It's a great beginning full of character and atmosphere and as Paige said a nice slip in of the love interest. It does need some tightening, but you know that. The most glaring to me was a repeat of the idea and the actual word of years in one of the sentences toward the beginning. And the phrasing of the sentence about her choice of dress-most of the time, she never, etc. etc- got a little wordy.
And it may be a tad too much physical description all at once. But perhaps that justs my taste- I don't feel the need to know exactly how a character looks, not right away certainly. Even when DG goes into Jamie's knife edged nose a tad too long and generous mouth- I tend to glaze over, but others like it. And some of the details gave us good background- no kids, riding, likes to change her hair color- stuff like that, so that's probably what you'd want to hang on to.
Really great start! I'm so psyched/proud you're doing the Nano and I can live vicariously through you.
>It's a great beginning full of character and
>atmosphere and as Paige said a nice slip in of the
>love interest. It does need some tightening, but you
>know that. The most glaring to me was a repeat of the
>idea and the actual word of years in one of the
>sentences toward the beginning. And the phrasing of
>the sentence about her choice of dress-most of the
>time, she never, etc. etc- got a little wordy.
>
>And it may be a tad too much physical description all
>at once. But perhaps that justs my taste- I don't feel
>the need to know exactly how a character looks, not
>right away certainly. Even when DG goes into Jamie's
>knife edged nose a tad too long and generous mouth- I
>tend to glaze over, but others like it. And some of
>the details gave us good background- no kids, riding,
>likes to change her hair color- stuff like that, so
>that's probably what you'd want to hang on to.
>
>Really great start! I'm so psyched/proud you're doing
>the Nano and I can live vicariously through you.
Well, I am trying to hit 50,000 words...*wink* But you're right, it can use some tightening up. I was looking for a way to give readers an idea of what she looked like and the setting. I'll work on it after NaNo is over. Thankis for the comments and ideas.