Accidents Happen

Bright, tawdry colors flashed past my uncaring eyes as carnival music filled my ears. Pictures of horses and green meadows whipped by; I didn't have the effort to stare at them. The many colors made my head hurt.

My mom's cool hand gently closed around my arm, so I wouldn't fall off the plastic, color faded horse I was riding. Drool trickled out of my mouth like a forgotten water tap, my head lolled to the side. I made an effort to close my mouth but couldn't. My body felt numb, uncontrollable. Mind over matter wasn't true.

My body wouldn't work, no matter how hard I willed it. The doctors said that I would never be normal. Not after the accident. Eyes flicking around in annoyance, I saw a little girl, jumping up and down with excitement. She held her mothers hand and led the way to a ride. I'd give everything to be her. Then she was gone.

I tried to focus on one thing, but to no avail. It seemed to go round and round, faster than before. A boy's face stood out to me. We had a class together when I still was going to high school, I think it had been history. Sometimes, I had copied his notes when I had been absent. The name came to my mind, we had called him Blakely.

A tiger paced its cage wanting to get out. Kids laughed and pointed every time he roared. I was like the tiger in some ways. Unable to escape the cage, the disability that life had put me in. When I was rolled past in the wheel chair, I was pointed at, like some kind of freak. Poor tiger, I wished I could free him.

The life I lived was like the merry-go-round I was on. Repetitive cycles that dizzied me. A wailing moan rose from my throat, equal to the frustration I felt. The ride stopped as I was pulled off. I thought idly on the days before the accident. When I could walk, run, and play.

Overall, not much to really go on, since it's so short. But i like the powerful imagery...

Eyes flicking around in annoyance, my eyes came to rest on a little girl

Should be 'they' instead of 'my eyes' since you have already said eyes once here.

The life I was living was like the merry-go-round I was on. Repetitive cycles that dizzied me

'like a merry-go-round, repetitive cycles that dizzied me'

Okay you have almost captured her emotion but... to me she doesn't feel sad enough. She's paralyzed or some kind of inability to move, so shouldn't she hate life? Or is she one of those perky go-getters never letting anything stand in her way?
Also, no eye colour, hair colour, skin tone, height, weight, size, shape, age, nothing. She isn't wearing clothes either >_<

This was powerful, and i loved it!

This was very well written. I found nothing really wrong with with grammatically or anything like that. I loved all of the description you used. However, I didn't really feel for the MC that much. Yeah, it's sad and all that she basically lost everything but I don't know the character that well. I don't know who she is, what happened to her, anything.
I'm not really sure exactly what to tell you because I like the simple beauty of this short piece but maybe try to develop the character a little more.
Nice work though

-Carly

Hey, Kaylyn!

Head lolling to the side, drool trickled out of my mouth like a forgotten water tap. I made an effort to close my mouth, but couldn't.

Eyes flicking around in annoyance, my eyes came to rest on a little girl,

A couple of nitpicks, you've got a little bit of repetition there


This is nice but, it's too short! You've introduced your character, and we know that she was in an accident that left her with paralysis, but beyond that there isn't much to go on at all.

So she's frustrated, but it's hard for the reader to really feel for her, we don't know what she was like before the accident, we don't know what it is that she's lost. Or if it was her fault even, was she an innocent by-stander hit by a car, a kid doing some crazy stunts, someone that forgot to put on their seat-belt?

It was pleasant to read, but I think that it would be interesting if you expanded it, showed us a little more about who we're reading about ^_^


Hope I was of some help C: if you have any questions or want me to take a look at something else, just shoot me a PM.


-fish!

Hey Kaylyn!

Here is my critique as promised: a line by line and then the macro ideas! Let's do this thing!

Kaylyn wrote:Bright, tawdry colors flashed past my uncaring eyes as carnival music filled my ears. [s]I could feel[/s] My mom's cool hand gently closed [s]encircled[/s] around my arm. Head lolling to the side, drool trickled out of my mouth like a forgotten water tap. Okay, grammatically this last sentence didn't make much sense so instead say "Drool trickled out of my mouth like a forgotten water tap, my head lolling to the side I made an effort to close my mouth, but couldn't. Expound on the underlined part of this. Tell us what it feels like...does it feel like you're choking? etc.

My body wouldn't work, no matter how hard I willed it. The doctors said that I would never be normal. Not after the accident. [s]Eyes[/s] Flicking around in annoyance, my eyes came to rest on a little girl, jumping up and down with excitement. She held her mother's hand and led the way to a ride. I'd give up everything to be her.

The life I lived [s]was living [/s]was like the merry-go-round I was on. Repetitive cycles that dizzied me. A pitiful, wailing moan rose from my throat, equal to the frustration I felt [s]was feeling[/s]. The ride [s]was[/s] stopped as I was pulled off. I thought [s]idly[/s] on the days before the accident. When I could walk, run, and play.

Overall:

The Good:

Your mastery of language is great! You really pull the readers in with your amazing imagery and description. Also the subject matter induces a lot of curiosity from the reader.

Stuff You Could Work On:

The Grammatical:

Prose: All right, so as you can see toward the end of your story, I struck out a lot of the "was going" types of things. That is because the piece flows much nicer without the was. Don't use the passive voice. Use the past tense, but not the passive voice because the repetition of the word was can get a bit annoying.

Describe it...without using words: Okay, so I don't mean without using words, what I mean, is try and describe things without overloading your readers with adjectives. Here's an example of a sentence you wrote with me taking out all the adjectives
Colors flashed past my eyes as carnival music filled my ears. Isn't that so much more succinct! It flows better as long as you don't overload on the adjectives and adverbs. Your writing is so beautiful without any of those fillers

The Ideas:

Is that...It?: I know you told me it was going to be short, but I didn't think it would be this short. You have the developings of a great story here. You've got suspense! You've got an internal conflict! You've got curiosity about the accident! You've got an interesting character! Why not continue on! In my opinion, this story is just getting started! I could see this being an intro to a much larger and more complex story.

So if I were to evaluate this story as it stands, without believing that you were to continue it, I'd say the following things --> There is no character arc. Your character stays in the same mindset throughout the piece. The piece itself is just one giant metaphor about your character's life. It really doesn't let us get a glimpse as to who this person is inside and what her true feelings etc. are. I want to see how people react to your MC, how your MC interacts with others, I want to feel her frustration. Because this piece is so short and we don't really have time to sympathize with your MC, it's hard to feel much emotion for the character at all. Pretty much she's just asking for pity for her life. I want you to show us why we should care about her. There needs to be some sort of change or there really isn't any point to telling us the story.

Show us a story: Also something to look out for: Showing versus telling. Show us how the main character feels. Your second to last sentence for example was very telling. You don't show us her memories of before the accident. We don't know what she was like before the accident. It's like when a character states "I'm angry" Instead, show us by saying, "My fingernails dug into my palm as heat crept up my neck". Show, show, show!

Suggestions?: Make it much longer! Explore your character and her feelings. Really bring sympathy by showing us who she really is. THis really is a great idea, and you're a great writer! So CONTINUE!

PM me if you have any questions! Good job!

As this is real short, I'll not be overly elaborate.

Hmm....this was slightly sad, if there had been more of it, then i would have felt incredibly bad for this girl.

Fortunately, what you have already made me contemplate my life a little.

I mean, I do have such a brilliant life.

I mean I might be hideously ugly, not very clever and a little tired, but I do have all my senses, full mobility, and I'm not starving,

I think if you really went to town and chaged this into a full peice, then it could work wonders with peoples minds.


I suggest that you begin subtle, as if this girl is perfectly normal and happy, and then, when the reader is happy, satisified and probably very bored, spring the cruel details on them.

I do admire the description though, I just think you could do so much more with his.

I was about to have a flash back. This isn't the end of course, just the intro of the book. I just wanted to see if it worked getting curiosity into the reader.

Well, um... is it going to continue? It seems like a prologue to a story. So if it is then great, but if not you might want to change it. It seems really sad, and what's with the carnival in the background? Is she in the hospital or what? That might need a little bit more clarity. Keep writing!

Read Courtney. She is reflecting on the days she could walk. The accident had happened some time ago. Yes its a prologue.

Actually, I quite like this. Though it's a bit short to actually comment much on... nevertheless, crit I promised, crit I shall.

Bright, tawdry colors flashed past my uncaring eyes as carnival music filled my ears. I could feel my mom's cool hand gently encircled around my arm.

You could expand on the description here, as I didn't realize that she was on a roundabout until later. Describe the colors, how do they make her feel? Sick? Wistful?
You could also pick out objects and faces as they flash past, and explain their effect on the narrator. This will add insight into her nature and outlook.

my eyes came to rest on a little girl,

How? She's on a merry-go-round. She cant move her head to track the girl as she moves.

A pitiful, wailing moan rose from my throat, equal to the frustration I was feeling.

Remove 'pitiful'. It's telling us to pity her, where as if you take it out, we may just pity her by our own choice- much more effective.

Overall, you have a pretty good prologue. It is different, so grabs the attention. Just make sure you show your readers, rather then telling them.
Also, expand, give us some insight on this character. A fair is full of objects and actions that could symbolize how she feels, trigger a thought, or lend an emotion. Make the most of it.

Because it's so short, I don't have a huge amount to say. I enjoyed it, so well done ^^

-Nutty

Thanks for the reviews, I finally edited it.

A few nitpicks at first

Pictures of horses and green meadows whipped by, *comma or semicolon* I didn't have the effort to stare at them. The many colors [s]around me[/s] made my head hurt.

Insert a conjunction in the first sentence or change the comma to a semicolon so that it is a compound sentence instead of a comma splice. In the second sentence, we all ready know that the colors are "around" her, so you do not need to state it again.

I made an effort to close my mouth, but couldn't.

You don't need the comma there. Your subject is still "I", remaining unchanged. Some people prefer a comma, I think it's useless

---

It does sound like a prologue, but it could also stand alone as a short story, "flash fiction". Yes, it is hard to connect with the main character because there are so few words, but since it is a prologue, it is only supposed to draw the reader in, not make them extremely sad over her yet, haha. Let me know when you post the rest; I look forward to it!

Hey Kaylyn!

Looks like you’ve got a great character. From what we’ve seen, he or she’s interesting. You don’t give out their whole life story in one big info dump, but at the same time, we’re not completely clueless.

Not really a whole lot of stuff to point out except for some questions. Nothing really wrong with what you have up except for its size, which is more of a tweak than a writing error.

I’m curious – why are they in wheelchair? What accident? What happened… stuff like that. What’s the back story?.

Echoing others – it’s short, normally want posts to be between 500 and 1500 words. Gives us more to work with as reviewers, and thus gives you more of an idea of what your writing’s like. What you have up here is fine, but definitely wouldn’t make it any shorter.

There’s really only one thing I can point out, and that is that at first, I thought your main character was a kid because of the drool and the plastic horse. The drool can be from any age if they have a disability, but the plastic horses are more reserved for kids, so was thrown a bit when you mentioned high school. I don’t really know what you can do about it, but just thought I’d throw it out there.

Other than that, though, it looks pretty good! Let me know if you post more, yeah? Like I said before, it’s interesting, and you look like you’ve got a strong character, and I’d be interested to find out what happened. Just send a PM my way if you ever post another part.