Flogometer for Sherry—would you turn the page?

Update: sorry, out of town today with no access to FtQ submissions. See you Monday.

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The Flogometer challenge: can you craft a first page that compels me to turn to the next page? Caveat: Please keep in mind that this is entirely subjective.
Note: all the Flogometer posts are here.

What's a first page in publishingland? In a properly formatted novel manuscript (double-spaced, 1-inch margins, 12-point type, etc.) there should be about 16 or 17 lines on the first page (first pages of chapters/prologues start about 1/3 of the way down the page). Directions for submissions are below.

Some homework. Before sending your novel's opening, you might want to read these two FtQ posts: Story as River and Kitty-cats in Action. That'll tell you where I'm coming from, and might prompt a little rethinking of your narrative.

Storytelling Checklist

Before you rip into today’s submission, consider this list of 6 vital storytelling ingredients from my book, Flogging the Quill, Crafting a Novel that Sells. While it's not a requirement that all of these elements must be on the first page, they can be, and I think you have the best chance of hooking a reader if they are.

Evaluate the submission—and your own first page—in terms of whether or not it includes each of these ingredients, and how well it executes them. The one vital ingredient not listed is professional-caliber writing because that is a must for every page, a given.

• Tension
• Story questions
• Voice
• Clarity
• Scene setting
• Character
  

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Sherry’s opening page of Beautifully Broken

For as long as I can remember, I’ve heard whispers in the shadows—dark twisting shapes that chilled my blood. During the day, I felt safe, the heat of the sun thawing the chill, but this morning, the gloom outside did little to abate my fears or warm my bare flesh.

Despite being tempted to jump back into bed and pull the covers over my head, I dragged myself toward the closet to pick out my clothes. Yawning, I threw a dress on the bed, and then undecided, rummaged in the closet again. Ugh, nothing I wanted to wear. I could cover up the outside with clothing, but inside, I was still an empty space.

A rush at the edge of my skin made me shiver.

The maelstrom of shadows caught my peripheral vision. They murmured in an ancient language, gliding along the floor. Red eyes glinted. They covered everything in their path like a dense, opaque blob. The air filled with the stench of sulfur and smoke.

Ah, crap. Forgot to open the curtains. Warning spasms of alarm erupted within me.

I glanced over my shoulder—and froze.

An amorphous darkness crept along the wall, different from the others. As though the dark itself had come to life and coalesced while I watched, taking on form—human form. For a second, I thought it was a ghost. It was something much worse. The shadow slid closer, growing in size. It stirred, altered, trickled into flesh, and limbs and...

I turned the page

I liked the voice, the clean writing, and the story questions raised by an assault of red-eyed shadows certainly made me want to know what happens next! Nice work. Still, I have a few notes . . .

For as long as I can remember, I’ve heard whispers in the shadows—dark twisting shapes that chilled my blood. During the day, I felt safe, the heat of the sun thawing the chill, but this morning, the gloom outside did little to abate my fears or warm my bare flesh.

Despite being tempted to jump back into bed and pull the covers over my head, I dragged myself toward the closet to pick out my clothes. Yawning, I threw a dress on the bed, and then undecided, rummaged in the closet again. Ugh, nothing I wanted to wear. I could cover up the outside with clothing, but inside, I was still an empty space.(I suggest cutting the last two lines for a couple of reasons. The “nothing to wear” part was simply extending this little patch of ordinariness before the foretold attack of the shadows, and I wanted to get on with it. The second, which is working on developing character, still felt like a non sequitur. It hinted at inner feelings, but then we left that. I think this is better off left to later.)

A rush at the edge of my skin made me shiver. (Now we’re getting’ somewhere!)

The maelstrom of shadows caught my peripheral vision. They murmured in an ancient language, gliding along the floor. Red eyes glinted. They covered everything in their path like a dense, opaque blob. The air filled with the stench of sulfur and smoke. (Two little things—how does she know it’s an ancient language? From previous exposure? What language is it? And how many red eyes? A pair? Several pairs? Random single eyes? That part of the picture could be more complete for me.)

Ah, crap. Forgot to open the curtains. Warning spasms of alarm erupted within me. (I really liked this part—first the characterization of the first couple of lines—oh, yeah, this terror crap is here again, ho hum. The contrast with the scariness of the previous paragraph was very effective. But then fear makes its way through the attitude and the tension builds.)

I glanced over my shoulder—and froze.

An amorphous darkness crept along the wall, different from the others. As though the dark itself had come to life and coalesced while I watched, taking on form—human form. For a second, I thought it was a ghost. It was something much worse. The shadow slid closer, growing in size. It stirred, altered, trickled into flesh, and limbs and... (She doesn’t know what it is yet, so how could she know it’s much worse? I’d cut that bit of telling and keep on with describing what seems to be attacking her. I’d think about cutting the ghost line, too—she has experienced the shadows before, and this seems to be part of that, so why would she think of ghosts?)

Comments, please?

For what it’s worth.

Ray

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Submitting to the Flogometer:

Email the following in an attachment (.doc, .docx, or .rtf preferred):

1. your title
2. your 1st chapter or prologue plus 1st chapter
3. Please format with double spacing, 12-point font Times New Roman font, 1-inch margins.
4. Please include in your email permission to post it on FtQ.
5. And, optionally, permission to use it as an example in a book if that's okay.
6. If you’re in a hurry, I’ve done “private floggings,” $50 for a first chapter.
7. If you rewrite while you wait you turn, it’s okay with me to update the submission.

© 2010 Ray Rhamey

Comments

[Kelley]

I voted yes. I like this a lot. I actually liked the line "inside, I was still an empty space" and wanted to know more about that.

I was a little confused by her ho hum attitude (as Ray calls it) due to the creeping terror in the room. If it's real terror, shouldn't she be afraid? But it's not enough of a problem for me to stop reading. A few more pages would probably explain it anyway.

[glj]

I voted no.

Good writing, yes. It gave the impression that the story would flow well and be well constructed. I get the impression that you are a very good writer.

My problem was that 1) the whole "just waking up" bit seems boring, predictable, and overdone, and 2) protagonist acting crazy-seeing things others don't, feels ordinary and doesn't stand out. There are many books out there with relatively well-crafted plots. I don't get a sense of why I should pick this story over other stories.

I don't get a sense of the protagonist at all. I have no idea if the protagonist is male or female, young or old.

Yes, hard to do in a first page. My impression is that the page is pretty solid, but nothing especially compelling.

The opening implies that the protagonist is used to seeing whatever this is and has strategies for dealing with it-although "open the curtains" seems weak. If I were being haunted by ghosts when it got dark, I'd have 1,000 watt spotlights in my bedroom, 24/7, wouldn't I? You bet I would! If the spirits arrived at 7:00AM, I'd have my alarm clock set to 6:30 and I'd get the hell out of the house!

I would feel more drawn in if the protagonist wakes up feeling that something is wrong and has to figure out how to deal with it. For me, the plot needs to be more than boy-or-girl-living-with-personal-demons. I can't help feeling that won't pull the reader along for 70,000 words or more. There needs to be a NEW danger.

[Deb]

Talking about the shadows before anything reminds her and then lazily gets out of bed was out of place.I would ditch that whole first paragraph or change her reaction. She needs to be alert getting out of bed if she is already thinking about it. I don't drag or yawn if I am scared. My blood is pulsing through my heart and head.I am jerking out the first piece of clothing I touch, already looking over my shoulder.

And the curtain thing I didn't understand. If the sunlight gets rid of the amorphouses then weren't they in with her all night anyway? Why does it matter then if they are there with her in the morning?

The last bit you start getting it right except for "ah crap" is something I say when I forget to mark my place in a book, not be attaacked by something.

Plus I agree with all of Ray's changes.

Your tension isn't building, it's jumping up and down, and this killed it for me.

[Doug]

I voted "yes", but there is some polishing that could be done. My overall concern is that the voice is somewhat literary, but the command of written English--word choice, punctuation, and sentence and paragraph construction--doesn't quite seem up to the task.

Opening line: "heard whispers" makes a strange antecedent for "dark twisting shapes". I can't reconcile shapes with sounds.

Back off on the commas. The second sentence contains four, but would be easier to read with just one [I used "with" to replace one comma]:
- During the day I felt safe with the heat of the sun thawing the chill, but this morning the gloom outside did little to abate my fears or warm my bare flesh.

The term "bare flesh" bothered me. One sees bare flesh when one skins an animal. Generally it's skin that is bare.

I felt a lack of continuity in that first paragraph, too. In the first sentence we were reading about disturbing shadows, and in the second we read about how heat makes things better. Going back and re-reading, I can see that you're referring to the "chilled blood", but I shouldn't have to go back and re-read on the second sentence of your work.

The second sentence of the second paragraph is multiply flawed. It opens with a participial ("Yawning") that's incorrectly used to imply a sequence rather than simultaneity. Commas are misused. And it's a play-by-play of "did this and did that and did this and did that"; sentences like that usually should be rewritten either by collapsing them into a single overall action or by making each step a detailed sentence. Personally, I'd scrap this sentence entirely and keep the two that Ray struck out. The only added value of the second sentence is to establish the protag as female, and that could be melded into the following sentences.

Remove the comma after "but inside" from the last sentence of the second paragraph.

There are two single-sentence non-dialogue paragraphs on this page. That's at least one too many. Single-sentence narrative paragraphs are exclamation points in the rhythm of the story, and they should be used very sparingly. I'd combine the first one ("A rush...") with the following paragraph.

I'm not sure what "the edge of my skin" is, although I'm willing to let it slide.

A tiny change: I'd make it "A maelstrom" rather than "The maelstrom" because I presume that she hadn't previously noticed the maelstrom of shadows.

I didn't like the sentence construction of "They murmured in an ancient language, gliding along the floor." The participial phrase seems out of place. The sentence is about murmuring, and we end up with another synesthetic disjunct between sight and sound.

The pronoun "they" in that sentence technically has a problem because its antecedent, "maelstrom", is singular, but I think it's pretty clear that the intended antecedent is "shadows". Still, I'd be tempted to open that sentence with "The shadows".

I agree with Ray about "how many eyes"?

From a visual standpoint, the blob being both dense and opaque is redundant.

The final sentence in the "Ah, crap" paragraph doesn't fit for me. I'd combine it into the following paragraph:
- Spasms of alarm erupted within me. I glanced over my shoulder—and froze.

Notice I deleted "Warning" from that sentence. It's redundant with "alarm".

The final paragraph on the page left me confused. Is the darkness two-dimensional like a shadow, or three-dimensional like a cloud of smoke? Or is it transitioning from shadow to substance? It's not at all clear.

The second sentence of that paragraph is a fragment, and I don't think it needs to be one.

I don't think that "coalesced" is the word you want. That means "came together", and there only seems to be one darkness. Maybe "configured"?

After the second in which she "thought it was a ghost", what did she decide that it was? You say "something much worse", but that's too vague. We're in first-person, so the reader should know everything the protag does.

The verbs in the final (incomplete) sentence of the page, especially "stirred" and "trickled", didn't work for me. I couldn't visualize what was going on.

The content is interesting and the voice is good, but more attention to detail would be welcome.

[Dark Angel Reviews & Writing]

Thank you so much for all your feedback! I have to admit that I sent this page to Ray quite awhile back and a lot of the suggested changes had already been made from feedback I'd gotten from my beta readers. Still, I went through and improved two rough areas that you guys pointed.

I’d love to know what you think! You can read the revised first chapter on my blog here: http://www.darkangelwritingandreviews.com/2010/03/first-chapter-of-dark-angel-ya.html

Also, in my defense about how she knows the shadows murmur in an ancient language? Well, you can't explain EVERYTHING in the first chapter. Because that would be like an info dump or too much backstory. I wanted the reader to be left with a few unanswered questions. Otherwise, why flip the pages, if not to discover the answers and solve the mystery…right?

Thanks again,
Sherry

[Heather]

I said yes because I wanted to see what the human-shadow turned out to be, but there were some awkward parts. I also could not really tell how she was supposed to be feeling... I'm torn. At times I think that she is complacent (dragged, yawning, and rummaging through the closet [where I figure there would also be shadows for whispering in]) because she has experienced the shadows, whispers, and (I assume) red eyes since her childhood with nothing having happened yet. At other times, it seems she really is frightened (chilled my blood, abate my fears, alarm erupted, etc), but if she's been terrified all her life, I would think she'd have more of a safety system set up (just opening the curtains in the morning seems weak if this is a terror she's battled all her life).

If she is terrified, then she needs to shore up her defenses better. If she isn't terrified until the "other" shadow starts to form, then I think everything should be described in just a creepy-but-normal way up until then.

Something else that threw me off was not really getting a clear picture of what these shadows are... Are these things IN the shadows or are shadows themselves these things? I think I get thrown because we open with whispers IN the shadows (as if the shadow is a doorway or a window to somewhere else), and then later, the shadows move and have eyes. If the (demons?) are the shadows, then I'd change the opening (maybe ...The shadows--dark, twisting shapes that chilled my blood--had always whispered to me).

Some awkward phrasing:

"bare flesh"... there's just something, I don't know... too stark about the word flesh (does she sleep in the nude?).

"a rush at the edge of my skin"... Can she feel the shadows as a physical sensation? (i.e., a brush against her skin? or maybe a rush at the edge of her senses--not necessarily touch because she might also see and hear them?)

"They covered everything in their path like a dense, opaque blob."... It seems to me that they are not LIKE a blob but really are one. (maybe: The opaque blob covered everything in its path?)

There's something about the order of this sequence of events that doesn't seem right. I might have the stench of smoke and sulfur alert her to the maelstrom activity along with the "rush...shiver" trigger, and then have the "ah, crap" moment (she hasn't seen it, but the smell tells her what's happening), and then, catch it in her peripheral vision.

"As though the darkness itself had come to life..." Not so much awkward in phrasing as it is in continuity. It seems to me that, with the shadows gliding across the floor on their own and having red eyes and all, the darkness has already come to life to some extent. I suggest finding another comparison. I would be tempted to remove the sentence and the following three. Saying that it's taking on human form seems presumptive when it takes four more sentences for it to even start forming limbs. (Maybe: An amorphous darkness crept along the wall, different from the others. The shadow slid closer, growing in size. It stirred, altered, trickled into flesh, and limbs... and whatever came next. [By the way, is the darkness actually forming flesh as in skin? Or is it just taking on shape? If it's forming skin, then I would have it form shadowy limbs first and then solidify into flesh.])

Interesting, though. Nice story questions.

[Jami Gold]

It seems like there's a really good story here, but the craft issues and uneven tone are interfering with it. I just read your first chapter on your blog and the same issues people talk about here show up throughout that excerpt. Every little thing like comma faults and misusing 'taught' for 'taut' add up to hurt the impression of your work.

And as many people here mentioned, the reader isn't sure if they're supposed to feel fear/dread or annoyance at these shadows because of the uneven tone. Work to make the tone smoother, leading from one emotional state to another.

For example, in your chapter, we're not sure how freaked out she is about seeing the woman in church as it flips from that to checking out the guy back and forth. We need transitions to follow the emotional state.

Keep at it though. If your story is as great at it seems like it could be, it's worth the work to keep plugging along.

[Deb]

You have a beautiful website, but as Jami said you still have issues. I didn't read the whole thing but this jumped out at me within seconds.

"Impenetrable gray clouds were all I could see out my window."

"Ah, crap, crap crap! Forgot to open the curtains."

[Sherry Soule]

Thank you again for the feedback. I submitted this opener because I knew it needed more revision, but I was too close to my own work to see the flaws.

A good critique indicates obvious overlooked errors, and is brutally honest yet respectful in the evaluation of someone's work. I believe feedback is crucial to a writer at any stage.

And any writer who “thinks” his/her novel is perfect needs a reality check. Even published authors have critique partners—they're called agents and editors!

Hmmm, why is it that we can easily point out errors in other people's work, yet overlook it in out own? lol

Anyhoo, I'm glad you guys helped, because it seems my MS may have found a publisher. :-)

[Sherry Soule]

The novel has gone through 2 MAJOR revisions now. Hopefully I'm finally getting closer to perfection.

Please stop by and take a peek: http://www.darkangelwritingtools.com/2010/03/first-chapter-of-dark-angel-ya.html