Ohana Reviews

Review ❀ The Cursed Bond

Reviewer: @mmjayoh

Book: The Cursed Bond

Author: @Denyefa4

Title and Cover: The title does sound suited for a werewolf novel. And I like the cover art chosen. My only suggestion would be to switch up the font, as right now it's difficult to read against the background. Perhaps, a different color or adding a bevel or shadow could help the title text really pop!

Blurb: The content in the blurb is good as it sets up the story and makes it sound enticing to read. However, there are a few sentences that read a bit funny to me. For example, in the second paragraph the sentence that begins "As her demons from childhood follow her..." reads as incomplete. To fix this, I would remove the word 'but' placed before 'the Alpha.'

Additionally, the third paragraph reads as one giant sentence. I would suggest breaking this down into a few sentences to make it more digestible. Also, maybe consider placing a dash – after 'never thought of doing' instead of a comma.

And one last note, the word 'royal' in the first section does not need to be capitalized.

Plot Overview: The plot is a lot of fun; I love the concept of a college for shifters. It's a refreshing take on a werewolf novel, and there are many opportunities for exciting plot-points.

You managed to keep me engaged throughout, and I never found myself getting bored. In fact, I was looking forward to reading more.

The only part of the plot that felt a bit rocky for me was the bully scene in chapter three. Reason being, it felt too stereotypical for me. I just don't think there was enough tension there to make me really believe Macey and her crew would treat Cathy that way.

I understand there is history between their packs, but is that enough for them to attack her and call her immature names? Maybe there's a way you could twist in some more drama such as Macey being the child of the new Alpha or perhaps there was unresolved drama between the group and Cathy before she was kicked from the pack. Just something to make that reaction from the girls more believable.

Pacing: The story has been paced nicely. You established the premise early on, and quickly moved into Cathy meeting her new mate. So, good work here.

Style and Flow: This story flows really nicely from one scene to the next. And, I really enjoy your writing style. Everything is described vividly–especially our first introduction to the campus in chapter one. Because of this, I was easily able to picture every moment and it made for a fun read!

Characters: I liked our first introduction to Cathy–it was apparent she was close to her mom and I appreciated how you crafted her backstory into her introduction. However, she comes across as timid and weak to me. Since she is an Omega, for some reason, I had thought she'd been a bit stronger–used to being on her own. But during that fight scene, she seemed to just accept it.

I understand her not being able to physically take them on, but maybe we could get a glimpse of her being mentally strong there. Perhaps, there's a moment of internal dialogue of her rationalizing just taking the beating to make things easier. Or maybe afterwards, she stands up on her own, gathers herself and holds her head up high–anything to show she isn't super frail.

However, I will say, with the way she currently is, there is a lot of opportunity for character growth and development. Maybe that's what you have planned!

Nath makes for an interesting love interest. I love the complicated history Cathy has with his family, as this really increases the tension between them. He seems hard to pinpoint, like he could maybe be a punk but also he did help Cathy out, so I'm intrigued by him.

Another character worth noting is Martha. I loved her introduction as she seems spunky and unpredictable. I'm looking forward to more of her, as right now, I think she's my favorite!

Grammar/Spelling: I had left a few inline comments, mostly in reference to tense changes. There were a few others I hadn't pointed out, so I would just make sure to pay extra close attention to making sure everything remains in the same tense throughout.

Also, another grammatical error I noticed was in reference to dialogue tags. For the most part, these were fine. But when you had dialogue followed by punctuation [question mark or exclamation point] you would incorrectly capitalize the dialogue tag [he said, my dad yelled, a woman whispered].

An example from your text is where you wrote in chapter one: "Where in the hierarchy are you?" He questioned. So, to fix this, the word 'he' should be lowercase. This error was repeated throughout, so if you cared to correct it, just go through and lowercase them.

One last thing, there was an inconsistency in words you have chosen to capitalize. For a general rule of thumb, most things don't need capitalization unless it's a name or the beginning of a sentence. Some words you chose to capitalize (but only sometimes) are words such as: werewolf, pack, pack names, royalty, and principal–principal should only be capitalized when speaking in reference to a name, like Principal Tom, etc.

So, if you are making the choice to capitalize pack names, make sure you capitalize all of them for consistency.

Final thoughts: Overall, this was a very entertaining read–probably one of my more favorite reads as of late. Your writing is descriptive and humorous at times. And the premise feels fresh and exciting to me. If I had any friends looking for a werewolf story, I wouldn't hesitate to suggest this one! Great writing. (: