Calling for hi_im_olaf

"Ms. Song's Wolves"

Author: hi_im_olaf

Main Characters: Song Jihyo and EXO

Genre: Fantasy/Supernatural, Fluff, Mystery, Romance, Romcom, Schoollife, Wolf AU

Status: On-going

Description of Story:
Song Ji-hyo is living her dream job as a new teacher in an all-boys boarding school.
But what will happen, when she discovers that the kids she needs to teach are 12 hot, handsome and naughty students?

    Critique:

Story Title

"Ms. Song's Wolves" -> Well, it definitely sounded intriguing for me. It was actually a simple yet straight-forward title. That itself gave me an idea about your story, and the genres can already be seen through it. The fact that you used "Ms." made it seem like she had a position of somewhat, which indeed, was that she was a teacher. It sounds like a title that you can see on AFF, but yeah. It still screamed the genres, and that's defiantly a good thing. To be honest, I really like it, and I can't really think of any title that is more suitable for your story. Good job, I guess?

 

Graphics

The very first thing that I thought after seeing your poster was that it was too crowded. All spaces were literally used; well, expect a few on the sides, but you get my point. It was too crowded. I can't blame you though. EXO has twelve members, but yeah. I got the whole point of making it look like they were in a classroom and all, and I think it was really cute to put the wolf on top of the board; it was adorable. 

Apart from that, I also think that it would've looked better if there was only one Jihyo in the poster. Again, it looked a bit crowded, but overall, I kind of like it. Maybe a change of the background, the one looking like a page with scribbles/notes at the back, would be better. I think a plain colored background would do the job since those scribbled kind of overdid it. The lines enlining the "Wolves" on the blackboard (I forgot what they're called) should be removed as well since they had no purpose whatsoever. I believe that it would look better without them, too.

As for the actual background used for the story, well... I can see the resemblance from the poster, but I deem it too colorful for my liking. Anyway, I can see that you didn't make those graphics yourself, so I understand your part. I am not asking you to change your graphics either, though a few improvements along the way would be better in my opinion. Needless to say, despite the crowdedness and a few things in your graphics, I like it.

 

Description and Foreword

One of the problems that I encountered as I assessed your brief description was the feeling I had that it sounded more like something you would say when someone asks you for the story's summary. I admit, it was short, simple yet straight-forward, but I don't think it was that suitable for your story. Instead of getting it all out straight and whatnot, try to prolong the idea. Entice the readers as much as possible with your words. Adding quotes or relaying your description with funny wordings would help, but changes would completely go under your choices though, so don't feel pressured.

There were a few errors in your description as well. Here's my revision:

(Original Version) Song Ji-hyo is living her dream job as a new teacher in an all-boys boarding school. But what will happen, when she discovers that the kids she needs to teach are 12 hot, handsome and naughty students? 

(Revised Version) Song Ji-hyo is living her dream job as a new teacher in an all-boys' boarding school. What will happen when she discovers that the kids she needs to teach are twelve hot, handsome and naughty students? 

I only made minor revisions for this one, like removing the unnecessary comma and putting up an apostrophe.

As for the formatting of your description and foreword, I think that you should work on making them look more enticing to the readers' eyes. First and foremost, why not use a fancier font that matches the mood of the story. A font like Georgia would do that mood, in my opinion. Secondly, try to put more effort in arranging the character chart or the casts' list. Beware of the pictures' sizes as well. Try not to put them too large. Balance them, and as much as possible, use pictures with similar dimensions and/or sizes. You should work on the author's note and the credits as well. Try to align them in the center, and lessen the font sizes. You don't need them too large. In fact, they can be put smaller since they're not really important in the story anyways. As much as possible, you should emphasize the elements that should be emphasized more, like the brief description.

Other than that, I noticed that there weren't nothing more to say in your description and foreword, so like what I've said before, try to put more on it, though then again, it's completely your choice.

 

Characterization

The understandability of the readers to your story character is very important. Their purpose is for us, the readers, to relate to them, and in relating, we'll feel very engaged in reading the book. It's true. How we read books and find a character very similar to the humans we see in our world today. The interest can be found within their character, how they act that makes us feel attracted to them and also how we will find ourselves hating or loving them. The audience needs to be able to understand them enough quickly, so that they'll commit to the story. However, you need to keep a sense of mysterious unpredictability with all, or most, of your characters, or the reader could get bored.

The purpose of characters vary. They are there because you need points of view for your story, and you need several because any good story has conflict. The interest in them stems from which characteristics the readers can identify with. In your case, there were several characters involved, which makes it harder for us to assess each and every character involved. Moreover, amongst the EXO members, we have not yet discovered who the main characters are within them. I don't think they'll all fall in love with Jihyo, to be honest, and besides, that would be too cliche and not really realistic, even though your story screams fantasy. I'd prefer if she ends up with just one man in the end, too.

This brings us to "focus." Any character can be interesting, if she is central to the story that you’re telling. However, just as we don’t tell everything that happens in a character’s life, we don’t delve deeply into every character. The characters who are central to the story end up being central to the plot, and if you find yourself spending a lot of time on secondary and tertiary characters, consider whether you should edit out those scenes. Again, as much as possible, you should accommodate all characters involved when necessary, but you should pay more attention to the main characters. In relation to your story, I could see the need of all EXO members to get screentime, so I suggest on bringing emphasis to those characters that you want to bloom out, though you don't necessarily need to disregard the others. I hope that made sense.

Let's go for my individual character assessment:

Chapter 2:

“You know,” someone’s familiar voice is heard from her back she turned around and saw Principal Yoo walked towards her while holding a cup of a hot coffee. She bow to him. “We also have indoor soccer field, Ms. Song.”

“Oh really?” Ji-hyo stunts in her place. “Well, thank you, Principal Yoo.” She bow and quickly run away, while the principal is only shaking his head then blow the smoke from his hot coffee.

For this example above, I couldn't help but notice how informal Principal Yoo was. Excuse me if that was on purpose in relation to his character in the story, but then again, he was too informal from him being the school principal. He should've at least told her that formally, and maybe guided her properly with the facilities of the school and whatnot. Moreover, he should've at least assigned someone to guide her in the school in the first place. That's mandatory since Jihyo was new and that she needed to be guided so that she'll be familiar with, again, the school's facilities.

As for the EXO members, so far, Joonmyun, Yifan, Tao, Jongin, Sehun and Chanyeol's characters were understandable for me. As for the others, they still seem blurry for me. They definitely came out as the members that we usually see on variety shows and whatnot, like Kris being in his "this is not my style" state and all. Chanyeol's character, on the other hand, was surprising. I didn't see him as the overly troublemaker boy at the bunch, especially when Jihyo reprimanded him of knocking at the door properly instead of just barging in like that. That sort of character normally appears at Jongin or maybe Tao's character for me, but yeah. This is your story after all.

Jihyo, on the other hand, was obviously the main character of the story. She was the curious and strong type of girl, which was relatable in real life as she was like that in Running Man. She had, however, her own weak side. She cried when her students, the EXO members, kept on going out from her class, which was totally understandable as that was disrespectful on the teacher's part. There's nothing much to say though, as the story hadn't yet progressed that much, but so far, I do like her character, and I am glad that you had provided us a few of her flaws. I'd look forward to how her characters evolves on the next chapters. The same goes with the other characters, particularly the EXO members.

Now, since we're done with the individual assessment, I'll relay my assessment of your characterization techniques in general/as a whole.

Sorry to say this, but you did poorly at this section. Why? Most of the characterization elements were missing. For instance, you didn't even describe their appearance that well. You have to describe them to drive our imaginations as well, making us feel like it's happening right in front of us. Was she wearing a skirt, a blouse, or what? Did she look too mature from the way she dresses, or did she dress normally but hot in the eyes of others? I remember Kris saying how hot Jihyo's body was. You should also describe their emotions better. If Jihyo cried, tell us how exactly she was feeling at the moment. Did she feel her heart shattering or something, or did she feel something in particular. Instead of telling us, show us!

One more thing: avoid stereotypes. We don't want to see the same characters again and again. That’s not to say you couldn’t take one of these characters and make them outstanding, while setting them within a not-so-hackneyed plot. It’s just more difficult to pull off.

 

Plot

As far as I'm concerned, your story already waves with points two and five. The others are still worrisome though, like the fact that the story doesn't seem realistic enough, though it does capture a readers' attention, especially since it's a fantasy story. Again, like what I've said in the characterization section, there were a lot of characters involved in your story, making it harder for us to differentiate and analyze each and every character that you have. Also, the story didn't really start with a bang. You actually started it, like, midway. There weren't enough introduction in the first place. You just started it with Jihyo already moving in the school's dormitory. Well, some stories start it like that, but in your case, I didn't see the point of starting the story in that way. In contrast, I was looking for some background info.

Anyways, here are some of the confusing scenes from your chapters that I found whilst I was reading.

Chapter 1:

“Well...” Jimin said shyly. “I accidentally over hearing your interview with the principal. You said you like chocolate.”

This was a confusing scene coming from the very first chapter. Why? Well, Jimin said that she accidentally overheard Jihyo's interview with the principal, and that she heard Jihyo saying that she liked chocolate. It was understandable for Jimin to overhear that since she was the principal's secretary in the first place, but the fact that Jihyo's likes was included in the interview made it weird. I mean, interviews like that are supposed to be formal, unless the principal is not that formal, but then again, there wasn't much said about Principal Yoo (Yoo Jae Suk), so the first thing that I'll