KamiKaza

The bells rang throughout the halls of Hiyama Academy, this marked the ended of a week long vacation for the students. The students filed into their classes one by one they took their seats. Hiyama is a large Academy of 3000 in which students enroll from high school freshmen to graduate students trying to earn their Doctrine. The school is one of three schools locate throughout the world. Chosama Academy which is located near the large city of Kobe Japan, Karatau Academy which is located on the island of Java, and Hiyama Academy which is locate right off the Olympic coast. Hiyama is made up of four large islands, the first and largest contains the high school and college along with the college apartments. The second island is the smallest of the four and is the least developed. It retains most of the natural forest that grows there. The third island is the shipping island which receives and sends packages to the mainland. This is also the only island where student can board a boat and headed to the mainland. Finally the fourth is slightly smaller than the first, this island holds all the high school dorms along with the medical center.

The academy offers a wide range of classes for the students, as well gives them a much better education than public schools. Class 408 is one class designed for students who need a challenge during the school year. The students of 408 are sophomores in high school, and most of the students are girls. Considering that most of the male students fail the exam to enroll in the class.

"I'm telling you this is right answer." One girl shouted, loud enough that is could be heard from the hall.

"No, I check it's correct" Another girl shouted, equally as loud as the first girl.

As the two girl argued back and forth, a teacher with the name tag reading Ms. Aiyanami walked in. She was in her late twenties, a slender woman with long platinum blonde hair. She had aqua blue eyes that stunned any man who looked into them, the few boys in the class dreamed about being with her.

"Miss Severina, Miss Benita please take your seat. You can talk about whatever later." Ms. Aiyanami requested.

Of course the girls also had respect for Ms. Aiyanami, she wasn't even 30 and she already had her Ph.D. in History. The two girls took their seats, and Ms. Aiyanami began to teach the class. As Ms. Aiyanami started teaching one girl in the second row noticed that there was one extra chair. When she asked why there was an extra chair, Ms. Aiyanami told the class that a new student would be joining them. The room then began to fill with murmuring about the new student. 20 minutes into the class an announcement came up on the intercom.

"Ms. Aiyanami, Mr. Kaza has arrived. The principal will escort him to class." the woman on the intercom said.

"Oh class let me take this time to tell you a little on the student." Ms. Aiyanami announced as she pick up a green folder.

"Just to be sure this new student is a boy, right?" one girl asked

*Comment Begin*
I started this story a little while ago, and have re written it at least three to four times already. This is just the first piece of the first chapter because I hate really long piece to review. Keep in mind that this is the first chapter and all I`m doing here is to introduce the setting, characters, and everything else that is needed for a story. I decided not to dive into the fantasy right away, but rather move in to it slowly. So Enjoy and comments are welcomed, esspically grammar comments I`m really weak in that part.
*Comment End*

Hello there, Achitaka!

Seeing you have no comments yet, I thought I would stop by. This is a decent beginning in the sense that you have specific direction in which you are going. However, there was one major flaw in this beginning that hurt this piece and that was telling.

I started this story a little while ago, and have re written it at least three to four times already. This is just the first piece of the first chapter because I hate really long piece to review. Keep in mind that this is the first chapter and all I`m doing here is to introduce the setting, characters, and everything else that is needed for a story. I decided not to dive into the fantasy right away, but rather move in to it slowly. So Enjoy and comments are welcomed, esspically grammar comments I`m really weak in that part.

I'm glad that you are trying to ease us into the story and introduce everything, but I think it could be done in a much more effective way.

When you tell the reader something instead of showing it, you do a few things that can be detrimental to your story. First, you rob the reader of the creative process of making their own connections and assumptions; these connections are much more powerful and more emotionally engaging than any amount of telling you can do and they suck the reader in. Second, it stunts character development. Telling me about your character is only going to bore me; show me instead and I'll be emotionally attached. Third, it bogs down the narrative and bores the reader, which makes it very hard to keep the reader's attention. And fourth, it robs you of opportunities to present these juicy details later on in the story, thus downplaying any intrigue you might bring upon the reader in the beginning.

All of these things bore the reader and make your story more laborious to read; normally, a bit of telling would not be bothersome, but in large chunks, especially near the beginning, it bores the reader.

Now, for some specific examples:

Hiyama is a large Academy of 3000 in which students enroll from high school freshmen to graduate students trying to earn their Doctrine. The school is one of three schools locate throughout the world. Chosama Academy which is located near the large city of Kobe Japan, Karatau Academy which is located on the island of Java, and Hiyama Academy which is locate right off the Olympic coast. Hiyama is made up of four large islands, the first and largest contains the high school and college along with the college apartments. The second island is the smallest of the four and is the least developed. It retains most of the natural forest that grows there. The third island is the shipping island which receives and sends packages to the mainland. This is also the only island where student can board a boat and headed to the mainland. Finally the fourth is slightly smaller than the first, this island holds all the high school dorms along with the medical center.

So, this is good information and if I were reading a history book, I might take the time to soak it all in and keep reading, but this is not a history book. This is a story. And at this point, I barely know any of your characters, so frankly, I really don't care what Hiyama is. Mind you, these are good things to know, but you are dumping to much information at the same time, you have no characters to keep me reading and I am not emotionally engaged yet, which means this paragraph only bores me. My suggestions is to cut it. Introduce us to your characters and suck us into the story; then you can start sprinkling details about Hiyama (though I still discourage putting it all together in this huge of a paragraph.)

The academy offers a wide range of classes for the students, as well gives them a much better education than public schools. Class 408 is one class designed for students who need a challenge during the school year. The students of 408 are sophomores in high school, and most of the students are girls. Considering that most of the male students fail the exam to enroll in the class.

This is less of a detail dump, but it still only tells the reader what the academy is, and I still have to no characters to relate to. Though I think you should cut this paragraph, don't cut the information. SHOW it to us; use your characters to show this wide variety of classes; use them to show how many male students fail the exam.

As the two girl argued back and forth, a teacher with the name tag reading Ms. Aiyanami walked in. She was in her late twenties, a slender woman with long platinum blonde hair. She had aqua blue eyes that stunned any man who looked into them, the few boys in the class dreamed about being with her.

I'm not a fan of physical description of characters at first meeting, but I'm not going to lecture you on that as it's more of a personal opinion. About the bold portion: you're telling me again! Now that I know your characters it is less boring and more annoying; I want to be shown this alleged affection men hold for her. I want to see the boy's dreamy eyes, hear their whispering about her; I want to envision the human aspect of this statement, not have it pounded into my mind through telling. Think of how much more powerful this would be if took the time and described a single boy who is infatuated with her... then we could see her reaction to that, too. See how much more you can do showing?

There were other instances of telling in this piece, but I think you get the idea. I'm not trying to be harsh, simply trying to discourage you from telling. Hope this was helpful! Nice start here and keep writing. PM me if you have any questions.

I aboslutely agrree with Writersdomain. However, I have one other thing to say. If i read this as the first page of a book, it would immediatly put down at the point where you begin to tell exactly the school was. One way to make the readble and exiting instead of making you go to sleep is make the school on an uncharted island string. Only the kids who pass the exams able to know exactlyu where it is. Another idea is to make the school totally fun but educational. Like make the teacher descuss what the kids were arguing about and solve the disput. Have fun trips around the world. I doint know, just do not make the school the most boring one, or like hog worts( boring but the magic makes surproises.). I can already tell the boy is the enmy involing magic or is the friend involving magic. i think! Pm me when you spruce up the storry some. It sounds exceptianally interesting when i take what you yhave writted and added my imagination to it. ( umm, you doint want to know what the girls were arguing about. It was about a mystery whether are not it was possible for boys to not think about girl and to study instead. Which of course is impossible. But one beil;eved that maybee 1 out of 1000 boys could if they set there minds to it!

When you tell the reader something instead of showing it, you do a few things that can be detrimental to your story. First, you rob the reader of the creative process of making their own connections and assumptions; these connections are much more powerful and more emotionally engaging than any amount of telling you can do and they suck the reader in. Second, it stunts character development. Telling me about your character is only going to bore me; show me instead and I'll be emotionally attached. Third, it bogs down the narrative and bores the reader, which makes it very hard to keep the reader's attention. And fourth, it robs you of opportunities to present these juicy details later on in the story, thus downplaying any intrigue you might bring upon the reader in the beginning.

I see what you`re saying talking about, but I wanted to avoid the all so common dragon, magic, battle type of beginning that I see so very often. The fantasy part comes into the story after the boy arrives, and no he isn`t the villian in this story. Though he is alittle weird, yeah I had to give him some sort of flaw.
But none the less I`ll re read it and see if I can`t fix what you have outlined for me.

I understand what you mean, but by asking you to show and not tell, I am by no means asking you to include action in the beginning. I am just saying that you could use more showing in a character development and setting sense. If you introduced us to your characters and showed us his surroundings, it would take care of the telling; you don't need action to show. Fantasy battle beginnings bother me too, so I know where you are coming from. Sorry for any confusion on that.

Gotcha, I that case I have quite a few good ideas in how to change this story up a bit. I get writting it here pretty soon. Thanks this helps alot.

Hey buddy. I finally got around to reading your work. I've got to say, in some places it's better than my own. Is this one of the stories you told me about in Japan? The one with the guy and his guardian tiger or something?

Anyway, I can't find much to correct that hasn't already been mentiond. Just one suggestion, when you finish a chapter you need to read it over, and I mean REALLY read. You'd be surprised at how many grammer or spelling errors you may find. I do that all the time with my stuff because I can't stand having it posted or shown in public with some sort of error.