The Hook is the Thing?

Thanks everyone for the comments! :)

Some more commentary from me:

Alc, I like it, very intriguing, but it didn’t read like the opening to a story, more like the third or fourth para. Not sure why… As if something is missing from the start? Or just the phrasing?

Ivanya, nice! Not sure if it’s the time of year, with longer nights and spooky, leafless trees, but we all seem to be going for the creep factor here! :D

Perp II; ooh, a literal hook. I like it! This one’s much more in-your-face than the other, definitely, um, hooky!

Ratsy; I do like it, but same comment as alc; I would imagine this a bit further down the first page, doesn’t read like the very beginning of the story somehow.

Boneman; Masterfully executed. :D I would definitely read more.
 
I guess I should comment on everybody else's...

Perp 1: yep, I say drop paragraph one

springs: I smiled. Job done

Mr Orange: good last line (keep that!). Start seemed a little formulaic

Juliana: I would read on

Ivanya: not too hooky, but well-written. I'd read on

Perp 2: intriguing, and I'd read on. Bad feeling it's a dream sequence, though ;)

ratsy: good set-up and I'd read on. Too many prepositions, though.

Boneman: hooky! I'm intrigued...
 
He caressed Matthew's naked, glistening stomach with his finger, and the bare flesh quivered at his touch. Matthew moaned. Stuart got up off the bed and washed his hands. He looked in the mirror and smiled to see his exertions had left him in quite a state. A few wipes with a towel removed the blood from his face. His fingers curled around the pliers and he returned to Matthew's side.

"Three down, seven to go. You're running out of fingernails, Matt."

Edited extra bit: little bit sleepy, so I'll check back later today and give a comment on others' thoughts when I am appropriately fuelled with caffeine.
 
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That hooked me until the last sentence, thad, and then I was quite disappointed. ;)
 
Right, other people's stuff:

Perpetual Man - quite liked this. First sentence is perhaps superfluous.

Springs - I always wondered what happened when people whose work you've critiqued caught up with you :p [More seriously, it works well]

Mr. Orange - I'd add something about the amulet's owner (a survivor/past victim/evil lighthouse etc).

Juliana - apparently Prague recently had 16 human skulls (with a number carved into each) discovered in the streets... anyway, it's a good premise.

Alchemist, was your Hooky Or Not reference from Mouse/Springs the one where a chap was wandering through a desert, using magic? I think I remember that.

Alchemist 2: I liked the first part, but the second didn't seem to add much.

Perp 2 (Perp Harder) - I found this quite amusing, and the better of your two efforts.

Ratsy - good, but I wonder if not being sure who the hooded figure was (Surely it couldn't be X, after all these years?!) might work better.

Boneman - hehe. I liked this, but personally I would've had an incompetent executioner. Three hacks to lop the head off, and then an even greater feeling of dread for the protagonist.


Hmm. Can't decide if I'm more tolerant than in my critiqures (I tend to be finickity) but generally the efforts all seem either pretty or very good.
 
I'm glad my hook seems to be doing the job.

Alc. the vague thoughts running through my head were certainly not a dream sequence.

Thad - just loved it, a brilliant bit of misdirection.
 
:) Immediate action/violence can be a mistake at the very beginnng. Try focusing on something simple, a single object, say, a bird.

A lone bird circled down towards Hamishs' hideout in the woods.

That's enough info dumped into the 1st sentence to behoove one to wonder a few things. Why is the bird coming down, is it to visit Hamish? Or attack him? Why is Hamish hiding in the woods? You also have location, woodsy, to go with the two characters.

In its beak something metallic gleamed and Hamish dropped the axe and ran into his cabin.

Okay now it's action but what? Does the bird have a gun of some kind, or a bomb? What is in the cabin, a weapon, or shelter, or a bottle of whiskey? We don't know and I think forcing the reader to draw a few conclusions, right off the top, is a good idea. Don't make it too too easy to read, don'[t let those dmn readers get lazy.

Now you can more or less choose what type of story, now that they are hooked* )

It was great to see Chirpy again and Hamish re-remerged from the tiny brown ramshackle slabby cabin with a huge infected grin on his elven mug,
or:
A purple ray lanced from the bird-thing down like a lightning strike to the cabin as Hamish flung himself back into the clearing, his Ion-pistol flaming. (Action!)
Mebbe.
Only once in the many long years Hamish had lived in the Golden valley, had a tiding of such magnitude appeared in the sky. The bird swooped and darted then flashed into the trees and disappeared and Hamish knew that the time had come for the people of Lorthorgolorglian to make ready for war. (Epic trilogism)
Get rid of the bird now, and bring it back later if needed. Maybe try it with some common objects, even inanimate ones.

The cheeseburger on Hamishs' plate was massive. He picked it up with two hands and something fell out onto his plate. Clunk.
:p
 
:) Immediate action/violence can be a mistake at the very beginnng. Try focusing on something simple, a single object, say, a bird.

A lone bird circled down towards Hamishs' hideout in the woods.

That's enough info dumped into the 1st sentence to behoove one to wonder a few things. Why is the bird coming down, is it to visit Hamish? Or attack him? Why is Hamish hiding in the woods? You also have location, woodsy, to go with the two characters.

In its beak something metallic gleamed and Hamish dropped the axe and ran into his cabin.

Okay now it's action but what? Does the bird have a gun of some kind, or a bomb? What is in the cabin, a weapon, or shelter, or a bottle of whiskey? We don't know and I think forcing the reader to draw a few conclusions, right off the top, is a good idea. Don't make it too too easy to read, don'[t let those dmn readers get lazy.

Now you can more or less choose what type of story, now that they are hooked* )

It was great to see Chirpy again and Hamish re-remerged from the tiny brown ramshackle slabby cabin with a huge infected grin on his elven mug,
or:
A purple ray lanced from the bird-thing down like a lightning strike to the cabin as Hamish flung himself back into the clearing, his Ion-pistol flaming. (Action!)
Mebbe.
Only once in the many long years Hamish had lived in the Golden valley, had a tiding of such magnitude appeared in the sky. The bird swooped and darted then flashed into the trees and disappeared and Hamish knew that the time had come for the people of Lorthorgolorglian to make ready for war. (Epic trilogism)
Get rid of the bird now, and bring it back later if needed. Maybe try it with some common objects, even inanimate ones.

The cheeseburger on Hamishs' plate was massive. He picked it up with two hands and something fell out onto his plate. Clunk.
:p
 
This looks like fun... I hope it's OK to join in.

Elsa peeled away ribbon and wrapping to reveal a large, ticking box. An incubator! Squealing with delight, she fumbled with the latches.

At last it was open. She reached into the moist warmth, her hand small against the green, pulsating egg.
 
Of course it's okay to join in TitaniumTi, and welcome to the Chrons, settle in and have some fun. There are plenty of things like this floating around that are fun for everyone.

Yours really did the trick, I think I was drawn in with the opening sentence and the rest was the icing on the cake. Enough there to easily hook a reader and then wondering about what happens next.
 
Hey I double-posted, is that infodumping?
I look at the first few paragraphs, I'm using 50 Great SF SS, Ed. Asimov and Conklin, very short stories, some of them, 50's SF, and the hookage is truly amazing in its variety.
Arthur C. for ex. The Haunted Space Suit 1958 - in about a hundred words, you are the manager of a huge space station under construction, and there is a strange object on the radar. You have to go out and get it.
There re no unusual words, no techbabble, no fancy writing. But no way can you stop reading it. ) This particular story then turns from an adventure in space, to horror, and ends up being funny.
Here's one more hook from Asimov:
Margie even wrote about it that night in her diary. On the
page headed May 17, 2155, she wrote, “Today Tommy
found a real book!”
:rolleyes:


 
Thanks Perpetual Man, I'll add an extra paragraph.

"Call me old-fashioned," her grandmother mumbled, sotto voce, "but I don't think it's a gift for a child."
 
I have a collection of first lines. It's a pity I'll never have time to write all the corresponding stories. Here is my latest effort:

When they returned to Earth, all the people were gone. Their re-entry capsule landed in a field of weeds.
 
I liked that too Martin, I'm not so sure it was the bit about the people being gone, but the image of weeds made me start asking what was going on, where were things you would normally find in a field (other than weeds) like livestock crops etc. That is when I started to wonder what had happened.
 
Here are a few thoughts:

Perpetual Man: "From the hill..." The second paragraph is reasonably hooky, the first less so.

Springs: I liked the first paragraph, but the second one didn't really work for me.

Mr Orange: I like the idea of accidentally causing destruction through "bad luck". The second sentence didn't add much for me and could probably be edited out.

Juliana: I liked this one. We've got a character with an interesting problem.

alchemist: A gory and amusing opening. I'd delete the "mini-assassin" clause.

Ivanya: A good opening, leaving the reader with lots of questions.

Perpetual Man: "I was pulled..." Interestingly different. Not sure about the "Happy Birthday" bit; surely the devil has better tunes than that to sing.

ratsy: Starting with someone tied up, isn't a bad opening. Although, I think that it needs a bit of editing to stengthen it.

Boneman: Pretty good. I'd read on a bit to see whether the MC survives.

thaddeus6th: An interesting shift from erotica to horrific torture. Not my sort of thing, but good none-the-less.

TitaniumTi: I'd read on to find out what was going to hatch. Dragon, alien?
 
Thanks for the thoughts martin.

Funnily enough the second of mine has given me an idea for a story. Happy Birthday (and the devil) would not feature. :D
 
Even through the depths of his sleep, Dan heard the bell. It tolled in a somber basso profundo that resonated in his bones. He dreamed of death and birth.
 
There was a definite hook in there Titanium, but it was slightly to grand for my liking. That being said it is only a small opening, given a few more lines it might take on a life of is own.
 
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