Huntress(rewrite)~2

2
Josephine

Janelle takes us to her office. We sit in huge leather armchairs and stare at her.
“Girls, do you believe in the old legends?” Bronwyn nods and I shrug. Our school is based on the olden legends, fables and fairytales about vampires and vampire hunters.
“We are learning about them in Lit class.” Bronwyn says. Her gold eyes are wide. I can tell she’s scared. I start to jiggle a leg.
“So you know them?” Janelle asks.
“Yes, Headmistress.” Bronwyn says. I nod again. Janelle sits in front of her desk, making sure her skirt doesn’t wrinkle.
“Well, my girls, I have a new place for you.” Janelle says. She rolls her chair to open the windows. The sunlight plays over Bronwyn’s face. It illuminates her black hair, with deep red undertones. We exchange scared looks.
“Oh, Relax. Josephine your parents want you to switch schools. Bronwyn, this school offers more.” Janelle says. We exchange another look. I discreetly shake my head.
“Why?” I ask. Janelle looks at me.
“Your destiny is too great for this school.” Janelle says. Bronwyn opens and closes her mouth several times.
“What school?” She asks. I can see the fear in her eyes
“Adams.” Janelle says. Bronwyn burries her face in her hands. Adams Academy for the Hunters, or ‘Adams’ is the school Bronwyn’s mother is headmistress at. Plus, the students there hate our school.
“Go and pack, please.” Janelle says. She turns to her Mac book, her way of dismissing us. Bronwyn is already by the door. I get out of my chair and walk through the door.
“Adams.” Bronwyn says. Her voice is shaky, “Why Adams.” She unlocks the door to our room, just down the hall from Janelle’s office. We begin to pull out clothes and Bronwyn pulls her Coach suitcases from under her bed. Then she breaks down. She hurls herself onto the bed and starts to throw a full-out temper tantrum.
“Why? Why? WHY?” Her voice grows louder with each phrase. She’s pounding her bed with fists.
“WYN!” I yell. “We HAVE to keep it together!” Bronwyn stops and sits up. If she was crying, I can’t tell now. We were always taught by our professors’ not to show emotion. Bronwyn was always good at masking what she was really feeling. We both resume packing, keeping our resolve.
A polite knock rings through the silence. We both look up.
“Come in.” I call. Megan steps in and whips out a measuring tape. We stare at her.
“What are you doing?” I ask slowly. Megan flicks a look at me and looks back at her measuring.
“This is my room now, so hurry up and pack your crap.” I watch Bronwyn change. She looks angry. Her creamy skin turns to a highlighter pink color and her gold eyes darken. She’s my best friend and I feel scared. I take a step back.
Robotically, Bronwyn grabs her whip from where it’s curled around her bedpost.
“Get. Out.” She says. It’s not Bronwyn’s voice. It’s harsh and cold. I can practically feel the ice in her voice. Megan takes a step backwards.
“That’s right.” The scary Bronwyn voice says, “Leave, you hateful little girl.” Megan eyes go as wide as saucers She turns on her heel and flees. Bronwyn snaps out of her scary phase. She resumes packing like nothing ever happened.
“Bronwyn?” I ask. She looks at me, “What was that?” I ask. She sadly shakes her head.
“I have no clue.” She sighs. The tears are back but she doesn’t cry. Bronwyn Marks doesn’t cry. I put my iPod on its dock and Blast my Marianas Trench album. Slowly, she starts to smile. She start to pack again with only the occasional outburst of bad singing.

We were done in under two hours. We drag our cases down the stairs and into the great hall. We have both changed into skinny jeans and tee-shirts for travel. Janelle is standing there with a man. He’s tall, not under five foot, and wearing a long black trench coat. I raise an eyebrow. Ugly, much?
“Girls,” Janelle says, snapping me back to reality, “this is Jonathan. He is going to drive you to Adams.” He gives a slight wave. Bronwyn gives a slight nod back. Janelle hugs us both.
“Good luck you two.” She says quietly. “Make me proud.” She lets us go and we exit the school for the last time.

I really liked this! I couldn't find anygrammatic errors (which is a first) lol. I really like Bronwyn: she's awesome There is abviously something wrong with her, or possesing her, aka scary Bronwyn. You have a way of making the readers feel like they know her. However, I don't feel like I know the main character, or narrator very well. Again, really well written. Loved it.

Me again! Hope you don't mind.

Firstly, I don't necessarily suggest you switch Points of View for each chapter. That tends to get confusing for the reading, and just gives you more work. If you stick with one perspective and one narrator, then you can develop their tone of voice and really get into their head to understand the character. When you use multiple first person, POVs, you have to develop the tone for ALL those characters, and make sure their perspectives are distinctive and unique.

Plus, it's harder for the readers to follow whose head their in. Just food for thought, mkay?

“Oh, Relax. Josephine your parents want you to switch schools. Bronwyn, this school offers more.” Janelle says. We exchange another look. I discreetly shake my head.

Why is Relax capitalized? It's not a proper noun, or the first word in the sentence.

Also, this confused me. I thought, when she said "this school" that she was referring to the one they were already in, and that Josephine would be transferring but not Bronwyn. That left me confused for the rest of the chapter. I was wondering why Bronwyn was packing, what exactly was going on, etc. So clear this up that they're both leaving.

Next, I don't know which story the previous reviewer was reading, but there really are quite a few grammatical errors. Mainly, read this tutorial on dialogue punctuation by Demeter. You're putting periods where there need to be commas, like right here:

“We are learning about them in Lit class.” Bronwyn says.

So check out that little article! It should clear some things up. Another example:

“Adams.” Bronwyn says. Her voice is shaky, “Why Adams.”

Should be: "Adams," Bronwyn says. Her voice is shaky. "Why Adams?"

If you proofread, this stuff can be easily fixed, so I'm not too worried about it.

Next issue is character voice, which ties into the first thing I said about POV. We get absolutely nothing from Josephine's first person narrative. I have no idea of who she is as a person, and this really defeats the purpose of first person. Really, neither of the girls (Bronwyn or Josephine) react at all. We get a couple of sentence of "Dang, why Adams?" and then a six-year-old temper tantrum. This isn't really a realistic reaction. These are teenage girls, right? They're bound to be confused, and scared, and the temper tantrum is a bit juvenile.

Try, instead, to show Josephine's reaction through her narrative. Have her describe to the reader how it feels like the breath is knocked out of her, and she's feeling light headed, and her mind is racing about why her parents would possible ask for the switch. Have her observe that Bronwyn is getting angry and crying, but maybe avoid the kicking and screaming.

Here's another tutorial, this one for character development. Making your character distinct will make your story rounded and believable.

Best of luck, and keep writing! The biggest things you need to work on are making us care about these characters, and to do that, you need to have these characters react. Use description, emotion, dialogue-- anything to bring us deeper into your story, because right now it's like there's a sheet of glass in the way of what could otherwise be an interesting story.

~Evi