Love Isn't Blind by 1234cve
Clockwork Reviews and Tutorials [BUSY](19 Chapters)
Requested: January 24, 2012
Completed: January 28, 2012
Title [ 10 / 10 ]
Creativity:There are many creative interpretations of the title so I’ll give you full marks for that.
Characters [ 42 / 50 ]
Development:
Min: Her personality is well built and understandable to an extent. She’s a bit of a “Mary Sue” though. I’m not sure if you know what that means, but I suppose I should tell you just in case. A “Mary Sue” is what you call a character who’s too perfect. Although she has a lot of things that are happening to her, she’s lacking realistic human instability. It doesn’t sound like a bad thing, but you’ve made her far too flawless for a realistic main character.
With all of that said, you did ruin her (in a good way) by making her blind. Her emotions are becoming easier to feel and sympathize with. She grew the most out of all the characters, going from a “Mary Sue” to someone who’s rather…real.
Suzy: The funny thing is, she is perfectly flawed. Suzy happens to be the most human of all your characters and she’s really the most developed. Her character is understandably human and easy to sympathize with.
Sadly, as everyone was growing and developing, she was doing the opposite. All of her character slipped away and she became this chipper, Taecyon-loving, baby-exuberant woman. Again, I realize that she wasn’t he main character, but she was so strong in the beginning and then suddenly she was nothing.
Dongho: It would have been nice to know what he was thinking and saying during the first days of her blindness and depression. At the end of the story he was suddenly given all of this background that felt like it was just thrown in there for the sake of it. If he had so much going on within himself, especially both of his parents dying, then shouldn’t he have had more trauma?
You already proved yourself to be capable of showing pain and grief and inner turmoil so I’m not sure why you didn’t sculpt Dongho’s personality with such detail. Although he wasn’t the main character, his personality didn’t reflect his background. I’m curious about how Dongho was innocent and pure and kind when he had an abusive drunken father and pained, grieving mother.
Hongki:His significance confused me. I’m sure there were other ways to make Dongho and Min meet – ways that were less cliché. It felt like Hongki was just thrown into the story for the hell of it.
Taecyon: He’s very rational and at times his dialogue is a bit cheesy but his thoughts are very relatable. I thought his character was the best in terms of consistency and role. Since he was always a side character, he stayed as such without having sudden significance.
Voice:Your characters have very different voices. I’m actually very impressed by this. They’re all clearly their own person and I would probably be able to decipher them without your POV markers. Good job with instilling so much personality into each person. You’re possibly one of the first people I’ve seen to give such definitive voices to each character.
Grammar/Spelling [ 17 / 25 ]
Correct Usage:
“Excited”
I noticed you used the above word twice to describe leaving places, like an airport or airplane. Was that on purpose or did you mean to write “exited”? If you meant to say she was excited to be off the plane, then you incorrectly used the verb.
“I might as well, seeing as my parents are getting a divorce, home where I grew up doesn’t feel like home anymore.”
I’m assuming you were going for a continuous thought and that’s why there are no period breaks. The problem is that the thoughts aren’t connected and therefore should not be involved in the same sentence. There should be a period to separate “…getting a divorce” and “…home where I grew up…”
Example: “I might as well, seeing as my parents are getting a divorce. The home where I grew up doesn’t feel like home anymore.”
‘This isn’t going as well as I had planned.’
Since you already italicized your thought here, it’s okay to leave out the apostrophes or quotations as they’re being used here.
Fiancé
Fun Fact (really it is, I’m so excited to tell someone this)! A lot of people mix these up and I figured you would like to know this as well for future reference. “Fiancé” is what you call the man. “Fiancée” is what you call the woman.
Sole
You were going for “soul” I believe. I just figured I should point it out in case.
Tenses: There were minor mistakes but nothing too bad.
Plot [ 65 / 75 ]
Intrigue: Personally, I dislike reading heavy stories about overcoming pain but the story is interesting from an unbiased point of view. Actually, you did write a relatively captivating story and it is understandable why it would be popular.
Originality:It’s sort of original. It’s more original than a lot of stories out there especially with the way you interpreted the plot.
Mark Downs: I had to take off points because your lot only pronounced itself halfway through the story. The first half was moving way too quickly for any proper development.
Story Structure [ 50 / 75]
Point of View Coordination: Sometimes I would become confused with the POV because of your “* * *” breaks. Most of the time you could’ve just double spaced but instead you used a more severe page breaker that is more commonly used to completely separate scenes.
Your overall command of the POV was fine, as in you knew what you were doing. However, this story could’ve been fine with 3rd person throughout. You were already italicizing words to convey the character’s thoughts so I’m not sure what the significance of having separate, choppy 1st POVs was.
If you’re very defensive about having each person have their own 1st POV then be sure to have great reason for doing so, otherwise it just becomes problematic when trying to become absorbed in the story.
Realism (in terms of story setting):
1st Half: Very unrealistic. The whole thing was just problem after problem without much resolution or reason and left a rather unpleasant impression.
2nd Half: You handled it well. It flowed much better than the first half.
The inconsistency was definitely the downfall of this story.
Functionality: I kept thinking there was more to the story than you were letting on…but there wasn’t. All throughout I was afraid of critiquing certain scenes because I thought maybe you were going to expand on them. You didn’t. Everything was pretty much laid out for us and each chapter I do believe could’ve stood on its own – except for the handful of chapters where Dongho and Min were bonding and living together while Taecyon and Suzy were away.
Style [ 33 / 60 ]
Personality:You have a certain style but it only became evident halfway through the story. Nonetheless, you did in fact build your own way of writing.
Description: The story is very character-based rather than plot-based. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, I just want to tell you that you should try to find the in between. Right now you’re careening too far towards only building the characters and you’ve lost sight of building the plot, setting, and all of the other things that make a story truly memorable and thoughtful.
The pain was bliss as I sliced the razor across my skin. The seconds that passed weren’t enough, I needed more, so I cut myself again. This time the pain stayed and consumed me, but seconds later I heard Suzy scream. Everything happened so quickly and suddenly I was on the ground shaking as Suzy pressed towels to my wrists. I could hear a buzz in my ear as if she was talking but she was too distant, I couldn’t focus on what she was saying. ‘I just want to fell alive again.’ I’m not sure whether or not I said it or thought it but everything clued in when Suzy hugged me. Her words became louder and I could catch bits and pieces of her telling me how loved I am. ‘Is that true?’ My mind became fuzzy; the blissful pain in my wrists burned as if acid was being poured into the fresh cuts. I slumped into Suzy’s embrace and lost consciousness.
Truly, I wish you had written more of these types of scenes. Your ability to convey emotions was further proved in the above paragraph. I was literally holding my wrists from imagining the twisted pain.
Dialogue: Your dialogue is genuine for the most part. I can actually feel the emotions in the words so that’s good. The formatting of your dialogue is also fine.
Clichés: You did use some clichés but for the most part you tried to recreate them. Again, the first half of your story was very much lacking and that’s where most of the clichés sprung up. The second half focused a lot on Min and showed a deeper side to being blind and trying to overcome hardship.
“Flow”: Within Chapter 1, everything is moving at a blurring, confusing pace. Although that may have been what you were going for, the fast paced style doesn’t make sense. I realize you were probably trying to show the passage of time in choppy chunks, you aren’t explaining enough of what’s going on. In the beginning it is crucial to make things clear for your readers, especially if you’re not writing angst, mystery or other dark genres.
Since you’re writing a romance though, sometimes you have to lay things out and remember that writing is a bit different from writing a drama or movie – so the time lapses have to be clearer.
By Chapter 7, there’s already way too much that has happened. You’re chapters are also short so everything is just moving in fast forward. One second everything is fine and the next there’s a freak accident putting the main character in a hospital. If you want to write fast-paced drama, you have to add more details and explanation for why each thing is happening. The way that this story is formatted, it’s filled with too many random coincidences and drama that makes little to no sense in the setting you’ve chosen to place the story.
This discovery crushed my sole. My life was over. I'd never be the same. I'd never see the sun rise in the morning or see flowers bloom in the spring time. I knew that I’d never be able to see again before the doctors confirmed it at my check up.
Here, this is a good example of awkward pacing. The emotion is perfectly believable but way too much happened in those three lines. I’m not even positive what to say about it. The passage of time in those lines is bizarrely fast without any time for the readers to absorb what has just happened/been revealed.
After rushing through all of the drama, you’ve suddenly slowed down. The second half of your story is much better in the pacing sense. Each scene has more details and takes its time getting to where it’s trying to get.
Formatting:There were some places where you should have had a paragraph break to properly separate the character’s thoughts. An example would be the first paragraph in Chapter 1. She’s describing the relationship she has with Hongki but her thoughts shift to different things that are not immediately associated with the specific details of the section.
The spacing and font size are also a tad bothersome. Although they make reading easier, the size is misleading as to the length of the piece. Be careful with adding Author’s Comments during the actual scenes. It’s a bit unprofessional, even for a fan fiction. Yes, I know a lot of people do it, but the story is negatively impacted when you insert your own thoughts as an author.
Literary Devices [ 4 / 5 ]
Metaphors, similes, alliteration, aphorisms, repetition, etc. : Yes you did.
Extras/Bonuses [ 4 / -- ]
Readers Enjoyment: They seemed to enjoy it. I’m not positive since this was a re-upload.
Particular Snippets of…: I really liked the Suzy/Taecyon parts. They were cute.
Improvement:You definitely improved. I was shocked by how much you improved.
Enjoyment:I liked it to an extent. There was nothing outstandingly painful about reading it once I got passed the too fast beginning.
Total [ 225 / 300 ]
75%
Reviewers Comments:
The overall story was nice. I did enjoy reviewing it and you are probably the most improved writer I have had the pleasure of reading from.
Since you fixed your pacing on your own I have no further advice for you.
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