Monday, December 17, 2012

Hangover Round 1 Entry #33

Title: THE THINGS THAT ARE
Genre: Paranormal Romance

After dreaming of her own murder, sixteen-year-old Chloe Hartwel discovers her prophetic dreams are linked to the society of demigods responsible for her father’s death and the boy she loves is one of them. 
 
Somewhere between my poorly executed bob haircut and my obsession with plaid phase, my therapist declared me crazy. Her exact words were “suffers from delusions and her behavior is a clear sign of conduct disorder”. Ethically she couldn’t call me a wacko to my face. But I had Google and her fancy psych words simply meant she wanted my mother to spend thousands more on her so-called therapy sessions. I was nine then and seven years later I thought I had finally ditched the crazy until I found myself hiding in the bushes in the middle of the night. The crazy was lurking.
           
My quads burned and my feet were numb from crouching for an unreasonable amount of time. I peeked over the bushes again. He was still sitting on the wooden porch swing with his legs resting on the railing in front of him and his phone pressed to his ear. If I listened to one more round of I’m sorry baby and you’re right baby, I was going to vomit. I already wanted to gag from just looking at his side swept, Bieber fever hairstyle. He had to be at least seventeen and seriously needed to move past his tween years.
 
I leaned forward to help balance myself and wrapped my hand around one of the branches, forgetting rose bushes had thorns. I yelped. He jerked his head in my direction. I ducked lower. The planks on the porch creaked and whined. He was on the move.

5 comments:

  1. Your logline sounds interesting, but I had to re-read it a few times to understand it, especially the boy being "one of them."

    There's a lot going on in the second phrase. Perhaps it would help if you inserted a em dash "Chloe Hartwel discovers her prophetic dreams are linked to the society of demigods responsible for her father’s death—and the boy she loves..." and rephrase the last part.

    Also, what's at stake for the MC? Her own murder if she embarks on a journey to find the demigods??

    The first paragraph caught my attention because I was curious to know in what way the MC was crazy.

    I somehow lost interest once I read the second paragraph. Who is "he"? The boy the MC loves? The boy is a Justin Bieber fan? How does "he" look like?

    I also suggest to make the sentence "He was on the move" active. Maybe, "He hurried", "He came toward me and frowned", etc. Any "to be" words are passive.

    I hope my suggestions help and I wish you good luck!

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  2. I'm assuming your genre is YA Paranomal Romance, not Paranormal Romance, since your protag is only 16?

    I didn't really feel grounded in the scene once we found out she was crouched in the bushes. Who was she watching? Why? I know there's only so much you can establish on the first page, but at least give us an idea of what's going on, what she's feeling, etc.

    Good luck!

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  3. I agree with the others as well. Grammatically, there's some need of hyphens and commas to help your sentence structure. This will help make your information easier to understand.
    I enjoyed your first paragraph and the use of 'the crazy'.
    I think your MC voice is pretty solid, but moving into the second and third paragraphs meant moving into question-land.
    I can assume from your log line that the love interest is the boy on the phone on the porch...but if I didn't have your log line, I'd be lost. I'm not sure I like the connection to Justin Bieber's hair...it may date your story...and bring to mind Bieber himself...which it did for me - and that's not a good thing! I think you can describe his hair without making reference to JB.
    Also, there was nothing in your first 250 words that referenced the murder dream...I wonder if you could try fitting it in somehow, what it would do to your conflict/story tension?
    Thank you!

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  4. I think I've seen this before and this is much improved. Others noted some good things. Mostly I just want to know earlier why she's watching this guy. Loved "the crazy" reference!

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  5. I saw this on MSFV for the first 250 words (no logline). I really liked the first paragraph then and still do. But, then, you lost me. I was okay with her crouching behind a bush but didn't understand WHY she was doing so. After that, I just lost interest.

    Also, I agree with the others and think the logline is just a bit confusing. I don't really have any suggestions to offer which haven't already been made.

    ReplyDelete