Ch.1 Rio Grande do Norte, Jan 12
An undead mailman his uniform blood socked and ripped, grabbed up at the teen sitting on the roof of a large semi. It was reaching barley reaching his feet as he waited for the rest of his crew. He watched the fleshing craving monster kicking its hand every once in a while.
The bridge was voided of all life except for John and the zombie mail man. Below the bridge was another story as the zombies chased riley, John’s germen shepherded. Riley would wait letting them get close and run away at the last second, she was a smart dog never getting caught she had been trained by the united states military.
The dog had belonged to John’s father and had come home with him from the Middle East. When the first zombies rose the two had been in the house, watching TV. His neighbor almost ripped off his head after busting through the bedroom window.
They had with his dad in Iran and his mom dead a week after the start, gone across country surviving by skin on his back. Few years back he had ended up in Brazil it was horribly long story. In short he had ended up just being one of the scavenging runts that littered the land.
He saw riley running towards him with a dasher trying to keep up, John smiled as she barked at him. He picked up the bat behind him and crushed the head of the zombie below him. He jumped down and waited for riley to come running by.
She yelped joyfully as she passed John the dasher close behind. He swung nocking it back and waited for it to stand. It stumbled up and towards him a large dent in its side.
John laughed “come on batter, batter.” He swung again hitting it square in the head sending its jaw flying the rest smashed to the ground.
Riley whimpered disappointed at the outcome of her new playmate, “sorry girl you’ll find another, there’s always another one of these dang things.” The two climbed back on the truck were they continued to wait.
He began to worry as the sunset the others weren’t back yet and they needed to get going. Zombies got more aggressive at night and John didn’t want to deal with the night owls, they were much bigger and faster. John didn’t doubt his ability to outrun one but he didn’t know about riley, she usually could keep up when they were on the ground and in the junk district she could get over the roofs on her own pretty easily. But today they were in the financial district and her back handle wasn’t going to help it would jest ruin them.
Then he saw them Wong, Lilith and Brian running towards them, his scavenger team and his best friends. He had met them after he got Rio Grande do Norte, he lived with Brian’s family a short wiry kid who was pretty fast. Lilith was their beat up the zoms specialist and was a banker’s daughter from Africa, and Wong was kind of like Brian but taller.
John stood up nudging riley from her snooze, he jumped down and watched as they got closer. Wong who wasn’t a good runner stopped and bent over from exhaustion. “Were have you guys been.”
Lilith strode up to him and face palmed john “the mall was not empty idiot it was far from empty, we were there thirteen minuets and we were almost over run.” Anger filled her eyes, Lilith had a bit of a temper but she was a kind girl who everyone trusted.
John sighed “ok, ok sorry its dash’s fault he gave me the info. Anyway did you at least get some supplies?” Wong raised his bag that held several ration packs and cans, and Brian pulled a 32. Caliber from his pocket.
“Pulled this off a dead solider, has no ammo but it’s in great shape considering the conditions of the place.” He handed it to John.
John turned it in his hands looking it over testing the trigger. “Barrels clogged mud maybe not easy to tell may be a bullet. It’s an easy fix, you plan on selling it.” He handed it back to him.
Brian laughed, “you joking I’m keeping it I’ve never seen one in this condition. The only problems mom.” He leaned against the truck thinking.
Wong stood up panting, “we should get going right.” He was right the sun had almost set they had to get going.
Brian took off, “see you there slow pokes.” Riley barked and took off after, as did Lilith who yelled after him to stop messing around.
John sighed and turned to look at Wong who was strapping his pack on. “There were only like ten don’t worry she’s just mad we didn’t get to the gun store someone was holding out there a month back. Said to have been packing some serious heat.”
John nodded, Wong was one of his best friends though annoying sometimes there was no other he’d have back him up on a scavenging mission. First day in the city he had saved his life and brought him to the towers. A series of apartment complexes, a police station, post office, and small mall that the local survivors had turned into a safe haven.
It wasn’t the only town out here there was Eilenberg, the church of Lazarus, and a few other towns and safe houses scattered around. Then there was the elusive Potiguar tribe, who live in the nearby mountains, they trusted few and were rumored to be cannibals. John truly doubted it.
Wong started jogging towards the tower, “come on let’s catch up before we lose them.” They took off after their two friends.
But below they were watched by two figures both cloaked, their face covered by a gas mask “well Mea Hoste.” They looked at each other.
“I’m not sure Qui Autem Graditur I think I’ll go to town and do some close up investigation, if I find your results conclusive we may proceed but until then return and wait.” They bowed to each other. They walked in opposite directions grabbing the cart they had left standing.
Mea Hoste contemplated what he was told, could it be true, he hoped so, he could only hope. A zombie walked up slowly, moaning like death its self which it was. “Remitte mihi frater, this is for my wellbeing.” His arm thrust out ripping through the flesh and skull killing it instantly. “Nunc autem requiem saecula.” He turned back to his cart and continued to head the direction John and his friends had run.
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125,018 Literary Works • 672,857 Reviews
Hola Jpwriter =) FallWolf here for a review
Okay, disclaimer, I am not always into the zombie-genre. sure, I have watched I Am Legend and love it, but usually I find zombie movies to be too gruesome for my sensitive self (=P) and zombie books too... just too much everything. However, this story is interesting. I was just sort of running through it, but when I got to the end my eyes perked up. He Walks and My Host (ran them through google translate, so hopefully those are correct) suddenly appear and my interest is now piqued!
Okey dokey, now for the actual review =P
"It was reaching barley reaching his feet..." I think you have an extra reaching in there?
There is a couple grammar mistakes, but nothing a read-through won't fix =) And even though it's a bit weird, reading or even whispering your story out loud can make a huge difference when trying to spot both grammar mistakes, forgotten words, etc. I found this out while reading some of my works to my mom, and it really does work! When people read just in their mind, they tend to only look at the shape of the word and the first letter. Because of this, mistakes can be very easily looked over when proof-reading in your head.
Other than that though, this is a pretty good story start! As I said before, I really like the ending with the hint of something more exciting than just some zombies =) The only other thing I would suggest would be a little more description. Reader's are gonna be really interested to see the scenery, and since it is probably very different than our world it could use some extra attention. I learned a trick that's pretty cool and makes for short, unique descriptions: focus on the little things instead of the big picture, and on the unusual things. For example, focus instead on a rusty truck rather than the whole broken city, or like in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, (the movie, not the book) when showing in a flashback about Smaug the dragon first coming and destroying the city, it focuses on a burning doll at one point. Small things are easier to comprehend and shoot the point home better than the large picture.
Well, that's all for now =) Looking forward to reading more of your work in the future!
-FallWolf
thanks wolf you've been a great help to me and I will tell you mea hoste you got wrong its Latin, the other guy was close enough but thanks your going to be very interested by what happens so please keep reading
Timmy hereee
I love how imaginative you are - how diverse your writing is. You're writing an obvious fantasy that I'm reviewing... and yet, here you are, proving you can write just as well in a very different genre. I love how realistic you make this sound, too. c:
Now I'm going to be honest. This piece needs quite a bit of work in order to make it unique, because as I'm reading through this, I'm noticing so much that makes it too similar to other stories. If you've ever watched I am Legend, you'll know exactly what I mean when I say that... because there are far too many things that are similar between the two. A few of the many similarities I noticed are that 1) there's a German Shepard in both, 2) Zombies, and the zombies don't like the day time. The biggest issue that I see are the zombies. They're too... normal. When I read through this, they seemed like the Zombies I see/read about in every. single. book. Do something no other writer or movie has ever done - make them unique. Because they are truly the biggest cliché in today's writing, in my opinion, so if you're going to use them, you have to make them something different, something unique. Work on personalizing them and making them yours, and this book will be even more wonderful.
Keep working on that punctuation, too. You'll get there eventually, where your pieces are pristine... but only if you continue editing and learning as you go along! Remember: editing is super important, especially at this stage. It's not even so other people can read your pieces with ease, but more so that you have that mental image in your mind of what's right and wrong when it comes to that.
The sentence above is a reason alone to work on your punctuation, my friend! It's basically unreadable - a run-on that a reader cannot follow because the lack of punctuation makes it so disjointed.
Period after tower
I think you could have done a better job introducing the characters at the ending - the two with the gas masks on. Not only did I feel that part super rushed, but also they confused me. We were with the other characters... and then boom - we're someplace else. If you're going to do that, you need to ease into a transition there (a split in the book works quite well). Also, more description of the characters would do wonders introducing them, because at this point all I see are two shadowy people wearing gas masks, and that doesn't feel like enough to me. They seem important and super dangerous, but then at the same time, there's not enough information given about them for me to have a clear picture on that. Just something for you to think about when writing future chapters~
All in all, while I'm a tad confused here because it feels like we're in the middle of something, I'm intrigued and I find myself liking the characters and their bravery. The area around them and the story you're submerging us into is also amazing! <3 I'm going to enjoy this quite a bit, I think. It's hinting at an amazing story that'll unfold in time. c:
~Darth Timmyjake
To start I'm trying to not give you to much yet you will get more later. Also if you want more on my cloaked goons take their names through Google translate and you'll be very interested. There will be more that takes this apart from other stories but just wait what you see right now is only a very big beginning just wait
Wow, I like the beginning of your story, and I think it's interesting!
Ok then, I'm here to review. (I'm not really good at that, but I'll try my best.)
At the start of your story you mentioned a zombie mailman; the way you mentioned his appearance it great, but I got a little confused when I was reading those lines.
"An undead mailman his uniform blood socked and ripped, grabbed up at the teen sitting on the roof of a large semi. It was reaching barley reaching his feet as he waited for the rest of his crew."
I changed this a bit,
"The undead mailman with a blood soaked and ripped uniform grabbed up at the teen sitting on the roof of the large semi. It was barely reaching the teens feet who was waiting for the rest of his crew."
Now the paragraph is much clear. You can use 'the' instead of 'it' because there is only one zombie mailman in the scene. And there were a few small spelling errors, like socked and barley. I corrected them in the paragraph I've written above.
"The bridge was voided of all life except for John and the zombie mail man."
This sentence is a little confusing, the zombie, is undead; which is much like he's between life and death or something. So using the word 'life' in the above sentence is a little confusing. (Maybe it's just my bad.)
"Below the bridge was another story as the zombies chased riley, John’s germen shepherded."
Maybe you could use "Below the bridge was another story," You can pause there and then write "Zombies were chasing Riley; John's German Shepard.
That way there is a flow in the story.
You've described the actions and skills of the dog pretty well. My suggestion is, you could describe the physical nature of the dog a well. then the reader could build up a mental picture in his/her mind.
Ok, these are a few tips that would be useful for you (Well, I'm not exactly sure, but I hope they'll help you to make your story much better; note it's already pretty cool!;) )
*Try to introduce the characters and make them unique.
I mean you don't have to, well you know say 'Hi I'm John' and so on, but you could describe them using dialogue and other tactics. Does he have unique features? is he brave or cowardly? Is he tall and thin? You can answer all that questions when you're describing your character.
*Have a pause between sentences which tells about two incidents or things.
For example,
"He began to worry as the sunset the others weren’t back yet and they needed to get going."
The above sentence seems a bit mixed up.
You could write is like this,
"He began to worry as he stared at the setting sun; his friends weren't back yet and they needed to get going."
Now, even though you write the two incidents separately without using 'as' the reader could see a connection between them.
*When writing dialogue try using commas and semicolons to separate sentences.
For example'
“There were only like ten don’t worry she’s just mad we didn’t get to the gun store someone was holding out there a month back. Said to have been packing some serious heat.”
The readers get a little confused when they're reading the first line, try writing is like this,
"There were only like ten, but don't worry she's just mad because we didn't reach the gun store someone was holding there a month ago."
See, there is a pause in each sentence enabling the reader to gather the facts methodically.
Ok, this is long; most probably the longest one I've written, but I hope it helps you.
I like to see where this story is heading. And I like to know more about John and his friends (And of course Riley; I love energetic dogs!)
Good JOb and keep on writing!!
thanks and welcome to yws I see what your talking about thanks I glad you like it