LordPalmerston's profile

I really liked the opening to this. You didn't over-describe, yet I was immediately familiar with the subject matter. You immediately make the main character sympathetic, which is a large part of the storytelling battle. A polish could turn this into a great opening chapter of a novella. Or, given the short length, even a short story of about 5,000 words or so. Some of the descriptions are rough around the edges, but that's perfectly normal for a first draft. And yes, the dialogue could use s...

I read through this because I don't like to start stories and stop in the middle. That's not true of all readers. Not only is there not a hook in the first paragraph, there's really nothing interesting going on until Virgil breaks in. Even then, I'm having trouble figuring out his motivation. Don't take this as a slam of the writing itself. Lyrically, it works. There's a flow, a rhythm in the piece, and it will be even better with another editing pass to take out some superfluous words and ph...