Sunny Side Up

Prolouge

I walked into the air- conditioned mall, already smelling the deep- fried corn dogs in the food court. I walked thru the mall, it was loud from the chattering and music, as usual. Its summer 2008 and school is starting in a week; everyone is buying clothes and school supplies, preparing for the new school year; as I was. I hated this place, hated it! When I was five, i got diagnosed with Leukimia, and they were able to cure it. I lived a normal life up until two years ago when I was at the mall... I was shopping in a store and suddenly my throat constricted and my stomach convulsed as a sense of nausea fell over me and i became dizzy, and before you know it, my body was trembling and I was being loaded into an ambulance because my Leukimia had come back. That was when I met Kyle, the day I got admitted to the hospital, or the day that a healthy life became more than just a dream...

This prologue was extremely short. There was very little detail. There was very little information at all. Where are the characters? When does this happen? Who are they? How old are they? What do they look like? What are their interests? What makes us want to read the actual story? This was quite boring to read because it sounded like a very short summary of... well... nothing. Start out with a hook for the reader. "It was the end of summer..." does not make me want read on. And then you need to tell us something interesting. Otherwise this sounds extremely cliché and very, very boring.

Things to fix:

KG_gibbs wrote:Prolouge

It was the end of summer. School was starting in a week; everyone was buying clothes and school supplies, bracing for the new year. I, for one, didn't want summer to end...NEVER. Try to avoid all caps. This is also an awkward way to end the sentence. Try to reword this. I was absolutely in love with the best man alive, his name is Kyle. Also, very awkward sentence. Maybe make this two sentences or reword the first part.He may not have the best looks, but he is very funny. I met him in a hospital room. And that is where my life became more than just a dream...Take out the "and" at the beginning.

This is quite a short prologue, i would advise adding more to it, but still a good start! Just a few things i think could be improved:

bracing for the new year

to me this just didn't sound quite right, bracing themselves for the newyear or preparing for the newyear might seem more at place in the sentence.

I was absolutely in love with the best man alive, his name is Kyle

perhaps missing out his name and replacing with ; and absolutely dosen't seem to fit, 'head over heels', 'completely' or 'perfectly' might be better replacements :
'I was completely in love with the best man alive; Kyle.'

but he is very funny.

perhaps 'his humour more than makes up for it' or his personality.

I think your on the way to a good start, with a few alterations the text would make for a nice begginning to a romance hope to hear more of your work!

Remember those defining details that characterize your entire plot, and keep it up l It will turn out if you don't abandon it!

KG_gibbs wrote:Prolouge

I am 17, and too beautiful for my age, my name is Kaylie. Its summer 2008 and school is starting in a week; everyone was buying clothes and school supplies, preparing for the new year. I for one never wanted summer to end...Never. I was absolutely in love with the best man alive; Kyle, he's 17. He may not have the best looks, but his personality makes up for it. I met him in a hospital room. That is where my life became more than just a dream...

KG_gibbs wrote:Prolouge

I walked into the air- conditioned mall, already smelling the deep- fried corn dogs from outside. The mall was loud, as usual. Its summer 2008 and school is starting in a week; everyone was buying clothes and school supplies, preparing for the new year. Im 17 and I was absolutely in love with the best man alive; Kyle, he's 17 also. He may not have the best looks, but his personality makes up for it. My name is Kaylie and I met Kyle in a hospital room. That was the day when my life became more than just a dream...

-You switched tenses a few times in here. At first you said she 'walked' the you said 'its the summer' Keep the tenses the same, otherwise you'll confuse the reader.
-she would have smelled the corn dogs before she walked into the mall? yes? because you said the corn dogs where outside?
-loud? why? people chattering? loud music playing?
-

I for one never wanted summer to end...Never.

--I, for one, never wanted summer to end...never. I wouldn't put the "...never" in there. I'd take it right out. Have you ever met one person that actually wanted to go back to school? I havent.
-write out seventeen...both times.
-you switched tenses again with 'My name is Kaylie...'
-Why was her life a dream?
-Why was she at the mall in the first place?


There was a lot of info dumping here and not enough detail. You went from talking about smelly corndogs and loud malls, to some kid named Kyle. And f.y.i...if shes madly in love ith him, then he should be handsome in her eyes? yes?

Well, even though this is only a prologe, it was short and needed more detail. I think if you revise, you can make it into a really good story.

Hope I helped a little. Good Luck!

KG_gibbs wrote:Prologue

I walked into the air-conditioned mall, already smelling the deep-fried corn dogs in the food court.1 I walked thru the mall, it was loud from the chattering and music, as usual. 2Its summer 2008 and school is starting in a week; everyone is buying clothes and school supplies, preparing for the new school year; as I was. I hated this place, hated it! When I was five, 3i got diagnosed with Leukimia, and they were able to cure it. I lived a normal life up until two years ago when I was at the mall... 4 I was shopping in a store and suddenly my throat constricted and my stomach convulsed as a sense of nausea fell over me and i became dizzy5, and before you know it, my body was trembling and I was being loaded into an ambulance because my Leukimia had come back. That was when I met Kyle, the day I got admitted to the hospital, or the day that a healthy life became more than just a dream...

1. Consider : "The chattering and music blared loudly as I walked through the mall." I'm not the best example, but it's pretty unsettling to see two sentences in a row starting almost the same way.

2. "It was the summer of 2008, and school was to start in a week. Everyone around me was shopping for clothes and school supplies in preparation of the new school year, as was I." Break it down!

3. "When I was five, I got diagnosed with leukaemia. Fortunately, they were able to cure me." Leukaemia.

4. Do get rid of that ellipse. Period instead. Since you already said you were in the mall, you don't need to say how you were in the shop, unless you want to give a nice detailed description. In fact, I think you should get rid of the "when I was at the mall" instead. Gah. Um, "My life was pretty much normal for some [insert number here] years, up until that incident, smack dab in the middle of my shopping.
My throat constricted and my stomach convulsed as a sudden sense of nausea consumed me. Colours dancing before my eyes, I felt dizzy.
The next thing I knew, I was in an ambulance, my body trembling where I lay. My leukaemia was back."
That's probably how I would write it, but you are under no obligation to follow my over-descriptive style of writing.

It just occured to me that I probably would've written it very differently. Maybe it's because of that, but I think you should add a helluva lot more description - let us picture it! Kind of like,
"I walked into the air-conditioned mall, already smelling the deep-fried corn dogs in the food court. It was packed with people doing their last-minute shopping. The nondescript walls of faint grey supported a group of teenagers, chatting and gossiping as they bit their cotton candy in strips. I turned and noticed a middle-aged lady towing her young son, who looked no more than seven, into a stationery store. Yes, it was that time of the year again. Summer. ..."

Something like that. Only put it in your style.

Hope I helped!

Cheers,
Lily.

I walked into the air- conditioned mall, already smelling the deep- fried corn dogs in the food court. I walked thru through the mall, it was loud from the chattering and music, as usual. Its it's should have an apostrophe as it signifies it is. summer 2008 and school is starting in a week; everyone is buying clothes You've changed tenses here and school supplies, preparing for the new school year; as I was. I hated this place, hated it! When I was five, i got diagnosed with Leukimia, and they were able to cure it. I lived a normal life up until two years ago when I was at the mall... I was shopping in a store and suddenly my throat constricted and my stomach convulsed as a sense of nausea fell over me and i became dizzy, and before you know it, my body was trembling and I was being loaded into an ambulance because my Leukimia had come back. That was when I met Kyle, the day I got admitted to the hospital, or the day that a healthy life became more than just a dream...

Right, I'm going to be honest here. I didn't like this at all. It was extremely cliched, the tenses changed, you didn't use the right grammar and you didn't even use the right spelling. You really need to work on your grammar, otherwise no one's going to even bother reading your stuff. Now, let's see:

Your tenses change a lot, and it's very confusing. You'll have to fix that alone because I can't tell what you mean.

Right, you need imagery:


Emotive Language
You need core emotion. Raw emotion that you are feeling. Otherwise there is no point in us reading it. See, you don't have any in this. None at all.

Empathise
Your MC has leukemia <that's the correct spelling, not the way you spelt it. but we don't really care. 'Kay that sounds a bit sad, but it's true. You don't give us anything to empathise with. You don't tell us about your character, other than that she is in the 'mall' buying things. You don't tell us how she felt or anything. Therefore we've got nothing to empathise with, and we don't care about her. Now, you haven't given her any qualities that would make us not want to empathise with her, you've just not given her any at all. So there's really no excuse for us not to like her, other than your lack of information/ knowledge of your own character. In a story like this we really need to empathise, otherwise we'll just put the book down.

Avoid Cliches
'Kay, you need to avoid those cliches! We don't want to read something that thousands of people have already said. You need to have your own style. Avoid them!

Interest us
Just now this story is boring. Yep, that was very blatant, but it was true. You need to have a good plot, good characters etc etc to interest us. Otherwise we'll just stop reading . To begin with, before you submit anything here you should spell check it, or we'll tear it apart *we can be evil* *grins* naa, I'm kidding, but seriously make sure you check your basic grammar. We want to understand the piece!

imagery
Use it. Use figurative language and interesting expressions. Make sure you use it, otherwise I shall be bored stiff.

So, good luck on this piece if you choose to pursue it, if you have any questions don't hesitate to PM me. xD


~Kirsten
xxx

Hey, KG! Hopefully I am of some help to you today =]

Red is for words that you need to add or ones I fixed
Bold is all my comments and concerns
[s]strikethrough[/s] is what it is
Bold and Italics are examples

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I walked into the air- conditioned mall, already smelling the deep- fried corn dogs in the food court. I walked [s]thru[/s] through the mall, it was loud from the chattering and music, as usual. Its summer 2008 and school is starting in a week; everyone is buying clothes and school supplies, preparing for the new school year; as I was. I hated this place, hated it! Start new paragraph here. When I was five, [s]i[/s] I got diagnosed with Leukimia, and they were able to cure it. I lived a normal life up until two years ago when I was at the mall... I was shopping in a store and suddenly my throat constricted and my stomach convulsed as a sense of nausea fell over me and [s]i[/s] I became dizzy, and before you know it, my body was trembling and I was being loaded into an ambulance because my Leukimia had come back. Whoa! This is a super long sentence. Maybe try it like: I was shopping in a store and suddenly my throat ocnstricted and my stomach convulsed as a sense of nausea fell over me. I became dizzy, the world started spinning, and before I could blink, I was being loaded into an ambulance. My Leukimia had returned. This makes a bigger impact on the reader like this, but of course, you can do it anyway you like ^_^ That was when I met Kyle, the day I got admitted to the hospital, [s]or[/s] the the day that a healthy life became more than just a dream...

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Wow, this was a really good start, but way too short for me. You have a good plot line going, you just need to make it more real by adding detail and supporting plot lines. This sounded more like a memory or a diary entry at the beginning of a chapter than an actually prologue. This could even be the back of a book summary. But not a starter. Way too short for that. Lengthen it up and you'll do fine

If you have any further questions, just let me know!