AUTHOR: AoifeCross STORY TITLE: Blood Root..

Title (05/10): I have yet to figure out when this title fits completely, but you get five points for half of the title to fit. I’m still looking for the root.

Characterization (06/10): Jimin is supposed to be ten years old in a flashback/dream. For a boy his age he is awfully reflective. It’s hard to portray kids properly, but Jimin is too mature compared to his age. As for the rest of the story, the Jimin is a very vague and flat character. It takes a lot to figure him out and he is just kind of there, the only plot he really participates in is the love square between Yoongi, Jungkook, Namjoon, and himself. I don’t see much of a development in him. The same cannot be said for the rest of them. The rest of the characters seem to turn like the flip of a coin going from being good to bad in a matter of seconds. I’ve selected a few characters to comment on: Yoongi: He is wonderfully described from Jimin’s point of view. He is weird, intriguing and intimidating, but it feels like the effort of keeping this mysterious side to him disappears already in chapter 3. Most we see of him through the story is from his own point of view or from others in terms of how much he loves Jimin. Considering how he isn’t human, I say it’s a waste of his character as I feel like the love story is only a minor plot but somehow comes to take up most of your word count. Jin: I didn’t really pay attention to Jin at first as he kind of seems to be in the background at first, but he suddenly makes his stand and his presence known in the story when it’s revealed how Yoongi and him aren’t human. Then he shows his true colors and how manipulative he is. I’m taking a point from you for including too many characters in your story. Characters like those from Monsta X, EXO, GOT7, BigBang, SNSD, and I don’t know who else you mention, how relevant are they to your story? Are they necessary to mention them by name like that and use so much effort on them? By telling so much about them, you ask your reader to memorize them and take note of their character for later, which is sad if they aren’t used for much plotwise. Then your reader is spending too much energy memorizing those people and it removes focus from the more important characters. The rest on the characterization I will comment on in the section on in ‘writing style and techniques’.

Themes (07/10): The themes of this story are kind of unique. It’s not a genre or theme that is found most of, of even less written as this kind of mystery. I think it fits pretty well with the tags on the story and the description.

Setting (09/10): The settings of this story is thought through thoroughly. A lot of details have been thought into the post-apocalyptic world and it’s very interesting to read in terms of settings.

Description and Foreword (06/10): It’s really not the best beginning when the first line in the foreword contains a spelling mistake. The rest of the foreword is building suspense by allowing the reader to follow the main character’s wonder of who this mystery person is. The attempt is very good and the author clearly has an idea of where they want to go. Though, the build isn’t smooth and proves of the writer’s desire to make each sentence an individual line which removes the chance of building a smooth suspense. That being said, the author could have picked a better part of the story to work as the foreword. It’s a common mistake among fanfic writers who actually put in a foreword of their fic. You’re not supposed to post the very first part of your first chapter. Forewords are supposed to be a snippet from the of the story or a short description/teaser for the plot.

Writing Style / Techniques (04/10): When you decide to include so many different characters and so many point of views, I don’t think writing the story in first point of view and not letting your reader know who they are reading from is all that good. You force your reader to pay a lot of attention to all the information you give in the first many sentences of each point of view before they can reason their way into who they are following and then they have to realize it and put all of this information to that character. Cognitively speaking, you’re putting your reader on overwork. Another thing I think could be worth considering when writing in first point of view, is how the different characters differ in their choice of words. When you write in first point of view from different characters what you write for each character is kind of supposed to portray their individuality. It’s a difficult thing to master, but something that adds more to the story. That being said, I think your story lacks depth. At first when you stick to Jimin’s point of view you have this wonderful mystery going on that keeps your reader on edge and curious of what is about to happen. When you change point of view, it all kind of drops and a lot of interesting things disappear from the story because the mystery of Yoongi’s character is gone in no time. I think it could be so much more interesting to see it all from Jimin’s point view, how characters change their ways of acting around him and no one knows why because Jimin doesn’t know.

Presentation (08/10): Nicely structured and sentences neatly divided. A few times the story lacks indication of a change of point of view, but that’s hardly anything worth mentioning. Nice graphic to follow the story too.

Structure and Flow (05/10): The flow of the story is kind of bumpy. It’s like there has been a plot for the story where certain events have been planned to happen. Each event is nicely written and easy to read, but the transitions between the events are lacking. There isn’t really a smooth transition between the heavy plotlines, which I think is a shame. Aside from that, it’s hard to read whenever the point of view changes. It takes a long time to figure out who the character the point of view is from. It takes some deciphering and it doesn’t really make sense to not announce who’s point of view that is followed when the story is written from first point of view.

Plot (09/10): The romantic plot between Jungkook and Jimin is developing entirely too quickly for my liking. It’s the second time Jungkook and Jimin meet and Jungkook is already talking about protecting him and implicitly saying he loves him by not letting ‘the other’ have him. Aside from Jungkook’s romantic feelings toward Jimin, this story is a rare gem among common coal in terms of plot. The plot has the potential to be so great, it’s just a shame the writing skills don’t match the plot completely and it seems vague and I kind of lost interest even if I saw a lot of potential.

Overall Enjoyment (05/10): Personally, it was kind of an ambivalent reading of this story. While I loved the thought of the plot and the complexity of the storyline, I didn’t find it carried out properly. The writing skill and decisions about how to portray the story simply was lacking to honor the genre properly. I was both frustrated by the methods of portraying the story, while the plot still kept me hooked. And that only made it even more irritating to me that the writing wasn’t complementing the story because I think the plot holds so much potential.

Overall Score: 64/100
Overall Percentage: 64%
Reviewer's Note:It’s a harsh but honest review. Don’t take it too much to heart. I’ve tried to comment on how to improve the parts that have frustrated me so that you can do it better if you decide to. I think putting some effort into rewriting parts of the story and maybe considering the point of view and how many characters you want to include as central people in telling your story and how much you want to reveal every time could make an amazing story.
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