Hey, there! I came to read, and now I review!
Your tags of "realistic/narrative" are very fitting for this type of work. We get a glimpse of a more-or-less normal person with a normal life. That is, it appears to be set in the real world and there are no fantasy elements introduced. The reference to houses, trees, and hills, people, places, and physical disorders all serve to paint the picture that we are encountering a story set within our own world.
The introductory sentences - specifically the first two paragraphs - do well at setting what appears to be a main theme for this story. It's clear to the reader right away that this story is going to have something to do with death and the main character's experiences with/relationships to death situations. From the very beginning, you've established some things which I assume will be important to the story. First of all, the most obvious, the main character and narrator has not been exposed to much death. Furthermore, at this point in her journey she is not quite sure what to think about it or how to deal with it. It also implies that she has been pretty sheltered. Finally, perhaps the most prominent feature of your opening is that this will likely be a story that is somewhat grim but very realistic, and hints strongly at the fact that the plot will heavily revolve around the character development the narrator will experience regarding the topic and reality of death.
I am thinking that your main character starts out a little bit naive, but has something of a matter-of-fact approach to things. Although she may have little life experience, she doesn't seem to shy away from grim realities. This all helps to paint a picture in our minds of what kind of character the narrator is. It gives hints at her personality and her outlook. Her traits and particular limitations become clearer the more we read and discover that she has not had the easiest life. Of course, these serve to show us that she may be a little insecure. I think you've also done well at indicating how she may feel overshadowed by her siblings.
I appreciate the direction you seem to be taking where kids with disabilities or limitations of some sort band together. We see the gravitation of outcasts to each other. This lets us know that there has been at least a temporary support system for the main character. However, she has indirectly mentioned that her family has recently moved/will be moving to a new location, so I'm getting the impression that her sense of support and security is about to be disrupted.
All these elements that you've woven in are pretty great at establishing what kind of character you're working with and the idea of where your story is heading, and you've done well at introducing a lot of the necessary information to get things started. You didn't spend a lot of time on useless details or information. However, I would say there was maybe a little info-dumping. We may not need to know all the specifics of the family's physical appearances right away.
I recognize that you used these visual descriptions to show how the main character feels removed or alienated even from her own family members, but maybe you could have been a little more succinct with it, such as condensing it to two or three sentences at the most. An idea of how this would sound could be like, "My parents both have brown hair and are reasonably fit but not glaringly skinny. And where their eyes are bright blue or brown, mine are an indistinguishable shade of dark green."
You could still go on to say how the mom looks beautiful in anything she wears and the sister Lena takes after the mother in physical attractiveness. You could even maybe mention the dad's oblong face. Basically what I'm trying to say is that we don't necessarily need specific color descriptions for every hair and eye color, etc. It kind of wanders needless off track, in my opinion. But like I said, you can still find a way to emphasize that the main character is awkwardly skinny compared to her other family members, and even that she may look a little different. Maybe you could just say she didn't seem to have inherited any of the attractive genetics.
I think all the details you've included are important to you, and most of them may even be important to the story, so I'm not saying you should leave them out altogether. Instead, maybe you could find a way to work them into the exposition of the story rather than info-dumping them all in the opening. It's the simple yet complex concept of "show, don't tell." Maybe you could expand by working in examples of interactions that show rather than tell how Lena uses her drama and her physical limitation to get what she wants. Work the examples into your story as illustrations of what you want to get across so that it paints a picture to convey the idea rather than just explaining it.
Well, that's about all I'm going to put in this review, but overall I think you've done a good job, and once again, I think your opening is pretty strong and includes a lot of important elements. Keep working and revising. Best wishes for more good work!
Points: 12914
Reviews: 223
Donate