Chloe's Book Reviews {CLOSED/ HIATUS}

Aronville

*This review may contain spoilers* 

Username: Wordchantress 

Genre: Mystery/Thriller 

Chapters: 5 chapters (including prologue) 

Specific: N/A 

Book 

Cover - 

While I do like the cover, I don't really know where or what it relates to within the story. Maybe it's relevant to the character Emily, or even to the woman that was murdered. Or because it's like a photograph, at crime scenes they take photographs and polaroid pictures as evidence from the crime scene. Having said that, I love the colour scheme. The reddish/ brown background is a good fit that sort of resembles 'blood.' And the neon-style title in the centre catches my attention. 

Blurb - 

I actually thought the blurb is great! It's short and sweet but gets to the point. You introduce the characters in a roundabout vague way without giving too much away when detailing the plot. 

If I had to be nit-picky, I would remove the (s) on "evidences" in the below example. 

{"With no plausible explanation of the killings, and an acknowledged lack of evidence, the town falls down the ladder of progress."} 

Grammar - 

Your grammar is pretty good! I couldn't find any faults. Great job! 

* I know you're editing, and you did a pretty good job with this so far. I left some inline comments regarding some misspellings and missing words. 

Punctuation - 

Again, the punctuation was smooth. I couldn't really find anything to fault. 

Character Development/ Plot - 

(Prologue) 

I really like how the prologue builds up the tension throughout the chapter, picking up pace towards the end. 

(Chapter One) 

Emily, whom I'm guessing is one of the main characters, has nightly visions that tend to keep her awake. These visions come in little fragments, but parts seem familiar as Emily comes to terms with each vision. 

I like how you incorporate the detectives at the crime scene. I don't usually like third-person narrative, but it works well with your story. We get an insight into the crime. Although, I'm a little confused about what Emily is actually seeing through her visions. Could she sense that this murder was going to happen? 

(Chapter Two) 

So, I reckon Emily knows more than what she lets on and I'm sure she will start to realise that the two murders are connected. 

The only thing that is confusing is the back-and-forth between all the characters. Like we see Emily discussing with her co-workers about the murders from watching the tv channel. It then cuts to the mother asking for justice and then goes back to the detective. Sometimes I get lost in it all. I still don't know how Emily ties in with all this, but hopefully, we will find out soon. 

(Chapter Three) 

So Ace has quite a temper on him, hasn't he? That's interesting since he's a detective and I wouldn't picture that to be a characteristic of someone in this profession. 

A few more speech tags are filtered throughout the chapter, which is good. I would still like to see some more or even some action tags to help build up the scene. 

Emily, the inspiring detective, investigates the crime scene after the initial inspection. She shouldn't be there; however, the door is unlocked. I'm wondering how can the door be left unlocked if a murder occurred in the home hours/ days prior. Surely the inspectors would close up the crime scene and lock the doors because of the possibility of incriminating evidence and intruders. 

(Chapter Four) 

It's interesting that Emily met the detective that is handling the case. I find it a little weird that nothing much happened out of their conversation. I was half-expecting a revelation or something to happen that revolves around the case. 

As the mystery continues and the plot thickens, I'm wondering where the plot is heading. 

Overall Enjoyment - 

I love all things crime. At first, this sort of reminded me of Jeffery Dahmer's case because 'Aronville' has that 'Milwaukee' sort of vibe. It's a small town where nobody expects murders to happen, let alone two murders in a short space of time. Each murder is gory and done in a particular way that could suggest it's the same person for each killing. 

Things I think you could improve on are: 

.1. Including more speech tags/ action tags when using dialogue - This is a very minor issue, but sometimes I got lost when two or more people are talking because I didn't know who said what. The dialogue is pure dialogue, sometimes with no description. I think there should be a balance. Nobody really wants to read a paragraph full of dialogue, so the balance between dialogue and description is key. 

Please remember that this review is based solely on my own opinion. If you so wish for the review to be removed in any shape or form, please let me know. 

Please keep writing & I wish you all the best on your writing journey! 

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