First attempt at editing

I'll get through as many of these as I can-- it's not posting well. Excuse the html probs.

Redleg--
Woo hoo? First comment? Here's the first paragraph of my current magnum opus:

With his back against the brick wall, Jack Pasternak couldn’t help but contemplate the discordant row of bayonets and gun barrels pointed at him. The cord binding his wrists together was a little loose, but even if he did pull a Harry Houdini out of his magic hat, he couldn’t see himself getting more than five or six paces before being gunned down like a rabid dog. All in all his options seemed to be to die momentarily or to die instantly. Neither was particularly attractive.

Okay, we're not doing openings here, so I'm just going to edit as I would any paragraph. But it's even more important in the opening paragraph to edit tightly and make the sentences as clear as possible.

So...
With his back against the brick wall, Jack Pasternak couldn’t help but contemplate the discordant row of bayonets and gun barrels pointed at him.
"Discordant" is a bit precious in a forceful sentence. Also "couldn't help but contemplate" seems sort of feminine and tentative-- but you know your voice best. It's just those two elements seem sort of... well, precious, not vital and muscular like the rest of the paragraph. And the "With" isn't needed, so I'd trim it just for the sake of trimming:
His back against the brick wall, Jack Pasternak contemplated the row of bayonets and gun barrels pointed at him.

The cord binding his wrists together was a little loose, but even if he did pull a Harry Houdini out of his magic hat, he couldn’t see himself getting more than five or six paces before being gunned down like a rabid dog.
Don't need Houdini AND magic, and the "couldn't see", again, is a kind of precious construction. This is an action scene, and should sound like it-- no extra words so the reader can feel the urgency.

The cord binding his wrists was a little loose, but even if he did pull a Harry Houdini, he wouldn’t get more than five paces before being gunned down like a rabid dog.


All in all his options seemed to be to die momentarily or to die instantly. Neither was particularly attractive.

"Seemed to be" is almost always editing to "were"-- "seemed" sends the message that this isn't true. So:
His options were die momentarily or to die instantly. Neither was particularly attractive.

I'm not sure about that "particularly attractive"-- again, it feels feminine to me. Not sure what to replace it with. But feel the toughness and desperation of the situation. Now if this is sort of a dark comedy, so you want a humor undertone, you're right to go with longer lines, even in an action scene. Also of course the character's personality should come through the lines, and he might not be hard-bitten and taut here. So my trimming might make this sound wrong. (If I were editing your whole book, of course, I'd have more of a sense of the narrative voice and would find it easier to edit towards that.)

But this is a good tense opening! I think it will draw the reader in.

--Alicia