Ooh! Can I play? I have a feeling I've wrecked my start over far too many rewrites, and now I'm not sure it hooks at all any more. It would be good to know if and where it turns everyone off, or if they hate the character altogether (he takes a bit of getting used to, but he's only in it briefly).
As for everyone else's pieces, I shall don my fake mind-wiping cap and pretend I don't know you. Here we go:
Spring's first piece captured my interest (
silent tower? Ooh! Then proceeded to mention it was PURPLE glass (yaaaaay!) full of lasers (shiny!). However, then there was so much description fired at me, my brain couldn't cope. I couldn't imagine it one after the other, and so I got lost and my mind wandered.
Hex's piece confused me on the first line (the misuse of the semi threw me, and I'm not too sure what "drifting fur of cotton" is), but I LOVE her descriptions - very beautiful, magic and dance healing gaps where "Beleth" seeps in. However, the description was a bit
too heavy-handed, and being beautiful and almost dreamlike wasn't enough to engage me all the way through because of the slowness. I found my mind wandering, trying to make sense of what the character was doing, but, because I liked the voice, I ploughed on and found my attention intermittently renewed even though it was slow. Perhaps, since we've all heard of how agents shy away from the "dream sequence", you could say something like, "The dream dissolves, but as I cling to its fading remnants, I know our work here will last." Or something. Anyway, I like the premise.
Juliana's excerpt was the best of the three, imho, because it had a good mix of action, interest, and description - just enough to let me know what was going on and and where we were without boring me. I liked that he lived over a magical haunted bookstore, so when he stood outside, I immediately wanted to look at it with him to see what was so weird about it. My attention waned after that paragraph, but then immediately resumed once we had some direct action "the dad talking"), which saw me all the way to the end. If Juliana wants, though, the description could be tightened just a wee, wee bit, for readers who like even faster pacing.
As for Spring's second excerpt, I will admit that the lack of comma in the first sentence niggled, cos I've tried reading it again and again, and each time my OCDness stumbles. I wonder if any will start to read the sentence as in, "As the ship's engines shut down Averrine Pettina..."?
Anyway, I picked myself up and kept going. The first para keeps making me stumble, though, and I can't identify if that's cos I'm too tired. Since no one else has said the same thing, I'm going to assume so. This is one of those times, were I writing, that I would end up separating out the second and third sentences so I could lose the commas and expand a bit, although when I'm less tired I'll likely put it back the way I had it, knowing me. Anyway, continuing: the next para hooked me, although perhaps remove the clichéd, "We have two ways we can do this", cos I don't think you need say that before you go on to say it in better words. Anyway, instant hook when I read about her son taking her power and empire. And ooh! She'd made Payne kneel? I love that sort of thing in books, the whole mind-power thing. It's no surprise it's in my own... And yes, after that I got to the end and was hooked.
As for Mouse's piece, I read the first para no problem, but my mind (I'm sorry) laughed at "wee" - I just didn't expect something so... what's the word?
Colloquial? Maybe it's a POV thing, because I prefer the distant kinda POVs, but I would have liked something a bit less ordinary - more hinting rather than outright "I need a wee" - or maybe skipped it altogether. Maybe even a bit of humour: "She couldn't even cross her legs in here, and the way her stomach was feeling, she
really needed to". Anyway, I made it to the end and would read on to find out how it
isn't a wampire story.
(Did I just write "wampire"?!)
Now my critter side wants to say you could remove a couple of things: the "Bringing a hand to her face", the "she replied" (I would just have her take his hand), and the "creaking wood" - I'm not sure the wood would creak, tbh, if you were rolling about on a giant long slab of it packed tightly in earth. I used to work with wood, and I just can't see it happening in that situation. Imagine if you took a cupboard door off and lay on it - it wouldn't creak. If anyone wants to correct me, though...?).
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Aaaaand, if anyone can help me out, I would be huuuugely grateful:
Either Maslin was getting old, or bodies were getting heavier. He sighed as he hauled his sledge. ‘Bloody age is jumping out at me again.’
At least his mud-stained pelts kept out the icy wind, unlike the tattered patches in his hat. He knew he should afford new head fur, but it was Fetah’s fault. If she wasn’t so bloody expensive and tempting with her curves and come-to-bed pout…! A man couldn’t skimp on boots, though, not for all the pouts in the world, not when a good pair could last you through yanith – and that was needed on this miserable route, when his legs sank into snow and he tripped on hidden tree roots.
A noise made him start: screeching blurs of brown and cream – a flock of whitewings – erupted from the woodland in a flurry of agitated feathers. No doubt an animal had startled them.
About bloody time! Since he’d left his hut at dawn, it had felt as if he’d dragged his bait halfway around the known world. There was a distinct lack of animals today. Come to think of it, there was a hush here too, a… feeling in the air, as if the world was unsettled. As well it should be! Why should the world be happy if he was bloody not? He tugged the boar over a particularly nasty tree root, grumbling. What he wouldn’t sell to have the comforts of a lord.
The sledge flew free after a violent tug. Only one more obstacle to overcome – a nasty rise that had caused him to slip more than a few times. It was easier to let the boar slide down the hill first before he carefully chose his steps. He heaved his load up the incline, forcing weary muscles to comply. Maybe he’d caught a cold. Why else would he feel so tired? More and more he looked forward to the day he left this life and walked through the city with the other white-hairs in a shower of cheers and petals. Finally he’d get his due! People would look to him with admiration. Bloody admiration!
Just as an image of a very adoring Fetah popped in his mind, he spotted a shape in the distance, lurking low to the ground. He blustered to a stop, squinting at the figure – surely a thief, for hunters didn’t die out here. Hunters were hardy, like himself.
‘This ain’t the backstreets!’ he whispered. ‘Bloody sneaky thievians.’ What was the world coming to? Maslin hoped to attract a rare predator with his boar, one his buyers would pay handsomely for. Some upstart wouldn’t rob him of that chance.
Stinking thievians. They never cared who they robbed or murdered. He grabbed an arrow from his quiver, set its nock on the cord, and drew it to his ear, contemplating whether he could loose it into the man’s head. Which end’s the head? He squinted at the shape. His eyesight was not what it used to be. Pah! Does it matter?
