My eyes flicker open to white lights, white lights everywhere. My breath quickens, as I lick my dry, cracked lips, and swallow hard with no memory of where I am or what I’m doing or who’s with me suddenly, so many questions rush to my mind, I...I can’t stay still. I have to move.
I have to go. Somewhere?
Sliding up on my elbows examining the room, white, plain white walls, floors, and ceilings for sterilizing or for someone with mental issues. Two gray doors on either side of the room, three small windows strangely, lined up on one wall. And one dead body.
Fear pulses through me as I suck in ragged breaths I lose control of my lungs, glancing around the room wondering what is this, how did this happen. Why? Why can’t I pull it from my memory. Looking down at my pale, dehydrated, starving body, is the blood smeared on my leg which appears to be my own from the deep cut on my calf that ragains feeling along with soreness, then the blood on my hands which doesn’t look like my own.
Attempting to process all this in the last minute has made my head spin, and while trying to put the pieces together just leads to more questions. But my thoughts are cut off by a shadowy figure racing by the three oddly placed windows.
Pushing myself to my knees, standing up, and wobbling across the room, easily became the most difficult task so far. However, before I could take more than two steps, the doors almost simultaneously clicked open with armed, masked men rushing toward me. Weak as I am I spun around with wide eyes, back stepping away from them as fast as possible, only to trip over myself but before hitting the cold hard ground one guard swung his thick arm under my back catching me.
In shock, my frail body went limp in their arms. So tired, so sore even if I had just awaken from a year of sleep I couldn’t help but let my eyelids slide shut from exhaustion into blackness, as the two guards carry my body out of the strange white room.
End of chapter
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141,249 Literary Works • 674,330 Reviews
Hey there, turtles... or dolphin? I'm Arouet and welcome to YWS!
I would like to mention that this story has quite a number of flaws in it, but this really is an interesting Prologue and I don't want you to be discouraged from writing.
This could be written without a comma because when reading the text there is no pause.
Since this is where you are listing/naming different thoughts, it would be wise to use a comma here to help give a better flow for the sentence.
I also think you should add a period (.) at the end of that sentence as it sounds like the end of a thought.
I'm not 100% sure how you meant to write this. Perhaps your character was disorientated and wanted to leave the room, if that was the case then writing it as "I need go somewhere else." or "I need to leave." would be more grammatically correct.
Since you're listing all the characteristics of the room you should add a colon
These few sentences have a number of mistakes in them, so I'll just rewrite it correctly.
"Fear pulses through me as I suck in ragged breaths; I lose control of my lungs. Glancing around the room, wondering what this is I think to myself How did this happen. Why am I here? "
Hopefully that'll clear things up for you. here is a link that could help you more on writing Hyperlink
No need for any of the commas, other than the one between "knees, standing up", that one can stay.
Other than that your story is very interesting and I'm quite interested to see the first chapter.
And I'll say again that I wish I didn't discourage you or offend you in any way, this is however a website where reviewers try to correct errors and improve the skill of your writing.
Keep practising and good luck!
-Arouet
Thank you for analyzing my writing it is extremely helpful because I don't have any experience with this sort of thing since I'm only in the 8th grade. Also I will be posting the 2nd chapter as soon as I have enough points if you would like to continue reading and review like I said any and all review are helpful to me
Turtles514
Hi, Turtles514! I'm Pan, and I'll be boiling up a review for you today.
You've got an interesting start here. I like the shortness of it, and you're great at preserving the ambiguity and capturing the reader's interest. That's the first step of any novel, and I'd say you've got that down.
That said, there are a few things I might suggest you take a look at in this opener. For one, you flip-flop between present and past tense a few times, particularly towards the end. I'm prone to mistakes like this as well - writing in present tense can feel awkward and unnatural at times, especially if you're not used to it, but that's all the more reason to check your work over and over. Reading it aloud may help in spotting tense oddities.
Some of the ones I noticed were:
My main critique, however, is that I don't think your narration reflects your character's state of mind. It's not urgent enough - if you or I woke up in a strange room with a dead body in front of us, I doubt we'd stop to count the doors or reflect on the strangely-arranged windows, if you get what I mean? We'd be freaking out about the dead body. We'd be too terrified to pay attention to anything for very long.
There are several ways to make your writing feel more panicked and urgent. I'll list a few here:
1) Using short, blunt sentences. When we're afraid, our brain works at light speed, only noticing the things it absolutely must. We don't reflect on things, don't stop to think. I really like your 'I have to go. Somewhere?' line for this very reason - it gets straight to the point.
2) Pare down the description. In a similar way, nobody stops to find the perfect adjective when they're terrified.
3) Repetition. Having a single, short phrase such as the one you used ('I have to go') and repeating it in quick succession can give the impression that the character's brain is stuck on something, or otherwise struggling to process what is happening. Take something like this:
I have to go. Somewhere. Anywhere. I have to.
The repetition of have to reinforces the character's desperation to escape, increasing the urgency. Don't think you have to use that line, however - I just wanted to give an example.
That said, don't worry about it too much. Learning how to match situation to narration is a long process, one that you'll get better at the more you write and read - I've been writing for about ten years and I still struggle with it all the time. These pointers might help you on your way, but don't get bogged down trying to put them into practice - just stay aware of them.
Overall, this is a great opener. Plot is the core of any good story, and yours is off to a great start. It's got mystery, intrigue, and a lot of promise. I'll be interested to see where you take it.
Hope I helped (and that I wasn't too harsh!). Please PM me if you have any questions.
Keep writing!
~Pan
Hi! Radio here with a review!
I thought this was a good piece and before I get to what I liked I'm gonna point out a few things.
I think, from what I've learned recently, that this would do well as a first chapter or excerpt. Unless you're going to jump forward in the plot, prologues serve as a scene setter that's partially detached from the story. Like they happen before the main plot starts.
You mentioned a body with the main character? The body wasn't described here at all. Maybe you should go over that a little more, otherwise we'd be confused as to what happened between the description of the piece and the actual writing.
It seems that you might struggle with splitting sentences?
I think here you should add a comma instead of a period.
Other than that I was sucked in. I'm curious to know what happened to the MC that they're in this compound sort of thing? It looks like you've got a good story brewing!
Good luck, cheers!