The Irreversible Beguilement
By: Tantk11

( 5 Chapter - Completed )

Requested: October 27, 2012

Completed: November 4, 2012

Area of Help: Diction

There are two key points you need to address before grabbing that thesaurus and flooding a story with better words.

1. Since there are a lot of strange rules in the English language, you need to be careful of what words you use. For instance, the word “e” is actually a synonym for excitement. In modern context, that word is a definite no-no when it comes to writing a non-explicit scene. This is one of the most extreme examples, but I feel like it best expresses my point.

As for you specifically, I came across one example of this misusage:

“His mother sounds so noble from his stories and his admiration is transparent from the way he tells them.”

The word “transparent” literally means see through or ghostly even. It doesn’t quite flatter the word “admiration” and therefore doesn’t convey the correct emotion. From the rest of the sentence, it’s obvious that what is trying to be said is that his admiration is apparent or forthright or just plainly clear to the rest of the world. “Transparent” however, makes it lose this feeling.

1. Ask yourself this question: What do you want to say?

Big words don’t make a story beautiful. Simple sentences also don’t make a story beautiful. If you’re only grabbing that thesaurus in order to make your writing more sophisticated, then please put it down. There’s no need for that. All you require is honesty and emotion. Those things are part of you and therefore you don’t need to work at it.

Alright, so now, if you still want to improve your diction, then here are the best ways to do it. Don’t whip out a dictionary. Instead, go read books or well written fanfiction or even comic books. I know I personally improved my English by reading manga as a child. The more you read, the easier it will be to pick up on vocabulary. It may seem tedious, but I’m sure that as a writer, you probably enjoy reading as well.

So no, the dictionary is certainly not your future best friend. It’s a reference textbook when you need to verify something. It shouldn’t be the first place you go when searching for a word to replace another word.

Furthermore, remember to be aware of what words you’re using.

Title [ 10 / 10 ]

Creativity: It appears that you have really thought about the title. There’s so much depth, so I can’t say much about it since it’s a rather interesting phrase to choose.

Characters [ 18.75 / 50 ]

Development:

Sandara: Your description of her background and upraising as well as her characteristics and aspirations are definitely clear. It was very good that you didn’t dwell or drift off from your main point and finished explaining her character in such a fluid and clean way. Furthermore, you express her values and growth physically as well as mentally.

T.O.P.: His character is understandable and clear as well. Your writing style easily allows for you to talk about their feelings and backgrounds. There isn’t much to say about T.O.P. considering his role was far smaller than expected. He was a main character surely, but a lot of the time the narrator was stringing the characters along like actors in a play.

Voice: In terms of their speaking roles, they aren’t very different. Yes, their character shines through due to the content of their words, but the actual wording of everything is very monotonous. As separate people, they require more than the narrator’s voice. They need to express their own style of speaking, which means it’s necessary for them to develop a certain twang to their speech patterns.

At the moment, everyone is very formal and stiff which makes the story lack in feeling. Your narration is wonderful, but the characters personalities aren’t being shown through their chances to speak and their expressed thoughts.

 Mark Downs: 12.5 points were taken off from Development. Development is worth 25 points and since you did develop the two characters, you received 6.25 points for each of them. The 12.5 points taken off were due to the lack of expressed development. They were described and explained, but rarely acted out their character in a true and convincing manner.

18.75 points were taken from Voice because the only real voice that existed was the narrator’s story telling style.

I want to be clear with why the characters scored so low. Please don’t think that I’m saying your characters are underdeveloped. They are real in their own sense. The problem is that their developed on a basic level. They aren’t embracing their roles to the best of their ability and no matter how well written the voice of the narrator is, it won’t make up for the lacking emotion in the words of the characters.

Human beings have a certain level of distress that isn’t found in your proper, formal style of storytelling. It’s similar to a fairytale – how you write, that is. The voice you develop is meant for telling a tale and so the characters don’t sound like they’re speaking.

Grammar/Spelling [ 20 / 25 ]

Correct Usage: You’ve mentioned that English isn’t your first language. I do not tread lightly for people who have English as a second language. Rather, I’ll be more in depth with my grammatical notes, so please understand that I am not trying to demean your grammar by giving you a low score. I just don’t know how to properly and fairly fix it in order to accommodate non-native English speakers on this rubric.

NOTE: Your biggest concern in terms of grammar has to be sentence structure and appropriate word choice.  As you may already know, your word choice is a bit off. Refer to my notes on word choice and thesaurus usage in the Area of Help section.

NOTE: In the below grammar corrections, I haven’t picked out every single mistake. Also, I am only going to leave specific notes on the first three chapters. These are just the few that I came across. Each one deals with a different type of grammatical error, so be sure to keep these corrections in mind for future situations with similar circumstances.

Chapter 1

 She has always wanted to be a midwife since she was eleven.

The problem here is that you have stated “always” but then you followed it up with “since she was eleven.” I see that you wanted to specify exactly how old she was, but you already gave an indefinite time range by saying “always”. When writing, make sure your statements are adding up.

In this case, decide if she has always wanted that career, or if she has wanted that career since she was eleven.

…Midwifery Caseload Practice where women are cared for by the same midwife, supported by a small group of other midwives, throughout their pregnancy, labor, birth, and in the early weeks following the birth of their baby.

The above excerpt is a run-on sentence with some misused commas. To avoid run-on sentences, consider the components of the sentence and find what sections you can combine for a clearer explanation of your thoughts. Instead of letting yourself naturally flow, sometimes you have to consider the coherency of your piece.

Example: ….where women are cared for by the same midwife as well as a small group of other midwives. Throughout their pregnancy, labour, birth, and in the early weeks following the birth of the baby, that support network is strong.

Chapter 2

The second year they spend together, after the countless ‘hanging out’ sessions…

Apostrophes shouldn’t be used in place of air quotes. It’s best to use “hanging out”.

Subtle flirtation and getting to know each other…

It should be “subtle flirting” because of the words case and agreement with “getting”. Flirting needs to be active.

Mrs Choi

“Mrs.” is a shortened title that requires a period after it to signify that it is an abbreviation. Leaving off the period changes the meaning of those three letters, so be careful with that in the future.

…but she can’t help the emotions it evokes out of her.

“Out of her” is an unnecessary specification that doesn’t add much to the overall sentence. Furthermore, “evokes” is to “summon/awaken” which is explanation enough without the prepositional phrase “out of her”. When it’s possible, don’t over specify because it isn’t always needed. Many times, authors will get too in detail and then the reader ends up growing confused from the wordiness of it all.

It’s moments like this that makes Sandara’s chest fill with warm fulfillment

This isn’t necessarily wrong, however, it doesn’t flow well with the rest of the sentence. To “fill” is to also “fulfill” and so that word becomes repetitive. Making “warm” into “warmth” would give the same meaning you are trying to convey, but with less words and in a more understandable form.

Chapter 3

Sandara falls pregnant

The usage of “falls” denotes an unfortunate occurrence. When speaking about a happy occasion such as the coming of a child, avoid using words commonly associated with sad or negative events.

…Sanghyun gifts them with a stroller while her parents and Mrs Choi go half on the child restraint seat; things Sandara and Seung Hyun get to save money on.

It’s clear what you want to say, but the actual written out context is perplexing. I’m assuming that her parents and Mrs. Choi are splitting the cost of the restraint seat. If that is the case, then the sentence should look someone like this:

“…her parents and Mrs. Choi split the price of a child restraint seat”

Saying “go half on…” literally means  to move towards half on the child restraint seat. “Go” is a verb that speaks to movement and since this is more of a split purchase, the wording should be as shown in my above example.

Furthermore, your syntax usage of the semi colon between “seat” and “things” shouldn’t be there. A semi colon is used to separate two independent clauses. That means the phrase before the semi-colon must be a complete sentence on its own and the phrase after the semi-colon must be a complete sentence on its own as well. The semi-colon separates and connects the two sentences together in order to show the dual meaning created when relating the two sentences together.

If you wanted to include a dependent clause as you have done, that is, “things Sandara and Seung Hyun get to save money on”, then you must use a different punctuation mark. In this case, it would be best to to use a hyphen.

Example: “her parents and Mrs Choi go half on the child restraint seat – all of which are things Sandara and Seung Hyun get to save money on.”

As shown above, it’s clear that specifying the quantity of items being received for free is important. Encompassing all of them requires an extra phrase such as “all of which”.

One, under no circumstances, is our mums coming to the birthing room…

You need number agreement between “is” and “mums”

“Is” denotes singular

“Mums” denotes plural

Since “is” refers to “mums”, it should be plural “are”

**Hopefully these corrections have been useful. Please apply them to Chapters 4 and 5 if you see it necessary.**

Tenses: Your tense usage is great. Present tense is a difficult one to stick with and thus far you have done tremendously well. I don’t have anything else to say concerning it.

Plot [ 73 / 75 ]

Intrigue: The readers appear to be sincerely affected by this story. Personally, I also see the merit in it. There was something eye-catching about the way you wrote in such a calm tone. Normally, it’s expected that a story about a mama’s boy and his wife would be comedic, but this one was far from it. Your readers are obviously taken by the concept as well.

Originality: This is certainly a unique story. The plot is so odd that it becomes interesting.

Mark Downs: Although it is original, the story at its core is still playing on the concept of an overbearing mother and her son in relation to the son’s wife. The dynamic has been used before, but what makes your story special is the way in which you have portrayed it.

Story Structure [ 68 / 75]

Point of View Coordination: Your P.O.V. is consistent. I don’t have much else to say except thank you for keeping it third person present tense throughout the story.

Realism (in terms of story setting): The story setting is relatively acceptable. There aren’t any outrageous situations or shifts. Then again, the writing style of this story doesn’t give much room for bizarre occurrences. Only one concept is curious. Make sure when you’re writing a story with medical or anatomical references that you’re verifying information. During chapter 4, you mention that it takes a few days for child labor to finish, but that’s not an incredibly accurate assumption. The average length of a women’s first child birth is roughly 16 hours. If you made a typo though, be sure to check over your chapters before posting.

Functionality: This is a difficult part to critique your story on, mainly because of your definitive style of writing. The story is a third person narrative and is read in that way. It’s very much a story that readers are peering into, rather than a story created to drag a reader within it. You do leave room for readers to formulate their own feelings and opinions on the characters, however, at the same time, you spoon feed information rather than showing it. That’s not always a bad thing though, so please do not take that in the wrong way.

Style [ 55 / 60 ]

Personality: As stated above, you have a very strong style of writing. It’s a narrative. Rather than showing us the story, you tell us a story. This isn’t a bad thing, not even close. If what you want to do is express a concept to your readers, then you may do so in any way you please. Actually, the most interesting part of this story had to be your very prominent style of writing.

Description: Since your style is narration, the level of description is intense. Your expression of it is well crafted over all.

Dialogue: The dialogue is all meaningful. Every word is necessary and contributes to the story and mood. The only issue is that the dialogue lacks in emotion. Again, since you narrate the story, the characters are very clearly the narrator’s puppets.

Seung Hyun and Sandara have backgrounds and personalities, however, the level to which those personalities are portrayed is lacking. They don’t express themselves in a realistic way, but rather, they are expressed in straight forward monologues seemingly put into the story for the sake of explaining their contrasting situations.

In the future, consider bringing them to life. Although you should keep your narrative style writing if you want, it’s still a necessity to express your characters in a true and raw way. Dialogue is normally undermined as a tool to description, but it’s actually a very important part of the character. When they speak, their words drip with meaning and personality. If you can so thoroughly describe their personalities, then surely you can turn that description into spoken words.

Clichés: The length of the story and the plot of the story didn’t give much room for clichés. Also, your tone throughout the piece was very calm, which already defeats a cliché romance.

“Flow”: Again, your writing style allows you to bend the flow to your will. There’s no need for you to evenly space out events since you can easily string in a blatant statement or time skip without it seeming out of place.

Formatting: Your formatting is lovely.

Literary Devices [ 4 / 5 ]

Metaphors, similes, alliteration, aphorisms, repetition, etc. : Some

Extras/Bonuses [ 3 / -- ]

Readers Enjoyment: Your readers are rather sincere from what I’ve seen.

Particular Snippets of…: The final scene with Dara signing the divorce papers threw me for a loop.

Improvement: It wasn’t a very long story, but the improvement I think would be in your consistency rather than your ability to change. The narration was strong throughout the entire thing.

Enjoyment: It was a nicely told tale.

Total [ 251.75 / 300 ]

84%

Reviewer’s Comments:

I don’t have much to say except that rather than diction, I personally believe you should work on your characters and expression of emotion. Your writing style is already clear and concise. What you’re lacking now is the emotion needed to reach your readers on an even deeper level. Experiment with displaying affection, anger, etc.

Anyway, I congratulate you on your score. Sorry for the strange number as well. I was being extra meticulous on the character portion of the rubric.