posted
Science fiction novel, about 90,000 words. It needs some serious work. I'm not sure if the below exactly qualifies as the first 13 lines. I may bea little over.
Jeff took his seat as close to the middle of the classroom as possible, the place least likely to attract unwanted attention. He immediately categorized the other students as they chatted idly or walked into the room. Jock. Nerd. Cheerleader. Preppie. Normal. But he didn’t fit any of those categories. Which did he belong in? Loner. No one knew his name. He had no friends, and preferred it that way. It’s no good having friends when you’ll be forced to leave them behind when you’re parents move. It hurts too much. Better to maintain anonymity. Jeff looked up toward the front of the classroom as Ms. Perkins slapped a yardstick onto her bony palm. “Attention class,” she wheezed. “Today we have Mr. Dunley from Nether
[This message has been edited by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (edited July 06, 2006).]
posted
You're a little bit over. I get 13 lines ending with, "He is with their academic recruitment department." 12 point Courier, 1 inch margins.
Here are the problems I have with your intro:
1. This character is a bit of a stereotype. Teen angst about not fitting in, even not wanting to fit it, is done too often. Personally, I start to lose interest. To make him worth reading about, I think he needs to be interesting for some highly specific and unusual reason. If he were a loner because he was a Quaker in a school full of Muslims, I'd pay attention. Or a gun nut from Topeka who just moved to New York, or a hacker who doesn't like to get to know people because he doesn't want to personalize his victims. But just a loner who moves a lot? As painful as it can be in real life, there's not much compelling to me there.
2. If you're deep in the character's point of view, then he's wallowing a bit. If you're not deep in the character's point of view, and the narrator's making the commentary, then this is a lot of telling. I think that categorizing the students when they come in is pretty reasonable, but I'd edit down or cut the self-categorization.
3. This is a novel, so I'd give it a few more pages, but I don't see much happening here. Ideally, Jeff would already be set up with a reason to want to get the heck out of here, or to be better than everyone else, or to make something of himself like his drug-addicted brother couldn't, or whatever. Or, if you didn't want to cram in detail, there'd be a significant mood set (foreboding, excitement, irritation, something) using Jeff's perspective on specific details. Specific, to me, means more than idle chatter and noticing that some guy is a preppie; it means (e.g.) noticing a Ride the Lightning T-Shirt and thinking that he'd like that kid to know what that really means. Right now, even if I read past your real first thirteen, I don't see tension: just a cool scholarship program.
posted
I don't understand how sitting in the middle of the classrom attracts the least attention. I mean that is where the cool kids always sit. Loners sit in the very back corners of the room. Plus, the "stereotypes" sounded like an attempt by a 40 year old to be "hip". I guess to an extent some homework needs to be done on this because I was really turned off by the lack of reality in this kid not being a teenagers from the fifties, when stereotypes like those still made sense. Try more current stereotypes like Emo, Punk, Skater, Prep (not preppie, I have never heard that), Rednecks, and Gangstas. What is "Normal" anyway?
[This message has been edited by Mystic (edited July 05, 2006).]
posted
I'm a loner--have been for a long time--and when I was in high school, I would sit in the middle of the room. The preppies (and, yes, they're still called that (I was only in high school a few short years ago)), jocks, and cheerleaders would sit in the back while the nerds would sit in the front and everyone else would sit somewhere in between (most of the time, these were the preppies, cheerleaders, and jocks that couldn't find a seat in the back with the rest of them). When I sat in the middle, people would sit two seats or more away from me until there weren't anymore seats left and they had no choice. (I never did figure out why they seemed to have such an aversion to me, but that doesn't matter anymore.) So I guess what I'm trying to say is that I speak from experience, being a loner who sat in the middle of the room, that to have your character do the same makes perfect sense to me.
I like your narration at the beginning, but I almost wonder if it would be better done in first person since the penetration into his thoughts is so deep. I suppose that depends on what you want to do, however. With only this little bit, it's hard to say what would be best.
posted
I have a problem with the character wallowing in his own misery in the first paragraph of a novel. I know it's what a teen would do, but that's exactly the reason everyone under nine and over twenty avoids them. Give me a reason to like this character in particular (or hate him, in which case make him wallow more) I didn't have a problem with the middle of the class thing. Do teachers in High Schools in the US sometimes tell people where to sit? That might solve the problem, have him sitting next to someone who is stuck by him although they hate it. It gets interesting once the guy from the computer game company comes along. I'm guessing the MC will be selected and lifted out of his misery. It's the dream of any teen (and many adults) to spend the day playing and get payed for it. The only problem with this is that it's cliché. Since the "depressed teen" MC is already cliché I'm not sure you can afford another one so soon.
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posted
I don't have the problems that others did with this section. Yes, he's wallowing, but he's miserable, and that's gripping to me. Yes, those categories are a bit bland. Maybe MC has a way of thinking about them that's idiosyncratic, to spice it up -- something like "bouncyball addict" for "jock"? I'd keep reading. Still, if the chracter's a little quirkier as others suggested, it wouldn't hurt. Posts: 2830 | Registered: Dec 2004
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posted
I think it would be more effective if you showed us that he's a loner. You make a good start of that by having him identify everyone else as "other" than himself. You don't need to say that he doesn't fit any of those catagories (except "Normal", you might want to use a more perjorative term for that), the simple listing of those catagories separates them from himself.
When you start talking about how he's a "loner", it makes him seem like a poser. It's also off-topic, he's interested in seeing who else is entering the room, not digressing on who he is. He's checking out his surroundings, and the other students are simply objects to be noted as part of that assessment.
Aside from that, it looks like an intersting setup. I could read a chapter.
posted
Like the majority of readers, I start to loose interest when the MC starts the pity party. It's too average. However, you did peak my interest in the beginning when the MC explains his seating strategy and he catalogs the other students. I think it goes with the whole "show don't tell" thing survivor mentioned. The MCs actions make the scene interesting to me, not the internal wallowing.
Also, the bit about the teacher's hearing aid seems to be a POV violation. Unless the MC knows for sure the teacher's hearing aid is the reason for her inaction against the noise and not a conscious choice to ignore the chatter, then I would think about nixing it.
Finally, from personal experience teaching high school, it usually takes more than the slap of a yard stick on the hand and a wheezy "attention class" to settle a room full adolescents. If the teacher's too old to vocalize properly, then she probably won't have control over her class, which means the kids should act realistically by not immediately complying. It might be kind of cool to have them not comply until the guest speaker starts up - make him the commanding presence in the room to accentuate his importance.
posted
The character is fine, but the "pity party" starting off is... well, I think it's unnecessary. The fact that he's categorizing them will express well enough the sort of person he is without having to say "This is the sort of person he is"
Likewise, the fact that he's a loner because he moves a lot could be better expressed in another way. Probably he'll be introduced, won't he?
"Class, please welcome Jeffrey Lastnamehere. He recently moved here from North Carolina." Jeff leaned back casually, trying not to give his classmates any reason to pay attention to him.
posted
Thanks all for your suggestions. They truly point to some problems I had not noticed before. I had not intended for the character to fit into a standard mold within the first 13 lines. The rest of the chapter brings out his character better. You find out why he is unique. I will modify the first impression the chapter gives. I could conceivably begin at a later point in the story.
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