Would you say this is captivating

[Coffeeandroses]

Hi all I recently started a thread asking for feedback on a creative piece I had wrote not long ago , I have since taken the advice on board that was given and tried to change my writing style slightly, in order to captivate a reader more.

I will copy and paste my more recent creative piece down below , any feed back would be much appreciated many tia x

As the sunlight beamed through my thin indigo nylon curtains and as I could hear the birds chirpily tweeting a merry tune I came to the realisation that it was morning. I had slept through the entire night and to my surprise I hadn’t wet the bed , my sheets had remained completely dry.
“Hannah? Hannah are you awake love?” Called my foster parent Pam from the dingy sparsely decorated hallway.
“ yeah I’m awake” I mumbled sleepily rubbing the dried sleep which had encrusted around my eyes, away.
“ oh good” said Pam suddenly bustling into my room wrenching the curtains open, allowing the light to enter the room , showcasing the peeling wallpaper that was coming off in the corners and the black mould which was creeping up the wall due to the damp and condensation which had inhabited the room.

It wasn’t perfect not even close and as much as I craved and wished to be back home with my Mum, surrounded by home comforts that were familiar to me such as my Harry Potter book collection which sat on the shelf ,my collection of beanie bears which lived at the end of my bed and my assortment of crystal rocks , pebbles and sea shells that I had accumulated from all the sea side holidays which me and Mum had visited over the years.

How I wished I could be sat on the sandy shores of Cornwall now, making sandcastles, Mum sat next to me soaking up the sun rays , me licking cold tantalising ice cream off my lips while it somehow melted and ran down my hand trickling down my wrist. Mum had got cross then ,and told me I should eat it quickly to avoid making such a sticky mess. We didn’t have any more ice creams after that.

Maybe one day when I get to go home Mum will take me back to Cornwall for a holiday sunbathing and paddling in the clear blue sea but for now this would have to do. I don’t even have a choice in the matter.

And as I crawled out of bed feeling like I had arrived on deaths door Pam stood before me a sweet smile plastered on her face grasping a set of freshly washed grey joggers and a violet faded t shirt in her arms. It wasn’t home and she isn’t my Mum but for now this would have to do.

But how I missed my Mum if only I could see her now. I wish I could go home. I wish none of this had happened and I was waking up in my own room still curled up under my hello kitty duvet while Mum was in the kitchen making us breakfast the smell of burnt toast And sizzling sausages cooking , wafting into my room.

It’s not fair , it never is.

I think if I were your target reader group, then I would want to know why she is in that situation, and would continue reading.

I think one thing you could do which would really improve the immediacy of this is to cut the excess adjectives. The birds 'chirpily tweeting a merry tune' and the 'cold tantalising icecream' and the 'dingy, sparsely-decorated hallway' are overkill, and draw attention too much to the writing. You also seem to swing back and forth between present and past tense, when you really need to choose one and stick to it.

I think you also need to characterise Pam more -- is the room Hannah is sleeping in damp and neglected because Pam wilfully neglects her foster children, or simply because she's poor (as suggested by the dingy, poorly decorated hall)? The fact that you depict her as having a smile 'plastered' on her face suggests falsity, but on the other hand, she's waking Hannah up and bringing her clothes...? Why does Hannah feel she's 'at death's door' when she's slept the night through? Is she of an age when bedwetting is fairly normal, or an older child in whom it might be evidence of trauma?

I read your last thread - this piece is certainly more engaging because you get quickly into dialogue, which is great.

I think you're still doing some of the things fed back on the other thread - as the above poster noted, you're using multiple adjectives and switching between tenses.

You're also giving similar information twice -

to my surprise I hadn’t wet the bed , my sheets had remained completely dry

If she hasn't wet the bed, we can assume her sheets will be dry. It would be better just to say the sheets were dry - that then engages your reader by forcing them to make the connection - a-ha, she wets her bed - rather than serving this up on plate.

Similarly:

black mould which was creeping up the wall due to the damp and condensation which had inhabited the room.

Your reader doesn't need an explanation of the causes of mould in a room. By tacking on 'due to the damp ...' you are taking away from the image of mould on the wall - that's what you want your reader to notice, the image of a mouldy wall, so that's where you need to leave things.

I do like the ending - 'it's not fair, it never is' as that's very much in character for a teenager.

OP I saw an earlier thread of yours and was impressed with the editing suggestions you received.

Now ... while I'm aware that an editor can really polish a piece of writing, it seems to me that the greater the original writer's command of all the tools of language, the more fun they can have in practising their craft.

I'd suggest, if you really want to make your work as good as possible, that you start to build up a small library of useful texts, starting with Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage. (I remember a much earlier version being an entertaining read.)

I'd also echo a previous poster's suggestion that you get back into the habit of reading as much well written fiction as you can.

Essentially, I think you could worry less about 'style' and instead really dig down to the most effective use of one word followed by another. Don't aim to be "captivating" - aim to be clear.

Don't aim to be "captivating" - aim to be clear.

I like that advice.

Things work when they're left to the reader's imagination. If there's a reason why you need the reader to know eg the curtains are indigo show the information rather than tell. "I wished the curtains were blue instead; I hate indigo. But nobody asked me."

As a point of starting to edit, I suggest you try cutting out at least one adjective at each point you have two. Read it through and see if it's lost anything.

As the sunlight came through my curtains, I could hear the birds tweeting and I came to the realisation that it was morning.
Is much slicker and you haven't lost anything important.

As the sunlight came through my curtains, I came to the realisation that it was morning.
May be even better-unless there's a specific reason why you need the birds.

Try reading it out loud. You pick up rhythm and the flow of the passage that way. It's easier to spot the extra words that you don't need, and notice things like all your sentences are the same length-which makes it a bit boring.

Just before I read your edit, Witchend, I was thinking that the exact manner in which the birds disturbed the protagonist might be used to indicate exactly what was happening outside. Unusually quiet - she's waking up disastrously late. Unusually noisy, demolition trucks moving in ... (I've been spending too much time on Amazon Prime videos ...)

OP, if there had been nothing distinctively special about this waking up I'd skip any long-winded revelation that sunlight and birds presage morning - but as there is, you might tie the signs of morning more closely to her perception of her unusual situation in bed.

One other thing, - coming under 'show don't tell' - in this passage:

Hannah are you awake love?” Called my foster parent Pam from the dingy sparsely decorated hallway

If Hannah is still in bed I wouldn't include the description of the hallway - unless as reminiscence from another time and place. Her foster mother simply calls from the hallway. We will see the hallway when Hannah herself moves through it ...