Gemstone Reviews [Closed for Catch up]

Review #41-Hidden Within Dawn

Title: Hidden Within Dawn

Author: Writingsomethingmt

Rating: PG-13 

# of chapters:  Prologue + 3 (ongoing) 

# of chapters I read: Prologue + 1

Summary/Blurb:

Sorano Kazuho is someone that remains a mystery to most, as he does. He remains as such, most could not dig up his past. There was nothing.

However his own past haunts him in his own way, he has things that he needs to do things that he has to fulfil. After many years of building his power, he is now coming back. It was time.

He is going back to Okiban. The city of Okiban a place that he once called home.

Review: (Sorry for how late this is! Thanks for being so patient.) 

Cover:

This cover looks badass as hell because it looks like a poster for a kung fu movie! Now that I look at the designer, no wonder it's so good—of course it would be made by Rachel. (I'm obsessed with action films revolving around karate/judo/fighting, etc. so you can understand my excitement)

I love the pagoda enveloped by flames in the background and the whole red/orange color scheme you have going on. It really matches the title "Hidden Within Dawn", because sunrises share the same hues. There is also a symbolic significance—sunrise are often associated with a 'new beginning', and through the blurb, we understand that it's exactly what the character seems to go through. The guy has trained for years no, and is finally going back to his hometown to tie up the loose ends of his past. We also have him on the cover (looks a bit like Tom Cruise, I'm not going to lie), looking as badass as the rest of it. It does make me wonder, however, about whether he's Japanese or a white American. I guess we'll find out.

The only issue I see with this are the subtitles—are they meant to be one continuous sentence, just split into two parts? Because it doesn't make sense from a logical standpoint when you put them together:

"There is always a way, just whether you are willing to pay the price."

There's something missing before "just whether", namely, "it's [just] a matter of".

Other than that, I don't have much to say—I'm expecting a lot of action!

Blurb:

I was captivated by the blurb, mainly because of the story it gave me a glimpse of. It's short, but it doesn't leave out any of the detail it would require to hook the reader—in a few words, we have the protagonist Sorano, finally returning to his hometown for unknown reasons. 

I feel like someone fucked him over when he was younger, but because Sorano was too young to do anything about it, he was forced to leave and undergo rigorous training to finally face his 'outer-demons' without getting his butt kicked. I think the ambiguity of the whole matter, namely, "his own past haunts him in his own way, he has things that he needs to do, things that he needs to fulfil", works in your favour, because it sparked my interest. There are many possibilities as to why Sorano was forced to leave and come back, and I definitely want to find these out. 

 My main concern here is that the blurb is littered with grammatical errors. Awkward sentences, forgotten punctuation, etc. and the whole thing needs some polishing.

1. "There is always a price to everything"— "Everything has a price"

2. "Sorano Kazuho is a young man that remains a mystery to most, as he does."—"as he does" is redundant, because it doesn't add anything to the sentence.