Zero O'Clock written by --caramel
i. COVER & TITLE
I love the aesthetics of your cover and wouldn't hesitate to call it appealing. However, it's really simple. Maybe you're okay with that, but this isn't the kind of cover that is going to jump out at a reader in the way it could. I would suggest looking for a new cover through a graphic designer. You could keep the picture, but adjust the way the font works and the manipulation of the overall cover.
Your title is interesting and original, so I don't have any problems there.
ii. BLURB
I usually advise against using a quote in your blurb, but I think yours works pretty well. However, I think you should take it out of quotations. This way, it'll seem less like dialogue and more like posing a question to the reader, breaking that wall and pulling them in. In addition, take the 'extended synopsis inside' out, or at least put it at the end. You have minimal words to hook your readers; don't waste them on something like that.
Now, as for the actual blurb, I love how short and to-the-point it is. I wouldn't recommend any changes other than erasing everything after 'the clock is ticking' in other words, take out the 'or' and the last line. They didn't really add anything and just made the blurb end on sort of a half-final note. Other than that, you've got an awesome blurb!
1 1 / 1 5
i. PUNCTUATION
#1: THE COMMA
Your biggest issue is commas. You have a problem with separating clauses. Just a quick review: clauses contain both a subject (who you're talking about) and a verb (what they're doing). If a group of words has both of those, it is its own clause and needs to be separated from other clauses by a comma. Look at this example:
'As he stared at the blanket of stars from the edge of the rooftop he smiled.'
So looking at this, there are two clauses here, but nothing separating them. 'He smiled' contains both a subject (he) and a verb (smiling) and therefore is its own clause. Here's the correction:
"As he stared at the blanket of stars from the edge of the rooftop, he smiled.'
#2: THE SEMICOLON
The semicolon is used to separate two independent yet still related clauses. Look here:
'The stone on his heart was heavy, he could feel its weight every time he moved.'
So that's a comma splice, which means you've separated two independent clauses with something not strong enough to divide them. We know these are independent because they would still make sense on their own:
'The stone on his heart was heavy. He could feel its weight every time he moved.'
So, therefore, you can keep the period, or you can use a semicolon there. I would recommend the semicolon because it makes the sentences less choppy.
ii. DIALGOUE
You've got a few dialogue issues. First, try to note that the dialogue tag begins with a lowercase even in the presence of an exclamation mark or question mark:
"You are twenty now!" He said.
That's not correct, it should be this, with the lower case tag:
"You are twenty now!" he said.
Next, dialogue tags can be continuous, but then the sentence needs to be as well:
"Happy Birthday to you," an annoying buzz disrupted her slumber, "Happy Birthday to you," it sang with mirth.
For one, you don't need to capitalize 'birthday' as far as I know. in addition, the problem here comes with the capital on the second line of dialogue. You have a couple options to correct this:
"Happy Birthday to you," an annoying buzz disrupted her slumber. "Happy Birthday to you," it sang with mirth.
"Happy Birthday to you," an annoying buzz disrupted her slumber, "happy Birthday to you," it sang with mirth.
Now I wouldn't go with the second one, since you have a dialogue tag on both sides, and that's not ideal. I would go with the first. You have a couple of these dialogue errors just to clean up.
You also have a tendency to confuse dialogue tags with action tags. Remember that while dialogue tags explain how dialogue is said, action tags describe how actions are said, and they have regular punctuation rules. Therefore:
Mrs. Min clicked her tongue, "do not try to be over smart, young lady."
is incorrect. This is how that should look:
Mrs. Min clicked her tongue. "Do not try to be smart with me, young lady."
iii. TYPOS
You have a few typos in your chapter worth looking over, beyond grammatical mistakes. I think downloading Grammarly will fix most of those problems!
0 9 / 1 5
i. PACING
I really do like your hook and the dramatic sentence-ender in the first chapter--it's very powerful and works very well. However, I don't like the timeskip. Timeskips in the first chapter show me that your story isn't in the right place to start. They're bad for flow and especially bad in the first chapter. I understand restructuring is hard, especially in the first chapter, but I believe it's essential to improve your pacing.
Beyond the first timeskip, you have many more. You have at least four in the first chapter, and that's not ideal. The problem is with the pacing, because timeskips make for bad flow. I understand that there are certain scenes you'd like to leave out for whatever reason, but often those scenes are essential to showing us background of the story and introducing us as naturally as possible to each character. I didn't see a timeskip in the first chapter that couldn't be avoided with simple restructuring on either side and adding in a transitional scene. I think this would massively improve your flow and give you opportunities to give insight to the story.
ii. TRANSITIONS
As for your transitions beyond the timeskips--referring to the transitions of the actual chapters, I really like those! Ilike the hooks of both chapters one and two, and I really like the way you've ended chapter one with a final, dramatic note. You work well with those, so it's only the timeskips within the chapters that are really hurting the flow of your story. The problem is the choppyness of the actual transitions. I try to explain chapters as their own, individual stories--with a beginning, a middle, and an end. And your chapters have beginnings and ends, but they don't have a middle; they have a bunch of middles that aren't connecting. I'd recommend fixing this problem up before anything else.
0 6 / 1 0
i. CHARACTERS
I think your descriptions are simple and easy to read, and they stay away from info-dumping. That's all awesome, but your descriptions do lean closer to the unoriginal side of things. I don't really say anything interesting really going on in the beyond basic colours and shapes and things. Here are some things you could add into your descriptions to make the just a little more unique:
- Voices are often left out of descriptions, but they appeal to the auditory sense--one that doesn't often get used in writing.
- Habits or tendencies are a really great way to describe a character. Qhat do they do that they maybe shouldn't? What do they have habits of that they wish they didnt'?
- The reasoning for your character decisions is perhaps what gets us understanding them the most. Why does she feel this way? Is there something that's happened in her past to make her wary of this kind of situation?
ii. SCENES
I have a bias towards long, beautiful prose, but I see the factualility and advantages in lacking that and going for the simple, quick prose. That being said, I think there's a way for you to improve your prose by making it flow a little better. I think you could do with longer, more connected sentences. Try learning commas just a bit better, and using that knowledge to make a more advanced sentence structures. In turn, that will make both your prose and overall descriptions a little smoother.
0 6 / 1 0
i. PLOT
I like what you wanted to do with the plot from the blurb, and I like the overall direction of the story. However, I think you have some confusion arising. I found it a little tough to keep up with your characters, as some of them were introduced extremely quickly. In order for your plot to truly shine, I think you might benefit from firmly establishing characters before moving on to new ones. Let us know a unique set of descriptions of both their physical appearance and behaviour, and then move on! It doesn't have to be too long, just something so we can follow your characters a bit better.
ii. TONE
Your tone is simple, easy and manageable. It's so simple that it lacks a little bit of originality, but that develops with the story, and we all go back to add in more after we finish the story. You stay in the same tense and maintain a pretty smooth tone, so i don't have any huge problems with it. But it's always worth writing out extra scenes from either your current book or other works to develop your tone even more!
0 7 / 1 0
I like the overall shape of your story, I really like your big transitions and I see the potential in your plot. I think there are a few things to clean up in the case of flow and those timeskips, and areas to improve your logistics. But it was fun to review this story and I hope it helps!
3 9 / 6 0