Technical Review
Story Description : Begin Again - Because some times in life, instead of giving up, we should just begin again.
A man can be destroyed but not defeated
Those words from your story description touched my heart. I’m going through a similar phase so I could identify with it.
Story
Chapter 1 :
Evelyn from the first para I could identify with her. I too can’t handle the stress of leaving things at the last minute. But after that it wasn’t an easy read.
Simply put it’s clunky. When i say clunky, I don’t mean grammar or tense. It’s the overall flow of your writing. It’s as if you’re trying too hard write each sentence differently. To reinvent each sentence so as to differentiate one from the other. Either that or you’re directly translating from a 2nd language. By any chance when writing this were your thought processes in Hindi ? Whatever the reason the result is the use of language here feels unnatural. That includes the dialogues at times.
To illustrate
Para 2 - “It was obvious on her side to wonder what made her an exception.”
Some of Kelly’s dialogues - “Have u started taking drugs Caleb ? “ (I get that it means are u mental ? Still a tad unnatural to read)
Evan - “ His facial expression did not acquire a slightest alteration ..... make out that he was troubled.”
Para after mentioning Valencia - “Evan shrugged it off .... Evan insisted to keep the plan as it was.”
“Melody by the strings of guitar touched Evelyn’s soul... “
These are not normal every day expressions we use in our conversations. They are just a few of the examples that took me out of the story.
Then there is the odd placement of prepositions here and there in this chapter.
For eg
Para 1 - “under pressure of the last minute left ...”
Kelly - “first one to react on Valencia’s mention.”
The last & most important one is deductions. I had to pause mid reading, many times this chapter, to work out what exactly were you trying to say through your characters, your story...
For eg.
Evelyn - “Her knowledge said aloud in her mind ... Precious four “ ( I understand this is a substitute for the italics, but I didn’t work that out until i read your intro in the bottom)
Caleb - “Kelly if you’ll give me a chance to speak then I will be... What are u eating these days in lunch by the way ? Sherlock Holmes ? “ (Took me a while to understand what Caleb meant ..he was asking why Kelly was being so nosy ?)
Meaning of the Tittle of Chapter 1 was unclear
Para where you wrote about Precious 4 losing their album... Sentence was “It just couldn’t stay masked.” - Had to work out that bit. You meant they couldn’t hide their feelings from each other didn’t you ?
You really made me work for it. I felt a bit like a code cracker deciphering cryptic meanings. This disrupted my flow of reading. Took me out of the story.
Chapter 2 :
It had the same problems as chapter 1 but on the whole lesser clunkier & much more smoother. It definitely was easier to read. And definitely a major improvement.
A few points tho
Tittle wise Chapter 2’s felt appropriate. It was also better to understand.
“Jesus please take care of Evan’s tensions” - That sentence could be interpreted both ways. It took me a sec to realise Evelyn was actually praying to God not exclaiming “Jesus ! You need to take care of Evan’s tensions !” to someone .
Referring to Evan as ‘The Boy’, several times in the story, when describing him made Evelyn sound like an old granny not a young person unless you’re thinking in context of ’Woh Ladka’. Same for the “Uss ladke ki awaaz main wo jaadu thi, ki log uski awaaz par mar mithne ke liye tayyar the ” - The boy had the voice....many would lay their lives for. ( Just my opinion tho )
Another unnatural sentence- “I look beyond what is visible... spend some quality time in understanding the concealed.”
By the way were you hinting at Evelyn having some kind of supernatural power cause her being perceptive about Caleb’s state of mind is not that convincing an argument.
Chapter 2 was definitely intriguing tho. 👍🏼
In your writing i can feel .. I don’t how to explain it... you write with insight into relationships/ characters/ experiences .. You’re very perceptive that way. I can feel that warmth & sensitivity emanating from you but it’s lost underneath all that clunk.
Regarding subject matter : I’m not into Teen / YA novels I wasn’t even into the Twilight series. Still for this platform teen novels is appropriate. Keeping that background of your reader in mind i found your story mildly interesting. But there was nothing so far that really grabbed at me. - The X Factor as u say. Although it’s still too early to tell. We’re only 2 chapters in. Your words need to be alive to touch my heart.
Hope this helps. Next time if u want a different feedback rather than a technical one let me know. All the best 👍🏼
Edited by Hallyumint - 4 years ago
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