Nate had been called to Luke’s high school to talk to the principle about Luke getting into a fight. As soon as they had been out of sight of the school, Nate had called him over and punched him full in the face. When Luke fell to the ground, Nate had kicked him in the chest and yelled at him a lot.
As though Nate had read his mind, he spoke up in a gruff voice. “So, anyway. You better not get into anymore trouble. I don’t like being interrupted to come and talk to that idiot who runs your school about your problems. I know you have problems, I know you’re a useless lump. I don’t need him to tell me that.”
“I didn’t want to fight, Dad!” Luke snapped. “I was just sitting on the table reading and a bunch of guys came up to me and started taunting me. I tried to ignore him, but he hit me. I didn’t have any choice!”
“You should have run.” Nate said, a cruel smirk on his face.
“I would’ve looked like a coward.” Luke argued back
“You are a coward! Why try to hide it? No wonder kids pick on you. You’re weak. You’re a target. If you’re a crappy fighter, you just have to hide. I used to be just like you, a pathetic fool. Then I got tougher and you know what I did to those kids who were mean to me?”
“What?” Luke muttered, rolling his eyes when Nate wasn’t lookingPoints:
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137,435 Literary Works • 672,020 Reviews
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: This is a pretty good start here I think. Definitely the sort of thing that can totally catch your attention as a first chapter and it does a good job of introducing the two main characters here.
Anyway let's get right to it,
Okay...well that's an interesting start here. Looks like we have a not so gentle father here and a son who is just trying to survive the consequences of all of that as his father seems to be rapidly getting more and more mad at something. Definitely a pretty intriguing start here, well let's see where this one takes us.
Okay...well, that sort of sums up the reasons behind the father's anger rather well and you can understand him being a bit annoyed but of course the other bits of context suggest that father doesn't really care for the son at all and is just annoyed for different reasons. The way that Luke her gets treated definitely does not seem very healthy there, his father's strictness seems to definitely be off the charts here.
Okay...well this is some very bad advice being liberally given out there. I guess the father is pretty much useless as far as being a father figure goes if that is the sort of advice that is being given out...well, it all does end up making for a very intriguing start at any rate.
Well this makes for a pretty fitting ending for what this chapter has been upto this point. I think it definitely works at any rate...and well, it's surprising and does manage to sort of hook you as a reader I think.
Aaaaand that's it for this one.
Overall: Overall, this is a fairly solid start to this piece here. I certainly think it works out quite well here. I would probably read another part of this having seen this as the first chapter.
As always remember to take what you think was helpful and forget the rest.
Stay Safe
Harry
Hey there, Malefica,
Okay, so this is an interesting introduction to a couple of characters - and that's good, that's what first chapters are for. However, there are a few things I'd like to suggest for improving this piece.
Firstly, on characters. Since this piece doesn't have an awful lot of action in, it's important to give the reader a good feel for the characters, and get the reader to care about them. From reading this, I get that Luke is the sympathetic character, and Nate is the unsympathetic one - a blatantly abusive father. However, I don't know much more about them. For example, when Nate punches Luke - what is Luke thinking about this? How does he react? Was he ready for the punch, so he rolled with it? Does he cringe away from it? Or stand steady and face it? The answers to questions like this will tell us something about Luke - he's grown up with Nate, so does he usually fight back against his father, or submit to the abuse in the hope it ends quickly?
Next, dialogue. You've got quite a lot of dialogue in here, and it's pretty good for the most part. In general, to get your dialogue just right, read it aloud. It's meant to be something that's said - so say it, and if it doesn't sound right when it's said aloud, it won't sound quite right in the reader's mind, either. Also, remember to start a new line when a new person speaks - you've missed the newline in the first paragraph, for example.
Finally, just a bit of a nitpick - be careful with words that sound similar to each other. The person in charge of a high school is the principal; principle is the other kind.
Please feel free to message me if you have any questions about things I've said. Happy writing!
Cadi x