.

This is Nikayla here dropping in for another review on this lovely Review Day for a lovely Lima Bean.

I waved a hand, trying to put him at ease, taking care to not direct an ounce of irritation towards his staff or him. “You can let me see the food storage.”

The first sentence here is a little awkward particularly after the second comma so I suggest rewording this.

I wanted to question why he calls her 'Lady Kerani' instead of 'Lady [Insert surname here]'? I'm assuming this is just for clarity because there are multiple women in the family, but I wanted to check.

I parked myself in an empty corner, one I’d had cleared because it was close enough to other underground stores— this time of energy— I could draw on even stronger sources. Exhaustion forced my eyes closed the minute I sat down, but the resulting calm wasn’t going to lead to sleep.

Fire filled my veins, a power as ancient as my claim to the throne. My body fell away and all I could sense were the impressions of this room, this land, and what was within it.

Literal fire? Metaphorical fire? I couldn't tell here.

Before I made myself bleed from restraining my voice he was gone and I was left hollow, fire burned out and every ounce of my spirit empty. Relief that the attacks would stop didn’t ease the razor’s edge of what if, with the list of possibilities ranging from this only being one poison source to this being the wrong poison source. I wouldn’t know until the next attack.

I love this paragraph for the 'razor's edge of what if' phrase. That's so powerful and so interesting to me because of how much is shown in only a couple of words. That being said, the main plot seems to be going on now--I just didn't realize before. I thought this might've been a subplot that lasted a chapter or two but linked up with the main plot.

I'm starting to realize that this might actually be connected to Kerani's job of protecting her family more closely. I don't know why I felt this wasn't official or that this wasn't important to the plot before? Or why I assumed that this couldn't be connected to the Rat or anything else of that sort.

Not for the first time, I was glad I hadn’t made friends among servants. Even if I still broke caste lines by interacting with them to the extent I did. The scorch mark on my heart still hurt too much from the last time I’d divided my loyalties away from my family for me to even try.

Awkward wording here with the first sentence. Might as well wrap up here as well to make this a more complete paragraph--the end of this chapter shows Kerani doubting her judgement for one of the first times in this novel. This'll be interesting to see how her thoughts at the end of the chapter end up progressing. The last couple paragraphs are impactful in leaving a mark on the reader because dang. That's really all the response I can give to that ending though I admit I'm starting to grow hungry to learn more about who poisoned Kerani's family (I do doubt this is an accident), but yes, another solid chapter.

If you have any questions, don't be afraid to ask! I hope I helped and have a great day.

So sorry for taking, like, a decade to get to this. My week turned out to be far more hectic than anticipated.

The kitchen was a cacophony of sounds, smells, and a scattering of visual images that came from various renovations that sometimes prioritized practical equipment and other times making the kitchens appear as Shira as possible.

Super picky/probably just me, but this opening sentence read a little awkwardly because it's rather wordy (with few commas). Maybe rearrange some things?

“No, don’t worry,” I said. “I’m not even sure what we're facing against, but there's no blame from me.”

Facing against sounds weird to me, seems like it should either just be facing or against, as opposed to the both of them.

Those are my nit-picks! I noticed some other things, but Lareine picked up on the rest so didn't bother repeating them. I did repeat the opening sentence issue because it threw me quite a bit (probably because it was an opening line), so I figured it was important to highlight that. But yus, let's get into things!

The highlight of this part, for me, was your description of Kerani using her abilities (is that the right word for it? I never really know what to call it). The way in which you write it here makes it quite simple to understand, which is nice, especially for anyone who wasn't so sure on how it all worked. You described it wonderfully, and I personally find it all very fascinating. The chef's character was quite amusing too. I don't know though, man, I don't trust him...



No, but seriously, you're writing this really well because you've got me all paranoid, and I don't trust anyone. The evil part of me wants one of Kerani's closest friends to be part of it or something because that'd be a pretty cool plot twist. Whatever the case, I'm suspicious of everyone, and that's a good thing on your part. Overall, yes, a wonderful little extract, not that I'd expect anything less!

I'm hardly rolling in critiques, per usual, but I'm sure I'll be able to pull something out of my butt. A kind of minor, probably just me thing is the return of the chef in this scene. Kerani shoo'd him, and it seems like he was pretty fearful of her throughout their interaction. As such, I find it a little odd that he would've just returned of his own will to be like what's up? It doesn't really seem like the thing to do, and I'd have expected him to be unable to return until Kerani said so. I mean, she could've been in the middle of working her magic when he returned willy-nilly. You described him as barging in too, which makes it seem even stranger. Such a small thing, but it bothered me a little, so thought I'd bring it up just in case.

The only other thing I really have for you is the development in these assassination attempts and what not. So far, there hasn't really been any. What I suspect is that in the last part of this chapter, a lot more will be revealed. As such, please take this critique with a kilo of salt. It's just that as it stands, things keep getting found and attempts keep getting made, but there's no progress in figuring out who's doing it/what's going on. I realise that's probably half the point--that finding the culprits is proving horrendously difficult, but I'd have expected some kind of development. Even just a few names thrown into the air or something. This is probably just me being stupidly fussy, but hey ho, I want to at least seem useful

That's all I have for you, anywho. Hopefully this has been helpful in some shape or form, and apologies again for taking a while to get to this. You've successfully made me trust absolutely no one with this assassination plot line you've got going, so yay for that. It's going to be very interesting to find out who is doing what exactly here, and I'm giddy at the though. Of course, be sure to let me know when you have the next instalment posted!

Keep writing,

xoxo Skins

Hey, Rosey! Wow, I feel like I just reviewed Cat Steps a little bit ago! Let's start, shall we?

Despite the warmth from over a dozen ovens firing, the air gained the same chill as hallways when they sensed me coming. The only thing keeping me from shivering in here was the actual, honest heat.

I had to read this a few times to see what made it feel so awkward. It wasn't as bad as some other examples I've pointed out in the past, but I think it's something as simple as "keeping" not being in the same tense as the rest of the sentence. While "firing" is past tense in the context of the ovens, and "shivering" is past tense in the context of Kerani, "keeping" is very much present tense—and it should be "The only thing that kept me from shivering" instead. A little issue you might want to look out for!

The normally large man who filled up the majority of the prep room— a veritable mansion of cutting boards, cookers, and marinating tubs— was down to his own size

This confused me for a bit, until I realized that you were initially saying the chef was "larger than life" most of the time. Perhaps take another look at wording to clarify that?

“Is there anything I can do for you, Lady Kerani?”

This is probably just me, but I would have loved to have seen a description of how the chef said this. This is our first real impression of his character and how he interacts with our businesslike Kerani, so while not entirely necessary, it would be nice, especially since you just gave us that description of how he shrank down from larger-than-life to "artificially small".

Then what brings up to visit?

Typo here?

Thankfully underground I had even more residual energy from my ancestors to draw upon, otherwise my body would’ve been back on the floor.

I love this note! It's a great way, in my opinion, to work in the source of Kerani's power as well as her cognizance of the fact that while her mind might not be tired, her body is worn out. To give you a good point in the middle of all this little nitpicky critique, when you do characterization, you do it really well, and your attention towards detail helps you a lot in cases like this.

At the same time, it would be nice to get a couple of more notes implying that Kerani's body is not currently able to keep up with her mental focus and energy; I know we're just coming off of the scene with Nitika, so you might not need it as much in the beginning of this scene, but it's something to think about as you carry the consequences through.

Moving on to the conversation about something being powerful enough to slip through—what description you have here is nice, but you slip a little back into your talking heads, and the way paragraphs are split up feels a little awkward to me. I'm left feeling like there are a few transitions lacking between the dialogue, Kerani's emotions, and her movements.

Either I was dealing with a multi-target attack, or I was missing something.

Another good note—you really do a great job of showing Kerani's thoroughness, and this encapsulates that well. She's done this kind of thing before, so it makes sense that she thinks like this, and I love that I can go through this connecting the logical dots and following along with her. I don't think I've mentioned this before, but I like reading a main character who sees things not necessarily the same way I do, because it's interesting to follow their logic instead of my own for a while. Kerani is amazing like that, because she is intelligent and logical, and I can't wait to see where this takes the story in the future.

He acknowledged and scurried out of the room.

Acknowledged what? (This sentence seems to be missing a word or two.)

I parked myself in an empty corner, one I’d had cleared because it was close enough to other underground stores— this time of energy— I could draw on even stronger sources.

This sentence is awkward in a couple of ways. I initially thought that "I'd had cleared" was a typo until I read again; perhaps take a look at changing that to "I'd asked to be cleared" or something along those lines? Second, clarifying that the other underground stores are of energy seems a little redundant when you've already alluded to the stores of energy underground—maybe re-word that to reflect something along the lines of "other underground stores, these of the land's natural energy/ancestral energy".

His voice was too sharply sweet, too laced with panic at what I was about to do. My mother was the one who raged. I simply simmered.

I'm sensing a hint of emotion from Kerani here, but I'm not quite sure where to place it in my mind. I don't know if she's irritated, impatient, what have you, but that could just be me.

As for the other good points of this scene I haven't touched on yet—well I think this whole part is generally a good point! I love how you introduce the poison itself and Kerani's interaction with castle staff, I love the reminder of her past, I love how you form her emotional response and her weariness and fear after all of the attacks and the possibility that she might not be able to catch the next one... I don't think I have words for how much I adore Cat Steps. If I did, they'd probably take up this whole review, and that wouldn't really be as helpful as I could be. As always: Keep writing!