Poison Chapter 1

Hi DarkShadows!

I stepped out of the warm building and into the cold, dark, rainy night.

I feel like you could have a stronger opening. Hooks are easily abused, but a good hook will really help you here, because as a first sentence, this one is kind of bland. Maybe it’s the vague adjectives. Like, you have descriptive words, but they’re generic: “warm”, “cold”, “dark”. They don’t tell me anything special. Don’t go OTT, but maybe spice it up a little? It’s kind of superfluous to say that the night is dark. Maybe try something more specific; maybe try “I stepped out of the library into the night. It was raining, and the cold air was thick with the smell of petrol fumes and spilled garbage.” That way we get more of a picture, sa? I’m guessing that it’s in a city, and completely making it up that it’s a library, but you get my drift.

I wrapped my black raincoat tighter around me to protect me from the cold, wet rain that was falling.

You already said it’s cold and raining, and it’s redundant lykwoah to say that rain is wet. ^_^

As I walked I kept my eyes on my boots avoiding eye contact from strangers.

Should be with strangers. Any particular reason for the character’s reticence?

I looked up the sky and my attention was consumed by the full moon that shined. It's soft light shining on the way home.

“Shined” should be “shone”.

“It’s” is short for “it is”. You need “its” without an apostrophe.

I don’t see why this is two sentences. The bit about the moon’s light should be one with the moon itself. Combine these two.

As I walked one I didn't feel as cold as I was before. Walking does help.

“One” should be “on”.

I saw a middle aged man with a drench coat on looking straight at me.

Shouldn’t that be “trench coat”?

"Are you Helena Gates?" He asked.
...
"I want you." He answered darkly.

Start a tag (“he said”, etc.) with a small letter, and end the dialogue with a comma, not a full stop.

I grunted and fell down my hood falling off my head revealing my shiny black hair. I looked at him with anger in my electric blue eyes.

Um, dude, no. I don’t care about what she looks like right now, she’s getting freaking attacked, I don’t give a rat’s bottom about what colour her eyes are. Tell us this later on when I might care about it. Character description is not necessary. I just finished a book and there was no character description; all I know is that the main character was tall, skinny and had a mop of hair. I don't know anything else, but it didn't hurt the story at all. What a character looks like shouldn't be the main focus of a story, it should be about what happens to the character. Also, even if someone's eyes are electric blue, would they really think that? If you're describing your appearance to someone, would you say to them, "I have shiny black and electric blue eyes"? You'd come off smug and vain.

Before I could stand up and beat the shit out of the man who assaulted me I felt the butt of a gun slam into my head and I blacked out.

She says this like she has a choice in the matter. Is she a black belt or something? Also, bashing someone on the head to knock them out isn’t a good idea. Getting bashed on the head usually means a concussion. A concussion means trips to the hospital, dizziness, vomiting, hallucinations, loss of balance, major confusion. It’s not like when Indiana Jones gets bashed on the head and he just walks it off. Head trauma is something serious. Wiki says concussion is “head injury with a temporary loss of brain function” and when you hear it put like that, it really does sound bad.

---
Hi! So I pointed out most stuff already, but here are the main overall things.


Narrative and emotion
First off, formatting! You need to leave a line between each paragraph and line of dialogue. It breaks it up so it doesn’t look so intimidating. A honking huge block of text doesn’t encourage readers. ^_^ While most of this moves at a good pace, the last part is far too rushed, and most importantly there is no emotion. Dude. Everyone feels emotion. Even Daleks, on occasion, have the odd moment of emotion, and the signs point to Helena being human.

Human = emotion.

Helena might be tough, but tough does not equal emotionless. You say she’s angry, but she doesn’t act angry. And why isn’t she scared? She’s out alone at night in the rain and when she’s attacked... there’s nothing. Not even a real thought. Nothing. You tell us stuff, like “I felt no fear towards this man. Only anger” but that’s not enough. I want to experience it along with Helena. Why isn’t she scared? Does she have low self esteem so she thinks no one would want to bother with her, even to attack her? Does she have killer arrogance so she thinks he can’t possibly want to bother her? Has she just come from a karate lesson, and is feeling pretty awesome and capable of serious butt-kicking right then? There’s so many different ways this could run, so many different reasons, but you don’t give us anything to go on. A lot of Helena’s actions don’t make sense. Like here:

The man lost his smile and glowered at me evilly. He could kill if he wanted to. I saw nothing but evil in this man.

So the guy is evil, he looks like he could kill her. Why the heck doesn’t she run away? Scream? Throw her bag at him? Do *something*?

Now I felt fear. Every instinct told me to run but I stood there looking at the man straight in the eyes.

Yes, she feels fear, so why doesn’t she run? This, incidentally, is a good example of where you tell, rather than show. You tell us she felt fear. Okay. Good. And? Show us her fear. Increased heartbeat, weak knees, urge to scream, urge to throw up, numb feeling of unreality, the slippery feeling of her shoes on the wet pavement. A weak clichéd phrase like “every instinct told me to run” isn’t enough. This is Helena’s fear. This is new and real and special to her, so make me feel it too.

This is a good article on Showing vs Telling. It should be helpful. ^_^


Narrative and Description
I mentioned this in connection to your first sentence, but it applies throughout as well. You do have some description, like Helena looking at the moon as she walks along, but you don’t take it any further. One of the reasons I love looking at the moon and the sky is that it’s rarely the same from night to night. What colour is the sky? Blue, black, navy, purple, burgundy? What colour is the moon? White, yellow, cream? Are there clouds? What colour are they? Sensory image is vital in making a scene come alive. Talk about the sounds and smells of the night, not just the sights. Let me see the night as Helena sees it. Description can also tell us a lot about character. Like, if I have a character who’s into poetry or detective shows, they might look at the moon and think of Shelley’s poetry: “and the moonbeams kiss the sea”. If they’re a science geek, they might look at the moon and think of lunar cycles and magnetic fields and all that other science-y stuff.


Anyway, I hope this was helpful! PM or Wall me if you have any questions, and keep writing!

-twit

Hello there. First of all, I would like to thank Day for taking almost every criticism out of my mouth. Almost. Let's begin with this:

I saw a middle aged man with a drench coat on looking straight at me.

Did you mean "trench coat" or "drenched coat?" Or, better yet, "drenched trench coat?"

Nitpicking aside, my biggest issue with this piece was how you used your dialogue tags. I don't have the problem with the grammar of your dialogue tags. That's fine. It's this I have an issue with.

"Yes and what do you want old man?" I asked (with irritation).

See the part I put in parentheses? At this point in your story the reader understands that the narrator isn't in the best mood. More still, the character's diction reinforces her attitude about her situation. The "with irritation" isn't necessary because we, the readers, already know that this character is irritated from the context you've established.

This happens a few times with the conversation, so it strikes me as a bit repetitive. I'd suggest rereading this piece and asking yourself, "What have I already established about these characters and their attitude?" Once you have the answer to that look at your dialogue tags and say, "Is there anything I put here that I already contextualized earlier?" This will draw less attention to your words and will allow your characters to speak through their thoughts, diction, and actions. Showing instead of telling, as it were.

And seeing as you're new to YWS I might as well give you some tips on how to format your stories when you post on this site. From what I've experienced as a reviewer on this site, most authors do not intent their paragraphs. Instead they put a space between each paragraph. This isn't a set rule, but it does help if you want to make your work easier to read.

I hope this helps. You're welcome to contact me with any questions or comments.

--Dover