Title: Disturbed Memory

By: SilverSerenity

Title: 3.5/5

Judging from the title and the ‘angst’ tag, one would be expecting something on the lines of someone stirring up someone else’s bitter past. There isn’t anything else to infer from the title, so I would say this is quite a fitting title for an ‘angst’ storyline. 

Poster 2.5/5

I had previously done a review for you, so I must commend you on Disturbed Memory’s poster being a lot more visually appealing as compared to Bottled Butterflies.

Based on first impressions, people will assume that the storyline is set during autumn, as seen from the orange background with tree branches…but hold up, flowers are blooming at the bottom of the poster…So…is this an set in spring or autumn?

Perhaps I’m way thinking too much, so allow me to kick the tree, branches and flowers aside, and so, what we’re left with would be the colour orange (we’ll talk about F4 later), so are you trying to get some message across with this colour?

From what I know, orange is NOT a colour of ‘angst’ and to be honest, it’s a very optimistic and cheerful colour.

And finally, on to the main highlight of the poster: The 4 guys.

I’m quite satisfied with the chosen pictures of the foursome; they’re not too smiley, so it doesn’t clash with this ‘angst’ theme. What I find most irksome is the fact that there is this semi-opaque ‘veil’ in front of their eyes which runs across the poster.

Why is that so? I really can’t think of a good enough explanation for this.

Even though this is quite a pretty poster you have created, I’ll have to dock points for confusing readers like me with regards to the background and the weird ‘veil’ thing.

Intro: 2.5/5

And now after reading the 2 sentence long description of the story, there are two people who potentially have ‘Disturbed Memories’, so I do not know whether the title should have been in plural form or that I could have been mistaken and only one of the 2 has a 'bad memory'.

There is nothing much to comment about with just 2 sentences, but it does give readers a very good idea of how the characters will act- Kris being somewhat like a wood block; probably anti-social and stuff; while Chanyeol probably daydreams 99% of his life away and acting like a love sick fool…

Content: 5/10

The story starts off with introducing the sick and alcoholic Kris who’s very fascinated by a can of beer. Chanyeol gatecrashes and declares that he is going to babysit the alcoholic until he starts functioning properly as a human, so the next few chapters were about the duo warming up to each other.

My brain had already shut down due to boredom and not even the could re-energise me.

I don’t know whether to rejoice or not when I was finally jolted awake during the car accident scene where Chanyeol was knocked down. I’ll admit I’m a sadist, but so are the entertained passersby whom you called ‘Spectators’. Kris then orders the Spectators to call for the ambulance and the very knowledgeable Spectators phoned for the nearest hospital.

I laughed at that because I’m sure 99.99% of the time when someone yells out for someone else to call for an ambulance, the passersby will just dial the generic number for medical emergencies, and in this case- 129, since this story takes place in Seoul(?).

And also, who in the right mind would touch an unconscious person who just got hit by a car? I guess only Kris will, because not only did he decide that fixing Chanyeol’s hair was a perfectly fine thing to do at that moment in time, but he also dragged the unconscious body onto his lap (to initiate some skinship(?)).

I beg you: Write with some common sense please, or risk being a laughing stock by ending up with an excerpt of your story posted on wtfasianfanfics.

I then struggle on reading the story and BAM- plot twist. My heart races for a while before it hits rock bottom once more.

In Chapter 9, it is revealed that Chanyeol was there when Tao died but is framed for killing Tao when he didn’t, not really, and Tao’s final wish was for Chanyeol to take care of Kris (Tao loved Kris) while my favourite people: The Spectators called for the nearest hospital once more (not kidding).

And so, the readers now know that Chanyeol is only helping Kris out because it was Tao’s dying wish and that he’s also pretending to love Kris.

Something else happens as well, because in Chapter 10, it is made known that Chanyeol has 2 jobs! He hasn’t been seen going to work since the start of the series and suddenly, he has to go to work!? Soon after, he loses both jobs faster than you can mockingly ask: He actually has a job?

So now Chanyeol’s jobless, which isn’t much of a difference since he doesn’t work at all from Chapter 1-9, and he takes out his anger on the sick man (Kris).

After all the random characters are done popping in here and there and attempts at spicing things up with mini-bomb-conflicts, the series ends with the good guys dead, but somehow manage to hang out in the afterlife, while the bad(?) guys get off scot-free and try to lead happy lives with each other.

Other things to note:

- In Chapter 5, Chanyeol suddenly calls Kris ‘hyung’, and in following chapters till the end, it doesn’t happen anymore. Very random indeed.

- In the A/N of chapter 5, you tell the readers to read up on Huntington’s Disease as it will help them understand why Kris is acting the way he does throughout the series. Most authors will provide a footnoteat the end to serve as an explanatory note, and I feel this will greatly benefit your readers if you could do so by doing a short write up on the disease on behalf of your readers. Why should your readers have to do ‘extra homework’ when they read your story?

Organisation: 6.5/10

The transition from one scene to another was quite fluid, though I felt that the introduction of new characters seem to happen quite a fair bit and at rather random moments as well. I cringe because whenever a new person pops into the scene, it’s always ‘Hey there, remember me?’… 

Vocabulary, Language and Structure: 12/30

The prepositions were awkward (because they're incorrect). Here’s an example: Shut his eyes off.

There were also a lot of wrongly used words in your sentences.

- ‘Sweating side of the can’ (Condensation right? And only animals sweat.)

- ‘Waste anymore of his seconds’ (Use time instead)

- ‘…the shine was not even touching him’

- ‘A heck of seconds’

And this took the cake for me: Chanyeol’s white body…

Is he a ghost? Perhaps you’re trying to describe him being really fair skinned or pale, but using the word ‘white’ can really give your poor readers a heart attack.

‘…reading words by words, sentence by sentence, meanings by meanings.’ That’s somewhat like talking to a senile elderly; couldn’t you have just said something on the lines of someone doing intensive reading?

Now, on to the tenses. Throughout your whole series, there was a big jumble when it came to your past and present tense use. You chose to write everything in past tense, but you would forget yourself and use present tense from time to time. An example would be when you were writing about Chanyeol’s personality 2 years ago and suddenly switched to present tense.

Audience engagement/effect on readers + Originality: 5/20

I appreciated the inclusion of plot devices from time to time, it really helped wake me up from stupor. However, the series was still bland and pretty much predictable. Many scenes in the story were hardly developed to its full potential, and an example would be when Baekhyun was introduced into the story and physically attacked Chanyeol because he was seen as Tao’s ‘murderer’. I was expecting some epic fight scene (again, I have remind you that I’m a sadist) or at least a really heated argument, but no. To my utter horror, Baekhyun just hits Chanyeol for a bit and suddenly…he begs like a weak dog that hasn’t been fed by its owner for days and asks Chanyeol what Tao’s final words were. And I was like…WHAT!?

As mentioned previously, the lack of thought put into writing, especially during the car accident scenes, made me laugh at you, not with you, since this isn’t a comedy or crack fic.

Unless the person reading your story is a die-hard Exotic, it would be pretty rare for a random AFF user to continue reading after the first chapter. 

Character Design/Depth: 4/15

Kris’ character is plain, boring and flat. He’s a alcoholic recluse and slowly opens up after Chanyeol crashes into his life. ‘Being a tiny bit happy’ pretty much sums up his whole personality at the end of the fic.

Chanyeol is supposedly the saint in here, being all cheerful and bubbly but it’s revealed that he’s actually just following a dead man’s final wishes so he has to babysit the alcoholic block of wood.

They’re both rather generic and there’s nothing interesting about them; no quirks, no unique traits- just having sad pasts and a rare illness.

PM me if you have any queries about the review.