First Impressions




Posted by Wally The Weird

You only get one shot at a first impression.

My name is Wally, and to be honest, I came here with the mass of people who flocked in with Kingdom Hearts 2. Yeah I know, they suck.

But I have slowly made a name for myself as a writer or at least a thinker, and so I figure it's high time I branch out more, and came here. I come bearing the first chapter of a story I am writing, and I wanted to get opinions on it.

so here it is.

Chapter 1: The Tome

Alex James Valentine was your average fourteen year old teenager. He had a girlfriend, was trying to find a job he could both hold and actually get in the first place, and he worried about school just as much as the next person. He hoped to one day become a famous actor and live a life of hollow bliss. Well, actually he wanted to be the first actor who had political views that were not almost all bogus and self righteous. Being rich and famous would be more like a bonus if anything.

And of course, he had friends. His two friends, Jacob and Robert Marley, were both crazy in the harmless fun way, and always up for a good joke. However, his closest friend was Walter Alphonse Black. Whereas Alex was more on the short and bulbous side, Walter was much taller and skinny. The two looked odd together, but they were still the best of friends.

One day, Alex was giving into one of his more favorite of past-times, buying things. Specifically on this day, he was browsing the old selection of odd nick knacks from the old couple just down the street, the Wilson’s. While not exactly rich, his parents did alright for themselves, and having three children might have made things tight every now and then, but things had been going well the past few months, and Alex had a fair bit of spare money.

Alex was almost immediately drawn to the collection of books that the couple was selling. The older ones looked like they dated back several decades, including a copy of his favorite book, War of The Worlds! The old cover and yellow pages were proof of it's older age. Several other books there also caught his attention, and he just had to have them! As much as he might not admit it, he was a bookworm, and he loved it. Picking up a stack of books, he took them over to Mrs. Wilson and asked her how much.

"Why young Alex! If anyone deserves these books it's you! I'll give them to you for," She paused for a moment, and took a brief glance at Alex's open wallet. "-for thirty dollars." She eventually said. Alex, all too happy, gladly took out the majority of his money from his wallet and stuffed the books into his bag.

"Thank you Mrs. Wilson! I'm gonna head home now, see you later!" Alex though he felt something tug lightly on his bag, but dismissed it as just his imagination. He was about to leave, when he felt something, this time he was positive someone was tugging on his bag.

"Hey, did you pay for that?" Mr. Wilson was demanding. Alex was confused, but then saw Mr. Wilson was pointing to the ground, and there Alex saw the most curious thing. It was a book, a very old book, it's cover was purple and had golden designs imbedded on it. Alex bent down to pick it up and examine it, and felt the slightest tingle pass through his finger tips as he held it.

"No, I must have dropped it by accident. How much for it?" Alex asked. Mr. Wilson's tough face melted away, and was replaced with one of a genuine smile.

"Well, I don't ever actually remember buying this one. How about ten bucks, and we call it even?" Alex nodded, and removed the last of his money from his wallet. He stood there for a few moment, even after Mr. Wilson had left, just holding the book, as if staring at it would let him read it without ever even turning a single page. Finally, after about a minute, he snapped back to reality, and placed the book inside his bag. He felt it was much heavier inside his bag then when he was holding it, and more so then the other books for that matter. However, he paid it little mind as he walked home.

It was on his way home that he felt something odd. That strange book he picked up, he felt his curiosity towards it growing constantly. He almost felt that if he didn't reach into his bag, take out that book, and open it right then and there, his head would explode with anticipation! Still, something else told him not to do it, not yet at least. His walk was broken into the fastest pace sprint he could manage, and he dashed home in a blur. Neither his parents or his brother were, so he dashed through the front door up the stairs, into his room, and locked the door behind him.

He stood there, holding the book again. He told himself he was just catching his breath, that he would open it in just a second, but something else was holding him back. Maybe it was fear, or maybe it was some sort of knowledge that opening this book would change something about him. All the same, he told himself he was just tired from running. He never was a good runner after all.

Finally, he took off his shoes, and sat down on his bed. He was still holding the book, but now he was caressing it, stroking its cover and feeling it's markings with his finger tips. Unlike before, when he felt the slightest tingle, he now felt a raw surge, as though his hands were being flooded with electricity and coursing up and into his whole body. Finally, after his entire body felt like one big lightning rod, but did not hurt, he gripped the sides of the book, and opened.

There was no flash, but rather more like a continuous flood of light had been unleashed from the book, filling his room with an eerie glow and making even the most benign things like a teddy bear seem sinister. He felt the light was evil and yet embracing, for it was not that he could not close the book, but it was more like he could not find the strength of will to want to close the book.

Lights swirled around him and out of the book, collecting into a storm of shapes and images in front of him, at first expanding, and then it started to contract, taking in its self and all the light that had filled his room. When it was no more then the size of a baseball, it had become and orb of pure white light. Alex stared at it for a moment, when he saw that it began to grow brighter! His eyes opened as far as they could, as if they would miss something if they even considered blinking. As the orb grew brighter it finally flashed and the sound of glass breaking filled his ears. Two rays of light from the orb came into beings and burned themselves into Alex's eyes. His eyes began to burn and fell like they were on fire while all the rest of him was consumed in raw pain!

He swore he felt his eyes crumble into ash, and his ears begin to bleed, and from his mouth a horrible moaning sound came, as though he were crying out in pain. He could see everything that was happening then, as if the world has become a movie and everything was zooming past him while he watched. He saw men being mugged and children being killed. He saw women raped and he saw brothers and sister playing with each other. He saw everything good and everything bad, from baseball games and card games, to murderers and rapists. He felt everything happening too, and he felt as though his body was being ripped apart by everything. But no matter what he witnessed, he did not, or could not die.

Finally, when it was over, only a moment has passed, but to him it felt as though an eternity had passed. His body trembled for a moment, and he tried to move, but found no strength. He fell to his side, his eyes were blank, and could no longer close.

The book that was done, and it's pages closed. The markings on it changed around for a moment, and finally it stopped.
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Sorry about any grammatical problems, and I do have more to the story, I just wanted to start with this and then move on. It is however, far from finished.




Posted by Sable Wind

Um, it's kind of bad but it's not that bad. Pretty run-of-the-mill if you ask me. Also please learn to English.

I'll make a better post when it's not 12:30 in the morning and I'm ready to pass out.




Posted by Wally The Weird

Well, at least I got a response. Could you be more specific on the English part though?




Posted by xuclo

I'm not really crazy about it. If I were, I guess I would've finished reading it :S Anyway, I guess I just don't like stuff about 14 year olds with electric hands.




Posted by BLUNTMASTER X

Looks like we've got a Mary Sue on our hands.

It wasn't written poorly, but lacked everything that makes a story interesting.




Posted by Average n00b

Needs more ethos really. I guess these are the types of books I only read when I'm in the mood, the story honestly didn't grab me in the beginning, but I do kind of like it so far. *Waits for chapter two* :)




Posted by Wally The Weird

See, THIS is why I came here! You guys couldn't care less about me! You are giving me honest opinions of what is wrong here!

OK, so, let's work on improving it!

How can I make this more interesting? I need thoughts and opinions!




Posted by BLUNTMASTER X

Make the character not you.




Posted by Sable Wind

First of all, please learn how to write dialog--the reason we put a comma there is because of the fact that it is a SENTENCE, and the "he said, she said" part is simply continuation of the sentence. Don't put capital letters after ,": it makes no sense. Also, when referring to objects as an "it", don't use an apostrophe when describing something that belongs to it-- it plays the opposite of everything else. "It's" means "it is" not "belonging to it."

Next, I don't know why your "first chapter" was little more than one or two random happenings in his life with seemingly no interesting detail. I know I sound mean here, but really, it was incredibly boring. Your word usage is sixth grade and below, and your story right now is little more than "d00d this kid is young and he has like some book and it's CRAZY lol!!!" Couldn't there be more conflict in this person's life? Some other background information, more detail, more real-life characters & scenarios that would make this page or two on Word more interesting?

The reason it is so boring is because you include so little else about this guy other than "he's 14. he has a girlfriend. CELEBRITIES ARE STUPID! REBEL!!!!" that it was not shocking or interesting at all when "conflict" occurred.

If you want, I could tear through the story bit-by-bit, as when I read, I see more errors in your general writing as well.

And again, I'm not trying to be mean, but I don't know if any of this could come out gently. Then again, I'm just better at being bluntly honest.




Posted by xuclo


Quoting Wally The Weird: See, THIS is why I came here! You guys couldn't care less about me! You are giving me honest opinions of what is wrong here!

OK, so, let's work on improving it!

How can I make this more interesting? I need thoughts and opinions!


Find something you're better at. :(



Posted by Omni


Quoting Wally The Weird: How can I make this more interesting?


Get somebody else to write it for you.

[quote]I need thoughts and opinions!

I know. If you had those, this might be worth reading.



Posted by WillisGreeny

Don't think "How can I make this story better", think "How can I become a better writer", allowing you to make this story much better.
The trick to being a good writer is endurance. A lot of writing is all about revising and reading, all of which helps in learning to communicate. Good writers revise their ideas repeatedly, so if you want to be a better writer then become a better reviser. Asking others to check your work ruins your oppurtunity to practise revising, so, don't do that. If you want to know how to make things interesting in litterature then perhaps you should read books.

Another important tip to writing well is having a good understanding for English grammar. Go line by line and look for syntex, spelling, or any grammar mistakes made, and fix them... I'm a great example of someone who doesn't . :D




Posted by S

Funny, I don't see you with balls enough to post any of your original work. Seriously, constructive criticism or get the **** out. This isn't the place to stroke your egos.

EDIT: Ninja'd.




Posted by WillisGreeny

I don't think anyone would be interested, and I know my grammar sux. I didn't mean for my post to sound negative, that just shows how bad a writer I am.




Posted by S

Key word there is constructive. Was your post constructive?




Posted by Sable Wind

I thought his post was constructive. Or wasn't it before, and he edited.

Either way, having balls or not doesn't change the fact that what he posted wasn't the best. I hate it when people use that as a defense/excuse.




Posted by Omni

[QUOTE=S




Posted by S

I wasn't even referring to Willis. He posted a split second before me.

Second; it's a valid argument, especially when people are saying bull**** like:
[color=hotpink]Get somebody else to write it for you.
Don't open your mouth if you're a coward but act as if you're some sort of expert or have the inability to post constructively.[/color]




Posted by S

I've posted my own work before; just because you've never taken the time is none of my concern. Equally, I haven't even posted a remark about his work; should I of, I'd have done much better than be a caustic ******* with a god-complex.

The majority of the posts, yes. Posts by you and your friend? Flames.




Posted by Omni

I don't have any writing to post. Stop bringing that up. That doesn't mean I don't know anything about writing and whether or not something I've read is awful. People who post their work have to be ready for people who are going to be caustic about it. Me giving him a totally negative and quite dismissive review doesn't mean I have a "God-complex" of any kind.

Don't post your work on internet forums if you don't want people to make sarcastic or negative comments about it.




Posted by S

Original work is not exclusive to writing.




Posted by Sable Wind

Er anyway, I don't really see why Lunair was so belligerent, while Omni was unnecessarily cruel, it was still warranted--he ASKED for it, so the angry, seemingly defensive movement Lunair made was a bit uncalled for. While I disagree with the fact that Omni was mean (though funny), I agree with that neither do you have to be a good writer to know what good writing is, but also that you don't have to back it up by posting your own stuff.

Some people consider their original work, writing or not, theirs, and don't want anyone looking at it it because it's personal, so that doesn't constitute a lack of balls. I don't post my crap here not only because I don't really indulge in any of those hobbies anymore, but because, well, I just don't want to. I just think the attack was really unnecessary.

Anyway, just stop, this is a thread for his writing anyway... you guys are fagging it up.




Posted by Wally The Weird

Well, thanks for the various opinions and comments guys.

Except you xuclo, you can shiver the fattest part of me timbers. I don't give two ****s about a guy who says 'Give up and go home' and that is the end of it. As much as hate her, Queen at least puts thought into his posts, you twice baked sorry excuse for a waste of carbon.

The X: Sorry, I did make him an awful lot like me. It happens! I think I'll revise that part too.

I've actually started re-making this already, and while I do like it, I think it's kind of comic-book like. So I don't know, I may post it when it's done later to see if it shows any level of improvement.




Posted by xuclo


Quoting Wally The Weird:
Except you xuclo, you can shiver the fattest part of me timbers. I don't give two ****s about a guy who says 'Give up and go home' and that is the end of it. As much as hate her, Queen at least puts thought into his posts, you twice baked sorry excuse for a waste of carbon.


I didn't like it, and I couldn't think of any way for you to fix it so I would like it more, without rewriting the whole thing differently. I could've stated what I did in much less civil terms.

There are things that I like doing, or would like to do, but just am no good at. Everyone has things like that. I personally didn't find your story or the style in which you wrote it interesting. In my personal opinion that is not meant to hurt your feelings you should find something that you're better at doing.

If you don't want to hear things like that, then just write and don't show people. I guarantee that there will be others who will say the same things I'm saying, but they probably won't be as nice about it.



Posted by WillisGreeny

Or, maybe you're brilliant and our little minds can't comprehend the genius through your writing




Posted by xuclo

I know I r too dumb. srry




Posted by Wally The Weird

Nah, it does suck, I just prefer comments with more thought then "Give up" put into them.

Besides, gotta start somewhere.




Posted by Vampiro V. Empire

You know what the problem was? 7/8 of the story was completely boring and then there was a one paragraph pay-off... which was also fairly uninteresting and didn't really even mean anything. I guess it's all right, but not good. Plus your sentence structure sucks, namely "One day, Alex was giving into one of his more favorite of past-times, buying things." I almost stopped reading there. I mean, it's almost engrish...




Posted by WillisGreeny

Sentence flow:

Alex didn't like to shop, but seeing all the unusual merchandise laid out in the display cases convinced Alex to take another look around the store.