Review for 'Twinkle twinkle little star, take my wish back to where you are' by jjkpop

Review by ScreamingMidget

Title (4/10) : Okay, I see what you’re going for here. Like, you thought of a play on words and changed the original lyrics and it made it more personal. But, I read your story and I don’t think it actually relates very well to the plot.

Okay, here’s a site: How Long Should Your Book Title Be? And there’s some marketing jabber here and there but what we really want to read is the section titled ‘How Long...Be?” so scroll down and you’ll see this short list:

"Think and Grow Rich" is one of the most effective titles in the history of publishing. As you can see, it's only four words long! However, those four words manage to:

• Tell what the book is about

• Make a compelling promise—you will grow rich merely by thinking the right way.

• It's on a topic that is of perennial interest to people (getting rich)

• The promise also piques interest. ("How can one get rich by thinking?")

• The title is easy to remember

Yeah, so i’m going to change it a little because some of these really only apply to those self-improvement/marketing books.

1. Gives a jist of the story. Does NOT need to be a summary but MUST tie to the story in SOME way (even if the relation is obscure, if done right, it can be almost poetic)

2. Makes people compelled to read it. Has an EFFECT on the reader.  

3. Elicits interest in the reader by relating it to a topic (probably a topic WITHIN a genre like romance.

4. Easy to remember.

To be honest, I don’t think your current title really hits any of those points right. It doesn’t tell the reader what the story is about. If I saw that title, I might think that it had to do with wishing on stars or one of the characters is trying to find a lost love. But if I have to spend time and think that hard, I probably wouldn’t feel compelled to click on it right away (so your title didn’t quite get the second one the list either). A topic of interest. Well, romance is always going to be the most popular genre on AFF. But, what about within romance? There are so many different types of relationships and romances.

I SERIOUSLY recommend shortening it. Titles that are really long are never as impactful as shorter titles. Just look at popular stories on AFF. Your title is WAY too long. I think you thought of the lyrics and decided to name your story that because you liked the way you changed the lyrics up but didn’t think about how it related to your story.

Isn’t the story about what goes on behind closed doors? We need to find a way to relate our title to the story! Otherwise, people who are interested in stuff like that won’t understand that that is what your story is about. From reading your title, I thought it was supposed to be like a cutesy type of story! Omg. It’s actually a lot more complex than that, I think, so let’s try to work on the title?

How about: “Behind Closed Doors” (not very original but relevant at least), “Take Five” (I really like this one. You know how when people are practicing or even shooting a music video or a recording or something, they tell them to take five minutes as a break? I mean...just ideas lol) or “The Other Side” (as in like the other perspective).

Description & Foreword (6/10) :

EXO - A Korean-Chinese boyband that consists of 12 tightly knitted boys with bonds that would never break, and happiness that simply overflows from all of them.

or so we think.

Okay, by rule of thumb, NEVER use more than TWO words when ONE higher-level word will do. This will improve your writing immensely. You wrote ‘tightly knitted boys with bonds that would never break’. Firstly, ‘tightly knitted’ isn’t what you’re thinking of. The usual “saying” is ‘tightly knit’ and when you’re describing something as being tightly knit, you want that thing to be a whole, singular group, not a plural form of individual people.

Tightly knit organization not tightly knit employees; tightly knit family not tightly knit parents. Second, the more popular form is actual tight-knit. ‘Tightly knit’ is the second way to say it but it might simply not look right to some people because ‘tight-knit’ is the more common way (but then again we might be from different countries even so don’t take it the wrong way).

So, never use more than two words when just one word will do, right? ‘With bonds that would never break’ → ‘unbreakable bonds’, ‘indestructible bonds’, etc. By saying ‘with bonds that would never break’, you’re killing the last chance you had with parallel structure. Parallel structure is always a good thing for descriptions.

You also don’t need to define EXO. When you update and your story goes up on the list of stories that just updated, people will see some of your description, right? But we might not even get to show a whole sentence sometimes. So, do the best you can with the little you have.

Those twelve boys, bound together as the seemingly tight-knit EXO, _______...right?

LMFAO I couldn’t think of anything in between but I just wanted you to get the idea.

As for the foreword, to be honest, I think you could have just used an excerpt from your story instead of just an author’s note. By all means, keep the ‘warning’ in there if you want but put an excerpt in before all that. If people click on your story, they can still go back and not read it. I think you’re a great writer so using a bit of your stuff in the foreword would definitely be to your advantage.

Content & Plot (19/20) :

I really like this! I think you made this pretty original.

Characters (10/10) :

I like this too! The characters obviously have their own flaws and drawbacks in their personalities. I think it’s amazing how you were able to show that! You’re a very talented writer!

Grammar & Spelling (10/10) :

I think you got this down. I couldn’t find anything wrong with your grammar or spelling. Keep up the great work!

Organization/Flow (7/10) :

It’s organized in a cool way - with like different scenes and all - and the reader won’t get bored! I think it’s great! But the flow is something you could work on. Take some time to really describe where they are, what they’re feeling, etc. but do so in a more fluid manner. I think that spacing between paragraphs would help the readers, too.

Appearance (6/10) :

You’re really in need of a background and a poster. As for the font, I like the size that you’re using. I think the font you’re using matches the story, too. But, I think you need a space between the paragraphs! It’s clustered together right now and that makes it really difficult to read! Just click enter at the end of each paragraph and WOW that would make a huge difference!

Enjoyment (15/20) : You’re an amazing writer. I think the title took away a lot of your story’s impression. I’m sorry if I graded that section too harshly but I sincerely want you to improve! Great story <3 I’m glad I got to read it!

Total : 78/100