Published September 24, 2009
The Soccer Locker
It was a normal morning for Henry Muford. He woke up,got dressed ,ate his breakfast and hopped on the bus. When he got to school he had five minutes to get his history books from his locker. He put his books in his backpack. The books were very heavy so he fell in to his locker. He hadn't zipped his backpack yet so all his books fell out. One book fell on his lap with a page open that talked about a soccer like game that was played in China about three thousand years ago. Henry said "I wish I could play that game." .Suddenly the locker door shut and it felt the locker was a rocket. After half a minute the locker stopped. Henry opened the door and walked out. Henry noticed he wasn't in school. He noticed he wasn't in his own time! He asked somebody were he was and they said "you are in china". He was passed a ball. He didn't know the rules so his team lost the first half of the game. At the middle of the game he read about the game. The book said the rules are about the same as soccer and the book said " This game was called Tsu-chu". In the second half of the game Henry's team won! They got more points in the second half than the other team got in the whole game. He went into his locker to see if he could figure out how to get home. He looked in one of his books to see if he could find a picture of kids at his own time. While he was looking in his book he found a drawing of a Japanese game called "Kemari" The book said this game was played just like Tsu-chu. He played the game and at the break he went to his locker and tried to get home but he couldn't get home. He heard somebody say"time to play". He went over to play the game. His team won the game and went to his locker and looked in his history book and he saw a picture of soccer today. He said "I want to play soccer". The locker felt like a rocket and in about thirty seconds it stopped and he hooped out. He knew nobody would believe him so he just went on with school.
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140,130 Literary Works • 673,028 Reviews
Good Morning/Afternoon/Evening/Night(whichever one it is in your part of the world),
Hi! I'm here to leave a quick review!!
Anyway let's get right to it,
Okayy well this is quite the tale for us to start off with. I don't believe I've run into quite something like this before and this one really feels strangely a lot more complete that some of these often tend to be so I find myself enjoying it quite a bit here. The vibes you manage to create are pretty solid here at the base of this piece.
The problems in this one arise at the level of the paragraphing and a bit of the pacing here. For starters what we have here is a giant wall of text which isn't particularly conducive when it comes to reading it and the general flow of it. I think you could easily break this down a lot better into smaller parts based on the parts of the story and this could do with a bit of expanding too. At the moment what we have here feels like its mostly just a narration of everything that happens and it feels a lot more like a plan for a short story than a short story on its own.
So overall, while this one has the bases covered as far as that needs to go, it does have a few issues that need to be looked at for this story to really shine through properly.
Aaaaand that's it for this one.
As always remember to take what you think was helpful and forget the rest.
Stay Safe
Harry
Hello there. My name is Jayleigh and I am your reviewer this afternoon. Off I go...
This is very boring/unoriginal/robotic. Okay...so today is like any other day...big deal?
Why was he so out of time? Was his bus late? Was this a part of the usual routine?
Wouldn't he be taking the books out of his back pack? Since he just got to school? No? Um, okay? Confused.
It wouldn't fall into his lap. It'd fall to the floor. Or at least that is more understandable when standing at one's locker. What happened when they fell to the floor? Was it loud? Was Henry nervous about people laughing around him? Emotions, please.
Why would he wish this? Does he play soccer? Does he just want to get away from his boring dull life? And...you have a period before "Suddenly" watch that. Was the door loud when it shut? And how was it a rocket? Was he in his locker? What is going on...very confused.
How did he know it had been a half a minute. Maybe after four long deep breaths?
I don't know about in your school, but in mine, the lockers are fairly small. Wouldn't he feel cramped and claustrophobic?
Okay...how does he know this? What makes him think he is not at school...or in his own time for that matter? What does he see/feel/smell/touch...anything?
The period goes inside the quotation mark. Who did he ask? What did this person look like? Were they freaked out, obviously the person would know where they are. And if they were in china, wouldn't they speak Chinese?
...What is the significance of this game. Give some historical facts...like when the page opens in front of his locker, to make your reader actually believe this happened.
This sentence doesn't make sense to me.
Again, the period goes inside the quotes. Buuut...if he is playing soccer, obviously the rules would be similar. And describe whats going on around him. Sweaty players, crowd cheering, that kind of thing.
There would be a comma after game.
hopped....not hooped.
Okay, this is very interesting. I could have gone on dissecting each line, but it was the same types of errors over again, so I stopped.
You have an interesting story line forming. But no emotions from your MC. It's as if he is a robotic soccer player. You need to describe. Describe *everything* he sees, smells, touches, feels. If you add in tons of descriptions, this could form into a nice short story. But to me, it ends here. Another chapter isn't needed.
Good luck, and keep it up.
-Jayleigh
It would make it a lot easier to read if you separated it into paragraphs. A big block of text is a little daunting to read.
You also need to work on showing rather than telling. This is way more than one paragraph's worth of story. To make it longer you should go into more detail and show what's going on, including the relationships and interactions between characters. Right now it reads like a summary rather than a story.
As for going on to chapter 2, I think you've already got at least 2 chapters-worth of story here. You need to draw it out a bit so the reader feel more immersed. Then write more chapters if it's looking good.
Awesome idea, very original. I think you should use more imagery and descriptions. Take more time explaining the main character, the bus, the school, the ride in the locker, what china looked like. You need details other wise the reader does not have a good picture in their head. Was the locker dark? Or was their light shining through the vents? Add some detail to when he plays the game, expand on the story and make that the first part. Make a second part/chapter with some of snoink's ideas.
Sounds good so far, keep working on it.
Haha, that was cute!
Ideas for chapter two... maybe you could make other people find out about the rocket? That way, it gets a little more complicated. First, maybe his friends would find out, then his enemies, and eventually the teachers, and maybe they would try to stop it!
But yeah. I would totally continue this idea. It's really neat.
Was that supposed to be a short story? I personally would have liked it better if it had been like a novel. It would be interesting to learn more about the game and about his adventures. You had quite a few run on sentences and spaces between commas. I really think it would be more interesting if it wasn't just one LONG paragraph. Anyways...if it was supposed to be short, that was fine, but I would have liked it better if it was more informational.
Oh and also. How are you going to write a chapter 2? You need to focus on one plot for a larger novel. Make the soccer thing one LONG novel and you can write a sequal about another time? okay?