B5 | JangRINA
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Slightly Envious
a storyline by JangRINA
Synopsis
"Look at him. Thinking he's all cute and . Like he's the best-looking in all of EXO. ing prick," he thought.
A sudden erruption of "Wo ai ni gege"s and "Luhan"s snapped him out of his reverie.
Luhan was dancing his own personalized version of "Wolf".
He looked towards the other members watching and dancing along with Luhan.
He couldn't help but feel envious as the rest of EXO-M started chanting Luhan's name like everyone else.
What's so great about Luhan anyways?
"It's not like he's the best vocal, Chen is really talented. And I can sing higher notes than him.", he pondered quietly.
Watching Luhan perform freely on stage made him sneer at how gracefully Luhan carries himself.
"He's shy. He was supposed to be shy. Why isn't he being shy right now?"
The answer came replying in hundreds of voices. Right.
"I need more exposure.", he sighed.
Joining his brothers in their activities once again, he pushed his feelings down and tried to concentrate on enjoying himself. On entertaining their fans. His fans. Fans who love him. Xiumin.
Which was really hard to believe.
Throughout the rest of the afternoon, all he heard was the continous cheers of "Luhan! Luhan!"
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Title
The word envy can be associated in every chapter. Although envious is a deep, and often times connoted as a dangerous description of a person, adding the word slightly toned it down. That is a good thing.
Description
It’s short yet it definitely summarizes the story.
Xiumin hates how perfect Xi Luhan is.
It's something he can't stand. He slowly starts to show his distaste for everything Luhan-related. People notice.
They promptly misinterpret.
It was mentioned by a reader of mine that Luhan clarified that Xi from his name must be removed. Until now I don’t know the back story. Moving on, the description is okay but the statement “They promptly misinterpret” seemed a little vague for me. My question is: What is there to misinterpret? Xiumin cannot stand Luhan’s perfection. That’s it. My suggestion is to try to change or perhaps paraphrase the last line.
Foreword
It’s short and it gave us a glimpse of Xiumin’s grave dislike or hatred (?) towards Luhan. There is just some mixing of tenses. I am a little bit confused though. Is hatred the right word to describe Xiumin’s feelings for Luhan? In the description, it is as if you’re saying that Xiumin only hates Luhan’s perfection while in the foreword, it is as if you’re saying that Xiumin hates him as a whole person.
In addition, the foreword gives off a really bad vibe. I don’t know if it’s just me but it may discourage some readers to click the next button. Protagonist with great attitude problem sometimes turned off readers. Although that is the whole point of the story, my suggestion is to just remove the Xiumin-hates-Luhan-for-being-perfect statements in the foreword because your description gave enough details.
It’s okay to include your author’s note and credits in this section.
Poster/Presentation/Appearance
[Graphics] I have to give credit to the graphic artist. I seriously liked the colour palette used and that giant person, making readers assume that it is a fluff or comedy themed-story...which is not. I think that is the problem. Setting aside the cuteness of the poster, the problem is that the story gives off angst, serious angst while the poster screams cuteness. And aside from that, it would have been cuter if the person being stamped on is Luhan, so that it will be assumed that the giant body there is Xiumin trampling Luhan. That would be the poster for the story.
[Script Style] It’s readable, no question.
[Paragraph Breaks] Try to use three asterisks (***) to emphasize a change in setting. This way, it will be less confusing to the readers.
Grammar/Spelling/Vocabulary
There are times when you switched tenses. Try to proofread all of your chapters and put them in past tense form, since you used it mostly.
Here are some common errors:
-
Thought
[Original] "Look at him. Thinking he's all cute and . Like he's the best-looking in all of EXO. ing prick.", he thought.
[Suggestion] Look at him. Thinking he's all cute and . Like he's the best-looking in all of EXO. ing prick, he thought.
[Note] To avoid confusion, italicize the statement if it only voiced out in his mind. Remove the double quotation because you used it on the spoken language (conversation).
-
Quotation and Identifier
[Original] "It's not like he's the best vocal, Chen is really talented. And I can sing higher notes than him.", he pondered quietly.
[Suggestion] ] "It's not like he's the best vocal, Chen is really talented. And I can sing higher notes than him," he pondered quietly.
[Note] Take note of your punctuation marks. Use comma before the last quotation. There is no need to use a period after the end quotation.
Plot
It is realistic. It can’t be helped that an idol often times gets slightly envious of fellow performers. It would be ridiculous and utterly unbelievable to think that they don’t have these feelings toward someone who is more superior to them. I think of this as more of a friendship story rather than romance.
Characterization
[Xiumin] You give that particular impression of Xiumin having an inferiority complex, that’s why he develops an attitude towards Luhan. My absolute question is: Why only Luhan? There are several members who get more spotlight than our protagonist, so why is Luhan the sole recipient of his envious feelings? Did Luhan perhaps done something to him other than being a crowd fave? You mentioned in your description that Luhan did nothing. By that, Xiumin is this protagonist that readers love to hate. I am confused with the last chapter. I get some of the ideas. But some are vague to me. It’s a shame because it would have been a major turning point on his characterization. He is doing some monologue for the readers to understand and pity him yet readers won’t totally accept him because the chapter is confusing. I would suggest that you try to go back to that chapter.
Pacing
The story dragged a bit. I understand that we are still in the preface and that we are still warming up. But all of the chapters only talked about his envy of this and envy of that. If your purpose is to build a foundation (Xiumin’s hatred towards Luhan), present it with some fillers.
Writing Style
The way you narrated the story is pretty straight-forward. There are those times when readers feel as if there’s a gap because sometimes there is lacking of details. It would help you a lot if you incorporate more details.
Personal Enjoyment
I thought this is a story but I think of it as more of a friendship and slice of life story. It made it easier for me to read it because is not my cup of tea. I understand that this is your first story. It’s a good decision too to ask help from review shops so that you can enhance your skills. I believed that you have it in you. Just a little bit more polishing and you can write more stories in the future. Please forgive me if I sound harsh, authornim and I am sorry too for taking a while to finish this review. But I hoped you find this helpful.
-littlemisshappyify
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