Calling for myunghun4ever

"Runes of Despair"

Author: myunghun4ever

Main Characters: Kris, Kai, Mark (Got7), Luhan, OC

Genre: Action, Fantasy/Supernatural, Romance

Status: On-going

Description of Story:
Year 2030. The country is now under an authoritarian regime by the Holy Government. Ten years has passed since the failed coup d'état by an anti-government group, the Organisation. But what if the members weren't all eradicated, and were waiting, waiting for the time to take revenge?

 

  Critique:

Story Title: 4/5

A title is a story’s first impression. People make a first impression with appearance, wardrobe and body language. Stories do it with a title, that's why titles are extremely important. A title creates anticipation and expectation or, perhaps, disinterest. Often the title is what will determine whether or not someone reads a story. Let's think of it as the first step in officially advertising/promoting your story. It's with an attractive title that makes a reader want to read a story, to be honest. Here in Asianfanfics.com, stories are commonly placed in section through tags, or through categories in general. Frankly, there are thousands of stories here on AFF, so clearly, there's no assurance that you're story'll be read by readers' that suddenly. So yeah. You have to really do a good job with choosing the right title.

Your title was indeed attracting, mainly because of the words you used. It's not that unique though since I'm pretty sure I've read a story before with nearly the same title as yours, or I think it's the same? Nonetheless, it did somehow capture my eye, so I guess you did a good job with choosing it. Personally, I'd read a story with that title since sophisticated titles make the story sound professionally written. As for the relevance of that title, I can't really say that it was that relevant to the story, but still, maybe that relevance I'm looking for will be quite elaborated in the next few chapters ahead. Overall, I think that title isn't the best to compare with your story, but it was certainly appealing. 

 

Graphics: 5.5/10

Your poster was well-designed; kudos to the designer. However, I can't help but find some loopholes. First of all, it didn't really incorporate the main genres of your story. Romance can clearly be seen, but for action... it's a bit blurry for me. The poster was too pinkish for me as well, to which made the poster lighter than preferred since for me, this is an action story, so normally I would look for a dark poster, or maybe it's just me. Also, the flowers pouring down was a bit distracting as well. I don't know if it holds a hidden meaning, but yeah. I found it weird. I would prefer a darker poster, wherein it screams of badass action, but at the same time portrays romance. The background was well-thought as well, especially the one at the bottom. I can say that it looks a bit future-ish, which complements the general setting of your story since it runs in an alternate future universe, am I right? As for the characters, they look cool I guess, especially since they both wore sunglasses. It somehow made them look badass.

For the background, well it was kind of disappointing that you didn't have one. Backgrounds are important as well since your poster would not be always seen. Putting a background would add to the effects, and seriously, it would make your story looks more attractive. I suggest requesting for a complementing background from the same graphics shop. Other than that, I'd say you're all good. The poster was attractive, yes, but some of the elements weirded me out. 

 

Description and Foreword: 7.5/10

In all honesty, I love your description. Primarily, you provided the base/the background of your general plot, whereas you stated that the time would be from year 2030, which got me really interested if I may say. Your words weren't really that understandable. More or less, I even got more interested in reading your story. I didn't get confused, rather I got enlightened that 'Ah. So that's what the story's all about.' As for the information provided, it wasn't that long but it wasn't that short either. For a story like yours, I'd say a description like that is of the right amount since it's from the future, so you have to do a good job in providing the primary information to start your story with. The issues I found would be the attractiveness or the physical appearance of your description since you didn't exactly use any font, and the confusing parts of your description. It made it look dull and boring, and yeah. I suggest putting up a font. Oh and you should try aligning it at the center. It would make it look more interesting. And if you're thinking of aligning them at the center, try removing the spacing as well. It was a bit unnecessary for me, and honestly, it didn't look too much appealing.

As for the confusing parts, well I got confused with the witch part. Personally, I think you should remove that part. First of all, I don't really think it's relevant to the other sentences as they were broad, whereas that witch part was a bit specific. Secondly, you could use that as your advantage. For instance, by removing that part, your readers wouldn't know that there'd be witches in the story. It's a sort of a twist. As for the grammar, I didn't exactly find anything wrong with it, except this one below:

(Original Version) A long 10 years have passed since the end of the last regime. 10 years since the Great Uprising.
(Revised Version) A long 10 years have passed since the end of the last regime; 10 years since the Great Uprising.

For this example above, I replaced the period with a semicolon mainly because the second sentence isn't a sentence at all. It was just a phrase, and since it's connected with the first sentence because of those 10 years, I decided to connect them through a semi-colon. A simple comma would do as well. It's your choice whether you want to change it or not though. Other than that, I've also noticed that you kept on capitalizing the word 'Organisation'. I don't think it hold any necessary meaning to class it as a proper noun, so I think it's best to uncapitalize that word.

As for the foreword, I have no issue with it whatsoever. The credits section was rather organized. I suggest putting up some font as well for them. I understand that it's only the author's note but people actually read it, so I guess a better font would somehow make it more interesting as well. 

 

Characterization: 8/10

First of all, when you're analyzing characterization, you are analyzing how a character has been shaped within a work of fiction. It is best to analyze the characterization of each character individually first. Sometimes, after you’ve analyzed three or four characters, you begin to notice a pattern in how an author chooses to characterize the characters in that story. As the author, you might specifically use dialogues to characterize, or actions, but it is important to isolate these concepts and avoid making assumptions about the work before you’ve looked at it closely.

First of all, I think you may have lacked on this section, mainly because some of the characters were too... perfect. For instance, Eunkyung had a bit of a perfect personality if you ask me. You started your first chapters with her taking the blame off of Jongin. That's kind of heroic, but then again, I was looking for some contradiction to cross her mind since a person would normally question herself from doing this and that especially with that kind of environment. Also, all the members of EXO seemed too caring of her. Well, her personality's nice and all, but I didn't really spot any major flaws. There were minor ones, yes, but I didn't find any necessary flaw that would somehow develop her personality. Honestly, I was looking for any signs of depression especially since her parents died in an excruciating way. Well, it's a good thing that it kind of altered on the following chapters. I've noticed that her character changed for a bit when she's facing danger and death, much to my relief, but she's still Mary Sue, and to be honest, I like her character the least. I seriously didn't find anything special about her. Like I've said before, I would've liked it better if she was more dramatic and if there were some parts wherein she's a bit depressed or something.

For the EXO members plus Mark, well they were characterized well I guess. You desc