With pms being ctrl alt deleted, if you have any questions you would like to ask me privately, please either email me (btsisthebest358@gmail.com) or reach out to me on Discord. I will leave a link here.
Congratulations to all the winners!
Ya girl did it again. The reviews are over 26k words long for nine stories!
My typing speed go brrr thanks to my fast hands. My future husband is gonna live such a happy life.
Anyway. Sorry, that wasn't Raven, that was my alter ego: Crow.
I edited this from 3 a.m. to 6 a.m. (just about 6 a.m. rn), so if there are any errors, I apologize, I've slept maybe 10 hours in the past two to three days, idek. Finals season is so fun.
I copy and pasted usernames right from your forms, so if I tagged anyone wrong, please let me know so I can fix it asap! Copy and paste errors happen, so if you don't see yourself in the reviews, please let me know.
Please do not argue with me. Remember this is for fun and all personal opinion. I don't give harsh feedback, just honest feedback. I can't promise it won't sting cause I'm still honest, but I will not be using words like "cringe" and "ugly" to try and insult you like harsh feedback does. You're of course entitled to your own opinion and you can disagree with everything I say if you want, but that doesn't mean you should be rude to me. Remember I'm judging by myself, so please be respectful.
Remember I'm giving a reader's perspective. Just because something is clear to you doesn't mean it's clear to me. You're the writer, you know everything about your story. Readers don't. Keep that in mind.
I ask that when you're reading your reviews, you read the whole thing before asking questions. Sometimes it takes me more than one paragraph to explain what I mean, so your question could be answered later in the review.
I'm one person doing this and trying to be as helpful as I can. If nothing about the review is helpful to you, then just ignore it. I'm not going to be offended. We're all different writers using different styles, so my suggestions may sound outlandish to you while to my style they would fit in perfectly. I always, and I mean always, encourage you to find your own style and don't just blindly listen to my suggestions because I'm the one giving them. I'm not always right, and my opinion is one in a sea of billions. Please keep that in mind while reading your review.
With the new Wattpad guidelines, I am going to be censoring more words than normal just to be safe, so if you see any censored words, that's why.
There are five total winners. 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place as well as two honorable mentions.
If you have any questions, please let me know! I am working on a few categories currently. Completed, best fanfic, and horror are currently being worked on. I'm not sure which one will be published first.
Also, quick reminder that I have a K-pop contest called the Forever Gold K-pop Awards that just came out recently, so if you are looking for more opportunities, check the first book on my profile!
3rd Place
The Captains and the Winter Soldier by MDjarin17
Review:
Characters: 7.5/10. I'm really, really, really glad you nerfed Captain Marvel. Alright, yes, I'm basic, I'm one of those people who thinks she's overpowered as heck because... well, she is. She can solve pretty much every problem and can beat the strongest foes without breaking a sweat. She can destroy entire ships just by punching them. Overall, she's pretty OP. I'm really glad you gave her restrictions and actually showed her struggling and needing help. She also has much more of a personality and fire to her than the MCU version of her has. Honestly, I feel like I know more about this Carol after one chapter than I know about the MCU's Carol after several movies.
However, even outside the differences between your book and the MCU, the characters stand on their own and do a good job directing the plot of the story. Sam is Sam, so can't go wrong with him. I also like how sweet Steve is in this book.
Overall, I like your take on the characters, and I think you do a good job with them, particularly Nick Fury and his roughness and distrust.
I have two main critiques of the characters. One is something I'll explain more in dialogue where some of their dialogue could be made more engaging by removing dialogue tags. It made some of the scenes hard to focus on because of how many there were, but again, I already wrote a detailed explanation in the dialogue section, so I will let future me explain.
Two, the kiss between Steve and Carol felt a little out of place, in my opinion. There's only one chapter out so far, and having it take place that early when it seemed, based on the way you were describing their relationship, that it was going to be more of a slow burn felt a little shocking. I was taken aback when I read it, and it felt a little contradictory to information we were given earlier, and also information we know about Steve and his best girl Peggy. I also found it hard to believe two experienced soldiers would kiss in the middle of a dangerous mission. I can understand adrenaline and feeling relieved the other person is alright, though it was a bit of stretch. A stretch that isn't a huge deal, but that when combined with how fast the kiss happens, it did make me very surprised.
For that reason, I would recommend slowing down with Carol and Steve's relationship and giving us more chances to see their bond and feel the tension between them. It may sound silly to say this, but I want to see more conversations between them with as little dialogue from the movie as possible. Most of their relationship thus far has been built around dialogue from the movie and some touching here and there. That's why I'd recommend adding something new to their relationship to give them more distinction. Granted, it's early in the story, so I acknowledge I have no idea what you have planned and you could have already written a scene that addresses this, though since I've only seen one chapter, I have to judge based on what's there.
Still, despite those two critiques, I think the characters are overall good, and I think you do the personalities of the MCU characters justice.
Plot: 10/10. The plot, so far, is good. I was worried at first that there wouldn't be many changes made to the Winter Soldier storyline, and I personally don't really care for it when books based on pre-existing media follows the pre-existing media's story beat-by-beat. In my opinion, it limits creative freedom and makes the audience question why make the book if it's just going to be the same story with one new character or something of the sort. However, you do not have this problem. There are many small, and also large, changes between the Winter Soldier movie and this book that keeps me on my toes. Winter Soldier is one of my favorite MCU movies, so I'm glad to see the plot of course, but I'm also glad you added your own spin to it. Good job!
Pacing: 7/10. The pacing is overall good, I only have some critiques.
I think I've mentioned in a past review I've given you, but my memory is about as reliable as a moldy slice of Swiss cheese left out to rot in the middle of a heat wave in August, so I apologize if I'm remembering incorrectly. Some of the paragraphs are a little long and can be split up, especially during action scenes to amp up the tension and fasten the pacing for a faster scene. I have no issues with long paragraphs and I think they work well in some cases, though I'm mostly focusing on the fight scenes since they're meant to be faster-paced.
There are also some sentence structure critiques I have for the sentences during fight scenes, though I wrote an explanation for that in the next section, so the deductions will be explained there.
Lastly, like I mentioned in the characters section, I wasn't a huge fan of Steve and Carol having a kiss that fast, and it felt a little out of nowhere and like it contradicted the emotions you were setting up in the beginning. It felt like you were going to go more the slow burn route with their relationship and there wasn't too much tension between them up until the kiss. That's why I'd recommend slowing down their relationship going forward, that way the audience can see more about who these characters are. We know them from the pre-existing universe, but these are your versions of the characters now, and I'd like to know more about them as individuals before I get to know them together, if that makes sense.
Other than those three things, I think the pacing is good.
Creativity: 6/10. The story is based on the Marvel Cinematic Universe, particularly Captain America: The Winter Soldier. However, making it a what if scenario pairing two captains together was interesting.
I have some recommendations for creative presentation. There are some cliche phrases throughout the story so far, like the small of Carol's back being touched, or her face flushing a bright color. I don't mind these phrases and think they're okay when used sparingly, I just caution you against using them too much, especially considering there's only one official chapter out thus far.
The next recommendation I have is to consider diversifying your sentence structure during fight scenes in particular. Many times the structure is like this: *insert words here* comma *insert more words here* comma *more words to end the sentence*. So you'll have the start of the sentence, a comma, some more words, another comma, then the end of the sentence. For example, let's start at the paragraph that begins with "Just as I doubled over..." about eleven minutes into the story. There are nine sentences between that paragraph and the paragraph after it. Out of those nine sentences, eight of them are formatted the way I just said. I hope when I give that example and break it down like that, it makes sense why the sentence structure got a bit repetitive, mostly during fight scenes.
Fight scenes are tricky to get right, and I would recommend considering changing up the dynamic of your sentences. Maybe try using shorter bursts to give the actions more pop. Since fight scenes are fast and intense, the shorter sentences can give the fight more style and intensity. That's just one suggestion and I'm not saying it will work for the book or your style, but hey, maybe it's worth trying and seeing if you like it. If you decide to try it, I hope it works for you since it's a fun style and can be very beneficial, but please only do it if you feel comfortable!
Lastly, the word choice is overall good, though there were some words I noticed were used a lot. Most notably, "smirked." There's a lot of smirking throughout this story, and I would recommend finding synonyms or new ways to describe the characters' facial expressions.
Dialogue: 7/10. It's a little hard to judge this category since the majority of dialogue in the book so far is from the movie, though the new dialogue we're given is good. The dialogue from the movie is also translated into the book well.
I would suggest using less dialogue tags. The dialogue is almost always introduced by *action, then tag like said, chimed, asked, etc.*. So, like this: Speaking into the comm of his wrist (action), Steve asked (tag), "Natasha, what's your status?" That's how almost all of the dialogue is formatted, and I would recommend using less tags. My father once gave me advice that changed how engaging my writing was, and it's the 50-30 advice. This advice states that of your dialogue, 50% or less should have tags, and of that 50%, 30% or more should be said or asked. The reason is because tags are inherently telling over showing, so if you can do anything to limit that, that'd be very helpful.
I say this because I believe almost every line in the story has a dialogue tag, so that's a lot of telling over showing, most of which being unnecessary. That's why I'd recommend considering downsizing in any area you can. It can make the lines feel a little flatter than they could be because there are many tags that get a little distracting after a while. In summary, to keep the emotions high and to also give the readers less telling over showing, I would recommend downsizing on how many tags you use.
With that being said, dialogue tags are done correctly, so that's a very good thing. The dialogue itself is overall good, it could just use some tweaks to its presentation.
Worldbuilding: 10/10. It's a little hard to judge this category so early in the story, but so far, you've given us the groundwork needed for a good world. You have solid descriptions and a clear understanding for the MCU lore that brings the world to life. All the new concepts are explained in a way that makes it easy for both MCU fans and non-MCU fans to understand. For that reason, I believe this section deserves a 10/10.
Grammar/Spelling: 9/10. The grammar and spelling is overall very good aside from a nitpick I have.
I would recommend staying consistent with which English you're using. It seems you're using US English due to the spelling of words like "realization," then you'll use UK English like "towards" instead of "toward" (which is the US English version of the word). That's really the only thing I noticed that was a consistent error.
The spelling is good and the grammar is good.
Description: 7.5/10. The descriptions in the story are good and do a good job setting the scene, particularly in the beginning with the scene with Sam, Steve, and Carol. I really liked how those descriptions were done, and I'm glad you incorporated some of the five senses into your work to give the scenes more vividness.
The main criticism I have is there are many moments of telling over showing or, like I mentioned earlier, some cliche phrases making their way in there. I don't mind the occasional cliche, though I would suggest being careful about how many are used in future chapters.
As for the telling over showing, there were points where you were telling us information about the characters and their emotions and relationships when we didn't need to be told it. For example, I have a pet peeve with the word "testament" because it's almost always used for telling over showing, and there was a case of you using it for telling over showing to talk about character relationships. I found the line, and it's this: "...in a rare display of affection that stood as a testament to our shared history...". This line individually isn't a problem, it's when there are multiple lines like this, if that makes sense. Using telling over showing is fine, and sometimes you absolutely have to; however, I'm using that line as an example to show where there were areas of telling over showing, and if there are any areas you can cut down, I'd say go for it.
Another small thing is the sentence structure and how fight scenes are described in similar structures, though since I already explained that, I will not over explain even more than I already have, haha. I tend to do that sometimes-
Overall, the descriptions are good, I would just recommend cutting back on telling over showing and cliche phrasing, and consider remodeling some of the sentences during fight scenes to make them stand out more.
Themes and Emotions: 8/10. The overall emotions so far are strong. Though it's hard to identify a theme yet, that's not an issue since there's only one chapter out. Since the theme is more hidden at the moment, I have no comments on it.
As for the emotions, I think you have a diversity of emotions throughout the story thus far, so it doesn't feel boring or one note. Like I mentioned in the characters section, Carol has many more emotions here than her MCU counterpart does, and I liked that you gave her more to do and an interesting backstory. Nick Fury has a surprising range of emotions, too.
The only criticisms I have are the same as before where the emotions could be a bit stronger with less telling over showing, and also some tweaks to the dialogue to make it more engaging. I could also mention the kiss between Steve and Carol being a little conflicting for my emotions, but I don't think that's a huge deal for the overall emotions.
Overall, the emotions are good.
Title/Blurb/Cover: 9/10. I like the play on words in the title and the reference to the Falcon and the Winter Soldier. It shows you put a lot of thought into what you were doing, and I appreciate the attention to detail. The title appeals to Marvel fans, which is exactly what you should be doing considering it's a fanfic for Marvel, so I think you did a good job. No criticisms.
The blurb does its job to establish what the story is going to be about, and I did not notice any major grammar errors. I ran it through grammar checkers to be sure, and they agreed. No criticisms.
The cover has a well-chosen photo. I like the way there's Capt's shield and the metal plating from Bucky's arm, then Carol's logo spliced over that. It makes for a unique visual that caught my attention. The only thing I'm not a huge fan of is the font. It feels a little out of place on this cover, in my opinion. It doesn't really give Marvel vibes, if that makes sense. I would recommend playing around with different fonts and searching for one that feels more Marvel-like or at least more in the action adventure genre. The font is cursive and a little too elegant for the otherwise gritty background picture and story. I hope that makes sense. Otherwise, I like the cover.
Total: 81/100.
2nd Place
Steampunk Heroes by RoxyMdp83
Review:
Characters: 9/10. I really like the main characters in the narrative, and I think you did a good job making them feel like real people engaging with fun scenarios that test their limits.
The only minor critique I have is sometimes the dialogue got a bit repetitive due to filler words and sometimes there being long areas where they don't use many contractions, even in their thoughts, which made them sound a bit overly formal at times (for example, in chapter 1, there was a noticeable lack of contractions, though it did get better as the story went on). I explained in more detail in the dialogue section before I wrote this section, so more info on the filler words in dialogue is to come.
Other than that, the characters are very good. For example, I adore how you made a squirrel and a human partners in crime. That was really cute and unique, and it made for engaging interactions that kept me interested in the story.
Plot: 10/10. The plot is overall very good matched with good pacing that makes it easy to read and digest. You don't try to overcomplicate things, and you give us all the information we need without overwhelming us. I have no criticisms for the plot, therefore it deserves a perfect score.
Pacing: 8/10. There's a lot of exposition. The prologue is all exposition, but that continues throughout the rest of the story where there are times you give us a lot of exposition. However, I honestly didn't mind as much as I thought I would because the narrator's voice makes the exposition more engaging than it would be otherwise. You incorporate humor and personality in a way that makes the exposition far more enjoyable and natural. If there's anywhere you feel you can cut down on exposition, I'd say go for it, but I'm glad you decided to make the exposition more colorful. It made the pacing feel overall good when there were areas of exposition, which is so strange for me since I don't think I've read many authors who've done that before.
Moving away from the exposition, the pacing was overall good other than some minor moments where it felt like the flow was interrupted for sentences that came a bit out of the blue. For example, from chapter 2, "Basking in the appreciative oohs and ahs of his captive audience." That sentence felt a little random, and it's a sentence fragment. There were also frequent director's notes, but I already wrote an explanation about the director's notes later on in this review before I wrote this section, so I will let future me explain it.
Other than that, I think the pacing is good, and I admire how you did your exposition!
Creativity: 7.5/10. Be careful with repetition with the adverbs. Many times you'll use the same adverbs in very close proximity to one another. Like in the first chapter, you use "quietly" and "instantly" twice each in close proximity. In general, I'd recommend using less adverbs since they're telling over showing and risk being repetitive.
Similarly, there are a lot of ellipses, and I would suggest using them less. Ellipses, like exclamation marks, are best when used sparingly due to the dramatic and emotional nature they imply. While they can be used casually and I'm not saying they shouldn't be, they can be a bit distracting when used too much. You use them quite frequently, and I would recommend downsizing on how many you use.
Moving away from those two critiques, the sentence structure is good and dynamic, the vocab (other than the adverbs) is good, and the story idea itself is creative!
Dialogue: 7.5/10. Dialogue tags are done correctly, even in special cases. Very good job there. You earned a warm chocolate chip cookie, and both sides of your pillows are going to be cold tonight.
I would recommend not using actions as dialogue tags. By that I mean words like "grins." The reason is because actions as tags tend to sound a little unnatural. Tags are meant to describe how someone is speaking words, and you can't grin words. You can grin while speaking, but you can't physically grin the words, which is what it implies when "he grins" is used as a tag. It's debated whether or not actions can be used as tags, though I'm on the side that they shouldn't be used and would be more natural as something more like: He grins. "*insert dialogue here*." So that way, he's still grinning, but it's not used as a tag. Everyone has their different opinions on that, though, so I recommend looking into it and deciding which side of the debate you prefer.
There were areas where the dialogue felt like it had too many words and filler words. For example, from chapter 2, "No one has ever said that they trusted me before." I learned this not too long ago, and it's greatly improved my writing and dialogue: the word "that" isn't needed most of the time. Most of the time, using "that" makes the sentence unnecessarily longer, especially for dialogue since humans tend to speak in more concise ways (in general, anyway). So what I'd recommend is seeing sentences where you have the word "that," and read them out loud first with the "that," then without it to see which one flows better. If you read that example with and without it, you'll notice it flows a bit stronger without it. As long as the sentence still makes sense without the "that," then you can remove it and improve the readability/flow of the sentence. "That" is a filler word, in many cases. Not in all, but in many more than one may think.
Overall, the dialogue is good, and you do tags correctly (yay, this is very rare!).
Worldbuilding: 10/10. The worldbuilding is solid throughout the story. I like the images being at the ends of chapters and not disruptive, so the readers get a chance to imagine what you're describing before you show us. I also like how you give us smaller details sprinkled throughout the narrative. For example, in chapter 7, there's the line "This is the place parents leave their magically inclined children when they become a tad too scary for them to handle." It's a small moment, but it really gives us a better idea of the world around the characters, and not just the physical world, but the internal world and mentality of some parents. I enjoy those small details, and I like that you took the time to show it. The bigger parts of the world are shown as well. Overall, very good worldbuilding.
Grammar/Spelling: 8/10. There are consistent punctuation errors, and the three I'll cover are semicolon misusage, comma splices, and missing commas. I'll do my best to keep the examples close together so you don't have to jump between chapters to find what I'm talking about. From the prologue: "The Archdemon's plan was an utter flop but make no mistake; many lives were lost." It should be: "The Archdemon's plan was an utter flop, but make no mistake: many lives were lost." Or the colon can be a comma. Either one is fine, but a semicolon is incorrect there. I always recommend using as few semicolons as possible because, honestly, we're all guessing when it comes to correct semicolon usage. They're complicated punctuation marks, so the more they're used, the more likely there's going to be an error.
There are times the commas are wrong, too. Another example from the prologue: "The Black Cloaks' souls were released at that moment, and have learned a valuable lesson, they will forever reside in The Hall of Nincompoops." There's a comma splice there where there's a comma before "and" when it shouldn't be there, and the second comma should be a colon. So, with those changes: "The Black Cloaks' souls were released at that moment and have learned a valuable lesson: they will forever reside in The Hall of Nincompoops."
Lastly, I'll talk about missing commas. Here's another example from the prologue: "It has been a relatively peaceful ten years since and most of the older heroes have retired." With a comma: "It has been a relatively peaceful ten years since, and most of the older heroes have retired."
The grammar is overall good as you can see by the high score, it's just the punctuation that could use some tweaks.
Description: 8/10. The descriptions are overall good and do a solid job presenting the story to us. As I explained in the worldbuilding section, you have many great small details that elevate your story from cool to awesome. Your attention to detail allows the readers to really set themselves in the scene and engage with the characters.
The main critique I have is to be careful of director's notes. This is term used to describe when there are sentences in the story that feels like a director talking to actors, or, in a book's case, an author talking to the characters, rather than the story flowing out. That was a word sandwich, so let me explain it with an example. From chapter one: "What is it? Who is attacking?" Kalliann wants to know...
The "Kalliann wants to know" is the director's note. The dialogue already implies Kalliann wants to know who's attacking, so having it repeated in general description makes it feel a bit unnecessary. You do the same thing later with "she wants to know." The way that's formatted makes me think it's supposed to be a dialogue tag, but that's a very unnatural dialogue tag and I would strongly suggest saying "asks" or another word similar instead.
These kinds of notes are done consistently throughout the story, that's why I'd recommend cutting back on them. They're also telling over showing. While it is necessary to do telling over showing at times, wherever you can limit it, I would suggest limiting it. I hope that makes sense!
However, despite that critique, I think the descriptions are good and even funny at times. I found it oddly charming in chapter 7 when it started with "Kalliann and his group of misfits are seated at a very, very long table...". There was something charming about the description of it being a "very, very long table." You have some descriptions that have a lot of pretty language, then some that are more simplistic like that one, which makes for a good balance. For fantasy stories, I always worry the author is going to use purple prose and hide it behind the "it's a high fantasy" excuse. I'm very glad you don't have this problem and write clearly yet pretty at the same time. You find a great balance between advanced vocab and writing in a way that the audience can understand. Great job!
Themes and Emotions: 8.5/10. The themes and emotions in the story are overall strong. There is a diverse range of emotions, and the themes are clear pretty early on in the story. Even some aspects of the worldbuilding get emotional, like the magical children I mentioned earlier. You know the emotions are strong when worldbuilding can make you feel sad.
The only critiques I have were already mentioned, so I'll only briefly go over them here. One is the ellipses were a bit distracting at times, and since ellipses tend to imply emotional weight, overusing them made some emotional moments not flow as well as they could have. Two is the director's notes that were telling over showing and felt a little random at times.
Other than those two critiques, I think the emotions and themes are very good!
Title/Blurb/Cover: 7/10. Steampunk Heroes is a fun title that stands out to me. It immediately lets the reader know the genre of the story, and it also rolls off the tongue well. No criticisms.
The blurb is a little short and could benefit from being more specific about what the story is going to be about. Maybe consider describing why the Kingdom of Alytheria was peaceful for ten years. Were there no wars or military problems? A good political system? Fair economy? Good opportunities for the citizen's social lives and careers? Those are just a couple of random questions, and you don't have to answer all of them or even one of them, but they are questions to keep in mind while writing. Consider describing the threat a bit more. Is it a nonhuman threat? What makes this threat so dangerous that it disrupts ten full years of peace? What does it do to disrupt the peace? You say it has epic destruction, but how? Does it destroy something major? Does it kill someone? Again, you don't have to answer those questions, especially if it would lead to spoiling a major event, but they're questions to consider to give more tension and emotional stake to the blurb. I know only slightly more about the story than I did after first clicking on it, and a blurb is meant to give the readers a clear idea of what they're about to read. That's why I'd suggest providing more detail and context so readers can better understand what they're getting into.
The cover is okay. It works for the story. Normally I'm not the biggest fan of floating head designs, but I think the unique art for the characters makes it more interesting to look at, especially since one of the characters is a squirrel? I'm not entirely sure if that's a squirrel or not, but it certainly piques my interest and makes me want to click on the story. My only critique is super minor, but it's about the "Steampunk" near the top right. I would suggest moving it down and to the right just a teeny bit, that way it aligns more with the photo of the child underneath it, and it also doesn't leave as much empty space between the photo and the text.
(Note I judge this section before reading the story, so I know now that it was, in fact, a squirrel haha)
Total: 83.5/100.
1st Place
The Road to Nowhere by Outrider51
Review:
Characters: 9/10. The characters in the story are overall very good. They have distinct personalities and emotions. I was hooked on Jes' story by chapter one, and as the narrative continued, I wanted nothing more than to see her succeed. She's a fantastic protagonist, and I love the way she's written. I also like Mitch and how he interacts with Jes. One of my favorite moments from the book may seem small, but it was such a nice paragraph that really gave me a lot of thoughts about Jes and the world she's living in. What I'm talking about is the opening paragraph from the chapter titled "You're Under Arrest." There's so much to think about in that paragraph, and I love how it relates to Jes' character but also alludes to her relationship dynamic with Mitch. It's a great opener, and moments like those really sell me on these characters.
The only criticism I have is something I will explain in far more detail in the description section, but there were times I felt you did too much telling over showing and used what's called "director's notes," which is what I'll explain in the description section. As a result, sometimes emotional scenes weren't as emotional as they could have been. The emotions were still strong, hence why you have a high score here, though they could be even stronger with some tweaks to the telling over showing. However, like I said, I already wrote a long explanation about it in the description section before writing this section, so I will let future me explain. There will be examples, too.
Otherwise, the characters are very good.
Plot: 10/10. The plot has good pacing and an interesting story matched with engaging characters that make for an entertaining read. As I mentioned in the previous section, I was hooked by chapter 1 by your characters, particularly Jes, and I wanted to see more. I didn't notice any inconsistencies or plot holes. No criticisms for the plot.
Pacing: 8.5/10. The story moves along at a good pace. Narrative events unfold at what feel like the right times, and the characters and their reactions to certain events feel like they fit into the flow of the book.
The pacing is overall good other than some moments where there are sentences that are hard to read, and they disrupt the flow. I'll explain more in the grammar section, though I will give a brief rundown here. Sometimes you had sentences that had too much packed into them, making the pacing slower than it needed to be. To summarize: When sentences are hard to read, it slows reading time and can make the pacing feel slower than intended. I'll give examples and talk more in detail about it in grammar, though.
Otherwise, the pacing was good.
Creativity: 8/10. There are some good moments of word choice throughout, but also some moments I feel could have been stronger. For example, there are some words you use a lot, like "maddening," "reverberated (or reverberating)," "look," etc. A specific example would be the opening paragraph of the story, where the word "drove" is used three times, then a fourth time in the first sentence of the second paragraph.
That's not to say you can never repeat words as that's not true, though I would recommend downsizing where you can, especially with words that have a lot of synonyms, like "look." They're used enough that they're noticeable, which is why I'm recommending downsizing on repeated words wherever you see fit.
The overall creativity in the story is very good. The story idea is engaging, and you have awesome characters you use as a vessel to tell this story. The sentence structure is solid other than some hard to read sentences I will go over later. Even though I had critiques for the word choice, I still think it's overall good.
Great job with the creativity!
Dialogue: 6.5/10. I would suggest giving the dialogue a bit more room to breathe. By that I mean, you'll often have dialogue in the middle of a paragraph or you'll have it near the beginning then there will be 4-6 sentences of description after the dialogue in the same space as the dialogue. I recommend this because dialogue can be easy to miss if it's put in larger paragraphs, especially in the middle of them.
The dialogue itself is otherwise formatted pretty well and tags are done right most of the time, only occasional errors where you use a full stop/period instead of a comma when you're using tags, but that's not a consistent error and other reviews have already pointed it out, so I won't dwell on it here or take points off for an error that isn't consistent.
I have two more suggestions for dialogue. One would be to not use actions as dialogue tags. Sometimes you'll use a tag like "she pointed to her Jeep," which is an action, not a tag. It's debated whether or not actions can be used as tags, though I personally believe they shouldn't be used as tags simply because it sounds a little unnatural. Tags tell the reader how words are being spoken, so by using a tag like "shrugged" (just as an example), it implies the characters are shrugging the words, not their shoulders. That's why, to me, it sounds really unnatural. So that's why I recommend not using actions as tags.
The last suggestion also has to do with tags. I recommend not using as many tags. For example, in chapter 2, if I counted correctly, there are 43 lines of dialogue. If I counted correctly, there are 41 dialogue tags for 43 lines of dialogue, and some of that comes from you putting two dialogue tags when the same person is speaking. So I would recommend using far less dialogue tags, and not using two if the same person is speaking unless it's a drastic change in how they're speaking. Sometimes you even use three dialogue tags for the same person, like the paragraph in chapter 2 that starts with, "Jes had taken her identification from him as she replied..." (it's near the end of the chapter). You have "she replied" right there, "she relayed" later, then "Jesalyn explained" all in the same paragraph for the same person speaking. You don't need more than one tag for that paragraph, in my opinion.
My father gave me advice for tags and recommended the 50-30 "rule." It's not a real rule, that's why I put it in quotes, but I think it's good advice. What he said was that of your dialogue, 50% or less should have tags, and of that 50%, 30% or more should be said or asked. The reason is because tags do nothing for the story other than tell you who is speaking, so the more you draw attention to them and the more you use them, the more distracting they become, and the more telling over showing you're doing. That's why I recommend using less tags and relying more on showing over telling methods to show who is speaking. You can do this by using specific speech styles to show who is speaking, or describing body language, or describing facial expressions, putting actions before dialogue to clue the reader in on who is speaking (like: Jes placed her hands on her hips. "Where are you going?" or something like that), etc. There are many ways to introduce dialogue/who is speaking without needing a tag, that's why I recommend playing around with your dialogue and finding what works for you. I hope those suggestions are helpful and spark new ideas in your head!
The dialogue is overall good, it could just use some tweaks to the presentation. I hope that makes sense.
Worldbuilding: 10/10. This is the kind of worldbuilding I was looking for, where everything is specific and named. The environments, the organizations, the important people and places, etc. have specific names and are given weight. I can tell you have experience with these topics and/or did a lot of research to bring this story to life, and I never doubted the world for a second. Everything is very well done, and every scene felt real with a real world surrounding it. Excellent job!
Grammar/Spelling: 8/10. As you can tell based on the score, the grammar is very good and I only have minor critiques.
There are punctuation errors and errors where the sentences feel a little clunky. For example, from the first chapter, "It wasn't until later after she had joined the Marine Corps when she met Nathan Guerra, that she had become complete as a woman." In my opinion, this sentence is a little clunky.
Here's what I would recommend: "It wasn't until after she had joined the Marine Corps and met Nathan Guerra that she had become complete as a woman." I removed the "later" since it felt unnecessary, and I changed "when" to "and." It makes the sentence a little more readable, in my opinion. However, that's just one way to reword it, and I encourage you to play around with it to see what works for your style. I felt the sentence included some unnecessary words, that's why I pointed it out. If you ever want to know if your sentence sounds too stuffed with words, then I'd recommend using TTS and having the generator read the text back to you. My father and I both use this method and it's worked wonders for us.
Here's something a little closer to how you wrote it: "It wasn't until later, after she had joined the Marine Corps and met Nathan Guerra, that she had become complete as a woman." That's another example a little closer to your style, so I hope seeing that alternative too is helpful!
As for the punctuation errors, there were times you used the wrong punctuation. For example, from the chapter Wisdom Shared: "As much as other people want to deny it; you can't really let go." The semicolon should be a comma, otherwise it is grammatically incorrect.
Overall, the grammar is very good other than those minor things!
Description: 8/10. The descriptions are overall good other than some small things. For example, you sometimes have director's notes. By that I mean phrases that sound like they were there for the author to know what the characters are thinking/feeling and weren't intended to be in the final draft. Another way to define director's notes is as short sentences that are telling over showing and tend to tell the reader what happened in the previous sentence. For example, from chapter 2, "A random thought popped into her head." That's an example of a director's note because this sentence is telling over showing and it's there to tell the reader what the previous sentence means, and in this context, the previous sentence was a character thought.
Long story short, I don't think you need the director's notes, so the "A random thought popped into her head" isn't needed. The sentence before it already shows us that Jes is thinking, so there's no need for telling us a random thought popped in her head, if that makes sense.
The descriptions are still very good, and I love how you incorporate those details into the characters and events. Everything feels very real and fun to read! The world in particular is well-described and has a lot of flavor/richness to it that makes it stand out from other books.
Themes and Emotions: 8.5/10. I've been on record many times saying grief is one of my favorite themes since the human mind goes through unspeakable things during a period of intense grief. In your novel, the theme of grief feels very personal and goes through the conflicting and sometimes dangerous emotions of someone really going through it. It's impressive how much love and care was put into the theme of this book, and I appreciate how much time you must have taken to bring it to life.
The emotions are diverse and complex, matching the overall grief theme going on here. Jes embodies many of the emotions, though I was pleasantly surprised with how much every character got, even if it was more minor. Mitch had his fair share of complex emotions as well, leading to an interesting dynamic between him and Jes.
The only criticisms I have are similar to the ones I've said before with the director's notes and telling over showing with the excess dialogue tags. By tweaking those director's notes and the tags, I think the emotional scenes will be even more engaging than they already are!
Overall, the themes and emotions are good.
Title/Blurb/Cover: 9/10. I really like the play on words with the title. Road to Nowhere is literal considering the destination is called Nowhere. So it poses a double meaning where, upon first glance, it seems like the book is going to be about a journey that feels like it's going nowhere, but the second meaning is the protagonist is quite literally going to a place called Nowhere. It's a nice title with clever word play that plays on our expectations. No criticisms.
The blurb tells us exactly what we need to know about the story and is clear. When I'm done reading it, I know what the story is going to be about. I only have tiny suggestions for the grammar. The first sentence: "Jesalyn Masters, USMC veteran and CIA analyst/ operative..." I would suggest removing the space between the / and operative, just so it looks a little neater. Next is the last sentence: "With the help of Mitchel Walker, interim Sherriff of Wake County, can Jesalyn overcome grief to rise to the occasion or will she sink into the oblivion of despair?" There should be a comma before the "or."
As for the cover, I like the background image and the placement of the text. Nothing is distracting and everything seems to work together. The red pop of the text works well for me. No criticisms.
Not to sound unprofessional considering I'm a judge, but... she's hot. Okay, there, I said it. No regrets!
Total: 85.5/100.
Note from judge: I just wanted to say you seem like such a kind person, and your hard work is not going unnoticed! I hope you keep writing and this review is helpful, and if you ever have any questions or need help with anything, please let me know!
Honorable Mention
Bound by Deception by romance_lover16
Review:
Characters: 8.5/10. Sterling and Aria steal the show as the main characters of this book. Their personalities are clear and contrast each other perfectly, but they're still respectful to one another and show a deeper bond than what's on the surface (considering the whole "there's more to the surface" theme is frequent throughout the story, this makes sense). Sterling is probably my favorite, and that's because of his inner thoughts in I believe chapter 2 where he described how he feels about intimacy. That one moment won me over, and I found myself wanting to know more about Sterling and his thought process. I liked Aria as well and her internal battle with keeping a robotic facade while her world comes crumbling down.
However, even beyond Sterling and Aria, the characters are all fleshed out and have unique personalities that challenge the main characters and give them more dialogue to bounce off of. For example, Aria's family. Her mother is very easy to identify through dialogue and has the most obvious personality. Overall, you did a great job with the characters.
The only critique I have is it takes a long time for me to be convinced that Aria and Sterling are truly the best at their job. A lot of their successes rely on coincidences, luck, and not getting consequences for things they should be getting consequences for. Three times back-to-back they're able to lead their target away from the crowd and execute them. I can accept the first two times since Sterling blows the whole place down anyway, but the third time, they took Gall away from other people. They had witnesses who saw them take Gall away, and their excuse for "Getting fresh air" wasn't a very tight one. I'll talk more about what I mean in the next section and also in the dialogue section, but the Gall murder was another moment that was hard to believe.
I have a far more detailed explanation in the plot and dialogue section, so I hope those sections explain what I mean more clearly.
Otherwise, the characters are good!
Plot: 7/10. The overall plot is good and has many fun moments and entertaining action scenes where things go off the walls crazy, but in a good way since it makes the audience want to read more. The unexpected happens quite frequently, like there being a mystery man in Aria's life that she once thought was dead. I wasn't expecting that, but again, not in a bad way. It was a fun twist to make me realize "Oh wow, this author means business!"
Just some things to keep in mind when it comes to consistency, there are some questionable plot moments that were hard to follow. There is one moment with security in the beginning of the story that I'll talk about in the dialogue section since it leads to some inconsistent dialogue, but also in the beginning of the story, there's a line that says "A silencer does wonders with our jobs." That isn't true. Silencers, or suppressors, do not eliminate gunshots or make them quiet. The best way to describe this is to say suppressors do not make guns quiet, they make them less loud, meaning they are still extremely, extremely loud. Guns are loud enough to cause hearing damage, and one reason why people use suppressors is to prevent that, but that goes to show how loud they still are when they're mostly used just to prevent hearing damage. That's why "silencer" is an inaccurate term coined by Hollywood, and "suppressor" is the more accurate term. I'm not saying call them suppressors btw, I call them silencers in my own stories since that's the more universally recognized term, I'm only bringing it up to explain why they're so loud.
Just so you know how loud they are, I will link a video here of a US vet shooting once without a suppressor, then once with one. You'll see there's not much difference between suppressor and no suppressor.
Now, why am I bringing this up? It's not a big deal. If anything, it's a nitpick, but since there were already quite a few stretches in this opening scene so the characters could succeed, it added another layer that made the whole opening heist a bit hard to follow. I wasn't convinced by the end of it that Aria and Sterling were experts or Madame's best because most of their success was based on luck, like the guards not being good at their jobs, there being no setbacks during the mission, and the silencers quieting the gunshot so much that no one heard it, especially when you established that there were cops in the crowd. Were none of them watching the VIPs? Both the Lady and Lord were pulled into quiet areas, and I don't believe the cops were mentioned again. Where did they go? How are there no servants or witnesses in the kitchen for a giant party? What about the snipers? Snipers implies they're far from the building, so even though the building got destroyed, they had to be far enough away to be considered proper snipers, therefore being out of the blast range (considering Sterling and Aria didn't move too far before it blew and they were fine). There's no reason snipers would be close enough to the building to have been killed in the blast, so those are witnesses to the attack, therefore making it so Sterling and Aria's plan would have failed, but I don't think they were mentioned again, and I reread the first five chapters just to be sure.
If you want to make this more believable, then there are some ways you can make the gun quiet enough that it can be far more convincing that no one heard the shock. For example, maybe they're using a suppressor and subsonic ammo, which reduces the noise far more than just one or the other would. What kind of weapons are they using? I don't think the type of gun they're using is specified and is just referred to as a "gun." Now, these solutions aren't perfect since, well, guns are loud, but at least it makes it a little more believable if you're also using subsonic ammo and specifying the type of gun. To solve some of the unbelievability, maybe remove the snipers altogether and focus more on making the on-site security more of a threat. Those are just a couple of ideas and I'm not saying they're good or will work with your writing style, but they may help with believability.
For that reason, I would recommend slowing down during these scenes. Not necessarily with pacing, but more with mentality while writing. Slow down and think of all the possible things that can go wrong, and consider having them happen. Assassinating such important figures shouldn't be easy, even for experienced assassins. Giving them more setbacks and opportunities to fail not only increases the tension, but it characterizes them since we'll see how they respond to setbacks and how their different thinking/methods will either cause them to clash or succeed.
Like I said, the plot is overall good, it could just use some tweaks to make moments feel more believable so the audience isn't left scratching their heads, especially if multiple times throughout the book there are people commenting on how bad security or spies or opponents are. If it becomes a consistent part of the story, then it makes it feel like the heroes are never in danger, and we also don't get to see why they're as good as they are. In the secretive work they do, there are going to be setbacks, many of them, too. The best aren't people who don't face setbacks, the best are the ones who face them but manage to overcome it. I hope that makes sense.
Either way, I still think the plot is entertaining, and I had a blast reading about Aria and Sterling's adventures together.
Pacing: 8/10. The pacing is overall good and you have a good structure of event-setup-event-setup-event, so when each main event happens, we know more about the characters, world, and plot before they do. That means the events don't feel random.
The only critique I have is sometimes the chapters feel like they end a bit suddenly, or like there was more but they were split in half. Sometimes it feels like entire chapters could have been combined. For example, the two a sense of normalcy chapters felt like they could have been combined. The first part is 5 minutes, the second 4, so it would combine to be around 9 minutes, which is still around average and not too long. You had a nine minute chapter right before that arc with kill your emotions 2, so it's in the range you would expect for your chapter lengths. I say this because the ending of the first part of the normalcy chapters felt a bit sudden and like the conversation between Aria and Sterling that happened in the second part needed to happen right then and there, not later. It kinda felt unnecessarily split, is the simple way to phrase what I'm trying to say.
My recommendation would be when you're ending chapters, make sure they end for specific story reasons. When reading, sometimes it felt the chapters were ended just to keep them shorter and not because the conflict within the chapter was resolved (even if the "resolution" is not a true resolution and the problem remains unsolved, that's still a type of resolution). Every chapter has a conflict/main event of some kind, so when that event/conflict is resolved, it feels more natural for the chapter to come to an end, even if the ending is introducing a new conflict/event for the next chapter to cover. That's why I used the normalcy chapters as examples: the conflict stirring between Aria and Sterling wasn't resolved, so it felt a bit incomplete. Don't get me wrong, you can still have shorter chapters and make them come to a natural close, so I'm not saying combine all of them, but even if you're splitting them up into 2 or more parts, try to make sure the conflict/event within the first part has a clear resolution (again, even if it's unresolved and needs part 2 or 3 to resolve it). Like maybe end on a cliffhanger, or end with a question that sets up what the next chapter will be about, or something similar. I'm not saying those are good suggestions that will fit with your story, but I hope that by providing you with those examples, they help you brainstorm! I encourage you to find what works for you and your chapters!
I hope when I break it down like that, it makes sense!
Creativity: 8/10. The story idea, sentence structure, and vocabulary were all very good and felt fun to read.
Sometimes the story feels more sci-fi than action adventure due to the amount of tech and new inventions they have, like the atom crusher from chapter 7.1 that's mentioned. I would recommend being careful about how much new tech you introduce in a story that's meant to be more realistic. I admire your passion for wanting to invent new things, but be careful about the genre match in that case.
I bring this up in the creativity section because it relates to how you're presenting your story idea, so it is a major thing to consider for future stories you write in this genre since it risks making the narrative not match with the chosen genre.
However, other than that, I thought the creativity was great and definitely deserving of a high score!
Dialogue: 7/10. The dialogue overall accomplishes what it needs to, though I have some critiques.
Dialogue tags are done incorrectly when you're using special punctuation (for example, ?). For example: "What do you have on you?" The guard demanded. It should be: "What do you have on you?" the guard demanded. Since dialogue tags are continuations of the dialogue, it doesn't matter what the dialogue ends with, the tag still needs to be lowercase unless it's a proper noun.
While on the topic, I would suggest not using actions as dialogue tags, such as "groaned" or "sighed" or "grinned," all three are tags you use often. I say this because you can't really grin words. Maybe you can groan or sigh words, but even then, they're more actions than tags. Since tags are meant to describe how a voice sounds, saying "he grinned" as a tag doesn't really make sense since, again, you can't grin words. You can grin while talking, but that isn't grinning words, that's an action accompanied by words. It's debated whether or not actions can be used by tags, and everyone has different opinions on it, but for me personally, I don't think they work, especially when they're super easy to move so that they aren't tags anymore, but you still have the action there. I just never saw a purpose in using them as tags. But again, that's my opinion, and I know this is a debated topic, so I encourage you to look into it for yourself and see what you think will work with your style.
In general, I'd suggest the 50-30 advice of dialogue tags. This advice says that of your dialogue, 50% or less should have tags, and of that 50%, 30% or more should be said or asked. The reason is because dialogue tags are inherently telling over showing, so the more you can limit them, and also the more you can hide them by using plainer language, the better. That's just one advice that doesn't work for everyone, but I've found that my dialogue has become far more engaging after using it. I only bring this up because many times you'll have a conversation between two characters, with Sterling and Aria being the biggest example, and there will be a lot of tags when that isn't necessary. I can understand more tags if there are three or more people talking, but between two people, the audience will naturally know who is speaking as long as you're keeping their lines separate (which you are), not to mention you also have descriptions and actions surrounding the dialogue that clue us into who's speaking without you needing a tag.
Lastly, sometimes the dialogue made me scratch my head. For example, from the first chapter, "Do you really think that I can harm anyone here?" This is said by Aria to the guard while she's trying to convince them that she's not a threat. I don't know if it's just me, but I would immediately identify her as a threat based on that, especially when she tripped the metal detectors and she was walking perfectly fine before then, making her excuse about having surgery on her back a little hard to believe. I've had two surgeries on my left foot, and even though it's been over a year since my last one, I still walk a little funny. My mom had numerous back surgeries and walks in a certain way, which is why I'm saying Aria, if she wants to sell the act, should probably walk in a certain way that implies she's had work done. The guard also doesn't search her purse after she says she has medicine in there.
Just because Aria later acknowledges that the security is bad doesn't mean it eliminates the problem. When you have the characters acknowledging the flimsy security, it doesn't feel like it's eliminating the problem, it feels like we can see you, the author, trying to pass it off because the plot needs to happen. It also feels contradictory because one moment Aria says the security is bad, especially for a rich man, then Sterling says there are snipers and cops in the crowd and it'll be hard to take the place down. That raises the question: Is the place really hard to take down because of good security, or is it easy to infiltrate? We were shown it was easy and the guards didn't even bother searching her purse or raising red flags about the metal detector going off, but told it's going to be hard to take the place down due to security. But then when they actually do the plan, they don't face a single setback and escape easily, so there isn't much tension. I hope when I break it down like that, it makes sense why this lines of dialogue felt contradictory and a bit like a head scratcher. Like I said, just because it's acknowledged in the text doesn't make it any less confusing or less of an inconsistency, so I would suggest instead of having the characters acknowledge it, maybe try to find ways to eliminate needing to acknowledge it at all.
There are ways you can go about fixing this. One suggestion is to have them prepare this excuse in advance by making sure she has medicine in her purse and have her limp or walk poorly up to the guards. While it may still be a stretch that they wouldn't search Sterling and Aria, at least her excuse is far more believable, and her dialogue makes more sense. That's just one suggestion and I'm not saying it's good or the one you should go with, but I hope seeing someone else's perspective helps you brainstorm and get inspired!
Overall, the dialogue is good, and I hope those suggestions make sense.
Worldbuilding: 9/10. The Syndicate world feels very interesting to read, and I was engaged the entire time. I wanted to know more about their missions, who they were sent to execute, who their boss was, etc. Those are good thoughts to have while reading since they keep me guessing and make me want to unravel the plot in my head.
Like I mentioned in the creativity section, sometimes there were new inventions being added to the story that made it a little hard to follow at times, and it made the world feel a little inconsistent when they were brought up. I admire that you want to be ambitious, though I would recommend downsizing where you feel you can so the genre still feels grounded in reality.
However, that's a small thing in otherwise really good world. You did a great job with this!
Grammar/Spelling: 8.5/10. The grammar is overall very solid and does a good job staying consistently solid throughout the entire story. The only two major grammar errors were the special dialogue tags I already explained in the dialogue section, and some comma errors I wrote a detailed explanation for in the blurb section. For that reason, I don't have much to say here as it was either already explained or going to be explained, but in summary, the grammar/spelling was good other than some missing commas and dialogue tag issues. Even though I go into the comma errors later, I will mention some errors here.
Here's an example from chapter 5.2: "Every birthday, her aunt would set up different animal plushie that would swing into her face the moment she walked into the door; and on holidays she'd be bombarded with glitter or powder or sometimes even water."
Here is the corrected version of the sentence: "Every birthday, her aunt would set up different animal plushies that would swing into her face the moment she walked through the door, and on holidays, she'd be bombarded with glitter or powder or sometimes even water."
I changed "into" to "through," removed the semicolon and replaced it with a comma, and put a comma after "holidays." That's one example of the missing commas. I would suggest reading sentences out loud or plugging them into a TTS generator if you are ever unsure about where commas go since reading them out loud can really help identify where a sentence needs a pause. I hope that makes sense, though I will give more examples in the blurb section.
Description: 8.5/10. The descriptions in the story are overall good and do a good job incorporating some of the five senses to bring the scenes to life. I particularly enjoy the way Sterling is described.
The only critique I have is to make sure descriptions match the emotion you're trying to portray. The biggest example I have is Aria and Edward. When she first bumps into him, it really feels romantic and like they were in a relationship, like when she's thinking about his warm arms and also relating them to cuddling, which is something couples typically do, not male and female friends. I definitely thought they were romantic partners and was shocked to discover they weren't since it felt her initial description of him + her extremely strong reaction to the possibility of him being alive (to the point where it's throwing off her work) made it seem more romantic. With Aria seeing a lot of death and running the risk of losing her friends in her line of work, it does seem a little strange that someone she only saw as a friend would throw off her game that much. I can understand it wobbling her, but it felt like she was completely losing her robotic facade.
However, other than that, I really liked the descriptions and felt you did a great job with them. They never felt too much or too little, and you never risked having purple prose or anything of the sort. Really well done!
Themes and Emotions: 8.5/10. The themes are clear pretty early on in the story and make sense for the chosen plot and characters. The emotions are diverse and also make sense for the plot and characters. Like I mentioned earlier, each character has their own special set of emotions they're known for, which makes the emotions easy to attach to. Sterling, Aria, and Aria's mom in particular have very distinct emotions you can read just by having them open their mouths, haha. But that's a good thing since the more readers can identify the characters through their emotions and how they carry themselves, the better.
My criticisms are the same as they were earlier: I recommend keeping the emotions as consistent as possible within the descriptions, and also consider adding a little more consistency for major plot events so the readers are more grounded in the moment and have more of a chance to feel the emotions you're trying to display.
Otherwise, the emotions and themes are good!
Title/Blurb/Cover: 7.5/10. The title involves emotional words (bound, deception) and has a lack of weasel words, making it pretty SEO-friendly. It also matches the story and evokes reader curiosity. For that reason, I have no criticisms for the title.
The blurb is good. There are some grammar errors, mainly with punctuation. For example, from the first paragraph: "Between Aria's photographic memory and Sterling's irresistible charm, the two make an excellent duo, however, they both hide dark secrets from each other and their families. Aria, who is disabled, keeps her second life away from her family and Sterling never mentions his parents."
There are two punctuation errors here. One, in the first sentence, the comma before however should be a semicolon. This will help the sentence flow a little stronger and have the pause sound more natural and longer. Second, in the second sentence, there should be a comma before "and" and after "family" since you're mentioning Sterling, a new subject.
Similarly, this sentence: "Feelings for Aria resurface and he has no idea how to control it." There should be a comma after "resurface" and before "and." The "it" should also be "them" because of agreement. "Feelings" is what the "it" is agreeing with, so "it" should be "them."
The blurb does a good job saying what the story is about, and it's also a good length. I would just recommend tweaking some of those grammar errors. Otherwise, good job!
The cover is overall good. I like the burning house since it makes me curious to know what the story is going to be about. I like the font and text placement, too. The only very minor critique I have is to consider turning up the brightness by a hair, and when I say a hair, I really mean just a couple of points at most. The reason is because the background is dark, and the two human figures are small with one of them (the man) wearing dark clothing. I didn't notice them there are first, and with the darker clothing on the man, I had to zoom in to see him. The woman is wearing darker clothing too, though since it isn't a similar color as the background image, she stands out a bit more, but still a bit hard to see. That's why I recommend a tiny tweak to the brightness so they're a bit easier to see, though that's just one suggestion, and I encourage you to get second opinions before making any changes!
Total: 80.5/100.
Honorable Mention
A Night With No Stars by MercuryEff
Review:
Characters: 8.5/10. The characters in the story are good, have interesting personalities, and have complex thoughts and feelings that make them feel more realistic. Maks is probably my favorite because I love his dynamic with Ewelina, and also his internal conflict with her. Seeing people naturally drift apart and have different interests as they grow and change as people is very interesting to see, and I think you wrote it well. I also like how Maks clings to Aleks as if Aleks is the only thing that can give Maks more purpose and meaning in his life. It's like he's looking for that thrill, for someone to set him free from the restrictions his own mind set on him. Aleks as an individual has a strong, clear personality and an intriguing introduction that makes the audience question who the heck this person is and how they're going to impact the plot.
The main criticism I have has to do with character emotions and how they're portrayed. Like how sometimes the dialogue and character actions felt a bit longer than they needed to be/overstuffed due to the frequent presence of filler words, adverbs, and repeating word choice (like the word "look" being used often). However, I wrote detailed explanations for all of these things later in this review, so I will let future me explain in more detail. I'll give a general suggestion here anyway: I'd recommend trying to cut down on the overstuffing wherever you see fit to help character emotions stand out more, but I will explain more later.
Other than those things, the characters are very good.
Plot: 9/10. The plot overall flows smoothly, makes sense, and is clear from the beginning of the narrative. I didn't notice any plot holes or inconsistencies. The plot also matches with the characters and their personalities. It's a good plot that's very entertaining to read. I was never bored while reading.
The prologue doesn't really feel like a prologue. There is a major difference between a prologue and first chapter, but the prologue feels more like chapter one than a prologue. All the main characters are present and it's happening in the current timeline of the story. So, to me, it didn't feel like anything separated the prologue from being chapter one. The reason I bring this up here is because prologues give the readers expectations for how a story is going to start, so when it's different from what a prologue is, it can be a little confusing to readers. If you had any particular reason in mind as to why you called it a prologue instead of chapter one, I'd be curious to hear your thought process!
Other than that, I thought the plot made sense.
Pacing: 8/10. There were many long paragraphs back-to-back throughout the story, and I would recommend cutting them up wherever you see fit to increase the readability. It can be hard to read walls of text, and some of the paragraphs were so long that they took up more than a page on my laptop, which means they're about over 14 lines long. I myself write long paragraphs, so I'm not saying to never use them, I'm more cautioning against using so many back-to-back, especially if they're getting longer than 10 lines.
There were some sentences that had too many words in them and thus slowed the pace unnecessarily, but I already wrote an explanation for that in the next section, so I'll let future me explain.
The pacing is otherwise good, and I felt the plot events and information about the characters revealed themselves at natural times.
Creativity: 6/10. The story idea itself is creative, and the sentence structure is overall okay and works for the narrative.
I would suggest using less filler words. By filler words, I mean words like "just" and "that." "Just" is an emphasis word, so the more you use it, the less impact it has later on. Sometimes you use it more than once in a paragraph. For example, from the prologue, the paragraph that starts with "That should probably set off alarm bells..." near the end of the chapter. "Just" is used twice in that paragraph.
I would also suggest using less adverbs. Adverbs are telling over showing and are, in many cases, not needed. You use a bunch of adverbs in every chapter, which is why I'm bringing it up. I would recommend going into Google Docs or Word and using the find and replace tool to look up ly. From there, find any words that end with -ly and consider removing them.
The word choice is overall good, though there are some words that are repeated often. The most prominent example is the word "look." Since "look" has so many synonyms, I'd strongly suggest eliminating that word wherever you can or modifying the sentence to the point where you don't need to use "look" or any of its synonyms at all.
The story idea is creative and engaged me with the text. All I recommend is tightening some of the presentation, then the creativity would be even stronger!
Dialogue: 7/10. The dialogue is overall good and does a solid job presenting the emotions of the characters in clear ways.
I would strongly suggest using less dialogue tags. Almost every line has a tag, and sometimes, when just one person is speaking, you'll put 2-4 tags, all for the same person. It got a bit distracting at times, and I'd also recommend downsizing because tags are inherently telling over showing, so the more you use, the more avoidable telling over showing you're doing.
For example, in the chapter titled Welcome to the Jungle. There are about 66 paragraphs including dialogue. Of those 66 paragraphs, at least 52 have dialogue tags. Since there were many long paragraphs with multiple tags within said paragraphs, it's highly likely I missed 3-6 of them. That means almost 80% of your dialogue has tags when that isn't needed. I would recommend the 50-30 advice for dialogue. This advice states that of your dialogue, 50% or less should have tags, and of that 50%, 30% or more should be said or asked.
The reason is because, like I mentioned earlier, tags are inherently telling over showing, so the more you're using them, the more unnecessary telling over showing you're doing, and the reason using said or asked is preferred is because by using more complex tags, you're risking taking attention away from what really matters: the dialogue. That's why I would suggest introducing who's speaking with speech style or actions more than tags, that way you're doing more showing over telling and also eliminating unnecessary tags. I would also suggest not using more than one tag when the same person is talking unless it's a drastic change in how they're talking, like they go from shouting to whispering, but even then, you don't need a tag for that and you can describe how a voice drops from a shout to a whisper.
I would also suggest not using actions as dialogue tags. Words like "shrugged" or "smiled" are what I'm talking about. The reason is because tags refer to how words are being spoken, so you can't smile or shrug words. You can shrug and smile while speaking, but the words themselves can't shrug or smile. By using actions like that as dialogue tags, it's implying the words are literally smiling or shrugging, which is impossible. It's debated whether or not actions can be used as tags, though I personally believe they cannot, and I would suggest not using them as tags.
I mentioned the filler words earlier in the creativity section, and the same applies to dialogue where sometimes you're including words like "that" and "just" unnecessarily. I would recommend removing them to increase the flow of the dialogue. For example: "...I could probably believe that you are one and just stopped growing in the middle of adolescence." If you read it once with the "that," then without it, you'll notice it flows better without it. "That" is used more in description than in dialogue, and there are less cases of the word appearing as the story goes on, but I still thought it was something worth mentioning. I'm not going to take off much for this since it isn't as consistent.
Otherwise, the dialogue is good.
Worldbuilding: 9/10. The world is very clear and interesting, and I like how you described it. I think it perfectly matches the genre of the narrative, and I like how the characters interact with the world around them!
The only minor criticism I have ties back into the pacing where sometimes it feels like sometimes you're trying to do too much, which makes the world feel a bit overwhelming at times. To alleviate this, I'd suggest cutting back on the filler words like I mentioned earlier, and also giving more breaks in between descriptions to give us more immediate scene and action, or doing more interweaving where actions are happening at the same time descriptions are.
Other than that, I like the worldbuilding.
Grammar/Spelling: 9/10. There were some overstuffed sentences like I mentioned earlier, which made the flow of the sentences hard to follow. Other than that, the spelling and grammar was good. Great job. I don't have much to say about this section since I didn't notice any consistent grammar or spelling errors.
Description: 7.5/10. There were many fun and vibrant descriptions that elevated the world, characters, and emotions within the narrative. You have an eye for detail, especially when it comes to describing how a character thinks to themselves. There were many scenes where I was extremely invested, and I overall enjoyed your writing style.
As I talked about earlier, be careful with how many long paragraphs you're using. Many times, you'll use really long (10+ lines) back-to-back, which makes it walls of text. Walls of text tend to harm reader engagement and make the descriptions feel less impactful than they otherwise could be.
There were times you had what's called "director's notes," which are moments of telling over showing where it feels like you, the author, are talking directly to us, the audience, to tell us what a character is thinking or feeling. From the prologue, there's this: "It looked pretty thin; he must have been cold." The "he must have been cold" is the director's note where you were unnecessarily doing telling over showing. Instead of directly telling the audience he was cold, consider showing the man shivering, or his teeth clattering together, or him rubbing his arms and hunching his shoulders to keep his body smaller + warmer, etc. There are many short ways you can do showing over telling and reach the same conclusion (he was cold), but the difference is it's more engaging since you're trusting your audience to draw that conclusion from the clues you give us instead of directly telling us. That's what I mean when I say director's notes, and I recommend cutting down on them whenever you have an opportunity to.
I also talked about the dialogue tags and how I think you could benefit from using less tags and instead introduce characters based on actions and speech style. Any areas where you can eliminate telling over showing could be beneficial. Of course telling is sometimes necessary and it doesn't immediately make you wrong if you use it, I would just recommend cutting out whatever you feel you can!
Otherwise, the descriptions are good.
Themes and Emotions: 7.5/10. I think Maks is a very strong character with strong emotions attached to him, and he's the emotional core of the story through his complex inner conflict that makes his emotions go back and forth, up and down, sideways and backwards. He really goes through it, but that's a good thing since it makes for an engaging protagonist and emotional theme. Overall, the emotions and themes in the narrative are very complex and interesting.
The only criticisms I have tie back into things I've talked about earlier, primarily with telling over showing through the extra dialogue tags, the long paragraphs back-to-back, and also the overstuffing of sentences that sometimes made the emotional weight not as impactful as it could be.
Other than those three things, I think the emotions and themes are solid, especially through the lens of Maks, who is a great protagonist.
Title/Blurb/Cover: 7/10. The title works for the story, is grammatically correct, and has style. It has a good SEO score due to the size of the title and the easy readability it has. No criticisms.
The blurb is a little vague. There's no mention of the character names, and we don't even know the gender of the first character mentioned. If it weren't for the last sentence saying this is a crime story, the blurb would give no implication of genre. It's very hard to tell what the story is going to be about, same with who it's going to be about. I would suggest expanding and giving the audience more details, and also tweaking some of the grammar.
Here is what I mean: "One of them is a boring, soon to be married financier." There should be hyphens there, like: "One of them is a boring, soon-to-be-married financier." Secondly: "According to the logic, their encounter should result in disaster, but life is rarely logical and the worst madness can sometimes make the most sense." With some tweaks: "According to logic, their encounter should result in disaster, but life is rarely logical, and the worst madness can sometimes make the most sense." I removed "the" before logic since it wasn't needed, and I added a comma before "and" and after "logical." Lastly: "A crime story with a slight touch of soul searching in the human jungle, with murder and romance in the background." There should be a hyphen in between "soul" and "searching," and this is a sentence fragment. While sentence fragments can be used in creative writing, I would advise against using them for blurbs since clarity is key so audiences can get hooked into your story. For that reason, I would suggest rewording this sentence to make it complete.
The cover is very nice and has a great color scheme. I love the silhouette being covered with stars. The only minor suggestion I have is to consider moving the title text down a bit so the "T" at the end of "NIGHT" is lined up with the curve of the lips. You have room at the bottom to move it down a bit, so it could be interesting to see what it looks like when moved down. I say that because the "T" is very close to overlapping with the silhouette, so moving it down might give it more space. However, that's just a small suggestion and not one I'm saying you absolutely have to do. You might try to move it down and hate how it looks, so I encourage you to play around with it and see what works for you! I overall like the cover and think it fits the story.
Total: 78.5/100.
REVIEWS:
Crooked Hearts by MMDCraftyMice
Review:
Characters: 8/10. The characters are solid throughout the entire narrative, and I like the way you wrote them. I'd say Alice is my favorite, though I like the others, like Emrys, as well. There wasn't a single character I felt was weak or didn't contribute to the book, which is really important when writing characters. Getting them involved and giving them dynamics with the other characters gives the audience more to read and have fun with, and you do a good job giving us many entertaining scenarios where the characters are challenged and pushed to their limits.
The main critiques I have of the characters has to do with the dialogue sometimes feeling unnatural due to the frequent presence of filler words and semicolons. It made some of the emotions of the characters not as strong as they could have been. However, I wrote a very detailed explanation in the creativity and dialogue sections explaining the filler words and semicolons, so I will explain more thoroughly later.
Other than some dialogue critiques, I think the characters are great.
Plot: 10/10. The plot is overall very interesting, and it hooked me from as early as the blurb. You do a good job showing us new ideas/concepts that will make anyone reading want to continue the book. I didn't notice any plot holes or inconsistencies. All in all, the plot is very good, and I have no criticisms!
Pacing: 8/10. The pacing is overall good and I only have minor suggestions.
Your sentences can sometimes get very long, making the pacing slow down a little too much, in my opinion. Especially during fight scenes, the sentences feel a little long and could be broken up more by using shorter bursts instead of long sentences that have a lot of commas and semicolons along with -ing words. I wrote a little bit more about sentence structure in the next section, so I'll talk more about it soon.
Overall, the pacing is good, but for action scenes, having high engagement and intense moments is crucial for keeping readers invested, which is why I'm suggesting considering breaking up your sentences more and experimenting with your structure.
Creativity: 6/10. Your word choice is overall good, though there were also times you repeated words unnecessarily, in my opinion. For example, "thick" is used twice unnecessarily in the first chapter first paragraph, and the word "mist" is used 5+ times in the first chapter. I would suggest playing around with word choice whenever you can. You don't have to get too complex with it, and in fact, I'd recommend you don't try to get too complicated, but it's worth considering playing around a little more with those kinds of words. Some words are repeated often throughout the whole story, like "inhale" and "look." For example, "look" is used I believe 5+ times in chapter 19 just in the first POV, not even including the rest of the chapter. Three of those 5+ uses are in one paragraph (the second to last one before the POV switch to Emrys). That's what I mean when I say sometimes the word choice becomes a bit repetitive and could benefit from being changed up, especially for a word like "look," which has many synonyms.
I would suggest playing around with your sentence structure. Many of the sentences include more than one comma and have -ing words. There aren't many sentences with no punctuation (excluding end punctuation), only one comma, dashes, colons, etc. Consider adding more diversity to your sentence structure so the text feels even fresher and more engaging.
You also use a lot of semicolons. Later, in the grammar section, I'll explain that there were times you used commas when you needed semicolons, which is why I'm recommending using less since there should be even more. For example, a little over halfway through chapter 1, you use 5+ semicolons within only a few paragraphs. Since semicolons are advanced punctuation, the more they're used, the more likely you are to have a grammar error, and they're more noticeable than commas. I recommend using them sparingly. Along with that, using semicolons risks overcomplicating sentences. For diversity in the sentence structure, I encourage you to play around with them, just be careful you aren't using them so often that they're appearing in every paragraph or every other paragraph. Some writers don't recommend using a semicolon at all throughout entire stories, though I think it's perfectly fine to use them as long as they're in moderation, and that's what I'd recommend for you!
The overall story idea is very creative and has a lot of intrigue that will make the reader want to continue reading.
Dialogue: 6.5/10. The dialogue has some good moments, though I do have some critiques.
Dialogue tags are done incorrectly. They're done like this: "If we stay, do you think we would make it to the end?" He protests. Since tags are continuations of the dialogue, they need to be lowercase unless they are a proper noun. So, like this: "If we stay, do you think we would make it to the end?" he protests. Think of it this way: tags are part of the same sentence, and you wouldn't randomly capitalize a Word in the middle of a sentence, right? See how it looks unnatural that I capitalized "Word" when it isn't a proper noun? The same applies to tags, which is why they're always lowercase unless they are proper nouns, even when the dialogue ends with special punctuation (like ?).
Along with that, you often use tags but have a period/full stop at the end of the dialogue, which you can't do. When using a tag, you can end dialogue in anything other than a period/full stop. Here's an example from chapter 19: "With my heart and soul." I assure him...
What it should be: "With my heart and soul," I assure him.
In the previous section, I mentioned limiting how many semicolons you use. There are a lot of semicolons in your dialogue, and I would strongly suggest removing most if not all of them. There are a couple reasons. For one, the overcomplication point I mentioned earlier. Overcomplicating the dialogue will make it harder to attach to the characters and understand their emotions. Most of the semicolons in the dialogue feel unnecessary. For example: "She just misses you; you both could've returned as heroes, instead you're here as criminals." The only thing the semicolon is doing there that a full stop/period doesn't do is complicating the sentence, which is why I'm recommending you consider using far less semicolons in dialogue. Two, a good friend of mine, hopelessromintic, once made a good point that humans don't really speak in a way that warrants semicolons, and I agree. We don't talk in that sort of way, so using semicolons in dialogue can look unnatural at times.
There are some chapters where you use less semicolons, like chapter 12 doesn't have as many as, for example, chapter 1. Still, there are many semicolons present in that chapter despite there being less, and I'm bringing this up to show how this is something that happens throughout the entire story and something worth considering tweaking when writing future books.
Lastly, I'd recommend giving more space to dialogue. Sometimes you'll have a long paragraph and then dialogue attached to the very end of it. So like if I were to add a line of dialogue to the previous paragraph after the "...when writing future books." That's not to say you should never put dialogue at the end of paragraphs, though I caution against it since it can make the dialogue not feel as impactful and/or get lost in the words, especially if it's not closely related to what the paragraph is saying.
Like I said, the dialogue has moments where it's really good, it could just use some tweaks to the presentation to give it more emotion. I hope that makes sense!
Worldbuilding: 10/10. The worldbuilding in this story is clear and fun to read about, and there were many moments that had me hooked on what was happening. For example, in chapter twenty with the paragraph starting with: "I load a paper cartridge of black powder..." It's near the beginning of the chapter. That paragraph was very engaging for me, and I enjoyed reading it. The imagery and how you described what Alice was doing was engaging and added subtle details to the world. It adds to the world because you're showing us the routine of the characters and how they interact with the objects in their environment. Those small details matter, and you did a good job bringing them to life.
Grammar/Spelling: 6/10. The spelling is overall good, though there are consistent grammar errors.
I'll try my best to keep the examples close together so you don't have to play musical chapters to find them.
There are consistent agreement errors, like: "I look up at the sky but see nothing but thick canopies that allow only a handful of light to pierce through, their leaves like a thousand eyes staring down at me obscured by mists, mists that slithers around us like trails of ghosts, Thick and suffocating" (chap 1).
The issue is the "slithers" near the end of the sentence, and also "thick" being capitalized. So thick should be lowercase, and "slithers" should be "slither."
Here's another example: "His hair are medium length at the top but thin at the sides, looking sharp yet casual in a messy side part." In this case, the "are" is the issue since it doesn't agree with "hair." The "are" should be "is."
Moving away from agreement, there are some comma errors. Example: "Yet the commander of the army insists on marching through, a tactical error but who are we to protest it?" There should be a comma before "but" and after "error."
This is a consistent error where you often omit commas before conjunctions. Not every conjunction needs a comma before it depending on the sentence, but in most cases, there needs to be a comma.
Similarly, there are many times you use commas when you need colons or semicolons. Example: "I inhale sharply, there is no room for hesitation on the battlefield." The comma needs to be a semicolon since you are connecting two similar ideas, but they aren't directly connected by something like a conjunction.
Description: 7/10. There are some very good descriptions in the story, like the one I mentioned in the worldbuilding section. You do an overall good job immersing us in your world and incorporating small details that rewards readers for paying close attention to what you're saying. Having those smaller details is fantastic for engagement.
I can tell you have a clear idea for what you want to describe, and I think that's good. I only have a few critiques to help with the presentation of these cool ideas. For one, there are many filler words, like "that," present in your sentences. For example: "...the girls always say that they are charming..." The "that" isn't needed. The word "that" is necessary in some sentences, but you'd be surprised just how many you can cut out. I'd suggest if you see a sentence with the word "that," read the sentence first with it, then without it and see if it feels necessary. In most cases, removing the "that" helps the flow of the sentence, therefore strengthening the flow of your descriptions. This also appears in dialogue, and I would suggest trimming it out of dialogue as well.
Secondly, like I mentioned earlier, you could benefit from diversity in your sentence structure and being careful not to repeat words too often, that way the descriptions will feel even more fresh and interesting to read about. By tweaking the presentation of the descriptions, I think they can be even stronger, and I'd also recommend using less semicolons like I mentioned before, that way you aren't overcomplicating descriptions and keeping them easy to read and understand.
The descriptions are overall good.
Themes and Emotions: 7/10. The themes and emotions are overall very clear and interesting to read about. There are many different emotions present throughout the story, and I think that gives us, the readers, a chance to see more sides to the characters that helps us get more attached to them.
My main criticisms for the emotions stems back to things I've said earlier, mostly with dialogue. Some of the dialogue feels a little unnatural due to the presence of semicolons and filler words, and by tweaking that, the emotions present in the dialogue could be stronger. Since dialogue is one of the major ways emotions are displayed, I feel it's important to bring that up again. The other thing is the diversity in sentence structure and word choice so the sentences and words feel more impactful and fun to read, but since I already explained that, I won't go into detail here.
Other than those criticisms, I think the themes and emotions are good.
Title/Blurb/Cover: 8/10. Crooked Hearts is a title I've seen many times. Even in my state, New York, there's a tattoo place named Crooked Hearts, and also many books and films named it. However, I don't think how often a title is done determines its merit. Based on the blurb, I can tell both of the main characters have their own issues and problems to deal with, leading me to believe they literally have crooked hearts, so I'm okay with the title being what it is and won't take off any points for it. I would recommend maybe playing around with it and seeing if there are different titles that can have a little more pop to them, but I don't think there's anything wrong with the title as is.
The blurb is overall good and gives the reader a solid idea of what the story is going to be about. The only minor critique I have is the very last sentence being "To put the life of violence behind him for good?" Starting the sentence with the "To" and making it slightly incomplete was a bit hard to read, in my opinion. I like using incomplete sentences for style purposes, though not too often, and not for blurbs. The reason is because blurbs are where your writing should be its clearest so the audience knows whether or not they want to click the "read" button. That's why I'd suggest something more along the lines of "Will he put the life of violence behind him for good?" I also say that because the previous sentence is "Will he find a way out?", so the language could match and have a nice repetition of the "Will he." That's just one suggestion, but it's your writing style and I never want to discourage authors from writing the way they want to, so I encourage you to find what works for you and only take this suggestion if you're 100% interested in it. I don't think that final sentence is a bad sentence by any means, and it certainly doesn't take away from the overall solid blurb, I just thought I'd mention it!
The cover has a beautiful image with an appealing art style that immediately hooked me in. I love all the colors. My only critique is the title is very small and hard to see, and the color blends in a bit with the girl's outfit. I'd suggest making it more noticeable and maybe consider playing around with the colors to give it more of a pop. If I didn't zoom in, I may not have noticed the title at all, that's why I strongly suggest making it easier to see. Other than that critique, I think the cover is good.
Total: 76.5/100.
The Fenrir Saga - Part I by CarolineHallonback
Review:
Characters: 7.5/10. There are a lot of characters, but I don't think that's a bad thing by any means. There were certainly more than I was expecting, but as someone who adores characters, I'm not gonna complain about that! I liked how different the characters were in terms of their core personalities. All the characters have unique and fleshed out backstories that make sense for the story. I found myself liking Beonnie the most. She had some moments where she was very dramatic, but not in a bad way cause I'm dramatic as all heck (I'm a Cancer, it's my job to be dramatic 💅). For example, when she was fangirling over Zac, she was super dramatic, and I love that for her. I found her rather endearing, and I wanted her to succeed. I also liked Zac's character introduction being so romanticized, then the descent as he says things "off the script," like Beonnie said.
I have two critiques. One is more minor, the other is major since it's dialogue.
One, I would suggest a little more balance for the characters. I'll talk about it more throughout the review, but sometimes it feels like you're trying to do too much. I admire that and I would much rather an author get ambitious and want to do too much, though be careful you aren't doing so much that we start to forget about the other characters. For example, Hild. Hild is forgotten about for several chapters in the beginning of the story. She has a very brief appearance in the first couple chapters, then we don't hear from her again until chapter 9. It's not a huge deal, but considering she's advertised as the second lead, it felt a little strange to not know much about our second lead until over an hour and a half into the story.
Two, there's something with dialogue I'd like to talk about where I feel you can incorporate more into the dialogue to make it feel more realistic and give the characters more individuality; however, I already wrote a long explanation for this in the dialogue section before I wrote this part of the review, so I will let my future self explain it.
Overall, the characters were good.
Plot: 8.5/10. The plot makes sense and I didn't notice any major plot holes. It's unique, and I really enjoy the connection to mythology. I like supernatural stories with Shadowhunters being one of my feel-good shows, so I may be biased when I say this, but I enjoy all the werewolves and seeing how you created their world.
The only points taken off were for pacing issues that impacted my understanding and engagement with the plot. I will explain this in the next section!
Pacing: 6.5/10. When the pacing is flowing out, it flows out very well. I think the pacing gets far stronger in the second half of the story, though I do have some critiques for how it's handled in the first half.
Three critiques for the pacing. One, I'll go over it in detail in the grammar section, but many times it feels like you're overstuffing your sentences and putting a lot of excess words in, which makes the flow not as smooth as it could be. I'll have an example in the grammar section and I'll explain more there, but I just thought I'd mention it here since it slows the reading speed and the overall pacing of the story.
Two, there's a lot of exposition, which makes the first chapter in particular hard to follow. I found myself feeling a little unengaged halfway through Hild's part since I had just read a lot of exposition for Beonnie, now I was getting the same amount of exposition for Hild. I like the decision to have them both start with their thoughts of running away, though I would recommend picking and choosing what you really need. For the first chapter in particular, it's crucial to have solid pacing and not do too much summary, that way more audience members will get hooked. I would recommend doing more scene rather than summary since the majority of the first chapter is summary (or telling over showing, in other words).
It goes beyond the first chapter. There's a lot of exposition throughout the book, and sometimes it can get overwhelming, especially since many of the paragraphs are long (8 or more lines). I'll talk about it more in the next section, but you have long sentences and paragraphs that can feel like we're reading walls of text. There are some really good moments of writing style, so that's not to say it's all long sentences or paragraphs because that isn't true, though I would recommend downsizing on the exposition and long sentences/paragraphs wherever you think you can.
Three, sometimes the POVs switch too many times per chapter, in my opinion. Like in chapter 7, there are four POV changes in only twelve minutes. I personally am not a big fan of switching POVs in one chapter at all since I feel more times than not it interrupts narrative flow, though I understand the appeal of it and why it can be used positively. However, I feel you don't need that many POV changes in such a short amount of time. Like I said earlier, there are times you overstuff your sentences to include too much, and the same applies to chapter content. I would recommend considering areas to trim and considering combining POVs to make one (i.e., can any of the things happening in Zac's POV be done in Beonnie's, or vice versa?), that way we aren't jumping between POVs that many times per chapter.
Like I said earlier, when the pacing is going, it's going and it's very good. It's just that since pacing is so crucial for the beginning of a story, my critiques are worth considering for future stories. I hope that makes sense!
Creativity: 7.5/10. The story idea itself is very creative, and the vocabulary is overall good. I only have a couple critiques.
Some of the sentences and paragraphs got a bit repetitive due to most of the sentences and paragraphs being long, like I mentioned before. Many of the sentences have 3+ commas each (showing how long they are), and many of the paragraphs are 8 or more lines long. While it isn't a huge deal to have longer paragraphs, it can become difficult to keep engagement up when they're back-to-back.
I believe another commenter mentioned it, but there's a lot of passive voice in this story, and I felt there were areas you could have eliminated it. Most notably, the first chapter I believe had more passive voice than active. While I don't think there's too much you can do about it, if there are any areas you can cut down, I'd definitely recommend it.
The story is overall creative and deserves a high score.
Dialogue: 7/10. The dialogue is overall good and has good grammar within it. I only have a few critiques for the presentation.
Some of the dialogue is a bit too expository, like in chapter two, the couple happens to say everything the audience and Beonnie needs to know. They talk very formally for mates, and that's because it's mostly exposition to inform us of their situation even though they have no idea anyone's watching. It feels like they're talking directly to the audience, not each other.
I'm not a huge fan of the way the dialogue is formatted. I'm a big dialogue tag hater, so I'm glad you don't use them most of the time, though I feel you could add a few more here and there since sometimes it gets hard to follow who's speaking. Many times you'll have dialogue with little to no description between the lines, so the dialogue is like this:
"Hi."
"Hey."
"How are you?"
"I'm good. You?"
"Great, thanks. Where are you going?"
"The park. Wanna come with?"
"Sure!"
Do you see how that's a lot of dialogue but not a lot going on? Sometimes you'll also do it like this:
"Hi."
"Hey."
He smiled.
"How are you?"
"I'm good. You?"
"Great, thanks. Where are you going?"
She contemplated it.
"The park. Wanna come with?"
"Sure!"
(Not from the story, just a random example off the top of my head to show how the dialogue is done)
That dialogue isn't very engaging because when we have conversations, things are constantly happening around us. I sometimes say the things I'm typing as I'm typing them, and even as I'm talking to myself right now, there's a fan blowing, making a noise. My nail sometimes gets stuck between one of the keys. My covers are blowing in the soft breeze. My hair is blowing. The calculator I'm using to add up scores is flashing in my peripheral vision. All of this is happening while I'm talking to myself, and I'm just one person. Now imagine a conversation between two or more people, let alone one happening in a whacky, uncontrolled environment like a forest.
For that reason, I'd recommend incorporating more descriptions into the dialogue. Not too much, but maybe instead of having "He smiled," maybe describe his voice instead. Does his voice get lower? Does it crack? Does he clear his throat? Does he sound breathy? Croaky? Maybe describe his body language. Does he move closer to her? Does he have any quirks he does while talking (like biting his nails, talking with his hands, etc.)?
That's not to say you never do this because that's not true. There are times you do it and do it well. I forgot which character it was, but one, I think maybe Tristan, ran his hands through his hair as a little quirk he had. That's good! I really like that. What I'm recommending is incorporating more of that into the conversations, that way the dialogue feels more alive and engaging, and it's also easier to tell who's speaking without you needing to use tags. I'm 100% with you about not using tags since I personally hate them, though they are necessary sometimes. However, as a replacement, maybe consider having more descriptions and short character actions to show us who's speaking instead of telling us. This will also help characterize your characters.
Lastly, I would suggest not using actions as dialogue tags. Sometimes you use something like "she tilted her head and looked at us" (chap 15) as a tag. It's implied it's a tag because the dialogue has a comma and the "she" is lowercase. That's not a tag, that's an action. Tags refer to how you're speaking words, and while you can tilt your head while speaking, you cannot tilt words like a head, which is what using "she tilted her head" as a tag is implying. You also use words like "smiled" as a tag, but again, you can smile while speaking, but you can't smile words.
It's debated whether or not actions can be used as tags, though I personally believe they are very awkward and unnatural, and they also disrupt flow. The only difference between "*insert dialogue." She tilted her head and looked at us, and "*insert dialogue," she tilted her head and looked at us, is that the second one disrupts the flow more and makes it seem like she's tilting the words like a head. That's why I never really understood the purpose of actions as tags and why I always recommend authors don't use them. However, I understand it's a debated topic, so if you personally don't agree, it's your style, so I won't stop you or try to discourage you from using what you're comfortable with.
It's overall good dialogue, I would just recommend taking it to the next level by incorporating more of what's happening around the characters and within the characters to make it stand out more.
Worldbuilding: 10/10. I have no critiques for the worldbuilding. The world is very fleshed out, and I can tell you had a clear idea in your head for where you wanted the world to go + how you wanted it to be described. There were many worldbuilding elements I thought were fascinating, like the entire concept behind mates and how they feel around each other. You put so much love and care into this, and it paid off seeing as I think the worldbuilding is awesome. Overall, you did an excellent job, and you absolutely deserve a perfect score.
Grammar/Spelling: 7/10. The grammar and spelling is overall good, though there are some comma errors, ellipse errors, awkward sentences where it felt like you were trying to put too much all in one sentence, leading to some words feeling out of place.
Let's start with the comma errors. There were many times commas were forgotten where they were needed. For example: "Kurt being the latest victim, more than eager to have the new stripper move in with him after seeing her dance for a while." There should be a comma after "Kurt." There also needs to be a verb (was) before "more" so the sentence makes sense and is complete. As is, it feels incomplete. So it would look like this after those tweaks: "Kurt, being the latest victim, was more than eager to have the new stripper move in with him after seeing her dance for a while." If you read sentence one out loud, then sentence two, you may be able to see how sentence two has stronger flow and feels more complete.
Next is the ellipse (...) errors. You consistently write ellipses as two dots instead of three when they are supposed to be three or occasionally four in rare circumstances. I wasn't sure if this was a UK English thing, but the English is also a little inconsistent because sometimes you use UK English, and sometimes you use US English, so it was hard to pinpoint if that was a reason why. However, after reading the Cambridge dictionary, I determined it was not and ellipses are done the same either way, so it is definitely three dots and not two. I would also suggest keeping the English consistent (for example, sometimes you use "towards," which is UK English, and other times you use "toward," which is US English).
Now the awkward sentences. For example, this sentence from the first chapter: "Stripping became a way of living; the rest avoided as much as possible, and I made sure to stay in each small town just long or short enough never to get tied down to anything."
Be careful with how many semicolons you're using. Most writers, myself included, strongly recommend using them extremely sparingly since they're tricky to get right, and the more you use them, the more likely they're going to be used incorrectly. Along with that, semicolons tend to overcomplicate sentences, and that is what the semicolon is doing here, in my opinion. The sentence feels a little unnatural and hard to read.
Here's just some small tweaks to consider: "Stripping became a way of life; the rest avoided it as much as possible, and I made sure to stay in each small town just long or short enough never to get tied down to anything." Or: "...and I made sure to stay in each small town just long or short enough to never get tied down [to anything]."
One, living was changed to "life." Two, the "avoided" got made "avoided it" since it was unclear what "the rest avoided as much" was supposed to mean. It felt like it was supposed to be: "Stripping became a way of living the rest avoided as much as possible," hence why the semicolon makes the sentence feel too complicated and like it was unnecessarily split. So I would suggest either "Stripping became a way of life the rest avoided as much as possible..." or "Stripping became a way of life; the rest avoided it as much as possible," though I believe it flows better without the semicolon because, again, semicolons tend to overcomplicate sentences.
As for the second suggestion, I rearranged where the "to" went just for flow purposes, but it works either way grammatically. I also put the "to anything" in brackets since I felt it was optional and unnecessary. It's already implied in the rest of the sentence that Hild doesn't want to get tied down to anything, so that's why I felt it was optional.
Overall, the grammar is still good, and I didn't notice any immersion-breaking spelling errors or consistent spelling errors!
Description: 8/10. The descriptions are pretty good and deserve a high score. A lot of details are added, and there are also recurring character likes/dislikes that are described throughout the story, such as Beonnie's love of chocolate. Those smaller details make for a more engaging reading experience, and it also gives us readers something to look for when rereading or when looking for more info about the characters.
I wasn't entirely sure where to put this, so I'm going to put it in descriptions since I feel it's related. Sometimes it was hard to tell when you were changing POVs because it felt like you were using the bold for emphasis. Along with that, the description and actions happening before the POV switches sometimes made it seem like you weren't going to change. The most prominent example of this is chapter 4 with the switch to Zac. Based on Beonnie's reactions and thought process, I thought the Zac was her fangirling for Zac still, and it took me a reread to understand it was now Zac's POV. Along with that, since we've never had a Zac POV prior to this (not that I was expecting to, not saying that's a flaw of the story or anything), it was even more unexpected as we aren't used to seeing his POV. I would suggest maybe having symbols or something to do a small break to see a clear scene shift. For example, the Expanse series (the books) uses lightning bolts to show when the scene is changing. You can do whatever symbol or mark you'd like, but having a more clear shift from one POV to the other could be very beneficial so the audience doesn't get confused.
That's more of a minor thing. The only main critique I have with descriptions is the same as I've had before: be careful you aren't doing too much or trying to overstuff the story with descriptions. It can be overwhelming at times as I explained earlier, so that's just another thing to be careful of when writing descriptions.
Other than those two things, the descriptions are good.
Themes and Emotions: 8.5/10. There is a diverse range of emotions throughout the story, and the emotions never feel flat or one note. The themes are present as early as chapter 1 and are relatively easy to identify.
The only critiques I have tie back into making some of the dialogue more engaging since dialogue is how a lot of emotion is expressed, and in general, even if the scene isn't supposed to be super emotional, giving the dialogue more around it can make the scene feel more grounded and fun to read.
Overall, very good job with this category.
Title/Blurb/Cover: 7/10. The Fenrir Saga is a good title that hints at what's to come and tells us what the book is going to be about. I think most people have at least heard of what a fenrir is if not know completely, so they're going to know immediately what you're referring to. My only suggestion is maybe you can add a bit more emotion to the title to give it more weight. While it still would have a good SEO score, maybe you can have an adjective in there somewhere to describe what kind of fenrir we're dealing with. Maybe instead of only saying The Fenrir Saga - Part I, you give the part a name so readers have a clearer idea of what the specific part is going to be about. That's my only suggestion and it's a minor one, so it's not a big deal, but still something I thought was worth mentioning.
The blurb is overall okay and introduces the audience to who the two main characters are going to be and what the story is going to be about.
There are a couple errors. One, the first sentence: "In Norse mythology Fenrir is a giant wolf, so powerful even the mighty Asguardians fear him." There should be a comma after "mythology" since it's an introductory clause. Also, Asguardians should be Asgardians. The sentence "Running for her life she stumbles across a powerful pack with a monstrous Alpha." There should be a comma after "life" since it's an introductory clause.
I would also recommend giving more information about Hild since it's unclear who Hild is and how she could possibly interact with Beonnie. It's fine if you want to give Hild more mystery, but for clarity purposes, I would suggest a little more detail so the details we get about Beonnie and Hild are more balanced, that's all.
Otherwise, the blurb is good.
The cover is simple but has an elegant feel to it that I think matches the story. I like the choice to keep it mostly dark. My main critique is the title. The title is very small and hard to see. I can understand if you want to keep it a little more mysterious, but it was hard to read and I had to zoom in to see it clearly. I like the chosen font, I would just recommend making it bigger and maybe bolding it so it has more pop. To put it into comparison, the title is smaller than the author's name, which normally isn't what you want for a book cover. Other than that, I like the cover.
Total: 77.5/10.
A Mage's Choice by sillverr89
Review:
Characters: 8.5/10. The characters are engaging, and I like how you introduced them to the story. I like Cassius' introduction in particular. From the very beginning, you can tell a lot about who he is as a person, what he wants, what he likes, what he doesn't like, etc. You do a good job setting the stage for who our protagonist is going to be, then you expand on that by providing interesting character backstory in the following chapter. As the story continues and more and more plot events unfold, we really get to know Cassius personally, to the point where he felt real. I enjoyed Cassius the most, but that isn't to say the other characters aren't good too since they are. All of the characters are written well, and Cassius is a stand out. I'd say Angela is, too. Both of them have a fun character dynamic that makes me want to cheer for them.
The only critiques I have have to deal with character emotions sometimes feeling a little less impactful than they could be due to some awkward sentences and grammar errors. By tweaking some of the grammar to make sentences flow a bit stronger, I think the emotions, and by extension, the characters, would be even better than they already are! Don't worry, I will explain the grammar errors in the grammar section.
Plot: 10/10. The plot flows well and makes sense for the genre and characters. I didn't notice any plot holes or inconsistencies. I like how you blended together a sense of adventure and the fantasy world, making for a classic action-adventure fantasy book with a twist of your own added to it with your unique writing style. The characters engaged with the plot and did a good job driving it forward. The pacing was overall good other than some minor critiques I'll save for the next section. Overall, good plot.
Pacing: 8.5/10. The pacing is overall good, and plot events/character information is revealed at a standard pace that matches the story you're trying to tell. I didn't feel overwhelmed by the plot information or characters, and I thought you did a good job giving us time to process things like character backstories and new info about the story.
I have one critique that made the pacing a bit too slow, in my opinion. There were quite a few moments throughout the story where it felt like you were focusing too much on description rather than actions to move the plot forward. Sometimes it felt like I was reading walls of text since you spent a lot of time describing things, and while I appreciate your enthusiasm for description, especially for a fantasy, I would recommend considering breaking it up more, moving description around and interweaving it with actions, and/or removing descriptions you don't think you need.
Otherwise, the pacing is good.
Creativity: 7/10. The story idea itself is very interesting, and I like the magical world and character backstories you gave the audience.
Be careful with using filler words. Most prominently, the word "that." In many cases, the word "that" isn't needed and is a filler word that makes sentences longer unnecessarily. Here's an example, from chapter 1: "The stone glittered with brilliant runes, runes that only the ones..." The "that" isn't needed. Sometimes "that" is needed, though I'd recommend removing it whenever you can without making the sentence grammatically incorrect. How you can do this is by A) reading the sentence out loud with then without the "that" and seeing if it makes sense without it, and B) double-checking using grammar editing software like QuillBot or Grammarly to see if it's okay without the "that."
Also, I'd recommend being more careful with word choice. You use words like "look," "smile," and "sigh" quite frequently, so I'd suggest finding synonyms or new ways to describe those actions. "Look" in particular has many synonyms, so I would strongly recommend using them wherever you see the opportunity to.
Some of the sentences were confusing due to missing words or typos, but I will talk more about that in the grammar section and I will provide an example of what I mean.
Otherwise, the creativity was good.
Dialogue: 6.5/10. What's being spoken in the dialogue is fine and works for the story, though I have some critiques for the presentation.
There is punctuation errors with the quotation marks. You write dialogue like this: " Hi. " It should be: "Hi." The quotation marks don't need to be spaced out from the dialogue. AKA: they should be attached.
I would also suggest using less dialogue tags. Since dialogue tags are inherently telling over showing, I would recommend cutting down on them so you're doing less telling over showing. Instead, maybe try to introduce who's speaking based on a clear speech style or actions. Sometimes you go a while without using them, and other times you use them for almost every line, so it's a little inconsistent, hence why I'm bringing it up.
I'll recommend the 50-30 advice for dialogue. This advice says that of your dialogue, 50% or less of your dialogue should have tags, and of that 50%, 30% or more should be said or asked. The reason is because tags other than said or asked can be distracting and feed even more into the "telling over showing" thing. While it isn't a immediately bad thing to use tags that aren't said or asked, you risk overcomplicating the narrative and taking attention away from what's far more important: the dialogue.
The grammar errors and missing words that I'll talk more about later sometimes made dialogue a bit hard to understand. But again, I'll go over which grammar errors in particular in the grammar section.
The dialogue is otherwise okay.
Worldbuilding: 8.5/10. The world is very interesting, and I can tell you have a clear image for what you want to do with your narrative's environments and places. I think you do a good job balancing pictures with descriptions. Since it's a fantastical world, I liked the inclusion of pictures since it helps readers like me, who can't visualize scenes no matter how well they're described, to understand what's going on. All in all, the worldbuilding was good and made sense for the story.
The only criticisms I have is sometimes it feels like you're doing a little too much worldbuilding, and what I mean by that is sometimes you'll spend a little too much time on descriptions and we end up getting 3-5 paragraphs back-to-back of just descriptions, and since the paragraphs are all a decent length and not short, this can get a little hard to read at times. For that reason, I would recommend finding areas you feel you write description for 3-5+ paragraphs and consider shortening them, rearranging them so the description is more spaced out, and/or interweaving actions and dialogue between descriptions so things are still happening while you're describing the environment and characters. Those are just a couple of general suggestions, though I encourage you to play around with it and find what works for you!
The worldbuilding is otherwise good.
Grammar/Spelling: 6/10. There are punctuation errors throughout the story. For example: "Every time the boy stepped inside his magic shop he became breathless." It should be: "Every time the boy stepped inside his magic shop, he became breathless."
I also mentioned the quotation mark errors earlier, but I'll restate it here: there shouldn't be any spaces between quotation marks and words in dialogue, so "Hi," not " Hi. "
There are times there were missing words, like "From he was standing then...", did you mean "From where he was standing then..."? Throughout the book, there are many times there are missing words like that. I would recommend using a free grammar editing software like QuillBot, ProWritingAid, or Grammarly to help with those errors since they made some sentences hard to read.
There were typos that weren't too frequent, but they were noticeable.
The grammar is overall okay, it could just use some tweaks to increase readability.
Description: 7/10. You have a clear idea for what's happening in your world, and you execute it in an overall solid way that makes me want to keep reading. The descriptions do a good job incorporating the five senses and giving us a lot to work with in terms of our imaginations. You include pictures here and there, but you never substitute description for pictures, and you also don't overuse pictures. Overall, good job with descriptions.
I'd recommend being careful about the kind of voice you're portraying through the descriptions. Sometimes the descriptions feel a little overstuffed or passive since you're adding too many words. For example: "He did choose to only purchase the..." Maybe try: "He chose to only purchase the...", that way it sounds more active and shortens the word count. Also, you used "I did" in the paragraph before that one, so the repetition of the passiveness back-to-back was unnecessary, in my opinion.
I'd also recommend cutting down on the telling over showing whenever you can. I mentioned the tags earlier, but also feel free to use more showing in general descriptions, even outside of the tags. Though the tags were the main area where I felt you could cut down on the telling over showing.
Along with that, I would suggest using less exclamation points. Since they're used for emphasis, the more you use them, the less impact they have, and they're also telling over showing. It's fine to do telling over showing, and sometimes you have to, but if there are ever any areas you feel you can cut back on it, I'd recommend it. For example, from chapter 4, "His blue eyes, the color of the deepest sky, flashed menacingly!" I didn't feel there was any need for the exclamation point there. It can also make the emotions in the story feel a little hard to follow since the exclamation marks can sometimes feel out of place, like it did in that line.
Other than those critiques, I enjoyed the descriptions.
Themes and Emotions: 7/10. I think it's very interesting how you take this fantastical world and give it an emotional center through the protagonist, Cassius. He has an intriguing backstory I wasn't expecting, so that was fun to read about. I also liked his character dynamics with the others, like Angela, and I liked Angela's emotions. The themes and emotions are good and make sense for the story.
My main criticisms tie back to points I've made earlier. One is the exclamation marks point where I felt you could have used less of them so future exclamation marks had more emphasis. Another is cutting down on telling over showing so emotions can feel a bit stronger in the long run. Lastly, be careful about grammar and spelling since errors in critical emotional moments can risk detaching the audience from what's going on.
Otherwise, the themes and emotions are good.
Title/Blurb/Cover: 8/10. I really like the title. It's short, sweet, and to the point. Paired with the cute aesthetic of the cover, this title is really nice and I have no criticisms for it.
The blurb is overall good other than two minor grammar errors. One: "Potions, magical creatures, amazing spells - everything is waiting there for our soon to be mage." There should be hyphens for soon-to-be. Two: "The only question is, did he make the right choice when deciding to become a Mage?" There's an extra space between "make" and "the" that should be removed. Otherwise, it's a good blurb!
The cover has a very nice background image that fits the story perfectly. The only critique I have is the title card + author's name. I feel you could experiment with the font a little and make it pop more. What I mean by that is, this is a magical story, but the font doesn't really scream magic or fantasy to me. Maybe try playing around with the more elegant fonts to see if you think something would fit the story genre more. I'd also recommend increasing the font size since the title is a little small on the cover/hard to see. Otherwise, I like the cover!
Total: 77/100.
Small Paws, Big Pride by TheWordArtistBooks
Review:
Characters: 7.5/10. I think Everblaze is the standout character from this book, and I really like how he has a clear personality and motivation. I love to see him always tripping and being clumsy since it adds charm to his character. It also makes sense considering he's a pup, so of course he's learning to do this all for the first time and must be nervous. The other characters are good, too. Diamond and Black are great contrasts to each other, and even though Black is really rude to Everblaze, I have to say I enjoyed seeing what new schemes Black came up with. Does that make me an awful person? Eh, maybe. Oh well! I had fun, that's what matters!
I would suggest giving the characters more distinct voices, body language, facial expressions, etc. There are many chapters where dialogue is the main focus, but most of the emotion is given to the dialogue tags, not the actual characters, and tags are telling over showing. That means a lot of the emotion in the dialogue is told to us, not shown. For example, chapter two b. Notice how a lot of what's going on in that chapter is told to us, not shown. When we are given information about what they look like, it's still told to us with lines like "looking very offended." To that I ask: how? How is Star looking very offended? You say "suspicious look," then "eyes narrowed warily" right after. The "eyes narrowed" is showing, but the presence of the adverb, "warily," is telling. Back-to-back, you give us two telling over showing descriptions to say the same thing: Star is suspicious. Maybe instead, you can shorten that to the "eyes narrowed" part, eliminating the telling altogether.
Most of the lines in that chapter are telling over showing, which is why I'm suggesting giving the characters more individuality in terms of their emotions.
I also have some critiques for the dialogue, but since I already wrote an explanation for it in the dialogue section, I will save the explanation for then!
I hope all that makes sense.
Plot: 9/10. The plot is overall good and flows well with events and character information revealing themselves to us at proper times. It's a very unique idea with a lot of creativity and thought put into it. I can tell you're passionate about this story, and I encourage you to stay passionate about it because it was an entertaining read with many fun events and tense scenes that made me invested in both the storyline and the characters.
There were some pacing issues that made the plot feel a little hard to follow at times due to me feeling like there could have been more description and some chapters felt unnecessarily split. I will explain in more detail in the next section.
Other than that, the plot was great!
Pacing: 7/10. The pacing is overall good. Plot events flow out at a good rate that always keeps the reader invested. I only have a couple of critiques.
I agree with the other commenters about how some chapters could have been combined, and sometimes it felt you were splitting them unnecessarily. Chapter two a and b could have been combined. Chapter two b is a very short chapter, so adding it to chapter two a could improve the flow without making the chapter much longer. Not to mention chapter two a is short, too. So if you combine them by copy pasting chapter two b into chapter two a, it could flow stronger.
Similarly, the pacing sometimes feels very fast since we aren't given much space between lines to process what's happening. By that I mean, sometimes there's a lot of dialogue but not many descriptions or chances to see Everblaze's thought process. You don't need to add too much so the chapters can remain short, though I would recommend more breaks so it isn't a bunch of lines of dialogue but not much happening around the dialogue. Not only will this make the conversations more realistic since, when we talk, a lot is happening around us, but it will also give the reader more chances to breathe and process the dialogue they read. A lot of information is revealed through dialogue, so giving readers a chance to process it is important.
Otherwise, I think the pacing is good.
Creativity: 7.5/10. The story idea is creative and isn't like most books I've seen. It's giving me Warriors vibes, and it was a bit nostalgic for me since I haven't read those books since I was a kid.
Sometimes there are cliche phrases used to describe emotions, like "A shiver trembled down my spine" in chapter two b. I would recommend removing as many cliche phrases as possible. I personally think they're fine to use here and there, though wherever you feel you can remove them, I'd recommend it.
The word choice is okay, though there are some words that are overused, like "look," "turned," and "smile." Seeing as "look" and "smile" have many synonyms, I would suggest diversifying the word choice whenever possible.
The sentence structure and story idea are both overall good, I only have those critiques for the cliches and the word choice.
Dialogue: 5/10. The dialogue has moments where it is strong and impactful. There are also some recommendations I have for strengthening the dialogue.
User YouCanCallMeCorn is correct about actions not being used as dialogue tags. I would strongly suggest not using actions, like "yawned," as tags. The reason is because tags refer to how words are being spoken. You can yawn while speaking, but you can't really yawn words, just like how you can't shrug or smile words because they're actions, not speech styles. In chapter 1, there's the line "Just five more minutes," I yawned. Using a comma makes the "I yawned" a dialogue tag, which is what I'm suggesting you don't do. However, you don't have to remove the "I yawned." In fact, it's an easy fix. You can do something like this: I frowned, yawned, and turned onto my back. "Just five more minutes."
Or: I yawned and turned onto my back. "Just five more minutes."
I removed the "I frowned" since I wasn't sure if it was necessary, but that's something I leave up to you and what you think the "I frowned" is doing for that sentence.
Or: "Just five more minutes," I said with a yawn.
Or: I yawned. "Just five more minutes."
As you can see, there are numerous ways to rewrite it and include the yawn, only this time, you're not using it as a dialogue tag, so it looks far more natural.
While on the topic of dialogue tags, I strongly suggest using less complex tags because they're taking away from the dialogue itself. Dialogue tags are meant to be used as sparingly as possible, and that's because they are inherently telling over showing, so the more you use, the more telling over showing you're doing. However, it becomes even more noticeable telling over showing the more you use words that aren't "said" or "asked."
Contrary to popular belief, it is not poor word choice to use "said" or "asked" for the majority of dialogue tags. In fact, it will make your dialogue stronger because you are letting the dialogue show the emotion instead of the tag telling it. In general, using as few tags as possible is generally preferred since you're doing less telling and making the dialogue more engaging. Now you have to introduce who's speaking by speech style and actions/descriptions, making it more engaging. For example, this line: "Go and take your share," cajoled Mum. I don't know what that word means and I'm a native English speaker and English major. If the tags are so complicated that people studying English for a living don't recognize them, do you see why that would take away from the dialogue? Now instead of processing what was said in the dialogue, I'm opening Google to figure out what a word means even though it doesn't change anything about the sentence. I want you to challenge yourself by asking yourself what is "cajoled" doing for that dialogue that A) the dialogue isn't already doing in a far more natural + showing way, and B) the word "said" can't do?
My father, a writer, gave me feedback called the 50-30 advice for dialogue, and it has drastically improved how engaging my dialogue is. This advice says that of your dialogue, 50% or less should be tagged, and of that 50%, 30% or more should be said or asked. It's not that you can never use different tags—I myself use words like whispered, muttered, murmured, and shouted—though the more you can limit tags in general, typically the better.
This advice also applies to how many tags you're using since you use quite a lot. I would recommend downsizing on how many tags you use, if you can avoid it. You consistently use more than one tag when the same person is speaking, which isn't needed. You consistently do something like this: "Hey Star!" another wolf interrupted, bowing at Star. "Sky is here," The wolf, which turned out to be the chocolate brown wolf, added.
You'll have one tag for one line of dialogue, then you'll have "he/she added" for the second line of dialogue. You don't need this for a few reasons. One, we know who's speaking, and it's implied he's adding more to the dialogue when a second line is introduced in the same paragraph. Two, the more tags, the harder it can be to focus on the dialogue. Three, the "added" doesn't add (pun intended) anything here since it's already implied the wolf was going to continue speaking with the first greeting, so the "added" tag doesn't really work here. There are some additional grammar errors in that sentence, though I will go over that later.
Some of the dialogue sounds unnatural and more like description than someone talking. I understand these are wolves, not humans, but some of the dialogue still sounds overly formal. If anything, I'd expect wolves to speak less formally. For example: "Just as I slowed down to catch my breath, I heard paws coming to me, then an awful bolt of pain at my left. Wincing, I held my left side and looked down." The second sentence in particular seems far more like description than dialogue and not how someone would speak. It feels a little too expository, in my opinion. I would suggest reading dialogue out loud or using TTS so you can hear how it sounds, and that will help with identifying when dialogue sounds more like description than dialogue.
I hope all that makes sense!
Worldbuilding: 8/10. Like the plot, the world is interesting and immediately hooks the reader in through its impressive landscape of forest environments full of critters. I like the idea of the wolf packs and how you display them, and also the role the alpha plays and how everyone respects said alpha. It's almost like whenever the alpha is around, there's a sense of respect floating in the air where everyone just kinda shuts up and listens, which is a good thing. Giving an aura to someone with that title is good since it sets the readers up for what to expect, but in a natural way, not a forced one.
I'll talk about it a little more in the descriptions section, but sometimes it felt like you were rushing through descriptions and not including more of the five senses and taking the time to describe what's going on in the world around them. I like how the characters interact with the world, like when Star takes Everblaze hunting, and all the times Everblaze trips over branches, though sometimes it felt like the world didn't have too much impact on the characters. I would suggest incorporating more details about, for example, the ambiance of their location. While I did understand the wolf pack, I feel by including more details about them too could be beneficial to the audience.
Otherwise, the world is interesting and fun to read about.
Grammar/Spelling: 7.5/10. There's some inconsistencies with capitalization. For example, sometimes "mum" is capitalized, other times it isn't.
I would recommend making sure you're consistently writing in UK English since you sometimes mix and match. Most notably, you use "mum," traditionally a UK English word, then you sometimes use "toward," which is US English, though this is inconsistent since other times you use "towards," which would be the UK English version of the word. It felt a little confusing to see the narrator using a typically UK English word like mum, then using "toward," a US English word, right after. It's not too consistent of an error, so I'm not going to take off much for it, but it's still something worth mentioning.
There are some editing errors where there will be a few grammatical issues in many chapters. The individual grammar errors aren't consistent, but the presence of grammar errors that likely slipped by in the editing process are consistent, if that makes sense. The sentence I mentioned in the dialogue section is an example: "Hey Star!" another wolf interrupted, bowing at Star. "Sky is here," The wolf, which turned out to be the chocolate brown wolf, added.
"The" shouldn't be capitalized (ties back into the capitalization inconsistencies I mentioned earlier), and "which" should be "who" since you're talking about a living being, not an object.
There are spacing errors here and there where you add extra spaces between quotation marks and words. From chapter three b: "Okay, Everblaze," muttered Star," when I signal you..." The " shouldn't be attached to Star, it should be attached to when, so like this: "Okay, Everblaze," muttered Star, "when I signal you...".
Otherwise, the spelling and grammar is good.
Description: 7/10. There are some interesting descriptions present throughout the book. I think a highlight is chapter five a with Everblaze and the cougar, and also the epilogue with Star.
I would suggest incorporating more of the five senses into your writing and slowing down to describe things. You don't need to do too much more description, but some scenes feel more like summaries than scenes because some details aren't shown. For example, the opening scene in the prologue. There isn't much description and most of it is action. I can appreciate that you want to get right into it, though for tension, everything happens fast, and the audience isn't given much time to process it. To increase engagement and add more tension, consider incorporating more of the five senses and slowing down so the audience can really see the world through Everblaze's eyes.
Also be careful that you don't have contradictory descriptions. There's a difference between purposeful oxymorons and contradictions. Here's an example: "I soon slowly accepted Diamond." "Soon" implies more immediacy while "slowly" implies just that: slowness. So having a more immediate term right next to "slowly" was a bit confusing for me. I'm also someone who's against adverbs, so that could just be a me thing, but it did feel a bit contradictory, in my opinion. Another example is "All eyes swung to him as he turned pink" (chapter two b). I didn't realize wolves could turn pink, so this description felt a little contradictory and confusing, unless I missed something. I would suggest making it more clear early on if there's a reason they can change color.
Otherwise, the descriptions were good.
Themes and Emotions: 7/10. Everblaze is the emotional core of the story where he undergoes many thoughts and feelings about his role in his new pack. I think you did a good job giving Everblaze a variety of emotions and connecting him to the themes. I also like the idea of found family present throughout the novel, and I think that added to the emotional turmoil Everblaze was going through. What happens to Star by the end was unexpected but emotional, and I'm glad you did it.
My criticisms are the same as what I've mentioned earlier with telling over showing, incorporating more descriptions, and making sure the dialogue isn't expository. Since dialogue and showing over telling are crucial to understanding emotions, I strongly recommend tweaking these aspects in future stories so the audience has an easier time attaching themselves to the characters.
Overall, the themes and emotions are good.
Title/Blurb/Cover: 7.5/10. The title is not too long and utilizes simple adjectives that make it readable yet emotional. It has a good SEO score and works for the story. No criticisms.
The blurb is a little vague and doesn't tell us too much about the story. Why is the alpha's son so intimidating? What kind of danger does the cougar present? Why does Everblaze want to be an alpha? Why is this adventure different, and why should we click to read more? You give us a brief summary, but not much detail. Of course you don't want to spoil the whole thing or anything like that, but including more descriptive terms and giving more context behind why these things matter could really help encourage readers to click on the story.
The grammar is overall good except for a couple errors. This sentence: "...the Alpha's son Black, and a cougar prowling on the hunt for Everblaze." There should be another comma before "Black" and after "son." Earlier in the same sentence: "He yearns to be Alpha one day, but still has to survive two vicious forces..." No comma is needed there because it's the same subject controlling the sentence. I personally think it sounds fine with the comma tbh, but all three of my grammar checkers are flagging it, so it's something worth considering changing since it's grammatically incorrect according to them.
The cover is nice and has a good color scheme + background image. The only minor critique I have is it could have been interesting to have more of a contrast between the small and big on the title. The big is done in spaced out letters, but part of the l's at the end of small go over the paws underneath it. It could have been interesting to see the small a little smaller than the paws to act as a nice visual contrast from the big later in the title. That's just one suggestion, though, and I encourage you to play around with it! Otherwise, no critiques for the cover.
Total: 73/100.