Revised below (about five posts below!).
[This message has been edited by skadder (edited March 26, 2009).]
It has the languid feel of the southern U.S. half a century ago. Just change the colors: replace the plant man with a black handyman. And Cora's long brown legs with ivory colored ones. The hint of passion leading to a forbidden dalliance.
Other than the green man's skin and Evelyn's POV, its like the opening of a romance novel. If that's your intent, you succeeded. If you're not into romantic suspense... the hook consists entirely of a muscular plant man. That's probably enough for many.
quote:
I watched Cora watching him--it, I reminded myself.
When I encounter telling, stagnant action in a story's first sentence, it immediately turns on my critic's instincts, turns me as reader out of a story.
Forms of watch meaning to look, to my thinking, are Dischisms. I feel as though I'm filtering through a writer's setting into a story's setting.
The second sentence is more compelling from its descriptive quality, and that it subtly places a lovely woman lounging on a porch, still static action, but not stagnant. Something's up with the woman on the porch.
The third sentence referring to "it", perhaps that's where the itness of him could be expressed.
//Cora sat in the shade at the edge of the porch. She swung her long brown legs in the sun, disturbing the dust at her feet. Of course, even at twelve I knew she was a little too interested in him--it, a Plant-man, grown, not born like our kind.//
Influx cause, internal effect, that leads into a reflective introspection and introduces a conflict.
The need to introduce a narrator and/or a protagonist in a first sentence isn't absolute. A first-person narrator introduced in a second or later, timely sentence gently pulls a reader into a story through showing the item of interest under scrutiny first, which if causal begins a train of cause and effect. Then that the narrator is watching is taken as a given.
[This message has been edited by extrinsic (edited March 26, 2009).]
Two things. First, I agree with extrinsic. I got caught on the first sentence, but the flow of the story started with the second sentence.
Second... Who's Buster? Another child? A pet of some kind? I found myself going back looking for an answer but didn't find anything.
Other than that, good job!
quote:
It has the languid feel of the southern U.S. half a century ago.
Actually it's sci-fi--but it's a rural location so I am looking for a retro feel.
Thanks for all the comments. I am in two minds regarding the opening line. I think it just needs re-wording to work.
[This message has been edited by skadder (edited March 26, 2009).]
Starting out by calling her step-mum seems a little clunky.
I think the phrase
quote:doesn't quite match up who is twelve. I'd rephrase 'even at my age, I could tell'
Even at twelve I could tell that she was a little too interested
FWIW, I always knew who Buster was. That was clear in my mind.
Languid, keep it languid.
- Owasm