J's Reviews [closed to catch up]

#12 The Ember In The Stars

First Impression
The Cover is nicely designed, with a professional vibe. However, it would be nice to see the author's name on it as at the moment it appears to be missing. I'm not a massive fan of the font that's been used, personally, I think it's a little bit plain, but that is probably just personal preference.

The Summary is decent and well written. It says enough about the book, but without giving too much of the plot away. It's a little bit on the lengthy side, but with the genre being fantasy then you can get away with it.

Chapter 1: untitled
I'm not quite sure what I think of the way the first chapter starts as, although it is interesting, I don't feel the hook is strong enough. There's also a lot of information within this chapter that I think would have been better to add to the story gradually instead of dumped in the early few paragraphs.

As I'm reading through this chapter, I can't help being a little bit confused. You have the kingdom of Kismet and Kaiman, the Prince of Gantrick, personally, I think these two names are too similar to easily distinguish the two. But as the prince is dying and possibly won't be mentioned further on in the story then maybe it won't be a problem. In one of my own books I had two characters, Jack and Jacob and was told the names were too similar. I was advised to change one of the names, but as Jacob was only in the story for a certain amount of chapters, I didn't really see the point.

I can't help but notice that you seem to use the word was, a lot when you are writing. Using words like was, can damage the nice flow of your sentences. The best advice I can give you on this is to read your sentence to yourself as it is, with the word was included. Then read it again without it. If it works without it then you can remove the word was all together.

This chapter is very nicely described and I can see you clearly know what show v tell is. There are a few grammatical errors here, I suggest downloading something like Grammarly that will help you correct these.

I absolutely love a cliffhanger, but I feel this one was a little bit slow, instead of sudden. Use shorter sentences to quicken the pace of this cliffhanger and it would drastically improve.

Chapter 2: Untitled
I really like the mysterious way you have started this chapter and for some reason, I already have an idea of who Isolde's attacker is. The fact that you've called Kaimam's brother, mad, makes me think this is probably him. I also can't help but notice that not a lot has been said about him other than the fact he is mad, so again, it makes me think this is most likely to be him. He's asking some very suspect questions which heighten my curiosity as a reader. I'm only on chapter two but I already want to know if I'm right about this character's identity.

I'm a little bit confused by a part here, where you say the only reason the Tsar is Kismet raised her as his own child. I thought the Tsar I'd Kismet was her father. Perhaps this should be clarified that they are not, in fact, father and daughter. The more of this paragraph I read, the more confused I become. The relationship between Isolde and the Tsar of Kismet is unclear.

The scene where she is briefly viewing Kaimam's dead body, I'm not sure if it's correct or not. Here you have a young girl viewing a dead body, now depending on how long he has been dead for, there is a high chance the corpse would begin to smell by now, but this has not been mentioned. At the end of the chapter, you mention the stranger saying sorry to Kaimam's dying body. So is he dead or not? This scene is again unclear.

Now if she had already been to the place where she was going to get married to Kaimam, surely she would have met his family, and his brother already? The fact she hasn't is a little bit strange.

Chapter 3: Untitled
Chapter three and things are a little clearer now, but I think the confusion should have been cleared up earlier on in the story. Make it clear in the first chapter that the Tsar of Kismet isn't her biological father and make it clear in chapter two that Kaiman/Kaimam isn't dead yet. Although I like your main character, I feel she is coming across as a little bit weak by accepting her fate to marry the mad brother of the love of her life. If I were her, the love of my life was dying and I was told I had to marry his mad brother, I would have told them to shove the idea somewhere painful and go on a quest to find a cure for my love, not just roll over and play the obedient little woman.

Conclusion
Like most books, this needs work. It is far from being perfect and needs polish. There are rather obvious spelling and grammatical errors within the chapters I have read. Unfortunately, some scenes are unclear, such as the relationship between your main character and the Tsar of Kismet and the scene where Kaiman is dying or has died. I don't know whether he has died in that scene or whether he is dying. There are two variations between the spelling of Kaiman's name, in the first chapter his name seems to be spelt K-A-I-M-A-N, as in the small crocodile, but in the later chapters, it is spelt K-A-I-M-A-M. My advice is to download Grammarly, and perhaps look into joining a book club or a writing community as I think that could really help build your confidence as a writer.