posted
Opening lines to a first-person, modern-day fantasy. Hack and slash at will.
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They never found the guy who drove his truck into the side of my family’s car three years ago. My parents died instantly, while my sister and I went into comas. Two months later, I woke up, screaming their names, while Amanda remained unresponsive in the hospital bed beside me, as she has to this day.
I often wondered, like I did this evening, how the driver got away without leaving a bloodstain or scrap of clothing behind, considering the cab of his truck compacted into a space the Devil’s own lawyers would find impossible to wriggle out of.
If he lived, however, I’m glad we’ve never crossed paths, otherwise I’d probably be in prison right now for murder, and there’d have been no one around to make sure my sister remained on life support.
posted
The premise definitely got my interest, but the presentation kept me from being hooked.
My take -- when the first-person narrator tells about past events, it creates distance. It pulls me out of the story. Could you start with "this evening", with where s/he is, what is happening now, and sprinkle in the memories as they naturally arise?
[This message has been edited by MrsBrown (edited April 08, 2008).]
posted
This opening has me interested - I would read on. A couple of observations - "...while Amanda remained unresponsive in the hosital bed beside me, as she has to this day." How long has it been? "...while Amanda remained unresponsive in the hospital bed beside me. That was two years ago and she is still unresponsive." or something like that.
"...the cab of his truck compacted into a space the Devil's own lawyers would find impossible to wriggle out of." This was for me very hard to take seriously. You're talkling about a car/TRUCK accident and the cab of the truck was crushed in such a manner? It's a bit distracting as my mind wandered from the story and I tried to imagine how such a scenario was possible.
[This message has been edited by nitewriter (edited April 08, 2008).]
posted
Thanks for the feedback everyone. It's good to see this has at least interested some folks, even if it still needs some tweaking. I'll probably turn it into a car crashing into a minivan to help with the realism a little. If anyone is interested in reading further, here's the basic summary of the story:
Jeremy Ivens is a security guard who hasn't slept for three years—yet mystifies the experts by remaining perfectly healthy. He uses the eight extra hours each day to care for his comatose sister, Amanda, the only other survivor of the car crash that killed their parents and left him permanently awake. When Jeremy interrupts an attempted murder at the mountain resort where he works, he finds himself duking it out with a pair of mythological siblings, the Oneiroi, who manipulate human dreams on a disturbingly powerful level. Except…their abilities have no affect on the insomniac Jeremy. So instead of fighting him, they offer a bargain—if he can track down and destroy a band of sentient dreams that are hiding out at the resort, the Oneiroi will wake Amanda from her coma.
[This message has been edited by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (edited April 10, 2008).]
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