Here are a couple of verses from a children's poem I have written for a competition. Any advice / feedback greatly appreciated.
I wake up in the morning,
alarm clock ringing in my head,
I've got to get up for school in a minute,
but I just want to stay in bed.
The thought of enduring maths and English,
makes me want to groan,
P.E, science or geography?
I'd much rather be at home.
Clambering around my bedroom,
wracking my brain for a lie to tell,
I trudge in to the kitchen,
and tell my mum I'm not feeling well.
Alice is absolutely right; you’re not fighting a losing battle. Your story and style is looking good. What a great start! I can’t imagine why a group of guys would start pummelling the girls… I also want to know what follows.
Technically speaking, you can tighten the prose by removing superfluous words and explanations that slow down the pace. Try to avoid using “telling” phrases such as “because”. You don’t need to explain to the reader things that we can already grasp on our own. For example:
“Eden could barely see because of the blood running in to her eyes on top of her tears—”
Why not simply write “Blood and tears obscured her vision”? (Though I think omitting “tears” reads even better) Also, your original sentence is 50 words! Consider breaking it up to reflect the violent action of the scene.
"Help!" Eden tried to shout, but her voice was weakened by her injuries and it came out barely louder than a whisper. "Please, help us!"
We know that Eden’s inability to shout is probably because she has been winded. This sentence also reads a little strange because the initial exclamation mark (“Help!”) is refuted by the relatively late “it come out barely louder than a whisper” only to then end with another exclamation mark (“Please, help us!”) Was she shouting or gasping?
The fight scene also contains several telling phrases. These are almost always identifiable by the word “to”. Consider:
“to hide the fear in her voice”
“to protect her already injured stomach”
“to minimise the blows to her face”
In almost every case, you can usually do away these in their entirety. Most readers can grasp why a character does something… it is only when they do something unusual that we might receive an explanation. You can use these, of course… but three in one paragraph is a bit much.
I hope this helps! Thank you for sharing. :)
Thanks Alice. I think I find it difficult as my family and friends are not really interested in reading my work, so I am the only one who reads it! Thanks for the encouragement, I will carry on writing for my own pleasure!
Hi Amy!
First and foremost, I don't think that anyone who enjoys writing is wasting their time by doing it - regardless of ability, it's (usually) fun, and practice makes perfect as they say!
But I don't think you should have any worries about fighting a losing battle - your writing style seems great to me! I'd be really interested in reading on from what I've just seen.
Thanks for sharing, and don't let doubt stop you from carrying on (not that I'm always the best at following my own advice!)