Review Shop 3 | OPEN

Aakriti : Forever is the sweetest con

Title: Forever is the sweetest con
Writer: Rosecherry2602
Reviewer: AakritiPathak

First impression:

Starting with the title, it's certainly eye-catching. Especially the usage of contrary meaning terms such as forever and con – that's a good wordplay right there!

Cover, to me, couldn't hold my interest any longer. Mostly because of the font size of subtexts, and the placement of story title. As much as the background image holds a hook, a title needs to be prime focus, something which can be seen easily and in bold. As for subtitles, they are not even readable. Suggestion here would be to work a bit on the cover. A good book cover catches much of the audience in the first go!

Coming to the blurb, it needs some work. Let's break it down to understand more in depth.

First of all, I'd add an advice to remove the details about tropes, other similar books, genre, etc. They can pretty well go in the preface, or introductory chapter of the book. Adding these details in the space of blurb makes the whole box look messier. A short intriguing description, and possible trigger warnings are enough. Secondly, the blurb should entice rather than summarize. Give details, but do not reveal everything. Talk about the bet, but try not to reveal about one possibly falling in love. This will diminish the intrigue. If your audience knows that one lead has fallen in love, they will most certainly come up with their own conclusions about how the lead will prevent any tragedy, or make the other one reciprocate. To have them on the edge of their seats and have their eyes trained to know further, hold back the turning points of plot.

Talk about the character. Give an idea about what the story is about (one character willing to give up on life, and then two of them making a bet to avoid such). Add a glimpse of any one incident where everything seems to be going wrong (a plot twist). Lastly, a few questions. You can also add a vague line about one of them falling in love. This way nor you're spoiling too much about the plotline, neither the blurb sounds cliche.

Come up with various versions of blurbs and then see which one feels more intriguing. Do focus on structure as well. I'll leave a small example here:

"The daughter of the richest man in Asia, and a notorious goon, made a bet. The bet is simple – Jungkook has to make Aera give her life another chance. If he fails, Jungkook will have to kill Aera with his own hands. The path won't be easy when it's not about only the bet anymore.

What led Aera to take this drastic step in the first place? How will Jungkook convince Aera? Will they move past their bets and acknowledge the newly forming emotions and bonds?

Join this journey of love, friendship, trauma, betrayal, support, economic disparity, and everything in between!"

Opening:

Prologue – it's enthralling, to say the least. Majorly they're the diary entries, but feel mostly real. Especially the words that Aera has used, the way she has portrayed raw emotions and conflicts ongoing in her family - it tugs at heart. Aside from grammatical errors, the whole prologue is spot on and it will definitely hook a reader to keep going further. Grasping the insides of the head of a narrator who is so conflicted (to the point of being suicidal) is an achievement of your writing style. Good job!

Character & Plot development:

I will talk about character development first. Let's take Aera and JK separately.

Aera, she's almost the same from starting. Her persona is artistic, but her own thoughts are gloomy. She's closed off in one line, then too open and trustful in the next instance. However, this is not exactly a bad thing. To portray a lead like Aera, confusion, hazy thoughts, messed up emotions are needful - that's what makes her a relatable main character. The strength of this character is her artistic personality and the way she sees the world. Something which can be improved is the mystery around her. There's so much untapped potential in this writing style, it could be transformed into something majestic. Make Aera the kind of character whom a reader would want to take out of the pages and seek her mysteries. Instead of having her warm up to JK in just one meet, make her mystic instead. Mystic in sense, wary of him. Her being over trustful makes her an almost robotic character (two-dimensional rather than three). When she holds some of her thoughts back, is not very approachable, a mysterious personality – then having her let go of the layers of mysteries slowly over the chapters will definitely create a solid character development.

The same suggestion goes for JK. When you are writing, hold some events back. For instance, give a hint that JK might be leading a rather poor life and him being a shadow of Jimin is an unavoidable situation for him. Let your readers come up with questions like "who is he exactly? Why is he working for Parks if they're so bad? What are his intentions?" etc, because these questions propel a reader to keep reading in order to find the answers. Even if he is smitten by Aera in the first chapter itself, he should cautiously approach her, try to read her emotions, her face, and acknowledge his own inner turmoil. The more depth you add to a character, the better masterpiece you're creating on the way!

As for plot development, the storyline is meaningful. This story has a variety of elements: ranging from domestic abuse, substance addiction, mental health issues, coping up with unhealed trauma, etc. With each chapter we're learning something new about the characters, their world. But at the same time the pacing of the plot is almost comical. We will talk about this in detail in the next point. Full points for this gripping storyline.

Adding a mini point here: the world building. The world as it appears in the head of the leads is absolutely beautiful. However, on the page, in the chapter it's not exactly enough or up to the par. Instead of adding photos in between the paragraphs, describe them instead. Show the world through your characters' eyes - it will be much more impactful. Additionally, pictures break the reading flow.

Pacing & Technicalities:

This is the aspect you need to do much work in. Both pacing and grammar (sentence formation, syntax, punctuation) are off. Pacing, I felt, is too rushed to wrap my head around. At one moment Aera is suicidal, in the very next she's spilling every single secret of her to Jk. Even in the case of JK, his tone in the first chapter appears to be resentful of the rich bloodline, but at the same time he's almost instantly warming up to Aera. As much as the writing style is beautiful, this unrealistic pace is a major shortcoming. Slow down a bit, give some scenes to both Aera and JK to showcase their conflicting thoughts, battling their demons, them on a crossroad, slowly opening up, giving chances. Everything is happening too fast right now. My prime suggestion would be here only.

As for technicality, there is a major slip in punctuation. For instance, over usage of exclamation marks. This is something to be rectified while editing, but tending the minor errors like tense switches and punctuation go alongside writing.

Hook & Personal impression:

The point of intrigue is most certainly present in the story. Once a reader picks up the story, they can't help but be pulled within the pages. All the credits to poetic writing style. Such a gripping, descriptive writing style is a gift and if polished more, it has high potential to create a novel worthy of binge reading. There is no lacking point in intrigue or hook. However, many things can be improved. Pacing, adding more setting descriptions, adding facial descriptions (including expressions), thoughts and conflicts in detail, and grammar – these points need to be checked.

I've tried my best to put forward some suggestions that you can look at. I enjoyed the plotline, despite these shortcomings. In simple words, polish your craft more, with such a deep plot, you can do much more than anyone can imagine!

Feel free to reach out anytime you have any doubts or questions. Hope this helps. Good luck! Keep writing.