Andromoidus, arch mage, sat on a mountain meditating. He saw a wondrous view, a green valley, winding river, and rising sun. Birds from the valley sang serenely, and the sun bathed the wall of a small castle below in red. Andromoidus felt cold. He felt, despite the beauty around him, despair.
It was the visions. The Sight, the ability to see the past, present, and future, had shown him something that scared him.
The visions had been short spurts, only flashes. A man in red robes laughed, skeletons walked like living things, warriors falling like harvested grain, and finally the boy. Always the boy. The boy was what surprised him. He was

And here is my second one. I tried to convey a hook while still having a plot. tell me how i did.

Calder woke in a cold sweat. His sheets were drenched, and he was breathing heavily. He had been dreaming again. He closed his eyes to see the dream better.
He saw images of walking dead and flashing swords. A fire raged somewhere. A man in scarlet robes was laughing at… something. He saw himself, sword drawn, running away from something.
He opened his eyes sat immobile in his bed. He looked around the room again, the dorm he shared with three other boys. They all were sleeping soundly. He looked at the full moon outside his window. It was still the middle of the night.
He lay back in bed and tried to sleep again, but he

Also, i want to get some feedback on the name Andromoidus. My Brother doesn't like it, but I thinks it's pretty cool.
[This message has been edited by drake the thall (edited July 08, 2008).]

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Andromoidus, arch mage the Arch-mage , sat on a mountain meditating. He saw a wondrous view, a green valley, winding river, and rising sun. Birds from the valley sang serenely, and the sun bathed the wall of a small castle below in red. maybe I'm in short-story mode, but I thought, why should I care? The descriptions seem..tired and cliched: 'green valley', 'winding river' Andromoidus felt cold. He felt, despite the beauty around him, despair. I'm being told, when I want to be shown
It was the visions. The Sight, the ability to see the past, present, and future, you're tellin gme the same thing several times had shown him something that scared him.
The visions had been short spurts, only flashes. A man in red robes laughed, skeletons walked like living things, warriors falling like harvested grain, and finally the boy. Always the boy. The boy was what surprised him. He was This is where it starts getting interesting.

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As it stands at the moment, I doubt I would read on. I might read on a bit further to find out about the boy, but you'd have to grip me very quickly.

So far, you're telling me, not showing me about a character I don't know anything about. Then a longish description of scenery which the character isn't noticing, and then the vision. The vision is quite hooky, but I feel I'm reading something which has been done before.

The visions had been short spurts, only flashes. A man in red robes laughed, skeletons walked like living things, warriors falling like harvested grainNOTE 4,, and finally the boy. Always the boy. The boy was what surprised him. He was [/QUOTE]

NOTE 1: You need a comma between mountain and meditating. The mountain isn't meditating, Andro is. Since there are only eight words in this sentence, I might suggest something like "The Arch-mage Andromoidus sat on a mountain, meditating." - that said, "on a mountain" is a little awkward. On a ledge, on a ridge, impaled on the top?

NOTE 2 - To paraphrase Badger - So? This part is really wordy. You have me reading, what, 31 words, 2 sentences, that feel like "it was a dark and stormy night."

NOTE 3 "The sight" is a fairly standard mechanism. Again, I agree with Badger. You're telling me stuff. If your "the sight" is different from every other one, let Andro describe it to someone in dialog later.

NOTE 4 You have a problem with tense here. The man laughed, the skeletons walked, the warriors falling? To match, they should have "fell". I like the imagery of "harvested grain", but maybe something like "like grain to the scythe" is less clinical.

In all, your hook feels "formula". It's not bad to have a story that follows a formula. After all, formulae exist because they work. The problem is that with your imagery, the only foreboding I get is that I've read this before.

The hook also feels passive. Andro sat. Ando saw. Andro felt. Andro was scared.

I'd suggest that you rework the hook by showing us a sight at the very beginning. Show us his horror, don't tell us that he has it. Have the vision invade his meditation.

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Andromoidus, arch mage, sat on a mountain meditating. Is he meditating about something, or just enjoying the morning? He saw a [wondrous view, a cut; we know its a view, and wondrous is telling, not showing] green valley, winding river, and rising sun. At first I thought this might be what he was meditating about, but then realized it is his physical location. You could condense all this description and use words that aren’t quite so generic. Birds from the valley sang serenely, and the sun bathed the wall of a small castle below in red. At this point I want to see what he sees right now; a vision intrudes on his sight, and he is no longer looking at the valley. Andromoidus felt cold. You could cut the next four sentences. He felt, despite the beauty around him, despair.
It was the visions. The Sight, the ability to see the past, present, and future, had shown him something that scared him.
The visions had been short spurts, only flashes. Play out this next scene instead of just listing elements of it; if they come in flashes, show us what he sees as he sees it.A man in red robes laughed, skeletons walked like living things, warriors falling like harvested grain, and finally the boy. Always the boy. The boy was what surprised him. He was

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- "He opened his eyes [and] sat..."
- "He looked around the room again [- it was] the dorm..."
- Vary your sentence structure some:
Bob woke... His sheets were drenched... He had been dreaming... etc.
Awakened by a [snorgleblower], Bob found himself in... The chilling dampness permeated his sheets... He had been dreaming...
(This is just an example - SUBJECT > VERB > DIRECT OBJECT works for the first paragraph but becomes monotonous if done throughout the text)

With a few changes, I would keep reading your second selection.

Broken Sky woke in a cold sweat. His sheets were drenched, and he was breathing heavily. He had been dreaming again. He closed his eyes and it was still there.
Images of walking dead and flashing swords. A fire raged. A man in scarlet robes was laughing at… something. He saw himself, sword drawn, running into the dark. The sky was blocked out by a huge shadow.
He opened his eyes lay shaking in his bed. He looked around the room again, the dorm he shared with three other boys. They all were sleeping soundly, except for Calder. Calder was his best friend, and was standing by Sky’s bed. Even though he wore a blind fold, he was staring toward Sky. “You were screaming.” He said quietly.

And here's another shot-

Broken Sky sat down in his seat. He slumped forward onto his desk. It was magical theory, the most boring class, in his opinion. He watched as the teacher explained something to the class for the tenth time. He looked down at his hand and concentrated on creating sparks.
A slight shimmer, nothing else.
A kid across the class caught his attention. It was Calder, he could tell from the blindfold. No one was sure why he wore it. Calder smiled, and sent up a shower of red sparks. The teacher looked around distractedly and blinked a lot. Sky could barely stifle a laugh, but it wasn’t very enthusiastic. He was still in basic magic, even though he

I like the name Broken Sky, it sounds like one of those people from the movie hero.
unless it is from the movie hero. can't remember.