Young Writers Society

Hi AlyTheBookworm,

Mailice here with a short review!

Don't ask me how I always manage to find anything to read. So let's get started.

That was a very active first chapter you presented here. The storytelling you present here is in many ways developed and connected to the plot itself, without any kind of pause to bring the pace to a halt, to introduce more about the character.

Reysa comes across to me as a very sensible girl, (young woman?) and yet somewhat divided in the things she does. She seems strong willed and shows great charisma. I think it's good that you get to know all this in her thoughts alone.

This alternating attempt between her inner world and the outer world makes for a very dynamic first chapter. As this serves as an introduction to draw the reader in for future chapters, I think you have already done well here to include a lot of information in an interesting and well-developed way to maintain this reading flow. While reading, I also had a strange idea in my head about how the story could develop, but I think I'll keep it to myself.

I would think that you just need to work a bit on making the descriptions a bit more vivid and deeper in detail so as not to bring a constant repetition.

Other points I noticed while reading:

A red airship drifted in the night- a drop of blood in an ocean of ink.

You start off with a very great introduction!

Covered in peeling red paint, it was made of old wood and frayed rope. The four sails- the mainsail, wings, and tail- were all the same faded red color, interspersed with squares of gray cloth from all the times they had needed to be repaired.

One thing that struck me is the descriptions you include. Firstly, it's good that you do that because it gives you an overview of where the story is going, but I think you could try to expand that a bit in places or try to use a richer selection of adjectives to present something. Because you start the story with "red", here you also write "red" and later you talk about "red powder". To avoid unnecessary repetition, I would advise you to go deeper into one colour. Here, for example, "cherry red" or "vermilion" or something like that. There are no limits to your imagination.

I had dug the airship out of the shed and taught myself.
I now knew how to steer using the tiller, how to adjust the sail and the wings on the outside of the ship, how to turn the valve on the metal box to descend and ascend.

You mention at the beginning that you don't know much expertise when it comes to sailing, and here you mention that Reysa taught herself. This is the perfect opportunity to share this expertise with Reysa and to use this "knowledge" more and more in the course of the story.

the Eredian sea

As this is a proper name, the "Sea" must also be capitalised.

Have fun writing!

Mailice

Hey, Zoom here for a review.

I just want to say before you read my review, I am going to point out a few problems but I see a lot of potential with this story and would like to be tagged in future chapters, please.

Here we go.

My airship drifted in ink-black night

This is quite clunky. "ink-black night" is a mouthful.

My airship drifted in ink-black night, surrounded by mountains of cloud and the lights of distant stars.

Actually, this entire first sentence isn’t working for me. I cannot visualise what this airship might look like. Also, it is said that opening with descriptions of the sky is cliché. It’s been a go-to for me in the past but hey ho.

And the adjective choice “distant” is pretty useless. Adjectives & adverbs have to earn their right to be in your story. “Distant” doesn’t add much to the reader’s imagination here.

Also you may want to check out the actual structure of your prose. You have introduced a lot of nouns in your opening hook, and with a very similar adjective + noun repetition. It makes the sentence very busy.

Finally, I’m a very strong believer in the opening hook introducing a pivotal element to the story, such as setting, conflict or tone etc, or you can raise a question that the reader will want to know the answer to. Airships sound pretty interesting but I still feel you could do more to grab people’s attention.

I liked to think of the stars as the souls of other sky-sailors. I imagined that they hung the lights on the sides of their ships as a signal. A message. You are not alone.

Lies. Much of my life was lies. But that was necessary.

This unintentionally reminded me a lot of the Lion King. Not an issue, just an FYI.

The contradiction of both of these sentences is quite jarring. If she liked to think of the stars as sky-sailor souls reminding her she is not alone, then it doesn’t make sense for her to believe that it is also a lie. It would make more sense if the star/soul thing was a common belief wherever this protag is from. That would then add folklore to your story, and strengthen your characterisation of the protag when you show us she doesn’t buy it.

Those beautiful illusions were all that kept me whole when I sailed alone in dark skies.

See now we’re back to putting a positive spin on the stars. Very confusing.

I think it’s risky business opening a story with a sort-of-but-not-really prologue – the danger is that you are putting your readers into a very short scene only to yank them back out almost immediately. It has to be worth it, you have to really nail one of the elements I mentioned before. I feel like I got a hint of everything but was left with not a whole lot more than what I had at the start of the story.

I woke to a clear, cool atmosphere and sunlight on the horizon.

Next scene opens with sky too. Also waking up is a cliché opening. Again, the sky has been a go-to for me in the past, and even my current story opens with three scenes in a row of waking up . . . just letting you know that people think it’s cliché.

Kyo and Kya

I already dislike how similar their names are and hope they are not pivotal characters . . .

After pulling on a faded dress and twisting my hair into a braid, I eyed my reflection in a shard of mirror.

Introducing character descriptions with your protag looking in a mirror is seen as one of the most cliché setups you can include in your writing. Also "shard of mirror" is confusing, where is this shard? Is it hung on a wall where the entire mirror used to be?

The sky was clear, the sun was bright, and I would be reunited with Kyo and Kya, my canid puppies, soon.

This was unnecessary – no need to summarise the last three sentences.

I knew how to steer using the tiller, how to adjust the sail and the wings on the outside of the ship, how to turn the valve on the metal box to descend and ascend. I refilled the container of red powder in the box every week- but I didn’t know much else.

Ma and Pa had never taught me how to sail.

Years ago, when supplies were running low, I had dug the airship out of the shed and taught myself. Now I could fly, though I still didn’t know much. The box, the powder, all of the questions that would never be answered

This would flow better if you started with the line about “Ma and Pa,” then followed with the paragraph “Years ago,” and add snippets of the first paragraph somewhere after “I taught myself”.

After a while of thoughtfully watching sky and sea, I pulled my sketchbook out and skimmed through the weathered pages to pass time.

Rule of thumb, if your protag is bored then your readers probably are too. At this point I am wondering where the story is!

There were pages upon pages of Kyo and Kya, running, playing, fighting, hunting. There were sketches of Cloudfins, graceful in their layers of flapping wings as they glided from tree to tree. A drawing of Drifter, carrying me, my canids, and two indistinct figures across the sea. To the places I’d only read about. To cities full of people and life.
Something twisted in my heart, and I stuffed the sketchbook away.

Okay this was pretty good – I get the set up with the sketchbook now. I just feel this could come later in the story once the actual story has kicked off. But yeah good job here! I love “something twisted in my heart” – as a reader you just immediately get the sense that this protag has very big dreams and they are not being fulfilled.

A gust of wind crashed into my ship.

I was thrown to the side, but managed to grab the mast. The airship spun through open air like a leaf in a storm- a speck against an endless sky. The sail caught the wind, ropes stretched tight as Drifter was battered back and forth. For what felt like an eternity, I was frozen at the sight of dark water waiting miles below.

It’s an airship. How is a gust of wind having this much impact? One of three things is wrong with this. 1) the gust of wind is more powerful than you have described and you need to elaborate on just how strong it is. 2) airships are not very good inventions in this world, which wouldn’t make sense. 3) Reysa isn’t a very skilled sailor so did something wrong to make the wind have this kind of effect.

I’d go with option 3 as it makes the most sense. Make it more obvious that this close-call was caused by her ineptitude.

###

Oh no. I’ve done it again. I’ve written a review that’s longer than the story.

Overall, these are my main comments:

1) You describe the sky way too much. But Zoom, it’s a story about airships and sky-sailors--how does one not describe the sky? That’s actually a good point. I guess it’s more about when in the story to describe the sky rather than how often. At the moment these descriptions are feeling a bit thrown in and are serving as a hurdle for readers to get around rather than helping to set the mood. The sky can do a lot to set tone because the sky has sooo many different ranges of colour, weather, texture etc, just like your story will have a variety of emotions and moods. Work on letting the two work together in a more cohesive way.

2) Nothing is happening. Well, okay, not nothing. But for the people like me who have a short attention span, we need the action, we need the conflict. Don’t get me wrong, stories can have a slow start, but only as long as they compensate in another area. This leads on to point 3:

3) Think about what you are promising your readers. The first few pages should be dropping down something major like setting, conflict, premise, storyline etc. You are making a promise of “this is what my story will be about”. The only implication to storyline/premise so far is that Reysa wants her parents to return so she can become a sky-sailor and leave Santhil to explore the world. That’s the promise you are making, and so far, it isn’t very compelling because we don’t know things like, why is it going to be exciting to be a sky-sailor? Why is the world beyond Santhil going to captivate us? What I am saying is, make sure your “promise” is accurate and consistent, and that it is something the readers will want to know more about.

4) You’ve done a good job with characterisation, you were mostly consistent and I loved the hints at how lonely and desperate for adventure Reysa is. I think characterisation is very difficult to pull off but whatever you are doing, it’s working, so keep that up.

5) I’m still not really clear on the whole airship concept, how they work, what they look like, why people are sky-sailors at all. Are airships only used for travel or do they tie in with actual professions? I’m not suggesting you include all of that in this opening but maybe just give us something more to go on. It’s actually good that you have raised all of these questions in my head.

So yeah, I'm very intrigued and would like to be tagged going forward!

-Zoom