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By the end of our journey, I promise to change your view on writing as a taxing task and une...
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TITLE: I can immediately see the relevance, which is satisfying (to me at least). 7/10.
COVER: I love the cover! The headers within chapters are also quite pretty. 7/10.
BLURB: it's clean; the character goals and conflict opposing them are introduced concisely. I would suggest personalizing/giving it a bit more voice? Either the protagonist's or both the romantic interest and him. Sounds a bit wooden as it is. 6/10.
GRAMMAR: could do with an editor. No problems with comprehensiveness, but there were frequent, glaring errors that can be fixed easily. Things like unnecessary capitalization. 6/10.
WRITING STYLE: 5/10 - diction The dialogue reflects the setting and time period. Good job.
"...Eyes shaking in fear" is not uh, clear enough. Does it mean she was looking around? Fix it. In chapter 2.
- representation There's an Indian character!! That's great, honestly. I will keep track of him. Update: his olive skin is said twice in the span of three chapters. Which, is okay, but something else can be said about him?
- story-telling techniques In the first chapter, there's a bit of info dumping about the protagonist's past. I don't think it's too much information like most info dumps are, but it is a bit sudden and random. Convenient. I would suggest moving that paragraph to a place where it's relevant not just in his thoughts, but the plot and scene. In chapter 2 and it's a similar situation with Helen's narrative.
CHARACTERS 7/10
- I've read somewhere that giving each side character a distinctive physical trait or quality would allow readers to remember them better. I didn't see this in your writing, so I thought I'd suggest it.
- Sometimes the telling becomes greater than the showing when it comes to character motivations and goals. I'd say cut down on the telling by 10%? For example, when the protagonist stares at the artists, and the scene continues on the same subject about him painting after they're gone. So readers can infer that he wants to be an artist, it doesn't have to be spoken out loud in the conversation. And his behavior seems like a regular thing, so why would he discuss it with his friend when it's already their norm?
- I actually like how they finally met and interacted in the fourth chapter. It made sense. He was smarting from the landlord hit, and she was the same because of Patrick from earlier. They were both feeling wired and ready to go at it when they met each other.
OTHER
- In the third chapter, Ella passes Helen a note during lunch, apologizing for not changing the subject sooner. But when did she find the time to write it?
- Why would Ella have a master key to the Institute of Arts? Update: oh it's mentioned in the next chapter. I suggest you move it forward into the third chapter as soon as the master key is mentioned.
Hope this review helps you out! I think it's shorter than my usual reviews but I've tried my best. If you have to take only one tip away from this review, I'd suggest upping the showing and reducing the telling. There needs to be a balance. That was the main problem I saw in the writing.
I'm always happy to work a second time with an author. Thank you for submitting your book. I wish you good luck!!!
