Chloe's Book Reviews {CLOSED/ HIATUS}

Matt Miracle

I'm pretty sure "felled" is not an actual word. Perhaps try fallen. 

A suggestion could be...

"Jane jumped across a few fallen trees and scattered logs." 

Punctuation - 

I didn't really have an issue with punctuation. 

Character development/ plot - 

Genesis: 

I wasn't sure if this is like a prologue or if readers could skip this section and if the story would make sense without this prior knowledge. Having said that, I did read it, but I found it hard work because it's twelve minute reading of pure knowledge. With the use of technical terms, dates, facts and folklore, it's too much of an overload of information for a reader to soak in all in one go. Readers might forget and would then have to sieve through the huge chunk of information to understand something relating to the backstory. 

I have to applaud you for all the hard work you've clearly put into your story by researching and making up your own history and folklore that relates to the backstory. A suggestion would be to add in parts relevant throughout the story, rather than a chapter before the first chapter. 

Eyes that see: 

I liked how you centred the reader throughout the action, feeding into their curiosity about this magical youth. I don't really know what's going on, besides the basics. The detailed descriptions and the gory details brought vividness to the chapter. 

Chapter One: 

This is the same point from the previous chapter, only now you are using a lot of names that it's hard to get to grips with who is who. You have so many characters in this chapter, that you throw names in every direction. I was reading thinking, who is Jessica? Who is Kate? It took me a while to realise that Kate is Mrs Wilder, but sometimes you switch and call her Kate, then back to Mrs Wilder. Be careful doing this because readers will think these are two separate characters. The same with Mr Wilder, who you sometimes call Oliver. 

Chapter Two: 

It's a little strange how after three/four chapters we finally get to see Jason, the main protagonist. I feel like the first previous chapters aren't needed if the characters are side characters or less important to the storyline. I don't really see how the previous chapter adds anything to this chapter/storyline. 

But I liked the premise of this chapter more than the others. For me, this chapter is chapter one, the start of the plot. 

Overall Enjoyment - 

I have to be honest, I couldn't really find myself getting into the story, although I much preferred chapter two to the other chapters. It was hard to keep up with what was going on and some parts were confusing to understand. One of your strengths is definitely your gory descriptions. They were great and kept me hooked in some places. I'm very much a horror freak, so I could envision the scenery due to your descriptions. 

Things you could improve on are: 

1- Grammar - Tenses - You need to work on this as you switch tenses throughout, and in some places, this can be jarring. (Claps would be... clapped) etc...

- Names of characters -  Please stick to just one name of the said character. You can't go from Mr Winterborn, for example, and then in the next paragraph say, John Winterborn and then back to Mr Winterborn...

Because the reader will start to think John and Mr Winterborn are two different characters and it will confuse the readers when you're actually talking about one character. When reading your extract, I thought Oliver was his son. 

If you introduce the said character as Mr Winterborn, then you can introduce his first name via dialogue said by another character. 

For example...

Mr Winterborn sat at the table in his robe. 

"John, pass me the salt," Mary, his wife asked. 

(There are lots of alternatives which you can use). 

2- Feedback - Listen to your readers - A lot of the readers left the same comments as me, and I strongly advise any author to read, reply and take into account suggestions. Their suggestions aren't always correct, but if you get more than two readers that comment on the same issue, well then you know you have a problem. 

Keep writing & I wish you the best with the rest of your writing journey! 

Thank you for requesting the review & I hope it helps you in some way. Please check, "Matt Miracle" if you have time.