>> curious crimson and his charcoal eyes
Heart, Mind & Seoul Reviews Archive
BY douxsoleil
CHARACTERS · Im Yoona, Kim Jongin, Kim Mingyu, Jung Soo Jung
STATUS · Completed
DESCRIPTION·
"She was beautiful, but in a way a forest fire was beautiful"
for all who thinks that they don't deserve love.
for lonely nights and painful sighs,
for those who are still here, despite the pain,
i wrote this for you.
Your description is as mysterious and angsty as your title. It still keeps us guessing what the story will be about. We do gain a little bit of information about the story in the second part of the description at the end. There we get to meet the 2 main characters already, but very shortly. It's a very intensive and intriguing description, it draws you in completely and keeps you there. There's no way back. I'm actually very fond of the first part of your description. It's practically a story on its own. But at the other hand still a valuable part of your story, because that's how you succeeded to set the mood right for your story.
FOREWORD
I checked multiple times, but apparently the foreword has disappeared from your story. So therefore, I can't give any marks.
TAGS
From the first look at your tags, I would say that the story must come across many search references/criteria as you mentioned Kai and Yoona, SNSD and so on. So therefor your story must get a lot of hits. I wouldn't change the tags, they are very suitable for the story.
To be honest, the poster or picture does fit your story in a certain way. But can't be really considered as full poster. The slogan and color scheme of the picture are well chosen. But your story would benefit even more from a real poster. This is just a little tip ;) It's still up to you what you are going to do with it. Therefore I can't really give you any marks as you didn't provide a real link to a poster.
DISPLAY
It does look a bit messy the overall look. Instead of using line in the description between the different aspects, it would look much neater if you use some kind of text divider. That would make it already much cleaner. It would come in handy to use those as well in your chapters to divide the different parts. As for the chapter headings, I understand that you were trying to set the mood again with using different photos/pictures that were compatible with the content of your chapters that you wrote. You didn't exactly fail there, only it looks messy again.
Kim Jongin
He's the perfectionist in the highest form! He doesn't make it easy for himself. His character is so intense that you get into the rollercoaster he calls his life. Apart from that neurotic side, he does have a gentle side. But he gets more developed as the perfectionist than as the gentle guy he can be. We do get some glimpse here and there, but it seems like his gentle and caring side is blocked by a dark secret that seems to get the upperhand of him. It's only at the end of the last chapter, we can fully understand why he is so intense as earlier on his life, he did undergo a major change. The funny thing about this is that I didn't notice the lack of that change up until the end of the chapters written.
Im Yoona
We get the image of the carefree girl without any worries at the beginning of the story. Unfortunately, the reality is completely different. She also has two sides to her character. She has a good side where she's able to love a person and care about them. But then she has also a dark side to her. Every time something went wrong, she needed something to vent her intense feelings somehow. So she did something irrational and started to harm herself by cutting herself. It lifted her soul as she loved the feeling of releasing everything. While after a long while she try to get herself together, so much time has passed by. Again this is a very intense character.
SIDE CHARACTERS
Soo Jung and his friends of the ballet company + Mingyu
They all play a vital role in the story.
All your characters are very intensely described. It's not easy to determine their character that easily. I got lost sometimes and that scared me because I wanted to get a full image of all characters present. You can change that fact, because the story itself is very intense and so angsty as well. Once you got to know one of them, they pull you so far inside the story and it's not that easy to return.
Also if you use the lowercase letters beware of the mistakes of punctuation. I will try to give you some pointers:
Chpt 1
Original: he sees reflection of himself
Corrected: he sees the/a reflection of himself
Original: but that is the only thing that would relate him to ballet(her, with the little knowledge about ballet, and bunheads, and skinny boys with excessive cleavage exposure).
Corrected: relate him to ballet _ (her,...): you need a space after the word ballet. Like that the bracket doesn't stick to the previous word, and that makes it a bit easier to read.
Chpt 2
Original: "what are you doing anyway? in a night this late?
Corrected: "what are you doing anyway? at night this late?
Original: and then falls gracefully in his head as he continues.
Corrected: and then falls gracefully on his head as he continues.
Original: she is dissapointed with his present self, who is nothing like him in the past, but she keeps it to herself. she's not ready. yoona isn't.
Corrected: which is nothing like him in the past
Original: a roll in the eyes is only his answer
Corrected: a roll with the eyes is only his answer
Original: im yoona just doesn't have the courage of facing him sober that day.
Corrected: im yoon just didn't have the courage
Chpt 3
Original: she whispers absent-mindedly as she watches him waltz in his toes
Corrected: on his toes
=> Same sentence 2x but then: maybe redefine the second but then)
Original: she hesitates to herself because jongin has always looked iridescent and beautiful in front of her
Corrected: she hesitates..
Original: in a sense that she attack those around her and the audience while playing odile.
Corrected: she attacks..
Original: time flies by, and the show is coming to a close.
Corrected: the show is coming to an end
Original: all the cast of the show stand in a straight line
Corrected: all the cast of the show stands
Original: jongin searches for doe eyes, and he could see none
Corrected: but he could see none/any
Original: but he still believes, because he caught her trying to keep herself awake amidst the show.
=> Leave out the "but" in the beginning.
Original: on the backstage,
Corrected: at the backstage
Original: "you were always great, but tonight you are amazing!"
Corrected: " you were amazing "
Original: jongin was about to run, but his feet is heavy
Corrected: but his feet are heavy
Original: yoona struts away in her painfully-high heels, which she wears only for jongin.
Corrected: which she wore only for jongin.
Original: when she comes across a mirror in the hallway om her way out,
Corrected: on her way out
Chpt 4
Original: he knows that it's not soojung's fault that she falls for him.
Corrected: that she fell for him
=> Pay attention to the use of his and her. Because it seems that you mixed both of them.
Original: she steps back from his brother to take a good look at him.
=> In this sentence it is Yoona who's talking about her brother. So as you started of with she, it should be her brother instead of his. Yoona is a girl and not a guy
Original: she still doesn't change
Corrected: she still didn't change
Original: years spent on the country of the unknown to learn and to heal herself
Corrected: years spent in the country of the unknown OR on the countryside
=> Pay attention to the use of his and her. Because it seems that you mixed both of them.
Original: but his brother deserve answers that she could not give after all the years she spent away from her family
=> In this sentence it is Yoona who's talking about her brother. So as you started of with she, it should be her brother instead of his. Yoona is a girl and not a guy
Original: but her sister, with wistful eyes and a smile he had never seen before
=> In this sentence it is Mungyu who's talking about his sister. So as you started of with he, it should be his sister instead of her. Mungyu is a guy not a girl.
I know that English isn’t your first language, so maybe it would come in handy to ask a beta reader to check up on those hiccups and improve the quality of your story.
8 upvotes
83 subs
1038 views
24 comments
It's remarkable how many views you have in comparison with the subscribers. It does seem that you have quite a few silent readers. Which is in a way great as your story does have potential, only too bad they didn't take the time to subscribe which would put your story on the map. You are slowly rising and getting to the point where you want to be. I do think that you still have a long way to go. After checking your comments and leaving one as well, it's noticeable how you are taking your time to consider all the feedback and comments and making sure that most of them get a reply. The overall stats aren't that bad, don't give up! You will get there!
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