TITLE – BOY TOY
GENRE —ROMANTIC THRILLER
Prada, Gucci, Cartier; spoils of a successful life—faint reminders of sacrificed time, energy and . . . love flashed through her mind as the daydream ended. He was coming—she had to hurry.
“Detective Lindstrom—what are you doing here?” Real estate agent Rachel Contino cracked the door to her high-rise condo in St. Petersburg, Florida wider and smiled broadly. Her heart beat fast as the taste of burning acid attempted to escape her stomach. The investigation into the death of her client and friend, developer Jonathan Harrell, was supposed to have been closed.
“Jonathan Harrell’s case is being expanded. Yesterday, we obtained some new evidence suggesting his death wasn’t a suicide.” With his short stocky body firmly planted in the doorway, Lindstrom glanced around her. “Perhaps this conversation would be better if we spoke inside.”
Fear spread across Rachel’s face, erasing her smile as she moved to one side to allow him to enter. “I thought you closed the investigation.” Her mind flashed back to the endless nightmares caused by Jonathan’s suicide and how it made selling the remaining condo units next to impossible, especially during this current housing meltdown.
“Well—it almost closed; but, as I said, yesterday we received some new information making us reconsider our decision.” He strolled toward a chair at her dining room table he used on many previous trips to see her. The sound of the legs of the chair dragging over her stone floor irritated her, but she forced herself to remain calm.
You write very well. I am hooked. The only thing I can suggest is smoothing over your last paragraph...
ReplyDelete"He sank into the chair at her dining room table just like old times. The chair legs dragged over the stone floor..."
Great job! Good luck!
I like RS& Thrillers, but this failed to grab me.
ReplyDeleteJMO, you need a hookier beginning. Also, your dialogue is repetitive. Good dialogue should reveal something about the story or character.
But, writing is rewriting (forgot who said it, but very true). Good luck.
Great job. The writing flowed and I was hooked by the end, wanting to know what happened to Jonathan Harrell.
ReplyDeleteThe only thing is I'm not sure who she was talking about in the first paragraph. She made it sound like she hadn't been expecting the detective. And if it was him that she was waiting for, why would she want to throw up? If it wasn't him, wouldn't she want to try and get rid of this guy fast since 'he' was coming. I'd almost drop the first paragraph altogether and start with the action. It's great!
Good job.
For some reason, I couldn't connect to Rachel. I honestly started wondering if she was the villain or the heroine. I'm not sure why. Maybe it was because the mention of brand names in the beginning made me thing, "Shallow", or maybe it was because the way she seemed nervous about the detective made me start wondering if she had murdered her partner. Maybe it's because a lot of the words -- burning acid, attempted to escape, irritated her, made me feel uncomfortable toward her rather than for her.
ReplyDeleteMy gut reaction: She has something to hide and she's not a nice person.
Um, was this the reaction I was supposed to have?
I was also confused about where they are. Is the detective coming to her condo, her work place or what? In the first place, it says she had to hurry. To do what?
I would read on. But I almost stopped reading after beginning of the second paragraph. You need a better transition. It's too confusing. The rest is pretty good and I sympathize with the MC and what she's dealing with. She seems a bit fidgety, makes me wonder if she's guilty of something with the suicide.
ReplyDeleteI liked everything except the first paragraph. It didn't seem to flow with the rest. The next four paragraphs set up the situation nicely and definitely sparked my interest.
ReplyDeleteI didn't get the first paragraph, but after that it read well. It sounds to me like she had something to do with her client's death adn she's nervouse when the detective turns up.
ReplyDeleteI would read on to find out why.
The first paragraph isn't needed - and the first line of the second paragraph is enough to hook me into the story. I don't think you need "The investigation into the death...", you give us that later in their dialogue.
ReplyDeleteI liked the imagery of the chair scraping across the floor and her subsequent irritation.
Good luck.
Two things that struck me. There are way too many 'introductions' in the second paragraph. We meet the detective Lindstrom, Rachel's a real estate agent, she lives in a high-rise condo in St. Petersburg, Florida, and she has a client AND friend who is a developer and we learn his name. It's an overwhelming 'info dump' *for me*. Not everyone will read it that way, of course, but that, coupled with the fact that the detective repeats her friend's name in the next sentence pulled me out of the story.
ReplyDeleteAlso this sentence:
“Well—it almost closed; but, as I said, yesterday we received some new information making us reconsider our decision.”
is another repeat of:
“Jonathan Harrell’s case is being expanded. Yesterday, we obtained some new evidence suggesting his death wasn’t a suicide.”
You only have so many words. Use them wisely. Don't throw everything at the reader all at once and, unless it's integral to the story, such as an affectation of the detective's, it's not necessary that he repeat himself. Most detectives give less information than more, hoping to catch people off-guard.
“We've obtained new evidence suggesting Jonathan Harrell’s death wasn’t a suicide.” With his short stocky body firmly planted in the doorway, Lindstrom glanced around her. “Perhaps this conversation would be better if we spoke inside.”
Fear spread across Rachel’s face, erasing her smile as she moved to one side to allow him to enter. “I thought you closed the investigation.” Her mind flashed back to the endless nightmares caused by Jonathan’s suicide and how it made selling the remaining condo units next to impossible, especially during this current housing meltdown.
"It's been reopened." Lindstrom strolled to the same dining chair he'd used during his previous visits. He dragged it across the stone floor toward her loveseat, and the sound made her cringe, but she forced herself to remain calm.
It's a minor, raw change, but gives the same impression without overloading.
Your voice is good, but it needs tightened.
Good luck.
Sorry, but not hooked. Several parts of this are obvious parts where the author (you) is shoving everything important about these characters into a single sentence and it becomes very infodump-y.
ReplyDelete(ex: Real estate agent Rachel Contino cracked the door to her high-rise condo in St. Petersburg, Florida wider and smiled broadly. AND The investigation into the death of her client and friend, developer Jonathan Harrell, was supposed to have been closed.
I think if you tapped more into Rachel's voice and POV then this would be stronger overall.
Good luck!
This is got that crisp, edgy writing style of a thriller, so already that is working for me. Sometimes, however, you do more telling than showing. Like instead of saying that the chair sliding irritated her, have her grimace at the noise.
ReplyDeleteOtherwise, I'd keep reading.
The opening paragraph felt disjointed and unrelated to the rest of the page so the daydream didn't work for me.
ReplyDeleteThe dialogue was also repetitious. Rachel asks him "What are you doing here?" and then reflects that the case was supposed to be closed. Then Lindstron answers that the case was expanded. Once he steps inside, she then says "I thought you closed the investigation" to which he agent responds that it was almost closed but they have new information so the case was opened again.
The repetition made the dialogue unnatural and slowed the pace so I wasn't quite hooked.
The first paragraph had my attention. I would probably read more though it's not really my thing. Good strong writing.
ReplyDeleteJust the title would make me pick it up and check out your first page. I felt some fear for her, but not enough. All the info slowed me down. It would be better to show the fear rather than tell. (next to last 'graph)With just a little more action I'd be hooked. Good writing.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the commenters that suggested you cut the first paragraph. And there is a lot of repetition here. Read through carefully and cut everything that is stated more than once. If it's in the dialogue, we don't need it told to us also.
ReplyDeleteAnd this line is outside her POV: Fear spread across Rachel’s face, erasing her smile as she moved to one side to allow him to enter.
Love the title, but the story left me confused.
ReplyDeleteThe first paragraph -- does Rachel have visions? It's not clear what these lines are referencing.
Real estage agent Rachel Contino is not her in pov. (We don't think of ourselves as [job title] [name].) Neither is Fear spread across Rachel's face.
I was confused by Rachel smiling broadly with a fluttery heart and stomach acid. If she's faking the smile, that needs to be made clearer. Right now her reactions are coming across as disjointed.
Assuming we're meant to like Rachel, you might want to remove the reference to somebody's suicide making it harder for her to sell condos. Especially since she considered Jonathan a friend.
This needs a good edit, I think, both to make things clearer and to remove extraneous details. The important things seem to be that Rachel's friend Jonathan is dead, everyone thought it was a suicide, but maybe it wasn't. Everything else can be fed to the reader when the time is right.
Cheers.
Not hooked. Sorry! To me, the opening paragraph felt like name dropping rather than character solidifying. It seems odd in comparison to the rest of the scene.
ReplyDeleteThere's some clunky writing too.
"Her heart beat faster as the taste of burning acid attempted to escape her stomach"
And "Fear spread across her face"
If your character is the murderer, she's going to be a certain way in this scene. If she's not, then she's going to be another.
If she's not and she knows she is being framed, then she would be yet another way.
Seems to me you haven't really nailed for yourself who this character is.
I'm in agreement with Nightsmusic. It felt repetitious. And I don't get a feel for Rachel. I don't relate to her.
ReplyDeleteI think it could be really good, just needs to be tightened up.
Good luck.
I got confused between the first snd second paragraph - perhaps because you use "she" in the 1st and then introduce the character by name in the 2nd. I also agree that there's a lot of repetition in the dialog, and the fear spreading across her face for me borders on a POV switch since she can't see her own face.
ReplyDeleteSorry. Mostly I'm confused by the first paragraph and I don't know if I should feel for or against your MC. Rachel feels suspicious, but ambiguous. I can't tell if she's in love with the detective or going to try and kill him. And it can't be both!
ReplyDelete