Title: 1/5

 

“I Forgive You” is not a good title for a two-shot. It’s a simple statement; something one person says to another person, and it isn’t interesting enough. I’m afraid that I wouldn’t click on your two-shot if I ever saw it on AFF because of the fact that the title is boring and uninteresting.

 

I’m going to advise you to change the title to something better and more original than the one you currently have at the moment.

 

Description/Foreword: 4/10

 

The description is fine enough, but you really need to remember to capitalize the beginning of a sentence and that, when asking a question, you use a question mark (?), not an ellipsis (…), ‘kay? If you decided to be a more descriptive and given an overall description of the two-shot, you would’ve gotten more marks for your description — I only gave you three marks for it, I’m afraid. :/

 

The foreword? I only gave you one mark for trying, and because I’m so nice. :P

 

Not only was the foreword an author’s note with no foreword/prologue/teaser in sight, but the thoughts were all over the place and you added many spaces when they were not needed. It didn’t help that you had different, random colours — the blue colour really hurt my eyes, and they weren’t at all needed. I advise you to change the foreword; add an actual foreword and then clearly mark an author’s note underneath — remember to organize your thoughts more as well.

 

Originality/Plot/Creativity: 7/20

 

Most of the things in here have already been done in stories, TV shows, and movies alike, so I’m afraid that this plot isn’t overly creative or original. However, you added plenty of things that made it different from other stories — such as the ending of this two-shot. I really hadn’t expected it to end this way, but it worked well with this two-shot since it was angsty, so I liked it.

 

So, because of this fact, I really had mixed emotions when it came to this short story. On one hand, it was painfully unoriginal. On the other hand, it kind of paved its own way — but not quite, I’m sorry to say.

 

Writing Style: 12/15

 

Your writing style was nice, but there were things that you should’ve changed.

 

First, sometimes, you added spaces when they weren’t needed. Remember only to press that space bar once, and only when you believe your chapter is in need of another paragraph. Also, remember that there is an option of adding a line for a page break when you are switching point of views or a reasonable amount of time has passed or if the setting is changing.

 

Second, when your characters are thinking inside their head, it’s best if you make another paragraph for that and italicize the thought so people know it’s a thought. This is sort of optional, but most people do italicize thoughts, so it’s best if you do so as well because it makes the writing easier to comprehend and take in for readers.

 

Third, don’t make paragraphs so long. When you are talking about a different subject, it’s best to make another paragraph and then continue on with the thought rather than allowing the paragraph to continue, for no paragraph should be more than nine-ten lines, I believe.

 

Fourth, you should take out “2min” from your tags, because that is rather misleading. Taemin and Minho are friends in this short story, not lovers — however, people may believe differently when they see this tag. 2min shippers would immediately click on this while people who don’t enjoy 2min or dislike would skip this two-shot.

 

These things you should look into if you ever decide to edit your two-shot. It’s best if you change them around, that way, not only will your skills as a writer increase but you should be able to get even more readers, commenters and subscribers.

 

Grammar/Spelling/Vocabulary: 6/10

 

You didn’t have any spelling mistakes — or, at least, I didn’t find any spelling mistakes, so you’re cleared of that. As for the grammar mistakes…well, there were a few.

 

Like this one:

 

 

If you read the sentence over, then I’m sure it’s fairly obvious what your mistake was. The sentence should sound awkward when you read it out loud, and so you’ll immediately realize what the grammar mistake is.

 

Still, if you don’t know, then this is the revision of your sentence:

 

However, the sentence still sounds weird. It’s not a grammar problem, but the words you used just make the sentence seem awkward.

 

So, if I were you, I would change the sentence into this:

 

You can keep the sentence I had edited before, or you could use the sentence above instead. I just wanted to let you know that the sentence sounded terribly awkward and seemed almost worded wrong. You don’t have to reword it if you don’t want to.

 

Moving on, another sentence with a mistake is this:

 

This sentence sounds terribly awkward, and though there isn’t a grammar mistake in here, I still think that you should change up this sentence a little bit because of how awkward it sounds when you read it aloud.

 

So, it should instead be like this:

 

 

The revision sounds much better and not awkward at all, so I’d say that you edit the sentence. Still, you don’t have to if you don’t want to, it’s just that if you allow the sentence to continue to sound weird like that, then it’ll be hard for a reader to really get a feel for your two-shot, and it makes them lose attention in the two-shot and instead pay attention on the sentence and how awkward it sounds.

 

Anyway, continuing, another grammar mistake would have to be this:

 

 

It’s rather obvious to me that this thought was said aloud, but to some it may be confusing. It’s best if you say something after “she thought,” and not just leave it like that.

 

So, the revision of this sentence would be this:

 

The sentence flows more smoothly, and there would be absolutely no risk of people being confused and wondering whether Key had been thinking aloud or in her mind.

 

Now, another grammar mistake is this:

 

There are a few mistakes in here. Firstly, “the world would have been a fairy tale” sounds weird. “A fairy tale”? It just seems so…random, in my opinion. “The world would have been a better place” seems more likely for someone as old as him to think, especially since Taemin is a boy. A teenage boy thinking of the world being a fairy tale is just too…well, non-realistic, I think. Also, you made a tense mistake in here. “Do not exist” is present tense, but since your short story is in past tense, it doesn’t work at all. It instead should read “didn’t exist” so there is no tense confusion.

 

Now, when you combine all of my revisions, you would get this:

 

 

There is just one more grammar mistake I found in the first part, and it is this:

 

 

That sentence…makes absolutely no sense. A “plaque” and a “plague” are two different things, as well as the fact that you got the metaphor wrong as well.

 

Instead, it was supposed to be this:

 

 

Your vocabulary was nice as well — you did really good with it, and tried to be as descriptive as possible, so kudos to you on that as well. Just remember not to use a few words over and over again, like perhaps the word “forgive.” You used it throughout the two-shot, and even though the whole two-shot was about that, you shouldn’t put too much emphasis on it or else the two-shot may seem a little cheesy.

 

Anyway, apart from these mistakes and my small advice here and there, there weren’t too many mistakes in your work. I, however, only looked over the first part for you; you should read your work aloud just in case to catch any other mistakes that I may have missed or not looked at.

 

Characterization: 22/25

 

Good characterizations; Key was very well thought-out, and was even a better character because of the fact that you had gone ahead and really explained her feelings about what had happened with Jonghyun and her feelings about what it had done to her relationship with Taemin in the letter she had given Taemin.

 

If you compare Taemin with Key, however, he fell a bit flat. His reasoning for Key being the reason Jonghyun died was a bit, I don’t know, not really portrayed as well as it could have been. You should’ve used the time when Taemin either read Key’s letter or while he was in class to really show Taemin’s thoughts about Key and Jonghyun and what had happened after Jonghyun’s death to go more in-depth with his character, me thinks.

 

Minho was a rather minor character, so I understand why he wasn’t that well developed in this. Still, I think that you should’ve at least made him more in-depth — at least a little bit. Maybe have Taemin think about Jonghyun’s death and what happened afterwards, then go into detail about how Minho may have comforted Taemin about it, and from there talk more about Minho as a person so one can understand his character a bit more. I would’ve really liked to know a bit more about Minho.

 

All in all, your characterization was good, but I feel as if it could’ve been even better.

 

Flow/Detail: 8/10

 

You definitely paid attention to detail, but I would’ve liked it if you explained a few more things — perhaps if you explained Key’s emotions a bit more when Key thought about Taemin and how their relationship had fallen apart so badly, or when she realized that Taemin wasn’t in his room and got a bit alarmed. Maybe even when she got the text from him; she would’ve been relieved and angered, right? It would’ve been best if you portrayed this. Still, however, I liked the attention to detail you had in this; I could picture it all in my head, except for the part when Key is at work, for you didn’t really explain how her work place looked like.

 

The flow was fine, but in some parts if fell a bit flat — for instance, when Key fell down the stairs. You should’ve gone further into her thoughts before she fell, just to show the readers how lost in thought she had been, which was why she never saw the man coming and bumped into him, thus having her tumble rather badly down the stairs as an end result of being lost in her thoughts.

 

Ending: 9/10

 

I pretty much liked the ending, and also the fact that there was a time skips so things didn’t seem too rushed, especially the part where Taemin pretty much kills Key. Still, I would’ve liked it if it was one or two years later which is why I took off a mark here, but eh. Whatever. Whatever floats your boat, really.

 

Ending — Taemin takes off the respirator and, generally, kills his mother by his own hands. People can see this any way they wish; Taemin loved her enough that he let her go and ended her suffering, or he is a murderer who killed his own mother.

 

It really makes you think about whether it was a good thing or a bad thing that Taemin had done, so I liked it very much in terms of this fact alone.

 

Bonus: 4/5

 

Four out of five for the surprising, angsty ending, as well as Key’s wonderful characterization in this two-shot!

 

Overall mark:

 

73/100

 

 

 

 

this review is done by Maria/SKID_11 who is one of the many reviewers from http://lemonswirls.visualchic.net/

I chose her because she's honest and straight forward and she's not hesitant to criticise a story which is what I really need to be able to improve!

 

I have corrected the MANY grammar errors as well as addind a proper foreword this time...but I won't change the title because as you all know, it is the theme to all three stories...and as for the spacing between each paragraph as well as the additional bits to strengthen Taemin and Minho's character...I'll edit them when I have the time!

 

anyway, I still have a lot to work on! so keep supporting me, okay? ^^