Wednesday, February 27, 2013

February Test Run #2

TITLE: Dear Katherine
GENRE: Science Fiction

My life began the day I turned eighteen and fell off a planet for the first time. Up until I left school, I hadn't started living--I had just existed.

But even after falling on and off most of the colonized planets in the Tetracoil Galaxy for fourteen years, I still felt exhilarated every time the synchrotron was powered down and gravity took hold of the spacecraft. The adrenalin rush from those seven minutes of free-fall, not knowing if the hovering jets would engage in time, lasted me days.

My heart was still racing when the hatch opened and fresh air rushed into the passenger cabin. I smelled brine in the air--my first greeting from Millanos. I unfastened the straps holding me to the seat and stretched my back. Through the internal passageway, I could see the three pilots moving around the cockpit. One of these days, I would learn to drive just to be able to ride in the fun seats. But first I had nine more planets to visit and Millanos was just a few steps away.

I collected the single duffle that contained all my possessions and shouted a “thank you” toward the cockpit. I had paid them in advance, so there was no point in disturbing their crosscheck protocol. And after six and a half hours in the confined cabin, I was more than ready to be outside. That wormhole was a long one.

8 comments:

  1. Wow, cool first line! I liked your opening overall, and I would keep reading.

    My one suggestion for improvement is that from your first sentence, I automatically assumed our narrator was 18. But no, he/she is 32, right (18+14)? But later, he/she talks about wanting to learn to drive. It's a small thing, but if you could remove the distraction of this person's age/life experience level, it would make for a smoother read.

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  2. I love your first line too! I agree with Yellow Post-it. The ages confused me. She starts at 18 but she only started jumping from planets at 14? I'd take the second age out because it made me wonder if she was 18 or 14 or what not.

    I re-read this a few times to figure out what Millanos was. You might want to say planet Millanos to ground your readers. At first, I thought it was a person. I wasn't sure.

    I definitely want to keep reading to find out more about your MC. Is it a he or a she? Why do they do this besides the adrenaline rush? etc. Nice!

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  3. I agree with the above PLUS love the tight writing and the visual I get with fantastic use of sensory.

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  4. I think I remember seeing this before, and I really like the changes that you've made so far. However, I'm finding that I got stuck on the following sentence:
    'But even after falling on and off most of the colonized planets in the Tetracoil Galaxy for fourteen years, I still felt exhilarated every time the synchrotron was powered down and gravity took hold of the spacecraft.'
    It just felt like a mouthful to me and I had to reread it to really absorb it, I think it's just a matter of rewording.
    It's coming along nicely!
    Good luck!

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  5. Thanks for all the comments. Would splitting the first sentence in the second paragraph like this help clear most of the confusions?

    >By the time I landed on Millanos, I had fallen on and off most of the colonized planets in the Tetracoil Galaxy. But even after fourteen years, I still felt exhilarated every time the synchrotron was powered down and gravity took hold of the spacecraft.

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  6. Hi Patchi!
    Yes, that simple rearranging totally changes how I read the piece! It's so much better and less of a mouthful! Great job!

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  7. Love this! You've definitely got me hooked, and I love the reworking of that sentence.

    The only other thing that tripped me up was the age thing, like others have mentioned. I think part of it was the mention of learning to "drive" and the fact that the MC referred to the cockpit as "fun seats" ... which reads a little younger to me.

    Overall, I really really liked this!

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  8. I have to agree with the rest--awesome opening line!

    And the fix you came up with is great. That was the only sentence in the first 250 that threw me.

    I'd definitely read more!

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