011: Half Bloods

Nicsnsd

reviewed at Cloudy Day, Clear Day (batch 3 - removed)

Title

I can’t say that the title is interesting, however, it does relate to the plot and matches well with the story. ‘Half Bloods’ is too common and trite to be placed as a title, though. It’s one out of many that I’ve seen in this site, not to mention that there’s also book entitled ‘Half Bloods’ written by Jennifer L. Armentrout. If I were to browse around and find your story in between, I must have to say the title doesn’t at all captivate my interest.

Foreword/Description

To start off, I’ll talk about the description. Despite the fact that you have some grammatical mistakes, the first paragraph shown in the description is actually quite captivating. You don’t actually reveal the whole plot. You merely put an overview about what’s the story going to be about. Perhaps, you should re-adjust the formatting. When you averted to the next paragraph, which is supposed to be author’s note or plagiarism warnings, I think it will look better if you can change the font type or size (avoid using different font colors – they’re distracting). You can also put something like “Author’s Note” or “Disclaimer:” before the second paragraph starts.

Regarding the characters introduction – I understand you don’t want to confound your readers with the complicated roles of your characters. In my personal opinion, though, I think it will be okay to not to put the introduction because it’s the art of writing, isn’t it, to be able to describe them in the story itself? However, I do understand and I’m not saying that you should discard it. The different font colors are distracting though.

Same goes to the foreword. The first paragraph gives even more questions to us readers. Who is the girl? What is she exactly? Whose point of view was that? The only thing that bothered me is the formatting, which you can refer to what I’ve mentioned about your description.

Originality

I will have to say that the plot of yours isn’t original. You’ve based it on Percy Jackson and even took the concept to be the stand of your story. I think it will be better if you can write something out of your own imagination. Besides, this kind of story is also very common in this site.

Characterization

As the plot goes on, characters need to develop as well. Aside from the obvious, I can’t seem to relate to how your characters feel, think, act, etcetera. Sure, they’re definable, but they’re lacking of traits consistency and distinctive flairs, which to me is such a waste. In order to build realistic and believable characters, you have to be in their shoes. Know every aspect about them, including their physical appearances and their way of thinking. You should also try to give more description because the excessive amount of dialogues you used will merely flow the plot without bringing the characters along.

Grammar/Vocabulary

You have a lot of grammatical mistakes that are very similar to each other, so I’ll just be correcting a few.

“The world is never what it seems. People on this earth can never believe in things they think can’t come true. If I tell you the GODS are still alive, Most won’t give a damn.”

Correction: “The world is never what it seems. People on this Earth can never believe in things they think can’t come true. If I tell you that the Gods are still alive, most of you won’t give a damn.”

Ø ‘e’ in the word ‘Earth’ should be capitalized

Ø After coma (,) the first alphabet isn’t capitalized

Ø Capitalization of ‘GODS’ isn’t necessary. You can place it as ‘Gods’ instead.

“But the children these GODS have ain’t something to play around with.”

Correction: “But the children of these Gods have nothing to play around with.”

Ø Avoid using ‘ain’t’ – the word is merely to be used in dialogues/direct sentences.

“They are, Half Bloods.”

Correction: “They are, the Half Bloods.” (it will sound better and more emphasizing.)

“Dionysus was approaching fast. Anytime now, he will spot me.”

Correction: “Dionysus was approaching fast. Anytime now, he would spot me.”

“Not too many years that will effect the camp terribly and not too little to not to improve the camp at all.”

Correction: “It was enough to improve the camp without affecting it terribly.”

Ø The sentence you wrote was very confusing, I had to re-read it several times to understand

Ø My correction might sound too far from the original, but in my opinion, it’s more efficient.

Ø ‘effect’ is not the correct word because it is a noun. Use the verb, ‘affect’, instead.

Try to re-read your chapters and spot your own mistakes. Also, take a note on the consistency of tenses used. If you’re using past tense, the entire story should be using past tense as well. You have the tendency to write in present tense albeit from the very first you were using past tense. So put more attention on that? :D

Enjoyment

I can’t say that I enjoy it. Although the story is interesting, it isn’t entirely gripping. You might want to work more on your grammatical skills and characterization. Keep on writing and that itself will help.

Writing Style

Your writing style isn’t peculiar. You have the tendency to write using a lot of dialogues and leave the descriptive parts behind. Although it matches well with the genre, I do think there’s an importance of descriptive paragraph to be put in your story. It will affect your flow and characterizations in a good way. Also, the rapid changes of point of views (from characters’ to author’s) confused me a lot, to be honest.

Bonus/Reviewer’s Comments

I apologize for sounding too harsh, but I certainly hope my review helps! I can only advise you to keep on writing and work more on your characterization & grammatical skills. I’m sure you’ll improve!

Thank you for requesting and don’t forget to credit us in your story!

macchiato-

AUTHOR'S NOTES; I admit that this isn't the best that I have. It's one of the first reviews that I worked on, so yeah. The author didn't pick up the review and didn't put any credit but since the review itself is lacking I don't think I have the rights to feel annoyed? ;~;