Quest Reviews (CLOSED FOR CATCH UP)

Questint's review

Username: Fayesther

Book title: While her lips are still red.

Genre: Short story/ fantasy

No. Of chapters reviewed: 12 (including prologue and epilogue)

Focus: Everything.

BOOK COVER:

I absolutely love the image you have chosen. I think it's a perfect fit to the story. Even the expression on the face fit so well. My only concern is the title font and colour. The red merges a bit with the dress and I feel the font choice could be a little better. Since the image has so much detail, maybe you could try a simpler font to balance it out instead of something fancy? Just a suggestion :)

The title is just perfect, poetic and very fitting. It caught my attention right away, and once I knew the significance, it took on even more meaning and I loved it!

BLURB:

I think the blurb really works. I love poetry and I love the warning placed at the beginning. It's such a unique structure, something I can't say I have seen before and it suits your story so well.

My only suggestion is to replace the word 'bandit' with something else. Because, having read the story, I can't really associate it with Rosie or what she does.

May I suggest 'femme fatale' or something along those line? Or succubus if you wanna get more poetic and mystique. You do describe her as 'A creature of the night who strives off the temptation of young men' in the prologue, so the word succubus comes to mind. 

STORY ARC:

I have substituted my usual sub-heading of plot with story arc, because I felt that was more appropriate, with this being a short story.

I think the arc was beautifully executed. Starting with the past, we see what led to her possession of the lipstick and then we see her meet Henry and fall in love. And lastly we see her slow descent into darkness clinging on to the last vestiges of youth. The end was the cherry on top that wrapped it all off perfectly. 

Beautifully executed three act structure. Your writing shows so much maturity just from the way you have gone about structuring this (which I my opinion, is harder to get right for short stories than novels)

It was paced just right, and the fact that you took your time to establish plot points and not rush through them was just top notch. 

Overall, I think the story arc doesn't need any improvements at all, it's perfect the way it is. I thoroughly enjoyed the pace, the narration and the structure. 

WRITING STYLE: (CREATIVE)

Descriptions:

What can I say? I'm a fan of your descriptions. They really do have a poetic quality to them, probably because you are a poet too. But it was so amazing to read. You pulled me into each and every scene and the description of Rosie - oof. The way it changed as the story progressed was beautiful. I could clearly picture every time, the youth disappeared and the real age started cracking through the surface. 

Dialogue/ voice and tone:

I have sort of combined the two because I feel they both influence each other. 

I love your dialogues, but I feel like the voice of the characters could be differentiated a bit more. Especially Rosie's and Henry's. Rosie, being the MC has a very clear voice and tone, both in the narration as well as dialogues but I found it a bit hard to distinguish between her voice and Henry's.