Originally Posted by: Jolly McJollyson"Montag's heart began to beat very loudly, and each thud was another of her screams." Don't use a conjunction here, it's weighing you down. "Each thud another of her screams" works just fine.

Okay, you're absolutely right about that one.

Your other suggestions, while probably better linguistically, just don't seem to work for me. They strike me as very Jolly-ish lines, and as I'm sure you noticed, our writing styles aren't very similar at all. I chose the words I did because that's more or less how I'd tell the story if I was making it up off the top of my head. My style of writing is fairly close to my style of talking.

Anyhow, I'm glad you liked it. :)