Sapphire's Review Store 3.0

Review by Addie: 91-DIVOC

Title: 91-DIVOC

Author: JouskaXu

Reviewer: Addison-AJ

Character Building: 3.9/5

      There are some awesome things with the characters. I love the nervousness of Mak and Vee's lonely life in Ghana. The recordings described their personalities from their point of view, which is amazing. The dialogue was also well put together and assembled correctly. However, I do think there are a few points that could have been improved.

      First of all, there are the emotions of the characters. Throughout the book, I felt like there was room for more feelings of Mak. It didn't have to just feel lonely most of the time. There was more of his experience staying at home that may as well have been included. I don't think the hopeful and lonely type of Mak should have been included so much. If he was staying at home for such a long time, it would have turned into anger and depression more. 

      There could have been a larger variety. Switch some of the expressions out and talk more about how he gets so angry about thinking he was one of the last ones left. Include more information about his time thinking about the virus, and his opinion on that. Does he even want to stay in Manhattan or does he think about the rest of the world? That is, before he meets Vee on Zoom. 

      Try to use more to describe how far his thoughts wander about the state of things. After he gets infected by the virus, perhaps you could add more to that. It almost seemed like he didn't care as much anymore. He didn't think about anything anymore. Tell the reader more about why? Why was he so lonely and bored with everything? Why did he only become curious at parts? Then, why did he not wonder about that as clearly afterward? Try to answer these questions as clearly as possible, so the reader can understand the story more.

      On the other hand, you told the story wonderfully from Mak's perspective. It was fantastic how you added what was happening outside of his home, and what he was doing inside. Your characters were easy to follow since there weren't so many that it became overwhelming. The point of view you used was also marvelous, and there were only a few things that could have made it better. But overall, fantastic job so far!

Grammar: 4.1/5

      I really didn't find too many grammar mistakes in your writing. I noticed a few here and there, but it was nearly perfect most of the time. Well done! Your writing has been edited and polished thoroughly and there are only a few errors left. Let's start with the punctuation and commas, which were the most common mistakes that I found.

      So sometimes, there were missing commas in your story. Here's an example:

Before Editing: Hey it's April 13th. 

      In this example, there is supposed to be a comma after the first word. After editing, it should look like this:

After Editing: Hey, it's April 13th.

      Just make sure to include punctuation marks where they are needed. If it sounds like there has to be a pause in between two words, that's where the comma should go. Another example is below:

Before Editing: Finally someone is here!

After Editing: Finally, someone is here! 

      I also noticed that you usually forget to add the comma after the first word in a sentence. Since your story is made up of recordings, Mak lets the reader know what day it is. Try to take a look at the first word in that sentence and see if a comma is needed. This applied to most of the recordings in your story. I would suggest that you use Grammarly to fix these. Moving on, I'll now be the ending of numbers. To explain this further, here are a few examples:

Before Editing: Sup it's April 21th.

Before Editing: t's April 22th.

      So there's actually more than one mistake in each one of these sentences. Let's start off with the first example. Here, the first word should be a sentence on its own. It's asking a question, so that means there should be a question mark (?) at the end. Also, the ending of '12th' is incorrect. Instead, it should be '21st.'

After Editing: Sup? It's April 21st.

      For the next example, there are also two mistakes. Number one is that the first word is not spelled correctly. 't's' should have been spelled 'It's.' Also, '22th' should have been '22nd.' 

After Editing: It's April 22nd.

      Also, some parts need to have hyphens connecting them. Here are a few examples:

- Self treatment should have been self-treatment

- Heavy duty should have been heavy-duty

      Just make sure to go through and add them where they are needed. But other than that, I thought your grammar was pretty good. Great job!

Writing Style: 3.6/5

      Writing your story in first person was amazing, and you have definitely perfected that. The story is amazing in that point of view, with all the feelings and emotions. As I said in the character-building section, there could have been more though. The only other thing that I wanted to point out was the time he met Vee.

      For this part, I think it may have been a good idea for more diverse actions. Try to keep the feelings consistent throughout, but also make them match with the story. How could Mak be so lonely and not sad or depressed clearly? Try to include as much as possible and make it clear is to why you chose what you did. Be very specific to the reader.

      Also, I wanted to mention the beginning of the story. At this part, I was somewhat confused about what was happening. It becomes more detailed later in the story, but perhaps you could include the information about the virus first? That way, the reader will have a good understanding of what's going on at the beginning itself. They won't have to wait for a while to hear the main idea. 

      I know you did include some information about the virus, but try to make it more of a detailed paragraph. For this part, it might be better to not include as many emotions. Just be very specific as to what the virus has done. What is the overall idea of the story? This should be at the start, since it is very important. Moving on, I'll also be talking about the descriptions in your book.

      You could have included so much more description, even if it was in first person with Mak recording. What does his apartment look like? Anything would work well. It's purpose is to make your story very intriguing and interesting to the reader. Detail will always pull them into your book, and make them want to read more. It's the impression that the detail has on the reader.

      As far as descriptions go, there could have also been more use of figurative language. I think there is quite a bit of room for more literary devices in your script. Similes, metaphors, personification would have been engaging for the reader. Even if it's just a few, I believe it could do a lot. This also relates to the detail in the previous paragraph, which would have a huge impact.

Plot + Originality: 5/5

      I really enjoyed the plot of your story, and it became more unique when you talked about the recordings and meeting Vee. I never expected anyone to show up, and I liked how you added that in. You also included his life alone, which was very interesting to me. I never thought he would get the virus from his roommate. There were a lot of twists and turns in the story, which was amazing!

      For the uniqueness part of this, I thought it would be cliche at first. That's what it seemed like, with the whole concept and idea. But you included many differences, so keep up the awesome work there! Your story was also nice to read through, without having too many grammatical errors or plot holes. I thought your plot was well-planned and your story became more unique as it went on!

OVERALL SCORE: 16.6/20

      Overall, you have an intriguing plot and only a few grammar errors. Just make sure you go through and work on some more detail and revise the personalities of the characters. But otherwise, I really enjoyed reading through your story. I hope this review helps in some way!