Where do I find a Green Rose? A Prologue

Cars and several people crowded Seventh Avenue. Sam and Janna, walked across the busy street looking for a place. They noticed both street vendors and passersby sheltering themselves with umbrellas, as the thunderclouds covered the sky. There was a small coffee shop named Couffles few steps away from where they were. It was one of the most popular coffee shops in town, and it was always jam-packed. The sign outside the store caught Sam's attention. The sign read, Try our new Cold Summer Coffee!, offering the shop's newest best-seller coffee. They headed to the shop and went inside. Mellow music surrounded the cozy place. Sam looked around to spot an empty table where they could sit.

"Oh, I think we can stay here", he told her.

The boy pulled out the chair and offered it to her, waiting until she grabbed it.

"Thank you," she said.

They both sat down and there was silence for a while.

"Uhmm...s-s-o wha-a-t are your plans fo-r the rest of the vacation?", the boy asked in his stuttering voice.

"Spend more time with my friends here and prepare for the enrollment, I think", she said with a smile.

The boy breathed deeply; it seemed like he was trying to say something, but he was stopped by her smile, her simple yet meaningful smile.

"How about you?", she asked.

The boy could not look straight on her face,

Ahh...yeah. I mean me too... and-" he paused.

(REVIEWS included.)

Hello there and welcome to YWS!
Alright, now I read your piece and I think that your grammar needs a lot of work. I am guessing that English is not your first language. So, I made some adjustments to your first paragraph which needs some work,

You wrote

The traffic is quite heavy, a bunch of people walking down the street. This is a gloomy afternoon, a rain might come down in a while. Sam and Janna is looking for a place where they can stay as they walk across the busy street. Two blocks from where they are is a small coffee shop named Couffles. It is one of the most popular coffee shops in town, that is why it is always full. The sign outside the store caught Sam's attention. It says, "Try our new Cold Summer Coffee!", offering the shop's newest best-seller coffee. They headed to the shop and went inside. Mellow music surrounds the cozy place. Sam looks around finding an available table where they can stay.

This is how I would write it,

The traffic was quite heavy. A lot of people were walking down the street. It was a gloomy afternoon, and it looked like it was about to rain. Sam and Janna were looking for a place where they could sit as they walked across the busy street. There was a small coffee shop named Couffles two blocks from where they were. It was one of the most popular coffee shops in town, which is why it was always full. The sign outside the store caught Sam's attention. The sign read, Try our new Cold Summer Coffee!, offering the shop's newest best-seller coffee. They headed to the shop and went inside. Mellow music surrounded the cozy place. Sam looked around to spot an empty table where they could sit.

The words in colour are the corrections I made. The rest of the piece also needs some work. I also think your work needs some suspense, you know, something to keep the reader glued to your story.
My strong suggestion to you is that you read as many texts as you can and also keep on writing to practice and get familiar and improve your grammar.
I hope I helped a little
PM me for any questions or anything.
Ziggie

Hi, Jemo! I saw your story on home page and I liked the title, so I started reading it. I said to myself "This rocks!" then I realized his author was iamjemo and I started laughing!

The traffic is quite heavy, a bunch of people walking down the street. This is a gloomy afternoon, a rain might come down in a while. Sam and Janna are looking for a place where they can stay as they walk across the busy street. Two blocks from where they are is a small coffee shop named Couffles. It is one of the most popular coffee shops in town, that is why it is always full. The sign outside the store caught Sam's attention. It says, "Try our new Cold Summer Coffee!", offering the shop's newest best-seller coffee. They headed to the shop and went inside. Mellow music surrounds the cozy place. Sam looks around finding an available table where they can stay.

"Oh, I think we can stay here", he told her.

The boy pulled the chair and offered it to her, waiting until she grab it. I like this part! LOL

"Thank you.", she said.

"Whew.. Am I really dating with her or what? So what now, Sam", he asked himself.

They both sat down and there was silence for a while.

"Uhmm.. So what are your plans for the rest of the vacation?", the boy asked with his stuttering voice.

"Spend more time with my friends here and prepare for the enrolment enrollment, I think", she said with a smile.

The boy breathed deeply; seems like trying to say something. But, he was stopped by her smile, her simple yet meaningful smile.

"How about you?", she asked.

The boy sneaked a sight of her face and answered with his eyes looking somewhere else,

"Ahh.. Yeah. I mean, with my friends also.. And..", he paused.

Awww, it's so sweet, in the Chapter II of my story "Unfortunately... I love you" the main characters had a conversation like this. I love it, so keep it on!

Hey,
I loved this conversation it was a great way to start off the story. The adverbs you used really helped the words flow, and you did a great job at creating your setting. Even though it was short you still managed to characterize the characters with your choice of words.

Though this sentence seems a little off to me.

iamjemo wrote:"Whew.. Am I really dating with her or what? So what now, Sam", he asked himself.

Maybe you could change some of the words?

"Uhmm.. So what are your plans for the rest of the vacation?", the boy asked with his stuttering voice.

Try "In his stuttering voice" instead of with because that makes it sound like he is always stuttering.

The boy breathed deeply; seems like trying to say something. But, he was stopped by her smile, her simple yet meaningful smile.

I love this sentence. You just missed a word.

"Ahh.. Yeah. I mean, with my friends also.. And..", he paused.

This definitely leaves the reader hanging.

I hope this helps. Keep it up!

Hi there! Here to review! First off, I love it! It catches my attention in some unknown way. But its very very good. Second, in the first paragraph, it sounds like you're making a list. You said:

The traffic was quite heavy. A lot of people were walking down the street. It was a gloomy afternoon, and it looked like it was about to rain. Sam and Janna were looking for a place where they could sit as they walked across the busy street. There was a small coffee shop named Couffles two blocks from where they were. It was one of the most popular coffee shops in town, which is why it was always full. The sign outside the store caught Sam's attention. The sign read, Try our new Cold Summer Coffee!, offering the shop's newest best-seller coffee. They headed to the shop and went inside. Mellow music surrounded the cozy place. Sam looked around to spot an empty table where they could sit.

The first part captures my attention the most. It's like you put a short piece of it in, then a period. Then another piece, then a period. Describe it more. Not simply "A lot of people were walking down the street." Say it like you're describing what a beautiful piece of clothing looks like. Say, "They noticed several people along the sidewalk, sheltering themselves with newspapers and umbrellas, from the rain that had picked up."

I know I'm not the best writer in the world, and maybe not even the best person to be giving pointers, but try to describe things more. Use plenty of detail. You don't have to go as far as what the little blades of grass growing in the cracks on the sidewalk looked like, but try to be very descriptive. You could always go back and take a piece out if you don't like it.

I love it! Make sure you spell ALL of your word correctly, and use good grammar! If you use first person in one paragraph, try to use it throughout the chapter as well! It's confusing when you skip around with points of view all in one little chapter. Not saying that it isn't good, but it complicates it for the reader. I noticed you didn't do that, and you stuck with 3rd person.

Another thing, you only say "The boy" and you don't use his name. Is that for a reason, or just because you didn't notice you were doing it? Same with "The girl".

One part I didn't understand to well:

The boy breathed deeply; seems like trying to say something.

Did you mean "Seeming like he was trying to say something" or were you changing from past to present? That's another thing you have to watch. It's easy to change it on yourself in the middle of a story. But make sure you check yourself. If you do it in past style, keep it did not do unless its in a quote, had not has unless in a quote, and smiled not smiles unless in a quote. That's just to name a few.

All together, I love it so much! And I'm off to read the next part! Any questions on my review, don't hesitate! Even the best of people, not saying that I am, mess up! That's the only way to make it better. "A fail isn't a fail, it's just another way not to do it."

Thank you,

~Tabitha~

I am here to review like you asked. Before I start I have to tell you if I repeat something someone else already said I am sorry, but I don't have time to read all the other comments.

red - the subject of all other colors. (unless at the very end of a paragraph then I am talking about that)
blue - general comment
pink - grammar
bold - things I like.

iamjemo wrote:The traffic was quite heavy. A lot of people were walking down the street. It was a gloomy afternoon, and it looked like it was about to rain. Instead of telling the people "It looked like it was about to rain" show them: dark thunderclouds blocked out the sun, and the humid air hung to the peoples clothes. Sam and Janna were looking for a place where take this out. they could sit as they walked across the busy street. If they are looking for a place to sit why are they walking across the street. Wouldn't they be walking on the sidewalk looking at different shops? There was a small coffee shop named Couffles two blocks from where they were. How could a sign catch Sam's (like you say later ) attention if they were two blocks away from the store? It was one of the most popular coffee shops in town, which is why it was I don't think you need to explain to people that it is always full because it is popular. We aren't that dumb. A better way to phrase this is: It was one of the most popular coffee shops in town, and it was always jam-packed. always full. The sign outside the store caught Sam's attention. The sign read, Try our new Cold Summer Coffee!, offering the shop's newest best-seller coffee. They headed to the shop and went inside. Mellow music surrounded the cozy place. Sam looked around to spot an empty table where they could sit. Hmm this first paragraph is choppy. There is a lot of short sentences. You need sentences of different lengths.

"Oh, I think we can stay here", he told her.

The boy pulled the chair and offered it to her, waiting until she grabbedadd it.

"Thank you.", she said.

They both sat down and there was silence for a while.

"Uhmm.. So what are your plans for the rest of the vacation?", the boy asked in his stuttering voice. When you say stuttering voice I think of s-s-o -wha-at .... say anything but that.

"Spend more time with my friends here and prepare for the enrollment, I think", she said with a smile.

The boy breathed deeply; seems like trying to say something. But, he was stopped by her smile, her simple yet meaningful smile.

"How about you?", she asked.

The boy sneaked a sight of her face and answered with his eyes looking somewhere else, (I would like to know what he is looking at.)

"Ahh.. Yeah. I mean, with my friends also.. And..", he paused.I like this it made me laugh

So, overall this is great, though as a prologue it didn't tell much about what the story was going to be like.

Hope I helped,

A. S.

Hey there jemo! I'm here to revie like you asked. All of my comments and corrections will be in pink.

The traffic was quite heavy. A lot of people were walking down the street. It was a gloomy afternoon, and it looked like it was about to rain. Sam and Janna were looking for a place where they could sit as they walked across the busy street. There was a small coffee shop named Couffles two blocks from where they were. It was one of the most popular coffee shops in town, which is why it was always full. The sign outside the store caught Sam's attention. The sign read, Try our new Cold Summer Coffee!, offering the shop's newest best-seller coffee. They headed to the shop and went inside. Mellow music surrounded the cozy place. Sam looked around to spot an empty table where they could sit. This paragraph is extremely boring. As a beginning paragraph it should grab my attention especially since it's a prologue. It is all telling and what you probably wanted to be interesting description is just dragging. I don't really care about these things as a reader if they aren't presented to me in an interesting way. I'm not going to tell you how to do description, but remember that 'be' verbs are quite bland when they are repeated over and over. Also, simple sentences become repetitive quickly. Remember that when you describe things that you want to appeal to all five senses.

"Oh, I think we can stay here," he told her.

The boy pulled out the chair and offered it to her, waiting until she grab it.

"Thank you," she said.

They both sat down and there was silence for a while.

"Uhmm...so what are your plans for the rest of the vacation?" the boy asked in his stuttering voice. By the way he speaks, it doesn't seem like he would stutter. Probably because it's not written out phonetically, but that's your call. If you were to put it in the sentence, then you could take out the dialogue tag.

"Spend more time with my friends here and prepare for the enrollment, I think," she said with a smile.

The boy breathed deeply; it seemed like he was trying to say something, but, he was stopped by her smile. Her simple yet meaningful smile.

"How about you?" she asked.

The boy sneaked a sight of her face and answered with his eyes looking somewhere else. [b]I think that just ruined it for me. First of all, why would he need to sneak a look at her face if they're sitting face to face in a coffee shop, and second that's just ugh.

"Ahh...yeah. I mean me too... and-" he paused.

All in all,
There's nothing that happened here. All they did was sit in a coffee shop and talk. I don't know how this is even considered a chapter of anything. Nothing happened. And in all honesty, it was boring and pointless. Anyway, you seemed to need some help on dialogue tags, so here's a link that should help you out. Also, are the '...' things supposed to be him stuttering or him hesitating? Because it's really unclear to me as to what it is. See you in the next part. Dialogue Punctuation Help.

PM me if you have any questions. Keep writing!

Always,
~Danie.

Heya
Here to review as requested!

The traffic was quite heavy. A lot of people were walking down the street. It was a gloomy afternoon, and it looked like it was about to rain.

I didn't really like this as an opening to your prologue. The opening lines of a story are actually very important, believe it or not. If you have good opening lines, they will draw your readers in, instantly making them want to read on. That is something that you always want to achieve when writing a story. The problem that I found with these lines as the fact that you seemed to be telling and not showing. You said that the traffic was heavy, there were a lot of people and the weather was gloomy. Don't tell us all of these things though; show us. You also don't need the comma that I highlighted in red.

The sign read, Try our new Cold Summer Coffee!, offering the shop's newest best-seller coffee.

I thought that this would look better in italics.

The boy breathed deeply; it seemed like he was trying to say something, but he was stopped by her smile, her simple yet meaningful smile.

Overall

I have to say, this wasn't the best prologue I've ever read. It wasn't bad, I just think that it could have been better! Because this isn't the longest piece, I can't really critique it very well. I will try my best though! Plus, you've already got some pretty nice critiques here and I don't want to repeat what has already been mentioned. Although there were things that you could definitely improve on, there were some pluses to this. Your grammar, for example, was very good most of the time. Your dialogue punctuation was really good, unlike me who cannot use dialogue punctuation to save my life. Your spelling was also really good, so well done for that! I think that the main problem with this piece is what happens combined with the length of it. This prologue is about two people who go into a shop and begin a conversation. I just think that you could have written it more detailed, therefore making it longer. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with short pieces. I juts believe that this piece would be better if it were longer and more detailed.

That's my main critique, really. I find that this needs to be a bit more descriptive. Although prologues are meant to be short and rather vague, I found that this one was a bit too vague and you didn't really have enough details. What I said on the beginning is a good example of this. You mentioned the fact that there was heavy traffic, lots of people and you said that the weather was gloomy. That's the problem though, you told us these things! What you really needed to do was show us, not tell us. For example, was the sky so dark, it was as though it was night time? Where the clouds blocking the sunlight, hiding its warmth and pleasantness? Were there drivers shouting and cursing at each other through their car windows? Where they all beeping their horns impatiently? What kind of people where walking by? Was there an elderly lady? Was there a mother? Any strange people? Any kids crying and shouting at their mothers? You need to set the atmosphere for us readers. For example, what sounds better?

I looked at the beach. The waves were hitting the rocks of the shore. There weren't any other people around, just Jeff and me. The sky was dark and there were loads of cloud in it.

Or

I stared coldly at the isolated beach. Thanks to the grey sky, the normally yellow sand no longer looked yellow. It was plain and colourless. As the smell of sea salt circled the air around me, I sighed. Stepping onto the cold, hard pebbles, Jeff and I headed towards the sand. As my feet touched the sand, I turned my attention to the angry water in front of me. The waves were violently crashing against the shore, it was as though it was devouring the land. A horrible silence surrounded us, it was more than awkward.

The second one was better, right? What I did there was show what was happening, how my character was feeling and the atmosphere. I didn't simply say that the sky was dark and everything was depressing, I showed how it was dark and depressing. I also included more than one sense. I included the fact that everything was silent, the smell of sea water was in the air, that the pebbles were hard, and I also described everything that was to be seen.

Overall, this definitely does have potential, in my opinion. All that you need to do is to take into consideration what us reviewers have said and edit this a bit. If you do that, you will definitely be able to have a really good piece of writing here!

Keep writing,

xoxo Skins