CHAPTER ONE
I ran in the pouring rain toward my house from the bus stop. It was a block down, lightning was flashing and thunder was booming as I got closer. I reached the iron gate, yanked it open and ran up the pebbled path that led to the front porch. Trees surrounded the white house with their long leafless branches. Reached the porch steps, I opened the front door, took off my wet bag and jacket and dropped them to the right of the door and walked to the kitchen door.
To the left of the doorway was the entrance to the kitchen and to the right of the doorway was the entrance to the living room and in front of the doorway was the stairs to a few rooms upstairs like my mom's bedroom, my bedroom, and my little sister's. I walked to the kitchen swiftly to see if my mom was here. As I opened the kitchen door open, as I suspected my mom was here. She was wearing her polo shirt and jeans. She must have just gotten home from teaching mentally disabled kids.
"Hi mom. What's that for?" She had a big basket full of fruit and cookies. "Hi Mary my darling, I was just packing some stuff for a picnic in the back yard. Will you get Sara from her room please."
I hesitated for a moment. "But mom it’s raining outside." She looked at me as if I was crazy. "No darling, it’s not raining just look for yourself." I did as she said and I gasped, It was sunny and not a single drop of water anywhere. I walked upstairs puzzled to get my sister.
I had gotten my sister down stairs and we all had gotten ready to go on the picnic, we walked outside and sat down where the trees loomed. It was creepy how it was pouring down raining but now its sunshine and rainbows. Deciding to let it go, we started to unpack the picnic basket.
Once we had enough to eat, Mom said "Let’s go on a walk, It should be lovely in the forest. Mary will you put the basket on the kitchen counter please." I grabbed the basket and said over my shoulder "Hey mom, You and Sara go ahead I'll catch up. I went inside and put the basket on the granite counter top. Wondering for a moment if I should grab a drink from the fridge, but decided not and went outside to catch up with them.
CHAPTER TWO
Screams. Screams were all I heard. Screams and a cry of pain and fear.
My heart thumped as I raced Through the forest trail toward the sounds. They were my Mother's and sister's screams. I burst through the trees were a clearing was and saw a creature on top of my mom. My sister was screaming in a tree throwing pine cones and sticks at the creature. The creature was jet black and was shaped like a human from waist above. Waist below was see through like black misty legs. It was on both misty knees and it’s hands were on my mom shoulders keeping her down. I could see mom bleeding from a cut on her arm. She paid no attention to the oozing cut and kept on screaming. "Mom, I'm coming!" I yelled. The creature snapped its head up as if it just realized I was there. It turned its face toward me. Gasping in surprise, I saw that it had no face. The only thing there was a mouth. It lifted its hand in a swift movement towards me and I suddenly flew back into a tree. My head banged against a rock and pain sliced through my head. Sara screamed with shock. Warm liquid seeped into my hair. I looked towards Mom to see that the creature was on her again, But she did not scream. Her face was white and her face full of fear. Her eyes was locked on the creature's face. "MOM!" I yelled with the last of my strength seeping out. I could not move, all I could was watch as the creature bent down and hovered its lips above hers and took her soul. "MOM!" Sara screamed. Tears dripped down her cheek as she too saw what happened. A final look at my mom limp body under the creature before everything went black.
I woke up on the living room couch. The fireplace was flickering, splashing light on the walls. Still waking from sleep, I looked around. Something told me that I was being watched. Turning my head toward the window next to me, I saw a black wolf. It was huge compared to a normal sized wolf. It was at the edge of the woods starring at me. “ You're probably an Alpha wolf aren’t you.” saying half to myself. It turned and disappeared into the woods behind him. I saw that the hind legs were a faded misty color. “That’s strange” I closed my eyes and drifted off once more not really taking further notice of it. I don’t know how long I ...
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140,703 Literary Works • 673,672 Reviews
Hey there!
It's been about a year since my last review, and over a year since I have written anything, so my review will be rusty, but I came online tonight determined to write someone a review - so here I am. I hope this review is of literary use to you.
The first thing I noticed heading into this was how you wrote actions, or more like, how you moved your character through the scenes. How you go about visualizing the scene and bringing it to life is by precise actions in order - he did this, this, this and then this. Keep in mind that some actions are implied, like closing a door behind the character (unless the character leaving the door open is a prompt to another part of the scene). Placement of objects also don't matter in most cases. When the character dropped their jacket and backpack "on the right side of the door", a simple "dropped jacket and whatever else" would have sufficed. Something to remember: bring your readers attention to what matters, and off the superfluous things and actions in a story that happen. Only Herman Melville could get away with that.
Why are the chapters so short? This is what I'm seeing in the chapters, which are shorter than normally seen. They're complete - in entirety. You have an entire chapter encompassed in the short sections you've designated as your chapters. A chapter can be thought of as a book within a book, a complete thought. So, in essence, a book is a compilation of books - many stories that are interconnected and encompassed within a larger idea. If that makes sense? You have a good sense of where to end your chapters, but you need to expand upon the ideas you have here and make more of a scene out of them rather than a screenshot or quick pass-over.
What you have here are two complete sentences sandwiched together with no peanut butter or jelly to bring them together! Sorry; I'm hungry.
Was booming is passive voice. Bring this to active voice by changing it to boomed. It's shorter and gives you a stronger and more concise delivery.
This is an info-dump. Rather than just throwing the fact that she teaches mental kids into the story there, it needs to be something that is touched on in a later time and in more depth. Judging from what I know of teachers and also of special needs children, it is no doubt her passion and what she loves, so it's a large part of her. Spending more time on this and expanding upon this at some later point, rather than in the beginning when you should be easing us into this, would be best.
Flickered - keep things in the active voice.
This misty thing needs more elaboration. I love the sound of it, but clarification and visualization of it would bring it to the light and help me see what you mean.
So I will spend a few more moments on the actual plot of the story. What you have here is an exciting idea - I love it. While I don't understand it in entirety because it's like we're flying by at mach speed through this, I see its potential and what you could do with this. It has massive potential. What I would like to see from this is expansion - greater detail and more of an easing into the story than bam! - a rapid succession of speed bumps for us to take in. Slow it down, bring us the characters. We need to see their emotion, feel their pain, and the only way we can do that is by character development and more time spend on them rather than speeding through the book. What you have written here so far should be around fifty pages, in my opinion. What you have here is an idea, and an incredible one at that! Expand and build upon that, and you'll have a fabulous book by the end of your journey.
I hope I was of help! Do continue writing this. Repetition is everything. Write every day if you can, and don't rewrite anything until you've finished your first draft.
~Darth Timmyjake
The reason why I did short chapters is because its a rought draft for now.
Heya, Lovestone! Casanova here to do a review!
Alright, when I first clicked this I was expecting a long chapter. Not five extremely short chapters. I would suggest lengthening them and separating them- or perhaps make this a short story. Either way would be fine with me. Anyway, on to the next thing.
What needs to be edited.. Well, to be honest you really don't have much here. It seems like the plot is somewhat there, but it's lacking in spark. In flare. Mess around with ideas and try to lengthen the plot, and make it somewhat suspenseful. I think this could benefit from it, and might make it actually interesting to read.
The character description is alright. But, and I usually don't say this, you have a lack of dialogue. You're having characters mingle together, but there's not really any dialogue. What would someone say/do in a position such as this? I think there would be somewhat of a reply to,"The thing that killed mom, it's here." Anyway, on to the next point.
Paragraph breaking. Break the paragraph at the dialogue, just so it looks neater and is better. This paragraph here-
Can be broken in a couple of places. And if there's a different character speaking, always break.
Anyway, I think that's all I have to say on this one. Hope it helped.
Keep on doing what you're doing, and keep on keeping on.
Sincerely, Matthew Casanova Aaron
I liked the plot. It seemed original, and I do want to know what happens. But the writing needs work.
First, there were a lot of typos and grammar problems. Second, the phrase 'mental kids' is dated and offensive--sorry, I'm a disability rights advocate and that's important to me. Maybe 'mentally ill' or 'mentally disabled' kids would sound better? Finally, I think that, with proper transitions, this could be one 'chapter' and you wouldn't need to break it into short sections.
Keep writing! I hope I wasn't too harsh; you have a good idea here.