Lunar Blaze Chapter 1 new version

Since nitpicking is what i am good at, here it goes:

“The glass fell to the floor, falling”- you should be already able to see what’s wrong here. I get what you were trying to do but try doing it in a way in which you will avoid the repetition. Same goes for glass, you repeat it in both sentences and I do think there are ways to avoid it.
“The drops matched those that lay not far from her feet.” Either elaborate or get rid of this one. Why did they match, is the question you’d like to see if you’ve answered because I can only make vague assumptions.
“shock bounded through” – not entirely sure you can say that. Haven’t seen it used before and my google searches came up with unsatisfactory answers. Also “clothes exploded around” is a rather odd construction. If they are “exploding” right now at the moment of speaking I suppose its ok, but I am getting a feeling you are trying to say there already were scattered clothes on the floor instead.
It’s not a bad idea for an introduction to the chapter but you should definitely work on it some more.

“Oh Mum, where are you” – this sounds more like a casual, playful “hey mom,” rather than a desperate cry in search of her mother. Perhaps a few more descriptions around it to set the mood.
“She felt as if they knew her sadness, as they dashed this way and that.” Why did she feel that?

I will stop here with the nitpicking because there are too many structural and stylistic things I can’t say I agree with. You should work more on this, it’s as if you just scribbled it down and left it as it is. I mean for a first draft its good but it’s really raw as it is.

The pacing is better yes, but now you lack the build-up you had in the old version, the only reason I understand most of what’s going on is because I had read that. You’d like to expand on your world, build and establish it better before springing into action. I don’t really feel I can say anything else, Tenyo pretty much covered all bases. Overall it is an improvement but it still needs some work.

Don't mind me, I'm just looking for things to review.

First off, I want to say that of the first version of your chapter one, I felt that the first two paragraphs were wonderfully written, though not as paragraphs inside of the actual story. For some reason they gave me a feeling of the writing that is on a back cover of a novel in which the writer (or editor sometimes) is trying to sell their book without giving too much details away.

Anyways, I'm here giving a review for this version of Lunar Blaze so let me start by saying that I liked this version quite a bit more for a few reasons, though it wasn't without it's stings of course. Before I begin, I just want to point out that Tenyo covered almost everything that I was going to comment (and things I hadn't even thought of) so my review is going to be much shorter then his was, or at least much less informative.

Pacing: I felt the chapter had much better pacing in this version of events than the previous one. In the original chapter things felt as if they were moving at an abysmal rate, never really speeding up yet never slowing down. It was almost just there. In order for drama to increase in any work things need to start rolling as fast as possible or they need to start winding down and let loose. That way of thinking was much more evident in this chapter and an improvement.

Grammar: Just a heads up for this part of my review - I am the worst person in the world when it comes to grammar. If I was you I might just skip this part, as it's coming from an idiot who really doesn't know what he's talking about.

Now that the head's up is over, let me just say good job! For the most part there weren't that many grammatical mistakes and there was really only one that I stuck in my mind, which is a good thing. While most of the time the reader doesn't pay attention to grammar that much, it's still something to keep in mind throughout any written work. Sometimes if it betters the storytelling breaks in the rules are allowed of course, which is when you're allowed to really get creative. Given how this story has a fantasy/horror element to it (I've only read the first two versions of the first chapter, so I apologize if I'm wrong), that would be completely fine, possibly even warranted. Still, keep in mind when you're writing that things do need a certain order to them.

Oh, and by the way the grammatical mistake that I found was the line "They stared into her soul piercing it like knives." Hm, you know what I take back what I said about it being a mistake, This is more an element of taste I suppose, which is subjective but I feel that a comma should be between soul and piercing, as it gives the sense of pause which then leads to heightened drama during the sequence. Still, it's such a small thing that I wouldn't even worry about it.

Finally, I have a little bit of a problem with the fact that the reader was told that it was a vampire attacking her. Again, this is something that may be up to taste instead of a well thought out opinion, but I find it much better when I'm shown things in a book rather than told. Given how vampires have been stapled into our pop culture, I'm pretty sure that most people could understand what the creature was and what it was doing in the sequence where it "sunk it's fangs into her flesh," we didn't need the part telling us the species of the creature. In fact, in some ways it's more frightening for a reader who doesn't yet realize that the monster is a vampire. Imagine, picturing the description so far with no idea what it really was. That adds more to the imagination and gives the reader more speculation on what's going on.

Overall, it was a pretty enjoyable read! I liked where the plot was going and didn't have that many problems overall. If it gives any comfort, it made me intrigued enough to continue to want to read the rest of the story and see what happens with Selina within the immediate chapters.

Hey there!

I'm here to review your novel! Like... All of it! You're probably not going to like me when I'm done.

First of all through most chapters I'll give feedback specific to the chapter, thinks like plot and pacing. Then later when I get to your more recent work I'll start working on the prose. I'll try not to repeat myself through the reviews, so if I say something like "you should get rid of every word with a T in it" assume that I mean in your own version of the full novel and not just in this particular chapter. If I say something like "the pacing here is too slow" then assume that 'here' means only this chapter.

So, where to start?
First of all, I like this version much, much better than the original chapter one. This one has a lot less clutter and cleaner descriptions. Chapter one is important though, so this is going to sting a bit.

Perspective
You don't have to write in first-person but you do need to write from somebody's perspective, usually this is your protagonist, Selina in this case. You really need to get into her head and think about how she sees things. When she enters a room that has been smashed up, what does she focus on most? If you have trouble getting into you MC's head then just think about what you would notice first. If she particularly admired her mothers jewellary then she would feel some shallow sadness that some of it would be broken, or if she disliked her mothers dress sense then she would describe the mismatching colours and styles of the clothes. Is it normal for strange trap doors to appear in her house? And would she be curios, or afraid, of what might be down there? Adjust your descriptions according to how she would percieve them.

Prioritise
Linking to the above, think of your priorities. As a reader walking into this sudden bedroom/crime scene I want to know what's there. I want to know if there is a body, or blood. Is anything missing? What is the sickly colour of the handprints? Are they human? (You don't have to answer these questions.) I don't care whichways about how startling green her eyes are or what her hair is doing in the breeze.

Add a little common sense
Someone has broken into her house and ripped everything apart... and she goes to sit in an open space near a river at night and fall asleep... See the problem with that? I want to know more. Is she deliberately careless, or naive?

Action
When she throws the necklace into the river is it because of something significant or is it because she had seen it done in movies and thought that it might bring her some relief? People have silly reasons for doing things sometimes, but we don't do things for nothing. There is always an emotion and even if she doesn't know it, you as a writer should still portray it.

Building a scene
First of all you set the scene, then you introduce your character, then the conflict, and then roll on into the action. For example you might have your character walk into a room (setting,) briefly describe their standing or mood (character,) have them speak or interact with something in the room (conflict,) and finally get the scene into gear. But of course not in that space of time.
The issue I have here is that you've crushed three very short scenes into one chapter and left out a lot of world and character building that you could take advantage of in the silence of the first two scenes.

Overall
I love the first scene and the way you've done it, starting with the falling of the glass, and ending with 'her mothers bedroom became a crime scene.' It's beautifully written. The second scene is good, but perhaps redundant since not much happens. The third is full of action and tension, and I like the approach, since the first scene sets up the fear and the third introduces what there is to be afraid of, so they go well together. The ideas and the plot is good, you just really, really need to flesh it all out.