Young Writers Society

SO, New novel It's all *cough cough* CinderStella's *cough cough* fault. She MADE me write this.


Chapter 1-


Liena stood in the courtyard of the palace, looking around. She was reluctant to remove her shrug. The dress her mother had forced her to wear was much too low cut, and she felt venerable without the warm wool shrug. “Take off your wrap,” Her mother snapped, her voice low, eager to not cause a scene.
Liena considered causing a scene, but decided against it. She didn’t need more attention then the peach colored dress caused her. She handed the wrap too the man waiting to take it, turning away before she could feel his eyes on her. “Miss.” The man said to her back. Liena ignored him, walking away from her family. ‘This festival of trees is cursed.’ she thought to herself, inching towards the library door. ‘I wish it had never come.’
“Liena?” Said a low voice. She whirled around, sure that Randolph would be standing there, ready to grab her. But no. It was just Theodore. “Oh Theo!” She said, flinging herself at him and wrapping her arms around his neck. “I’ve missed you!”
“Hello Ena!” He said, hugging her and picking her off the ground. “How is my beautiful girl?”
Laughing, Liena pulled away and looked Theo up and down. “Not bad old friend, not bad. Tell me, how is the war going up north?”
Theo’s face darkened and he shook his head, his dark curls bouncing on his forehead. “I don’t want to speak of it. I really don’t.”
“That bad?” Liena said, sitting down in one of the large armchairs inside the library.
“That bad.” Theo replied, smiling. “And it’d darken this lovely night.” He looked her up and down.“Oh my. What does she have you wearing now, Dear?”
Liena rolled her eyes. “Please, don’t mention it. I begged, I cried, I threatened, I stormed, I raged. Nothing could get me out of this abomination.”
He grinned at her. “Crying didn’t work? As I remember, you were an excellent crier.”
“Still am, but she’s apparently learned to block it out. She was convinced that I wouldn’t find a suitor if I was wearing something decent.”
“I can fix that.” Theodore, said, grinning sinisterly.
“You can?”
“I can. Tell me, if I happened to pretend to be interested in you tonight, would your parents believe it?”
Liena laughed. “Ah, perhaps, perhaps. Just depends on how you play it.”
He put his forehead against hers and sighed. “Well, I can be charming when I want to be.”
“You can? First I’ve heard of this.”
“I’ve changed a lot... Have you?”
“I’ve changed from the little girl that ran around with the boys to the girl that won’t leave the house from fear of being caught alone and captured by Randolph.”
“Captured by who?” Theo said, pulling away and looking murderous. His eyes were sparking with anger from the thought of someone hurting his best friend.
“By Randolph Adlington. he has a weird fascination with me. And he is rich. Which makes my parents love the thought of him. He is the reason for this costume tonight.”
“Ah. And he is betrothed to you?”
“No. You know full well people can’t be betrothed until the festival of trees is over.”
The festival of trees was a yearly winter celebration, which lasted two weeks while men were in the forests cutting down the trees for the winter firewood supply. It was during this time that balls and banquets were held, and anyone looking for a wife or husband hoped to find one.

“True. Well then, I suppose they’ve forgotten how rich I am as well.”
“Theo, you’re not that rich.”
“Not as rich as Randolph, for sure, but at least rich enough to give your parents a sum of money for you.”
Liena shivered. “They really don’t care, do they, Theo?”
“We answered that question a long time ago, Ena.”
She stood up. “We can’t stay in here the whole party. It’s time for you to show me what an amazing actor you are.”
He laughed. “You’d be surprised.”


She took his outstretched arm and walked out of the library, attempting to look happy. And she was, really. She had her best friend beside her, one that could be killed at any time, while he worked as a doctor for the war. She pressed against him as she caught sight of Randolph, who was standing at the other side of the room, separated from her by different colored gowns and coats. The shinning light from the candles that floated around on their own accord, the golden light bouncing off the marble walls and floors. The light shone down, and Liena felt exposed. She wished she could snuff the golden light, plunge everyone into darkness.

Theo patted her gloved hand with his. “Don’t worry Ena. He won’t get you tonight.”
“You truly are a great friend.” She whispered, smiling.
“Don’t you forget it.” He grinned back, then led her towards the ballroom, His hand gripping hers to his arm. A waltz was ringing through the room, and Liena smiled. “Let’s dance, Theo.”
“What, now?” He mumbled. He had always hated to dance.
“Yes, now. We came to here to dance, didn’t we?”
As they walked to the center of the room, Theodore mumbled about how he hadn’t come to dance, and he really would prefer not too. Liena ignored him and whirled around, placing her hand on his shoulder, and holding his other hand in hers. Unwillingly, he put his hand on her hip, and they slowly began to turn, getting a feel for the music.

Even though Theo hated to dance, he was very good at it. He kept up with the best dancer in the room, lifting Liena and whirling her at the right times. She laughed as he threw her into the air, only to catch her a few seconds later, and twirl her out away from him and then back.
“Can we stop now?” He asked, as the music stopped for a few seconds.
She turned, her eyes sparkling and cheeks flushed. “I suppose.”
“Don’t look so disappointed, Ena.” He led her off the dance floor, heading towards the refreshments table. She sighed and leaned against one of the marble posts. “Would you get me a drink Theo? I’m so tired I can’t walk another inch.”
“Of course.” He winked at her and walked away, nodding to the people he passed. As charming as always.
“Well.” Said a rough, low voice from behind her. She flinched and wished she had accompanied Theo to the drinks table. “It seems the angel has found herself a devil.”
“Pardon me?” Liena said, turning around. She groaned inside, realizing she had just turned her low cut front towards Randolph. Sure enough, his eyes flew across her chest and down.
“I’m saying that you’ve found a devil.” He said after licking his lips and turning his dark eyes back to her face. “A devil fighting for the wrong side, incidentally.”
“I was under the impression they were the ones fighting for the King and Queen.”
“The King and Queen are the wrong side, my dear.” He took a step closer to her, and she flinched. She could feel his drink soured breath on her face and neck.
“Liena?” Said another voice, Theo’s. “Is this person bothering you?”
“Yes.” She said, stumbling back to him. “Yes, he is.”
Theo looked Randolph up and down, while Randolph did the same to him. “It would be in your best interest to leave Liena alone, Sire.”
“And who are you?”
Liena spoke up, her voice wavering. “He is my escort.”
“He didn’t bring you in.”
“Fine then. He is my ‘date’ if you wish.”
Randolph rolled his eyes. “I’m sure. Well, Miss, I leave you in his... Hands.”

Theo watched as Randolph left and then turned to Liena. “Come.” He said urgently. But before they could move, Liena’s mother stomped up to them, a murderous look on her face. “Liena! What in all that is good and holy are you doing?”
“Why, accompanying Theo wherever he wishes, Mother.” She said sweetly.
“What about Randolph?” Mrs. Alder spat, her face reddening.
“What, that molester? I would rather not be raped during the festival of trees, Mother.”
“Mr. Adlington is a gentleman, Liena. How dare you use such crude words.”
Liena rolled her eyes. “I will not marry him, Mother. I refuse too.”
“You do not have a choice, Liena. It is up to your father and I.”
“What parents force their daughter to marry someone like that?” Liena gasped, her eyes sparkling with anger.
“The parents that want a future for that said daughter. But I will not discuss it here. We will talk about it at home.”
Liena turned on her heel and pulled Theo away, her shoulders hunched in anger. They left the ballroom and ran into the library again. Hidden among the dusty volumes, Liena fell to the floor, her voluminous skirt flying out around her. Her shoulders shook from unshod tears, and Theo knelt beside her. “Oh, I’m sorry Ena.”
“Why are they so cruel?” She gasped, tears running down her cheeks.
“I’m afraid I have no answer for that, Darling.”
She leaned against his shoulder. “I want to run away Theo.”
He pulled away and turned her to face him. “What?”
“I want to run away. I want to go with you, back to the camp. I want to help the wounded. I want to escape the never ending parties, the never ending darkness that will be my life if that scum marries me.”
“Okay.” Theo said, helping her up. “Let’s go.”
“What, now?”
“If you want to run away, now is the time. Everyone is here. We can sneak back to your house, grab your clothes. The camp in a few days journey away. I’m meeting two of my friends in town tonight to go back. Wynn, you’ll like her, and her husband Aster.”
“Okay. Let’s.”
“You’ll need a cloak of some kind.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that.” Liena walked out of the library, keeping her head down.

Heading towards the kitchen, she hoped that a warm hearted cook would help her cause. “Excuse me,” She said when she entered the stone walled and floored kitchen.
“You’re in the wrong place, Lass.” Said a voice.
“I don’t think so. I need a cloak. I’m running away.” Liena replied boldly.
“Well, I won’t stand in your way. Look over there.” A hand waved through the steam towards the corner, where cloaks had been heaped on the dirty floor. Liena picked a heavy wool cloak off the top and ran back to the library, thanking the person that she couldn’t see through the steam.
Theo was waiting for her. “Let’s go.” He said, smiling at her, wrapped in a much to large cloak. “I’m afraid you got the duchess’ over coat, Dear.” He laughed.
“Shut up.”
He chortled and led her out, sneaking her through the deserted entryway and out the large oak front doors.
“Let’s go run away.” Theo whispered into her ear. And together, they ran towards the carriage house where Theo’s horse waited, puffing warm clouds of air into the cold chill.

Spark,

I actually remember reading the snippet for this when we were doing workshop So I feel priveleged to see the next development.

I understand that this a draft, so I'll say that as a draft this piece is enjoyable, it's full of color and movement, which I like. Oftentimes, drafts tend to be dead and dull, but this is not so. I can tell that you enjoyed writing it, and in turn, I think readers will enjoy reading.

The strongest element for this piece, I think was its dialogue. I mean, you did a pretty nice job incorporatin little details and nuances for each character's voice and personality- I feel it went by natural and was pleasing/easy to read. I also liked how you incorporated backstory into the dialogue, I thought that was also well-done, as far as this piece is concerned.

That being said, I feel the weakness in the piece was the grammar. I'm not going to go so far as to point every little thing out, but I'll mention the general things I found:

1.) Use of to/too. Throughout the piece, I found these errors.
to is the preposition. Think of "to" as in "towards" - "to" implies direction. People don't say "too-wards"

too is the adverb. Me too. I like cheese, too. I'm too sick to go. This is too big.

If you're describing something use too. If you're talking about direction use to.

Another common thing I found:
2.) Incorrect capitalization of endearments.
Mainly the capitalization of "dear" - In general, you don't capitalize endearments. So honey, sweetheart, etc.

It's kind of confusing, because there's a rule where you capitalize all proper nouns. So basically, names. You capitalize names of places, people, titles. You would capitalize "Mom" or "Dad" because that is what a child calls his/her parents. Think of it like a title. If someone habitually refers to their parent as "Mother/Father" then you would capitalize that, because that is what they call them. To that person, that is their name.

However, something like: "She is my Mother" is incorrect capitalization, because you're not calling that person by a name - you are merely using the identification of the noun "mother" to describe that person. Think of it this way: you wouldn't say "She is my Audy" because Audy is a proper noun and I belong to no one. I'm a free man, darnit!

So when husbands say "Good morning, Honey" that capitalization of "Honey" implies that the word is used almost like a nickname. Just like if someone's name is Jessica, and we were to give her the nickname: Jess, you would capitalize it. If terms like -Honey, Flower, Sweets - are used as a replacement for the name/ a nickname, capitalizing is okay, but if it's used as a term of endearment, you wouldn't capitalize it.

"Can you get the door, sweetheart?"
"Can you get the door, dear?"

In the work itself, I know for sure the doctor (see I didn't capitalize it, because I'm refering to his occupation - and he is not called or known as "the Doctor" ) called Liene "Ena" at some point.

“Hello Ena!” He said, hugging her and picking her off the ground. “How is my beautiful girl?”

So, for him to later call her dear, I know that he is using it as a term of endearment, rather than a proper noun. I hope this all makes sense.

3) Dialogue tag punctuations.
Dialogue is in two parts. There's the dialogue itself, which is inside quotations. Then there is the tags - the he said/she said part.

So if there's no tag. Then the sentence is complete on its own and the periods/exclaimation points/question marks go inside the quotations:

"She loves me."

If there's a tag, then you would insert a comma before the quotation mark, and the period goes at the end of the tag.

"She loves me," he said.

If there's a tag in the middle, there would be two commas to separate the quoted part from the tag, and the period would go before the second set of quotations.

"She loves me," he said, "I'm flattered."
"I can't believe it," he said, "she loves me." *note that she isn't capitalized. That's because the entire sentence is comprised of both the tag AND the quoted sections.

That being said, you can have a sentence comprised of the tag itself:

He said he couldn't make it.

but the tag has to be a complete sentence, it cannot be a fragment. Also the quote has to stand on its own, it cannot rely on the tag.

“Let’s gocomma” he said, smiling at her, wrapped in a much too large cloak.

Now, enough about grammar! Before I close this off, I just want to say that I love your characters - however when you go back to revise this, I would like to see more development. Right now, I don't get a great sense of Liene except that she does not want to be married off (rightfully so!) to some rich man, and she does not want to live a domestic life. I think this is a great character and especially once she's developed. I want to know why she is the way she is. Why she makes the decisions she does, etc. And be careful with that kind of thing, it can't be told but only subtly woven in.

Theo seems like a great guy. I'd like to see him more developed as well and I'd like to see some flaws.

As for the story overall, I'm excited about the direction that it is taking. I love fantasy stories like this, because already I'm getting a sense of the kind of world it's in, with Dukes and Duchesses and dresses and balls - more description to help set the scene would've been lovely. I still am loving the festival of trees idea! I get the sense that this world is on the verge of peril, what with the war going on, so it's all very exciting! I like how the pace whips along - already she is going on an adventure with Theo, and they seem to make a great duo, and complement each other in that sense. I get the impression that she is very impulsive, full of passion/emotions - and Theo seems more reserved.

Again, I'd like to see that you keep this quick-pace, which I think compliments your story - but develop it more and really set the scene with descriptions of the ball, the people in the ball, the night maybe - set an atmosphere. And characterize, characterize, characterize.

I hope this monster review helps. I know I've been picking at the grammar, but that's only because I strongly believe in the story.

~ as always, Audy

Drama! I take ALL CREDIT for this being posted, do you hear? ALL CREDIT.

I. NITPICKS

she felt venerable without the warm wool shrug.

vulnerable

“Take off your wrap,” Her mother snapped, her voice low, eager to not cause a scene.

lower case h

then the peach colored dress caused her.

than

“Miss.” The man said to her back.

Something you really need to get into order is your dialogue punctuation- which is SO confusing, I know. Believe it or not, I got taught it by a retired English teacher on a Harry Potter fanfiction site via PM. Yeah. However, this article does just as well. Do try to get a handle on it, takes away so much of the apparent sloppiness of writing!

His eyes were sparking with anger from the thought of someone hurting his best friend.

If this isn't from his perspective, we, like Liena, can only speculate about why his eyes might be sparkling.

The festival of trees was a yearly winter celebration, which lasted two weeks while men were in the forests cutting down the trees for the winter firewood supply. It was during this time that balls and banquets were held, and anyone looking for a wife or husband hoped to find one.

Now, you know how I love the idea of the festival! But I think you could do much better in integrating this explanation into the story through dialogue and small notes rather than this, which is a bit of an infodump.

She had her best friend beside her, one that could be killed at any time, while he worked as a doctor for the war.

This is not a happy thought. She wouldn't be happy thinking this. She might be happy that he is home and safe at the moment and NOT about to be killed at any moment?

II. DESCRIPTION

As you get further into this piece, it gets better. And I think that's because you begin building an atmosphere. In the earlier parts, we don't get much of a feel for the party- is it crowded and warm? Or calm and peaceful? Or when Theo first appears- we don't get any idea of how he feels to hug, of his warmth or his smell or the sound of his voice. You need to start using all five senses a little more. As we get further on, it does get better, because you're less awkward about it, you're letting the descriptions come unbidden, and it flows excellently. But you need to pay more attention to creating the right sort of atmosphere earlier on to help drag your readers in

III. ARRANGED MARRIAGES

Now, popular belief in the modern Western world is that arranged marriage is bad. I believe it, I'm sure you believe it. But in the past, there wasn't another option. Marrying for love wasn't really a concept, there was no EITHER OR. There was just... marriage. And it was arranged. And lots of people were happy with it. And parents are canny creatures, they would try and make the best matches they could for their children.

My point is that by itself, the marriage to Randolph bugs me a little as Liena's reason for running away. Now, if the betrothal had already happened, it was irreversible, and she planned on eloping, I would understand. But she's not eloping. She's running from a situation which every girl in the society you paint probably find themselves in. I just want you to think about this, to think about Liena's reasons for going beyond the marriage. As it is, it's alright. But you can make it better than alright. You can make it brilliant and original and realistic.

IV. OVERALL

I love these characters and the festival! It's just a little rough around the edges SO GLAD you posted though!

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

-Stella x