Open Roads *Prologue*

I was an outcast, that no one cared about, or no one needed, or even both. They were jealous of me. Was it because I was different, because I had powers? I could feel the little sweat beads running down my head onto my chin. My eyes welled up, and it became hard to see the Linden-Burg Orphanage. I hated that place with a fiery passion. I had stayed there for seventeen years, and seventeen years another family passed by my room, leaving me.
Now eighteen I was to old too stay there anymore. I was to become either a staff, or leave.
I left, why should I want to work at the very place that had kept me captive for so long. I sat down on the curb, eating a loaf of bread, crying. What was I doing. I had to be strong, I had to take care of my self. I had powers, I..I could control energy, I could read peoples minds, and I could even control the minds I wanted to. I stood there, dumbfounded, not able to breathe.
All these years, I could have controlled the minds of the people who made me stay at that horrible orphanage. But I didn't. Was It out of ignorance, or was I just to good of a person to do something so sinister? I guess if I could take one thing that I learned from that place and applied it to my life, It was not to be selfish. So I guess I did the right thing, but now was not the time to be thinking of that. However, I couldn't feel sorry for my self. I must leave, and stay strong. I had to live my life!

Hey Jackpot!

This was an interesting prologue, though I'm not usually one for prologues. Prologues are pretty hard to write well, and I'm going to give you some pointers to improve yours.

Paragraphs
With any literary work, paragraphs are important. This prologue is one huge paragrah. Yeah, it's short and a prologue but it still needs to be formatted right. Try breaking things up when the general focus changes from one thing to another.

Action
Right now this is practically devoid of showing action. There are two ways to write about things: show and tell. And no, that's not in preschool when you could bring your favorite toy to school.

Showing is when you write something in a way that shows it to the reader, and telling is writing in a way that just tells something to the reader. Here is a great article that explains it: Show and Tell

Basically I'd like to see some actual action go down here, and continuous action. Every once and a while there is an action mentioned such as the main character sat down on a curb and cried.

Though this brings me to my next topic:
Continuous Stream of Thought
Some of this seems to follow the stream of thought style of writing where a main character is telling the story and one thought flows into the next. Part of this prologue is like that, but part of it isn't. With the scattered action, it breaks that up.

Now either way the prologue would work fine, but the two don't exactly fit together the best way. My suggestion would be to pick one and stick with it through the prologue.

Well that's all I have to say for now, hope I helped! If you have any questions, feel free to PM me!

Good job and keep writing!

-Lauren-

Hey there Jackpot.

I'm actually reading the Prologue after having read the first chapter. Normally, I'm alright with prologues but not this one. It doesn't add anything to the story, and it removes info from the chapter.

You see, if I'd known this before reading the chapter, I would have thought it's because of his powers that he wasn't afraid of anyone, and not because of his size...Just a thought

Tanya

Hello there, JJ!

Here to review.

I, I was an outcast. Not a good starting line... well, a bit okay. No one wanted me, no one cared. It was because I was different. They were jealous of me. Why would they be jealous? Say something like: was it because of his power? or something? I could feel the little sweat beads running/ran down my head onto my chin. My eyes welled up, and it became hard to see the LindenBurg Orphanage. I hated that place with a fiery passion. I had stayed there for 17 years, and 17 (better to use 'seventeen' instread of a number) years another family passed by my room, leaving me. Now 18, I was too old to stay there anymore. I was to become either a staff, or leave. I left, why should I want to work at the very place that had kept me captive for so long. I sat down on the curb, eating a loaf of bread, crying. What was I doing? Try italicizing this part. It would give a good effect on your prologue. I had to be strong, I had to take care of my self. I had powers, I..I could control energy, I could read people's minds, and I could even control the minds I wanted to. I stood there, dumbfounded, not able to breathe. All these years, all these years (unnecessary repetition)I could have controlled the minds of my captures. What captures? people? But I didn't. Was it out of ignorance, or was I just too good of a person to do something so sinister. I guess if I could take one thing that I learned from that place and applied it to my life, it was not to be selfish. So I guess I did the right thing, but now was not the time to be thinking of that. I had a life to live, and a damn good one too! I didn't like the ending line, 'cause you just said he felt being an outcast then he started to say he has this good life.

Okay, I agree with Lauren. One thing that'll make your prologue good is your formatting. It's because if the readers don't see this as representable, they won't be motivated to read this. And what kind of prologue, that has only one paragraph? Cutting or breaking it into two or fewer sentences will make difference and also try italicizing sentence coming from your MC's instincts.

Also, it's like you are just trying to state here his past and his feelings towards the orphanage. There's no action-towards-climax thing, and it should have. Like, how did your MC find out about his power to read minds? What is he going to do now? Something like that.
You should write something more climatic parts in your prologue.

Proofread: You should have proofread this, so lesser mistakes will be seen by the readers.

Overall: This has a potential but just so you need to improve it. Prologue is like a key that opens the reader to know what's in your story, remember.

Hope I helped.

Peace out!

_yuri_

I like the prologue, it's interesting. Now let's review it, 'kay?


I was an outcast, [remove this comma] that no one cared about, or [don't need this] no one needed, or even both. They were jealous of me. Was it because I was different, because I had powers? I could feel the little sweat beads running down my forehead [I'd just add the fore, that's just me] onto my chin. My eyes welled up, and it became hard to see the Linden-Burg Orphanage. I hated that place with a fiery passion. I had stayed there for seventeen years, and seventeen years another family passed by my room, leaving me.
Now, at eighteen years old, [remove]I was to old too stay there anymore. I was to become either a staff, or leave.
I left,[Make that a semicolon] why should I want to work at the very place that had kept me captive for so long. [That's a question, add a question mark!] I sat down on the curb, [Remove this comma] eating a loaf of bread, crying. What was I doing. [Question mark not a period] I had to be strong, I had to take care of myself. I had powers, [Make that comma a dash] I..I could control energy, I could read peoples minds, and I could even control the minds I wanted to. I stood there, dumbfounded, not able to breathe.
All these years, [Don't need this comma] I could have controlled the minds of the people who made me stay at that horrible orphanage. [combine these sentences with a comma] But I didn't. Was it out of ignorance, or was I just to [Wrong form of the word. It's "too"] good of a person to do something so sinister? I guess if I could take one thing that I learned from that place and apply it to my life, it was to not be selfish. So I guess I did the right thing, but now was not the time to be thinking of that. However, I couldn't feel sorry for myself. I must leave, and stay strong. I had to live my life! [Changed around that last bit a little so it made more sense. It's "myself" not "my self".]