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Glowing Embers - Detailed Feedback

In general, the description in the story is pretty solid and does a good job setting the stage and describing the characters. I'm glad you didn't shy away from describing what the characters look like even though you're writing in a pre-established universe. Many authors writing fanfic tend to shy away from describing the characters, so I'm glad you didn't.

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What Didn't Work:

Dialogue tags are done incorrectly. When you're using dialogue tags, they should always be lowercase unless they are a proper noun, and the dialogue can end with anything other than a period. Dialogue tags should either be before the dialogue or after it, not above or below it.

This is a proper dialogue tag:

"I missed you," he said.

From chapter 3, "I'm starting this year. " she said with equal enthusiasm.

It should be: "I'm starting this year," she said with equal enthusiasm.

So, here are some examples of proper dialogue tags for your reference:

"How are you?" he asked.

"Where are you going?!" she shouted.

"I'm back," she said.

"Hi there," Jungkook said.

Jungkook is the only one capitalized because it is the only proper noun.

While on the topic of dialogue, make sure every line spoken by a new person is given its own paragraph. So, instead of: "Hey," Raven said. "Hi," Jimin said.

It should be:

"Hey," Raven said.

"Hi," Jimin said.

There are excess spaces in the story around quotation marks. From the prologue, " I don't fear you Avery!" Do you see the extra space between the " and the I?

What it should be: "I don't fear you, Avery!"

The example I gave for dialogue tags (from chapter 3) is another example of the spacing errors.

The extra space isn't necessary. Quotation marks should be right next to the first and final word in dialogue. So, for example, "I missed you," he said. That would be proper punctuation and spacing for a line of dialogue. I hope that makes sense.

Be careful with repetitive word choice. For example, from the prologue, "shone" and "lights" are used quite often. I would recommend switching up the word choice to make the sentences feel more unique from one another, and also to keep the readers more engaged.

This is a small thing, but I would recommend using less exclamation marks. They're telling over showing and, more often than not, are unnecessary. Your descriptions do a good job setting the scene and establishing emotional stakes, so some of the exclamation marks in the story feel a bit out of place. I'd recommend using them very carefully since using them too much can make them lose their effect.

The only chapter I didn't particularly care for was chapter 2. I liked the ending where Ember is imagining her mom there with her; that was a very sweet and necessary moment. The part I didn't like was the first half since it was all exposition. The pacing felt a bit too slow, in my opinion. The prologue started with intense action that set the stakes, then chapter 1 slowed down and gave us character information and some exposition, then chapter 2 was a lot more exposition.

I think the train scene is necessary, but I feel some of the exposition could have been cut out or, at the very least, moved to later chapters and/or tied in with Ember leaving, that way the plot is still moving while you're giving us exposition. The story comes to a stand still when you're giving us all that exposition, which is why it slowed the pacing so much.

It's early in the story, so it's hard for me to give much criticism about the plot and characters yet; however, I would like to see more of the relationship between Hermione and Ember. I feel this is a huge opportunity to explore the emotional side of Hermione and her struggles since Ember and her can relate on something the others don't understand.

I'm sure you have that planned already since they do interact a bit in the published chapters, which is why I'm cautious to say that at all, but I hope that helps steer you in the right direction.

Lastly, I would like to get to know Ember more. As I mentioned above, it's still very early so I'm saying all this without knowing what you have planned for her. She's interesting, but I would like to see some of her core character flaws. So far, she's very good at everything and even surpassing other students who are known for their intelligence, such as Hermione. For that reason, I would definitely like to see some more defined character flaws in the future chapters.

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Summary:

- Good job capturing the Harry Potter feel

- Solid prologue

- Engaging plot

- Neville, Ember, and Hermione are great so far

- Descriptive worldbuilding

- Energetic writing style

- Grammar errors (dialogue tags, excess spaces, dialogue formatting)

- Some overuse of exposition in chapter 2

- Consider doing more character work for Ember and Hermione

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Overall:

Glowing Embers is a fun book that came out recently, so now's a good time to get into it. It features an entertaining cast of characters and a great depiction of the HP world. If you're a Harry Potter fan and are looking for something fresh, then this is the perfect story for you.

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Thank you for submitting your story. My inner Potterhead came out a bit while reading. I haven't read many HP fanfics even though I've been on ff websites for a decade now, so I'm super glad I got a chance to read one. I've read maybe five in my entire time as an online writer, which is insane considering how much I like HP.

I hope you continue writing this story since I'm excited to see where it goes next!

Please let me know if you have any questions or would like any additional reviews.