Question by Monica: Can you judge part of my novel, opinions and comments?
The view of the river looked gorgeous from the park. It was cool and bright with the sun and birds decorating the blue sky. Cirrus clouds moved along in the midst of it all. Palma scrapped her feet against the brown, yellow, and red leaves, scattering across the grass. Andy took her hand and stroked it for awhile. Palma’s green eyes stared at him with intensity. He couldn’t stop thinking how beautiful she looked in her silver halter-top with sequined stars on it. Her jean shorts covered her mid-calf, revealing her pale legs. Normally, Andy wouldn’t have spent this much time with Palma, but Palma had been upset lately. So it was natural to try to cheer her up.
“Nothing’s wrong with me.” she smiled, taking a sip from her jug that contained apple juice in it. “I was just having a headache. Sorry if I came off as a bitch to you.”
“Nah, it’s okay.” he said, smiling as well. “I will always be there for you when you have problems.”
“You’re sweet.” she said, laying her head on his lap.
He stroked her for awhile, thinking about the times they shared. It has only been three months since they dated, but he felt close to her. At first Palma was just another girl he thought was hot, but after getting to know her, she became different.
Her soft buttery-blond hair tickled the side of his face as she sat up. A noise could be heard coming across the river. It sounded like someone screaming. Andy started looking around, frowning as he saw Dexter randomly making weird noises on the other side of the river. He looked like an ant to them.
“Fucking idiot.” muttered Andy, turning his gaze back to Palma.
She leaned in towards him, placing a kiss onto his lips. He wrapped his arms around her, kissing her back. A soft breeze, plucked Palma’s hair up, causing it to blow swiftly in Andy’s face. They weren’t thinking about anything, but their lips meeting. Finally when they broke apart, Andy looked at her for a moment. He examined her mark on her forehead that hadn’t been there before.
“What’s that?” he asked, pointing to the area on her forehead.
She quickly covered it with her hair. “Nothing, I just fell.”
“Did someone hit you?” he asked concernedly.
“No!” she said quickly. “It’s just that I was playing soccer and I tripped. My head came down on the ground pretty fast.”
Andy wasn’t sure if he believe her or not. Letting it go, he turned his attention to the old couple walking their three dogs. It reminded him of Buzz. Buzz was probably at home getting into trouble. He smiled at the thought. In a few hours, children would be going door to door trick-or-treating. He enjoyed seeing children in goofy costumes begging for candy. Often he liked to scare them a little bit.
His house was always the best decorated on Christmas and Halloween. Novelty corpses and coffin would accumulate his front yard, attracting cars to pass by his house. The ghost in his attic hadn’t been bothering him for awhile. It was relief that he was no longer hearing scary noises at night. Maybe it was just his imagination from the stress at school.
“Hey,” began Palma. “You wanna go feed the ducks?”
“Sure.” he grinned.
The pond was a few yards away from the river. They stood underneath the gazebo tossing bread to the hungry ducks.
“You ever wonder how as soon as a human approaches the pond, the ducks come towards them.” observed Palma as a baby duck pecked at her jeans.
“Because they know humans means food.” stated Andy. “Ducks love it when humans come. Sometimes if a duck is hatched from a egg, it’ll mistake a human as its parent if the human is the first thing it sees.”
“They have very human characteristics.” nodded Palma. “They follow each other, they fight for food, and they even listen to what their mothers say to them.”
“How ’bout that?” grinned Andy, feeding a duck by hand.
Palma kissed him on the neck, giggling as she hopped away. He laughed, chasing her around the park. Catching up with her, he tackled her onto the ground, kissing her all over. Their bodies met as they wrestled each other to the ground. It was the best day they ever had together.
They arched their way back to Arlene’s white BMW, feeling exhausted. It was 6:30 and the sky was dark. It wasn’t too dark, but it was getting close to that time where the sky would turn black. Sun still peeked out and they could see tiny children walking towards houses with pumpkin bags to put their candy in.
“How was it?” asked Arlene, combing her dark hair.
“It was good.” smiled Palma, sliding into the back seat. “How was your day?”
“It was alright.” she admitted. “I had to get rid of a few Jehovah Witnesses.”
Andy cackled. Their house was always being visited by Jehovah Witnesses. “That sucks. Did you tell them you were an atheist.”
“Better yet, you should have told them you go to a synagogue.” joked Palma, looking down at her cellphone.
Arlene smiled into the rearview mirror. “I wish.”
Andy grinned at Palma who gave him a thumbs up signal. She did that whenever she was
Best answer:
Answer by retooser1
I’m going to be honest with you: this story is rough. It has potential, but right now it’s extremely rough and needs to be edited. You have some punctuation/ grammar issues, and your syntax doesn’t help the flow of the story. Your dialogue seems a little stiff, and the descriptions sometimes get in the way of the action of the story.
What I would suggest is reading your story out loud to yourself, that way you can hear the flow and choppiness of the work. It has good potential, you just need to harness it.
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