Dreamland Review Archive

Tears Of A Lost Soul (Yin)

Book: Tears Of A Lost Soul
Username: lekro01
Chapters reviewed: 1-6

Hello! Sorry this took so long. I was writing my own book and got sidetracked.

Anyway, let's start with the title and cover. Tears of a lost soul. Hhmm. It sounds nice. Vague, not what I expect for a high fantasy like yours, but it's nice. And for the cover I actually loved it! Everything is clear. Just a bit nitpicking. 'Redemption Waits For All' doesn't sound good. Maybe 'Redemption Awaits All'?

I think you've edited the blurb? It's better now. But I still don't think you need the third paragraph. Or maybe you could move the third paragraph to first. Only then it flows better. But it's only in my opinion. I'm inherently bad with blurbs XD

Let's talk about the story.

One, it's great how you build your world with the map. I always adore someone who writes high fantasy the way you did. You have great worldbuilding. You know your world, you've developed it very well, you have proper names of places and people that really sound believable for a high fantasy.

Chapter one introduces Bathe and Berathelmus. Hope I get it right. In this chapter, you don't really introduce the world, but you introduce the characters. You did introduce some in Berathelmus's dialogue. There's a note you left in chapter 1 telling us that they're in Evigray, but correct me if I'm wrong, you don't mention the place in any paragraph in chapter 1. You should do that, you know? You write in Omni. You should tell us where they are. A/N is not a part of a book. If you publish the book, would you leave A/N to explain things? No. You explain things in the narration. Don't tell us the place is on the map. You need to tell us in the story itself.

From chapter one, I know your characters are very well developed. You know them very well. Great job! Bathe really sound like a curious kid. You have a deft hand in characterization and world building.

Moving to chapter two, you did introduce Evigray this time. I just wished you introduce the place sooner and don't tell us through the A/N. And I really like the mystery around Bathe, how he dreamed of the old sailor. Thorin (the father) knows something for sure, but he keeps it to himself. It's a very nice plot you have. I like how you name the things in your story. Like Lothian and the name of the village. I can't even spell it 😂 And you get extra praise coz you dedicate the chapter to me 😂

I really love the small creature you called Kove. They're so cute! Lol. They're like a garden gnome I guess? I like how you don't make it cliche and changed the name into something else. Here in this chapter, we get to see Thorin's love as a father. Maybe the night before make him fear for his son and he wants to somehow make him happy after the nightmare. You left hints in this chapter. The names Tom and Cesar. Which I'm sure we'll get to know someday. And the cliffhanger is really good. I love the voice that calls out to Bathe and attracts him into the forest. Makes me wonder what's exactly living in the forest. Some kind of elf? Fairy?

And in chapter 4, we know the name is Visarth. Well, that's a very fancy name and makes the story much better if you ask me XD what I like most about this chapter is the six white figures. How did you come up with that? It's brilliant! I'm still confused about how the appears and what they're, which lies in what I think you can improve, which I'll talk about later, but I really like it. So Visarth is some kind of darkness? They touched Bathe's soul and what actually happened to him? He lost his consciousness. Would he die if not treated? Bethalamus (don't know if it's right) said Bathe's soul is strong. So what would happen if they don't treat him? He'll become the curse ones too?

Chapter five's title is 'Visarth' but there's no exposition on this Visarth thing, because when Ren asks about it, they tell him not to speak of that name. Even the omni narrator doesn't tell us what a Visarth is. So why the name of the chapter? Nothing much happened here, just them trying to get the plant that could heal Bathe. So I don't have much to say.

I feel bad saying this, but I don't get chapter six. At all. I don't get what's the deal with the two deads. You explained in your A/N that they're simply the spectators, and their significance will come up later. So why not leave it to later? Why introduce them earlier if you don't even introduce them? It's just a scene and not a narration.

From the six chapters I've read, your story is actually very good. The fact that you've built and developed everything before you started the story makes everything more believable and fantasy-ish. I know you take it seriously from the way you wrote the story.

Now let me talk about things you can improve. No matter how good your story is, your writing needs a lot of improvement. The biggest issue with your writing is not grammar, but redundancy. You try so hard to make your sentences...poetic or having subtext here and there. I don't get half of the sentences you write. I'm not writing any examples here, as I've left hundreds of inlines in your book. You know what I mean.

There are times when I don't understand what's going on and you explained the story to me, telling me it will be explained later and so on. It's not that I don't understand the story, it's just I don't understand what you're trying to say. Syntax-wise. You need to tone down your writing a bit. You used a lot of adverbs too. Again, I've pointed out most of them. You can simply refer to them. Just don't try so hard to make your sentence fancy. It's something I learn throughout my writing journey too. Less is always more.

I don't have much critiques to give, coz this is a first draft and in my opinion, you've done a great job for a first draft. I'm not sure how many chapters you're going to write. From the pace and length, I believe it would be more than 50 chapters. Talking about length, you have to keep it constant. It's getting shorter and shorter. Might want to work on that.

For your writing style, the only way you can improve is to write the book and finish it. Come back and reread it. You'll see what I mean. And get an editor. You need a lot of work writing-wise. The plot is vague, but it's more because of your writing rather than your worldbuilding.

I think that's all I have to say here. I've said what I wanted to say inline.

Good job, great story in the making, and good luck with the rewriting.