The Snow: Chapter 1

Right - onto the overall review!

I think you have a good premise for your novel here; the unending winter is a bit reminiscent of CS Lewis which I love. The speed at which the plot is developing is quite solid although there are definitely bits you skimmed over that could be expanded upon (which I'll go into detail with later) but overall I feel that the pacing was just right to keep your reader interested. Now onto the things I think could do with a little improvement

1. Your characters.
This is chapter one of your novel right? That means this is the first point your reader gets any contact with your characters protagonist or otherwise and a connection to them is vital to ensure they keep reading. I feel like we don't get much of an insight into your characters thought processes or feelings at any given time. I'm not even sure if the character is male or female as Alexy could be Alex or Alexandra (for the purposes of this I'm going to assume male). A physical description isn't needed by any means but some more exploration could be useful. From the maths I've worked out that he is nineteen so why would he never have been out with his brother to get supplies. I'm guessing that there is an underlying reason that is going to be explained later on but with the fact that he suddenly decides to go it just gives the idea he has been being pathetic up until this point.

2. The setting.
I understand that these two characters live together in the snow, but it's unclear as to whether there are others like them or they are the only civilisation they are aware of. When Alexy references seeing the dress in a history book I got the idea that he had been schooled to a certain degree but later on when he said he hadn't seen a female since the age of six I got the impression it was just the two of them... unless they live in a male society? I think this needs to be clearer.

3. Monsters.
This is kind of related to my last point but the monster introduction was a little too blasé. Your characters just seemed to accept that there were monsters - identifying them as monsters rather than creatures or strange things they did not recognise - which begs the question: Are monsters a frequent incident in the world they live in? Either way, I think this needs more explanation.

4.Jumping to conclusions.
I don't know about you, but if I saw a girl sleeping in the only green place in miles of snow I wouldn't automatically assume she was the reason it was green. Your characters seem far too quick to jump to conclusions - especially if their conclusions are right! It takes away some of the mystery of the plot.

5.The ending.
Why on earth are they laughing at her? This girl has been asleep outside for goodness knows how long, they've just rescued her from monsters and she's potentially discovered the world she thought was safe is in fact covered in ice. Surely she's justified in crying?

That's pretty much my thoughts after reading this chapter - I hope you've found them useful. Feel free to PM me or post on my wall if you have any questions about what I meant
Happy writing!
Icy.

Hey, Icy here for a review! It's been a while since I've reviewed something so I apologise if I'm a little out of practice. I'll start off with grammar/nitpicks and then do another section for general plot development and characters etc.


The snow outside fluttered peacefully to the ground (semi colon here because these two can exist as separate sentences) it was that time of day again. (Not sure if I would start a new sentence here because it doesn’t flow quite right. Maybe you could put the part before the semi colon in the first sentence on its own and then combine the later part with this next sentence?) The time when the blizzards would stop and it would be safe to go outside, though it was still freezing out there. Most people had taken shelter inside abandoned (Just changed to the correct form of the word here) houses or wherever the snow couldn’t reach. Some people even went to the dwarves, begging to be let into their underground city; )Semi colon or new sentence needed here) I wonder how that worked out… (Not sure this gives the impact you intended and it feels a little forced. Maybe try playing around with the structure here to see if anything works better? However most people simply froze to death, caught it the wintery blast that erupted at the beginning of the storm, fossilized in eternal fear.
(New paragraph) “Staring at it isn’t going to make it any better you know, (comma rather than full stop) ” My brother stated coldly as he pulled on his gear.
“I know that…” I muttered back, aiming a frown at the dusty wooden floor. He always went out into the cold, searching for food and whatever else he could find, leaving me alone feeling useless. (Seems like this decision is out of the blue. This might have been intentional but I feel like she/he – we don’t know at this point – could have just gone out at any other time. Why now? “Brother… do you think… I want to come with you.” My words were uncertain; I hadn’t been outside since the snow began. Armin looked at me, shock showing on his normally emotionless face. He sat down next to me on the window seat and put his hand to my forehead.
“You feeling okay Alexy? I thought you were afraid of going outside.” The shock was now replaced with a hint of concern; my brother was all I had left in this world. Our parents had been caught in the initial frost blast that had swept over the world, anyone who hadn’t been inside at that point had been frozen instantly. I was only 6 at the time; imagine the horror on my face as I watched my mother die before my very eyes out our front window. Ever since then Armin had made it his duty to protect the both of us from the world’s dangers.
“Yea… I just… it’s been 13 years, I want to go outside, I want to help you.” Armin let out a chuckle and grabbed the extra snow suit from the wardrobe.
“Suit up then, and watch your back, there are still things out there that will attack us. Here take this.” He pulled out an old box adorned with golden vines, it had been fathers… Inside was his silver gun encrusted with the golden seal of the king, like the box it too had golden vines flowing down the barrel and a dark wooden plated handle. “Just aim and shoot, you’ll learn how to use it eventually.” I nodded, acknowledging my brothers words as I quickly pulled the heavy snowsuit on over my clothes. The snow boots were heavy and made my feet feel like lead, but they’d keep me dry and warm. “Let’s head out then.” Armin’s calm and cool demeanor was back as he strapped his sword to his back and thrust open the heavy wooden door. Pounding clumsily against the floor I quickly followed after my brother into the storm, closing the door behind me. The branches on the trees reached up like icy fingers to the grey sky; it was kind of eerie. “Keep an eye out for anything we can eat for food. If it moves, shoot it,” My brother shouted through his scarf, his words greatly muffled, again I nodded.
We walked for a while without finding any signs of life, exhausted from our heavy gear we decided to take a break. “Is it usually this hard to find animals?” I questioned taking a swig of water from the canteen my brother had offered me.
“Yea, most of them are hibernating or dead…” he sighed, leaning up against a tree. “Sometimes I never even find anything…” my brothers words faded to the back of my mind, something else had caught my attention. No more than ten feet away stood a white stag with great antlers; it seemed to glow defiantly against the dull world. Its black eyes were trained on me, my breath was taken away; I’d never seen something so beautiful before. Suddenly I heard the sound of bells tinkling and the stag leapt off away from me, giving me one last look before it vanished out of site. I felt compelled to follow it, and so I did, darting away from my brother as I jumped over fallen debris in my attempt to keep up with it.
New paragraph “Alexy, wait up! Where are you going?” Armin was close behind me, yet his voice sounded so far away, I felt like I could hear birds chirping. When I finally caught up to the stag I was at a loss for words, it was standing in a green clearing by a great tree that actually had leaves on it! (Exclamation mark seems forced) The coldness was gone here; it was warm, to warm for the snow suit. Subconsciously I stripped it off walking lucidly towards the stag. It lowered its head to the ground and that’s when I noticed the girl sleeping by its feet. Her skin was fair (Don’t need the ‘e’) yet at the same time it glowed with warmth (removed the comma here) and her blonde hair was pale, but radiantly gleaming. Her clothes were strange too; she wore a dress I’d only seen in old history books. It looked almost like a short kimono with purple trims and a matching ribbon around her waist. How had no one ever noticed her here, the lush clearing stood out like a sore thumb against the white world. When I bent down to examine her closer the stag raised its head gracefully and gave me a look that seemed to smile before bouncing off again. “Alexy- woah…” Armin had finally caught up, as astounded as I was. “W-what is this place? How is everything so alive? Is that a girl?” my brother slowly made his way over to me, I could see his black hair sticking to his face; he was warm inside his suit.
“She’s asleep…” it was meant to be a statement but as the words came from my mouth it sounded more like a question.
“Hey, wake up, this isn’t a place to be sleeping, it’s dangerous out here.” Armin grabbed her shoulder and shook her.
“B-brother, careful, you’ll hurt her!” I frowned; he was so strange around people. (I don’t think shaking someone to wake them up is all that strange) . Suddenly monsters materialized from thin air, ugly and twisted like gnarled tree roots. “Damn it! Not good. Alexy grab the girl, get her out of here! Run back to the house, I’ll be right behind you,I promise!” Armin hissed snatching up his sword, with one strike he easily took one out and wounded the others. Not wanting to get caught in the middle I carefully picked up the girl and ran back in the direction of our house, doing my best not to trip over anything. Without my snow suit it was freezing, but the adrenalin pumping through my veins kept me from thinking about it too much. As promised I could hear Armin running behind me stopping every few seconds to attack the monsters again. I could see our house coming into view and a wave of relief washed over me, however it was short lived. I skidded to a stop as another hoard monsters materialized directly in front of me. With the girl in my arms I couldn’t reach my gun, and Armin was still a few paces back taking care of the other two monsters, currently I was a sitting duck.
Suddenly I felt the girl shift in my arms and her hand went up reaching out towards the creature. She muttered something in a language I’d never heard before “lhach…”she whispered and the monsters burst into flames letting out horrid screams before they shattered like glass and disappeared. The girl was limp in my arms again breathing heavily, her skin growing colder. I could be shocked later, but for now I had to get her inside before she froze to death. I hurried up the steps to the door and pushed it open as fast as I could, running into the other room to find blankets. As I placed her down on the bed I heard the door slam, and moments later Armin appeared in the room beside me.
“I’ve never seen so many appear at once like that.” He frowned tossing me a heavy woollen blanket. As he continued to talk I carefully wrapped the strange girl up, shielding her from the cold. “What was with that area? It was completely green and alive! I haven’t seen anything like that since we were kids… do you think it was because of her?” I paused and looked up at my brother, his black hair had fallen over his eye again and for the first time in a while the curiosity on his face made him look like a child. Perhaps it was possible, maybe she did have something to do with it.
“She used magic…or at least that’s what I think it was, she made the demons explode in flames…” I mumbled, I still couldn’t believe it.
“Magic? Impossible! Only the elves could use magic and they’re all gone.”
“Maybe not… she said something in a language I’ve never heard before.”Armin frowned at me before giving the girl a quick glance. If she really was an elf than perhaps through magic she would know a way to end the snow.
“Then it seems she has a lot of questions to answer when she wakes.” My brother let out a heavy sigh as I wrapped the girl in the warm blanket.
We were both on edge that night; I don’t think either of us slept. My brother stayed by the door, keeping a watchful eye on the barren night. I on the other hand stayed with the girl, jumping every time she moved. She was quite beautiful, I hadn’t seen a woman since I was six, so of course I was fascinated by her. Her skin looked warm and full of life, much unlike my dull greyish skin, and even though I had watched her destroy a monster in seconds she looked very fragile, almost like a porcelain doll. “What were you doing out there alone..?” I mumbled, letting my thoughts escape my mind. Almost on queue the girl turned towards me and opened her eyes, gently at first, but when she saw a stranger they shot open. She immediately started shouting things I couldn’t understand, backing so far away from me that she fell off the bed with a loud thud. “M-miss please don’t worry, I-I won’t hurt you!”I stuttered, peering over the bed to look at her. She didn’t seem to understand me however and hummed the first thing she could grab at my head, which thankfully was only a pillow.
“What’s going on!?” Armin shouted bursting into the room as soon as he heard the commotion, sword at the ready.
“S-she woke up…” He looked over at the girl who had another pillow in her hand ready to throw if needed. “I don’t think she understands English…” I frowned as my brother got closer to her.
“You can put the pillow down, you don’t have to be afraid.” He smiled reaching his hand out. However Armin wasn’t very good at smiling, he was actually pretty scary when he smiled, (I feel a description would be better here rather than simply taking the protagonist’s word for it) the girl wacked him with the pillow and ran in my direction. I thought I’d have to grab her, to keep her from running away. I didn’t expect her to run straight towards me, and I most certainly didn’t expect her to kiss me. Her lips were warm and gently against my frozen lips. My first kiss and I was too shocked to even move, it was short lived though; the girl tore away from me seconds later and shoved me to the ground.
“Where am I?” She demanded a hint of fear in her voice. “Where is Valhalla?” She held her hands in front of her and strange runes started to appear. (On her hands? Out in the air? More explanation needed)
“Please, calm down we’re not going to hurt you! You were sleeping out in the snow, we rescued you.” I tried to explain.
“Snow..?” She turned to peer out the window and her eyes went wide, had she not known? Her hands dropped to her sides and the runes faded away.
“The world has been like this for a long time. A wave of frost came from the world tree, turning it and everyone not sheltered to ice.” Armin explained.
The girl looked down at her bare feet, her hair covering her eyes. “Then we were to late…” Sparkling droplets fell to the floor turning the wood floor dark.
“A-are you-“
“I’m not crying!” She sobbed wiping her face with her sleeves. Armin burst out laughing and I couldn’t help but smile too, she was just like a child.
And just like that, our lives changed forever…

That's pretty much all of my nitpicks. Many are little grammar things that can be fixed easily. You may want to look up your rules of speech just to double check you're doing it right and some of your sentence structure is a bit forced. Again, these things can be easily rectified by a quick edit but try not to make a habit of it or you'll have a lot to edit!

Overall review to come

Wow! The idea is very exciting!
I will remind you to start a new paragraph whenever someone begins speaking, and there were a few spots where I think a comma or semi colon would have been necessary, but grammar-wise you're nearly perfect. (Better than most of my classmates)
I hope you will detail the history of this world a bit more in the next chapter, just to fill out the exposition and give the reader a better idea of their world.
You're doing great, and I look forward to the next chapter!