Young Writers Society

Hi there Lima Bean! Nikayla here dropping in for a review on this Review Day.

Don't expect this review to be fully conscious for warning, I already forget parts of the first chapter--hopefully reading the rest of this will refresh my memory. Like how I almost forgot Kerani's name just now! Anyway, I enjoy how we pick up where we left off in the last part.

She undid the lock before I got to the door and I held it open for her. She returned to her sensual air. “You always are such a gentleman, Cat.”

My shoulder throbbed from the impact, legs still braced from the throw. Threads of shredded cotton landed on the equally shredded skin on my deltoid, making me wince. I reached up to feel my shirt in tatters for the whole joint, leather vest scratched and edges damp from blood. I’d skidded, hadn’t I. That, or landed off my armour before turning to take it on my back.

Judging from the bloody streak on the stone a few feet ahead of me, both was the best bet.

Me again!

Tension build up in my arm as I readied for the throw.

Hello! Reviewing 1.1 and 1.2 as a full scene.

This is a little difficult for me to get my thoughts in order on these parts, mainly because they are a beginning part and not quite indicative of the entirety of the novel. However, I did think your pacing and characterization were pretty good -- I only have a couple of smaller nitpicks with the narration and the overall tone of the piece, but the latter is definitely influenced by the former. Apologies if I repeat myself. Let's begin.

I shook my head. “Glad you enjoyed yourself.”
He followed me out of the wing. “I would’ve for longer had you not called. What’s going on?”
I didn’t reply but instead went to Pari, who was now inside the courtyard.
“I wondered when you’d come out,” she said.
I jerked my head back towards my friends. “Had to get them. Saw anything?”
She shook her head. “Just heard the grunt. Told my people to get inside, if there’s already trouble.”
“Good.”
We walked out and this time the door locked behind us.

The feathers on her gold bracers were gold-tinted.

She dipped her head before turning to catch the eye of her next client, poised to take advantage of any territorial individuals who wanted to be her first that night.

A small smile spread across her lips. “Glad to have you on board again.”

I always like seeing a good enchant in fiction. Or in your case, a ward.

In your combat, I'm hesitant to pick apart the pacing because I honestly want more information--or rather different information. I like that Kerani talks herself through the fight, but the man lacked animation, and felt sort of tutorial-trial-dummy for the introduction-to-cat-steps package. It's a shame because everything up until this point has been so alive and animated; you'd think that an action scene takes that to another level entirely. That said, your first fight was a decent one, with Sakari's elementalist powers not dominating the action, as admittedly predicted.

And instantly we have plot number two, giving us
1.) love!and!marriage! and
2.) trouble in the south, more politically rooted.

It's a good indicator of Kerani's upcoming character development. Knowing you, this is only the tip of the iceberg. My final comment comes in the form of the Rat(s). Unless I read too quickly, you failed to mention what the Rats were until they were a major player type in the scene. Pay attention to that in case it wasn't a fluke on my end, as it's risky and hard to pull off elements before they've been introduced.

Hey darling. Surprise This is gonna be a combined review for both 1.1 and 1.2.


Okay, your grammar is impeccable, so I'm just gonna talk about what I'm seeing. I'm seeing confusion. This is still the first chapter, and sooo many characters have been introduced, so many things have happened it's just...wow. I need a breather. My brain can't process any of this. I don't even know who the MC is or what they're doing or why they're doing it. I kind of understand she's trying to find out stuff about a possible husband, but I'm not quite sure what interrogating a hooker has to do with it. You also info dumped. A lot. Not so much in this post, but definitely in 1.1. And you didn't really info dump about anything relating directly to what's going on. It was random facts about the world that don't even feel relevant yet. I really don't need to know how little bits of the world work. I need to be introduced to characters. I need to understand what this story is about. By the time 1.1 is done, we've been introduced to 6 characters with mentions of at least 4 more. That's a lot. It's an overload. I understand the concept of diving right in but.... sloow down man. Let me soak in the fact that she's this badass warrior that goes to whore houses to check out possible husbands and then gets into street fights with random people for no reason (or was there a reason?). Give us some background. Why is she so intent on knowing everything about this possible husband? Did something happen to make her this way?
And another thing, why and how did she become a warrior in the first place? Is it a tomboyish habit she picked up when she was little and never grew up? Or is it something that all princesses are trained to do? Apparently this place is pretty dangerous considering she kind of waltzes into a street fight. Does this happen often?

Next nitpick. Your dialogue. It's long, and it's hard to keep track of who's talking. There's not enough action to keep it interesting. It's just straight up dialogue so there's nothing juicy. Tell me what they're doing while they're talking. Are they playing with their knives, ready to fight? Give us something here. Help us get to know the characters through the little actions and things they say.

Next. There's a lot of odd wording going on. It's very formal, stiff and odd feeling. It doesn't sit right. I don't know if it's worded oddly because you're trying to sound more old than a usual contemporary novel or what, but it's really difficult to read easily the way some of your sentences are worded. For example,

The lattice was less dense on this floor, and with my face pressed to the screen I could see a figure lying near the entrance to an alleyway across the street, just barely visible in a lantern’s light.

I like this so far. I like the start but, I have found that you do have an awful lot of dialogue which can become somewhat confusing. I like all of the action which is taking place in this part of your novel and I think that I'll read the next part once its been written.

Hey again!

I'm going to keep this as a comment for now, because I really can't think of what to put in a review. There are a few things I wanted to talk about~
-I think I understand the characters more clearly in this part than the second part. I mean, it's still a bit confusing, but it's getting there and I'm sure as the story goes on everything about them will become more clear.
-I really love the action in this section, a nice contrast to the other part, because it was way more exciting to read.
-I feel like generally, there's just quite a lot of dialogue in your story, and it's often short bits. It does reveal stuff about the characters, but sometimes not much to the story.

Okay, that's it, keep writing!

Even though not a whole lot changed in this section, I think it reads a lot more clearly due to the changes in 1.1; we’ve seen a little more detail about Aryan and Sakari and at least heard of Vy before, so when it comes to a fight it’s a lot easier to follow along without going “wait who are these people again??”

I’m going to sound like I’m repeating myself but, again, I sort of love the relationship between Isra and Kerani—it’s really, really nice to see a prostitute-client relationship that seems like it’s genuine while also obviously still predicated on exchanges of money for services. You handle that balance really well, I think.

I don’t think I mentioned this last time, but I do really like the way you set up the pre-fight. Creepy too-empty alley, weird circumstances surrounding the body… I didn’t notice so much reading the first draft, being too caught up in trying to work out what was going on, but you do a marvelous job of building suspense once Kerani et al are outside.

“Vy, the one who’d tried to teach me how to wield the crossbow she held” feels clunky to me. The information seems important—Vy’s a long range fighter and Kerani presumably isn’t, if she’s no good with a crossbow despite training—but the phrasing is sort of opaque and weird. “Vy, holding the crossbow she’d once tried to teach me to wield” might read a little better, but I think you should also consider finding a different way to get that point across?

This is minor, but—is the plural form “the Rats” or “the Rat”? I noticed you used both. Or is it that the organization is “Rat” but a group of its members are “Rats”?

I want to read morrrrrrrre. Desperately. The ending has me doing the internet equivalent of shaking you by the shoulders and screaming “WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?!”