| | Indefinite Hiatus | |
I hope to return to this project someday, but it isn't feasible with my current health issues and life circumstances. I have to cut things from my workload so I can breathe. However, I still intend to complete my current li...
Source: Message board Genre: Paranormal, thriller Mature: Y (sexual content, strong profanity, violence) LGBTQIAP+: N Status: Ongoing First impressions: 33/40 Digging deeper: 76/100 Final thoughts: pending
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First impressions: 33/40
Title: 9/10
This is just a nitpicky thing on my part, but I don't like titles that are fully capitalized. I'd prefer just the first letters to be capitalized: Cursed Heir.
Story description: 9/10
I really like the content of this blurb. It's well written, without grammatical mistakes, and it gives away just enough information to catch a reader's interest without spoiling anything. I don't really like the order of the sentences, though. Or rather, the first sentence. I've been playing with swapping things around to see what I think would flow better, and I came up with two options.
First, move the second sentence down to the second paragraph. That would set the first sentence apart as more of a logline than a blurb, and the blurb would essentially start with the second paragraph. The reason I think this would work is the first sentence feels more like a logline than a part of the blurb. It works well on its own, but it doesn't flow into the rest of it.
The second option, and the one I prefer, is to just cut that first sentence altogether. It doesn't flow well into the second sentence and the rest of the blurb, and I don't like the repetition of "forbidden bloodline" in the last sentence of the blurb. But as with the first option, I would pair the question with the second sentence in the same paragraph. The second sentence needs something else, and that question works well to give it that something. You could also consider reworking the first sentence and tucking it between the second sentence and the question.
So, those are some things to consider. I know you're still writing the story, so you may not know exactly where it's going, and if that's the case, waiting to reevaluate the blurb until after the story is finished (or almost finished) wouldn't be a bad idea.
Addendum: I had my suspicions this may be AI-generated, and after reading the introduction, prologue, and chapter one, those suspicions are much stronger. Chapter one is so, SO good, though, because you switch to your own writing, and that is what I recommend you do for all of it. This blurb, as is, matches the tone and style of the introduction and prologue, but it doesn't match chapter one at all. And that's the one you want to match.
Cover: 7/10
I like the background image. It's kind of blurry, and I'm not sure if that's intentional or not, but I think it works. That sort of adds a mysterious, things-may-not-look-the-way-they-seem vibe to me. Like there's much more under the surface than what the image portrays. I also like the title with the combination of two font styles and colors. "Heir" would blend in too much if it weren't for the bold white "Cursed" above it, but since it has that, I think the color for "Heir" is fine. The white draws the eye to that spot, and it's natural to continue to the second word.
