[05/04/13: I'm closed to swaps for now. If you're interested in reading my MS, without me reading yours in return, feel free to message me.]
Hi ya'll,
I've gotten to the point where I could use some beta readers. I am hoping to do MS swaps with other authors who write young adult novels.
I'm not looking for line-by-lines at this point, unless you see blatant errors/typos (although there shouldn't be any, since I've already revised the MS.) I'm looking for overall thoughts about the book, including perceptions of character arcs and plot structure. Perhaps some insight into descriptions you may find lacking, too; I'm not as good with descriptions as I am with dialogue, since I naturally skip over descriptions when I read books.
I'm hoping for these critiques to be done within a month of agreeing to swap manuscripts (after we exchange first chapters and decide we want to proceed further.) I will do the same in exchange.
ISA is complete at 65,000 words.
Here is a description of the book:
Hi ya'll,
I've gotten to the point where I could use some beta readers. I am hoping to do MS swaps with other authors who write young adult novels.
I'm not looking for line-by-lines at this point, unless you see blatant errors/typos (although there shouldn't be any, since I've already revised the MS.) I'm looking for overall thoughts about the book, including perceptions of character arcs and plot structure. Perhaps some insight into descriptions you may find lacking, too; I'm not as good with descriptions as I am with dialogue, since I naturally skip over descriptions when I read books.
I'm hoping for these critiques to be done within a month of agreeing to swap manuscripts (after we exchange first chapters and decide we want to proceed further.) I will do the same in exchange.
ISA is complete at 65,000 words.
Here is a description of the book:
When sixteen-year-old Isa is told by her chieftain father that she must kill and devour one of the deer people, she doesn’t question it. The ritual comes with the territory of being a human-wolf hybrid, just like her night vision and sharp teeth. Her attitude changes when she sees her target. Their shared human roots are obvious. She can’t kill someone who looks so similar to her. She won’t.
Her refusal to fulfill the ritual gets her kicked out of her tribe. She finds refuge with the very person she spared, a boy named Avery. Any rational person would run at the sight of their predator, but not him. No, he’d rather invite them in for tea.
He should’ve run, Isa thinks, when she learns about the true purpose of the ritual: to prevent a curse of the wolf tribe from raging within her, one that threatens to fill her with a hunger so potent that she’ll be left with nothing but the desire to kill. Or so one of her fellow tribe members tells her.
Since she hasn’t yet felt this so-called curse, she remains with the deer tribe, and everything seems just dandy until one of their villagers is found dead. Murdered and eaten by one of Isa’s kin. Such killing is forbidden outside of the ritual, but her tribe has run out of food and will starve unless they feast on the deer people. Or unless Isa finds something else for them to eat.
She pledges to travel with Avery, as well as members from the shark and hawk tribes, to the Homestead, a mysterious place that routinely provides supplies to all of the tribes except hers. Their journey goes smoothly - apart from the occasional slip from a hundred-foot-tall waterfall and bear attack - until Isa begins to feel the curse. If she doesn’t get help for her tribe, they’ll be forced to outright slaughter the deer people, sacrificing the last remnants of their humanity. But if she doesn’t fight off the curse, she will lose her own humanity and any chance she ever had of saving her people.
Her refusal to fulfill the ritual gets her kicked out of her tribe. She finds refuge with the very person she spared, a boy named Avery. Any rational person would run at the sight of their predator, but not him. No, he’d rather invite them in for tea.
He should’ve run, Isa thinks, when she learns about the true purpose of the ritual: to prevent a curse of the wolf tribe from raging within her, one that threatens to fill her with a hunger so potent that she’ll be left with nothing but the desire to kill. Or so one of her fellow tribe members tells her.
Since she hasn’t yet felt this so-called curse, she remains with the deer tribe, and everything seems just dandy until one of their villagers is found dead. Murdered and eaten by one of Isa’s kin. Such killing is forbidden outside of the ritual, but her tribe has run out of food and will starve unless they feast on the deer people. Or unless Isa finds something else for them to eat.
She pledges to travel with Avery, as well as members from the shark and hawk tribes, to the Homestead, a mysterious place that routinely provides supplies to all of the tribes except hers. Their journey goes smoothly - apart from the occasional slip from a hundred-foot-tall waterfall and bear attack - until Isa begins to feel the curse. If she doesn’t get help for her tribe, they’ll be forced to outright slaughter the deer people, sacrificing the last remnants of their humanity. But if she doesn’t fight off the curse, she will lose her own humanity and any chance she ever had of saving her people.
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