posted
Weather was becoming more unmanageable. Too many countries tried to make it rain for their crops and be sunny on holidays. Now it was raining in Nevada. It had been raining for days and days. A gentle but persistant rain which had the Weather Bureau apologizing daily on the noon and six o'clock news. They never did anything to stop it though.
The water spilled over the curb in front of Sandra's house. Soon it would be coming in the doors.
"They say it's like this in India, too," her father said.
"It's snowing in the Sahara," her little brother added between bites of oatmeal.
At school the principal called a meeting in the auditorium...
posted
So . . . Did you want comments on this? Readers for more? Short story or novel? Length? Like that.
Posts: 932 | Registered: Jul 2001
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posted
The first two sentences I was reading as if you were just the author giving us a bit of setup. My impression is that they're too weak or from a school report on weather.
Start with it was raining in Nevada. Then follow up with the flooding.
The rest of the description of weather conditions in other places build on the unusual aspect of flooding in Nevada. Written as dialog, it's more interesting than the straight 'tell' of the first few sentences.
posted
I don't know the story, but I can speculate.
This seems to be Sandra's story. Is she the one that will be experiencing and influencing the major story events? A child can't control the weather, so she won't have influence over that; so it must be something more local that her story is about. (If not, I suggest a different character.)
What kind of story is it: milieu, idea, character, or event? Based on that, you can decide where the story starts. I think you may have started at the wrong place, because you gave us a couple of lines of dialog and then ended the scene -- it must not have been important. Those bits of dialog could have been between kids at the school assembly.
posted
Just a side note, I've lived in Nevada and it takes only a day or two of rain for it to flood uncontrollable,(at least in Vegas it does) so I'd imagine that days and days of rain would probably be closer to flooding the whole city and be nearer than the curb. The reason is because the ground is so hard that the water doesn't absorb into it, so all of the water just stays on the surface. But it is an interesting idea--if we could control the weather (which I am assuming the people could) then this seems exactly what people would do. But I get the impression that they've lost control over it? Maybe it could be clearer so that the reader doesn't have to speculate.
Posts: 47 | Registered: Dec 2005
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posted
There are a lot of ways that you can go with this, I like the idea of weather control gone awry. Good luck.
Posts: 13 | Registered: Feb 2006
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