Project Athena | Reviews

We Give Unto Thee (Emily)

Author: Knighted_Rose

Genre: Fantasy

Reviewer: OutOfMyImagination

Hello and thank you for requesting a review. As you requested, I focus on specific topics within the story, and of course overall impression. I read five chapters in total, so the review is up to that point in the story.

We Give Unto Thee opens a window to Astria, the world in which creatures known as Clots give powers to their owner. Having a Clot can be a blessing or a curse, depending on how a person looks at it. Here we meet Seraphina, an orphan girl working on the farm. Receiving a mysterious letter from her birth mother sets Sera on a quest to find her roots, but her discovery is far from what she hoped. Sera unexpectedly gets powers she can't control and needs to decide if her Clot is a blessing or curse for her. Setting her on a quest to find her destiny.

I will start with the cover and book description because those things are what readers notice first. The book description is informative and suitable for readers to get interested in the story. The cover, however, is bleak. It relates to the story but is not well made, and fantasy books tend to have more attractive covers, which means your cover won't stand out positively when people stumble upon the book.

The story premise seems unique to me, and the world build has great potential. When it comes to fantasy books, readers expect to discover the world in not overwhelming way and I believe you achieve that. The story flow is slow, but the start is a bit dull. I would like to see Seraphina run away from the farm. We get to know that later but it is told and not shown. Starting with action, for example, when she is running away and stealing Buck would be more interesting.

I usually read a bit further than five chapters, but considering the length of the chapters of this book, I read a somewhat similar amount of words equal to other books with shorter chapters. I would suggest splitting chapters so they would be 1.5-2k words per chapter. You can make "part one" and "part two", etc., and have two chapters as two book parts. This "standard" is advisable for online published books since most people read on phones and it's easier for them to read "on the go" when chapters are shorter. So specifically your chapters, Chapters 1-4 could be split into two parts each, and the 5th chapter could be split into three since it's reaching around 7k words.

The same could be said about some paragraphs. Some are bulky, and it's harder to keep track of the text that way. Again, this is for Wattpad and other similar online writing platforms. (Some platforms don't even let post more than 2k words per chapter.) With more parts per book you can gain more votes/reads as well, so essentially you are not losing anything.

The book is polished enough though there are a few missing punctuation points and in a few places "WIth" is written like that, so not sure if that is on purpose or not since it's not just once. Other than those small issues, this book has great potential. To fulfil your request fully, I am not sure if I noticed clues or subtext. I don't see much mystery in this story. I would say the story is more based on world-building and potential character builds.

I would rate this story three out of five stars. With the way the story is right now, it is harder to read, and while I love descriptive stories majority of the word count here goes to descriptions which are not always needed.

I would recommend this story to anyone who likes quest-based books, extensive descriptions, and a slow-paced plot.