The Broken Crow (Chp. 1, Part 1)

It was late afternoon, and the department store was busy. It was the perfect time to shoplift. No one would notice Chase Josner as he walked out with iPod shuffle beneath his sweater. All he had to do was act cool, stay calm. He'd done this dozens of times before.

He'd only been caught twice.

The woman at the Electronics counter was eyeing him suspiciously. Chase pretended to be examining the adapters with an innocent look on his face. Or at least as innocent as a face with a knife scar, a recent black eye, and a slightly crooked nose could get.

Out of the corner of his eye Chase saw a large family approach the counter. They were drooling over $500 digital cameras.

Chase grinned as the saleswoman turned away from him.

Perfect distraction.

With a casual glance around to make sure no one else was looking, Chase hooked one of the shuffles and slipped it under his sweater. He strolled away inconspicuously until he was out of sight of the electronics counter.

Victorious, he dodged into the clothing aisle. At a rack of sports wear, he took out his knife and tore open the packaging, keeping his hands between the clothing.

The shuffle finally fell out into his hand. Here it was, the thing he'd finally obtained after months of longing--an iPod. Maybe not the fanciest, but it would do.

He carefully hid the wrappings beneath some men's sweatpants and tucked the shuffle into the pocket of his sweater. Now he just had to find a USB cord. But that could wait for another day. Better to end on a good note.

"I'm good," he whispered with a savage grin.

Chase wove his way out into the main aisle and headed for the door. He hitched a look of casual disinterest on his face as he walked up towards the front.

Nevertheless, his adrenaline started to go up.

His senses seemed to heighten as he walked towards the door. This was the part he always dreaded, the part that could either make or break him. If he had fucked up, he would know here.

You didn't screw up, he told himself, you removed all the labels and packaging. What could go wrong?

Everything, that's what.

Paranoid. He was too freaking paranoid. He had to stop this now or someone would get suspicious.

He remembered to breathe, because a blue face looked very suspicious. The sensors loomed like dark sentinels. We're going to catch you, you stupid kid. It felt like everyone in the store was looking at him.

Oh, shit, he was ten yards away from screwing up the biggest steal he'd ever done. He should go, he should turn back, he could get in serious trouble this time--this wasn't a candy bar or cheap jewelry or something stupid like that. He could go and put the iPod down somewhere, and no one would ever know.

Five yards from the sensors...two yards...one...

He stepped through.

Nothing happened.

Chase continued walking, acting as if he'd never even noticed the sensors. Inside him his heart was doing a weird sort of flip.

I did it, I got it, it's in my pocket and the alarms didn't go off!

It was all he could do to restrain a grin. In his head he whooped in victory. Ha! Take that, fuckers!

"Hey, kid!"

Uh-oh.

Chase's heart rate went straight through the roof again, but he kept walking like he hadn't heard the guy.

"Hey, you! I'm talking to you! Get back here!"

Chase ignored him.

There was the sound of hasty footsteps behind him, and someone grabbed his shoulder and turned him around. A tall and heavy black man in civilian clothes stood behind him.

"Hey!" Chase jerked away from him. "Get your hands off me, faggot!"

The man glared at him. "What you got in your pocket, kid?"

Chase pulled out the five dollar bill he'd brought, just in case he got caught. Then he could pass off stealing as a forgetting to pay.

"Nothing, see, nothing, just money," Chase said. To his alarm, his voice came out a pitch higher than usual.

The man narrowed his eyes. "Nothing, yeah? All right, kid, let's see your pockets."

"What?" Chase couldn't believe this was happening.

"Turn 'em out. Go on."

Chase stared at him, panic starting to cloud his brain. What to do? Run or obey? Either way the guy would know he was guilty.

Then again, if he ran, he might not get caught.

He ran for it.

He didn't get very far. The black man moved a lot faster than his bulk suggested. He grabbed Chase by the arm and yanked him back. As he did the silver shuffle fell out of his pocket.

Shit!

The man bent down and picked it up. "Nothing, sure," he said. He dragged Chase to the door and pointed to a small sign in the glass. "Can you read that, kid?"

Chase just glared and looked away, his jaw taut.

"'Free ride in one of our police cars if you shoplift'," the man read. "Well, how about that. Looks like you just got yourself a free ride. We're gonna go call them up now."

Chuckling at his own joke, he pulled Chase back into the store.

Hey Enigma! Good ole Esther is ready for a rip roarin' review.

Well, let me just say that I am a sucker for this kind of story. I already got an idea where the plot was going from the beginning, but you didn't give too much away which is good. I looked at your plot synopsis and it seems well thought out as well. This is has a nice, quick pace to it without feeling rushed.

Now that have said that, let's get onto the meat of the review.

MY POINTS(Separated by paragraph):

The beginning paragraph, while capturing what is going on, is a little dull. Let me tell you that I have read this opening paragraph format literally dozens of times, so it doesn't lure me in at all. I think you should put a little more insight into what the character is feeling, and perhaps not mention his full name. Just call him "Chase". You can call him by his full name later, but going on a first name basis starting out can make the reader more comfortable with the character. (Does that make sense, ha.)

Second, your use of profanities is a turn off. This is the type of story that will appeal to the young adult range, and while the occasional cursing or F-word is okay, repetitive uses totally mess up the flow and will turn away more conservative readers. There are more ways to pull off a bad boy additude with less cursing, and if you manage to do that, you'll set yourself apart from the rest of the people who just curse to sound more mature, when they really sound infantile.

I actually can't catch too much other than that at the moment. I would advise using less italics to represent what he is thinking. Because this is third person, you can just state what he is thinking as well. Mix these up to increase flowablitiy. (That isn't a word, is it?)

Other than that, I LOVED this. It reads like an actual novel and I am excited to see where it goes. If it isn't too much trouble, I would love it if you PMed me when you get the next chapter up. Keep up with the writing.

Esther

It's a great start. My problem when I read novels is that I'm very picky. I feel that if I'm going to sit there for ten to twenty minutes reading a chapter it should be something worth reading. I'm not a sucker for love stories, but I do like stories with love in them. I just don't like it if that's all there is to the story.

From the summary it sounded really good. I can't wait to read the rest. Do me a favor and keep me updated on when you're going to post more of it.

It reminds me a lot of the story I'm writing right now. Well it's a short story, but it's a lot like yours. It's about a boy that's quite a bit younger than yours that hates his life and he finally gets the chance to have a real family. I promise I didn't steal your idea, because I started to write it long before I read this.

I don't like swear words, but for this I think it was very appropiate. He's a troubled teenager that was never taught anything better. I can totally see that and the swear words didn't bother me when I read them. Usually they take away from the story and make it sound like you're uneducated. But like I said, it's appropiate in this story.

I noticed that your paragraphs were kind of short. A lot of them were only a sentence each. Perhaps you should add a bit more detail so that they are a little longer.

I loved the story! Keep it up!

I promise I didn't steal your idea, because I started to write it long before I read this.

Haha, of course not. It's probably a really common theme.

Hey-oh!

Ooh, a hero who shoplifts. Interesting. I wanna see how this all goes down.

A few questions that popped up:

Does he have a computer to deal with this iPod? How wealthy is this kid? Is he sort of a punk, just doing this for kicks? Actually trying to get by through theft? Or does he just not have spending money?

How did the guy know he was shoplifting? I mean, like you said, he got rid of the evidence, so unless the guy had seen him do that, how did he know? And why does the guy assume he's been shoplifting when the iPod falls out? I mean, tons of people own iPods. Why is he automatically guilty? Sure, running seems a bit suspicious, but the guy was practically mugging him. I would have run too.

I'm interested, though. I wanna see how this is gonna go down. There are plenty of questions that I want answered.

~GryphonFledgling