Reviews!

"I'm not after him, I'm after his Ramen" - Review

"I'm not after him, I'm after his Ramen" - Review 

I really liked the new approach to an arranged marriage story that xXhopelessromanticXx took. The characters are different than your average Sue and Stu, and for once, their parents play a large (continuing) part in the early chapters. (As opposed to - 'you're engaged! and now we're sending you off to live together! KBYE!'... which brings me to another point... I'd like to read a story about an arranged marriage where the couple barely sees each other before the wedding. Talk about tons of mystery and tension here, people! ... anyhow. I digress.)

It opens with a young Chloe's hand in marriage being sold. The buyer is Cameron, as well as Cameron's parents. Actually, I wasn't entirely sure how this was going to work. Cameron's father was being paid for the marriage, as was Cameron, though the reader has no idea why.  But again, I'm left feeling like I have no idea why any of this is happening in the first place. 

If you want to write an arranged marriage story, awesome! I'll read it, because I love that sort of thing. Two unlikely personalities thrown together repeatedly until they fall in love against all odds - who doesn't love that? I'm a total sucker for that type of story. But you've got to make it real! Why is there an arranged marriage taking place in the first place? All laws suspended, and assuming that this is happening in an alternate reality where this is actually legal, I still need to know more! 

Why are Chloe's parents such hateful clods? Why are they selling their daughter's hand in marriage? Why pay out big bucks for a daughter they don't even appear to care about? Wouldn't it be much cheaper just to let her find her own young lad instead of doling out tons of cold, hard cash for one themselves? A couple questions I had that, if answered, would have totally brought this story to another level for me. 

It has got to make sense! This isn't about whether or not the plot is intriguing. You can literally do whatever you'd like in a story. It's your world!  Aliens can decide that they need to take over all the McDonald's in the world... but you have to explain to me that it's because they naturally feed off of the unique kind of bacteria that seems to be found in their hamburgers. Because, then I'll be like, "Oh, well, yeah. Duh. Of course they need to get control of all the McDonald's in the world then!" ... Perhaps I shouldn't write these reviews at 2:30am. I seem to be babbling.

But all that aside, the details and nuances make the plot interesting and addictive. But, "they got married because her parents sold them to his" only makes sense if slave trade is actually a theme in the story. Otherwise, I need way more than that. 

There were a couple of mistakes made in the way of sentence structure and tenses along the way. Lines like, "Suddenly I became startled hearing screams..." will throw a reader right out of the story.  You don't *become* startled... you know? The very nature of being startled is that it's immediate. So, even just changing this to "I was startled by the sound of distant screams" will serve to create suspense in the story, instead of actually putting a halt on the flow. See what I mean? Every word counts! 

I'd agree with the author when she states that Chapter 3 was her favorite. It was interesting to read, and you really saw her hit her stride near the end. Our Chloe is freaked out by the proposal from Cameron and takes off for the beach where a seedy character notices she's alone and tries to assault her. A kind stranger drives by and notices, and beats up the guy, taking the unconscious Chloe back to his place to be sure she's alright. Some might balk at this being slightly too convenient, but not me! I'll follow you anywhere in a story, so long as you give me good reason to.  And here, xXhopelessromanticXx does that! She lays it out well:

Guy drives by and sees girl being attacked -> Guy feels compelled to act -> Beats up crummy pervert -> Wants to make sure girl is alright. 

See! I can believe that, I'll follow along like a long-eared dog. It leaves me with that ever important, "yeah, I get that." sense. 

Chapter 4 was written almost 9 months after the first three, and I can't even begin to tell you how impressed I was by the improvement the author made in this. You can totally tell right off the bat that the xXhopelessromanticXx has grown tons as a writer in those 9 months. From the first line of chapter 4, she drags you into Chloe's head with her. Aside from a few too many POV changes for my particular taste, this chapter was a really good sign of things to come. I'd most definitely keep reading to see how things turn out for Cameron, Chloe, and the mysterious stranger.