: Re: Any suggestions to improve these three introductory paragraphs of a novel I'm writing (e.g. writing style, description and flow)? These are the paragraphs: Someone had called me at half past

@Eichhorn147

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I'll answer question two honestly: Sorry, but it didn't make me want to read on. My first reaction is 'So what?'. You haven't given me any reason to care that he didn't pick up the phone or that he doesn't get along with Mai any more.

Does he not pick up the phone because there's someone or something after him? Hint at that. Does she seem distant to him because of some dark, mysterious history between them? Hint at that too. There's just no hook that that makes me go, 'Oh? What's this? I want to know more!'

Again, sorry for being so brutal, but that's just how I feel about it.

And the short answer to question one is that you need to work on improving your English first. I understand you're not a native speaker and it's great that you're working on it, but it's very jarring to read. I can't get any sense of the flow when I'm jerked out of that world by bad spelling, grammar and punctuation so often so I can't really provide any feedback there.

But please don't be put off by this - writing only improves with practice, and there are flashes that appeal to me, such as how you describe Mai's distance from the narrator as them being dead to each other. Keep going!

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