Title: What's The Truth?
Author: nataliechengg
Characters: Kyungsoo & Yunji (OC)
Genre: Sad
Category: B*G
Status: Completed (One-shot)
Description: As I stood there holding his flowers she looked him straight in the eye.
"Never" I said.
"Look. I'm sorry!" He answered plainly.
"That's it?" I asked, "that's all you've got to say? 'I'm sorry?'"
"You never listened to me" he said lowly.
"Tch. Me? You're the one who never listens to me! If you want to talk. Talk. Right now. Explain to me why there are pictures of you two together. Text messages.
Selcas. Tell me it wasn't true!"
I started to hit him.
He looked over to her, but said nothing.
"Exactly!"
"Look. If you don't believe me then don't."
"How do you want me to believe you when there is PROOF!?"
"I don't know. What happened to the trust?"
"What happened to the truth?"

Title (8/10):
I think the title suits the first part of the story more than the second part. The part when Yunji confronts Kyungsoo is definitely a “What Is The Truth” moment because she wants to know whether or not he had cheated on her and what really happened to him. However, after Yunji had broken up with Kyungsoo and met Jongin, I didn’t think the title would suit that bit since she had moved on after finding out the truth from Kyungsoo. Nevertheless, the title does suit the story in a sense.

Description & Foreword (6/10):
Your description is the beginning of your story and therefore gives your readers a teaser of the real thing. Though I would say that there aren’t any information on the characters or their past, which sometimes can be a good thing, but in this case, I would have thought that some kind of background information would make it easier for your readers to understand by just reading the description.

Graphics (8/10): 
The poster is really pretty, I have to say. But one thing I have to point out is that the poster only consists of Kyungsoo and Yunji. Though they are the main characters, maybe if you had added Jongin onto it will make it even more complete. Since Kyungsoo and Yunji broke up in the beginning of the story and Yunji had moved onto Jongin, I would have thought by having Jongin in the poster as well, the effects of the poster on the reader may be greater, though it’s only my personal opinion.

Your background graphic matches with your poster so it’s sure that there aren’t any clashes of colour and design. However, personally, I would recommend a less graphic-like background to make it a tad bit easier on the eyes while reading because too many pictures in the background may be a little distracting.

For both you poster and background, they give off an autumn feel, ideal for break-ups and heartbreaks. I’m not sure if that was your intention to begin with but I think overall, they really suit the plotline.

Character Development (8/10):
Since the story is quite short, it’s quite hard to judge on this. I think Yunji had gotten over the break-up pretty quickly for a girl and Kyungsoo had let out the truth too easily. I’m not sure if that’s the result of me reading too many dramatic fics or not but since this is an one-shot the characters’ changes cannot take too long and there I have taken that into consideration.

Again, as the story is an one-shot, I couldn’t fully grasp what kind of personality the characters have before the story ended but it seems like Yunji is the outgoing type, Kyungsoo is on the quiet side, whereas Jongin is the popular boy who doesn’t really take his fame to heart. I could be wrong because there aren’t enough to base this theory on but I think these characteristics are probably the best guesses there could be.

Appearance (7/10):
The font size is good to read and I didn’t have to enlarge it or anything, but I think it’s mostly because you’re not using a layout for the main body, which in a sense is good because sometimes, layouts may be a little too complicated for some stories.

There are paragraphs but they’re not obvious. I would have expected it to be more “block-like” text, rather than the current “line-by-line” text. For this reason, I feel like I’m reading off a play script, rather than a novel-like text.

Originality & Plot (5/10):
Honestly speaking, this isn’t the first time I’ve read something like this. The plot is not uncommon and the love-triangle is something that we see all the time in stories. I think in order to make this more unique and appealing, you will have to expand it to give it more depth and detail, though that will most likely make it a multi-chaptered story rather than an one-shot.

For example, there is a conflict in Kyungsoo’s words. At the beginning of the story, he said that he never liked her and therefore he cheated on her, but near the end of the story, the part in Kyungsoo’s POV, he said that he loved her at one point. So did Kyungsoo like her or not? I think this part may need a little more explanation.

Flow (5/10):
I think the beginning was a bit rushed. I feel that if there was some kind of explanation of that, the story will flow better and the reader won’t feel like they’re starting at the middle of the story rather than from the top. Also, I think Yunji had moved onto Jongin too fast. Yes, she had moved on from Kyungsoo but can a girl really go onto dating another person so quickly? Furthermore, there was no heads-up as to Jongin being Yunji’s first love so why did she go out with Kyungsoo despite that fact?

Though this is an one-shot and I appreciate the fact that you’re trying to keep it short and simple, but I feel that there should be more details added to make it seem more realistic and flow more naturally.

Writing (6/10):
In this particular story, the text is mostly dialogue and there aren’t many places where you have described the surroundings or emotions. Even though speech itself can say a lot, description is also very important. Because not all characters will say what’s on their mind out loud, description of their emotions is essential for the reader to understand what the character is feeling and thinking.

Nonetheless, I feel that the simplicity of your story can be an advantage to you. As there are many non-native English speakers here on this site, reading something simple may be the best for them. By no means I am dissing them for the language but sometimes, reading something in detail in another language can be really difficult and therefore your simplicity isn’t a bad thing at all.

Grammar & Spelling (8/10):
Overall, I can’t find any major problems with your grammar and spelling, though there are a few things I would like to point out to you.

1. Original: “He went to far.”
Corrected: “He went too far.”

2. Original: I decide its time to sleep when I glance at the clock that says it's 10 pm.
Corrected: I decide that it’s time to sleep when I glance at the clock - it says it’s 10 pm.

3. Original: With that, my head thoughts disappears and I went to sleep. A happy place.
Corrected: With that, my thoughts disappear and I go to sleep. I dream of a happy place.
[Instead of “went”, which is past tense, it should be “go” because it’s in the present tense. Also, I didn’t really understand what you mean by “A happy place” so I assumed that the main character dreamt of a happy place. “A happy place.” by itself doesn’t make any sense so you’ll have to add something either before it or after it.]

General Enjoyment (7/10):
Personally, I’m more of a chaptered story person because I’m the type to dwell on the smallest details. But, after reading your story, it gave me a refreshed feeling because it’s been so long since I’ve read something the same length as this. I think the way both Yunji and Kyungsoo said goodbye to each other was nice since they had a mutual understanding even though they didn’t say it out loud. To be honest, I didn’t expect Kyungsoo to be the type to cheat on a girl! How dare he! I would love to see more of their interactions, especially with Yunji and Jongin because they started their relationship so abruptly and suddenly! I feel that this story is a nice break from all the overly dramatic ones that I read! Well done!

Total score: 68/100
Reviewer: Saki1017
Reviewed on: 14/09/2014
Comments and thoughts: First of all, thank you for requesting! Secondly, I am sorry for the wait and thank you for being patient! I’m not really used to reviewing one-shots so I hope I wasn’t being too harsh on you! Thank you again~


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