Chloe's Book Reviews {CLOSED/ HIATUS}

Just Dreaming

Username: @CrazyKatiexox
Genre: Horror
Chapters: five chapters (includes prologue)
Specific: N/A
Book

Cover- 

I like your cover and title. They both fit well. If I saw it at first glance, I wouldn't necessarily picture the genre to be horror.

Blurb- 

Your blurb is good. I didn't find anything wrong with it. You introduce the characters and the conflict.

Grammar-

(Chapter One)

I'm not sure if this necessarily comes under grammar, but I noticed a paragraph that has a lot of telling, rather than showing.

Your example...
"Madison is five and is going to attend school with Mayddox next month when she turns six. Her father, George, owns the franchises that keep the town running..."

If I could make a suggestion, it would be to add these intricate details when there is dialogue between these characters, like backstory to the character. Having it in this solid paragraph after she gets ready for school feels abrupt. There isn't a need to be telling this straight afterwards.

(Chapter Three) 

You switch tenses in this paragraph.
You are writing in the present, but you switch to the past.

Your example...
"As soon as she steps through the front door, she caught a whiff of supper cooking. Her hunger had awoken and she'd never felt so ravenous before that moment."

A suggestion here could be...
"As soon as she steps through the front door, she catches a whiff of supper cooking. Her hunger pains come back with vengeance as she has never felt so ravenous before."

Again in this paragraph...
"She went back downstairs after setting the pail down on her bed, then she headed straight towards the counter with a basket filled with..."

A suggestion here could be...
"She sets the pail on her bed and goes back downstairs, heading straight for the basket on the counter." (Then you can talk about the fruit in the basket).

(Chapter Four)

Your example...
"Her jaw is dropped..."

You could reword this to...
"She drops her jaw..." to avoid the swapping tenses and passive sentence.

Punctuation-

(Chapter One) 

Other readers have commented on the use of comma when it isn't needed, so make sure to pay attention to your readers' comments. (It can be very useful when you reach the editing stage).

Your example...
"Honey, I wouldn't dare forget you." he says with an ear to ear smile, "I know..."

A suggestion would be...
"Honey, I wouldn't dare forget you," he says with a wide grin. "I know..."

Character Development/ Plot -

(Prologue) 

I can already tell I will love the plot of your book. I've always wanted to astral project, but being a firm believer of the paranormal, I haven't had the courage to try anything after I've encountered a few paranormal things late at night. What I'm trying to say is I'm a scaredy-cat.

(Chapter One) 

I like how you describe the settings with detail and also tells the readers that maybe this time period is from back in the day. I'm getting an 18-19th century vibe from the way you describe her dresses, the carriage, the tin pail and the stone-paved road. Either that or you do a great job alternating between words with a good wide vocabulary. For example, most people would say a bucket instead of a tin pail. That's what made me think that this is set in an olden era.

(Chapter Two) 

It's nice seeing the difference between Ashton and Mayddox, since they come from different classes. It's like opposites attract.

So, has Mayddox been trying to astral project, or is this something that happened all of a sudden?

(Chapter Three) 

I'm not sure about Mayddox's character. She seems genuinely upset when she makes fun of Ashton, but repeatedly calls him names and thinks badly about him because he is poor and he works on a farm. I don't know where she gets her behaviour from because her mother discourages it. I guess it could be from society itself. It makes me feel sad for Ashton and makes me dislike Mayddox's character a little. I'm sure not every wealthy person thinks like this.

(Chapter Four) 

It's nice that we are learning small details about Mayddox and why she doesn't like being touched.

I do feel like the pace is a little slow because we haven't reached anything about the dreams and the astral projection. (You've briefly touched about her having dreams). This could be because your chapters are fairly short, which is if that's your style, then that's okay. I would just be mindful about making the chapters a little more interesting, and I don't mean that in a bad way. Each chapter has to have some kind of relevance and some new information or meaning for the plot to progress to the next chapter, otherwise, what's the point of the chapter. You want to keep the readers invested in your book.
Or perhaps you have a slow burning plot, and if I read more chapters, I could see more of the plot unfold.

Overall enjoyment-

I liked the premise of the story and the concept of astral projecting. I think your book shows some potential. It just needs some polishing with grammar, punctuation etc. 

Things you could focus on are...

-1- Grammar/ Punctuation - (Tense switching) 

 It's really just to remember adding commas/full stops within speech or action tags. You tend to add a comma when it's action and vice versa. Grammarly can help with this.  Like when a character smiles, there should be a full stop even before dialogue. (I'm bad at explaining. Message me if you need help, I can inline comment on some examples). 

You switch tenses quite a few times. Grammarly can help with this too. If you type on a word document, you can get the laptop to read it back to you. This may help you spot any errors. 

-2- To add more physical attributes and appearance - Apart from chapter one, I didn't notice many physical attributes of the characters and their personalities, apart from Mayddox. Each time somebody talks, add in a few actions from the characters. This is an easy way of adding appearance too. 

You're doing a great job so far & I wish you good luck with your writing journey! 

Feel free to ask me any questions.

Please check "Just Dreaming," if you have time. Thank you for requesting this review.