was examining the map and some of the papers with it, I noticed it looked like the bright, sunny, and warm country was in North Dakota. I didn’t see how this was possible, because North Dakota was so cold, but I trusted my father.

I feel this searching through the Secret Study should be stretched into multiple paragraphs. It is a secret study, going through this place nobody ever really visited should be something of pure motion to Alex, going through her fathers life work, I want to feel what she feels, I want to be in the study with Alex!


For the sake of having to read any other quoting I do, I just feel this piece needs a bit more added to it, more overall detail.

Not to bash but is the mom so absent minded that she would allow her 13 year old daughter to purchase her own plane ticket and not notice the boarding call going to North Dakota instead of Florida?

This like this just need a bit of fine tuning

I hope this review helps!!
I truly cannot wait to view the revised version of chapter one and the chapters to come!!

-zerkk

P.S.
Please PM me if you want help with anything!

I'm not going to nit pick. It's not worth it. Because there is something fundamentally wrong with your story.

A greatly intelligent man once said "Brevity is the soul of wit".

Your story isn't funny, though. So why are you going so fast!

You want to get to the good part so much that your leading the reader on a frenetic rocket ride where nothing makes sense and everything is clumsy. This should be about 10 times as long as it is now. Yes, I said 10 times. Writing is all about the journey, ultimately, and not the destination. So give us less destination and more journey!

So add detail. Lots of it. Elaborate. Show instead of telling. And only then can I really review this story, because right now you can do much much better.

Also, avoid generic-ness like the plague. This story is much too generic for even a normal reader, and for someone who likes the offbeat stuff like me, it was impossible.

So, you show great potential. Writing something makes you already better than 99% of the people I see on a daily basis. But you need to come a long, long way.

And all I can say is, Good Luck.

Hi! I'm Kylie (aka lostinmymetaphor) and here is my wonderful (sorta) review!



My English teacher's favorite quote is "show, not tell". And I think you were doing a bit too much telling. When they first arrive in Ranna, describe their surroundings more. Is it pretty? Boring? Dull? Dry? (Well, they're in a desert... maybe that one's a little obvious.) Describe the mountain, describe the desert. Are there any trees? Rocks? What's the weather like? Is it raining, is the sun scorchingly hot? It would help if that was described more.


I think everything else was great! Just one nitpick...

So, we went out and spent all of our savings on a trip from Marshall, North Dakota. It was 250 miles from Marshall to New Rockford, North Dakota.

It shouldn't be a trip from Marshall, it probably should be worded as a trip to New Rockford.


It is a little generic, but something that seems generic doesn't always turn our that way. Keep writing!

~ Kylie

I've only read about half-way through, but here's my critque of what I read:

I’m a fourteen-year-old girl who just moved from Florida to North Dakota.

No need for that first hyphen.

...and I could visit. Oh to visit Ranna again…”

These should be two seperate sentences.

“I’m going miss you… I love you.”

Try not to over use the dotdotdot.

"I won't, I promise."

Make this uni-sentenced, and replace the exclamation point with a period.

Overall:
It'd be great if you could add more emotion to the story and a lot more details, though a lot of what I read was well written.

My daddy knows of a secret place, a country.

So, we went out and spent all of our savings on a trip from Marshall, North Dakota.

“I hope you have a lot fun sweetie,”

“I will, Mom,”

“It’s too bad your mom couldn’t come to see you take off, Vanessa,”

Okay, we go to go, Mom.

Hey Random! Back for chapter one.

First, some nitpicks.

I’m a fourteen-year-old girl who just moved from Florida to North Dakota.

I'm confused. They just moved to North Dakota, yet Alex and her friend buy tickets to North Dakota? I understand they have to put on a show for their mom, but why didn't they just run away? Take the bus or something?

Also, I want a little more descrption of your MC. Height? Hair color? Fat? Thin? Glasses? I still can't really see what Alex looks like. Change that.

“Calm down, little one!” he would chuckle. “It’s called Ranna, it’s fairly north and a long ways out. Maybe some day you and I could visit, oh to visit Ranna again…”

I think it should be "Maybe some day you and I could visit. Oh to visit Ranna again. . ."

"I won't. I promise!" She had cried, lenaing in for the juicy secret.

Should be, "I won't. I promise!" she had cried, leaning in for the juicy secret.

“Do you have enough money to buy your tickets? And do you have enough clothes?” She asked, pulling a stray lock of black hair out of my face and tucking it behind my ear.

Should be, "And do you have enough clothes?" she asked . . . This issue comes up a couple of times. Don't capitalize after quotations unless it's a new sentence. For example: "I really like this sweater," she said, touching the soft sleeve. vs. "I really like this sweater." She touched the soft sleeve.
For your story I think it's almost always the first example.

“It’s too bad your mom couldn’t come to see you take off, Vanessa,” Mom told her.
“It’s ok,” Vanessa assured her. “Mom had to go to that job interview.”

This read a little too repetatively for me. I think you could do without the second her, since the reader assumes Vanessa will be answering the mom. So you could just say, Vaness said, instead or something.

It makes one less person to lie to.

You switched tenses here. It should be made.

I heard the sound system announce our plane was boarding. “Okay, we go to go, Mom. Florida’s waiting. I love you.”

I think you mean got to go.

Once arriving in New Rockford, we hiked as far as the map would take us, and a little further.

I think you need to add more detail here. I don't know what New Rockford looks likes. I can't imagine where they're hiking for hours. So, add some more description.

“Don’t move,” Was all I responded with.

It's just the same issue as before. Was shouldn't be capitalized. But also, I think you could use just plain "said" more often. Too many respondeds, assureds, whispereds, crieds, and other ed words can distract the reader.

When we reached the Noones (which looked to be part human, part horse, part lion, and the size of an elephant)we were baffled to see them TALKING amongst themselves!

Now, I'm really having a hard time picturing how a human, horse, lion, and elephant fit together to make an animal. Maybe try to describe them a little more? Does it have the legs of a horse? Head of a human? Tail of a lion? Tell me how it fits together.

“Well not personally, no. But he is greatly known here…”
“What is your name?” I spoke up, asking the Noone.

Wouldn't Alex want to know why her father was so greatly known? But instead she just asks the Noone what his name is, rather than why her father is so famous. Also, you don't need to say Alex "spoke up". We already know she's talking to the Noone so it's kind of confusing to say that because it sounds like she just jumped into the conversation or something.

“My name is Obel but you can call me Obe. Now, what can I do for you?”

Give Obel his own description. What makes him stand out from the other Noones? It could be something as simple as different colored fur or something. But just make the reader able to picture him and the noones and see their differences.

We traveled at a slow pace, the large creature slightly bouncing with each step, but it was interesting to learn about Noones and other creatures in Ranna, and the humans as well.

I want to hear this interesting conversation they had. I want to learn about the creatures of Ranna along with Alex and Vanessa. Add some of their conversation and thoughts in to make it more interesting to read.

Overall

I think you have a really good idea here and a story with a lot of potential. As others before me have said, you're in such a hurry to get to "the good part" that you let a lot slide. In fact, I feel that this is so rushed that when the characters actually get to Ranna, it's kind of anticlimactic. It's your job as the author to make me care about your characters and their situation. You did this beautifully in the preface. Bring more of that description and caring into the chapter.
You really do have a great idea here. But just add some more detail and don't rush the plot. Remember, it's not so much in the destination as it is in the journey.

Good luck! Keep me posted on this and feel free to PM me with any questions.

First thought for this is boring. Sorry but this just didn't interest me in anyway at all. After the first paragraph, I really wanted to X out but I kept going. It didn't make me want to keep reading.

The beginning of this is very bland. I can't really say much else because I didn't read past where the mom was saying good bye. All I can say is this needs a hook, something to keep the reader in.

Hi Random,

Overall, I agree with earlier posters that this feels generic.

The beginning follows a particularly cliched format typical to a lot of YA stories. First, the protagonist's vital statistics - her name, age, sex and location - are ticked off. Then we're then told why this protagonist, like all other YA protagonists, is moving to a new town. It's because of that YA staple, a dead parent. So I'm starting to feel like a lot of YA cliches have been packed into the opening paragraph.

Cliches are not in themselves deadly, but you have to offset them with good execution, eg. unique characterisation and/or strong voice, and I'm not seeing a whole lot of the above.

I also felt like the writing style was consistently undersold. When you use descriptors at all, you reach for the blandest possible word. For example, you describe the protagonist's house as a generic "small house", when you could go for a "tiny house cowering under the eaves of its taller neighbours" - or anything that creates a strong visual image.

At times, I wondered just how deeply I was immersed in the protagonist's point of view. For example, would the protagonist actually think of her mother as Lauren? Or would she think of her as "Mom"? Why would she think of her father by his full name? Would she think of her family as a "small family" - this seems like a particularly adult, distant perspective.

You might want to double-check your dialogue: I found myself questioning whether a father would address his child as "little one" in a real situation. I'm trying to picture this, and it sounds terribly patronising and forced to my ears. One trick for writing fluent dialogue is to read it aloud, and perhaps try to imagine being the speaker yourself. If you find yourself cringing, there's probably a problem.

I feel quite distanced from the protagonist. I'm not sure I know a lot about her personality except that she's interested in her father's stories. Is she social or antisocial, geeky, interested in sports or music or theatre, is she introverted or extroverted, shy or bold, lazy or dedicated ... ? I don't have a grasp on her character at all.

I'm not feeling her character motivation for going to North Dakota. The sum total of her thinking is "We’d dreamt of going to Ranna and meeting all sorts of creatures". So -- she lies to her mother, ditches her and goes on a scary dangerous journey ... because she's curious? I feel like we need a much stronger, clearer motivation here.

I kind of see what you're aiming at. She used to share this thing with her father, and now he's dead, and maybe it's the thing that she most remembers him by - she misses how he used to tell her stories and she used to believe them. And she thinks if she can find this place, she can prove that he was telling her the truth, prove that those experiences were meaningful, and she can feel that she's near to him in a tangible way. So it's all tied up in the death of her father and the fact that he's gone but his stories are still with her.

But very little of this is actually in the narrative.

If I'm right that this is what you're going for, it would also solve a structural problem. Portal stories (like this one) follow a certain basic structure. Protagonist has problem in real world. Protagonist goes through portal and in the other world learns or gains something that helps him defeat the conflict in the other world. Protagonist returns to the real world and is empowered to overcome his real-world problem.

Take Harry Potter as a classic example. Harry lacks a real family - he's emotionally abused by his relatives. So he goes through the portal of Platform 9 3/4 and enters the Wizarding World, and there he gains a real family: Hogwarts and his friends there. And this new family empowers him so he can go back to the real world and face his real-world problem (his relatives) with new strength and power. See how that ties together?

At the moment, in this story, the protagonist has no real-world problem, and so I'm struggling to see how this would tie together thematically. But if her real-world problem is that her father is dead and she wants to feel close to him, this could potentially have a thematically relevant and heart-warmingly fuzzy ending where she's returned to the real world, but her memories of Ranna are like a part of him that she keeps with her (or insert sappy ending here).

Few final points:

I'm unsure about Diminutive Desert as a place name.

Your description of the Noones is a bit of a copout. If you want the reader to picture a creature that's "part human, part horse, part lion, and the size of an elephant", you need to do the hard work first. Give us a clear visual image, not a collection of things that don't fit together.

Be careful of spelling and grammar, especially dialogue punctuation.

Okay, I'm done. Hope this helped.

Cheers,
Karsten