What do you all think?
"Super Popular" I'm kind of iffy about... it's just not that strong an idea. But I'm conflicted.
I'm thinking of just publishing Year One of Elidread for the contest. Here's a sample page:
~~~
Will is on a train.
He has snuck onto the Ceuron Tram after running away from his small-minded hometown of Berwyn in a desperate search for change.
“Change” is a simple six-letter word of which Willoughby R. Martins has desperately sought for ten years; ten arduous years of intellectual suffering at the hands of the simpletons who raised him.
Personally, Will struggled to say they “raised” him, but he recognized that his parents had certainly taught him a lesson, whether they wanted to or not: Will was going to have to leave Berwyn if he ever wanted to have a chance to make a real difference in the world.
Will saw that the world needed to change; it wasn’t hard to see. He had a feeling that maybe, just maybe, he could help to bring about that change. He had a thirst for knowledge, an insatiable curiosity, and a profound sense of logic, all of which led him to question everything and be satisfied with only the most efficient solution to a problem.
Will was thoroughly hated by all of his neighbors.
His parents did nothing but discourage his creativity throughout his entire life; they burned all his books, threw out his pens, and tore his paper to pieces. He cried in desperation. No one listened.
Berwyn was a simple town. It was structured upon values that were hundreds of years old- from the 1900s, even. Everyone seemed the same in Berwyn; few people had any opinions that were truly personal, any ideas truly ground-breaking. Will at first struggled to see why anyone would think less of someone because of such a silly thing as skin color, much less a whole village of people. He came to understand, though: Berwyn was not a town where people changed.
These are the things that Will has thought to himself during the seven-hour course of his train ride into Ceuron.
Ceuron was a sparkling land of opportunity for Will. He knew practically nothing about it- just that it was immensely large and filled with all different kinds of people- but for Will, that was part of its charm.
He is ready for an adventure.
~~~
What do you guys think - which story idea is more favorable?