A Wall Inbetween

Written by ZeroPrincesses & Reviewed by BringingyBaek

 

Title: 9/15 points

Your title is rather eye-catching, but it's not necessarily something that I would click on if I were to see it on AFF. To be perfectly honest, I didn't really see a connection with the plot of your story and its title before you took the time to explain it to me and all. After you explained it to me and I finally understood everything though, I decided that your title was just perfect for your plot. It definitely made sense with the physical and non-physical barrier in their relationship and I thought that you were quite clever for thinking that up. Well done!

However, the word 'inbetween' in your title is not actually a word. If you type it on anything that has a spell-check, a red line will appear below it and when you try to find the word 'inbetween' in the dictionary, the only thing that comes up is 'in-between', with a hyphen. There's actually a rather large debate on writing communities about the use of 'inbetween', but most say that it's informal and incorrect, so I've decided to take off a few marks for that as well.

From the title, I had a feeling that I would be reading an angst story or a story with darker genres, but when I saw the tags and actually read the story, I found out that your story is actually a romantic-comedy, which is far from what I expected it to be from the title. Next time, you have to make sure that your title matches the mood of your story, because when I was really expecting angst, I got rom-com instead.

 

Description & Foreword: 6/10

I'm taking off points because of two reasons. The first reason would be your description placement. Like I've said in the presentation category, you should've placed the description in the description box. The description of your story is one of the first few things that a reader sees when he/she clicks on your story, and if he/she sees the character profiles for a story that he/she doesn't even know about, it's likely for that person to just go and look for another story to read.

The second reason would be how your description was a bit cheesy. I'm not saying that it's bad, but I don't really like it at the same time. When I first read it, I felt like I was going to read a story with action or drama in it, so I took off a mark because it didn't really match the mood of your story.

 

Plot: 25 points from two categories

• Originality: 8/15

To be perfectly honest, this category was rather difficult to write about because I wasn't quite sure what your plot was about. After you PM-ed me and explained the details and all, I understood the plot a lot better but still got a bit confused. Nonetheless, I will still do my best to review the originality of your plot!

So, 'A Wall Inbetween' is actually a bit cliché. It's basically about two people who let their stubbornness prevent them from being together and when they get older and lead separate lives, they finally realize that they like each other. I've actually come across a few stories like yours but I didn't find a lot, so I suppose your story is somewhat original.

There were quite a few things that were not-so-original though. An example of such would be how both the boy and girl have dark pasts. Hyun Soo has multiple phobias and Myungsoo acts cold because his heart was broken by a noona that he was in love with before. When Hyun Soo finds out about the noona that Myungsoo was in love with, she decides to try and 'heal his broken heart'. There are a lot of stories like this so this really affected your score.

 

• Believability: 5/10

Some parts of your story were just...pretty unbelievable. There were some parts that seemed normal and all, but then there were also some parts that were just unbelievable and strange. I don't think that you've done a lot of research for your story either.

For example, Myungsoo called Hyun Soo's mother 'ahjumma' and Hyun Soo also called Myungsoo's mother 'ahjumma'. Although 'ahjumma' can be used to call an older woman with children, it actually sounds a bit cold and even rude. You would normally call any of your friend's mom 'eomoni' since it's less cold. 

Another example would be Hyun Soo's phobias. Her claustrophobia was believable and I didn't get confused about that, but her fear of piano's was just...unbelievable and rather odd. Now, I've recently done some research and there is no such thing as a fear of piano's. There is no fear of piano's but there is a fear of music, so I don't think that you've researched on the topic of phobias very well.

Also, the fact that Hyun Soo was the class president but didn't even pay attention during class was rather unbelievable. Yes, I do know that people can't be expected to focus in class all the time, but Hyun Soo was staring out the window just because she was in a boring class. If the other students in her class were capable of focusing, why was she chosen to be the class president? If the class president was chosen just because of his/her academics and not because of his/her actual performance during class, then that would also be unbelievable.

Another thing that confused me was the nightmare Hyun Soo had in chapter 28. She dreamed about being chased up the stairs by a female ghost and she was afraid because the stairs were getting smaller and smaller. You said that she was afraid because of her claustrophobia, but claustrophobia is the fear of being trapped in small rooms or areas. Having claustrophobia doesn't necessarily mean that you're afraid of all things small.

And it was also unbelievable when Myungsoo suddenly just said "Are you stupid?" and "Are you blind?" when Hyun Soo was solving the chemistry problem. C'mon, he's the new student and why didn't the teacher tell him off for being rude?

 

Presentation: 6/10

The actual layout of your story was perfectly fine, but I didn't like the way you presented the description and foreword of your story. I didn't like the font you used for the character profiles (It's called Comic Sans for a reason), and you used too many different colours. Also, you should've placed the description of the story in the description, not the foreword. Ater all, it's called "Description" for a reason.

Next time, put the description for your story in the description box and stick to regular black and basic fonts, like Arial, Georgia, Times New Roman, Tahoma, and Lucida Sans Unicode.

 

Characters: 7/15

To be perfectly honest, I didn't like your characters. I mean, Hyun Soo is quick-tempered, but is somehow cool at the same time? She's down-to-earth, but arrogant at the same time? And it seems rather strange to be cheerful but quick-tempered and to be a down-to-earth daydreamer. In fact, the opposite of a daydreamer is a down-to-earth person! It just didn't quite make sense to me.

Also, I didn't really like how Hyun Soo was an OC with a haunting past. I've seen a lot of fics where one of the main characters had a dark and haunting past, always refusing to talk to others about it and secretly waiting for someone to shine some light into her life. Having characters with a 'dark and haunting past' seem to be popular in AFF nowadays, so I guess that this applies to your originality too.

I didn't like Myungsoo's character as well. I didn't like how he was the good-looking and intelligent but quick-tempered, stubborn, cold and hard boy with a haunting past. Myungsoo is often portrayed that way in stories so I was disappointed to see that he was portrayed the same way in your story too.

 

Spelling & Grammar: 4/10

Frankly, your grammar and spelling isn't very good. In every chapter, I spotted quite a lot of grammar, punctuation, and spelling mistakes, and seeing so many mistakes in one story was a huge turn-off for me. Your mistakes consisted of not punctuating the end of your sentences correctly, not punctuating words correctly, not putting commas when it was needed, putting unnecessary commas and full stops after close quotes, and more.

Here is an example of not putting commas in a sentence when it was needed and not punctuating the end of your sentences correctly.

[How it was written] "Hey what was that for I saw that,"
[How it should be written] "Hey, what was that for? I saw that!" or "Hey! What was that for? I saw that!"

See, if you write your sentences the way I pointed out, all the words would just be a big, jumbled mess. It would confuse your readers and make reading the sentence, which is actually multiple sentences in one, very difficult and confusing. Punctuating your sentences properly is very important because if you just confuse your readers with sentences like that, less people will want to read your story.

Some examples of putting unnecessary commas after close quotes, not punctuating your words correctly, and separating two words when they should've been one.

[How it was written] "Sorry never meant to hurt you. You shouldnt be sleeping!", she exclaimed.
[How it should be written] "Sorry, I never meant to hurt you. You shouldn't be sleeping!" She exclaimed.

[How it was written] WHAT A WEEK? Ive got exams next week.
[How it should be written] WHAT? A WEEK? I've got exams next week! or WHAT, A WEEK? I've got exams next week!

[How it was written] "No no hes just a class mate. And hes also my neighbour.", I replied.
[How it should be written] "No, no, he's just a classmate. And he's also my neighbour." I replied. or "No, no. He's just a classmate. And he's also my neighbour." I replied.

You tend to put in commas and sometimes full stops after close quotes, which is incorrect. You don't have to put in anything after close quotes and you have to capitalize the first word after a close quote, unless you used a comma to end your sentence. Also, you have to put in an apostrophe for contractions, which are words like 'can't', 'won't', 'he's/she's', and 'don't'. The word 'don't' is a contraction for 'do not', 'I've' is a contraction for 'I have', and so on. Basically, a contraction is when you omit a few letters and make a word shorter. You have to put in an apostrophe where the letter or letters have been omitted, but it's not always the same place where the two words have been joined.

Your spelling is a lot better than your grammar, but I still managed to spot a few mistakes here and there. Your spelling mistakes were caused by joining two words when they should've been separated and separating one word into two when they should've been joined. I've mentioned one of your spelling mistakes earlier in the review, but I'll focus on them more now.

The following mistakes are actually a mix of punctuation and spelling mistakes, but I'll focus on the spelling mistakes because I already explained the punctuation mistakes.

[How it was written] Just go and get dressed will you or do I have to help you with that aswell?", he smirked.
[How it should be written] Just go and get dressed, will you? Or, do I have to help you with that as well?" He smirked.

[How it was written] I took all of these things carefully to the living room and placed them onto the coffee table in front of me just incase I get hungry or thirsty.
[How it should be written] I took all of these things carefully to the living room and placed them onto the coffee table in front of me, just in case I got hungry or thirsty.

[How it was written] Youre forehead is quiet cold.
[How it should be written] Your forehead is quite cold.

[How it was written] My castophobia came back.
[How it should be written] My claustrophobia came back.
Important Note: Castophobia is a fear of casting directors, which I'm pretty sure was not what you were trying to say. Make sure to spell your words correctly, otherwise you'll make mistakes like this.

You joined the words 'as well' and 'in case' when they should've been two separate words. Admittedly, 'incase' is an actual word, but the meaning is different from what you were trying to say. In the ninth line of chapter 23, you wrote 'You're' instead of 'Your', which is actually incorrect in that sentence. As I've said earlier, 'You're' is a contraction for 'You are', so it didn't make sense in that context. You got the word 'quite' confused with 'quiet', which is perfectly understandable as the two words are homonyms, but always make sure to be careful when writing.

In order to avoid making any spelling mistakes, I suggest that you turn on the automatic spell check thing as you type. It'll point out all your spelling mistakes and even though it considers most Korean names spelling mistakes, you can always add the word. Also, you misspelled Kim Hyun Joong's name in chapter 19. Always be careful when writing because if you end up misspelling someone's name, it'll just be  quite embarrassing.

I suggest that you find an editor or a beta-reader.

 

Writing Style: 8/10

Since 'A Wall Inbetween' is a rom-com, I suppose your writing style matched the mood of your story. However, I'll still be taking off a few points because you should've been more descriptive in chapter 23, since it had a more angsty feel to it and you should've made your writing style match the mood you were going for.  Your writing style is not exactly a writing style that I particularly enjoy though, but it was alright.

 

Flow: 2/10

The flow of your story was far too slow for my liking. It was actually pretty strange because the first few chapters were rushed and everything was just too quick, but after a while, I realized that the story itself was just too slow. So many things were happening in the story, but there was no actual conflict or plot development. There were a lot of random moments between the characters and I actually read 7 chapters about a single day, but I really just didn't see any plot development or just any plot, really.

I had to go through 23 chapters to finally read about something that seemed like the start of the plot, but then it literally just disappeared after a few sentences. Right after I found out about Hyun Soo's phobias, I was expecting something interesting to happen, but instead you made Myungsoo apologize and just ended the 'plot development'.

Basically, the flow of your story was a mix of too fast and too slow.

 

Enjoyment: 7/15 points

To be perfectly honest, I didn't quite enjoy your story. I didn't laugh at the parts when it should've been funny, I didn't feel sad at the parts when it should've been sad, and I just didn't really enjoy reading your story when I was reviewing it.

Your story wasn't particularly bad, but it wasn't exactly good either. It's probably because you based your story on real-life events, and since things aren't always interesting in real life, you couldn't really write about anything other than what you were basing your story on.

 

Bonus: 0/5

I don't feel like you deserve bonus points because I don't feel like there's anything particularly special about your story.

 

Total Score: 62/125=49.6%

 

Extra: Hello, Erica here! I'm sorry for having to give you such a low score, but since you told me to be extra harsh, I decided to just do it and ended up giving you this. I'd like to apologise for taking a long time for your review and for bothering you with the request to help summarise your entire story! Next time, if you ever decide to request again, I'll try my best to be more hard-working! And also, I'm fairly sure that Kyun Soo is a name for boys.