Roots

Aug Pro Agent Challenge (NOW CLOSED)
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Audience and Genre: YA Fantasy

Logline When a Black girl from the Roots of the Great Tree becomes the first of her people in generations to be blessed with magic, she must decide whether to survive under the Crown’s authority, or fly in spite of it.

Entry

Chapter 1: “Dangerous.”

“You weren’t supposed to wake up.”

The voice hits me like a bucket of cold water. It snaps me from dull consciousness into acute awareness: the firmness of a bed; the orange glow of faerie lights in a suffocatingly small room; and the backlit silhouette of a woman looming over me.

“Where in the skies am I?” I say hoarsely, blinking rapidly in the hazy light. Somehow, it’s too bright and too dark at the same time. The woman’s face might as well belong to a ghost, with how it fades in and out of focus. “And who the heck are you?”

“Who I am is a privilege reserved for those who have earned the right to know. You, hapless girl, have not." Strange light illuminates her sharp features. “Now here you are, defiling our Tree’s highest branches with your annoying will to live. Insects have that same inconvenient talent. Being places where they shouldn’t be. Scurrying in the shadows.” The woman lifts a finger and presses it against my forehead, right between my eyes. “All it takes is a little pressure…” She presses harder, making my already throbbing head ache even more. "To make it as though you never existed.”

I force my eyes open and make myself stare up into the woman’s face. That look on her face—pure, unearned superiority—is somehow the most familiar thing in this room.

Screw that.

“If you don’t get your bony-ass finger OFF of me—”

She presses so hard that spots pop in my vision. “You’ll what, little bug?”

“I’m NOT a bug!” I shriek, and at the same time, strange light flares. The woman recoils as if burnt, hissing as she yanks her hand back. “I have a name. How ‘bout you learn it before puttin’ your hands on me again.”

The woman looks from her finger, then back to me, some of that superiority sliding away just long enough for me to notice something else. Is that fear? I don’t know, and I honestly don’t care, because there’s something much more important demanding my attention. The place where her finger touched feels prickly. That light…it couldn’t have been me. Could it?

The woman fixes her face, a sneer erasing the uncertainty. “I will not burden myself with a dirt-dweller’s name. I have one job, and that’s monitoring you, regardless of how difficult you make it.” Her eyes move from mine, down the length of my body. I follow her gaze and almost scream.

Glowing vines. They cover me from head to toe like a many-armed insect, clustering over places like my chest and torso. What remains binds me to the bed. I struggle against my bonds, trying for any hint of freedom. But I know how feeble the attempt must look while fatigue still has the reins over my body. So, I stop struggling and push down the rising panic flooding my chest. It’s then that I notice the uniqueness of the vines. What had caused the strange light on the woman’s face.

The vines glow, their pulsing matching the frenzied beating of my heart. They seem to be telling the woman everything she needs to know, given how her eyes follow their pattern. Is she a nurse or something? If so, she sucks.

CRITIQUE INSTRUCTIONS:
Your RC1 critique has two parts: The Story Score rubric and a written review.

For the rubric below, give a gut-level reaction to each question: 1 means it reads like a first draft. 3 means it’s good, but not something you’d remember. 5 means it reads like a book from the bookstore shelf. For more info on how to use the rubric, remove the “dot” and type the following into your browser: readychapter1 dot com/critique-guidelines/

For your written review, reply to the post. Your reply should include something positive, something to work on, and should be at least 75 words long.

  1. The author’s Voice is confident and compelling. I’m sucked in to the story.
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  1. The Characters feel distinct, complex, and relatable. I care about what happens to them.
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  1. I sense that the Plot is headed somewhere intriguing, and I’m curious as to what happens next.
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  1. Well-crafted Dialogue/Non-verbal Communication adds personality to the story. I’m intrigued by how the characters talk, think, and interact.
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  1. Descriptions are vivid and detailed. Whether the world is real or imaginary, it feels like I’m really there.
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I really liked the use of dialogue in describing how you automatically don’t like the woman caring for her. The line of dull consciousness to acute awareness. The first part puzzled me a little bit as to what exactly that meant. It seems like she wasn’t conscious at all because she didn’t know her body was completely bound to the bed. Which would be one of the first things you’d notice.

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You already said they glow.

The MC is really distinct and brash. There’s a really clear power imbalance that you’re portraying and you’ve set up some of the good leading questions to keep the reading going, such as who are these people, how did she end up here, and what is going to happen.

For me, there’s a jarring mix of fantasy and modern which makes the world hard to place. The vines immitate a heart monitor and the MC likens her captor to a nurse, which are both very modern.

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Thanks for the redundancy catch! It’s amazing how many times you can read though something and not catch the obvious stuff. I’ve also updated some of the jargon so there’s less confusion about modern verbiage versus fantasy. I appreciate your time!

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Tania not recognizing earlier that she’s bound to a table is honestly SUCH a good catch, and i really appreciate it. I updated my document to have her recognize the fact she can’t move much earlier, and the chapter overall reads much better for it. Thank you very much!

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I know had that is, glad I could help.

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I love this line, the comparison to an insect not literally but as a matter of signifigance. This sets up the struggle and the power dynamic. It gives the reader something to relate to… anyone who has been made to feel insignifigant, especially after climbing to a great hieght will relate to this demeaning comment and feel a connection to the MC.

Later in the page there is another comparison to an insect, more literal about the physical vines. This might detract from the first comparision to an insect, which is figuritive.

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Thanks for pointing that out, and thank you for leaving a comment! I’m glad you’re already picking up on the themes of being made to feel insignificant and rising above it.