The morning began with a green dawn and the exodus of the dragons from Palmiro Castle. They spread across the heavens like a molted rainbow, eerie against the sickly sky. Their massive wings beat the ground with turbulence. Trees bent, cornstalks broke, the donkey brayed—too dim-witted to hide his alarm.
Thea shivered in the shade made by their winged formation.
“Dragons,” her young brother whispered beside her. “Where are they going?”
“I don’t know.” She grabbed his arm to pull him into their thatch house. “Come on.”
“Thea, Thom…” Their father burst into the room. “Brace the door.”

[This message has been edited by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (edited December 03, 2010).]
 

Nits:
--dim-witted: dimwitted
--Thea shivered in the shade made by their winged formation: consider changing their to the dragons' since 'their' is somewhat removed from what it refers to.

Good luck

[This message has been edited by WouldBe (edited December 03, 2010).]
 

I think the cognitive load is a bit higher than optimal here. We're wondering about that green sky, then we get an otherwise nice bit of figurative language ("molted rainbow") that is interesting but somewhat obscure. This is followed by a somewhat awkwardly phrased concrete image: "Their massive wings beat the ground..." That's two bits of circumlocution in one sentence. First, the *wings* don't beat the ground *with* turbulence (which in any case is invisible itself and impossible to picture). Second, the wings are surely not *massive*, but large (great, enormous, giant, or what have you). You are unconsciously using rhetorical devices you don't really need (specifically metonymy: Mass *suggests* size and vice versa). They are clever but we end up pondering *them* rather than the scene itself.

See what I mean by cognitive overload? You've packed the scene with so many rhetorical goodies that rather than making the scene more vivid, they're starting to obscure it. For example, we are told the donkey brayed *because* it is too dim-witted. That's nice, but obscure because but we don't have a POV character identified yet. It makes us wonder where this analysis of the donkey's intelligence is coming from, the author, some narrator we haven't met, or the POV character's thoughts. It may only be a tiny bit of confusion, but we've already got a lot on our plate.

I think what you want here is a simple, arresting, magnificent image of dragons taking flight as seen through Thea's eyes, then conveyed in the most straightforward and concrete way possible. Get us right into her head, then really imagine those dragons flying. Then make that sight beautiful and maybe even sensuous, certainly not sickly or peculiar. Foreshadow the coming terror through Thea's realizing the donkey too stupid to hide. Then set the hook by showing us that Thea herself is doing the same thing (Bar the door!)

Make it simple. Make it memorable. Make it terrifying.

[This message has been edited by MattLeo (edited December 04, 2010).]
 

First off, I'm not sure you've pegged it right as a paranormal romance. Fantasy romance might be closer, since this seems to be second world. I'm no expert on the sub genres, though. Frankly, it doesn't really matter until you start writing your query letter anyway.

One nit:
"molted rainbow". I think you mean molten, as in partially melted. Not molted as in a messy-looking bird shedding its feathers.

For a novel, you don't have to hook quite as hard in the first 13 as you do with a short story. This opening feels a little abrupt to me. If it were me, I'd open perhaps with Thea going about her chores (giving a hint of everyday life in this world), noticing an unexpected shadow, and looking up to see the dragons flying away. Give it a little touch of wonder, perhaps (that hooks in a fantasy, too). Perhaps give a little more description of the phalanx of dragons and what Thea feels seeing them. Is she excited by the sight before she realizes it has to mean trouble?

You might give a little more reaction to her father, too. Obviously, he's expecting trouble. Does he by word or gesture reveal that he's relieved his children made it into the house before telling them to brace the door? That could up the tension a bit.

Just suggestions.

BTW, you don't give ages, but you imply that Thea is fairly young by surrounding her with her little brother and her father. Is this intended to be YA?

[This message has been edited by Meredith (edited December 04, 2010).]
 

But bear in mind I'm a bit of a point of view totalitarian, I write tight third person past tense, and pretty much only that (I occasionally dabble in first person but I don't care for it, and I've recently been trying multiple POVs for third person past and it's hard for me.)

So if I were writing this passage, I would be in Thea's head from the very first word. While it's possible "The morning began with a green dawn and..." is a thought from Thea's head, it feels more like a cinematic POV - are you familiar with that term? It's in Orson Scott Card's great book called CHARACTERS and VIEWPOINTS, highly recommended if you're into this sort of thing - most libraries have it if buying one more book isn't feasible at this time of year (like it isn't for me, lol.)

Cinematic POV is a POV from a distance, often "zooming in" to a main character before then becoming a 3rd person story where the POV is like riding on the shoulder of the 3rd person character and/or riding in their brain seeing with their eyes.

You can combine, in fact Orson Scott Card does this with some good effect in the opening of Ender's Shadow, as I recall. However my personal preference is for a tighter connection to the POV character.

So in this instance, Thea's opinions, thoughts, and fears about the dragons are most compelling to me. Then things like the donkey braying (too dimwitted to hide his alarm) make more sense, because they're Thea's *opinions* about things, they don't stand out as these isolated thoughts we have to find a home for. Does that make any sense?

So something like:

Thea was going about her morning chores when the exodus of the dragons from Palmiro Castle began. The sky was green that morning, and as Thea shaded her eyes from the brightening sun, the dragons spread across the heavens like a ... molten, etc. Their massive wings caused her <benefit of this is you can use it as an opportunity to describe her like golden> hair to spin around her in a whirl. Her younger brother (give him a name) Joe grabbed at her long skirts (again, you can give us more features to ground us in time/location/type of story, maybe he's grabbing at her jeggings or her leather micro-mini or her jetpack, know what I mean?) ...more here including the donkey line which is kind of funny and gives us a nice sense of your voice, etc. etc.

See what I mean?

As with all feedback, take what works, leave the rest. I'm afraid I'm overcommitted on crits right now but I wish you the best of luck with this piece!
 

The problem is I don't have much to say. I thought molted was the right word, it seemed to fit the dragons in flight.

It was a tiny bit of a shock or change when you "zeroed" in on your MC.

Other than that it worked for me but you should see, as you seem to have done, what the previous posters wrote.
 

Your title for the thread attracted my attention. I liked the play on the original quote.
 

I'm very hooked immediately.

And I am very interested in the POV comments above. They are very helpful to me too.