January 16th, 2021 at 09:38pm
Comment swap also brought me here.
Right off the bat, let me state that this is not the kind of story I would normally read.
I am NOT going to mention misspellings, because those tend to happen and should be worked through in one burst, honestly.
To start off, I don't really like the "X week(s) earlier" approach to storytelling, as it seems like a weird kind of trailer thing that books really don't have any need for, but that's just me. In my eyes it should only be used if there's a HUGE difference between now and five weeks ago, which isn't the case here.
When you first introduced the room she was entering you used a second person as an adresee, as if she was explaining it to someone else. I found this to be quite awkward. Technically not wrong, because she IS telling a story TO someone, but it still feels quite awkward.
Your prose also tends to be a little beige at times.
There is also quite a few mistakes in the tenses ("I still needed to get the rest of my stuff but I'll do it later" is a wrong tense and it also sounds awkward, I would probably have written it as "but I decided to get the rest later.")
At points you could do with some more explaining, you're missing a lot of explanations for sounds or smells or the like, which could make many things more interesting.
Your dialouge also tends to be somewhat... "on the nose", I feel. The characters tend to explain things that, to them, very much easily visible and therefore should not be mentioned in a normal conversation and sometimes you explain things that could have been interesting to mix in with dialouge.
Your writing is pretty all over the place at times. Sometimes you take your time with a scene, although not all that much and sometimes you speed through them as if trying to get to another part, which was quite staggering and it threw me off more times than I would like to admit too.
The chapters are the right length for what you are doing however they feel kind of hollow, even though they're pretty short. I think with some reworking you could make all of it more interesting with more lively descriptions and the sort.
I hope my criticism was at least partly helpful or I hope that I didn't tell you something you already knew.
Also, don't take anything of this as a personal attack. Artists can only grow through criticism and adversity. Keep up your work, don't let anyone bring you down.
Little stuff:
"fast-paced city life?"
Check strategy for compound modification?
9 lives, no worries. Ha!
"is stairs" are stairs?
"snoop too much further" much further?
"front door" front doorway?
I scanned through after seeing so many occurrences of the word “but.” There are three in this vicinity—a tip off and then I saw a bunch more (25?) Synonyms for the word “but” include although, however, nevertheless, on the other hand, still, though, yet, besides, and more. The word “but” oft is overused and oft there is a synonym with a meaning more in line with what the sentence is saying. The word “but” implies some opposition to the foregoing words, yet oft the word choice to be used should not declare opposition, rather it should supply a meaning of “in addition” or “in juxtaposition” or similar. In working with new writers, I have come to hate the word “but.” It is so overused. It also might be an indication that sentences could be more varied. “But” like “was” is fine for a first draft. Then, go through and rewrite them out.