Roses by the Lakeshore (1)

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Hey, LovePeace! First of all, welcome to YWS!

Okay, now that's done...

I think this is pretty interesting story, but I am kind of a sucker for ghost stories, especially romantic ghost stories! Uh huh... it's all good!

However, I think you could probably start at a different place! Instead of waking up and such, why not start at the gravestone? Less angst and way more action and thrills. It's going to be fantastic!

Keep going with this!

Hello! I'm Evi.

my face was twisted with melancholy

Here's a good example for me to point out showing vs telling, which is something you'll hear in YWS critiques all the time. It means, simply, to show and image or describe a scene rather than tell what it's like. So the face is twisted with melancholy-- cool idea. But what does that look like? What does it do to the facial features? Does the mouth curl down, the eyes squint closed, the nose wrinkle, the cheeks flush? Show the image instead or telling us what it is.

Glancing at my pillow, I noticed it was a bit damp. Slowly, I slid out of the warmth of my bed to put my ear against my door. Not a sound. Quietly I opened my door and dragged my self through the hallway to the kitchen. Opening the refrigerator, I pulled out a bottle of water, rolled the cap off and chugged some of the water down to soothe my throat. Sighing I threw my clogs and a thin jacket on then walked outside.

All of these sentences begin with either an adverb (slowly, quietly) or an -ing word (glancing, opening, sighing). Work on sentence structure variation, or your tone becomes choppy and monotonous. Try to start as many sentences as you can with different things-- nouns, -ing words, pronouns, adjectives. It's generally a good idea to avoid adverbs altogether.

I quickly turned around, yet there was only myself there.

Oddly phrased. Perhaps, instead: I turned around, but I was alone. or I spun around, yet there was nobody there.

Snoink is right! You want to begin where the most action is present, and since nothing too important happens in that first paragraph after the flashback, you might want to start where she's walking to the cemetery, or even where she hears Aiden's voice for the first time.

You could also describe the scene a bit more. You explain the past well, not just dropping a huge chunk of info-dump in there, but I can't envision her surroundings much. What's the temperature, the weather, like? Is the stone cold and smooth, or jagged with age? You mention dead flowers; that's a start. Go from there.

Overall, a nice start-- your prose is clean for the most part. I think the most important things here are to set up your setting a bit more and avoid starting so many sentence with "-ing" words, because it'll kill your flow.

PM me for anything!

~Evi