Author: EXOcrux

Main Characters: Chanyeol and Yifan (EXO)

Genre: Alternate Universe, Fluff, School Life, 

Status: Completed

Description of Story:
Yifan is a man who seldom speaks, to the point of being mistaken as mute. But when he saw that beautiful pianist, he decided to break his silence with the help of his little Cupids: flowers.

Story Title: 3.5/5

Honestly, I adored your title. It was short and one-worded, but the title itself was attractive in my opinion, as that term isn’t to be categorized as simple. Relevance-wise, you did well. I mean, Floriography is the language of flowers, which was used for coded communication during the Victorian times. That description itself was used really well in the story. Moreover, the flowers that Yifan used to confess with Chanyeol were really meaningful, which gave off explicit scenes. It made Yifan’s confession much more romantic, too.

Originality-wise, however, your story didn’t stand up. Google has proven that thought. I had searched your title up in Google and it appeared to me that there are a few more stories with the same title as yours. There are those with similar plots as well. I’m totally not saying that you should change your title though. Heck, it suits the story overall! It just so happens that the title is overused. Then again, it captured the meaning of the whole story, so there’s no need to change it. Nevertheless, good job!

Graphics: 0/0

I’d feel guilty for grading this section when you didn’t really request for graphics in the first place, so I’ll just be excluding this one from the over-all grading. Nevertheless, I don’t think it’s necessary to request for graphics either. The simple picture of a flower placed above the piano keys was enough. I already got the relevance of the picture as Yifan had loved the sound emitted from the piano every time that he even let the music flow inside him. It was understandable, too, since it seemed like a picture that Kris himself had taken, which made even more sense as he was part of the Photography club. It was nice, all in all, though the background used for the story was too flowery for my liking. It would’ve been better if the shade was darker – similar to the colors used in the poster. Other than that, it was fine.

Description and Foreword: 5/10

The description was fine, to be honest. It was of the right amount. You didn’t exceed the necessary information so as to spoil us with what was inside the story. Other than that, I think it would’ve been better if you remove the “collegeAU” placed just before the description. It kind of ruined the introduction of your story. Maybe you should put it in the foreword instead.

I had also noticed an error, though not exactly an error.

(Original Version) Yifan is a man who seldom speaks, to the point of being mistaken as mute; but when he saw that beautiful pianist, he decided to break the silence with the help of his little Cupids: flowers.

(Revised Version) Yifan is a man who seldom speaks, to the point of being mistaken as mute; but when he saw that beautiful pianist, he decided to break the silence with the help of his little Cupids: flowers.

I simply combined the two sentences through replacing the period with a comma and uncapitalizing the conjunction. I’m not really a fan of starting sentences with conjunctions, but nonetheless, I think that it would be better to combine the two instead since there’s really no point in dividing them.

I would also like to question this description. From what I know, Yifan had already started placing flowers on the piano before he even saw Chanyeol playing the instrument. The description said that when Yifan saw that beautiful pianist, he then only decided to communicate flowers, right? From what I remember, he started doing so even before he saw him. Proof: “Days passed since he gave the flower to the unknown pianist… *flash forward* Yifan’s body stiffened when he heard light footsteps and the familiar sound of know being turned… *flash forward again* Focusing his lens, he clicked the button and snapped a shot of the pianist.” This was an excerpt from the scene where Yifan was daydreaming. Your call.

I also noticed a slight grammatical error in the sneak peek provided in your foreword.

(Original Version) Chanyeol was humming to himself as he walked to the Music Room.

(Revised Version) Chanyeol was humming to himself as he walked to the music room.

For this example, I was a bit confused as to why the “music room” was capitalized. I mean, it’s not a proper noun, so you should uncapitalize those words. It should’ve been rightfully capitalized if the music room had a name, like “Audio Visual Room” or something. Sorry for the lame example, but you know what I mean. Common nouns should not be capitalized whatsoever.

Characterization: 7/10

The story had started off with your introducing Yifan’s character. He was the quiet, -faced Yifan that we all know in the real world, and he liked to keep to himself. The only problem that I encountered during the first parts of the story was that Yifan seemed too dramatic and I didn’t even know why? Why did he think that he was alone in this world in the first place? When he listened to the music that had filed from the piano in the Music room, he even felt tears forming in his eyes. Why so? What had even happened in his past?

“Not buying. Just… walk around.” Yifan didn’t know how to explain himself anymore.”

I laughed at Kris’ broken language like the one above. I understand that he had a difficult time talking since he disliked socializing with others, meaning less communication. However, I still deemed it unrealistic, especially with how he talked above. It seemed more like he didn’t know the language he was speaking of instead, especially with “Just… walk around.” I would’ve understood his part if it was “Just… walking around,” since it would seem like he was just stuttering too much.

Other than that, there was also a scene where Luhan from the flower shop had assumed that Yifan was always like he didn’t like speaking. I was just confused since Yifan, in real life, doesn’t really look all Korean, too, so people would clearly assume that he was a foreigner, right? Then, the first assumption that Luhan should’ve made was that Yifan didn’t know how to properly speak in Hangul since he’s, in fact, a foreigner!

You also said that Luhan wasn’t used to sign languages. It was said that he used it in order to talk to Yifan. Why would he need to use it though? It wasn’t like Yifan was deaf or something. He just had difficulties with talking. More so, he still replied to the man’s questions and such, with difficulties, of course, so I don’t think that the sign language was necessary at all.

It was also said that he thought Yifan was the practical type of a man instead of someone who liked to give flowers. I’d like to question that thought, though. Based from his actions – a person who seemed not to l