The graveyard was quiet, the only sounds were the calling of crows and the swish of leaves as the caretaker raked the ground. The sky was grey, it was always grey, or so it had been for weeks. The old man looked up, stroking his grey beard. He saw the statue, the same one he saw every day. A little girl, no more than six he guessed, with a simple dress and a little hat, carrying a doll. This one always made him sad, one that died so young. The man groaned, grabbing at his side. He chuckled.
“How much longer will it be before I join you there in the ground, huh?” said the caretaker with a laugh.
Suddenly a sinister voice whispered out at him from the fog.
“Sooner than you may think.”
The man frantically turned around, trying to find the source of the voice.
“Who’s there!”
“Just little ol’ me.” hissed the voice again with a laugh.
Suddenly, a horde of crows flew in from all sides of the man, converging on him. The caretaker let out a scream, flailing his arms uselessly at the birds. He was pecked and clawed at by the mass of crows until he fell to the ground, but they still didn’t stop. The man, screamed, yelled, and tried to fight off the birds, hoping that someone would hear and help him. Then he was silent and limp.
“Excellent.” hissed the voice again.
The crows turned away from the caretaker’s corpse and flew to the girl’s statue. They swirled around it, forming a mass of black, only interrupted by an occasional flash of orange beak. Around the statue they flew, covering the entirety of the stone. Then, as quickly as it had begun the crows explode outward revealing the statue once again. Something was different though. The girl’s skin was no longer grey stone, but real pale flesh. Her clothes had been restored to blue, as they were when she lived. The girl giggled and stepped off of her pedestal onto the grass. She walked past the mangled corpse and toward the street, followed by her mass of crows.
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125,010 Literary Works • 672,839 Reviews
Crows don't have orange beaks.
Wait, that's ravens.
Nevermind.
Hey, good overall, but maybe get rid of the crows. People this day and age don't like crows, and you have to be a crowd pleaser. ASSIMILATE. ASSIMILATE. Try inserting something like Selena Gomez or Justin Bieber into the role of the crows. You have to appeal to the young demographic.
Also, the girl seems to be obsolete in this story. Perhaps it would be better if it was Al Pacino, just to put some action into it. Your story lacks action. You should also change the setting, because a graveyard is too clichè. One way to remedy this would be to move the setting to Steve Jobs' sex dungeon. Add the appeal to the adult readers. It will really light a fire under your female fans. It'll be like 50 Shades, only better.
Hope this helped,
Greg Homberg
This was a very attention grabbing piece, but I feel as though there was no reason for the undertaker to be there. He was described so little and had so few thoughts that I hardly considered him important at all. I suggest adding to this character a bit so that readers actually care what happens to him. Besides that, this was an extremely chilling piece. I am a fan of Poe, so I enjoy any thrillers with crows. I am excited to read more. Keep me posted. Happy Writing!
Okay so normally I would have dropped this book like a hot coal. I hate thrillers but this book reminds me of that old movie, Crow, which I loved. Now to the review, I love the name, it's interesting and a total attention grabber. I liked this piece because it's interesting, it's grabs the readers attention and doesn't let go. I really don't have anything bad to say. I mean this peace is interesting, creepy, and well . . . good. Keep writing like this and many people will keep reading. Good Luck!
Interesting... Scary as well...
You describe well, but I have a question: do crows have orange beak? Or were there other birds besides crows?
And one more thing, I think you should describe the caretaker some more. I got my own vision of him, but it may be totally different from what you thought, so it may be good to clarify it.
Otherwise you are really good, I'll keep reading.
Sephiroth! Finally something of yours to read.
First off, this is quite an interesting concept. I'm definitely hooked. It was well-written too, I could spot no major mistakes. But, here are some nit-picks:
That's a lot of grey's
An idea would, for example, be giving the caretaker personality, and narrate the event through his eyes to make things even more terrifying (he could very well be scared sockless by this), instead of using a flat, external narrator.
I personally would have used a full-stop after 'quiet.' Shorter syntactical periods build tension, I've found. Plus in this case it also sounds... more correct. I dunno.
Might want to try 'who's there?!' it is a question, after all.
That above was a pun because, technically, it's not a 'horde' of crows, but a 'murder.' Flock of sparrows, murder of crows. Also, you could phrase that last bit to be 'converging on him from all sides.'
Hypothetically, you could also build some more tension before the attack, have the caretaker pick up on details, detect an aura that's not right, something's off, maybe.
But these are just nit-picks, this piece was good! I enjoyed reading it.
Hope this helped
~Ita
Hey there.
So a lot has been said about this prologue, and I have to say that I'm curious as to what's happening. I'm going to add a few more remarks there.
First of all, I think there needs to be a better transition to when the caretaker sees the statue of the girl and when it actually happens. It happens too sudden I think, and there needs to be a better build up to it.
Secondly, I think you could have characterized the caretaker a bit more. How long has he been working at the job for? I would think he would have worked at the graveyard long enough to have seen the statue several times. Does he have any particular thoughts or feelings about that particular statue? From how it's written at the moment, it's like he's new at the job since it's like his first time seeing that statue. If that's what you are intending, I think you need to develop that more.
And lastly, I think there needs to be more of a reason for this prologue. This can easily be introduced into the first chapter. All we know is there is a girl that can regenerate her body by devouring the living, but is your story only about just that, or is there more to it? I think for this to be an actual prologue, there needs to be more of a back story to the world you've created.
Anyways, hope this review helped. If you have any questions feel free to ask.
Andy.
Well, the backstory will definitely come in later chapters, but this is just an introduction to a single character. I do see what you're saying though.
Hi zephion! This is a really cool prologue. Like Audy said, this really can go anywhere. I just noticed a few little things while I was reading it:
I noticed that you repeat the same word three times in a row. Maybe you could describe the old man's beard as "white" or "salt and pepper" so that there's less repetition?
I don't want to go crazy with the nitpicking, but there should be a comma after "me," not a period. Not a big thing. More importantly, the voice says something "with a laugh." Just a few lines before that, the old man also speaks "with a laugh." Try to shake up your descriptions so that you aren't repeating words and phrases too much.
The ending was intriguing! I could definitely imagine the crows swarming the statue. Very cool. I can't wait to see where this goes!
Hope this helps!
Magnus
Zeph,
I am loving the concept for this :3 I shall be very interested in seeing how this story unfolds - and I'm intrigued! I want to know who this girl is, and what these crows are, and what is she up to, exactly? It's unclear the direction of the story, which makes me want to read more to find out. Is this a supernatural murder-mystery, a fantasy, devils/demons, I mean it can go in any direction at this point.
One thing I would watch out for is just to double-check for word usage, grammar, and punctuation errors. I noticed a couple. Here's one of the more glaring ones:
So yeah, no big deal, I'd just double-check for things like that.
I have a love-hate relationship with prologues in general (this has not so much to do with this story, as I haven't even looked at any of the chapters yet! but more to do with prologues from other stories) I guess my main problem with them is they all seem to just be generic dark/creepy atmosphere with dramatic twist that gives you no answers, no insights, some have even nothing to do with the story overall, and some are just taken straight from the middle of the novel. At that point, I always think, why have a prologue at all? Why not just begin at the beginning.
With this, it looks like the prologue is setting up the way the novel might be structured -- where the exposition and the origin story so to speak (this girl must have gotten her powers from somewhere!) will be revealed in flashbacks? while the main conflict will begin in the actual chapters. This kind of set-up I don't really have a problem with, but then again, these are just my guesses, and I don't really have much to go on, so they can be completely and utterly wrong xD
In any case, bring on the next chapter!
~ as always, Audy
Okay, thanks for the review!
Interesting start...definitely eerie and compelling! It makes you want to read more, which (of course) is the purpose of a prologue, so I have to say that it's a job well done. My only problem is that, in the first paragraph, your sentence structure never changes. Form sentences in a way that doesn't sound so stilted, and your story with have a more human effect.
There were also minor grammar problems in a couple of places, so clean it up a little and it will be more grammatically correct.
In any case, I'm excited to read more! Keep writing!
Thanks, I can see what you're talking about.