- This is the prologue. There's nothing really romantic about the beginning but this was the best category it fit in.
BLAIRE LAKE
It was 5:30 a.m. and Marianne White was sitting up in her bed, wide awake. Dawn was lighting up the horizon over Blaire Lake. She could see the deep blue water through her bay window with its heavy ivory silk drapes. A light breeze was floating through the open hatch in the window pane. In the willow outside of her bedroom you could hear a swallow singing to the sunrise. Marianne had had that awful dream again, the one where the girl was drowning. The dream always started with a young woman around seventeen, Marianne's age, dressed in a white taffeta gown and a matching bonnet. The girl was walking on a pier over Blaire Lake, that was closed down because the wood was rotten. She knew it was unsafe but she liked danger. A young man walked beside her, his gray wool coat bundled around him. They were walking together, arms interlaced. Around them the lake was covered by gray fog making it almost impossible to see the water. Then one of the wooden planks gave out underneath the girls weight and she tripped into the dark waters below. The boy tried to catch her waist but his fingers only gripped foggy air. The girl cried out, flailing her arms to grasp the boy's outstretched hand. But she couldn't swim since her thick gown was so heavy, soaked full of water. It had been foolish of her to risk walking on the damp and rotten wood anyway and now it was too late. She let out one more strangled gasp as the freezing current pulled her under the surface into the black depths. Just as she went under the boy sprung after her, yelling her name in despair,
"Blaire, Blaire!" Little bubbles floated to the surface. He dove after her rapidly sinking body. Even though he knew it was to late and he didn't have much air left, he dove on. If she was dead, he'd die for her, at least he'd try to. And that was how the dream ended. Marianne always woke up with her body shuddering. She didn't understand why she kept dreaming that terrible dream, it was, as if someone was trying to tell her something, but what? Marianne shook her head. But what scared her most was that the girl in the dream looked exactly like her.
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125,012 Literary Works • 672,842 Reviews
Welcome to Young Writer's Society Madeline! (See, see, I'm writing out the site's full name as a sign of well... thoughtfulness!I'm quite sure you know its full name though and are currently finding this very offensive as my comment seems to be making a mockery of your intellect, which it's not by the way!
Yes well, just to let you know, I'm not going to be really bothering about the grammar and punctuation and such as I usually concentrate more one the content, characterization. plot, etc, etc.
Now, before I get a little more in depth, I'd like to point out a few things.
The story is a little bit too compact. I suggest that you add more paragraphing as to make it a lot more easier to read (I personally prefer writing that is a little bit more spaced out because, whether or not it's a 10,000 word story or a 500 word story, compact writing makes my head go haywire and more often than not, forget where I'm up to whenever I take a little break).
And I kind of lied when I said I wouldn't be bothering with grammar (technically, it's not really grammar as it's actually nitpicking about the wording but I tend to generalize many things). I'll only be giving a few examples to get the point across.
Now, for characterization. *Pauses* I'm not really sure how to go about this as I don't have very much to work with but I'll try my best. Marianne, I find is just kind of...there. Sure, she's telling us about her dream and what not, but I can't really see much of her personality coming through. Remember, it doesn't need to be written in first person to show a person's character (the way I see it, first person is basically a story written with the main character's name replaced with an 'I'). You can possibly improve this by giving your character some input into the story she's telling, make her comment on things, maybe she thinks Blaire's gown is stupid, maybe she thinks it's wonderful, may be she thinks the guy looks like a creep, maybe not. You can use this method to give the reader more insight into the main character's mind/thought process.
Overall, this story is promising. The grammar and wording is a little wonky here and there (don't ask me about spelling, I'm abysmal at it), and the character needs a little bit more work (you can disregard this as me attempting to over-analyze things because right now, I'm only judging this from the little bit of writing I've been given) but the story holds a lot of promise. Keep up the good work!
Welcome to YWS, Madeline...I have a feeling that you'll like it here!
Okay. You should either add an 'and' there, or you should break this sentence into two sentences.First off, I have a question. So is this chapter one? A prologue? What exactly is it? You must specify that.
About 96% of the nitpicks I will point out will be comma problems! Those are minor, but they must be fixed. Yes, commas are great, but you don't want to overuse them! You generally add unneeded commas to your sentences, and in some cases, need to break a sentence into two pieces instead of adding just another comma. I will highlight all unneeded commas/commas that are causing problems.
So let's get started.
Nitpicks:
Don't need that comma.
Don't need that comma.
'Bundled around him'? I don't understand. Change that comma into a period.
Change that comma into a period...break this into two sentences. The second sentence could start with 'then', since 'when' doesn't work with the sentence well.
You should say 'flailing her arms in an attempt to grasp the boy's outstretched hand'. You need an apostrophe in 'boys'.
Possibly you could say 'since' instead of 'and'.
Don't need that comma.
Capitalize 'little'. Break the second sentence into two.
Should be 'too'. You should say something like 'Even though he knew it was too late and he didn't have much air left, he dove on.'
Don't need 'die'.
Change that comma into a period. I think it would be better if you said 'with her body shuddering'.
Overall:
Except for the comma problems, this was fairly well written. This chapter/prologue left me in a place wanting for more, wondering what is next, which made this strong. You have a great start to your story! Keep up the good work! Hope I helped.
~KD