TITLE: By The Night
GENRE: Literary YA
Luna raised her gray eyes to meet the brilliant shine of the moon. It was full and pearl white hanging pregnant with promise in the inky sky, purple clouds flitting across its surface only transiently, the light filtering through the wisps to obliterate the dark. To her and her kind, the moon was nature's most perfect creation - round, and so mysterious - the only thing that was in a constant cycle of change, and yet every month stayed the same. The fluxuating but consistent pull of the moon made it unique within their universe. It was as old as time and because of that it held the tomes of creation.
Not to mention Luna's secret.
The night around her seemed calm, but Luna felt the life buzzing around her body, radiating just off her skin, pulsing with promise. Her stomach tightened with anticipation as she honed her ears to the wind stirring the long yellow green grass that grew wildly across the meadows, her eyes focusing on the bats and bugs that flew near the tree line, awake for the night, until the sun crept from its slumber and rose the next day. Underneath her bare toes the ground was cold, the minerals seeping through the gaps in her toes. She scrunched her toes and felt the dirt squish between them, leaving her with toefulls of fresh upturned earth.
Miss Snark's First Victim
I Love the opening. It gives a sense of place as well as a character that draws us in. The author does a great job of showing the reader the suspense of the atmosphere while promising them secrets that the reader can't wait to discover with each turn of the page.
ReplyDelete- Lauren Smith
Nothing happened.
ReplyDeleteI don't know who or what Luna is.
I don't know what her kind are.
I don't know why she's there.
I don't know what the problem is.
Perhaps, rather than all the description, you might answer some of those questions?
Beautiful description, but perhaps just a teensy bit too beautiful.
ReplyDeleteShe's using most of her senses, but how do they determine what she's feeling?
I think she has to sense something besides the visual and touch. She needs to hear or see something happening to drive the story, even in the first couple of paragraphs.
Remember to show, don't tell: It was full and pearl white hanging pregnant...
Try: Its pearly surface hung pregnant with promise...
The writing has a nice flow, but I think there's too much description.
ReplyDeleteI kind of agree with what Barbra said.
I'd echo Barbara but also add that some of the descriptions had a trying-too-hard feel. "transiently" makes my ears hurt. And "toefulls" actually sounds icky, not to mention impossible.
ReplyDeleteThere was some beautiful language and descriptions here. But that alone won't hold interest long.
I'm interested in what's going on with Luna--particularly her secret. However, I feel like the first and third paragraphs echo each other somewhat. I'd like to see more forward movement in this opening.
ReplyDeletethe description is beautiful but almost verging on purple.
ReplyDeleteit's a little too long and wordy.
i'd keep reading as i'm interested in what her secret is. it's got a shifter feel like werewolf or weresomething. and i could be way off base, and that's just a trick.
i'd almost rather know up front what she is if she's not a weresomething.
as well, this reads almost paranormal to me vs. straight up literary fiction.
To be honest, had I picked this off the shelf and read
ReplyDeleteBy the Night (title) - Luna (character's name) - and that first overly descriptive sentence about the moon (luna), I would have put the book down right at that point.
Had I kept reading anyway, I would have stopped at the first sign of author intrusion: Not to mention Luna's secret. This sentence is not only in a different voice from what we've just read, it's sort of an unwieldy device to clue the reader that there's something strange about Luna. It doesn't flow as part of the story, so it calls attention to itself. Now, I'm also guessing that Luna's kind all share the same secret, which sort of negates it being a secret to anyone that Luna cares about, which means it's only a secret to the reader.
Tell the story; let the revelations come naturally.
I'm not going to lie, most of this description seems overdone because it tells us nothing about what's happening. About what Luna is or what her secret is. About what she wants. About why she wants it. About what she's up against, because there must be conflict. There's no tension in this scene, not even micro-tension, because nothing is contradictory. Everything is just "awe." You should at least have conflicting emotions in there to pull readers in, if you don't have physical conflict. I.e. she feels awe at the moon and is scared of it too. I'm assuming that's not your story, but that sounds more interesting to me. Now get your interesting conflict on the page.
ReplyDeleteTwo things that really turned me off of this, specific to the prose:
"Luna" is her name and this has to do with the moon/night...which must be a big theme since it's in the title, too. Cliche. Done one too many times. It's like having someone's last name be "McQueen" when she's the secret fairy queen and doesn't know it. Have a name unique to your character, not to the moon she worships.
This may be gross, but I can think of one other thing that cycles by the month and is associated with "pregnant." Don't call me immature for thinking it. Your audience is young adults. A majority of them would snicker at that first paragraph over-description because of your word choice and the fact that Luna is a girl.
This has too much description for me and too many fancy words all vying for attention. It's like looking at a crowd of people all dressed in bright colours. No one really stands out and it's a bit overwhelming. If only a few people were dressed brightly, they'd really stand out. You obviously have a great vocabulary, but I'd prefer if you chose one or two great words per sentence and really let them shine.
ReplyDeleteAlso, when you say things like 'It was as old as time' the part of me that studied science is putting up her hand and saying 'Um, no it's not.' And I know that's really unromantic and you probably don't mean it literally, but that's my reaction.
I'd prefer this if you pared it down, chose a few words to highlight, and gave us some hint of conflict.
Much of this writing is beautiful in a poetic way, and as a reader of literary fiction, I can appreciate the author's urge to use it. However, I think all of this at the start keeps the story from starting. There's no tension in this, nothing that would make me wonder what's coming -- and thus make me want to turn the page. I'll bet the real beginning of this story is a page or two away, so start there!
ReplyDeleteKeep at it!
RE: the title—Nice. I like it. Feels very literary.
ReplyDeleteAs for the text—
Luna raised her gray eyes to meet the brilliant shine of the moon. It was full and pearl white hanging pregnant with promise in the inky sky, purple clouds flitting across its surface only transiently, the light filtering through the wisps to obliterate the dark. To her and her kind, the moon was nature's most perfect creation - round, and so mysterious - the only thing that was in a constant cycle of change, and yet every month stayed the same. The fluxuating but consistent pull of the moon made it unique within their universe. It was as old as time and because of that it held the tomes of creation.
Not to mention Luna's secret.
The night around her seemed calm, but Luna felt the life buzzing around her body, radiating just off her skin, pulsing with promise. Her stomach tightened with anticipation as she honed her ears to the wind stirring the long yellow green grass that grew wildly across the meadows, her eyes focusing on the bats and bugs that flew near the tree line, awake for the night, until the sun crept from its slumber and rose the next day. Underneath her bare toes the ground was cold, the minerals seeping through the gaps in her toes. She scrunched her toes and felt the dirt squish between them, leaving her with toefulls of fresh upturned earth.
This excerpt raises many, many concerns for me.
1- You’re trying to be “literary” when being literary isn’t about overwhelming the reader with long, convoluted prose and instead more about focusing on the quality of the prose and the writing and the beat. If your entire novel reads like this, you’re going to have to scrap a lot and rewrite.
2- You’re not starting with the story—there is nothing urgent or immediate or tense about this scene. It’s entirely an introduction—a way to build up character and the world and her internal thought processes, but this isn’t an effective way to start; it’s hard to wade through and it’s uninteresting.
3- Details are most effective when they are sparse—drop in one line of detail that highlights everything we need to know—it’s going to have to be one heck of a detail, but efficiency here is key.
4- The sentence re: the secret is author intervention—a way of setting up fake tension; instead of making us wonder, you only make the reader annoyed. Either don’t tell us that she has a secret or put us into a scene in which that secret can’t be revealed but has to be (or something like that).
I’m not hooked—I would have passed on this after the first few sentences.
Some of these descriptions are lovely, and I feel as if you are probably a very good writer with lots of potential, but this isn’t working as it is written.