TITLE: Crawl
GENRE: Horror
She lays a squirming bundle of leaves in the lap of a ragged skeleton she calls Mother. With broken-nailed fingertips she nimbly unties the package, spilling its living contents onto Mother’s thigh bones. Wriggling night-crawlers, limping crickets, cracked bird eggs, half a mouse carcass. Delicacies. She pats Mother on her dusty head, then squeezes back through the open vent cover. It is her turn to hunt, her turn to feed.
The metal vent is cold on her naked skin. It wakes her up, keeps her sharp. She moves easily up the icy vertical chute and onto the cool stone foundation. She grabs the scattering spiders, stuffing them into her mouth as she scrambles along the ground. In the dark spaces her vision is clear, her memory of this path honed to precision over many, many years.
A hollow space in the wooden walls allows her to climb two stories straight up. Her hands and feet grip warm familiar beams. She heaves herself ever upward, her toughened skin impervious to splintered wood and nagging nails. Twenty feet above the ground, she moves a wall eave aside and scampers out onto a tree limb into the night air.
It is a good night to hunt: bright moonlight, soft earth after a summer rain, quiet grass to stalk from. Wriggling worms are pulled easily from their burrows. Sleeping mice are caught unawares, awaking with a snap of their backs. She basks in the moonlight, savoring her kills.
She has no name.
A little hooked. Curious, more like it. Hunting for mice and worms don't seem to be eventful.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I like the descriptions.
I would read a little more to find out what happens.
I'm grossed out! Very creepy.
ReplyDeleteWhy doesn't she have a name? She has a mother.
I'm slightly hooked and would give it a few more pages to see where it's going.
Creepy, yes. It made me squirm. I'm curious what she actually is, since she fits through such small places. And she doesn't really have a mother, just a skeleton "she calls Mother." I would read on.
ReplyDeleteA breakfast of champions, I see.
ReplyDeleteYuck. Creepy and slimey.
I am curious to find out what this thing is and if the skeleton is her mother's actual skeleton or what the thing has symbolized as her mother.
Wondering what horror she is going to be subjected to or bring to the others in the story.
Not my genre, so I don't know if being creeped out is good or bad. I don't get a sense of time or her age or much about the charachter really. I'd read on to see if you ground me some more, but only for a little while. Your descriptions are very good. Best of luck!
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed the descriptions immensely, and would definitely read on to find out what the heck is going on! Hooked!
ReplyDeleteIf I like horror, I'd read on. Well done.
ReplyDeleteI want to know what/who she is. Is she human, animal, moster? Large, small? Alive, undead?
ReplyDeleteYou do description well, but I'd rather see a description of her, whoever/whatever she is. I'm frustrated that I can't 'see' this character.
I'd give you another parg. or two, but not much more.
Not a genre I read much, but I'm interested and would read on to see if it kept my attention. I would have been much more engaged if the MC had shown tenderness to Mother. Good luck with it.
ReplyDeleteEvocative descriptions, but it bugs me that I can't place the character in the scene you've created. I wish I knew at this point if she was even human.
ReplyDeleteThis isn't a genre I usually read, but I'm curious enough to give it a couple more pages.
Not yet hooked but I'm curious enough to read a few more pages at least. I would like to know more about the MC, and it irks me that I can't picture her (it?) in my mind yet.
ReplyDeleteThank you for the feedback!
ReplyDeleteI'll concede that a little more description of the creature here would help. I don't want to give too much away as her origins are revealed over the course of the story.
Patience, friends, the end is very worth it!
I do read some horror, but this didn't particularly draw me in. I think it's partly because I can't picture the MC and partly because this is the kind of opening where you're clearly setting the stage and establishing the tone (which you do very well) but not much is happening.
ReplyDeleteI like how you use strong visuals. You also have a nice feel for a good mix of action (verbs) with description (adverbs & adjectives).
The last sentence of the first paragraph is a bit of "telling" that you don't need. I'd delete it.
In the fourth paragraph you curiously have two sentences in the passive voice (the 2nd and 3rd sentences). I'd fix those, make them active like the last sentence of the paragraph.
This opening creates a strange paradox: you write extremely visually with terrific descriptions, yet the reader cannot visualize the character. Feels weird, and I imagine you'll need to satisfy the reader's frustration fairly soon for them to read on.
I don't think I'd read more of this, but there are a lot of good things about your writing!
I don't like horror at all but I still liked this! Well-written and really creepy without grossing me out completely (till now at least!).
ReplyDeleteI'm hooked!