The Moon Spirit | DivineDionne's Production

Review Written by exoticbabylove

Title

I have to tell you that your title is one of the best titles I have seen in fanfics. The length is great as it is neither too long nor too short; you didn't give away the whole plot or story so it did intrigue me to read on for the story. So, your title did fulfill many of my requirements for a good title. One was the word 'moon' and 'spirit'; when I read these words together, they sound so mysterious and unique; it indeed pique my interest on your fanfic. I like how you used the word 'moon' as an adjective to describe more about the spirits.

Being a big fan of supernatural, horror and fantasy genres, I was excited and keen about your story. So great job for choosing such a unique and special title. As for the connection for the title and the story content, it was amazing as the title has a strong connection with the content. I couldn't ask for a better title! Even for just a little cameo without any specfic mentions in the first chapter, I still appreciate how you managed to fit Sungjong in.

Plot

So, I had a hard time trying to figure out the type of story your fanfic is. At first glance, when I spotted the description, I had the feeling that your fanfic will be a chaptered story. However, after I read the first chapter, it made me feel a little lost when the second chapter had no relationship with the first. In my opinion, the description of the story was mis-leading. You made me think that the story is a chaptered-fic. My advice is to write in the foreword that every chapter has a different story and all of them are one-shots. This will at least make the readers' understand what is going to happen in the future chapters.

As you can see your author's note is also misleading, let's have a look at them:

Ah...an Infinite fic, I'm a bit nervous haha. I'm entering this fic into a competion(competition) so you don't have to worry, I'm not abondoning The Boy Who Wrote a Hundred Love Letter (since this will only be a four-chaptered story five tops!) so yeah. 

First, I will recommend using the header: (A/N) or author's note so that people will understand that your addressing is not part of the story. Next, as you can see, the underlined parts of the story makes me think that your fanfic is a chaptered fanfic like you had mentioned yourself. You should write that they are three different one-shots or simply use the phrase 'one-shot collection'. By using these words, the readers will now understand the story better.

Remember you have to be specific in writing as we, readers, cannot read your mind when you read your story. So, it is your responsibility to elaborate on your story's way of writing and many stuffs like that. This is my personal opinion as a reader so I hope you wouldn't mind about the strictness about this. We have to be specific as some readers(like me) tend to be slow in reacting when the story sounded different from the author's note.

For me, the first story(first chapter) wasn't very developed in terms of plot for me. It was really very vague and unclear in the main story. I didn't understand what was that 'thing' Sungyeol gave to the Moon Spirit. There were many things that could be that suitable pick, it could be Myungsoo since he was precious to him. It could be Sungyeol, himself, since he really loved Myungsoo that much. Some of my thoughts included Sungyeol's parents and close ones like his relatives or friends. So, that 'thing' that Sungyeol gave to Sungjong was really vague.

I do wish that you can elaborate more on the actual story as I only found out what you wanted to say in the author's note. Personally, it isn't really a very good choice of clarifying things to the readers in that manner. For me, I would prefer you giving us a little more hint about how that spirit was(Sungjong) since it was left hanging before I read your author's notes. Next, I was really lost in the part of 'something valuable Sungyeol gave to Sungjong. So, I want to tell you that there are some plot holes in the first one. For me, my advice for you is to revise the story again. Think of the expected points which readers need to know. Consider the following points that I have stated. 

For the next story, I totally loved it! It was fabulous and the plot was very unique and heart-breaking for me. I liked how the characters were pictured in the story and I will elaborate more on what I wish to say in the 'characterization' part so don't worry. I did love how the Moon Spirit relates well with most of the stories in the collection. So, the title has a great connection with the stories thus I have to say that I really love the title!

Language & Writing Style

There are some awkwardness in your writing style. The story did sound nice with all the descriptive words, in fact, I really enjoyed the way you tend to slow down the story pace by elaborating on the scenes that you wish to depict to the readers. However, there are some mistakes, or should I rather say sentence-structure errors in the story. You tend to write your sentences in a certain way which makes the sentences sound awkward and weird.

As for how you can improve on this style of writing, I will recommend reading your finished product several times so that you can spot all the mistakes in the story. You do need time to 'deal' with all these weird structures in your story. It isn't easy but you have to try hard! For me, I did have the same problem as you a few months ago. There are still minor sentence structures in my sentences right now but compared to last time, it was a great achievement. Initially, I had worser structures than you, so you should be able to change your writing style at a faster rate than me. What I did was to read, not fanfics but real novels from famous authors. Soon, I was able to adapt with a proper writing structure after I remembered the author's writing style.

So, let's look at the sentence structures that I have spotted:

He closed his eyes as he savored the beautiful feeling of silence of the world—only hearing the occasional rustle of the leaves as