Published June 9, 2011
A.N: This is my first story here and it's based off of a dream I had the night before. I hope it's as interesting to my readers as it is to me. Sorry for the shortness of the prologue, it's just an introduction to how everything started.
A shadowy figure trudged through the rain soaked mud that layered the ground. His face was hidden beneath a dark mask and his body was shrouded in a black cloak. A distant glint of reflected light caught his eye causing him to stop. The man squinted in the half-light trying to find the shining object. A sudden flash of lightning lit up the area just long enough for him to spot a small round object laying in a low crag in a cliff face.
The man veered off his path to investigate. He approached the object with caution, still unsure of what it was. He knelt in the mud to get a better look and his breath caught in his throat when he realized what it was. An Epsilon egg.
With trembling hands the man gingerly pulled the egg out of the crag. Even in the dim light it radiated the most brilliant hues of reds and blues and greens. Any color the human mind could imagine danced across its spherical surface as if alive. The man dropped the egg -rather carelessly- in the soggy dirt and drew a sword from his belt. He raised it to smash the treasure but hesitated. It very well may have been the last Epsilon egg. He dropped the sword and bent to pick it up, shielding it from the rain with his cloak, and hurried across the plain, in the near horizon a village came into sight.
A single question nagged in the back of his mind, could he betray everything his people stood for for a single Epsilon?
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140,879 Literary Works • 673,697 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!!
Anyway let's get right to it,
Okay...well, this seems like a fun little prologue at first glance. It seems to be cutting right to the point without any sort of general description to establish the setting, which is certainly fine when it comes to a prologue, and I do like how you do still establish a general sense of the atmosphere here and also do a little bit of subtle foreshadowing before this discovery is revealed. It is rather short, but I think you manage to capture the sense of something interesting peeking out from a random spot and then getting discovered quite nicely.
Well I'm going to assume Epsilon is something that you created cause I've personally never heard of it besides it being a greek letter and the way this person speaks of it here, it seems like some kind of rare creature and not exactly a greek letter.
The fact that it is the greek letter for e and egg starts with an e is a lovey coincidence thereHmm, the description for the egg's vibrance of sorts is pretty interesting, it looks like this is definitely not your typical egg, but something potentially magical and maybe even harmful to humans judging by the initial thought of the man to destroy it despite calling it a treasure. All in all, this sounds like a pretty intriguing prologue here, certainly intriguing enough for me to want to read more of the story 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
Nice. You really piqued peoples interest with the noticing of the egg. As stated before, it leaves a lot of questions. What is an epsilon? Who is the man? What does his people believe? why did he hesitate?. Definitely leaves you wanting to read more and find out what is going on.
Hi Silvy.
So, for a prologue, this isn't too bad. I mean, you introduce the plot, but not entirely, which is kind of what a prologue's job is. However, I noticed one or two things that I think you should consider adjusting.
First off, the first paragraph is the epitome of info-dumping. That means, if you don't quite know yet, that the first paragraph is more telling rather than showing and you, quite frankly, are dumping a load of information on your readers. This can be a massive turn-off for some readers because lots don't like reading an opening line or paragraph where everything is told in one go. You need to keep it fairly simple in a prologue so as not to confuse the audience. But, if you want to describe everything in exact detail, I suggest dragging those out, making the prologue longer. You'll still be describing what you wish to be described, but the details will be spread-out through a larger area and therefore it won't quite appear as info-dumping.
Secondly, (this also ties in with the part about info-dumping) your opening line is way too wordy, sad to report. An opening line should be fluid, sans the info-dumping and straight-to-the-point. Below, quoted, is my suggestion for your opening line:
Now, what you did here was you told everything in one go. SLOW DOWN. You could, however, follow up with the first sentence with something maybe like this?
That's only a suggestion, though. I'd like it if you came up with something from your own imagination
Overall, you just to lay off on all the information. Slow down. Prologue's only introduce the story. You'll have loads more time to say more later on. I think it's a good start, though.
Yours,
Lavvi
Yeah, thanks for the tip! I have the setting all written out in my outline so I guess I forgot to add that it
Alright, interesting hook. I didn't really see any errors, so there's not much to critique. My only suggestion would be to add a little more description of the settings; the cliff face sort of comes out of nowhere. Is he walking through a forest? Or through a ravine in a mountainous region? Also, it's not entirely clear whether it's night or day. Little details like this help the reader transition more smoothly into your story.
Keep up the good work! I look forward to seeing what you do with this.
It's just the prologue so I left out a lot on purpose to add a bit of mystery. In chapter one I'll include more such as who found the egg and what an Epsilon is
I really like this. Is there going to be more? Because this doesn't really explain what an Epsilon egg is. I get that they are rare but why? Why does it put his people at risk? Alot of unanswered questions .