Dreamland Review Archive

You Must Remember This (CY)

Book: You Must Remember This
Author: FranklinBarnes
Genre: Fiction

Cover: 60/100

I'm not sure if the current cover is only there temporarily for lack of a better one, but it doesn't fit your story in the slightest. A blurry painting depicting a cityscape. What does that have to do with the dull and prison-like Heller High, or even Frank himself? My recommendation for most covers is that you find a central object, whether person, symbol, or idea, to be the focus of your cover. It needs to be something that ties to your blurb so that your readers can get an Idea of your story, and see that it's actually relevant. A bad (uninteresting, in this case) immediately pushes readers away, and I don't think I would choose your book out of the millions on Wattpad just because of the cover. It's really important to have a good cover!

Blurb: 90/100

Your Blurb is great! It immediately highlights your use of high-level vocabulary and the philosophical elements that are to come in your story. Only, I'd like to see more statements that make you ask questions, ones that really draw you in.

First Impressions: 90/100

First off, I'd like to say that I am probably not the right reviewer for you, since this book is not a read that truy grasps my interest, and we'll probably have to agree to disagree on several matters.

Usually, I use this section to mainly discuss the basic principles of grammar and such, but your story had few grammatical errors, and even less not already pointed out by a comment. I'd recommend proofing just a slight bit more, reducing repetition in some of your sentences, and making sure they're understandable.

There was only one such occasion when I found a sentence I couldn't grasp the meaning of. Maybe my brain just isn't working but it didn't make any sense to me:

Original: ...the cars formed a polychromatic snake then, a train assisted by staff, would still move sluggishly despite their best efforts.

Fixed: ...the cars formed a polychromatic snake, a train that moved sluggishly despite the staff's best efforts.

I'm not sure what was going on in your version of the sentence above, but try to reword some of your sentences to improve their flow and ability to convey your point.

Otherwise, very well written! I'd also recommend taking a look through the comments because most every minor grammar error I noticed had already been commented upon, just not fixed.

Further Analysis: 85/100

Again, like I said before, this won't be quite the review you're looking for because your writing style is not quite what I prefer. Not to say it's a bad thing, but just keep in mind that a lot of Wattpaders are middle-school age and this feels like a 100 year old novel with difficult vocabulary that not many want to read. I understand that your book is aimed for older audiences, obviously, and even my own books aren't quite for the age level found on Wattpad, but your use of vocabulary definitely will cost you some readers. But of course, you may not want those readers anyway… You could definitely simplify some sentences because the Shakespeare vocabulary gets a bit droning at times. Just a suggestion, and I'm not saying fo away with all of it, just words that your readers won't possibly know the meaning of.

My next issue with this book is the pacing and description. I hate to be so blunt, but the info-dumping and the excessive (and sometimes pointless) details about the school really gets boring. I would definitely reccomend rereading and, again, viewing your comments to decide which descriptions may not be as necessary, because there a lot of readers who have even shorter attention-spans than I. Not to say that your descriptions aren't good, in fact, they're exceptionally well written, just a bit droning. I also think It would benefit you if you were to take some of these descriptions and incorporate them into different story parts, that way you aren't losing them, and you reduce the overload of info. It also takes quite a toll on your pacing. 

Something that was also mentioned is breaking some of your paragraphs apart because the giant blocks of text are sometimes hard to get through, and Wattpad is a place filled with tiny mobile screens. I would also again recommend that you cut back on some of the descriptions so you can get through to the actual story. It seems like it took me half an hour just to get through the simple event of students going to an assembly, when the majority of that time was spent reading the description of the school. Again, really well written, but consider removing unnecessary info-dumping.

My next comments are about your characters. In this aspect, I believe you completely nailed the descriptions of your characters and their personalities (but I do have to say that it was weird that the boy [I forgot the name] was sad he couldn't join the conversation but didn't want to anyways), but I do have to say the amount of characters introduced was a bit overwhelming. And it's kind of hard to say that the Main Character is Frank when the first chapter says hardly anything about him. Remember that the first chapter is the most important part to drawing readers in, so you don't want to overwhelm or bore them with excessive details.

As far as theme goes, I didn't quite delve deep enough into your story to advise you on that, but based off the blurb, the idea for this story's lessons to come seem promising.

Final Notes: 80/100

Again, my level of expertise can't really cover novels of this level, but in all, your describing abilities and your technical writing technique make for a great book, but you might want to take it down a notch or two for the readers of Wattpad. I am absolutely honored that you asked me to review your book because honestly, if you've read any part of my novel I'm sure you know, I write like a kindergarten student compared to this. Fix a few inconsistencies here and there, and keep improving! And feel free to ask questions! Because I know I have a tendency to ramble and not make any sense.

Thanks so much for letting me review your book, and I'd also recommend seeking advice from others as well.

—Cyprus