Imortalised

First of all, I would like to congratulate you for a job well done delivering this story. The categories you chose were mystery/suspense/supernatural--my friend, your story stayed true to it! Although it's kinda short for me, I think the storytelling you just did is just perfect to outline what you have to say in your story. I thought at the beginning this is just another vampire story, since the title is Imortalised. But hell, I was proven wrong! It's a beautiful twist at the end, and that's the best thing I liked in your story.

I noticed few mistakes but none too big to ruin everything. Some proofreading would take care of it. So, what do I say more? Keep writing things like this and keep improving!

I had several concerns as I read through this piece. Granted, you're young, and it's obvious you were influenced by other texts, but I want to make it perfectly clear where this piece needs work.

(I hope I dion't sound too abrasive. It's a good concept. It just needs some tweaking.)

Your grammar and punctuation is inconsistent. You have several spelling errors in this piece. It is rushed, it is colloquial when the context clearly doesn't call for it, and I worry that your main character is a Mary Sue. It's difficult to write a main character who discovers she has some sort of ability she had no idea of without making them a Mary Sue, but that doesn't mean it's okay. J.K. Rowling fought very hard to make Harry Potter the exact opposite by making him lazy and cocky and poor and awkward, and some critics might say she failed in doing so. Be sure to run your character through a Mary Sue test and make sure you have them fully developed before you write them, lest they come out sounding all-mighty.

Now, while I had some other concerns, I'm only going to mention one more in this review. Otherwise, I worry it might be too long and you won't read it. So, my final contribution:

"My life has never been an easy one."

This doesn’t read well as a first sentence. I’m sorry to say that, but it’s true. Open any book, any printed fiction novel, and read the first line. What it’s designed to do is provoke mystery and to entice the reader to read further. I’ve said many times (unfortunately, all of these posts have been removed when the site last re-vamped so I cannot link to anything, but anyone who knows me is perfectly aware of this) that the first sentence is crucial. Allow me to provide a few examples, just to make it clear what I’m trying to say.

This first one, I’ve tried for an example I think you might be familiar with. If not, I apologise, as I might spoil the story for you.

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins:

“When I wake up, the other side of the bed is cold.”

The reason why I chose this book is because it’s not only a popular book but it’s one of the few books I own that come close to matching the genre of the piece you’ve written. I wouldn’t say the Hunger Games is exactly supernatural, but it’s fantasy to a supernatural degree (mockingjays, those creepy wolf dogs, etc). The first thing I want you to notice is the smallness of this sentence. Not its length, necessarily, but how small it is. If you’ve read the book or seen the movie, you know how dramatic and intense the plot is. This sentence doesn’t give that away. More importantly, it entices the reader into a sense of curiosity. Why is the bed cold? Is this unusual? When you keep reading, you learn about Katniss’, the main character’s, relationship with her sister, Prim, which is the most important character development device introduced within the series, not to mention plot device. The whole reason Katniss goes into the Hunger Games is to replace her sister, Prim. This is crucial, yet the first line doesn’t give any indication of what sort of ride the story is going to be. It entices, but it does not explain, spoil, or alienate. Can you imagine Katniss’ journey if it were to start out with “my life has pretty much just sucked up til now”? For one, it would be true, but it would blow everything that Collins works for in the realm of character development out of the water. Katniss has PTSD, we learn that as we go along. To ruin that in the first sentence is to ruin the bond that forms between the reader and the main character. Does that make sense?

I’d like to use a lesser known example, if I may. This next book is my go-to because it makes me weep with its perfection.

The Secret History by Donna Tartt:

“The snow in the mountains was melting and Bunny had been dead for several weeks before we came to understand the gravity of our situation.”

What questions does this sentence arouse for you? For me, despite the fact that I have read the story many times and know exactly where it’s going, I still get the same questions clear in my mind. “Who is Bunny?” “Who is ‘we’?” “How did he die?” “Was the ‘we’ involved?” “What situation?” “How much gravity is involved in the situation?” which, again, loops back to “Was the ‘we’ involved in Bunny’s death?”

Yet, nothing is given away about the characters other than the fact that one of them is named after an animal and is dead.

Not one to bombard you with criticism without offering some friendly advice (anymore), I’d like to help you by suggesting alternatives to your first sentence. I’d like for you to look at this piece as needing to be finely crafted. Sure, when we write a first draft it always comes out rushed and desperate and needing to be written down. The process of editing is where we take a poem or a chapter or a story from being a boiled egg to a Faberge one. My advice to you would be to take away any character development from the first sentence.

Think of the relationship between the audience and your character as being like that of two people going on a blind date. Some people might bombard the other with “here’s a list of all the weird stuff about me”, but very few ever would. Getting to know someone is an on-going process (I think it’s estimated to take about 6 weeks or 6 months to actually be able to know someone), and you can’t treat your writing any different. You know this character, I don’t. Telling me straight away about her life story and demanding sympathy is a bit like racing up to a stranger on the street and saying “THE COLOURS RAN IN MY LOAD OF LAUNDRY!” and expecting them to know that this means your prom dress is ruined and it’s too late to buy a replacement so you’ll have to wear a hand me down from your sister that she used to wear while she was in her chubby stage and so the fabric’s all worn out at the rear and your underwear will be visible through the worn fabric. It just won’t work. If anything, it’s alienating.

So, you’ve taken all of the characterisation out of your first sentence. The next thing I would suggest you do is strip it of as much plot as possible. Wait, what the heck does that mean? Bear with me. Let’s take the Donna Tartt sentence again. What do we get from that? Bunny is dead. Is Bunny’s death within the plot? Certainly. So, it seems to contradict what I just said. But, The Secret History is about a young man’s journey to college, to an unknown world, to becoming accepted by a crowd he is otherwise unused to (that is, a rich, snotty crowd), and his awareness of how much of a slippery slope it is for him to be cast out if he doesn’t go along with this crowd. Bunny’s death is crucial to this plot, but it’s not THE plot. The book doesn’t end when Bunny dies or at Bunny’s funeral or wake or even in the aftermath of his death. It’s not THE plot.

For a better example, let’s go back to the Hunger Games. Assuming you’re familiar with the plot, I’ll tell you that the Reaping isn’t mentioned until the last sentence of the first paragraph, and the Hunger Games themselves aren’t mentioned for several pages. So, the plot is kept held high above the reader, giving them something to work for. Do you understand what I mean? You can’t expose all of these crucial elements of your story – the character development and the plot and exactly what will happen – right off the bat. Otherwise, the reader might just read your first paragraph and consider the story done. It might sound cruel and fickle, but a reader isn’t likely to stick around if they feel like the next 100+ pages offer them nothing more than the first page does.

Actually, this advice is applicable to your whole piece, but especially the first paragraph. Take all of this stuff away. Let us work for it.

Oh, also, sorry! One last thing. This really needs to be said.

My next piece of advice is as follows: unless you are writing in the second person, don’t reference your audience. It sounds accusatory, presumptuous, and – here’s that word again – alienating. How many published, successful authors do it? Very few, and there’s a reason for it. Your story is about your character. Your story is not about me. When you reference me, it makes me feel like you’re making assumptions, like you just assume there’s an audience there when there mightn’t be, and, honestly, it’s sloppy writing. If you feel the need to make a reference to an undefined person (like in the “when you live as long as I have” line, which in itself is void considering most, if not all, of the people reading this story will have lived to 13 years old, and most of whom have not accepted such, making it sloppy writing when you could have done so much better), reference “one”.

“When one lives as long as I have…”

Even though I hate the sentence with a passion and will suggest you eliminate it completely, the “one” reads smoother than “you” because it doesn’t make presumptions about the author or attack them for not agreeing.

Maybe if the main character was 113, I’d accept the line and move on, but, as it is, you’ve alienated most of your readership who is 13 or older and doesn’t have the same sort of pessimism as our character, who is rapidly losing sympathy and will have caused many readers to close the covers by now.

Okay, I hope that helps! If you need any more advice or help or clarification on what I've spoken about, just message me.

This was great. I could literally feel the sense of betrayal Emily felt. I felt as if I was there, the setting was described so vividly. I really want to read more. Which is probably what I shall go look for. I know you're pretty knew and I actually am too. But this was awesome please keep writing!