Young Writers Society

Hatched

The egg was cracking, my tiny figure emerging from the egg filled with a milkey white substance. My eyes barely opened into slits and I could barely make out a man hovering over me with a hand lens.

" Dr. Preston!" the man exclaimed, though he didn't take his eyes off me. Dr. Preston, a gray haired man in a white lab coat hurried over to me.

" Holy cow!" Mr. Hanna, get me a pair of gloves," Dr. Preston beamed. He leaned down in front of my face as he lifted me up in his hands. I was just the size of both his hands, maybe a little bigger.

" I think I'll name you Cas."

So, I was born. I've lived in The Factory for sixteen years. I wasn't exactly normal, nobody here was. We aren't birds. Ha, not even close. We're better. We could bleed until we had no blood left, be in excruciating pain, but still live. We could punch somebody so hard there would be an indent of their face. We weren't humans, we were hatched.

Then there's the Poison Ones, all starting with Sean and Helena. Instead of white eggs they were black and instead of the thick white substance inside they're was a thin velvet red substance, like blood. They were bad eggs.

They'd always been against the factory, I guess it was almost natural. They started an army, a rebellion, when they were both fourteen. Hatching eggs of their own. It kept going until they out numbered us. Far away, hidden from the factory they were, and we just about forgot them. Nobody has heard from them since, until last night that is. Because last night Helena returned to The Factory.

* * *
Thunder clapped in the dark sky as I peered out the window of my dorm. I heard a knock at my door and I opened it even though it was after curfew. My friend Finley was standing there, his brown hair wild and his Factory sweat shirt thrown on insideout.

He walked in and shut the door. His eyes were gloomy and he looked like he might have been a little scared, too.

"Helena's back," he announced. I was caught off guard, and I didn't believe him. There's no way she's back, and how would Finley know if she was?

I stammered, " That can't be. How do you know that?" Finley frowned as if he didn't know himself then took a deep breath.

" I saw her in the library, but I don't think she saw me." I put my hand over my mouth, he was telling the truth. I could tell, and anyway Finley's my best friend.

" Are you sure it was her?" I questioned, and Finley nodded. " Was Sean or the others with her?" I asked and he silently shook his head.

"No, I think she was looking for something here though," he said.

A piercing scream rang out from down the hall, and we reconized it immediatly. Bast, Finley's thirteen year old sister.

I took off down the hall after Finley, ignoring shouts from the staff and wandering people. It hit me, Finley was heading towards the library. Where Helena is.

I like it
I think the beginning was a bit fast.
BUT I love the idea haha.
I hope to see more of this story!
x

okay, thanks!

Hello, I spotted a few spelling errors and typos:

I heard a knock at my door and I opened it even though it was aftr curfew.

Forgot the "E" in after!

A piercing scream rang out from down the hall, and we reconized it immediatly. Bast, Finley's thirdteen year old sister.

Three things here.
One, immediatly is spelt immediately.
Two, thirdteen is spelt thirteen.
Three, reconized is spelt recognized.

Okay, so that's all I saw for nitpicks.

This is quite an interesting idea. I like it and want to see what happens next.

Hope I was helpful!
~Crazy

Thanks, for this and all the other reviews you've done for me. : ) Appreciate them!

Okay, I actually liked how you started the story. It was a risky idea, but I believe it paid off well. It had shock value to it that took me by surprise, but in a good way that made me want to keep on reading. And keep on reading I did until the end of the chapter. Then I stopped to do this review.

Moving on, I saw some minor spelling errors, but if you run it through a spell checker before the final draft, I'm sure that would pick it up so I won't dwell. What I will mention is some awkward sentencing that you had:

Far away, hidden from the factory they were, and we just about forgot them.

The whole, 'they were' part of the sentence threw me off a bit. It seems to be one of those sentences that makes more sense talking it out, but just looks awkward in text. It reminds me of Zoidburg from Futurama if you get the reference...
Well, I would suggest taking out 'they were' and leaving it like that.

It hit me, Finley was heading towards the library he encountered Helena in.

This is also a it awkward. I would suggest in this case to seperate the sentences. I will show you my suggestion if you don't mind:
"It hit me, Finley was heading towards the library. Where Helena was."

I find that the last sentence of a chapter needs to be strong in order to keep the audience wanting to read more. The first example that I can think of is the Percy Jackson series. Every chapter ends in a cliffhanger and as frustrating as it was at 2 in the morning when I wanted to sleep, it worked quite well. The cliffhanger here should be an immenent encounter with Helena.

Well, that was my first impressions and let me tell you, I want more! Keep it up! Oh, and feel free to PM me with any questions because I can't guarantee I will see it if it's posted here.

it is a good one and i like it very much.

I love the idea, but you kinda got me mixed up...ok I'll say this, you have to stop repeating words choose other words to speak of something or someone and also can you describe what year and what happened before bringing the action in full speed rush? (or else im confused @_@) Anyway thank you for your novel, looking forward to the rest of it

I really like the idea, it's very interesting and unique. That's one key thing ticked off, now you just need to tell it and introduce great characters.
We don't know much about the characters yet, obviously, it's only chapter one. I look forward to hearing about their lives in the past, if you do choose to write about that (I hope you do!)
It was rather fast paced and sudden, try and slow it down just a tad - we want to hear more. The speech is rather hasty, but maybe that's just me. I like the bad eggs idea, just the 'eggs' in general, I trust we're yet to find out why they are being hatched?

Still, apart from the brief spelling mistakes and slightly speedy structure - excellent!

I really liked it. The beginning was a risk, but it paid off, and the writing felt really natural. It reminded me of Maximum Ride (you should read it, it's an awesome series). You've already got the conflict in it, which is always good, and I look forward to reading more.

-Frankie

Supernova ) Okay! Thank you, and I'll be sure to use your advice while writing the following chapters.

Dahanain13 ) Thanks a bunch and welcome to YWS by the way! And yes, I've read Maximum Ride and it's awesome! James Patterson is mind blowing. Anyway, thanks!

Heya jDawn!

I'm here to review as requested. You've got some nice reviews here, so hopefully, I won't end up repeating everything that's already been said. Anyway, I'll start off with any nit-pick's that I have for you.

The egg was cracking, my tiny figure emerging from the egg, filled with a milky white substance. My eyes barely opened into slits and I could only just make out a man hovering over me with a hand lens.

I changed a word in the last sentence to vary it a bit. As a whole, this opening is pretty good, but I think you can do better! The opening of a novel is very, very important. That's where you hook the reader in. I myself am quite bad at coming up with exciting openings, but I'm sure that you can think of one pretty easily. Think of it as though if it weren't your story, but someone else's. Do you think that by reading the beginning, you'd feel really inspired to continue? Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that your opening is bad, not at all! I'm simply suggesting that you get the best you can out of yourself. I like the concept of how you've opened it... the whole egg hatching thing, but I'd like for you to make it a bit more interesting and really make us readers have to read over it twice to believe what we're seeing. I hope that makes sense...

So, I was born. I've lived in The Factory for sixteen years. I wasn't exactly normal, nobody here was. We aren't birds. Ha, not even close. We're better. We could bleed until we had no blood left, be in excruciating pain, but still live. We could punch somebody so hard, there would be an indent of their face. We weren't humans, we were hatched.

This came a bit too fas for me. I would have liked to have seen your MC describe the beginning of their life a bit more and in a bit more detail.

Instead of white eggs they were black and instead of the thick white substance inside, theirs was a thin, velvet red substance, like blood. They were bad eggs.

Sean and Helena always been against the factory, I guess it was almost natural. They started an army, a rebellion, when they were both fourteen.

I edited the names in here because, at first, I wasn't 100% sure on who was being talked about.

Thunder clapped in the dark sky as I peered out the window of my dorm. I heard a knock at my door and I opened it, even though it was after curfew. My friend Finley was standing there, his brown hair wild, and his Factory sweat shirt thrown on insideout.

" I saw her in the library, but I don't think she saw me." I put my hand over my mouth. He was telling the truth. I could tell, and anyway, Finley's my best friend.

Overall

What I loved the best about this was the idea of it. It's original and as far as I'm aware, I haven't read anything like this story before. Really well done for coming up with something that is far from cliché. I think that's an important aspect of a novel or story; the originality of it. You've got that down, so it's all good! Your grammar was pretty good. I did find a couple of errors, but any that I did find, I corrected for you in my nit-picks. I also found a few spelling errors in the piece, but nothing major at all. It's clear that you have a good idea behind this novel and I can see a good plot being developed in the future. I'm confident in saying that this novel has buckets of potential.

My main critique for this is probably the fact that I fee it's moving too fast. Overall, this is a pretty small chapter, yet you've squeezed an awful lot of information into it. We've seen your MC hatch, sped through the first sixteen years of her life, been told about the bad eggs, one of them has visited the factory, and Finley's sister has screamed, obviously meaning that something's happened. What I'd actually like to see in this first chapter is the introduction of your character's, especially your MC. Right now, we basically know nothing about her. What's life like in the factory? What are the staff like? Nice, nasty? Show us these things by showing us your MC's life up until she's sixteen. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to see her entire life story, just give us readers some time to get to know your characters before you jump right into the action.

I also noticed you telling, not showing, quite a lot. That's part of the reason the pace is moving a bit too quickly. For example, when you're describing the story behind the bad eggs. Don't just tell us that Sean and Helena were evil/bad, show us what made them evil/bad. Sure, they had dodgy stuff in their eggs, but that isn't really enough to show us that they were bad eggs. Show us how they behaved up until they were 14 and moved out. Did they pick on the other super-human-birdie people? Did they break all of the rules? Curse? Lie? This would be a good thing to describe while describing the first 16 years of your MC's life. As a whole, your telling and not showing isn't really that bad. I simply think that with a little bit more care, you could show things a lot better and do so really well. I know you're a good writer because I've read some of your other stuff and it's good. So is this! You just need to polish off the little details.

Other than those two little things, there's nothing else I have to say. As for nit-picks, I often noticed you changing tenses. Make sure that you keep the story in either the present, or past tense, throughout the whole novel. That's something for you to remember in the next few chapters. Nonetheless, this is a really interesting opening chapter. I can certainly tell you that this novel is full of great potential. All that you need to do is to take us reviewers advice and edit this up a bit. If you do that, this will definitely be a really epic opening chapter!

Keep writing,

xoxo Skins

Awesome, thank you!

I'll try and edit this, and add on to it too. Thanks to everybody who reviewed!!

Hi!

First of all, I realized a completely common problem; show and not tell. As Skins said. : D

Anyway, I would try and tell us a little bit about what happened between that huge gap of fifteen years and that would also add lenth to this short chapter.

Also, the supporting characters such as Bast, Finley, and Dr. Presten, at the time they're a bit flat. As well as the MC, tell us a little more about them, their looks, their personalities, and their past. If you think about it, people just don't pop into the world. That means everybody has a past so let us know about each of the character's past.

This is pretty good so far, please continue writing because I will read!

~Teardrop~