10:56pm January 4th 2200AD
Kevin was staring at himself in the mirror wondering why nobody seems to listen to him when things matter, but have no trouble doing it when it's not important. He took one more quick glance at himself in the mirror to admire his unique appearance, he is 21 average muscle but what makes him unique is despite his age he has several large scars the most notable being a big scar from a blade running up most of his right arm, and a scar that runs from his left cheek across his nose and right eye and ends near his hair. He was walking into his room about to lay down to go to sleep when he heard a scream and noticed someone being eaten alive. He sighed and tapped his shoulder switching to his armor from his normal clothes. He knocks on the wall to his younger sister Lilly's room to tell her to get ready to leave in 5 minutes. She is 10 but without knowing her you would assume 30 because she is more mature than most people are at three times her age, she has long black hair and is very strong willed. Then leaps out his window from the 6th apartment aimed directly at a zombie to break his fall. He looks up when he hears her bedroom wall explode and sees her drop the 6 floors down the same way and pulls a grenade out from behind her to toss up and down while looking for zombies.
"So by the number of undead I saw I guess that dumb mayor ignored you and this city is doomed?"
"Sounds about right, time for plan B I guess, first we need to see who and how many here can still be saved"
"Then the police station is first right big brother?"
"Yes extra firepower will make saving people faster and less risky. As long as he is working like he said he would be we can get there and start saving people in under an hour."
"If Bryan isn't there?"
"Then we will probably waste a lot of time on stubborn morons and cowards before we get any extra help"
"How will we get to the place you found for safety?"
"A cars, buses, armored vans if we're lucky enough to find one, then a boat or helicopter to an aircraft carrier due to return in 6 days. But we need to get on it in 5 or it will be visible in the distance and zombies might try to reach it."
"Can zombies swim?"
"You know that is a great question, I wish I knew. But they ARE undead, they don't drown. I imagine with enough time to try they could reach it from the ocean floor. If we are in deep enough shit though, they can still float on water like us."
"I'm curious, how exactly did you find such a large area that would be safe, that nobody else in the billions of years on earth ever discovered."
"I'm awesome" Kevin said with a grin.
"No seriously, how?"
"I'm richer than most would believe, I have a list of contacts and informants world wide, I'm a genius, I have an unmatched skill in hacking and firewalls, I'm clearly lucky as hell or was at least."
"That's all true but most of those apply to me as well, all except money people world wide, and I second you for computers."
"Honestly it was blind luck, I just happened to be using the internet to view earth, I happened to find somewhere I never saw on a globe or world map. To be sure I had several informants check it out, then taken care of to be sure news never spread. I told them to report to me before notifying anyone for a bonus paycheck doubling the money offered, bugged their omni-phone to block calls they might try to use to leak anything as an insurance policy. Then had their boats go missing halfway after their return, not going into detail their. After 5 similar reports I confirmed it exists, and can very easily support a good million or so people in isolation or safety as I saw fit.I also released a virus online to wipe it off any map on any site, and keep it that way."
"So you found it by blind luck, killed any informants to make sure we would be the only people to know. Then made sure to keep it that way?"
"That and had 10 boats as big as a military submarine full of resources like metal, wood, electronic equipment, and any other building materials. Plus a submarine with a automated system that generates synthetic oxygen, not healthy for lengthy exposure, but safe for a few hours without causing damage. It has wild animals for food in it, plants and grass that don't need sunlight that way vegetables and animals survive and when needed can be brought out, that system can last a few years more with the amount of power it takes. Plus a boat of medical supplies and everything needed to treat cure and progress medicine."
"Sooo you thought of everything, prepared ahead of time, and all we have to do is pick it up along with a small amount of military forces. What happens next?"
"First we save as many as possible world wide, then see how much of a population is left. After we are sure nobody else is alive I damn my soul and use a weapon that will pretty much vaporize anything that moves outside with my weapon that is on standby in orbit. Zombies still have part of their brains active, it's what drives animal instincts in them. So my weapon can't tell the difference and I didn't have time to find a solution. I and I alone shall burn forever for that in the afterlife. In this life though 5 billion zombies will burn from being vaporized. But to be sure nobody gets hit by accident I have a virus on the internet that will announce world wide to every alive from their omni-phone there is safety with resources that would last a hundred years or more easily, and a military force to save them ending the message with a frequency that calls my omni-phone directly, it also sends their exact location when they use it. I want to be absolutely sure I don't miss anyone. My weapons don't target animals or plants just humans, and only if they are outdoors, it wasn't made to fire at buildings, it has a safety program that prevents it from firing at anything close enough to a building too. It won't kill every zombie but most will die, and people will be warned to stay inside once I am about to activate it. I will leave it set on a timer for a week before risking sending squads out for scouting after."
"You really did plan for everything."
"Everything except my terrible fate in 80 or so years. We are almost at the police station, by the way. I figure i should mention this sooner rather than later. Although it IS unlikely, if anything happens to me all my omni-data will be sent to you, along with instructions predictions how things will play out for the next 150 years. And how I die, if I get bit I will take my own head off to be sure just a heads up... no pun intended."
Points:
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Canary word: Present
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125,020 Literary Works • 672,861 Reviews
Okay, a zombie story.....I can roll with this, and I like the fact you used your name. very unique. Moving on I quiet like this story and the only complaint I got is how you started the story. You kind of just jumped in with no background story, no info on characters, no info how the world became like this. It was straight action from the beginning till the end. Now I do not mind this but others might, just saying you should go back and try to add some more details or something. Explained how we got to this point.
Hi! Cricket here for a review!
I saw your title and I just had to leave a review on this.
Firstly, I would suggest taking a look at your opening sentence. Kevin was staring at himself in the mirror wondering why nobody seems to listen to him when things matter, but have no trouble doing it when it's not important is not the best way to start off a story. What do you look for when you pick up a book? Something interesting sounding, of course! You want to be interested and entertained while reading. And what is going to make you think that this book is going to be entertaining? Generally, your first impression of the book is going to determine your overall opinion of it. So your first impression would be based off of the first line/first paragraph. While, what you have here hands out a fair idea of what he's doing, it is still pretty boring. Why not try and spice things up a little here?
Take a look at your opening paragraph. All that you're really doing, is describing his physical appearance. We don't need that just yet. What's the climax in this chapter? How exactly do you want to build up to that? For starters, a reader isn't going to be interested in the appearance of a character that they don't at least know in the smallest degree. From the description that you gave us we can tell that he is a bit arrogant, or at least slightly proud of his looks. Don't overdo that, but instead lightly brush up on that, and give us just little details. For instance, he can look at his muscles and admire them (he was doing that, I think), but you don't want to overdo it. You don't need description of his scars quite yet. Expand a little on those later.
Sorry, if this seems a bit all over the place. Basically, you should have a interesting beginning sentence and paragraph. Really, you should avoid starting off stories with description as well. Make sense? If any of this is confusing, please tell me and I'll elaborate more on it. *isn't the best with being clear all the time* ^^
lol This seems slightly humorous to me somehow. He says it so casual...
I noticed this small error throughout as I read, a couple of times. Always remember to have a period when you end a sentence.
Same thing here, except you need to remember to have a comma here before going into a dialogue tag. Here's a great article on this particular subject.
I'm reaaally reallly sorry for pulling so much out, but I figured this would be good for an example.
Where I put Start new paragraph here means you need to break up your paragraphs at about those points. Paragraphs aren't about a certain length. They are about the idea that they contain. Now granted, if you pull apart that paragraph and look at its context, it is a fascinating topic. But they aren't all one idea! There are around three or four separate ideas in that paragraph, and you can only have one idea per paragraph.
Also, as a side note, make sure when you're writing using numbers to actually write out the numbers like five or ten instead of 10 or 5. It reads out much better, and is smoother.
Haha, that's funny.
Anyway, I hope this review is somewhat helpful. Let me know if you have any questions, and be sure to tell me if I wasn't clear on anything. You've got some great talent here.
Keep writing!
~Cricket
It was helpful thanks. I'm aware of my lack of proper punctuation, it's something I just don't understand at times and never really did. I do try to avoid typing numbers and optto spell them instead usually but sometimes don't out of sheer habit.
As for the last thing you pointed out about zombies swimming, yeah I try to include humor as often as possible in my stories as long as it doesn't damage the situation or dampen the mood. I add the humor if I think it fits the moment but avoid it if I think it's not really the right moment. To much sarcasm can ruin a character or story.
do you want to make a club with me and write together?
Would consider it, but I prefer to write more and see how things turn out later. Writing with others is not a good idea until I write different things and find what kind of story or plot works best for me. That way I can consider how far things might go.
cool,OK
Very short to be a first chapter also how did his sister blow up her wall and how did it all start? I do like the apocalyptic setting, but its very hard to not over do weapons,powers and armor in a setting like yours. I would love to help you write your second chapter. I love how its a brother and sister survival I have never read something like it.
Your second chapter could start like this
On their way over to the police station they walked past a large mall. The sister started to walk in but her brother stopped her. He reminded her that the mall was the last place you wanted to be in a zombie apocalypse. So they continued on their way, they past a fortified house surrounded by barb wire and lots of zombies....
And the rest is up to you if you want to use it
It's a zombie story, and people aren't made out to be stupid like they are in dawn of the dead or something. A zombie horde is most likely in places that are crowded, such as a mall, superstores like wallmart ect. As for a plan for safety that isn't something you explain in detail early in a story, kind of ruins the idea of adventure and mystery. As for not explaining how, my phone crashed first time around typing but I will fix that.
I was thinking like there were people in the house and the zombies heard them so there was now a hord around their house.
Sounds like my luck playing state of decay on Xbox 360. That's the most realistic zombie game btw. Cars and resources are limited you have to sneak around carefully not making to much noise. Weapons eventually break. Hordes wander around. The two characters I got killed in that game died from a hordes swarming a house I was in lol. Funny you say that. But no my story takes place at the start of it all after I post a few more chapters I finished you will start seeing that though. I used mainly people I know and matching personalities in a future type environment but keeping everything as close to what I or other people I used are capable of. I'm a computer wiz. I don't plan on major gun usage I plan to have most people good at swordplay instead makes it more interesting and unique that way.
Hello!
I like what you have so far. This would make a very good introduction, but for a first chapter you may want to answer a few questions readers may have. A few that entered my mind were what is the setting of this? Who is Kevin, what is he thinking right now? Do they have any sort of weapon on them or other such things. This really is a good beginning to a story but I think that you may want to add a little bit more to really get things going.
Actually Kevin is my real name, my best friends family pretty much raised me so although I'm not related my little sister Lilly is the most important person in the world to me. The city is where we are from. I had to retype this because first time around my stupid phone crashed and I didn't notice I missed a few things you pointed out. It's short for a chapter because I write short stories, I have absolutely no intention of ever being an author of any books to hit the market or internet. I write because I enjoy it, it's also a stress reliever. It's about the length of a chapter in a manga.
Hello, nice story you've got here
a little short to be the first chapter. Perhaps you could lengthen it, or make it a prologue?
lol. I also love how you give the date and time at the beginning; it adds something to the story 
I don't want to be harsh, but there's not very many GOOD things I can say about this at the moment, besides the fact that it has potential. Remember that: you can make this better.
So, my thoughts:
- your lack of punctuation. It makes for MANY run-on sentences. I can count more run-ons than I can actual sentences.
It's nothing that can't be fixed with a simple read through, though. Such as "Then the police station is first right big brother?" It should be something along the lines of "Then the police station. Right, big brother?" I also feel like the "is first" is unnecessary and makes the sentence too clunky.
Just check on all those sentences, because many of them either need to be split into two sentences, or they need commas.
- you need a bit more description. Where are they? What do they look like?
The first chapter is where you want to tell the reader all that. Yes, it's where you introduce the plot, but it's also where you introduce EVERYTHING ELSE, too. Yes, chapter 1 is pretty important.
Which leads me to my next thought
-your first sentence is actually not too bad. It introduces the main character, and adds some action to the story. However, adding his age is very clunky, and not a good spot. Plus, his age is the only thing we know about him. That's a problem. Add a bit more there, because it's the perfect spot. The same when introducing Lilly. Get rid of the age and tell us what we really want to know. Then introduce the age with the background info.
But other than those things, I think your story could be good! You've got a nice idea. Zombies are always interesting
Keep writing!!
-Anna
Punctuation and where a proper sentence ends was were I failed miserably in elementary school English, just couldn't understand it. Although I'm 21 and take free college courses online, I have always been a 5 to 10 grades past where I'm at mostly. High school mathematics by 2nd grade, is a good example, I have been able to read and spell at a high school or college level for almost my whole life. Just punctuation and a couple other things I could just never do. As for the missing details you mentioned my phone crashed when I tried to save the first time I typed this, and I didn't realize I left them out. I will get around to it right now though.