Aphrodite Reviews

four | hard to love

Book: Hard To Love

Author: Tricky_minds

Genre: Erotica

COVER

I had to start with the cover because it is well.. stunning! Personally, a good cover is what lures me in. You need something eye-catching that relates to the book and you had just that!

DIALOGUE

The prologue starts with dialogue, which is extremely interesting to read. Dialogue and character interaction were presented thoughtfully and with mindfulness toward character traits. I felt I could grasp what inferences you were making per character behaviour. One thing I noticed when you write dialogue, is that you often switch between using commas and full-stops, which I quite liked. It gave variety in your dialogue structure. However, there is one piece of dialogue that confused me a little:

Original: 'Am, I don't realize I have told you how thankful I am that you decided to move here with me. You gave your job up.'

I think this doesn't flow as well as it could, so would recommend writing something like:

Edited: 'Am, I don't think you've realized how thankful I am that you decided to move here with me. You gave your job up.'

As you can see, I have slightly changed it and hopefully, you agree that it flows better.

GRAMMAR

On the whole, I think the grammar was very good. However, I picked up on a few errors or sentences where the wording wasn't always ideal.

You have written

Original: 'He was true,' I recommend replacing this with something like;

Edited: 'he was right'  or 'he was correct'

There are then only minimal mistakes going through the book. They are hardly noticeable and with some editing, can easily be corrected. As the mistakes were hardly noticeable, it may be a little hard to find errors - but do try! One example of this is the slight word change from 'on' to 'is'

Original: 'Although this town did bring back a lot of memories, Amelia was persistent on finding a good job here and avoiding Ethan as long as she can.'

Edited: Although this town did bring back a lot of memories, Amelia was persistent in finding a good job here and avoiding Ethan as long as she can.

Also, I noticed your use of tenses. These were often mixed:

Original: 'She said, kissing him softly and watched Alex as he walked towards the door and closed it behind him,'

Edited: 'She said, kissing him softly before watching Alex as he walked towards the door, closing it behind him.'

also

Original: 'didn't saw her'

Edited: 'didn't see her'

I'm going to point out one last thing, as I don't believe it is suitable to go over every minute detail.

Original: 'Wednesday evening was not much unusual'

Edited: 'That evening was like any other,' or 'Wednesday evening continued as normal/usual'

What you have written doesn't make too much sense, so I recommend either changing it to one of the versions I have listed, or anything else you might think of.

SCENES

I felt there was a huge display of developed scenes. However, I felt you could push yourself as a writer. There were some scenes where I felt you missed opportunities to develop characters etc. However, the scenes were so amazing that I wanted more! With each chapter, I wanted to read another. I felt missed opportunities were more visible in early chapters when you had just started writing. However, I could see the progression from you, as a writer, throughout the book which was so great to see. I particularly liked the descriptions in chapter 13 - Lucifer.

LANGUAGE + DETAIL

You used alluring language which had me hooked. scenes were detailed. You gave away just the right information and I personally think the book was extremely successful. The descriptions were so great that even after having read it, I can still picture scenes in my mind! Misuse of language choices I spotted was:

Original: 'you'll have to cover up your lipstick'

Edited:'you'll have to touch up your lipstick'

Slight language mistakes like that occur throughout the book. If you don't have time to go over this or would prefer for someone else to do so, I would recommend using an editing shop just for the little mistakes I've listed xx

CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT

I had to mention this because the character development was literally perfect. Throughout the story, I saw how Ethan opened up more and how Ethan and Amelia's relationship progressed. You did a brilliant job at portraying character traits and emotions

OVERALL

This was an extremely successful piece. The plot was interesting and the writing was structured. Overall, this is a brilliant story and you are an incredible author. I cannot wait to see how the story develops <3