review sample
Ashes: What’s Left of Us - CrystalxDoLL
Reviewed by Listening
Title
I personally liked the title. It’s eye-catching, and there are no problems with it in terms of grammar. I believed that it pretty much summed up Ha Yi’s and Yoseob’s relationship, so in a way it related to the plot. It also connected to how Ha Yi’s sketchpad started to burn in flames in her nightmares. Well done.
Description and Foreword
Let me first point out things that you need to fix in your description.
"But when time came that her body had finally gave up on her, her dream finally had the chance to devour her completely to tell the tale of her very own misery.
The sentence itself was great, intriguing even, but the verbs should be in the present tense as that’s how it was for the whole description.
Correction - "But when the time comes that her body had finally given up on her, her dream finally had the chance to devour her completely to tell the tale of her very own misery."
Other than that, I thought your description was pretty decent. It didn’t give away too much about the oneshot, and didn’t spoil the ending. It was interesting. I wanted to read more.
Language Skills
Regarding your spelling, there weren’t many things to point out. But what really irked me was your grammar and your tenses. You kept confusing your past and present tenses that I was entirely frustrated not knowing when all of the events were happening. Please, please refrain from doing that in the future.
Now, onto your mistakes:
"--My teddy bear that I cuddled passionately in my sleepless nights as a kid, the blanket my mother had always sheathed my with right down to my pencils and other art supplies."
Here’s a correction for part of the sentence. "--My teddy bear that I cuddled passionately in my sleepless night with as a kid…"
As for the rest of the sentence, I have absolutely no idea what you were trying to say. What does "sheathed my with right down" even mean? I have a feeling that you must’ve forgotten to add in a word or two. I suggest that you re-read your work over again to edit your own mistakes.
"I always tried to reach out for it, but before I could even touch it, it fades into ash along with my other drawings and as it does so, my dream world constrains me to shed only a tear out of my big eyed face looking dazed and confused."
First of all, this is a run-on sentence. You should break it out into different sentences. And what’s the deal with the "big eyed face"? No. That just sounds awkward. Try replacing it with "doe-eyed face" or, better yet, just "doe eyes".
"Every night, that is all that comes to mind: a movie so gruesome I detested even putting myself to sleep."
Correction - "Every night, that was all that came to mind…"
Also, why were you suddenly mentioning a movie? How was that even relevant to the story? Was it supposed to be a metaphor that compared horror movies with her nightmares? I hope it was; if it wasn’t there for that purpose, then that phrase would just seem totally misplaced in the oneshot and you should take it out.
"Relieved that the night had ended, I got up from my bed for two although occupied by one."
This sentence just sounds awkward, period. You should rephrase it, maybe like this. "Relieved that the night had ended, I got up from my bed. The empty space beside me made me feel lonely. It was a bed for two, occupied by one."
I added more, but it was still related to the topic.
"Admittedly malnourished with hair so dry that dessert tumbleweed would bow down to her bushy head."
Homophones, homophones. You chose the wrong word, darling. "Dessert" means food. A sugary snack. I’m pretty sure you meant to say "desert", which is a land of sand. Oh, that rhymes. Haha.
On another note, I have to admit that I disliked this sentence. It’s just an image awfully strange to visualize. Tumbleweed bowing down to her bushy head? Although it’s relevant to showing readers how dry her hair was, I feel like you could come up with a more better way to describe it than that.
"I shrugged it away. Appearances no longer matter when you’ve found your better half, surely I’ve found mine."
Correction - "I shrugged it away. Appearances no longer matter when you’ve found your better half. Surely, I’ve found mine."
"I sat there like a living mourning sculpture until I heard footsteps coming closer and closer to me until I saw a pair fo rusty Adidas and high tops meet my eyes."
You shouldn’t be using ‘until’ twice in the same sentence.
"I reached out to hold his hand and embrace him, but I just passed through him like was… a ghost."
Umm… what? I think you forgot add in a ‘he’ betweeen ‘like’ and ‘was’.
Correction - "I just passed throug him like he was… a ghost."
"Still having the same smiling expression, tears began to swim down his face."
Tears swim down his face? That’s a bit peculiar. Rather, you should replace ‘swim’ with a different word. ‘Stream’, perhaps? I don’t know. It’s up to you if you want to change it, but I honestly think that it would sound better if the statement went as followed, "Still having the same smiling expression, tears began to stream down his face."
"Despite the heaviness I felt, I told myself something I should’ve told myself a year go: get up."
It should be "a year ago", but in any case, this sentence didn’t seem to have the same effect that you were initially going for. The repetition of the "told myself" bit was weird, but if you rephrase it a little, the sentence would have a bigger impact. It already has the potential; you just need to fix it.
"Once done, I gave one last look of the apartment and headed back home…"
‘Of’ should be replaced with ‘at’.
Even though I made a lot of suggestions and pointed out many of your mistakes, there are still much more present in your oneshot. But I think I’ll stop here.
Character Analysis
I re-read this oneshot about three times over as I focused on different aspects of the story, but even after reading it again and again, I still couldn't help but ask myself.
Who are the characters, really?
I know that Ha Yi is 'frail', as you have said so in the description. And I can clearly see that in the story through her vulnerable-like state. She's sad (obviously), and helpless. But why is it that I don't feel some sort of a connection with her? Ah, because you didn't give me - and all the other readers - enough time to understand them. This oneshot was so short due to the absence of events that would allow us readers to really get to know the characters. Because of this, we only know that Ha Yi is depressed that Yoseob isn't there. We know it, but we won't feel it, and that's exactly what you want your readers to have the ability to do - feel your story and your characters.
As for Yoseob, there isn't much to say about him because he was barely characterized at all. This is all the readers know after reading your oneshot:
- Yoseob is a ghost
- He was once a guy who loved making friends (as said by Ha Yi)
- He's caring (shown through his interaction with her)
And that's it. That's it. Put in the same sense as Ha Yi's analysis, I only know him, but I can't feel and understand him.
Story Plot
To be honest, due to the lack of plot and background, this story seemed like more of a drabble than an actual oneshot. The plotline wasn't crystal clear, and it seemed to me as if you went from Ha Yi having nightmares about her burning sketchpad, to a sudden where she seeks a closure with Yoseob, the ghost. And because it seemed so rushed, I wasn't able to feel what the characters felt. I wasn't able to empathize their sadness and their tears. I felt nothing, nothing but confusion as to why I wasn't provided with much of a backstory. I didn't know the characters too well and, therefore, I wasn't able to relate to them and understand them.
Coming back to the plot, I can't say whether it's original or not, but let's face it. Originality is hard to come by these days. But for your oneshot, in this case, there was only a ghost of a plot, and I can't make a conclusion to its originality when provided with so little.
Story Flow
As mentioned earlier, your oneshot seemed to move along too quickly. This isn't in terms of pace, where you would need to use small, choppy sentences, but in terms of plot development which is explained in the earlier section.
Also, the inaccurate use of past and present tenses really mess up the story's flow, too.
Overall Enjoyment
Personally, I wasn’t able to enjoy your oneshot that much mainly because I’m picky with things like grammar and appropiate word choices (in which you really need to improve on). But that wasn’t the only thing that bugged me. You rushed with the ending, and as a reader, I wasn’t satisfied. You also didn’t give enough time for the characters to develop, a key part of writing a story. A oneshot does not excuse the face that characters need to have some sort of development through a sequence of events because even though it's all in one-go, it is still possible.
Final Note
All in all, you really need to work on the technical factors of your story. Your attention on your tense verbs need a ton of improvement. I was confused as to whether everything was taking place in the past or in the present because you would always change it.
I was truly disappointed with this oneshot. It has the potential, it really does, but you still need to be more clear with your plot and refine your technical skills a bit more. Your characterization needs more attention, too. Hopefully, you’ll do so later on in your future writing.
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