The power to create a world, solely from the words written by your own mind, is a gift that should never be hidden.

Friday 27 May 2011

Made of Awesome Contest!

Not to be confused with the Maid of Awesome Contest. That is a horse of a different color.

So here's the new contest. It'll be similar to the Twitter Pitch contest with the critique round and the judging round. But instead of entering a twitter pitch, we're doing a first page contest. (their words, not mine)
Here is the link to the actual contest entry page. If you know me, you probably have already been there... 100 times.

On May 28th, post your title, genre, word count and the first 250 words on your blog for critique.
Here be mine.
(I have revised my first 250 words and it is now up for review in the time that is left. The old version is still below for a comparison.)

The Event.
Sci/fi Fantasy
96000 words

Chapter 1 (2nd revision)

Days before the event happened worldwide panic set in. I remember my parents telling me we had to leave quickly. My father rushed around the house grabbing things. Our camping gear, lanterns, batteries all flew into the car. My mother grabbed food, as much as she could stuff into our four door sedan. I jumped into the driver’s seat but my dad sent me such a glare that I just mumbled a sorry and moved to the back. I had never seen my dad drive that fast before as we practically flew away from our house, while both my parents had a heated argument about a store. As my dad drove past the store he barely slowed down. Gunshots could be heard ringing from inside. Every window was broken and people were running around carrying armloads of items. Some of the weirdest things can stick in your head. I remember one man; his eyes were wide in terror as he held a bag of dog food in his arms. Dog food, I could never understand why a person would have grabbed that and risked his life for it. My dad gave my mom a look and floored it away from the store. Lawns and houses blurred by so fast it looked like one long strip of green.
           
            My Dad took us into the woods. There was an old cabin tucked away in a valley near a small lake; its waters were crystal clear. He said we were lucky no-one else came to this spot.


Chapter 1 (original)
            No one knew the devastation it would bring. The world I knew as a child was gone. Most days I can scarcely remember what it was like then. I do remember it was a time of convenience. Everyone had everything, or so I thought in my youth. Fancy cars, polished to shine in the sun lined the roads. Every yard was lush and green. Houses were all neat and tidy and the streets were always lit up bright every night.
           
            Days before the event happened the worldwide panic set in. I remember my parents telling me we had to leave quickly. My father rushed around the house grabbing things. Our camping gear, lanterns, batteries all flew into the car. My mother grabbed food, as much as she could stuff into our four door sedan. I had never seen my dad drive that fast before as we practically flew away from our house, while both my parents had a heated argument about a store. As my dad drove past the store he barely slowed down. Gunshots could be heard ringing from inside. Every window was broken and people were running around carrying armloads of items. Some of the weirdest things can stick in your head. I remember one man; his eyes were wide in terror as he held a bag of dog food in his arms. Dog food, I could never understand why a person would have grabbed that and risked his life for it. My dad gave my mom a look and floored it away from the store.


I am ready for your words of encouragement! Or if that fails, tell me what you don't like about it I want to hear from YOU! At the very least you can slap a thumbs up or down right under this post. Thanks for visiting, and good luck in the contest!

28 comments:

  1. Hiya,

    As a fellow contestant, I'm here to review your entry for the Awesome Contest:)


    First impression: I want to know what happened. Was it the apocalypse? Zombie invasion? You've got me interested and I want to keep reading, so thumbs up.

    Needing some love: It was a bit heavy on backstory and info dump for the opening paragraphs, though in saying that you drew me in with your writing style - easy and flowed well. I guess I wanted to also know where the protagonist was right away, rather than being told what had happened. Your opening line is a good hook.

    What I liked: Your voice really works for me. The tension in the air, and the part about the small things he remembered. That's so true.

    Best of luck in the contest:)

    Here's mine: http://tfwalsh.wordpress.com/2011/05/28/made-of-awesome-contest/

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  2. I like the voice, but I'm not in love with opening with what is essentially backstory. I'd like to get to know the character in the here and now, in the world of the story, not hearing about how he got there.

    That said, I'm interested to see what the event was, how the world as we know it was destroyed and what kind of world has grown up in its place. I'd read on a little, just to see where this is going...

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  3. I totally understand why a guy would risk his life for dog food and I'm guessing you do too :0)

    I like the voice, and I would read on for sure.

    I think the first paragraph needs tightening - maybe drop the first 2 sentences and start with "Most days I can scarcely remember what it was like." (drop the then) "It was a time of convenience." And then the rest.

    The back story works for me, but people are quite opinionated about it, so I'd hope your present day story starts quickly after this point.

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  4. It's an interesting story. I suggest starting with the terror the event caused, not the perfect world it destroyed. Keep it active and you've hooked me. I want to know what the event was. Great job.

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  5. Instead of calling it "the event" I would just call it "it". It may be better to have the character looking at something that was now destroyed and lead into the old / perfect world. But I don't think backstory is bad/wrong. I liked the backstory. I would just maybe intersperse it with current action tags, like dialogue :)

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  6. Hi! I love the dystopian feel of this first page, and I'm curious to know that the 'event' is, you definitely drew me in. I'd suggest getting rid of passive voice and changing, "Gunshots could be heard" and "people were running around" to stronger verbs, ex: gunshots exploded/rang/sounded or people ran/scurried. Hope this is helpful. Very interesting though!

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  7. Hello,

    I am definitely engaged and interested to know about "the event". However, I do agree with the others that an immediate scene might be more engaging, like the scene at the store. I bet you could cover all that info in dialog. For some reason I stumbled over this line, "Some of the weirdest things can stick in your head," because I was expecting "some of the weirdest things they could stick in their hands," referring to what they were taking from the store. But that could easily just be me. Disregard if no one else mentions. Good luck!

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  8. very cool,
    while i can see what other people are saying I don't think this falls into classic info dump territory. it is setting the scene because we know something major happened and the character is reflecting back on "better" times so when we are brought to the present we have a reference point on how things stand in the present. I enjoyed this, and hope the guy keeps the dog food!

    douglas esper
    http://douglasesper.com

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  9. Great concept, and I really like the first line. I agree with Sharon... dropping immediately into a scene at the store would add tension and make a super strong hook. It would also eliminate those pesky passive verbs. Good job... best of luck!!!

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  10. You've done a great job writing a beautiful set of memories. Most of the agents I've spoken with would say--info dump. Your writing flows beautifully.

    Also, consider a comma after "sun" in the first paragraph. That was the only sentence that threw me.

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  11. I have to agree, it's a bit of an info dump here. That's really hard to pare it down and have it still make sense. But I did think your writing had great memories and descriptions. Not bad!

    Good luck with the contest!

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  12. I would cut the first paragraph completely. I loved the imagery using the specific with the man and the dog food. Great start with conflict/action!

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  13. A little tightening would smooth out the flow. Ah, the inevitable info dump. I cut whole paragraphs from my first page to pare it down (and yes, it hurts). Think of it as plastic surgery - your first page will be gorgeous afterwards. Other than that, interested to find out what the event is and where this is going. Good luck!

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  14. I liked very much. I didn't find it 'telly' because the voice of the narrator was so strong and appealing. I was dying to find out about the apocalypse. However, if I read on and didn't get to some action soon (giant meteors, zombies, whatever), I'd be pretty disappointed.

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  15. I liked how this made my pulse race. I could feel the panic.

    I suggest choosing a different word other than "flew" because you have it twice so close together. And grabbed/grabbing.

    Great work! I would for sure keep reading!

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  16. Like many of the comments, I'm definitely intrigued to know what the "event" is! What happened to make them all scatter like that? The world under attack from aliens? Zombies? Hmmm...you have my attention.

    With that being said, I would agree as to where you started this.

    Having your MC flash back to the scene first, would be a great opener...so in essence, flipping your two paragraphs around, would be a great start.

    As well, you might need to break your second paragraph up, as it is quite a lot of information. A good place to break it would be here:

    "...My mother grabbed food, as much as she could stuff into our four door sedan."

    "I had never seen my dad drive that fast before as we practically flew away from our house, while both my parents had a heated argument about a store..."

    And the line about the man with the dog food? Being a dog owner myself, I know exactly where you're coming from here - not to mention, having eaten my fair share of the stuff as a toddler, I also know how long a 40lb. bag of it would sustain even a human life (as gross as that sounds, but in times of desperation, I think I'd eat worse!).

    Great submit, Jamie - I'd definitely read on.

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  17. Hmm, to me, I don't love that you aren't explaining more about the event. By your wording, I'm thinking it's dystopian, but you list the genre as scifi/fantasy, so I'm left confused...but that's just one opinion!

    I agree that you can go without the first few lines - they're a bit cliche and vague (sorry). I love the part about the parents and the store - maybe you could start there (skipping the part about life as he knows it, basically that's the life everyone already envisions as "normal")

    Good job and good luck!
    erica

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  18. Good voice, interesting opening scene.

    My thoughts: consider losing (or repositioning) your first sentence. Your opening is much stronger when begun at your second sentence.

    Best of luck!

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  19. I like this. It's mostly backstory, yeah, and I would like to hurry up and reach the present. But this is also pretty interesting.

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  20. I definitely think you should reconsider and open with direct action instead of reflection. That's what readers are more into these days. I think the consequences of whatever the event is (and I'd like to know that, too - alien invasion? Volcano? Zombie apocalypse?) is fine to reflect to, but later.
    I get the feeling this is all a flashback from an adult MC. I just don't think it's a good idea to open in a flashback.

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  21. if there's any way to move the flashback to the store scene & dog food guy to realtime, then do it. if by doing that it'd leave a large time gap between where the rest of the story goes after this chapter then i think this is pretty much all backstory and should be taken out & filtered throughout the story. it's an interesting scene though, so i can see why you'd want to start w/ it. but flashbacks are always better in realtime if you can manage it.

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  22. This is beautiful writing. I'm drawn to this story on a human basic. What happened to our world that caused life to change so completely, I wonder. Your writing reminds me of Dean Kontz's. It's flashback, yes, but really compelling flashback.

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  23. Thank you everyone for the feedback. I am reading and re-reading every one. I have revamped my first page. (about twice this length) based on the feedback and it may become the replacement page come the 31st. Time alone will tell. When you think of it 250 words really isn't that much of a bite into a story. This section may seem as a flash back but the story only continues from here. Think of it being writen from the point of view of an old man sitting on a rocking chair on his porch. A group of children at his feet as he speaks of a time, a time he barely remembers.
    Thank you all for the time you have put in to help me polish this page, and to those who have yet to post. Perhaps one day you will have the choice to buy my book. I sure hope so anyway!

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  24. It's great to see a scifi in here! I really like the exposition that opens with this narrator and his explanation of what happened in his eyes. It's a great way to pull the reader into the story.

    Good luck!

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  25. I am definitely intrigued and want to know what happened; however, I feel there is a lot of back story here that could be sprinkled in as you go. Try to start in the middle of something, and relay pertinent info to the reader on an as needed basis.

    Hope this helps!

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  26. Hi, Jamie,

    Very compelling beginning. I definitely would continue reading!

    One of the hardest things us writers face is not giving a bunch of backstory right away. I know I face the same battle! :) Ease back on that a little. Make us a wait for the explanation. Let my imagination try to figure it out. Then prove me wrong.

    I think this is awesome.

    Thanks for sharing. Good luck!

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  27. I am not distracted by the "info dump" because the voice carries me through. I care and I want to keep reading backstory and all. Great job and good luck

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  28. Wow! So much better! Good job!

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