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So I'm playing around with another story. What follows is what I have for the first page. Does this bring you in to the story? Do you want to read more? Or are you already looking for the "End Game and Leave Comments" link?

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Your memories of when you were younger are garbled and confusing. You can hear screaming and yelling. There is someone fighting and the sound of steel crashing into steel. You feel heat and see bright orange flames, then screaming. It is very hot and you can feel your skin starting to burn. You start to cry out when you suddenly wake up, covered in sweat...

You are in the small orphanage, wide awake in the middle of the night. You can hear light breathing from the other children lying in the beds around you. You work to control your breathing and hope that you did not yell out loud, waking other children, as you have often done in the past. Looking around in the darkness, you see no movement, so you must have caught yourself before you cried out.

As you close your eyes again and will the dreams to stop, you wish you could know more about your parents and what happened on that fateful day. You know nothing of them, only your life here in the orphanage with the other four children here. You are sure that your father is a strong, powerful knight who is out saving people right now. You just wish he would come back and get you. After all, a ten-year old shouldn't be left all alone. And your mother is likely a powerful sorcerer of some kind, maybe a healer, out helping on a battlefield somewhere, just waiting until the time is right to come back and get you.

You smile as you find your way back to sleep for a few more hours...

I enjoyed it, Ogre. Is the story actually a medieval setting or is the kid just imaginative and whimsical? Other than that, I don't really have much feedback, but I'd turn the page and keep reading.

Not sure what the choices there would be but it's a great intro. A little mystery and some sympathy for the kid to hook the reader right away, and the length is just about perfect IMO.

One nitpick, the mother would be a sorceress.

Thanks for the tip, I'll fix that!

I think it's going to actually be a medieval setting where you start out with the 10-year old, make selections, and lead him into adulthood some way.

I like it, Ogre. I would definitely keep reading! Nice intro!

Thank you!

Actually, in this one I don't know the whole story yet. I hope to expand the fantasy setting and allow the reader to make choices that will determine some types of abilities and allies that will impact the story later on... I know that doesn't really say much, but this is still quite early in the planning stages. This also feels, to me, like one of those stories that I'm going to discover as I write it, rather than knowing in advance where it's going to go...