Story Review by Divergin1004 from ~H A L O Reviews~

Story by hazel_marie13

Reviewed by Divergin1004

Title (2/5):

I could tell straight away that the story would be a love one. Moreover, I deducted points because I can guess the story without having to know, and also that it’s very likely that there will be other stories with the exact same title as yours. Now, it doesn’t really catch my interest because it doesn’t make me wonder on what the plot can be. Yes, you showed how one of the characters can’t cope with the other not being there when I read your story but, if I were to read the title again as a first-timer, it’s like I can guess the plot almost-accurately. You’d want to attract your readers into reading your story but it won’t work unless you really make them think on what the title could mean.

Now, I didn’t give it a really low mark because despite the fact the title’s quite common, in a way it’s comforting and familiar; this aspect also applies to your story which I’ll talk about later. Moreover, the title does relate to the story which I think is more important.

Foreword and Description (6/10):

The description was mainly comments from you which I don’t have that much problems with.

Onto the foreword, I felt that it was more of an introduction to a fairy-tale. You reveal lots of information which yes, does prepare the readers on what they should expect, but to me, it ruins the story. This was the main reason why I deducted points; your description lacks implicit detail. Just like you’re title, you’d want your readers to be intrigued on what you story could be about. Try hint things in which could make your readers question. Mess their mind a bit on what could be true or not true, that way it makes the reader more anticipated. An example is on the second paragraph when it was mentioned that Heechul agreed to do a bet.

Here’s a little example I thought of for your second paragraph:

So what happens when Heechul agrees to a bet that includes the Ice princess?

Will he win, and not have to do his homework for four months?

Or will he fail, and suffer the consequences?

Now here, I don’t mention what the bet is or how the bet actually started. Moreover, I also don’t explain what the consequences are if Heechul does lose the bet. These things could be answered while reading the story, so it saves you the trouble of having to include it in the foreword. A few things to mention is that the first sentence of your description was alright, but the one following after it is a bit silly to me.

Example: Jessica is known as the “Ice Princess” in her school. She doesn’t have friends because she’s cold to everyone.

Isn’t that a bit obvious? I think most readers would know the meaning of “Ice Princess”, so you didn’t have to include the fact that she’s ‘cold’; we readers could figure it by ourselves, as “Ice Princess” literally explains itself. In addition, why would she be called “Ice Princess” if she wasn’t cold?

Overall, despite the fact your description was a bit iffy to me, I understood it and at least I have an idea of what the story could be about.

Graphics (3/5):

I quite like your poster! It seems a bit angsty, which is included a bit in your story so I’m alright with it. I like the use of black and white as it matches the elegancy of the font. The two characters are cut cleanly, and they give off a mysterious aura.

However, I don’t really understand the background; what is it? That aspect made me confused on why it was used, to be honest I would’ve preferred a different background. I was thinking of either a countryside or city as it was mentioned quite frequently in the whole story. Anyways, despite the background I quite like your poster.

Plot (13/30):

Can I say your plot was predictable? I’m not quite too sure, really. Well, I thought that the main plot of the story was for Heechul to get Jessica to like him. Apparently both of the two fell for each other which was no surprise at all. However, one thing that really bugged me was that Heechul and Jessica were yes; off to a bad start in the beginning but at the end of the first chapter, they’re already friends! That left me wondering on what the rest of the story will be about as I thought that the main aim of the story was for Jessica to like Heechul, not for the two to realise their feelings for each other; I thought that along the way that would happen.

Moreover the twist wasn’t fresh or something that I wasn’t expecting. It’s something that could happen to most stories really so I wasn’t that surprised. To be honest, there might’ve been other stories similar to yours that I’ve read, so I was interested on how you’d take this concept and twist it. Unfortunately, your story didn’t really prepare me for anything exciting.

There was one chapter that I thought seemed a bit confusing and unreal. This occurred in chapter four, when Jessica transferred back to her school. Now, I have some questions which I wanted to be answered throughout the story but it didn’t.

How on earth did the student managed to retrieve information about the bet?

 Why I’m asking that question is that Heechul and his friends are a pretty large group, so how was it not likely to see someone overhearing their conversation. Also they were at the school gates, not at some classroom where it’s possible for someone to hear your conversation. Secondly, in chapter four, it wasn’t mention that the bet lasted for four months! So how did the student managed to find that out in the next chapter? I believe you should re-check your work just so that some information will be set right.

The teacher mentioned that she saw the treatment that the classmates were giving to Jessica, why didn’t she or any other teacher do anything about it in the past?

It makes sense that if a teacher sees that a student is being mistreated, they’ll at least try to do something about it. I did read a blog that even though the consequence of bullying isn’t that severe, a lecture to the bully or the whole class will be addressed. In this case, there wasn’t any mention of any teacher asking if Jessica was doing alright. It’s a bit strange as Jessica was meant to be in third year so shouldn’t they, her teachers, be checking regularly if she’s used to the environment rather than focus only on her grades?

It took one day for Jessica to transfer schools, isn’t that too quick?

Okay, two things seemed a bit unreal. I believe that it doesn’t take a day for someone to conclude that they want to move. After all, they need to deal with documents and papers (well not that much) to confirm they want to move. Secondly, what made Jessica do that? She’s a strong girl and I don’t really believe that she’d want to move out of her school, out of the city in one night. Seriously, that was a bit unreal. If she left after a few days, fine. But after a day? I doubt it.

Now, what I did like the story was that it was simple. There were not that much twists so I wasn’t confused. It was easy to follow along, and despite the fact I wasn’t that impressed with your story, it was quite sweet. I’m a er for romance, and I like the innocent love that blossomed between Jessica and Heechul.

Characterisation (13/20):

Here, I’ll mainly focus on Jessica and Heechul. I’ll start off with Jessica. I didn’t feel the cold aura that was meant to be present in the story. It was just mentioned, she either ignored you or she gave a cold glare, and that’s it. As mentioned, I could mainly see that aspect in the first chapter as well as some in chapter five and six. I just find her someone who tries to get of her problems quickly so she doesn’t have to deal with them, but not in a lazy-type of way. Cold to me is someone who bears no emotions whatsoever. Jessica does care which is why I don’t regard her as cold. I can tell Jessica’s the type of person who bottles up her feelings and deals with them alone. Moreover, she tends to think a lot and that’s covered with her ‘cold’-like appearance. That kind of aspect is something that I think I can see in real life. I can also see that she isn’t some bratty-kid, I can see her humbleness when it’s mentioned that she wanted to learn some domestic things. I do see her as a bit naïve though, and I feel that when she cares about something; she’ll care about it a lot.

Now onto Heechul, I find him a bit perfect at times. One, who’s willing to transfer schools just to get back someone they like or love? We live in a society where it’s easier to spam someone with messages and so on, rather than move places. Also he’s there everywhere for Jessica! Isn’t there one place where he couldn’t be with Jessica almost every time? I understand that’s he’s sweet, and when he’s close to someone, he’ll be by their side, but; it’s as if Heechul is with Jessica almost everywhere. Who would be that dedicated? It’s a bet so I understand that he’d try hard to get Jessica to like him but why so serious about it? He’s the type who can see through things and I like that, but it’s just that I can’t think or believe someone as dedicated like him. But I do like him; he’s a gentleman which is why I can understand why Jessica liked him.

Grammar and Spelling (14/20):

Your spelling is alright! I don’t think I found a lot of mistakes concerning your spelling.

Onto the grammar, if there was one thing that confused me, it was your tenses. You switch between present and past tense that I get mixed up on which you want to use.

Here’s an example (this was taken out in chapter one, when Jessica got splashed by the water):

Example: Jessica was hurt about what happen so she stands up after getting her things. Heechul followed her after glaring at the girl. Jessica went to the school garden and sits on one of the bench there to cry.

Correction: Jessica was hurt on what happened so she stood up after getting her things. Heechul followed her after glaring at the girl. Jessica went to the school garden and sat on one of the benches there to cry.

Here, I got confused on whether the scene was in the present as you used the terms ‘stands’ and ‘sits’ but after reading what the tense was before, I assumed that it was meant to be in past tense. Now, I have to admit, I was horrible at tenses, especially in the past. To make sure your story was set in the past, the actions must be set to pass- one to avoid confusion, two; it makes things a bit more clear.  To re-check your work, try and say the sentence out loud if in doubt. If it doesn’t then where it sounded wrong should be corrected. Soon, you’d get used to mentally correcting your mistakes.

Example: (this was taken out in chapter three): “Yes. The people there are nice. I even gain some new friends.” I answered.

Correction: “Yes. The people there are nice. I even gained some new friends.” I answered.

The term ‘gain’ almost made the scene set to present, so by adding an ‘ed’ at the end, it reassures us that Jessica’s speaking at the past tense.

There are similar sentences like these, which I think are easy to be spotted. I believe you can fix theses mistakes quite easily as your English is quite alright! Just remember to re-check your work so that you avoid little mistakes, and whether the sentence is in the right tense.

Enjoyment (3/5):

Did I enjoy this story? Well, the story was simple. As mentioned, it was easy to follow so I didn’t get confused. Even though, your story wasn’t one where I was impressed, it was nice and sweet to read.

Extras (2/5):

I’m just going to comment a little on your writing style. This relates to what I mentioned in the Foreword and Description section; your story lacks implicit detail. You tend to explain things explicitly. Sometimes, you also tend to write a lot; a good example is the last chapter. Boy, was it huge. I wasn’t really interested on how the rest of the SNSD members got together with the rest of the Super Junior’s member; I lost interest almost halfway reading it.

 I’m the type of reader who likes to look for a deeper meaning when reading, but unfortunately I couldn’t do that in your story. Now don’t be discouraged! You did say that ‘Without you’ was your third story, and it does take time for an author to reach that level of implying things. Your style of writing is just like any other story out there in AFF with it’s simple, and cliché-like plots however, I feel that when you finally think of a really good story that you want to write about, that’s when you improve. I recommend that to try stick in writing and developing in one genre, like romance, and when you feel that you’re quite strong in that area, try and expand your preferences. 

Going back to the fact you write explicitly, it’s that when someone or something is occurring, you explain why. Here’s an example:

Example: All of them are quiet after what happened yesterday. They really feel guilty with what they did.

Here you didn’t have to explain why, in the first sentence, the reader could figure out that after what happened, it seems obvious they felt bad on what they did.

Here’s another example:

Example: Remember when a friend of her greeted her? I don’t know why I get jealous.

One, there was only one scene in the whole of the chapter, or even story where Jessica greeted her friend, so there wasn’t really a point to include in the word ‘a’; you could’ve replaced it with ‘that’. Secondly, it was pretty obvious that Heechul got jealous in that scene; so why include it? I don’t think a confirmation was needed that Heechul was jealous.

To finish off, your story wasn’t that bad, but it wasn’t really really good either. As mentioned, try focusing on writing with one genre so that you can develop it. Don’t forget! Don’t always explain things explicitly! That’s for the readers to find out!

Final score:

56%

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(A/N: Wasn't expecting a 56% score for this story because I was expecting a lower score and I really believed on what the reviewer's opinion about my story so I'll surely follow her tips to improve my writing skills :)