Young Writers Society

Hi again! Again, this is going to be more of a comment than a review.

1) This chapter felt rather long. I think Lana had a good point of there being some filler description/dialogue, so that could maybe be trimmed.

2) I'm not sure I've ever heard an American use the term "flat" to mean a place of residence. It's a British term for what we call apartments. Also, I've been picturing this area as more suburban, so the houses wouldn't be "flats".

3) Wait a minute...so the school called a lockdown but they don't know why there was a lockdown? Was there any sort of threat or weapon spotted or anything? A school wouldn't just put everyone into lockdown and cause a panic for funsies. Maybe the principal could explain a little more of why they thought there was a threat or a shooter. Presumably they have some sort of non-zombie reasoning for the lockdown.

Okay, that's it. Time to get into Chapter 6!

Hello hello! Here to bring this out of the green room for you!

This is an interesting take on a zombie novel, looking at it from the detective's point of view as they try to figure out exactly what is going on!

I think my biggest qualm with the chapter is that there is a lot of information and I'm not sure where exactly the chapter is moving forward. Lana provided a good summary of the chapter below. As a general rule of thumb you should be able to summarize the main point of a scene or chapter in 1-2 sentences. More than that, you probably have too much going on in the chapter or scene.

Think about what absolutely has to happen in order for the plot to work and for the plot to move forward. My guess, without having the context of the preceding or the following chapters is that the crucial moment in this chapter is that Nunez needs to investigate this alleged zombie sighting and figure out what is going on.

There's a lot of repetition and back and forth before that. I think the whole beginning part can be condensed way down - basically establish that Nunez is in charge of investigating this and he plans to talk to a few of the eye-witnesses today. I don't think you need all of the information about the other cases right now because to me that felt a little info-dumpy. The majority of the scene should be Nunez interviewing the witnesses. That should be super detailed, enough that the reader has enough information to start to draw their own conclusions about what's going on and what all of the evidence could mean. It should be pretty clinical - he's just trying to gather factual information, he doesn't need to give the other characters any of his ideas or opinions about the information just yet, he needs all of the information first. After he leaves then you can piece some of the evidence together in his thoughts about those interviews.

I think it's an interesting concept and you have a lot of interesting moving parts here. I think restructuring a little and really focusing on the high point of the chapter will help take it to the next level. Let me know if you have any questions or if there's something you'd like feedback about that I didn't mention!

Sup,

I'm gonna open up with a recap to make sure I have your details straight and to help you see what's getting across and what's not: Nunez is a new(ish) recruit of the anti-zombie government agency. I say anti-zombie government agency because I'm not entirely sure what they do, just that they're the guys to see in case you see a zombie. Zombies by the way are kind of global warming, Scientists agree that it's happening, and there are a few believers but for some reason a majority of the population isn't convinced. It might be because we're in a shelter city and they're just not convinced it will affect them? So Nunez and a veteran detective--whose normal job is not reacting to school lock downs? But I have no idea what the FIS does besides that--go to investigate the school, they learn (and this wasn't in the case file even though it's basically the only important detail) some kids saw one and nobody else. They decide to talk to the kids and find out that yes they saw it, probably (it wasn't any more confirmed after they left the school) but they have no idea what to do because apparently the FIS finding zombies is not something that happens a lot.

Sorry if that got sassy. I'm in a sassy mood. So onto my critique.

"He had come up from the UN to investigate the previous day's lockdown...the possibility of being an explosive catastrophe."----A little flat out, but alright. Setting the scene. I’m not at all versed in your story so forgive me if I didn’t expect zombies, but I’m into it.

"and had been called three times already to perform this exact task. "----You’re burying the lead is getting a little frustrating at this point. No offense, it’s just when I got to the “to preform this exact task” I had a visceral eye roll of get to the point. This is probably just a me thing, but it’s unnecessary to bury the lead on this. I know you’re a second from saying what he does.

"who Nunez recognized from the office."----Man they must have some crazy conversations around the water cooler down at FIS.

"Detective Dan Portman, as a more experienced officer, worked in the higher office of the FIS. In about 3-5 years Numbers could expect a promotion into the higher office, where they investigated all sorts of interesting phenomena. That's why Nunez had joined. But he was no longer sure he was willing to stick it out that long before transferring into the higher office." ----Okay…so I really want to hear about Portman when you say when you say “Oh, that’s Portman.” This is the set up, you say character walks in, their name is Dan, then you tell me about Dan. As a reader I expect it to happen that way, and when you don’t give me context for Dan I start to believe that his only characteristic is he has the job Nunez wants.

"In about 3-5 years Numbers could expect a promotion "----When autocorrect prevents you from getting that promotion.

"Then, shaking the hands of the other two individuals... because they were quite busy."----So here I’m wondering why you made me wait with Nunez just a second ago. I know that in the grand scheme of the piece you dedicated three paragraphs to Nunez being bored in a room, but without anything going on it feels kind of pointless. I don’t thinks it’s bad that he was waiting in a conference room, but you don’t need to isolate him to fill us in on the details of the case/lore. Think of it not as taking out the fact that Nunez had to wait, but the five minutes of footage where he was sitting in a room before the others arrive. As for the crucial information you could easily slip in the fact that his job feels mostly pointless in the dialogue between him and the principal. Have Dan walk in and ask if he’s been waiting long, have the narrator explain that Nunez is annoyed that this is another false alarm when he gets the file. By integrating it as part of the narrative you’ll have your readers be more invested in the characters and the action that’s going on, it will feel more natural, and I promise you you can do it without your readers getting confused. (P.S. I know I said a second ago that burying the lead, but there’s a difference between burying the lead two inches down and making the lead a journey)

"the subject"----So when Nunez uses the term “the subject” is that a euphemism (as to not admit that there’s an unbelievable thing) or is he saying it as a technical term? Ideally not saying what “the subject” is would be to build up tension for the reveal. We already know that its gonna be a zombo right? So what I want to know is if the principal would react to him saying “the subject.” Because the two characters are on very different experience levels with zombies and thus would have very different ways of referring to them (I guess I’m also making the assumption that the world doesn’t all know about zombies but in that case you’d expect them to just outright say it.) I guess what I’m trying to say is is that you need to think about how the characters would think about zombies. Are they scared of them? Is this just a day job? Are they protective of their students? Are they in denial? Whatever it is, apply that to their dialogue. The principal seems very nonchalant to the use of “the subject” and I wonder like what they’re thinking in this moment. They seem to be acting like this is a routine thing, but I gather that it’s not since they say later that they thought it was a prank and now there’s this official meeting. It doesn’t seem like we’re going to be spending a lot of time with the P and VP, but knowing how they react tells us a lot about our world.

“It's the only lead we've got at the moment, so we might as well investigate it.”----I hate to say this, but I’m writing this literally as I am reading it (which is why some of my facts are off and there’s a lot of assumptions), and I’m gonna have to repeat what I said about having Nunez sit in a room. The scene seems to be starting in the wrong place, and I know that because you set up a meeting to ask two questions. So in this case there’s really only one option: get rid of it. You can do this in a variety of ways. One, start at the first lead. You can just go right into the action and reveal all this stuff we learned in media res. Two, change the situation. What if instead of a meeting, the principals are walking him to the first “crime scene” (Like I said I’m writing as things come up, so I don’t exactly how this lead is going to be portrayed. My money’s on going to the kid’s house for an interview). Or maybe Nunez doesn’t know quite so much about the case (but that seems out of character). Or maybe the principals weren’t needed at all and Dan could have just explained this all. Regardless starting the scene here felt like jumping off the bus at every station. You get there you get off the bus and you wait for another bus.

"but that didn't account for Portman's presence"----Can you go into more detail on this. Nunez is clearly wondering about it so maybe he can tell us why it’s weird? (Me from the slightly less distant past: lol you literally lead right into this but my point still stands. As a reader I had no idea that it was weird. Which, yes, you're about to tell me, but it comes out of no where when you're reading it for the first time. The narrators responsibility is to make us ask those questions. We should feel that it's not normal before you ask the question.)

"Do you think we should talk to her too?” “We should interview her if we want to talk to her kids. We'll need permission from her anyway.”----We’ve asserted that this is the lead from the conversation with the principals. I know I’m not the advocate of the principal conversation, but I felt it was worth mentioning that you got that across perfectly. This also leads into my feeling about the next few lines which is, while your detectives may in fiction be figuring out what’s next, the audience doesn’t always need to hear every detail. If the scene has ended and you are going to a new location, it’s okay to end the scene and do a jump cut. It’s okay, in the instance where the audience wasn’t going to get any information about the world or the story from the narration of an action to just say flat out that it happened. I know the saying is “Show don’t tell” but sometimes telling is okay. Rule of thumb being that if you want it to give the reader an emotional response show as much as possible, but if it’s something the readers don’t need to be emotionally invested in then telling is just fine. For instance, here, because we know the lead is this woman you could just say-and you had this exact line right at the end of the principal conversation- the detectives started in the conference room for a while, determining the best course of action” then follow that up with “they were in the car on the way to detail detail detail because detail”

"They pulled up to the house and got out of the car. The middle aged woman who met them at the door welcomed them into the house with a finger to her lips. The baby was sleeping. She offered them cookies and milk, which they graciously accepted. They made some small talk about the baby and about Portman's daughter, who would be graduating from school in a couple of years. Nunez introduced himself and talked a little about his wife. When they were done eating cookies the detectives turned the conversation to serious matters."----This, however, would be a show moment. The woman’s givin out cookies! Is she afraid of them? Nervous as to what they might find? Happy someone’s taking them seriously? What is the motivation of the cookie, that is a serious question. What’s Portman’s daughter like? Did he bring it up to make the woman more comfortable? Is that a skill Nunez hasn’t picked up on yet, small talk to relax the victims?

"and was still beautiful"----beauty is relative. Is this Nunez thinking she’s beautiful? What does Nunez find beautiful? Does age preclude someone from being beautiful?

"Detective Nunez stepped forward. “You're Mrs. Natalie Brooks?”"----why did we see the other woman if this woman is clearly the one deserving of a closer look?

""It's possible," said Portman"----forgot Portman was there for a second.

"“That's okay,” said Nunez. “We should probably get going.”"----I thought we were interviewing the kids.


"Why schools?”----why not schools. They’re heavily populated, full of people not focusing, likely to be protected which would explain why you’re hearing about them.

Sorry if I was a bit indelicate in this critique, like I said I'm in a sassy mood. I was when I wrote the first comment and I was a little more aggressive by the end. To be perfectly honest, the first part was my favorite part, you seemed to have conceived this beginning that you wanted to have--this image of Nunez sitting alone in a conference room bored out of his mind. But as you went on you didn't really have an idea of where you were going, you weren't happy with where you started the scene but you didn't want to get rid of the background information or Nunez's boredom so you kept having to justify why you were starting here. I've been there numerous times, in fact I just got out of my writers block for practically the same reason. I used to write mystery--ironically I stopped when I started planning out my stories--and reading this felt very familiar. My suggestion would be to scan through what you have here and figure out where this story line ends. Pick out anything you want to keep--because what you have here brings up some interesting places for world building and character development, of which I outlined some of the places that I wanted to know more about--throw out characters you don't need and pay attention to your writers block because it may be telling you that you started in the wrong place.

-Happy Editing, Lana