The Locker Exchange

Original Edition: check your story !! guide

DISCLAIMER

This will not guarantee that you'll get a bunch of reads! A lot of you have been sending me your stories and asking for feedback, but there are just so many I can't get to all of them. I'm also getting ready to start college, so I'm really busy.

→ Instead, I'll make this guide and hope it helps give some insight!

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F I R S T G L A N C E

Does your story title have correct capitalization?

IF NOT, you should fix it! That's one of the very first things people see when deciding whether or not to read your story.

What does your cover look like? If it was someone else's book, would you click it?

If you answered no to that second question, you need to change it! Think about some stories you really like and see what their covers look like to get some ideas for yours. If you need help MAKING a cover, message me and I'll let you know how I do it.

If you're not confident in your skills at making a cover, go to my reading list "covers" - there are a couple cover shops where you can request a cover and someone else will make it for you!

If you don't like the ones in my list, you can always look up "covers open" or "covershop open" in the search bar and a bunch of them will come up. No worries.

Is your summary grammatically correct?

If you're not sure, that's probably not a good sign. If a reader sees that your grammar is a mess in the summary, they'll assume it's a mess in the rest of the story and probably skip it.

For those of you who struggle with grammar, maybe you could try Grammarly (I've never used it before though, and I'm not sponsored) but it might help while you write your story to avoid errors. Same with the summary.

If you really aren't sure, send it to me over message and say something like "hi, could you check the grammar in my summary? thanks!" I'll try to help you!

Please be nice, though.

Is your summary interesting? Is there a hook?

I'll be the first to admit I'm horrible at summaries. But I know a good one when I see it.

I'll make up an example of a bad summary:

My name is Riley, and my mom died when I was 5 and now I live alone. I'm a nerd. But then I met Dakota and suddenly we're living together! But will this bad boy find out the secret I've been trying to hide since my dad ran away?

Let's see what's wrong with this summary.

1. It's in first person.

Although first person can sometimes be really engaging in a summary if the writer is good at voice (like @orangechicken), I'd stay away from it unless you're confident. It's a lot easier to describe someone else than yourself, right? That's how I see it.

2. The 5 should be five.

If a number is a single digit, you have to write it out. And although it's technically correct to write numbers higher than 10 in number form, I generally stick with writing it out in letters.