Review by Sunshine: Ruthanne Georgeson High
Author: Distinctive-
Summary: 4/5
Your summary is pretty great! I love the way you introduce the reader to the school itself, effectively using synonyms and antonyms to help set the scene. I also like how that then leads into the actual blurb of the story, where we meet the main character, the context and even get a glimpse of the stakes at hand. You showcase a broad vocabulary range and you use it well, so great job there! The summary, grammatically, does need a bit of polishing. For example:
"Manacled to a life of an uneventful past, a doomy present, and a bleakly future; she clings to the scintillas of learning about science and dreaming with her heart, while hoping for the slightest chance to open to escape."
In that above example, we see an incorrect use of a semicolon. I suggest changing the comma to a semicolon – and I'll explain more below, in the grammar section of this review. Secondly:
"An opportunity came for that to happen when she got a rare scholarship to study at Ruthanne Georgeson High School,ar and she heartily accepts it, not sparing a second thought."
Okay, so here, we have two main issues. Firstly, I think the 'ar' after the "Ruthanne Georgeson High School" is a typo, so I'd remove that. Also, you change tense in this paragraph. You say "an opportunity came" [past tense], but then go on to say "she heartily accepts" [present tense]. And finally:
"But little is she aware of the surprises and pits awaiting her-events that are bound to kicking her out of Ruthanne and back to her dirt life."
I would change the "kicking" to "kick" for it to make sense in regards to tense.
Otherwise, good work!
Grammar: 3/5
Similar to the summary, the story itself had quite a few grammatical issues that need fixing. Nothing too drastic – but just small notes that I made.
Firstly, semicolons. Semicolons can be used for a few different scenarios, but I'm going to focus one specific scenario that you didn't quite do accurately. A semicolon can be used to join two independent clauses that are heavily intertwined – meaning, they are very closely related. However, the clauses must be independent. That means that if a full-stop was used instead of a semicolon, the story would still make sense. For example:
"Demi watched; with the rest of the Ruthanners gawping at Ivie, wondering what in the world had just happened."
The clause beginning with, "with the rest..." would not make sense as a sentence on its own. Therefore, this use of a semicolon is inaccurate. In fact, I would take the semicolon out completely – that spot does not need punctuation.
Another thing was capitalising words even if they were not the start of a sentence. For example:
"Mum," She called.
It's a bit tricky, because it's straight after dialogue, but this is still one sentence. The 'she' is not a proper noun, either, so it should be:
"Mum," she called.
Another thing was tense. In one chapter, you had the sentence:
"Demi perked." [past tense]
But then, in the next paragraph, you had:
"Romoke turns to her." [present tense]
I recommend going back and polishing your grammar. But otherwise, it didn't disrupt the fluency too much – so good work.
Character Building: 4/5
Your characterisation is pretty darn great! I loved that we were introduced to a few characters as omniscient narrators, and each one led a completely different life to the others. And, better yet, we caught glimpses of their lives merging together – which was a great and satisfying feeling. I did find that your characterisation grew stronger as we progressed through the chapters, as we got more snippets of what the characters were thinking, but overall, it was pretty consistent.
I do think there are times you could have given us more. You need to let us live and breathe these characters – especially since it doesn't exactly stick with one character throughout. You need to make the omniscient narration stronger and more present from the very beginning. For example, when you introduce Demi, who is reading the textbook, you wrote that she was 'pondering on the piece of information [that] she'd read'.
Take it one step further. What had she just read? Why was she pondering it? If you gave us that, you would have automatically characterised her as someone who thinks hard and who questions what she reads by showing it to us. Let us know how she feels about certain things. I know she speaks about what she was reading a bit later, but then and there would have been the perfect opportunity to let us delve into her character more.
Writing Style: 4/5
It felt amazing reading a story that took its time to really flesh out the description of the settings! I loved reading about it – the way you used figurative language to show the setting to us was just wonderful. Great work there!
There were, however, moments where I wondered whether you could weave those descriptions in more seamlessly rather than breaking away from the narration to describe it. For example, rather than saying "the street had coffee cups scattered on the floor", you could say, "Demi stepped over the coffee cups that littered the path..." [this is not an actual excerpt from the story – this was made from the top of my head]. That way, the writing and story will flow more seamlessly and it may even introduce certain traits of characterisation if you're thoughtful about it.
Another thing I noted was your use of language within the story. You used some foreign language in the dialogue, which is totally fine, with the translation at the bottom of the page. If I were thinking from a professional viewpoint, I would say that the surrounding dialogue tags and description should give the readers an impression of what the tone of the dialogue might be. We don't necessarily need to know what they're saying, but we should know whether it's good or bad. We should know how to feel. Right now, as I was reading the foreign dialogue, I was quite unsure of how to feel – so you need to ensure that the description surrounding the dialogue is rich with expression and easily expresses what the dialogue revolves around.
Plot + Uniqueness: 4/5
Your story is pretty great! I have to admit, the whole concept of a girl gaining a scholarship to a prestigious school even though she won't exactly fit in straight away is quite common, but there are some unique elements to your story.
For example, it is crafted in a unique way – I like that it doesn't follow one character, but rather, multiple. And I love seeing the way these character paths cross and merge, as well as seeing the backstories that led them there. So excellent job there!
I do encourage you to make your final lines in the chapter more impactful, so the reader feels that hint of satisfaction at the end of every chapter. I was also thinking that perhaps you could introduce Demi to the letter in Chapter 1, because the best stories are ones where the gears start turning in the first chapter. We should get a vague sense of the story's direction, or there should be enough questions or tension keeping us flicking those pages. The first chapter in itself felt like a filler because the story didn't feel as if it had officially 'begun' without the letter. So if you could perhaps combine the first two chapters, or find a way to introduce Demi to the letter in the first chapter, that would make your opening chapter much more purposeful and effective.
OVERALL SCORE: 19/25
Overall, a great story so far! Just work on polishing your grammar and keeping your chapters purposeful, and you'll be good to go! I hope this review helps.