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《Maria》Love, From the Graveyard

Reviewer: marshaa1306

Public Review
“Love, From the Graveyard”

Story by kimsuga86

Title/Cover - 10/10
I like your title because it conveys a sort of wistful, sad mood which matches how the main character feels about her brother’s death. Plus, it has sort of a double meaning which is really clever.
The cover also looks quite nice and I love it. It has the same depressed tone as the title but it also has a note of hope from the bright rays of the sun and the green of the foliage in the background. It has an overall great message.

Blurb - 7/10
The blurb is super short which isn’t a problem in of itself, but it doesn’t have a lot of information and it doesn’t make much sense. I’d advise making your blurb a bit longer to add more info and intrigue. You can keep the two sentences that you have but perhaps word them differently so they read: A girl found her love at her special place. But will the love be reciprocated?

First few chapters/Exposition - 10/10
I really like how you introduce the situation that the main character is in without blatantly stating it. The reader is allowed to learn the setting and characters in the story through dialogue and things instead of having to read some sort of lengthy description.

Plot - 19/20
The plot in this story is certainly not something to be scoffed at. It’s different from most of the romance stories that I’ve read which I liked. The two main characters were drawn to each other because they both had family members who passed away, not because they were physically attracted to each other or had abusive parents or something. In my opinion, your plot is not cliche and it’s unique.
The one thing I would say is that your plot is very simple. This isn’t a bad thing per se, but the storyline can become a bit boring if it is too simple. So, you don’t necessarily have to change much. Just be aware of this when you are writing.

Pace - 8/10
The pace remains the same for pretty much the whole story and there haven't really been any faster-paced scenes in the part of your book that I read. I’d advise varying your pace a bit more to keep the reader on their toes.

Grammar, Punctuation, Syntax & Diction - 9/10
The grammar in this story is almost perfect; there are just a few small mistakes.
1) There are a couple long run-on sentences that need to be broken up.
2) In your dialogue, you often have your characters say “yaa” instead of “yeah”. Please correct this so it has the proper spelling.
3) Also, there shouldn’t be a space between the last word of a sentence and any punctuation (the question mark/exclamation point/period should be right after the last word).

Characters - 12/15
Luce: At first glance, she seems like a good character, but I don’t really know anything about her besides the fact that she has no family. I don’t know what she looks like, how old she is, and some of her personality traits. Now, I know you write in second person which implies that the reader is the main character but you still need to give the main character her own persona. Otherwise, I feel like her character is too open.
Jin: As with Luce, I don’t know much about Jin either. He gets a bit of a character description, which is good, but his character is still a big mystery. So, I’d love it if you gave him a solid, interesting persona.

Overall Enjoyment - 14/15
I actually enjoyed this story quite a bit (much more than I thought I would). This story has a good base concept and a lot of potential. With a few tweaks it will be better than ever!

Total Score: 89/100