Hi, Querencia. Dropping in again.
"There's the road!" Monica cried, pointing dead ahead. There was a significant height difference between the dirt road and the highway, and everyone except Fred braced themselves for impact. My mother's car! Finnley yelled inwardly
I've mentioned this a few times, but it is a consistent issue in your work that you never seem to pick a specific viewpoint to tell a chapter from, which can make it harder for me to sink into the story. Here, you mention that everyone except Fred braced themselves for impact, which suggests a degree of awareness about all of the characters, even though the next sentence dips into Finnley's internal thoughts, which suggests it's specifically grounded in his point of view. It's sort of interesting, because I've actually recently been studying the theory behind how readers manage to 'enter' the world of the story, and a lot of it seems to be to do with establishing who the events of the story are positioned around and how they perceive them. The kind of inconsistencies in perspective that crop up in your work seem to explain why I sometimes feel a bit detached from it; I can't latch onto a particular viewpoint and figure out how to align myself.
With a great heave, the car plowed forward, up and over the bump. Then the car promptly died.
Oh man, Finnley is so screwed. His mum's understanding, but I think this might push even sweet Mrs Bale to her limit.
"I'm not giving up on this car," Finnley said through gritted teeth. It was only after he said that that he realized he truly meant it. Without wasting another second, he shoved open the door and dashed to the front of the car.
Why, though? This seems like a bit of an idiotic move. Much as you might want to save the car, surely it's not worth getting smashed to bits by a truck? I can't believe the others wouldn't drag him away from it, as well. Especially Uncle Fred. I mean, come on, man. You're all the adult supervision these kids have got - at least take enough responsibility to stop them from becoming roadkill.
Mia was the first to get out of the car, vaulting from her seat and shoving the door open. Her cheeks glistened with tears
Would she even be crying at this stage? I feel like she'd be so stunned and disbelieving that she would barely even be able to process that it was happening. It's not a major issue, but people do talk about being 'too shocked to cry' quite a lot, don't they?
Fred was just a heartbeat behind them. The front door was missing, but wasn't burning, so Mia went straight in. Inside the kitchen, and most of the living room too, the demon was standing in front of Mia's parents, who were pressed up against each other and the wall.
"Mom! Dad!" she cried, running into the room. Finnley started to call after her, but a large hand covered his mouth. It was Fred, telling him to be dead silent. The demon breathed fire, sealing the entrance to the foyer, trapping Mia as well as her parents. Fred pulled Finnley back into the shadows of the staircase, where Monica was waiting.
Where's the description of the heat? The smell? This scene definitely needs more fleshing out, sense-wise. It always floors me when I realise just how hot fire is. I went to a show just over a week ago and they had some pyrotechnics on the stage, and even though I was probably about 20 feet from the flames - which also happened to be intermittent - I still ended up really sweating. Fire is hot. Fire is searingly hot. Finnley should be feeling that, and the smoke would get right in his throat. Not to mention he'd probably barely be able to see.
I'm also struggling to picture where Finnley is. Did he actually run into the building as well? Or was it only Mia who went inside? I don't get how Monica got here, either.
It was Monica who answered. "That's where I come in."
Ahh, so I guess this is the big reveal with Monica? I'm looking forward to finding out what it is, though I still definitely think that this would be much more of a wham line if you hadn't been quite as free with your hints up to this point.
Well, that's all for this chapter. This was definitely much more enjoyable than the last one, but there's still a lot of viewpoint inconsistencies and I wasn't sure about the realism of Finnley trying to preserve the car. The whole bit with the truck felt like it was just drama for the sake of drama; it didn't really affect the plot much, beyond slowing them down so the demon could get ahead, and I think you could easily have it go out of sight and overtake them without needing such a drastic distraction. Still, it was pretty exciting on the whole, and I didn't guess that the demon would cause this much destruction. How the heck is Finnley going to explain any of this to his mother? Or is she finally going to learn the truth as well?
Keep writing!
~Pan
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