Nightshine - chapter 1

chapter 1

THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL. I thought to myself with a sense of dread . My name is Louis Nightshine. I'm your typical 13 year old eigth grade student with you typical parents, friends and life. My life was pretty boring, just living from day to day. I have no problems with anyone at school and nobody has any problems with me. I never got into any fights with my parents and to be frank i wasn't really even that close to my friends. There isn't anything very distinguishing about my appearance either. I am medium height with dark brown hair and about medium build. There was one thing though, on the back of my neck I had a strange marking that sort of resembled a V-shape. My parents called it a birth mark but it has always intrigued me.

Most of the clubs, groups, or electives I found uninteresting but I had to pick at least 3 ways to spend my time besides my regular schedual. I began to sift through the choices in my head. There was a book club, as soon as I saw that I signed up immediately. I loved books. I loved everything about them. It's as if inside every book is a new story, a new world, a new universe. They're so unpredictable. The moment I picked up a book and began to read my mind would become a canvas and detailed and adventure filled pictures would fill it as quickly as water flows from a waterfall. I read alot. my room (painted beige) is filled with books. I read them to get away from my boring, uneventful life. I began to look through the list again. I figured that it might be interesting to join the school newspaper. I signed up for that too. I was about to sign up for a gardening and landscaping club in the hope that we would install a pond or two. Beside reading, there aren't that many things on this earth that I enjoy, but I am very relaxed when I see still water. Just a silent, still, pond so still that it looks like a sheet of glass. I find that very relaxing. But I never signed up for that club, because I looked at the other names on the list and I saw a name. written in terrible handwriting was the name "Mike Liller".

As I said before, I dont have any problems with anybody at school but Mike Liller was a different story. It's not that I dont like him. he's fine, but there is just something about him that makes me uneasy. I cant put my finger on it but whenever i'm in his prescence I can feel myself getting lightheaded and dizzy. It's strange and I try to avoid him as much as possible. I prayed to God that I wouldnt have any classes with him. But it seemed that God wasnt listening, because I had three. Algebra, Science, and Shop, my least favorite classes. At least we didnt share any electives. and I only had shop for the first quarter of the school year so that was good news. I didnt chose another elective so lucky me i got stuck with French.

Well, the first day of school came and went. I decided to walk home that day so I could stop at the bookstore. I went there almost every night to discuss literature with the owner, Mr. McFowen. I acctually learned more than discussed. He taught me about both ancient and modern peices of literature and their authors. Mr. McFowen was a good natured and relatively jolly old man in his late 60's. He is incredibly nimble for his old age. He is probably my closest and most valued friend."Just got a new shipment in this morning sonny! Take a look!" As I looked through the box of old and dusty, but still interesting books, he continued on."So how was your first day? No problems i hope?" I repied briefly, "It was fine. Just another day. As to the second, you know I never do." And he did. But lately he had just been asking about problems more and more, like he was expecting something.

So, after a few weeks at school Mr. McFowen got his wish. It all started on my way out of the shop room. I had stayed behind to ask the teacher a question after everybody else had left. After I got a satisfying answer, I left the room. In the hallway was Mike Liller. The taller black haired boy was standing right in front of me blocking my path. "Lou, we need to talk." He began. " What about?" I asked suspiciously,starting to get that same drunken feeling that I got whenever I was around him. "Listen, this is very important" he said slowly as he reached his hand into his bag. As he did this, he seemed to step toward me. "This is for your own good" Out of his bag he pulled a strange mirror. The design reminded me of something but I coudn't put my finger on it. He pulled it toward me and I totally lost it. I can't remember for sure how it all happened because of the incredible amounts of adrenaline coursing through my viens. I couldn't even see straight, but one thing I was well aware of was the impact of a fist on a face. What scared me though, was that it my fist on his face. They were the strong, well placed blows of a man who had fought many enemies in his life. What scared me even more was that I had no control over it. I was a mess, just sitting on top of him feeling his warm blood on my hands as I beat him. Tears came to my eyes as I tried even harder to stop, screaming as loud as I could. Finally all my strength had deserted me as I fell onto my back crying loudly. The next thing I knew I was being carried away. I heard voices that sounded far away as my hearing returned, but I didn't care anymore, it didn't matter who was carrying me away or where they would take me. I just wanted to go to sleep and never wake up.

I. Showing vs. Telling

nightshine wrote:THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL. I thought to myself with a sense of dread . My name is Louis Nightshine. I'm your typical 13 year old eigth grade student with you typical parents, friends and life. My life was pretty boring, just living from day to day. I have no problems with anyone at school and nobody has any problems with me. I never got into any fights with my parents and to be frank i wasn't really even that close to my friends. There isn't anything very distinguishing about my appearance either. I am medium height with dark brown hair and about medium build. There was one thing though, on the back of my neck I had a strange marking that sort of resembled a V-shape. My parents called it a birth mark but it has always intrigued me.

Hold up. Stop. Just stop. You just told me an outline of your character's biography and peculiar facts. You are not writing a character outline. You are writing a story. The first chapter at that. Frankly, this is one big info-dump and it needs some serious pruning. People get bored after reading humongous chunks of information (albeit even useful information) on a character's background. You never ever give us a profile in the beginning of story no matter what person it's writing in.

I. NITPICKS

Most of the clubs, groups, or electives I found uninteresting but I had to pick at least three [in writing you always write the number] ways to spend my time besides my regular schedule.

I read a lot. My room (painted beige) [unimportant information] is filled with books. I read them to get away from my boring, uneventful life. I began to look through the list again. I figured that it might be interesting to join the school newspaper. I signed up for that, too. I was about to sign up for a gardening and landscaping club in the hope that we would install a pond or two. Beside reading, there aren't that many things on this earth that I enjoy, but I am very relaxed when I see still water. Just a silent, still, pond so still that it looks like a sheet of glass. I find that very relaxing. But I never signed up for that club, because I looked at the other names on the list and I saw a name. written in terrible handwriting was the name "Mike Liller"[combine with prior sentence].

As I said before, I don't have any problems with anybody at school but Mike Liller was a different story. It's not that I don't like him. he's fine, but there is just something about him that makes me uneasy. I cant put my finger on it but whenever I'm in his presence I can feel myself getting lightheaded and dizzy. It's strange and I try to avoid him as much as possible. I prayed to God that I wouldn't have any classes with him. But it seemed that God wasn't listening, because I had three. Algebra, Science, and Shop, my least favorite classes. At least we didn't share any electives[combine]and I only had shop for the first quarter of the school year so that was good news. I didn't chose another elective so lucky me i got stuck with French.

Well, the first day of school came and went. I decided to walk home that day so I could stop at the bookstore. I went there almost every night to discuss literature with the owner, Mr. McFowen. I actually learned more than discussed. He taught me about both ancient and modern pieces of literature and their authors. Mr. McFowen was a good natured and relatively jolly old man in his late 60's[sixty's]. He is incredibly nimble for his old age. He is probably my closest and most valued friend."Just got a new shipment in this morning sonny! Take a look!" As I looked through the box of old and dusty, but still interesting books, he continued on."So how was your first day? No problems i hope?" I replied briefly, "It was fine. Just another day. As to the second, you know I never do." And he did. But lately he had just been asking about problems more and more, like he was expecting something.

III. OVERALL IMPRESSION

I think you need to re-vamp this whole piece. As aforementioned, you do a lot of telling in this piece. I don't believe there was a time when you really showed the reader what was happening through description. You just give us blocks of information. I'm not quite sure if you meant for this to be like a diary entry, but if you are it would help to have "Dear Diary" in the beginning so the reader is sure. OTher than that your a bit rocky in the grammar department but I think that you can save this piece. PM me if you have any questions.
----Periwinkle

Hmm... This was good I liked Mr. McFowen and how it seemed he knew something was going to happen. There's not much of a problem in this story other than it could be expanded a little longer and a few grammer mistakes. But nothing big just little things like capitalizing.

THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL. I thought to myself with a sense of dread .

I personally wouldn't capitalize those first words. Also, use a comma instead of a period after 'school' and there's a space between 'dread' and the period.

I'm your typical 13 year old eigth grade...

You spelt 'eighth' wrong.

...with you typical parents, friends and life.

Change 'you' to 'your'.

There was one thing though, on the back of my neck I had a strange marking that sort of resembled a V-shape.

Put a period after 'neck'. Dividing it this way sounds better.

Okay, this first paragraph is a cliche. Especially the beginning where you state her name then say 'and I'm your typical blah blah blah. Even the word 'typical' is a huge cliche in this situation. Other than that, this was a big info dump, where you told us, not showed us.

There was a book club, as soon as I saw that I signed up immediately.

Use a period instead of a comma after 'club'.

It's as if inside every book is a new story

Isn't that obvious?

They're so unpredictable.

Not always.

my room (painted beige) is filled with books.

Capitalise the 'm' in 'my'. And the part about your room being painted beige is just a random, unnecessary piece of information. Just get rid of it.

He is probably my closest and most valued friend."Just got a new shipment in this morning sonny! Take a look!"

Whenever you have someone new start speaking you need to start a new paragraph.

."So how was your first day? No problems i hope?" I repied briefly, "It was fine. Just another day. As to the second, you know I never do."

Once again, you needed a new paragraph when the main character started talking since its someone different speaking.

What scared me though, was that it my fist on his face.

Put 'was' between 'it' and 'my'. Other than that, though, I thought the way you executed this was good. It was kind of like a mini story twist.

That last part, after the part I liked, I thought it got a little weird. It was just so random and there was no reason for that uncontrolable fight to happen.

I think one of your main problems is sentence and paragraph structure. You need to learn how to use the lengths of your sentences to make the story more fluent. You also need to study how the paragraphs of stories work, and try your best to determine when you're supposed to start a new paragraph, because your paragraphs were huge and practically entire sections of your story. This will all make your story easier to read, and more people will give you reviews since it looks less bulky.

And like I said, the beginning was a cliche and your entire story told me things rather than showed me. What you need is more dialog, shorter paragraphs, and you NEED to describe the world around your main character. There were little or no descriptions other than what that Mike guy looked like.

Don't let this huge review trouble you too much. You're well on your way to becoming a good writer, but you have to learn from those of us who can help, such as me. Take what I've said, remember it, apply it, and keep writing. Goodbye and good luck.

Okay, I'm gonna talk to you a little bit. There's nothing too seriously wrong with this, but maybe try the following tips.

Parallelism. Keep your verbs in the whole post in the same tense. Period.

Like instead of this:

chapter 1

THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL. I thought to myself with a sense of dread . My name is Louis Nightshine. I'm your typical 13 year old eigth grade student with you typical parents, friends and life. My life was pretty boring, just living from day to day. I have no problems with anyone at school and nobody has any problems with me. I never got into any fights with my parents and to be frank i wasn't really even that close to my friends. There isn't anything very distinguishing about my appearance either. I am medium height with dark brown hair and about medium build. There was one thing though, on the back of my neck I had a strange marking that sort of resembled a V-shape. My parents called it a birth mark but it has always intrigued me.

Try this:

chapter 1

THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL. I thought to myself with a sense of dread . My name was Louis Nightshine. I was your typical 13 year old eigth grade student with your typical parents, friends and life. My life was pretty boring, just living from day to day. I had no problems with anyone at school and nobody had any problems with me. I never got into any fights with my parents and to be frank i wasn't really even that close to my friends. There wasn't anything very distinguishing about my appearance either. I was medium height with dark brown hair and about medium build. There was one thing though, on the back of my neck I had a strange marking that sort of resembled a V-shape. My parents called it a birth mark but it had always intrigued me.

And you need commas, spelling corrections, capitalization corrections, and so on. Like this:

Chapter 1

The first day of school, I thought to myself with a sense of dread . My name was Louis Nightshine. I was your typical thirteen-year-old eigth grade student with your typical parents, friends, and life. My life was pretty boring, just living from day to day. I had no problems with anyone at school, and nobody had any problems with me. I never got into any fights with my parents, and, to be frank, I wasn't even that close to my friends. There wasn't anything very distinguishing about my appearance either. I was medium height with dark brown hair and about medium build. There was one thing, though; on the back of my neck, I had a strange marking that resembled a V. My parents called it a birth mark, but it had always intrigued me.

Just simple stuff, like I said. But your writing skills are great. Keep up the good work!

thank you everybody! thank you so much. i really dont want anybody to hold back at all. i want your full opinions.

so thank you for letting me know what you thought about the "info dump" and everything. that was really helpful and im going to rewrite it based on what you told me. ill make sure to be more careful with my grammar and spellingand such. but just to let you people know, my friggan computer didnt come with any microsoft programs so i had to use notepad which basically sucks because i cant use italics without a hassle and it doesnt have spell-check which is why some things arent correct even after I went over it. but anyway thank you for catching them and ill be sure to bear them in mind.

i think I really do need more dialouge so you can be expecting that in the revised version. also I dont think I will have the "info dump" problem anymore.

so anyway keep the critiques coming and dont be afraid to really let me have it!

Hey there, Welcome to YWS!

I thought I'd say that since it's your first piece on YWS. You're still lacking a review though, you're supposed to write two before your first piece.

I'm quite intrigued as to the story you're setting up here, but the beginning was a bit chunky to get around.

Ayumi mentioned the issue of the tenses in your first paragraph. It's something I've spent many, many hours debating. I think you should keep the 'My name is Louis...' Unless the name changes through the story, the same with age, grade, and such. I'm not sure about other readers but I usually pick out these things at the very beginning to work out what's staying and what's changing.

Also, warning, people have many different versions of average :p You can either say you had a typical life, or roughly define it, but if you do both you're at risk of the reader questioning you.

What this piece needs more than anything is an instant hook. Your audiance will usually look for a reason to read before actually doing so. Maybe you could play with the structure a little, try telling us that this perfectly average kid is standing over a teacher with blood on his fists, that would probably make a pretty good hook.

Anyway, keep writing This is a good start. Keep it up.

Also, if you've got notepad, you probably have wordpad too, it's in the accessories menu I think. It doesn't have spellchecker, but it has things like italics and different fonts.