Ahh, your review is wonderful! Thank you so much!! I've been considering changing the description so that it's a little more clear about what the story is about, instead of just an excerpt from one of the chapters, so this is probably the push I need to do that. The points in the first chapter are absolutely dragged out, and he is sorta listing the events that have already happened. I'll admit to letting the prologue go a little too long on this one. The first two episodes are basically him catching you up on his life, then it gets into the nitty gritty of current events.
That being said, the first two episodes probably need to be reworked ^-^;
Thank you again, I really love a reviewer who wants to help people better their work instead of just being unnecessarily mean <3
I'm glad you found the review helpful. I was worried about coming across as mean which I seem to have avoided, haha! That aside, I really do enjoy reading your work, and most of the stuff I said was just my opinion.
I'll push you on the description bit. But as far as reworking your first chapters go, there are surely a lot of people who enjoy the way you have written them and they also speak volumes about Julian as a character. Please keep this bit in mind before you decide to change the first chapters since they are pretty good as they are right now as well.
I have 0 experience with poems, so I don't think I am anywhere qualified enough to give you a critique on this. I did enjoy reading them though. Keep up the great work!
I read a few chapters of your Trial Run story and then jumped some to get an idea where it's going. I like the setting, an interesting mix of magic-steampunk with a sprinkle of some modern notions and concepts thrown in there. You keep the story at a fast pace, and it should be an interesting read for those who are looking for more of this kind of almost-LITRPG, reminiscent of Beginning After the End-themed story. But it seems you had a more interesting/darker? twist in wait.
The first person writing is not my cup tea. Just my preference, it makes the world seem a little empty for my taste. But keep going! You know where you're going with this.
If you're up for it, here is my little story. Loosely inspired by the Malazan Book of the Fallen series by Steven Erikson. So, expect a wide cast of protagonists and antagonists both after chapter 5. Human and otherwise.
Good work on publishing for the first time! It's pretty amazing of you! I'll try my best to make this review as helpful as possible.
-The cover/banner: The cover and banner give off starkly different vibes. You might want to fix that.
-How hooking the prologue is: The very first line of the first chapter has a mistake. I thought it was a stylistic choice but you never use it again. That will leave a pretty bad impression on readers.
Further, some sentences are very awkward with regard to your word choice. Their meanings are unclear and their grammar is incorrect. Take this one, for example.
But when I glanced up, catching his eyes watching me – these beautiful eyes – I completely forgot about my entire hands. Like – I forgot what they were supposed to be for.
The style tells us what kind of person Nik is with the use of em dashes. But the odd word choice takes a couple of re-reads to understand what you were conveying.
The first chapter, honestly, feels like a simple romance story with some dark elements at the end. I would suggest making it more snappy so that people can know what exactly to expect from the story.
-Impressions on the first few chapters: The first chapters are off to a good start. While the characters are surely well made and interesting, sometimes they feel very artificial. A more concerning issue that I should point out is that Nik and Kaami are very timid around each other for me to believe they have been together for 8 years. This last bit is a tad concerning, especially since they are adopting a kid together.
While we are on the topic of characters. The interactions could be a bit better. For example in episode three where Cheryl describes Tau's original foster situation. It all moved too fast to properly understand what was happening and how the characters in the scene were feeling.
-General story and/or artwork: The story is very engaging and unique. It's unlike anything I have ever read.
-Style, tone, and setting: The setting is very intriguing much like the story is clearly one of the strong points of your writing.
I would strongly suggest leaving lines after each dialogue instead of continuing them next to each other.
-Writing/storytelling style and how smooth it is: As mentioned before, some sentences are written awkwardly and the grammar is a bit loose. Both there make the writing a bit rough to go through. You mentioned that English isn't your first language so I would highly suggest using a text editor like Grammarly.
I really enjoyed reading this and learned a lot for myself as well. All the best with your first work. Keep going!
I'm not very good at reviewing but I wanna be fair to you so I'll try my best. I think your summary is good but a little too long and repetitive imo. I think you could shorten it down a bit. As for the story itself, I think you do a good job with getting into the characters' heads and moving the story along. There's a good mix of both comedic and serious moments. The pacing is pretty good for the most part and I like a lot of the characters. Some of the narration seems a bit awkward to me, like the part below is a bit clunky. Could use some refining, as in toning down the repetition. It's a bit confusing haha.
Overall you've got a solid novel on your hands and looking forward to seeing where it goes in the future.
And uh
Here's my comic if you wanna review lol
Thank you very much for the review! I was conflicted about going over all of the starting chapters to smoothen them out and your review is definitely the push I needed! Thank you for the compliments and especially for the continued support. I can't put in words how grateful I am.
I'll also surely review yours in some time!
I really enjoyed this comic. I can't really critique it on anything since it's a gag comic, but this is totally a hidden gem! Keep going with this stuff!
This one I have been following for a long time. I really enjoy it too. I can't say anything about the art and since there's just one chapter, I don't have anything to critique about the story either.
The dialogues are very natural and the plot till now is being revealed splendidly. In my opinion, you have nailed everything here.
A rather personal? issue I have is that at times, there's just too much happening on one page like here.
It becomes hard to keep up with the pace in pages like these, but again, it's a personal thing.
I really like this story and am really looking forward to read ahead. Keep up this amazing work!
thank you so much for your reply. I highly appreceate your time and effort! Ive never gotten real feedback about my stories, so its something really new to me. Thakns a lot and I will try to fix the things you mentioned!!
Thank you! That's so nice to read and I'm very happy people are enjoying my comic!
And for this issue I do agree that sometimes I put too much stuff happening on one page, It's probably because, doing one page at the time and not fully thinking of the flow of multiple pages, It can feel to me like it's a boring page lol
I think I've gotten a bit better in the latest pages? But well, I hope I'll learn more and more as I go on
And thank you again!
Thank you for taking the time to do this!
I agree that the pacing is a little off in the beginning and it’s my biggest concern going forward. I’m glad you like it overall though!
(I hadn’t realized the thing with the bartender until you pointed it out - I’ll have to be more careful!)
Thank you for sharing this, I learned a lot while writing this review and found many places I could smoothen over in my own work. I hope this will help you too.
-The cover/banner: I really like the cover! The banner is good too! I'll use this to talk about the description a bit.
An outbreak of strange curses and a kingdom in chaos...
Leaves Lunette's young, cheerful, and sometimes ridiculous Prince Cricket one choice.
The dots and spacings make this awkward to read.
Along the way, they meet a dashing if not rigid young hero named Yoshi
This line really stands out. Your description shouldn't explain what the characters are like. The same is done with Prince Cricket which too is unnatural, but Yoshi's really stands out since it starts on a different line.
The last paragraph of the description is the only one that really tells us anything about the story and that too is pretty vague. Your description needs to be much more crisp and attractive. Here is an article that really helped me write my own description. It might be helpful to you too?
Summary
-How hooking the prologue is: Alright...
The tricky thing about stories is this, they all have to start somewhere. For some it is with "once upon a time", others with "it was the best of times".
This story begins thus...
I don't think this is a good choice. Don't mean to be rude at all, but it seems like this story is saying "I'm not like the other kids" which is a red flag in my opinion.
The content of the prologue is good. It's interesting. There is more stuff but I will come to that later.
-Impressions on the first few chapters and whether they make me want to keep reading: I think the content is good, the story seems to be moving to an interesting place.
-Style, tone, and setting: Style... You certainly have a unique style. I can see why you use third person and while it is a different method to tell a story, I think you might be abusing it.
Let's start
In a kingdom along the shore of the ocean Selene (named so for the great goddess of the moon who cried the ocean into being when her beloved Endymion was lost) there was a young king called Jaxith
Why add that extra commentary in brackets? I can understand once or twice, but as a reader, seeing this many times does nothing except tear me away from the story. It makes it impossible to get immersed in the story.
Moving on in the prologue.
Summary
But as with many good things, this too had to come to an end. And as with all good stories, this one, too, is fraught with sadness.
And this.
Nearly eighteen years later finds the young prince Cricket much grown, but no less jovial, and mischievous for it. His midnight hair is long, sweeping well past his back, trailing stardust in his wake. His smile...is just the same, though not quite as gummy anymore.
And at a few more places, these sentences are simply telling the reader what is happening. You have to show it. Show, don't tell.
Another problem I can point out is grammar. Tiny issues are alright, but I rarely see commas. At some places, tenses are pretty messy and the sentences read awkward at some places.
If you don't already, I highly suggest using Grammarly or some other text editor and checking out some books on grammar, they will surely help a lot.
One more thing I have to say is, I know nothing about your fantasy world. Your balance in conversations and actions is on point, but there are barely any descriptions on what the world looks like. How are the streets? How are the shops? What kind of design do the shops have? They eat mochi but mostly use spoons, so what is the setting like? This stuff needs to be shown in your writing otherwise people won't get interested in your lore at all. No matter how good the characters are or how strong your plot is, if I don't know where they are or where the plot is progressing then I won't be able to connect to it.
Overall. I really enjoyed reading it and am really looking forward to where you take this, but a few rounds of editing is certainly necessary in my opinion.
If you find my phrasing rude at any point, I sincerely apologise. It is not my intention to be offensive at all. Again. thanks for sharing, I learned a lot for myself as well.
Title: Talipandas
Type: Novel
Genre: Fantasy, Slice of Life, Romance
Status: On-going
Description: When spoiled rich girl Ari's life ends, she finds herself reborn as Princess Iris in a fantasy world created by her childhood imaginary friend! But being a princess comes with being the last hope to remove an evil curse from the royal bloodline, which would be a lot easier if she hadn't inherited the most useless kind of magic in the world.
Content Warning: one paragraph of sexual content, mental health issues, and countless profanities.
Latest Chapter: Chapter 52 [Part 1]
Chapter Link: https://tapas.io/episode/2224850
Other sites:
AnyStories: https://m.anystories.app/stories/60dd5281360c030013cacb50/talipandas
Royal Road: https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/43395/talipandas
POPINK: https://www.popinkapp.com/novel/200001216
Neovel: https://neoread.neovel.io/book/9168/EN/talipandas
