Dark Secrets [Prologue + Chapter 1]

Prologue

In a world where Prada, Gucci, and Chanel reign, how can you expect to be different or abstract?

How can you be an individual in a town that shuns differences?

For four girls in Pennsylvania, however, being different is almost too easy.

Chapter 1

Sunlight streamed through Sophia Maher’s window. She squinted against it, struggling to glance at the photograph on her desk. Held in a square, purple frame was a picture of Sophia with her three best friends – Alexis DuLac, Mackenzie Peters and Peyton Hale.

Sophia held back tears as she studied the girls’ smiling faces. She still wonders why they even thought about smiling because it was the first photo taken of them after their other best friend, Isabelle Evans went missing.

Swallowing hard, Sophia tore her gaze from the picture. She had to stop thinking about Isabelle’s disappearance, the police were working as hard as they could to try and find her. Sophia didn’t have anything to worry about, because she knew Isabelle’s case was in the hands of the authorities.

Sophia slung her black Prada tote over her shoulder and headed downstairs. Seconds after stepping into the grey-tiled kitchen, she could feel something was wrong. The usual scent of coffee wasn’t lingering in the air, and her mother hadn’t left for work yet.

“Hi Mom,” Sophia greeted her.

“Good morning, Sophia,” Katherine Maher replied, pressing the heels of her hands into the granite countertop.

“What’s wrong?”

“Everything’s fine. I was watching the news again and couldn’t bear seeing Isabelle’s picture, you and her were so close. It just… freaked me out a bit. I’ll be going in a minute.” Katherine explained, concern flashing in her eyes.

“Okay. Bye, Mom.” Sophia called as her mother hurried out of the kitchen.

Sophia grabbed a blueberry muffin from the counter and whirled out the door. She sank into her Corvette’s leather interior, inhaling its scent. Worry clawed through her stomach.

Shaking her head, she slammed the car into DRIVE and stomped on the gas pedal.

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Sophia stepped out of her car and locked it. She inhaled deeply before walking up the stone walkway to the school. She glanced at the red-bricked building as she strode into the school.

She steeled herself as she entered the building. People stared, they whispered and gossiped, they pointed at her – obviously in awe because of Isabelle. She got sick of it sometimes, Isabelle went missing two months ago, wasn’t it time to get over it already?

Oblivious to the chattering, she stepped up to her locker and quickly unlocked it.

A folded strip of pink paper was wedged between her Chemistry and History books. Curious, Sophia reached for it. It was thick and stiff, like it was written on expensive paper.

She unfolded it and read it. Her mouth dropped.

Hey Sophia,

Miss me? Trying to forget about me? Well, I’m not too far behind. Be a good girl now, because if your not – you’ll pay. Or, if you say, want the world to know about your skin-opening habit…
I can help you out with that.

- I

Color flooded Sophia’s cheeks. She swallowed hard and pushed the paper back into her locker.

Was Isabelle here? Why won’t she come home?

Sophia shook her head and trudged into her English classroom, wondering if any of her friends have gotten creepy messages.

She shuffled down one of the desk-lined aisles to her desk. She sank down in it and threw her bag to the floor.

“Hey… What’s the matter, Sophia?” Peyton Hale asked.

Sophia looked up. Peyton was sitting across from her, twirling her corn-yellow hair.

“Uh, listen, I’ll tell you about it later. Meet me in the cafeteria during lunch.”

“Okay… Are you okay?” Peyton questioned.

“Yes… no… I don’t know.” Sophia replied, dazed.

Before Peyton could speak, their English teacher walked in the room. The class’ attention focused on the teacher.

“Take out your novels and copy these notes from the board.” The teacher, Mrs. Genevieve ordered, turning to the white board.

Shuffling and mumbling circled the room. Patricia Genevieve was the strictest teacher in the school. She squawked at anyone who was late and gave detentions for every little thing.

Mrs. Genevieve began writing swirling cursive across the board. Peyton craned her neck to see over the greasy-haired boy in front of her.

Suddenly, her cell phone vibrated. She snuck it out of her bag and opened it. ONE NEW TEXT MESSAGE the screen flashed.

Peyton,

How’s English going? It’s boring, isn’t it? If you want more excitement, just say the word.
I’ll help you out, by revealing your secret to the entire class.
Being anorexic is kind of annoying, right? Oh well, I know you’ll find a way to keep it hidden… unless my tongue slips.
And you know that I’m not very good at keeping secrets…

Cheers!
- I

Peyton blushed and slid her phone into her pocket. The only person she’d told was Isabelle… and she was missing
.
Confusion swam through her as she turned her attention back to English class.

Hey RedRaven!

I've read this through and have a few suggestions for you to try out and some comments/questions for your pondering.

One of those questions is, why Peyton and Sophia aren't very shocked when they get those messages? Something like that would probably be really distressing, especially if it's signed "I." That "I" plus the secrets in the message must lead the two to some suspicious--but of course they'd be horrified, too!

And maybe spurred into wondering about whether Isabelle's alive and safe, and why she's sending such mean-spirited notes.

I think if you add in some of this, you'll help the reader get a better grasp of the plot and where the story's going. For instance, instead of "The only person she'd told was Isabelle...and she was missing." you could write something about how, well, the only person she'd ever told was Isabelle, but Isabelle would never write something like that.

I dunno. Your story

Another suggestion I have is to make the narrative a bit more natural. As it is, you're sort of giving the reader the winkwinknudgenudge that the plot of the story's concerning Isabelle and that there's more to the disappearance than meets the eye and such. I got this impression because the disappearance kept popping in, as if to say, "Hi reader! Don't forget about me!"

But the thing is, if the reader's constantly being directed toward this event and the matters around it, the reader's either going to figure it all out beforehand or get bored. Maybe both.

It's an easy enough fix, though, and you have a multitude of options to go with. You could start the story off from somewhere else--right when she gets the note? when she walks downstairs and finds her mom still in the kitchen? when she drives off to school? Or, right where you already have it.

Just fill in some more details. Normal details. Things can keep popping in that remind Sophia of Isabelle, but I think what you want is for Sophie to be a high school girl whose best friend went missing. That way, you get all sorts of deep stuff.

Those I think are my two main things. I have a whole slate of technical pointers I can give you if you're interested. Just let me know if you want those, or if you want any further explanation!



Rach

P.S. I really don't think you need that prologue at all! Let the story speak for itself. Hang on to it, though, because it makes a nice blurb-type deal.

I agree with Racheal. Delete the Prologue or use it for some sort of blurb.

Nice story. Definitely has a catch.

The main thing I would change would be when the story starts. Start it earlier. Show all the girls hanging out. Then later show the scene where everyone discovers Isabelle is missing and her friends have to speak to the cops. This way the readers will know more about the characters and be able to empathize better with Sophia over situation.

Another thing, don't switch point of view without warning. It confuses the reader. If you want to change to Peyton's point of view, show some transition mark. Maybe one like this on you used:

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Last thing, you use first and last names a lot. Once you said the last name once, you don't need to repeat it again.

Anyway, I hoped this helped. I'm going to review the next chapter.

Hey Raven, it's Stella!

I. NITPICKS

Sunlight streamed through Sophia Maher’s window.

Weather. Thrilling.

She still wonders why they even thought about smiling because it was the first photo taken of them after their other best friend, Isabelle Evans went missing.

You just switched tense.

“Everything’s fine. I was watching the news again and couldn’t bear seeing Isabelle’s picture, you and her were so close. It just… freaked me out a bit. I’ll be going in a minute.” Katherine explained, concern flashing in her eyes.

Confused about dialogue punctuation? Here!

She steeled herself as she entered the building.

Make sure you don't start too many sentences with "she".

because if your not

you're.

Mrs. Genevieve began writing swirling cursive across the board. Peyton craned her neck to see over the greasy-haired boy in front of her.

Wow! You just totally switched perspective without telling us!

Alright.

II. PROLOGUE

Honestly, I think your prologue is totally unnecessary. Cut it. It's more of a blurb, like you'd put on the back of a book. It's not needed here and I'm not sure why you put it in, but honestly, you don't need it.

III. FINDING THINGS OUT

So honestly, I quite like this. It's definitely original. My only concern would be the photo. Maybe don't put that in there. let us discover for ourselves about Isabelle going missing, it's more fun that way. Introduce Peyton and the third unknown friend as they come. That way you have more chance of character development. Also, is it necessary to switch perspectives? If you're going to be doing it a lot, then fine, but make some distinction. If not, then let us read the text as Sophia does.

IV. OVERALL

Not bad, a pretty promising beginning. Just needs a little work!

Hope I helped, drop me a note if you need anything!

-Stella x

Hey Raven!

Shubhi here to review. The moment I read the title I knew I had to read this and review it. And then to add to my excitement was the synopsis you gave. This made me read this, but then I didn't have time to the review before as I already had too much to be reviewed.

But at last here I am.

Definitely this story has a lot of potential and the plot seems quite interesting. A girl missing and then sending out messages to her friends about their secrets is quite a thrill. This makes me wonder what possibly could their secrets be and why she, Isa being their best friend is so eager to tell them..Also, I have another thing on mind..Is the person Isabelle or someone else? Well, that's to see.

But I think you are moving way too fast and there's no emotion in here. Just imagine(I hope it never happens) that your bestie has been kidnapped and she hasn't been found even after two months. Just think how your days would be like and how you would react to if you see her photo and remember everything that has happened. You should develop the characters here and make them believable. Besides, everything happens too quickly here that I get very annoyed sometimes. The length of this chapter was very short, and you could have made this longer by making the characters believable, and adding their physical descriptions. This was good as an Author's Draft, but it seriously needs work.


To help you out, when Sophia receives this chit, there should be a lot of fear, mixed emotions inside her. After all she has just received a note, rather a chilling note from her missing friend. And same goes when the other girl receives the message. I really want to know what and how they feel. Here's an article by Snoink that would help you create your characters and mould them.Article. Also, browse YWS Writing Tips to find other useful articles and help tips. They are really helpful.

The other thing that I would like to say is that the prologue you provided there is not necessary and it would be a good material for the book jacket, or synopsis when it's later published. Just don't make it a prologue.

I read bits of Racheal's review and I totally agree with her. Just give this piece a soul which is very much lacking in here.

On to the next part,
~Shubhi