Azimuth could shiver, start, tremble, gasp convulsely or do any of a number of other things than sit up in bed.

I suppose I’d also like to know just a bit more about the dream — was it something recurring? Did she (he?) have shocking dreams often? Was it related to the fitful sleep of her (his?) brother? A hint, a clue, a word or two would suffice to increase interest and intrigue.

I’m not bothered that you don’t describe the dream in detail, though, and I don’t discount it because of that. In my experience, I’ve woken from dreams that haunt me but I can’t remember them. I’ve only had vague feelings aroused by them. And I’ve seen it to be the same with my children — they wake up with the night terrors and can’t tell me what it was about.

I suppose the point I’d make here is that it all depends on your intention as an author. Does Azimuth recall the dream and the aspects that scare her? Or is she left with only vague feelings? And what does this mean for the story you are going to tell us?

Again, a word or two would make your intention clearer for us.

Is there a reason that you have to give us the year? If you don’t mean 1638 on Earth, then I think the date will only serve to confuse readers. Clearly, it’s not _our_ 1638 because not only were clocks rare, they didn’t glow in 1638. Or, if you want to list it, perhaps annotate it with a mention of which calendar you’re using. Today, we’d say 1638, CE to denote _our_ 1638. Perhaps your world has a different calendar?

Thanks for sharing!

Humbly and respectfully,
Kit

I didn’t have the problem with this story that Kevin did, which I guess is why we have so manytypes of books and stories and readers! I got the sense right away that the audience might be young adult or kids, and if so, the progression of events in the story is just right.

I had no problem with Azimuth (I am assuming that Azimuth is the narrator of this segment) waking in shock then looking around at the little things while orienting him/herself, because this resonates with my own experience of sudden wakings from horrific nightmares.

but I do agree with Kevin that if it was that bad a nightmare–and it’s still scary–then Azimuth is likely to retain at least an image from it. (Or else let us know why not.)

Another little thing occurred: if this is 1638 (though the name of the month as well as the names of the two characters hint that this isn’t quite our world) were they measuring minutes then, outside of math? Weren’t timepieces extremely rare, and so people didn’t measure their day in minutes, but in bigger chunks of time? I may be wrong here–I’m not up on time measure, though I do know clocks were relatively rare. But it’s a small thing, and I was intrigued and would definitely go on reading.

What a dull nightmare if your narrator can’t even describe it, and moreover, is so shaken by her night terrors that she goes on to describe the nightlight and her strangely-named brother “Astrolabe.”

This bored me and I wouldn’t read any further. Why it bored me starts in the first sentence, where you tell us that she was “shocked awake by a dream.” Well, it’s either that or a bedbug, and since people don’t do bedbugs in stories too often these dayd (more’s the pity), I was wagering it was a dream.

Anyway, despite being shocked awake by this dream, the next paragraph she goes on to blather about the “lumifex” (which sounds like some sort of prescription medicine) and how she’s not afraid of the dark and blah blah blah… The reader loses sympathy and interest at this point. Finding out that her brother is named “Astrolabe” is sort of weird, and if this is a common naming custom, I feel sorry for the cook’s kids next door, Corkscrew and Cheesegrater.

Anyway, what you need to do is engage the reader with your narrator’s thoughts to begin with. If it’s a nightmare, give us pulse-pounding emotion, not dull blather. And rather than telling the reader that she’s “shocked,” “not scared” then that something’s “still scaring” her, let us gather the emotions from actions. After all, if she wakes up screaming and peeing down her legs, do you need to tell us she’s frightened?