TITLE: Justice
GENRE: Sci-fi
The girl's death was obviously a suicide, so no one really wanted to investigate further. Not until she told us she was murdered.
Kelly Crockett's parents had come home late after having dinner with friends and gone straight to bed. They found Kelly the next morning.
She'd hung herself.
Miss Snark's First Victim
Think this would be more effective if you start with:
ReplyDeleteShe hung herself.
The second sentence intrigued me, and then the back story in paragraph two pulled me back out.
ReplyDeleteNot exactly hooked, but I'd keep reading.
Not hooked. First paragraph was good, but then you lost me.
ReplyDeleteLoved the beginning. Not sure about the middle, though.
ReplyDeleteSecond sentence totally hooked me. I got caught up a bit wondering if "the girl" was the same person as "Kelly Crockett".
ReplyDeleteIf it were me, I'd start with "Kelly Crockett's death was obviously a suicide..."
Great start, but the second and third paragraphs threw out too much information too quickly.
ReplyDeleteYeah, you lost me on the backstory. But I liked the first sentence a lot.
ReplyDeleteJust make your first sentence the last one, and it works. For me, at least.
ReplyDeleteNot hooked. The jump back took me out of it. I think you should start at one point in time or the other.
ReplyDeleteAs it is, it looks like the hooky opening was pulled from elsewhere in the story and put up front just to be hooky.
It could probably flow better if the opening para was the last.
Not hooked. I agree that the back story threw me out of the story.
ReplyDeleteI like the idea of this story, but it was an attempt for too much information in the beginning.... I think switching the order the sentences might help. I agree that "She'd hung herself." should open.
ReplyDeleteI like it. I'm hooked. I might put "not until she told" in its own paragraph to emphasize it.
ReplyDeleteI'm kinda hooked, but I'm thrown off by "she" in the second sentence. Who told you? The dead girl? A bit confused.
ReplyDeleteI was hooked at first, and then I lost interest. I'm not sure if I like Paragraph #2; my impulse is to get rid of it or move it to later and start the second paragraph with, "She'd hung herself." then elaborate.
ReplyDeleteI'm kind of hooked on this. But I would rearrange the sentences slightly for better clarity of the story by putting the first 2 beginning sentences at the end (by this I mean right after the sentence that says 'She'd hung herself.') Hope this helps! :)
ReplyDeleteInitially hooked, but then you lost me. While I love shocking openers, it needs to be more obviously related to what follows.
ReplyDeleteIn the first paragraph, you try to establish reader curiosity by making them ask how someone who is dead could say she was murdered. However, I've seen this sort of construction too often, so it failed to grab me.
ReplyDeleteI agree with FictionWriter that starting with "She'd hung herself" would be very powerful. As it stands, that line seems repetitious. We already know this kid committed suicide; we don't need to hear, after a gap of two paragraphs, that she hanged herself.