Sapphire's Review Store 3.0

Review by Gnome: Protector or Lover

Title: Protector or Lover

Author: Silver_Ashes_

Reviewer: GnomeMercy

Summary: 3.5/5

Your summary has all the basic things a summary needs! Well done! However, there are a few sneaky sentences here and there that could be rephrased, as well as a tense slip or two:

...constantly moving from place to place as if he was a criminal.

As the summary is mostly in present tense, it should be "is" instead of "was". Another one:

This world is a unrecognisable to one he has always known.

Firstly, before any word starting with a vowel, it should be "an" and not "a". Secondly, there should be some rephrasing:

This world is an unrecognisable one to the one he has always known.

You'd repeat "one" twice in this rephrasing, so I recommend improving on that and not using this example.

There was also a typo:

Agaised the odds the Prince finds love.

It should be:

Against the odds the Prince finds love.

But it still sounds a bit weird. Try:

Against all odds, the Prince finds love.

Other than those few small things, a decent summary! Well done!

Grammar: 2.5/5

While you do know some of the basics of grammar, there were a few errors that I saw.

Firstly, the difference between "woman" and "women". The former is the singular version (one woman) and the latter is the plural version (two women).

Secondly, you had a little bit of a problem with apostrophes. Here is an example of a sentence with a misuse of apostrophes.

The Lady Amanda, like Princess Daniele, was his fathers favourite.

It should be:

The Lady Amanda, like Princess Daniele, was his father's favourite.

Apostrophes are usually used for things that belong to a person (not an object, however) or are used for contractions (such as "it's", "wouldn't", "won't"). I recommend doing some more research into learning how to use them, as they're commonly misused.

Another thing I noticed was tense slips. Most of your story was in past tense (using words like "was" or "said'), but sometimes you'd slip and say "it's"--which is a contraction for "it is", which is in present tense. Make sure to keep your tenses consistent!

And lastly, verbal tags. These are also called dialogue tags, things like "he said", "they replied", "she stated". They are a part of a dialogue sentence, and capitalising them or using a period at the end of the dialogue before they are used is grammatically incorrect. Here are some random examples which show the right way to use dialogue tags.

"I'm sorry," they said.

"I'm sorry!" he said.

"I'm sorry?" she said.

If there is no dialogue tag at the end of a bit of speech, you can use a period (as well as a question and exclamation mark, and a dash. Just anything that is not a comma, as that insinuates the sentence continues). Here is an example of a bit of dialogue without a verbal tag after it.

"I'm sorry." She shook her head.

Overall, you definitely knew a bit about grammar, but there were some typos and other errors that were made. I recommend rereading through your published chapters and cleaning them up.

Writing: 3/5

While you did have a decent writing style, you had a habit of telling and not showing a lot. This was quite prevalent when it came to emotions, too. Don't tell us that the character is sad—or that a character prefers a certain person over another, for example. Show us this. You can use dialogue, body language, the actions they take, how their decisions are affected. It gives characters depth, and make them much more realistic.

As well as that, add more descriptions! What does the palace look like? How do the princesses look like? Use the senses as well to make it really come alive! I'd love to know more about the characters and the setting as they are super important!

Overall, I don't have much to say on writing style. I'd love some more description, and it would be better if a few more things were shown instead of told!

Plot: [no score -- not added to final score]

As for plot, within the few chapters I read I didn't get much of the general storyline. That isn't too surprising, as we're only nine chapters in, and I didn't feel as if I had enough content to review your plot. I will say, however, from your summary, it seems as if it has an interesting premise that could be a very engaging read if executed well!

OVERALL SCORE: 9/15

(I decided not to have a characters section in this review as there weren't enough chapters for me to really get a grasp on your characters.) Sorry there were not many sections! I still hope there are some things to be gained from this review and that it was helpful. I apologise for the tardiness.