GreenGardenPop : Heartfelt Voice

Characters. Park Jiyeon, Byun Baekhyun, Im Yoona

Status. Ongoing

Description. A young teacher was being haunted by a voice - and it claimed itself as the voice of her heart.
 

STORY LINK

Story title. 4/5
The first impression your title gave me was somewhat warm and fuzzy, and I had anticipated your story to be full of fluff. However, that was not the case, perhaps it will be in the future, but certainly not at the moment. The title is nice, but right now I don’t think it really fits the story, most probably because of the word ‘heartfelt’. I think in contrast to your plot, your title is rather soft in the sense that it tells your readers that it will be a romantic read.


Description, foreword & tags. 7/10
Your description is incredibly short. While sometimes I do encourage short descriptions, in this case, I think your description is a little too short. It doesn’t tell your reader much that will lead them to wanting to read the story. Honestly, when I first read the description, I thought the story was a horror, if not a thriller. I think in order to really grab the attention of potential readers, you should add another sentence or so that will reveal a tiny bit more about the story so your readers will want to read further on.

For your foreword, you’ve written a small poem, which I find is really good. It tells us what the main character feels about the voice inside her head already, and I think this will make it easier for your readers to understand the story better. As for your tags, they are perfectly fine to me.


Appearance: graphics. 3/5, layout. 4/5
The poster is quite well made, but I don’t think it fits the theme very well. The colour scheme of the poster is rather cold, which contrasts the feeling of the story, in my opinion. Also, the poster and the background image doesn't match and that bothered me a little in an aesthetic sense.

The overall layout of your story is very clean and simple, which makes it easy to read and follow. Though, I do suggest you using another font, or format, for when the voice speaks to avoid confusion. It’s fine when it’s just Jiyeon and the voice speaking, but when the voice cuts in during Jiyeon’s conversation with someone else, it does get a little confusing as to who’s saying what (especially during the times when you don’t indicate who’s saying what).


Characterisation. 8/10
Firstly, let’s talk about the main character, Jiyeon. She’s a very young teacher that teaches maths at a high school. Her life seemed pretty simple and normal until she started to hear the voice in her mind that claimed to be the ‘voice of her heart’. At first, I thought she would have totally freaked out by it, because let’s face it, you’re hearing a voice in your head that’s not yours - that’s gotta be scary. However, she didn’t seemed too bothered by it at the beginning. In fact, to me, it looked like she welcomed the voice more than getting freaked out by it, though the more she talked to the voice the more she was annoyed at it. Honestly, that behaviour irked me a little.

She’s rather childish and immature, which is demonstrated by her constantly introducing herself as ‘the youngest teacher’ (no wonder why Taeyong dislike her). The way she acts around her mother is rather immature as well and it makes her seem spoilt and rather ill-mannered. Nevertheless, it seemed like she was able to realise that thanks to the voice tell her about it. Which then brings me onto my next point - why does she listen to the voice all of a sudden? After the initial encounter with the voice, she was rather bothered by it, so in theory she should have been ignoring it like the time when it told her not to ride her bike that morning. Perhaps you will explain this more in the future, but at the moment, it is definitely one of the questions raised about this particular character.

Next, let’s move onto the ‘voice inside her heart’. Not a lot is known about this ‘voice’ - we don’t know its name (well more like his name), where it came from, how it became Jiyeon’s ‘voice inside her heart’. This character is full of mysteries and I think it will be rather fun to read about this character as you reveal more about it in future chapters. From what I have read so far, I can’t really tell whether this character is actually helping Jiyeon or is just simply being childish. For example, when Jiyeon thinks about Baekhyun, the voice tells her not to - is that because the voice knows that Baekhyun is not a good person for Jiyeon, or is the voice simply being childish and not wanting Jiyeon to go near Baekhyun because she’s ‘his girl’?

As for the side characters, I think the most significant ones are Taeyong and Yoona. Taeyong clearly dislikes Jiyeon (he even said that to her face), but I can tell that his role will be very important in the future, because the things he does to oppose Jiyeon allows her to realise things she never did before (with the help of the voice). Yoona, on the other hand, is a character that I can’t say for definite whether she likes Jiyeon or not. She seems to know a lot more than Jiyeon and it makes it feel like she will be the one to lead Jiyeon to Baekhyun (or the voice). Not much has been said about Baekhyun yet, but it will be interesting to see how these side characters help in the development of Jiyeon’s character and the plot.

So far, I think the characterisation of your characters are done quite well. Of course, there are still some space for improvement and development, but I can see that coming along pretty smoothly through the chapters. Keep going!


Plot. 13/20
This plot, to me, is actually quite new and fresh. I’ve read stories about people being haunted by ghosts, but so far I haven’t read anything that’s about the main character with a different voice inside her head. The plot itself is rather unique and different, which is a huge advantage to you because that means it will be easier for you to get your story out there and known to readers. In a psychological sense, the plot seems plausible, because there are cases where people hear voices inside their heads that tells them what to do. However, I think the fact that Jiyeon isn’t freaked out by the voice is rather surprising, and that makes me wonder if she has a mental disorder that doesn’t make her repel the intruder in her mind.

Right now, there really isn’t much I can talk about in regards to the plot, since you’re only three chapters in, and I can tell that this story is going to be a rather long one by the flow of it. Though, I do think your plot has great potential and it will definitely be a sight to see how the future plays out for the characters. Also, there aren’t any romantic elements yet, so I hope it will come up soon!


Consistency/flow. 7/10
I would say the flow of your story is quite slow. You’ve taken the time to properly talk about certain things, but I think it can be sped up a little. Your chapters are quite long, but they don’t cover a lot of time, and honestly that made me a little bored. Perhaps you can try speeding things up a little.


Grammar, spelling & punctuation. 13/15
There isn’t many major mistake regarding your grammar, spelling and punctuation. I am able to understand your writing with no difficulties at all - well done! But, there are a few things I’ve picked up whilst reading your story.

Chapter 2
1.
ORIGINAL: [...] however, the image of her mother worries kept her running.
CORRECTED: [...] however, the image of her mother worrying kept her running.

2.
ORIGINAL: “Slow down, don't eat so fast, you'll choke yourself.”
CORRECTED: “Slow down, don't eat so fast, you'll choke.”

3.
ORIGINAL: [...] she returned to her room and sat down in the chair.
CORRECTED: [...] she returned to her room and sat down on the chair.

4.
ORIGINAL: Let your own heart's voice tell you a lullaby to make you feel alright and sleep in peace.
CORRECTED: Let your own heart's voice sing you a lullaby to make you feel alright so you can sleep in peace.


Structure. 4/5
The paragraphing within your story is done very well. However, in chapter two, I would suggest using a page divider, or anything of that sort, to separate the scene where Jiyeon falls asleep and the scene where she wakes up. The scene skip in that section is rather sudden and it causes confusion, so please do indicate a scene skip with a page divider or a couple of symbols.


Readers' response. 3/5
Your statistics are to be expected, especially since it hasn’t been long since you’ve started the story on the site. Give it some more time and I’m sure you’ll be getting more attention. What I really like is how your readers give you quality comments, but it’s a little disappointing to see that you haven’t replied to any of them. Please do spend a little time reading and responding to your readers’ comments, because not only you learn about their opinions about your story, but it also shows your readers that you care about what they say!


Overall enjoyment. 8/10
This is definitely an interesting read! As I have mentioned before, this is my first time reading about someone hearing a different voice inside their head and not knowing who it belong to. I really like the way you’ve kept everything a secret and that you’re slowly revealing them one by one. I think what stopped me from loving the story is Jiyeon’s character. She’s not really my type of ‘ideal main character’, but I do hope to see some development to her character in the future. Also, it will be very interesting to see the relationship between Baekhyun and the voice inside Jiyeon’s head! Thank you for giving me the opportunity to read your story, and keep up the good work!
 

total grade : 74/100

Notes