Ronald and his brother fished the waters around the Kirin Islands for their entire lives and had never worried much about the pirates. Pirates and fishermen hunted different prey, and both groups pretty much left each other alone. None of this made Ronald feel any better about the pirate vessel, the Merry Dancer, bearing down on his little fishing boat.
The pirate ship dropped sail as it coasted into position alongside his boat. “Ahoy,” a pirate shouted as he threw a line down to Ronald.
Ronald grabbed the line and tied it to a cleat before turning a worried eye to his brother, Donald, at the tiller.
posted
I prefer the order it's in. Before we know how worried to feel (with MC) about the pirate ship, we need to know, well, how he feels about pirate ships.
posted
I like the order it's in. And you've got my attention, I definitely want to know what happens next.
The fact that sailors don't worry about pirates until they actually get boarded doesn't bother me.
I've got two nits:
1) The name thing. I'm confused. Even if their parents had named them in rhyme, by the time they were grown they would each have personalized their names. (Ron/Donald?) As a reader, I stumbled over that and had to regroup for a moment. Unless there's a powerful reason, I'd make their names different.
2.) You used the word "pirate" two more times than you needed to. In the first sentence, we establish that pirates are bearing down on them. Further down you write, "pirate ship" in one sentence and "a pirate shouted." These would have been wonderful opportunities to describe the ship and the shouting man (which I, as a reader, would have let represent all the other nasty scum aboard).
These are my humble opinions. I know nothing. I just wrote my first 13 lines of fiction this morning and posted them in short story fragments. Please take my comments accordingly.
I would really like to read the rest of it.
Toni
[This message has been edited by tdeveson (edited March 15, 2007).]
[This message has been edited by tdeveson (edited March 15, 2007).]
posted
I'd prefer to see the opening begin with the pirate ship bearing down on them (and do change the names! "Ron/Don", that's confusing!) and then be surprised at Ron's lack of worry - then you can get into why he isn't worried. That creates an intriguing difference from most pirate stories, IMO, that he isn't worried about being boarded. Hope this helps. Good luck with it!
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