Title – Bittersweet Days (Chapter 1-7)
Author – Red-Panda-Chan
Reviewer – sadnitez
Story Link – http://www.asianfanfics.com/story/view/17107/bittersweet-days-snsd
Title – 3/5
The title isn’t those romance cliché title types, but it doesn’t really stand out among the sea of titles. “Bittersweet Days” does hint a certain level of maturity in the story and may attract people looking for such genres to read. But sadly, it didn’t seem to be the case here (as I read on).
Author – Red-Panda-Chan
Reviewer – sadnitez
Story Link – http://www.asianfanfics.com/story/view/17107/bittersweet-days-snsd
Title – 3/5
The title isn’t those romance cliché title types, but it doesn’t really stand out among the sea of titles. “Bittersweet Days” does hint a certain level of maturity in the story and may attract people looking for such genres to read. But sadly, it didn’t seem to be the case here (as I read on).
Graphics/Poster – 3.5/5
This is generally a sweet, simple and poster that is pleasant to the eyes! But the yellow background seems too large against the center design, giving a rather plain and blank look at the corners. I would suggest reducing the yellow background size to reduce this blank-ing effect. Bonus for having a quote on the poster that matches very well with the title!
This is generally a sweet, simple and poster that is pleasant to the eyes! But the yellow background seems too large against the center design, giving a rather plain and blank look at the corners. I would suggest reducing the yellow background size to reduce this blank-ing effect. Bonus for having a quote on the poster that matches very well with the title!
Foreword – 4/10
Foreword and description should always throw in sneak preview of the story’s plot. They should NEVER throw everything out into the open light. This is done to create suspense and interests for readers! Your foreword (in purple sentence) though too brief, still created certain suspense for your story. However, everything was blown off by your description which practically told the readers the spoilers of the entire story. I do hope you will make some adjustment to your foreword and description again. (>.<)
Foreword and description should always throw in sneak preview of the story’s plot. They should NEVER throw everything out into the open light. This is done to create suspense and interests for readers! Your foreword (in purple sentence) though too brief, still created certain suspense for your story. However, everything was blown off by your description which practically told the readers the spoilers of the entire story. I do hope you will make some adjustment to your foreword and description again. (>.<)
Originality – 6.5/10
The plot and setting is rather common but never failed to bring in readers because everyone can relate to school life! On the downside, there are too many stories in AFF that set around school and campus romance. So I can say that the more interesting point of your story lies in Jessica’s secretive dark past that Tiffany seemed to play a large part in it as well. I hoped you can develop more on it to intrigue readers to read a plot that hasn’t been quite figured out yet.
The plot and setting is rather common but never failed to bring in readers because everyone can relate to school life! On the downside, there are too many stories in AFF that set around school and campus romance. So I can say that the more interesting point of your story lies in Jessica’s secretive dark past that Tiffany seemed to play a large part in it as well. I hoped you can develop more on it to intrigue readers to read a plot that hasn’t been quite figured out yet.
Flow – 9/15
Pacing of the story went too fast for my liking. The relationships of both main female characters seem to appear out of nowhere and end out of nowhere. Drastic shifts between each side plots are also preventing me from getting firm foothold on any plot to let me to enjoy the story better. Perhaps you can focus on the more important plots in the story. Take your time to develop them into more complex plot! ^^
Pacing of the story went too fast for my liking. The relationships of both main female characters seem to appear out of nowhere and end out of nowhere. Drastic shifts between each side plots are also preventing me from getting firm foothold on any plot to let me to enjoy the story better. Perhaps you can focus on the more important plots in the story. Take your time to develop them into more complex plot! ^^
Writing style – 12.5/20
You introduced a lot of characters and relationships in this story which enable the main story to branch out to several other stories. It’s good to read side plot that focused on other characters’ rather than the main leads. But each plot seems under-developed and brief to me. Somewhere at the middle, I was getting confused by the numerous plots and relations being thrown in. Frequent sentence errors aided to the confusion as well. But overall, I still get the gist of your writing style and the story’s content.
You introduced a lot of characters and relationships in this story which enable the main story to branch out to several other stories. It’s good to read side plot that focused on other characters’ rather than the main leads. But each plot seems under-developed and brief to me. Somewhere at the middle, I was getting confused by the numerous plots and relations being thrown in. Frequent sentence errors aided to the confusion as well. But overall, I still get the gist of your writing style and the story’s content.
Plot/Characterization – 13/20
Plot-wised, there seems to be too many things going on all at all without a strong development for everything. I’m suggesting perhaps you can rewrite some scenarios again to increase the credibility of this story. I find it weird that each character seems to handle relationships like a baton in a race. (E.g.: How Tiffany suddenly decides to break off with her fiancée Jaejoong to be with Ji-Young instead). I also find it especially weird why Tiffany wasn’t in jail for killing someone and why Changmin seems to take this truth with a pinch of salt. I know stories are fiction and all, but you still have to write it in a way that readers will find the content acceptable.
Plot-wised, there seems to be too many things going on all at all without a strong development for everything. I’m suggesting perhaps you can rewrite some scenarios again to increase the credibility of this story. I find it weird that each character seems to handle relationships like a baton in a race. (E.g.: How Tiffany suddenly decides to break off with her fiancée Jaejoong to be with Ji-Young instead). I also find it especially weird why Tiffany wasn’t in jail for killing someone and why Changmin seems to take this truth with a pinch of salt. I know stories are fiction and all, but you still have to write it in a way that readers will find the content acceptable.
I am impressed by your efforts to introduce so many characters into your story; I know you have put in a lot of effort in trying to describe each character. But a lot of authors tried to avoid doing that for good reasons. Readers will get confused by the sheer size of the cast and may not remember them well enough for them to understand the story properly. Though you tried to solve the problem by introducing a character chart, I was feeling a bit frazzled trying to remembering all the pairings in the story and I couldn’t really identify the main male lead till Chapter five because Jessica had meet too many guys! ^^b
I appreciate how you try to give each character very different personalities. But there seem to be a lack of development of each character, so they appeared really two-dimensional to me. Maybe you can rephrase some of the characters’ lines to prevent them from attaining cliché and shallow images in the minds of the readers.
Grammar/Punctuation/Spelling/Vocabulary – 5.5/10
There are frankly, quite a lot of errors in the writing. The most problematic area lies in your usage of commas. Authors often over-used commas in their sentences. However you under-used the commas (and full-stops) and this led to long awkward sentence structures.
There are frankly, quite a lot of errors in the writing. The most problematic area lies in your usage of commas. Authors often over-used commas in their sentences. However you under-used the commas (and full-stops) and this led to long awkward sentence structures.
E.g.: One of the boys took a drink from his water and when he wiped his face with his arm his eyes caught with mine.
One of the boys took a drink from his water and when he wiped his face with his arm, his eyes caught mine.
E.g.: I came across my classroom and walked in to find a student sitting in my seat his feet on the desk and his head slung back, mouth wide open, snoring.
I came across my classroom and walked in to find a student sitting in my seat. His feet were on the desk and his head was slung back, his mouth was wide open as he snored.
Do take note of your verbs and adverbs as well.
E.g.: “What did you just say?” I blurted out and he looked at me confused.
“What did you just say?” I blurted out and he looked at me in confusion.
E.g.: “Yah!” I yelled picking up the closest thing to me and throwing it across into their window.
“Yah!” I yelled, picking up the closest thing beside me and threw it through their window.
Overall enjoyment – 2.5/5
I apologized if I sounded really harsh on you. This story really started out well. I can definitely see an interesting plot forming around your story. But lapses in your English standard appeared in subsequent chapter, making an-other-wise-good-story fall into muddled plots. I’m sure that the story will fall into place once most of the sentences and tense errors are corrected. Fighting! ^^
I apologized if I sounded really harsh on you. This story really started out well. I can definitely see an interesting plot forming around your story. But lapses in your English standard appeared in subsequent chapter, making an-other-wise-good-story fall into muddled plots. I’m sure that the story will fall into place once most of the sentences and tense errors are corrected. Fighting! ^^
TOTAL – 59.5/100
