This is a very, very good start with good atmosphere. I will send a more detailed review by email attachment.
I turned tracking on and added my suggestions. Mostly the suggestions are a different word that I thought helped maintain the mood or cut some words to push the pace.
Do not be shocked by the appearance a single word changed every couple of sentences looks much worse in tracking then it really is. As always, you are the judge and arbiter of your style. Let me know if this helps or not and if you want me to look at anything else. Feel free to take your revenge on any of my work you want.
Good beginning. The pacing and consistent tone helps me care about Berliona and set up your opening conflict. I will need to read more of you novel. I have a few specific suggestions on word choice. I have saved your Prologue in Word and turned tracking on. I will send this file to you as an attachment.
They are only suggestions you are judge and arbiter of your style. Let me know if this helps.
This is a good start. You do get me to care about your main character right away. While your description of the opening sword fight is good I suggest tighten up beginning. You want the reader breathless going into the fight. This is what I would do:
“Battle was in the keep, heralded with a ring of swords and guttural war cries. I loosened my swords and prepared for assault. Suddenly a warrior burst into the hall I warded; last defense of the king’s chamber beyond.
My foe pulled off his helm, releasing long flowing golden hair. I gasped; alerting her to my presence. She dropped her helm and whirled to face me, swords drawn. A look of surprise and recognition washed over her but it quickly changed into that smirk. …”
I would not change the rest. Good luck and I hope to see more.
Powerful images and good pacing but the pacing could be better. Your pacing is good but needs to be even tighter otherwise it weakens the images. In the first paragraph have no mercy on the reader, give them no respite. This is what I suggest with the first paragraph:
“...Paranoia consumes his memories. "Time is everything, time is nothing; time is all the same. Another day, another day, another week and another day. The compulsion to check the time again overwhelmed his shame. “Dave’s trembling fingers retrieved his watch examined only minutes ago. The seconds echoed, synchronized with his heart. He shuddered as a chill reverberated down his spinal chord. "Biting frost and body-snatchers linger in the hour.” Two-seventeen a.m.? “Perfect time to unravel the kite."
He shuffles by the window, the television, a worn armchair, scattered paint chips line the bare wood floor where tears of water had leaked from the cracked roof. Dave stubbles into the bathroom flicking on a fluorescent light. Its monotonous buzz radiates off the walls. He opened the cracked mirrored, exposing a collection of vials, capsules, bottles and tubes. His searches franticly for the relief his senses demand. He clinches a small vial and rushes back into the other room. Violent footsteps and a glass bottle falls from its perch exploding on the raw tiles. Dave slouches in the armchair that displays countless years of abuse and stains and extracts a crystal from the vial. Underneath the cushions he pulls a lighter and a blackened pipe.
Relief, freedom, ascension, escape...
First I want to say I really like your character descriptions. You do a very good job of introducing us to your characters. I have no trouble seeing them.
However, starting with chapter one I suggest you give us a hint what the major conflict of the story is going to be right at the beginning. Why is the court gathering, how did Baron Dulani die, whatever. Since I don’t know what your theme is I can’t know what your major conflict is.
Your introduction of Leopold needs a little work. On first read I though he was a young man, maybe early 20’s or younger until I got to the end of the chapter. I would suggest you do something with his “rampage.” His rampages are the passionate bloodlust of a callow youth not the calculating strokes of the mature warrior that he was, etc.
In chapter two I again like you characters but I need something more about their world. At this point the major conflict seems to be about who going to marry who. I need a reason to care about this people.
I don’t want to sound negative because your skills at describing your characters are really very good. And I do want see where you go with this story.
I like what you are doing with the story but I like opening hard and fast. The opening paragraph should be fast paced. Cut whatever you can, add only to set the mood of the moment. Let extra details wait to later in the chapter.
Here's what I did:
"Eternity was full of frenzied souls. It was (Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday) and it didn’t make a difference. The cover change was outrageous and it didn’t make a difference. The drink prices were larcenous and it didn’t make a difference. All that mattered was the overwhelming rhythms. It seemed like all of Miami’s young and rich wanted to press onto that dance floor. The frenzied bodies moving to the driving music jumped in an out of view with the flashing strobes. Eternity’s dance floor was a chaos of motion, sound, and light set within flashing mirrors and gleaming fixtures."
Keep writing. If you rather you didn't get these reviews from me just send me a "thanks but no thanks" email.
An intersting start. I assume the vampire is going to be an anti-hero. My suggestion is to launch hard with short emotionally charged sentences and save details for later in the story. Here's what I wriote:
Silence filled the interrogation room like a malicious spirit. Sorin scorned to notice it, the heat or his full bladder. Sorin Dechevney sat robed in silence. As if he was untouchable. Livia wanted to hurt him, to hit, to rake her fingernails across that smug pretty face. Liva wanted to rip the heart out of his chest and squeeze the truth out it.
“She isn’t making any headway, Martin,”
“It’s only been a couple of hours or so … give her some time. This joker is a hot shot. He’s not going to like being questioned by a woman. She’ll crack him.”
“You really think he had anything to do with these missing women?”
“ If he didn’t do it, he knows something. He runs the club where the women hung out. The three women were all regulars in his VIP room.”
“ Then you nail him. The last one was the Mayor’s niece, and believe me he’s no one to piss off.”
As Captain Landus turned away from the two-way mirror Detective Martin Brown growled “You got it Captain.”
His voiced dropped into a feral whisper of a twenty-year veteran who still knew how to hate. “We’ll get him.”
Keep up the writing and good luck!
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