Ohana Reviews

Review ❀ Gallows Humour

Reviewer: @mmjayoh

Book: Gallows Humour

Author: @copyedit

Title and Cover: The title is unique. I'm not sure it gives me 'horror' vibes, but it stands out. The cover looks professional. The cover art is captivating and appropriate for the story, and the title font meshes nicely with the image.

Blurb: The blurb is concise, which is good. There are a number of incomplete sentences, but assuming that was a stylistic choice, it all flows nicely. My only real concern is that I'm not sure I have a good understanding of the story based on the blurb. It sounds like a dystopian world and there might be some villain after them, but I don't have any real idea what the premise of the story actually is.

Right now, I don't feel immediately compelled to read the story. Try leaning into the most exciting element of the story. What's True Gallow's purpose for the story? Seeking revenge, survival, saving a friend? Maybe try giving a direction or reworking what you have already written to make your last sentence pack more of a punch–make me want to read what you've written! Because it is wonderfully written, I'd hate for someone to miss out.

Plot Overview: The first five chapters were a fun read! What impressed me most was your worldbuilding. You've created a wonderfully grimy, horrific world for True to exist in. It's a perfect example of how scenery can add to the plot because, right now, the story shines because of the world you've created.

It's clear you have a good understanding of story structure, which makes me hopeful you have created a loose outline for the whole story. This helps keep things on track and give the story direction. So far, your story follows basic story structure since you took the time to set-up the story, created an inciting incident at the market, and now True is on a journey to debate whether or not they will take up Gayla's ask to go after the factioneers.

The story has been engaging throughout and I'm very intrigued to see what happens to True from this point forward. What will happen to intertwine their story back with the factioneers? It seems they've made the decision to run and leave things behind, but there has to be more to it.

Last note, you've done a nice job of setting up the world without information dumps. This is clearly a complex world that has been through some things that would need explained. However, for the most part, you offered this information subtly. For instance, in chapter three as True raids a house we are offered information that a virus has caused the destruction. Through this scene, we were offered a glimpse of what occurred. You did the same with the factioneers and shadow dwellers–while I still may be a bit fuzzy on all the details, you've offered enough for me to understand so I can keep reading and learn more later.

The only place where things felt like an information dump was in chapter five, explaining the history of the market and red faction–it felt out of place where it was offered and was a large chunk of text. Like you did with the explanation of the virus, I would try offering this information more subtly and organically in the story. Maybe offer bits of information here and there, instead of all of it in one large text.

Pacing: The pacing felt nice to me. You really took your time setting up the story before jumping into any fast-paced action, but that was necessary. The world is so unique and important that it was essential you take that extra time to set the scene.

Style and Flow: Your writing style is a lot of fun to read. You've managed to use the perfect language to create a grimy, edgy tone for this story. For instance, in chapter one you created such harrowing visuals by saying things like 'a crater for a nose' or 'a canyon splitting their face.' It's a horrifying visual, which was exactly what you were going for.

However, you also add little touches of humor. This breaks up the dark, gritty horror and makes for a fun read. True has some witty, dry humor and their personality jumps from the pages through your writing. Great work, here!

Characters: I love that you showed True's character through their actions such as in chapter one not caring if they had killed the dweller or not. Or later, when their boot broke and they handled it by flipping it off. It's a smart way to get their sarcastic personality across.

I also love the touches that humanize them. The detail of True's lisp or their attachment to their bandana to hide their scar–it made them more real and loveable. And, while they're presented as a loner, they clearly have a soft spot for Ragdoll. True could easily get rid of Ragdoll if they wanted, but they let it slide, and I love their dynamic!

Grammar/Spelling: There were some minor typos throughout–I pointed some out in the inline comments. It could benefit from a good read-through to correct these things, but those are easy fixes!

The entire story was pretty clean. I didn't notice many grammatical errors, so nice work. The only real thing I noticed was some inconsistency in capitalization. When you introduced new 'players' like 'scavengers, after market, or factioneers,' you would capitalize them at first. But after a few uses, they would return back to lowercase.

You should decide early on if a term will be capitalized or not and then make sure to stick to that throughout. In my opinion, almost none of those things need capitalization, but if that's important to you just make sure it's consistent!

Final thoughts: This story is super unique. The premise is a new take on a dystopian world, and the way you've written the story is fresh and exciting. You're very talented in world building and creating characters. The way you've described scenes or characters' appearances are perfectly grimy and gritty. It was a fun read and I hope you keep writing!