Falling into Darkness [Weight of the World - Prologue]

Good Morning/Afternoon/Evening/Night(whichever one it is in your part of the world),

Hi! I'm here to leave a quick review!!

Anyway let's get right to it,

The demonic voices ring through my head. Give in. Give up. They whisper to me sweetly.

Tears spring into my eyes and I bite my lip. I sink against the wall and break the ferocious grip on my left hand. The knife clatters to the floor.

It’s easier than you think. The voices tell me.

I know that. I know it’s easy to let it all go.

I just don’t know when I’m going to do it. I realize rhat I’m ready to let life slip away, I'm just unsure of when when I want to give up on everything.

The voices are trying to win again.

Okayyy, well even by the standards of a prologue, we have ourselves a rather short piece right here, although I daresay the most surprising part of that happens to be that it still somehow manages to sort of work, as shortened as this manages to be here. It is quite an intriguing choice here. At any rate, let me dive into the actual content here.

We have what seems to be a person struggling against some sort of external force trying to control them and there's a very intriguing ambiguity to things here. For one, we have sort of a feeling that this voice or force is something bad with references to the whole demon thing but then the situation with the knife seems to suggest a possible good direction and so this is all setting itself up in a very intriguing way here.

At any rate, I think overall, this all comes together very nicely to create a prologue that despite its rather small size always keeps you guessing as to what could possibly be going on and that ultimately means as a reader you really want to know what happens next here.

Aaaaand that's it for this one.

As always remember to take what you think was helpful and forget the rest.

Stay Safe
Harry

Comments in red.

RedRaven wrote:The demonic voices ring through my head. Give in. Give up. They whisper to me sweetly. I disagree with the first reviewer. Sweetly is a good choice here. It presents a sort of paradox. Honestly though, this is a very dark beginning and I will be expecting you to maintain this seductively dark tone all throughout the novel. If the rest of the novel isn't so, then I suggest you tone it down a bit.
Tears spring to my eyes and I bite my lip. I sink against the wall and break the ferocious grip Ferocious grip of what? on my left hand. The knife clatters to the floor. Knife? A knife was holding her left hand? Honestly I don't get it. Where did the knife come from?
It’s easier than you think, the voices tell me.
I know that. I know it’s easy to let it all go.
I just don’t know when I’m going to do it. I realize that I’m ready to let life slip away, I'm just unsure of when when I want to give up on everything.

Contradictions abound in that paragraph. If she is ready to let life slip away, then why won't she do it now? If you're ready it usually means you are able to do so on the spot. So if she's not sure when she wants to give up on everything, she's not exactly ready.
The voices are trying to win again.

The writing is good, but when I realized this was about a suicidal girl I was turned off. No, not because she's suicidal. More like it's because I don't know her yet and she's not winning my sympathy by trying to kill herself at once. I need to know, understand, feel her pain. Show me how terrible her life really is. This way I won't turn up my nose when she tries to kill herself.

Also, I don't know - when you mentioned demonic I immediately thought this was paranormal. But now, at the end of the story, I feel like it's just her delusion or something. You might want to clear this up.

My review is made from 100% pure opinion. PM me if you have any questions about it.

Sincerely,

Kara

Hi, I'm Sophie. Comments are in red.

RedRaven wrote:The demonic voices ring through my head. Give in. Give up. They whisper to me sweetly. (I like the first two sentences, but I am not sure 'sweetly' is the right word - it's a word I really don't associate with demons)Tears spring into my eyes and I bite my lip. I sink against the wall and break the ferocious grip on my left hand. (This sentence didn't really make sense to me - it sounds like you're saying breaking someone else's grip on her) The knife clatters to the floor.
It’s easier than you think. The voices tell me.
I know that. I know it’s easy to let it all go.
I just don’t know when I’m going to do it. I realize rhat (typo) I’m ready to let life slip away, I'm just unsure of when when I want to give up on everything.
The voices are trying to win again.(In my opinion this was quite a weak, abrupt ending of what was a very atmospheric piece. You could fix this by adding a bit more 'meat' to the ending.)

I enjoyed this. You don't swap tenses, which is something I know I have problem with. Your images of whats going on in her mind are quite clear, but I don't know what she's doing, where she is. . . I think that would help a lot. It's powerful, quite simple, really, but very effective.
Well done, keep writing!
Sophie