Title: The Undying
Author: lokai47
Summary: 3.5/5
I have to say, the first line of your summary is absolute perfection. It is such a captivating way to introduce your book, and it really had me ready to read more. Well done!
The rest of your summary is also pretty good. It introduces the protagonist, the setting, and the hints at the conflict (mystery cases). I wonder, though, whether you could flesh this out more. First of all, could you perhaps give the reader a glimpse of what some of these mystery cases are? For all we know, there could be a six-year-old stealing spoons from the local restaurant. Obviously, I highly doubt it is that, but my point is that you could captivate the reader more by showing them how serious these mystery cases are.
Additionally, what are the stakes? If Mason can't solve the cases, what will happen? Will SilverWoods be trapped in a turmoil of corruption forever? Make sure you mention the stakes, so that the reader can understand and support the protagonist even before the story has begun.
Finally, your punctuation is a little messy. Let's look at the line below:
"Mason Bridge, a sheriff that hasn't seen his fair share of crime, in fact, SilverWoods is thee most safest place in the world, as well as the most quiet."
Okay, first of all, this feels like it is supposed to be two sentences but was squeezed into one. Next, 'thee' should be 'the', and 'most safest' is redundant – 'safest' would suffice. This would look a lot neater:
"Mason Bridge is a sheriff that hasn't seen his fair share of crime; in fact, SilverWoods is the safest place in the world, as well as the most quiet."
Grammar: 2/5
Okay, so since your story is officially complete, I highly recommend you go back now and polish up the grammatical mistakes. A few are just typos, such as writing, 'coguh' instead of 'cough', but there are some rules that you break rather consistently. I thought I'd break them down for you here, so you can refer back to it when you're editing.
First of all, let's talk dialogue. When there are two characters speaking to one another, each character should get a new paragraph when they speak. For example:
"Honey?" Liam calls slowly. "He is gone, baby. He is gone." Kathy's eyes pouring out.
Since it was supposed to be two characters speaking, it should be:
"Honey?" Liam calls slowly.
"He is gone, baby. He is gone," Kathy said, tears pouring from her eyes.
Now, you probably noticed that I changed the "Kathy's eyes pouring with tears". I made this change because it wasn't a complete sentence. Sentences like "Jefferson reminiscent of his father's tales" and "Grant imagining every detail possible" are not complete. Additionally, you also have to look out for typos – you had a lot of them, and you also had sentences missing the full-stop at the end. Along with this, you mixed up words that are similar but have slightly different meanings. For example:
"There's a serial killer on the loss."
It should be:
"There's a serial killer on the loose."
Additionally, you wrote:
"Your alright, Baldwin."
You were trying to write, "You are alright, Baldwin" with the contraction, "You're". It should be:
"You're alright, Baldwin."
Anyways, back to dialogue. Let's now talk about punctuation within the dialogue. If dialogue is followed by a verbal dialogue tag (such as 'he said', 'she whispered', 'she exclaimed' – or anything referring to how the character says the words), there should be a comma before the closing inverted commas. If it's anything else, this comma should be replaced by a period (or a question mark for a question and exclamation mark for an exclamation). For example:
"This is an important discovery." Jefferson says.
'Jefferson says' directly addresses the dialogue. It should be:
"This is an important discovery," Jefferson says.
Also, you change tense quite a bit. You occasionally jumped back and forth from present tense to past tense. For example, you wrote:
"A massive thud echoed through the cave as the pentagram cracked fully in half." [echoed = past tense]
"The crack starts to ooze out black oil in waves." [starts = present tense]
You need to choose one and stick to it.
While you were in third person most of the time, there was a slip I caught where you changed to present tense? You wrote:
"Masson starts to think about how the family was before he got there." [third person narration]
"I did background checks and nothing really stood out." [first person narration]
Again, make sure you keep it consistent.
Character Building: 3/5
There were some really nice moments of characterisation in your story. For example, when Kathy was making the chamomile tea and we saw her internal monologue as she remembered her son – that was heart-wrenching and very touching to read. As a reader, I could really see the fact that she lost him sink into her heart.
Another moment I adored was towards the end, as the chapters became more climactic, the 'dullness' that we saw in Mason dissipated and he came incredibly determined to fight the fairy demon. I really liked that development, especially since I didn't really feel anything from him beforehand. I also did like the way he recalled his grandfather's words to himself – those moments of intimacy and philosophy were a nice way to add some complexity to his character.
However, overall, I just didn't feel much from the characters. I didn't feel Jefferson's fear. I didn't feel Liam's pain when he lost his son. Yes, I could see he was crying, but I didn't feel the connection. Why? Because you told, not showed.
Let's look at some examples from the work, shall we?
"Mason starts to feel angered by Liam's tone."
Don't tell us that. Show us the anger – make us feel the way his blood simmers, make us see his clenched jaw. Again, another example:
"Mason is still a bit sour towards her."
You shouldn't need to tell us that. You shouldn't need to justify his actions. We should already be able to understand that through his actions and internal thoughts.
Additionally, you have a lot of characters – which is alright! I love a big cast. However, they didn't all feel that distinct. Make sure you think about them carefully, give them idiosyncrasies, and make their interactions carry weight and meaning.
Writing Style: 3/5
There were some wonderfully vivid moments of gore throughout your writing. There were quite a lot of brutal death scenes, but I liked how you made them all different but fast-paced. A particular highlight for me was when they took Gina's life – that was horrific and gruesome, but also, perfectly attuned to the genre. Well done!
Overall, however, I found that your story was rather thin when it came to the writing. I got minimal description of the setting – even from the very start, in the caves. You can use the setting to help build what I feel is a rather gothic mood, so please use that to your advantage! You occasionally wrote, 'the wind howled' in those last few chapters, so I encourage you to exploit this more – use simile, metaphor and personification. They'll help make your writing much richer!
I've already discussed showing and not telling above, but another thing I noticed was that, when you did describe things, you paused the narrative to describe things. For example, let's look at when they first saw the demon. You wrote:
"It was wearing a hospital gown with its vertebrae poking out from its back."
Great – that is very important! But why not weave it into the narrative? Tell us how her hospital gown seemed to shimmer as she waved. Better yet, use these descriptions to show us more about your character. Mason is a sheriff, right? So, naturally, wouldn't he want to be internally noting details so he can catch the suspect later? If so, make this more clear and write something along the lines of:
"Mason tried to take in as many details as possible – tried to memorise the way its stained hospital gown fell over its bony limbs..."
Not the best example, but can you see how it ultimately links back to the character and shows the reader, subtly, his intelligence as well as how he does his job?
Plot + Uniqueness: 4.5/5
Your start was incredibly haunting with all the deaths – from Jefferson, to poor little Max. The concept itself is wonderfully terrifying, which I love! I love the imagery of corpses with black oil coming from their eyes, and when Kathy took a turn and started eating her own husband? Good lord – I did not see that coming, and I really was startled by that. Haunting, but perfect for the genre!
I also liked the slow unveiling of the past. A demon bringing on the apocalypse? A fairy demon? Wow – crazy, but cool. I also liked how it all started to make sense regarding the victims – I like how she considered the 'innocent' to be those who were victims of deceit, and that's why she targeted them. Clever! I didn't make that connection until that moment.
And, okay, wow. The ending. It's not everyday you read a book where the protagonist fails and, well, I certainly wasn't expecting the end of the universe! What a powerful and unnerving ending – I guess it reminded me that not all books have to have a happy ending.
The climax was huge, but the build-up wasn't quite there. Again, I think this is due to the showing/telling and lack of tension, so once you go back and flesh out your story and characters more, it'll be so much more impactful.
OVERALL SCORE: 16/25
Overall, a concept that is thrilling and fascinating! Make sure you work on your grammar and punctuation, and you should be good to go. I hope this review helps!