Young Writers Society

I have a manuscript completed that I have decided isn't good enough and am editing for the sixth time since I wrote it two years ago. But, no matter how hard I work on it, I can't seem to find enough courage to submit it to an agent.

That brings me to the reason why I joined this site: critism. I desperatly need feedback. My only critics are currently friends and family members, and I can't trust them to be as hard on my work as I am.

My plot summary is this (it's not very good and kind of pretentious...):

Belinda is a sixteen year old girl with an overdose of angst and serious anger managment problems. She is stuck out in the middle of Washington state after being dragged away from her family and friends in upstate New York by her estranged sister, Mary. And into this mess enters the bizarre and freakish Ashes: Mar, Rina, Miriam, Kalyi and Markus. They are isolated by the school. The standard rumor is that they are troubled rich kids, but they don't draw attention to themselves and are well behaved. Except for Markus, whose personality is nearly a perfect copy of Belinda's own.
Snarky boy meets snarky girl and the fireworks start. Belinda swiftly discovers the truth behind the Ashes' mysterious auras and strange appearances: they are vampires. Her discovery brings her into the world of the night of which she has only dreamed of. However, her sister has a strange aversion to Belinda's new friends, and as time goes by, the secrets pile up and Belinda discovers things about both her sister, and herself.

I'll try to get up the first chapter once I figure out how to work this site...

Hm... this sounds a bit too much like Twilight.

I actually was toying with this idea before I read Twilight, and, unfortunatly, the plot summaries sound similar. However, the actual story is quite different, and the personalities of Isabella and Belinda are nothing alike.

^^ Agreed with the first poster. Sounds almost exactly like Twilight. I'm sure you could add a little twist. Everything sounds the same. Odd town. The family is very isolated and stick together. There are five kids and five kids in Twilight if I'm not mistaken...

...um, does it have to be vampires? Can it be something a little less overdone than vampires, like...say, Yetis? Or aliens? Or underground cave people who've lived beneath the earth for as long as humanity has walked above it, and have only now sent a delegation of their best diplomats up to deal with the humans? Or Daleks--wait, that'd count as aliens. Awesome aliens, but aliens nonetheless.

Sorry, I'm just throwing ideas out here, so that's probably why they're all horrible. Still, vampires are so stereotypical that--forgive me--actually rolled my eyes when I read that the kids were vampires. Maybe you could make them into another kind of supernatural being? That'd preserve the basic premise without all the tack and unoriginality of vampires, would it?

I'm a bit leery to make suggestions, as you have worked on it for a long time, and it'd probably be difficult to overhaul it completely...but I can say your chances at getting it published are probably better if it doesn't involve vampires, or does something completely new and creative with vampires (but PLEASE dear GOD do NOT make them sparkly *retches*). But it'd probably be better if the vampire component was removed completely.