Review for touslesjous // Reviewed by: pilsuk123

Title and Story link:  

Rhetrorical⁽ᴺᴳ⁾ (Ongoing, reviewed with 21 chapters)

Title: (16/20)

At first glance, I thought it's a misspelled title from rethorical but after reading all the chapters posted, I remembered that it meant something else. I just couldn't remember which chapter was it when you briefly touched on the meaning underlying 'Rhetrotical' but I feel that it should be more impactful. I think what usually makes a good title is when the readers can link the meaning of it with the story almost instantly without thinking much. That the only part that I feel wasn't highlighted enough, be it in the description, beginning chapters or somewhere in between. Otherwise, I feel that it's a catchy, original and refreshing title. Extremely original I would add because you could've just go with a really mainstream or long title about jihye skipping 13 years but instead come up with something original, short but expressive one word title.

Overall Appearance: (5/5)

I would say that there isn't much I can add about the overall description because it was done as though it's from a professional book. Especially for the story's description and foreword! I liked how you didn't go for pictures of the oc with their face clearly seen because that would actually destroys the readers imagination of their appearance through the description.

Description and Foreword: (20/20)

This - 'As fiery as sparks. As fast as heartbeats.' was probably the closest to the simplest yet detailed description as it can gets. I don't know if I'm looking too much into it or that it's the description of Jihye feelings with the two main leads in the story. Jihye feels the spark with Jaehyun or so she thinks from 13 years ago. And there's just something about her and Joonmyun with his and her heartbeats as he kept on emphasizing. It's so lovely you cannot understand how much time I literally spent reading that sentence again and again after finishing a chapter. The foreword/prolouge was also wonderfully done, you didn't give out too much details but showed some sneak preview to make readers curious. I had no idea what I was getting myself into which made it so much more fun and to enjoy. And you touched breifly about heart beats again here which is still magical when I read it again. That ending line in the foreword seriously made me died again after absorbing it all, great just great!

Plot: (28/30)

As mentioned, I have completely no idea what I'm getting into when I started reading the story because there was barely any main plot or idea given in the d/f, reading the story made it like as though I'm on a really long roller coaster ride that goes up and down. I don't even know where to start because there's just too much to touch on after reading 21 chapters. I couldn't stopped at just 12 to review because I wanted to have a deeper in depth of the story before writing the review but even after 21 chapters, I still couldn't find a way to write or start this review. Where do I start? First of all, I think it's reasonable to start off that the concept of the story can be somehow similar and misleading towards the movie - 13 going on 30 but to be really honest, the only similarity there is about the jump in the time zone, the rest of it all are just original. Moving on the the overall plot of the story, in the beginning, it was pretty hard catching up with the story because 1. the names aren't familar as it is in aff with idols name in it 2. it's started off pretty flat about Jihye and her life before she decided to play with the spirit stick and 3. I ALMOST lost interest in the story. Just as I thought that this story isn't going to be special, that's when everything changed. There's so many good and surprising element in the story and details I'm dying to know.

I loved how Jihye woke up in a different time zone yet it's everything that she doesn't expect for everything to be. Her husband, her brother, her friends, who she turns out to be...  and everything. It made the story from yeah-it's-an-okay-story to damn-this-is-the-real-deal story. I mean the moment she woke up, she's with the guy that she hates so much and even ''fought'' with in school. 

Also, I thought that the story would just end really quickly of Jihye being about to go back but in the mean time, she'll just try to adapt but she's doesn't want to adapt! It made the plot so much more interesting to see such a strong character and probably the most unique and strong characteristics I've read in a while (more of this in characterization). 

In the beginning, I'm all in and rooting for Joonmyun and Jihye together because they're indeed the perfect pair and the way he behaves around her (in the earlier chapter before more of his other sides starts getting reveled) was just exactly of how a loving husband would be. His touch was as if he loved her dearly and wanted her to stay. That would stay really gets to me whenever Joonmyun said it. Every time he's begging Jihye to stay, I felt what Jihye felt.

And when she's trying hard to understand her situation of how she ended up as she is in the present, everything just falls apart and the curiosity is making me pulling all of my hair out. I realized after many chapters later, that this story's plot is more than it may be giving now. I somehow feel this angst and big revelation coming out soon and I'm really sad/excited for that to happen. 

All the crazy plot twist in between is intense, from Kim Bap, Donghyun, Joonmyun being the famous racer, Jaehyun wanting her back and everything. You just can't relax and it's been an extremely thrilling ride and I cant' wait for the later chapters to be posted!

Out of all the chapters, I do remember clearly that some of my favorites where about heartbeats, chapter 8 and the 18-20 chaptes. All extremely intense and thrilling to read!

Originality: (20/20)

This is definitely one of the best and most original story I've read in aff or in other sites. Even if there's similar concept or storyline, the way you had written the whole story and the continuous surprises and the characterization and the way the theme is leading from comedy and romance to angst... all of it are original and has it's own trait. This story definitely has it's own trait and it's own twists that makes it really original. Moreover, it's nongasoo, which means that everyone who reads and stayed reading and supporting the story is solely based on the original story plot and the way you created it and not because it's a idol the readers like.

Language: (20/20)

It's obvious that you go on the extra mile to make sure that every chapter you posted have no mistakes in it. I really can't seem to spot any grammar or language mistake at all. It's all very clearly and properly done! So I apologise if I can't help you with this part but there really isn't any mistakes or typo in the story that I can spot. 

Writing Style: (18/20)

From a reviewer's point of view, I thought the writing style in the story was really chic and it stands out from the other stories. It has it's own special way of delivering emotions or the character's thoughts. The way you spelled b.itch or eye-phone, it's all really realistic and special. However, as a reader, I can't help but find the repetitive words such as b.itch or queen continuously or over-used. At some point, it does feel as though it's unimportant. As a reader, after a few chapters or at least after getting used to the story, they will know the character slightly enough so I do feel that there isn't a need to constantly write her thoughts about her being a queen or b.itch. For example, in the later chapters, the thoughts written before she do anything would be about her being a queen or ceo or b.itch and that's why she can do it etc. That's the only feedback I have about writing style, otherwise, I find the in depth details or the smart sense you have on your writing style to be addictive. 

Characterization: (25/30)

Characterization and Flow are the two parts I really argued with my inner self because there's a lot of strong points yet there's also a few contradicting points about a few parts. I really find Jihye's character amusing and interesting to read as a leading character in the story. She doesn't portray the usual oc girl in stories - she's really special. However as I wrote in writing style, how you always express her thoughts are great for readers to understand her better but sometimes they're kind of repetitive. Also, I find her character rather strange sometimes. I do fully and completely understand most of the times, but sometimes I just don't get why you choose to do things in the story. She's a character that's witty, poise, classy, smart and all however I don't get after meeting so many people from the past, she's unable to get solid information that could help her figure out about how she became someone she dones't recognize. In one of the chapter, I remembered trying to scream to her to just get her assistant or someone she trusts to find her boyfriend for her but instead she goes to find her friend, her old house, gets into a bunch of trouble and later only asking her assistant to search for her brother/boyfriend for her. I feel just as tired as Jihye because she's been looking for answers for so long and she's a smart woman but it just keeps repeating.

Joonmyun,on the other hand, was my favorite character that I've been rooting. But not anymore. I feel that he's keeping a lot of lies and secrets from Jihye and he's sneaky and stalky. 

The current character that I'm hopefully rooting correct for is Kangwoo and Jaehyun.

Overall, I find all the characters in the story really interesting to read and get to know more about and although it takes time to get used to the names in the story, I think you did a crazy good job juggling that many characters and still have very clear and distinctive characterization for each of them. 

Flow: (24/30)

The flow of the story is a tough one. At first, I felt that the pace was just nice with all everything being extremely detailed but the flow in the beginning chapters does feel dragged out and kind of slow. The middle and the more updated chapters was still kind of slow in the plot building but at least there's a lot more clues and the story is definitely developing more so the flow is getting faster. For the pace, although it was slow at first, now I kind of enjoy the slow pacing because I want to read more details and I want things to slowly getting reveal one by one. 

Reader's Scope/ Overall Enjoyment (5/5)

How can I not give full marks here! I just have a lot of feels from the story plot and characters! This story definitely exceeds many standard coming from aff or soompi, it raised the bar THAT much higher and I don't know how I'm going to read other stories after this one. The story was so damn enjoyable that I had to share it with my best friend who's alike with me, couldn't wait for the story to get deeper for more things to be revealed. I'm a fan and will continue to read and comment and support the story as a reader <3 

Bonus (+4)

The efforts you put in for the story was really inspiring. I hope more writers would be more motivated to create a better and a more professional story like yours and have the courage to write something completely new and different from others.

Final Score/ Total (185/200) = 92.5%

A/N:

Hello! I'm sorry this took so so long but I hope you think that the review is ok! It took me a while to finish reading but most importantly I do have to apologies for the extremely long review (in terms of the length of this review and in terms of how long it took me to finally post this)! It would've been a much faster review if I would stopped reading after 12 chapters but that wouldn't be good because all the good and crazy and exhilarating things happen only in the more updated chapters! I hope you might find the review insightful or least get a more detailed view of the story from a reader/reviewer pov. Will definitely continue to support the story because it's so damn good! Hope you would update soon because it's killing me! You ended with a huge cliff hanger and I can't wait! Good luck with the story <3 And this would be featured but please give me some time to get it to the featured page because everything's a mess rn!

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