Hello, everyone!
Here is another first page critique. I really hope you guys are finding these critiques helpful!
Best,
J
First Page:
There are three types of people in this world: the oppressors, those running from the oppressors, and those unaffected by the oppressors. Guess which group counts me as a member? [This paragraph feel a little unfinished to me...I think it might help if there was a sentence to help the transition between this one and the next, so that it connects with the rest.]
The final bell rang. I’d have to make it home on my own today; his appointment [Whose?] was at 1:45, and I doubted he’d be back yet. I decided to try a new tactic. Instead of dashing out the front door at 2:19, like I did every other day, I lingered at my locker. [I like the voice/language here.] My heart pounded in my chest. Could I do it? Could I really slip past them? [I'm a little unclear here...the narrator (she/he? seems female) first says "his appointment," and here she/he is saying them.]
Right now, they’d be on the front steps of the school, waiting for me, searching for my face in the throng of students clogging up the entrance. Maybe they would find one of their other targets and forget about me for today. Maybe if I delayed long enough, either they would leave or he would arrive. [Is the narrator a target of bullying? How so? He? The one who had the appointment?]
I rearranged my notebooks and swept the junk at the bottom of the locker – gum wrappers and rubber bands and paper clips – onto the floor with my hand. [I think this is a nice job of showing something about the characters environment.] I took my phone out of my pocket and checked the time. By now, all but a few stragglers will have exited the building. I sifted through the coats and sweatshirts stuffed onto the hooks and found my old green windbreaker. Ha! So that’s where it had gone. I pulled it on and tried to stretch the sleeves down. No doing; three inches of boney wrist stuck out at the bottom of each sleeve. Whatever. I pushed the sleeves up to the elbows and headed down the hallway to the back door.
Most of the other students – the ones without after-school activities - had already left the school. It felt strange to be in the building; I was not an after-school activity person. A janitor walked by, rounding up little bits of trash and dust with his enormous broom. He kept his head straight, but his eyes slid over and gave me a quick glance; he knew I didn’t belong here. [Not a bad start. I think there are some things that need flushed out, such as why is the narrator is reluctant to leave this time? There are a number of things that readers could infer, so you'd want to clarify.]
