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Mon Oct 05, 2009 8:20 pm
strawberrycat1 says...



Wow, i love it! Its really good and well written. :elephant:


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Erin Paige Love stood on the roof of Primark store next to Sebastian. It was late at night and the only sound was the cars going by below them. “I hear Parker has a sister. I want her dead. Be a sweetie and kill her for me” Sebastian said.
“Ohh Sebastian.” Erin laughed. “I know longer work for you. In fact I work against you so what would make you think I would do your biding?”
“Don’t be like that Erin.” Sebastian sighed “After all the things I’ve done for you, you cant do me this tiny favour.”
“All the things you’ve done for me! Like what? Like the time when Ruby was going to kill me and you left because you had got what you came for. Or the time you made me go and stay with some crazy 90 year old so you could find a way to get into her basement though me. What have you done for me? Nothing. No I will never ever not even if I was paid do something for you.”
  





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Wed Oct 07, 2009 2:13 am
Jamie_rocks says...



6/10. The paragraph itself seems interesting, but I was so distracted by all the grammar mistakes that I could hardly read it.

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I won't let myself fall. Because the truth is, once you do, no one is going to pull you back up. The people who swore they'd be there are nowhere in sight, and you're left floating in an ocean with night rapidly descending. Sure, there'll be people who try to help. You can sit there and tread water for as long as you can while your friends stand on the shore and toss you life preservers that don't float, but no one is going yo jump in and pull you safety, and what it comes down to is it's getting dark and the sharks are circling closer and you're still all alone. You won't survive if you have to rely on other people.
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Sat Oct 24, 2009 8:04 pm
Krupp says...



7.5/10 a good jump-off point to initiate the story. Readers will wonder what exactly the narrator has undergone to think such a thing...
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Cold and windy, raining outside. I can hear the constant splattering of liquid pellets assaulting the roof, and it feels like it’s been a lifetime since I last saw the sun. Although in truth, the sun had slipped out of the grasp of the cloudy skies only an hour ago. Despite its best efforts, however, the dark murkiness retained its savage grip, rendering the bright beams useless to me now. Everyone is running around, laughing and talking nonstop. It is Saturday; I guess that explains the lack of work being done, and the unfiltered noise filling up the hallway. There’s nothing but walls of water outside of the dormitory. I can see it running through all obstacles that are unfortunate enough to present themselves in the walls’ way. Trees are slapped around by the winds. The very air itself is moistened, and for a moment, I am convinced I will need an oxygen mask or scuba-diving equipment to leave the building and avoid drowning outside.
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Wed Nov 04, 2009 10:37 pm
McMourning says...



6/10. "The sun had slipped out of the grasp of the cloudy skies." Nice. It sets a mood for the scene, but there is no action yet.


Katherine pushed the drawer closed. 26 shirts stacked by colour—most of them blue. She shook her head. Only one white shirt which she had placed in a pile with the three blacks. She would have to buy more. White was timeless.
Of course, she’d had others at one time. The ¾-sleeve button down that she wore weekly, and the one with the pink buttons, and the one with the grey pinstripe pattern.
She shook her head again. No use remembering those times. Those clothes would never again fit.
"One voice can be stronger than a thousand voices, " Captain Kathryn Janeway
  





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Sat Nov 28, 2009 7:57 pm
asxz says...



Hmmm... Sorry, but it's boring. I wouldn't read on. It's just too... Like you said. No action. Nothing happned. 3/10

---\
=== Being a bit of a hypocrite here, but:
---/

Some say that the eyes are the window to the soul. If that is true, then Lizzie’s soul must be easy to find, because her mother had once told her that the vibrant shade of blue which flared through her iris’ was almost see-through. Sometimes when she was in the sunlight, they lit up, almost like a neon sign inviting people in. Lizzie liked it like that, because she felt that that was just the way it should be. If the windows really were the eyes to the soul, then it would be a lot easier if everyone had eyes like hers, because then people would just be able to forget the secrets and the lies, and get along for once.
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Tue Dec 01, 2009 4:40 pm
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PhoenixBishop says...



Brilliant description. A bit of a cliched first sentence, but the description after is cool. 8/10

Death had many smells. There was the pleasant kind, that occurred when a spirit had peacefully left its body. That usually smelled like fresh rain in spring time. Then there was the sweet smell of someone that had died too young, and lastly there was the repulsive smell of someone that had not peacefully left their body. These three smells varied depending on the intensity of each situation. Right now Tala could smell a thousand corpses baked in dung with a side of rotten eggs.
This is one little planet in one tiny solar system in a galaxy that’s barely out of its diapers. I’m old, Dean. Very old. So I invite you to contemplate how insignificant I find you.

Death~
  





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Sun Dec 06, 2009 10:49 am
Master_Yoda says...



Interesting. I found that the tenses need a little more interplay to be able to truly bring out the spooky tone that you'd want to create for a piece like that. It's quite entertaining as an opening, but lacks the urgency that would make it great. 6 / 10

Ms Fitzgerald stared bemused at the center of the dance floor; Ms Fairsworth's clumsiness was quite entertaining. Several eyes now followed Prince Alfred and his less than mediocre dance partner parading across the room. The Prince, to Ms Fitzgerald's delight, seemed to be growing frustrated at each misstep Ms Fairsworth made.
#TNT

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
-- Robert Frost

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Sat Dec 12, 2009 1:08 am
Evi says...



5/10

I like the idea, and the questions it stirs up, but the way it's phrased makes the characters' identities unclear. A first paragraph needs to be clear and not recquire a double-take, but I wasn't sure who was who here. Clarify, and it'll be very nice. ;)

The snowflakes came down like miniature fallen angels, but Katie didn’t seem to notice. She was frowning into the wind, letting it breathe down her jacket and color her ears pink. Something about the cold made her look breakable—the ice crystals settling onto her hair, giving her the impression of having either a halo of snow, or a bad case of dandruff.
"Let's eat, Grandma!" as opposed to "Let's eat Grandma!": punctuation saves lives.
  





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Mon May 30, 2011 11:01 pm
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Master_Yoda says...



The paragraph is beautifully descriptive and vivid. It begins to show emotion. Still, it develops no tension of any kind and therefore fails to grip tightly. I'd rate it with a 6/10.

It was Valentine's day of 2050 and Charlie still didn't have a girlfriend. He was seventeen, perhaps too old to be climbing trees, but he nonetheless perched himself upon a branch that overlooked the rest of the park. Usually the park was empty, but not today. A sickly swarm of swooning couples littered the park's grass like dog droppings. Just ahead Matt was snogging his new girlfriend, whatever her name was. The sweet looking sucker didn't know what she was getting into. Charlie laughed hollowly
#TNT

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
-- Robert Frost

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Sun Jun 19, 2011 4:07 pm
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Name2533 says...



Really confusing my kind of story
Here is mine
My eyes widen. I couldn't believe it. As I walked closer and closer,his eyes seem to fall apon me.
"What was he thinking" I thought. " is he happy to see me "
Then, his eyes met mine. He smiled. Never seen him smile that big. I guess he is happy . its sappose to be in italics but if it's not sorry I'm new
  





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Mon Aug 29, 2011 3:25 pm
Twit says...



7/10

Your grammar needs work, and it looks like it's going to be a romance, which personally I don't like. ^_^ The flow is disjointed and if you mixed up your sentence lengths, it would run a lot smoother.



My mother called me Myrddin for my father’s sake. It certainly didn’t endear her—or me, for that matter—to any of her family, because it served only as a reminder that yes, she had slept with one of creatures from the Hollow Hills and had its bastard son, so now no man would ever be willing to take her.
"TV makes sense. It has logic, structure, rules, and likeable leading men. In life, we have this."


#TNT
  





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Sat Sep 17, 2011 2:22 am
noninjaes says...



Interesting. A good hook. Who is her father, and why did her mother sleep with her father?

I scowled into his smoky green eyes. "I have been lending you money for almost a year now but you have yet to give me back a single cent that you owe me." I slumped back into the plush white chair that sat behind me.
"Just another hundred dollars; that's all I need," retorted Dylan. I deepened my scowl. Dylan lived in the apartment next to me. Over the past year, he had been having trouble with making his rent payments. Being the generous person that I am, I had been lending him money so he could make those payments. He shot me an innocent smile. "Please, I really need the money." I sighed.
"You have needed the money for so long now. You can't just take and take and take. Look, I can't keep giving you money all the time. I don't have a disposable income so I just can't afford to be giving out all this money left right and centre!" I shook my head, exasperated. Dylan took a step towards me, his expression curving to a look of disdain. The light that came through the window highlighted his cropped blonde hair. I fiddled with the charm on my bracelet.
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Tue Sep 20, 2011 6:05 pm
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Twit says...



6/10
You have a good strong character voice already established in just a few sentences, but the dialogue, which is vitally important, runs lopsided and doesn't sound very realistic. Try reading it out loud and using contractions. People don't speak like textbooks, and they don't often use correct grammar.





The wind was howling life a wolf outside, and the piano sounded sour. In the faint candlelight, the keys looked yellow instead of white, as though the sourness was leaking through and would stain my fingers.
"TV makes sense. It has logic, structure, rules, and likeable leading men. In life, we have this."


#TNT
  





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Mon Sep 26, 2011 12:51 am
Cspr says...



4/10. While it seems interesting, you start with a cliche and you use sour twice in the space of two sentences, which would work--if perhaps it was a longer paragraph. You also used 'life' instead of 'like'.

'Course, don't go by me. The first paragraph of Raven Fall, which follows, is rather horrid I've decided (but that was sort of the point).

"Chas stared at the red-rust dribbling down the hill, slipping between raised flagstones and soaking into cracks, feeding the small green plants that sprouted there, yet to be smashed by a wagon’s wheel or smothered in horse’s dung." -Raven Fall
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Wed Jan 04, 2012 2:17 am
BluesClues says...



Your first paragraph is interesting - I don't know if I'm supposed to get this, but the sense I got was sort of an Oregon-Trails kind of thing. Good description and interesting. The only thing I didn't understand was the rust "dribbling." I mean...dribbling? I wasn't sure if this was supposed to be just a descriptive thing (like, the rust was spread in sort of a dribbling pattern) or if you meant it was literally dribbling, which I don't understand because it's...rust, and rust doesn't dribble. So that's my only thing.

This is the opening paragraph to my novel "Country Boy."

(viewtopic.php?f=365&t=87242&p=912250#p912250)

"He sat in a corner booth at Yee-haw’s, watching another idiot give himself whiplash on the mechanical bull. The idiot’s cowboy hat fell off as he flew from the bull amidst cheers and groans. That crowd would cheer, the man in the corner booth thought, pulling the brim of his own hat down over his grey eyes. Yuppie city folk wearing dollar-store plastic cowboy hats and belt-buckles half-hidden by their sagging beer guts, playing rodeo and boasting to anyone who would listen about the bruises they’d gotten falling off the mechanical bull. Pathetic. Somehow even more pathetic than the kids from his high school who’d gone the other way: The sons of farmers and farriers, wearing their baseball caps sideways and their pants halfway down their buttocks, listening to rap and – worse yet – rapping. He’d despised them for it. But here he was, thirty-six years old and living in New York City. Working at an auto shop and spending his Friday nights in a country-themed bar. In the end, he’d become one of them."
  








Too often we crave the extraordinary in life, without even learning how to cherish the ordinary first. Friend, I promise you this: if you can learn to take joy in the simple mundane things in life, the extraordinary will take care of itself, it'll be on its way, hurrying towards you. But if you skip the first part, it'll ever evade you.
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