Nathan Bransford - The Forums

JT Shea... you are completely right on the "animal" edit. It should read 'animals', implying that beyond the bird, there have been others visiting the remains. Great catch. Thanks again for reading through, for the kind words, and for providing some additional thoughts on this opening and ...

I agree with the comments about this being a little overwitten. Sometimes I felt like I was reading the same line twice, written with just very subtle differences, and this kind of thing makes the work feel choppy and slowed me down. Some thoughts: I wanted to stop my feet from tapping erratically. ...

Thanks for your thoughts everyone! The line about the bird and "outshining" his darkness. DT Roberts and Emily both make good points about some of the conflicts in this line. I was trying, with this paragraph, to do two things: 1) hint at the MC's personality (that he is similar to the bir...

Hi All. I'm Erin. Like Adam, I'm also from the granite state. I write a fiction and at the moment I've got two YA pieces in the works (one is contemporary fiction, the other more of a dystopian tale). I blog about writing and the pursuit of publication over at http://refinedwords.tumblr.com I've bee...

First page (roughly) of my MS. I'm still heavily editing a few sections of the story, but the first third is in good shape and so I'm looking to get feedback on how it opens. Anything is helpful (hook, flow, voice, style, you name it). Many, many thanks in advance. :) --------- Today is the last day...

Overall, I think this is a strong beginning. Action, conflict. You get pulled in quickly. A few thoughts, most of which others have already brought up. Behind her, hounds barked and soldiers shouted and the shrill blare of their drake-steeds echoed in the air. If they caught her, they would kill her...

There is not a super strong opening conflict, but I think this is 100% OK. There is enough tension building to pull a reader in. Even without much alluding to it, I'm fairly sure the MC is going to discover some seriously interesting things once she starts digging around for her family history. Mayb...

I too really like the analogy of the bus to social hierarchy. Like mentioned, I feel you need to start with the kids though. When someone mentions a school bus, I immediately picture the kids on it, not the driver, and because of how you've ordered things, the opening feels rather choppy, and almost...

I agree with a lot of the comments here. First thing, I definitely think you need to identify the "he" that the prologue opens with as the general earlier on. When I finally got to "My Lord, you called?," it took me a second to realize that the general was in fact the same man th...

I think the comments about combining the best of both are really the way to go here. When it comes to first sentences alone, I think #1 is by far, stronger. Both the water and the sky were the color of gunmetal the day a news story cracked my soul. This tells me something. I get a sense of not just ...

Hey Krista- Glad you've already checked out FEED. I figured your story likely differed or branched off in one way or another, and its good to know you've already made sure it stands on its own. That being said, you should try to get through FEED again if you have downtime -- andnot for research or i...

The idea of the Stream Surfer reminds me a lot of FEED by MT Anderson (also a YA distopian novel). And I'm not saying this is a bad thing, just interesting, and you may want to check out FEED to be sure you're not going down a path too close to something already out there. (Of course, my opinion of ...