Young Writers Society

Good Morning/Afternoon/Evening/Night(whichever one it is in your part of the world),

Hi! I'm here to leave a quick review!!

First Impression: OKayy...this has some pretty good vibes working for it at the start here. I have to say I already adore this protagonist. That personality is just something I love to see and in first person it works extremely well. And I'm loving the vibes of an impending apocalypse too.

Anyway let's get right to it,

Today’s the day. I’m finally going to get these train tracks out of my mouth.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to drive you there?”

My mom offered to take me to the Dentist this morning but I feel like my braces coming off is my first taste of independence. No pun intended. So I wanted to experience this for myself and go alone.

“No, I’ll be fine”.

“There’s a warning on the news about -“

“It’s fine, I’ll miss the bus!” I said cutting her off and running out of the house. I can’t wait.

I’ve always been fascinated by dentists. I considered becoming one until I realised that I couldn’t make retching noises at the sight of people’s teeth all the time. But how else would they know how gross their teeth really are. Maybe then they’d actually do something about it. But I suppose for their business to run they need the gross teeth people. So I guess it’s a necessary yet unfortunate cycle.

Okay...well I have to say this is perhaps the only time I've seen a story start with a dentist's visit on YWS and I have read a lot of these...xD Well it certainly takes you a bit by surprise here, and even though the visit itself seems fairly mundane the personality of this character here really draws us in as readers.

My bus is here.

Weird, there was no one on the bus today, it’s usually cramped and filled with old ladies and men who all seem to know each other or rowdy teens who think the bus is their second home. It’s like having my own first class driving service!

I ran to the back of the bus and took one last look at my braces in the window reflection. “Finally, I’ll have one of those Hollywood smiles”, I thought.

But on my way to the Dentist, I looked outside the window, and things looked... different. Where are all the kids at the park? Must be the weather I guess, this rain and wind isn’t the most inviting.

Okay...I sense a slight tension in the air. There's just a slight shift in the air here and I get the distinct feeling that something isn't quite right here. Mixed in with this protagonists general outlook in life it slides into the background, but I'm really loving this sense of impending doom.

I jumped out marching to the Dental building. Sprinting even. But when I got there my heart dropped and my world was turned upside down. Written in big letters outside the door was “PERMANENTLY CLOSED”.

I saw a man coming out of the building holding some boxes of what looked to be surgical instruments and remnants of rotten teeth.

“Look, I have an appointment letter here to get my braces off!” I said frantically

He looked up wearily and said “This place won’t be open for a while, kid.”

“But it has to be! You don’t know how long I’ve been waiting for this! I desperately pleaded.

“Sorry kid, but there’s nothing I can do for you.”

Hmm, well that's certainly devastating. Impeding doom levels are rising fast now and I get the distinct feeling that something horrible has happened somewhere and our protagonist and his family is one of the few that somehow have no idea about what's going on.

He said before walking away.

I was so devastated. This was the worst news I’d gotten since the news of my goldfish Pete running away. But that’s a different story for a different day.

I turned around and the streets looked real deserted, almost like one of those country western movies. Except this wasn’t the countryside and certainly not the West.

As the wind was blowing a newspaper swept across my feet with the word “Apocalypse”, in big writing.

I began to run home.

Ohhh...well...that's quite something. Apocalypses are always entertaining especially when we have a main character like this who clearly has his priorities straight here. Well, this is quite some ending here, I think it works wonderfully with that title.

Aaaaand that's it for this one.

Overall: Overall, this looks to be a really solid opening piece here. I think you've done a really good job of bringing across this protagonist personality which is very likeable at least to be and there is more than enough mystery to make us want to find out more here.

As always remember to take what you think was helpful and forget the rest.

Stay Safe
Harry

Andrew here with a review. Haha, loooove the concept, and it'll be fun to see a post-apocalypse book written in this whimsical style. The writing style is easy to read, and seems very, chill, almost as if a friend is just mentioning the details to you. My biggest complaint overall is that it feels a bit rushed and unedited. Like you're kinda just making it up as you go with little actual thought or detail. That's great for a first draft, but to really bring your story to the next level, I'd advise editing to sound more professional and interjecting some more details. I understand that you don't want it to sound professional in the sense that it feels like a legal document, but you do want it to sound like it was written by someone who knew what they were doing. As an author, your job is to get the story into my head as naturally as possible, and right now it feels a little too fast. If you know what I mean.
On that track, it seems your story is both written in the present and past tense, which can really gum up the works of reading it, so I'd advise picking one and sticking too it.
I also like the whimsical style of the apocalypse, feels kinda cartoony, and if well handled, that could be really entertaining.

But into specifics!

Today’s the day. I’m finally going to get these train tracks out of my mouth.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to drive you there?”

My mom offered to take me to the Dentist this morning but I feel like my braces coming off is my first taste of independence. No pun intended. So I wanted to experience this for myself and go alone.

“No, I’ll be fine”.

“There’s a warning on the news about -“

“It’s fine, I’ll miss the bus!” I said cutting her off and running out of the house. I can’t wait.

Like this exchange almost feels like it's floating, it would be nice to have some more dialogue tags, descriptions, and context. Where are they having this conversation? What's mom look and act like? etc etc.

I’ve always been fascinated by dentists. I considered becoming one until I realised that I couldn’t make retching noises at the sight of people’s teeth all the time. But how else would they know how gross their teeth really are. Maybe then they’d actually do something about it. But I suppose for their business to run they need the gross teeth people. So I guess it’s a necessary yet unfortunate cycle.

Funny little train of thought here, the emboldened part is entertaining, but I kinda tripped up on it, so I'd advise editing the wording to be more clear and less run on sentecy, or that might have just been me.

My bus is here.

Weird, there was no one on the bus today, it’s usually cramped and filled with old ladies and men who all seem to know each other or rowdy teens who think the bus is their second home. It’s like having my own first class driving service!

Here's an example of the two different tenses, is, and was disagree.

The old rusty bus came to a screeching holt.

Did you mean halt?

I jumped out marching to the Dental building. Sprinting even. But when I got there my heart dropped and my world was turned upside down. Written in big letters outside the door was “PERMANENTLY CLOSED”.

Reminds me of covid

“But it has to be! You don’t know how long I’ve been waiting for this!(") I desperately pleaded.

You need to close this quote with a quotation mark right there
So yeah, fun, just needs some editing. Break down some of those run-on sentences, and add some context.
But that's all just my two cents! Hope it helped!
I like stories with narrators who have personality, so I could see myself enjoying this a lot.
Thanks, and keep writing,
Andrew