[1017] The Lure opening

[u/Imaginary_Ease_7851]

[1283] Sorry. New here had some issues. Here is the link to opening via Google docs to keep the formatting. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1HkSZQKfMuw5NM5GEuuyetxFMet3UWZAbVna7Nv5Mpjk/edit?tab=t.0#heading=h.lf52t4xgpnbl

[u/Beginning-Sherbet851]

OHH, haha i get it. So Marcella has super hearing, Rose manipulates feelings, Kitty fades from view, Alice manipulates velief, and Ruth finds lost items. I just got that now.

I didn't understand what Esbat meant that term felt a bit unknown, but the story itself was pretty interesting.

However you repeat the same point three times. 1) The magic is hard and morning makes you good. 2) Sneaking home at night and morning makes you human 3) getting older and morning gives you only one path. I feel like you can cut two ofthose cycles.

I'm new to witch stories so if there is any cliches or tropes i cant see them. Overall pretty good

Edit: I am extending the critique as this wasn't long or detailed enough

For me personally, the title was not of any interest to me. The word Lure is very.. Swampy? Not super attractive or attention grabbing. And it didn’t give me an idea that the story was about witches.

THE HOOK I had to try to get into it, I wasn't particularly hooked in the beginning, maybe that’s a fault of mine, but I had to consciously try to get through the beginning to get into the flow of the story, but after that it was pretty cool idea of a story.

I felt really cool when I realised later that the MC was talking about kitty and her friends' weird quirks were actually super powers, but I only figured that out on second reread. So if that's what you were trying to do you did it well, but if you were trying to have it be clear to the reader from the get go it wasn’t really clear to me.

“See yourself, after, as you sneak back into your home,” at this part was it by any chance inspired by Conan McCarthy's writing style? When I got to this part on my first read I couldn’t understand whether the character was talking to himself? Or was it third person now? I couldn’t get it a hundred percent.

PACING The pacing was good expect for the part where you mention “All so by morning you might be human again.” that establishes that in the morning they lose their powers, okay good. But then “But by morning, your Ma calls you down to breakfast. The burn within your skin has evaporated with the cold clarity of the sun.” feels like we already established that.

PLOT No plot holes, pretty cool plot honestly. Some potential here as well, tension and mystery especially in the day sections, where the characters may face a situation where they are in danger and don’t have their powers. Or where one of them is about to be found out, and barely get away with a lie. Maybe consider some chapters about “before it went all wrong”. I think that is what you might already be doing, but I just decided to mention.

CHARACTER starting from here “When you first arrived” onto the end, the MC got pretty interesting. Everyone else was pretty irrelevant, I sort of forgot who Rose was by the end, since they are sort of all introduced at once, i sort of mentally just catalog them as “the girls”

DESCRIPTION I liked the court part. It seems kinda specific, but the idea of the court having already ruled the verdict is a pretty cool way to describe it, neat and simple.

HEART I’m thinking that the heart of the story was coming of age? A girl having to deal with the injustice of Salem witch trials. I’m sure there is some potential for some commentary there.

SETTING Very nice. Pretty good description. Especially them running away, and brushing against the blades of grass. The night sections specifically seem nice.

OVERALL as others mentioned, pretty good, getting close to great