Hello! Sorry his took me a bit, I've been feeling a little off lately. Anyway, I read your first chapter and I think it's definitely an interesting idea. Generally, I love a good murder mystery. I'm assuming this is a small town setting, which makes it more intriguing if that's the case.
There's a lot of information in the first chapter, but I'm not sure all of it is crucial at the moment. The opening was very slow and a little odd with Dylan being called out of class by his dad to solve a murder. I understand the first part was likely to introduce the concept of the pill, but that's information that could be given later in a more natural way, maybe through use or even in the part where Dylan is asking if he can use it.
In general, I think the pacing suffers from the bits of information scattered in the form of Dylan recalling things. During the scene where they're in Jen's house it feels like things slow down when Dylan recalls Phil's advice. Because this little memory so closely follows a decently long memory about Jen, the point of the story and the moment in the present gets lost. I had to stop and read back because I was lost in all the switching around. A little restructuring could definitely help fix this as well as picking what information is crucial for the reader's understanding and what can be saved for later.
As far as tone goes, it was generally fine. Again, I think some of the tension bled out during the flashbacks, but it did return a little towards the end. The lazy, boring atmosphere you were going with at the start was definitely there as well, so I think you do pretty well with maintaining a clear tone that fits the situation. It was also cool to see Dylan focusing and analyzing the crime scene at the end.
One thing I'd like to point out though is that there were some instances with odd wording that did take me out of the story, like the line: "opened closets puked out paper". The wording could be better, same with "the rainbow always made its mark on the florist's place". That one took me a moment to get. Other words like "languid" and "nuance" were used oddly where it feels like another word would have worked better.
A general note about grammar, I'd give it another look over. There was at least one spot where the tense changes and some of the dialogue punctuation is incorrect. For the most part, it was pretty solid.
Again, I really like the idea and I like Dylan and Phil. I think Dylan could definitely be an interesting character to follow and to see how he develops and grows. He's so young and so idealistic at the moment and I know there's a lot he's going to go through that will test him, so that's really fun to look forward to. It was also really nice how you're building up this mystery around someone Dylan knows well and who is also a bit of an outsider in this small town. There's definitely a lot of potential in this story and your writing is pretty good. Your characters have clear personalities and you're already giving them interesting motivations so I think you're on the right track.
Like I said at the start, I just think this needs to be streamlined a little--cut back on the info to make it lighter and make the intrigue the focal point. Engagement is actually very important for a first chapter. You have to hook your readers from the start, keep their attention until the end, and give them a reason to keep reading. I think you can manage this by tightening things up because you already have a really good story and characters!
