“What color is the sky?”
“Red.”
“Bright red or dark red?”
“I don’t know. Middle red.” William asked looking intently at the sky. It had changed every day since he was able to see and no one had ever told him it was anything special. Now all of a sudden the color seemed to be all anyone wanted to talk about. He was sick of hearing about the color.
His dad looked up at the sky and then at Will, something was wrong, Crimson was not a color which people saw unless something was going to happen. It was an ominous sign, but hopefully the color would change soon.
What difference does it make?” Will asked looking at the sky again.
You may want to put a question mark after "Middle red."
This is an intriguing start. I'll read, but I make no promises that I'll get it back to you soon.
A couple nits:
In the lines
quote:there should be a comma after the word asked, because the looking and asking are two different actions in different clauses.
William asked looking intently at the sky.
Will asked looking at the sky again.
quote:
His dad looked up at the sky and then at Will, something was wrong, Crimson was not a color which people saw unless something was going to happen.
This is a run-on sentence. I think you were trying to go for a feel of quick thought. It works just as well if you make the first comma a semicolon; the second ought to be a period.
Another thing: this whole phrase bogs down in my head:
quote:
Crimson was not a color which people saw unless something was going to happen.
Sure, it's proper grammar to not use contractions, and yes this is third person, but "was not a color which people saw" is unwieldy. I think it sounds smoother to say, "Crimson wasn't a color people saw". It's up to you. I don't like the last part of that sentence either: "unless something was going to happen."
Okay, so nothing happens whatsoever unless the sky is red? Maybe put in an adjective here: "unless something bad was about to happen" or "unless something big was going to happen" or "something strange" etc. What do you think?
It seems interesting, and I'd like to take a look at the whole thing. 11,000 words makes it novelette length, by the way. Please email it to jforrest_2004 (at) yahoo.com
I also agree with him (maybe I should have just type "what Deepdreamer said" and exited) about the end of that sentence. How about something like, "The only time the sky was crimson was when something weird/big/bad was about to happen."