The Gauntlet: Results and Reviews

Delusional by XerinaFang

Final Total: 3 (reshelved)

Reader 1:

Cover: 1/4

Um. Is... is this... Shrooms? Special Brownies? LSD...? The colors make it look cute. And I'm talking in the way Trolls™ are cute. The punkish cutout font only makes it look even worse, like a Disney TV show aimed at 8thgraders. Unless... it is actually aimed at 8th graders. Then great, it's spot on for age group. Not for the blurb, though. The relationship there is shaky at best. The blurb sounds dark, not cute. 

Title: 0/2

What in the actual HECK does being delusional have to do with being blind? Is her blindness the delusion? Is her delusion that the government is controlling everything, even her blindness? There isn't a clear enough connection between the title and the blurb, and what little there is smacks of dismissing a serious mental illness and/or physical handicap as something made up by a corrupt government. That alone would make my medically-blind self chuck this out the window after stomping on it a few times.

Blurb: 0/4

Lose the opening quote. One, it gives too much away. Two, it's trite, and betrays a gross misunderstanding of what being delusional actually means.

You break the 4thwall and address the reader directly in the very first sentence, and then keep doing it. Not kosher. It's a form of 'head hopping,' from the reader to the MC, and it's annoying as all heck. I would rephrase that whole first paragraph, personally. The last line is clumsy and suffers from vague references to things that aren't backed up in the setting or description.

Second paragraph has incorrect comma usage going on: 'I will decide who I am, for(,) I am Brenna Lawson.'

Third paragraph: 'I have been blind my entire life*.*' Since the day she was born is implied, no need to resurrect a dead horse. You could move from that first thought into something along the lines of, 'I thought I would be blind till the day I die, until scientists discovered a cure for 'blindness.'' The quotations only make it seem like her blindness is questionable, which throws a lot of doubt on everything else. (And don't give me some weird gripe about that being the effect you're after, it's misleading, which is NOT the purpose of a blurb.) 'But I'm not convinced they're *being* completely truthful*.* Sometimes the cure is worse than the disease.' End there.

General Note on Plot: First we have what could actually qualify as a delusional hallucination – everyone is being controlled. So Brenna is the delusional one here. Then we jump into the MC's first-person declaration that she is herself. So, she's the only one who isn't delusional? Then she's blind, which may or may not be a delusion, and then she's not convinced that they cured her? Which makes her delusional again... or maybe she's just woke now that she's cured? Which would mean the government is the one who cut its own strings... And what does not being able to make her own choices, then deciding she is who she is, have to do with being cured of "blindness"? Didn't she have a choice in being cured? Which would mean she's not delusional after all... so she's still... blind... *eyes glaze over* *brain drips slowly out of ears*

This entire blurb is missing too many things. There's nothing that pushes the MC into action. There isn't any action at all. I'm not even sure she gets the 'cure.' There isn't anything that drives her except maybe a desire to be a Real Girl without the puppet strings, but that's something I had to infer. What is this story even about? Backstory, setting, MC introduction, buildup to inciting incident, inciting incident, stakes and obstacles, hint at resolution phase, question resolution. So far I know a blind girl named Brenna Lawson thinks everyone else is brain dead and doubts the claims of a few scientists. If this is a psychological thriller about a blind delusional girl, going deep 1stperson wouldn't be a problem. Don't even mention government corruption, just focus on the thing she has to struggle with, and what she decides to do about it. If it's a The Truman Show style political/psychological/conspiracy thriller, you need to present your MC as the only sane voice. Either way, the threat needs to be clear. And her reaction to it needs to be clear too. She needs to be driven to act, otherwise there's not going to be anything to read.