The Destined Luna

ToothFairy1999

Initial Impression: (cover, title & blurb)

Your cover looks clean and professionally done. I like the colour scheme, the merging of the pictures and the beautiful font. It's exactly the type of cover that does well on Wattpad!

Your title is equally eye-catching. It's not too long, but it's unique and representative of the story.

Your blurb has a few issues, but I like the overall bones. I appreciate how short it is and that it's nice and spread out. For one, the organization is a little off, and you have some grammar slip ups and comma misuses. However, the sentences are well-structured and good to work with. Below I've edited your blurb. I'll talk about what I did to it after.

We are merely the mutes of wolf society.

Living in a time where rogues are slaughtered by pack wolves, Anastasia has accepted her fate as a rogue living scarcely in Moon Bar. But with the uproar of a new rogue group causing chaos amongst packs, war is near.

Alpha Vincenzo is well-known for his gift by the goddess: "With the power invested in me, I thrive, I dictate, I create and I destroy."

A ruthless power-driven Alpha and an abandoned rogue. What will happen when Destiny pairs these two together?

There's only one way to find out.

So starting from the beginning, I took the quotes off the first sentence. For some reason, I just find it clearer that way, but I really don't have an intellectual reason to explain why. I just think it's unnecessary. Next, I've re-ordered your information so that it follows a clearer path: Anastasia, Alpha, then both of them. I also took out the extra questions at the end because I don't like questions in blurbs. They seem a little cliché and it's less aggressive and dramatic than telling. It looks like I did a lot to your blurb, but the important part is that I didn't have to actually re-write any sentences. That means you've avoided awkward sentence structure in your blurb. Awesome! As always, you're perfectly allowed to copy and paste the blurb if you want. You don't have to–I'm just letting you know you can. Or you could reorder it yourself. Or leave it the way it is.

13/15

Logistics: (grammar, spelling & dialogue)

Grammar was very good. You have a wonderful lack of awkward sentences. You either have a natural talent for concise writing, or you've really worked hard to make this story beautiful. I have two things to mention. One, you occasionally slip up in your commas. Examples from your writing of comma misuse:

'Sighing, I looked back up at the worn-down ceiling, it was yet again time for another shirt.'

Above is incorrect. Correction would be replacing that comma with a period, since both sentences are completely independent. Another comma mistake:

'The attic consisted of a small room, the walls bending in as though it were trying to close in, on the already small space.' (Note: I've changed the 'was' to 'were', since this is an imaginative clause. Were is for things that are being imagined or are plural. Was is simply the past tense.)

Above is incorrect (the last comma). There should be no comma there because the two clauses are dependant on each other. I'm not going to go into depth on the rules of commas, but you can look at my last review or PM me for all the comma rules. In truth, you strike me as the type of writer that has been writing so much or for so long that you've started to use commas correctly without knowing why. That works most of the time, but understand the independent-dependant clauses will help you clear up the mistakes you made above.

The second thing to mention: the semicolon (;). You use the semicolon right for most of the time, but there were a few times you slipped up. A semicolon belongs in between two independent sentences that are still related. A quick trick to tell if the semicolon should be there is to replace it with a period. Is the sentence still grammatically correct? If it is, the semicolon belongs. Example from your writing of incorrect use:

'Despite the status which I represented with; the owner Jackson took an odd liking to me.'

So I totally understand how you made this mistake, because the clauses are independent, in a way. However, using the period trick I mentioned earlier:

'Despite the status which I represented with. The owner Jackson took an odd liking to me.'

Above, this is incorrect. The first sentence makes no sense on its own. This is a weird case. Usually, the second clause is dependant on the first. But here, the first clause is actually dependant on the second. So no semicolon. A comma would be correct. Using the period trick should help get rid of these mistakes.

Moving on to spelling, you have a typo here and there, or at least I'm assuming they're typos. I found two in the first chapter that I'd like to point out because they were bigger ones.

'The body in any form is a message itself it carries central details from both the heart and the mind.'

So you missed a semicolon in this sentence in between 'itself' and 'it'. Just a typo, I'm assuming.

Another one:

'Back to my first question Why am I rouge?'

You missed a period or a colon here. You probably know that. We just make mistakes sometimes, and you had admittedly very few. But ones like these do confuse readers, so be careful to run through your chapters and edit thoroughly. I wrote and edited my book nearly two years ago, and still I find mistakes like these after going through twelve billion times. I usually ask somebody to look through my chapters, because they'll find things us writers won't.

You have issues with dialogue tags.

- A dialogue tag is anything that describes the way something is said (ex. he screamed, she whispered, I asked).

- An action tag is anything that implies who is speaking by using an action (ex. he grinned, she raised an eyebrow, I blinked).

Some verbs can be used as both, such as 'he groaned.' If you want to say he said something in a groan, it's a dialogue tag. If you want to say he said something and then he groaned, it's an action tag.

Now, placing these into your writing. Here are the rules:

When you have a dialogue tag following or proceeding a spoken sentence, the beginning of the spoken sentence is always capitalized and if your dialogue tag is after, then you end the spoken sentence with a comma and begin the dialogue tag with a lowercase. If the dialogue tag comes before, then you place a comma after the dialogue tag and begin the spoken sentence with a capital.

Examples:

"Hello," he said.

OR

He said, "Hello."

When you have a dialogue tag in the middle of two spoken sentences, you

a) either pick a sentence and attach the dialogue tag to that using the above rules, or you

b) make it all one sentence and end the dialogue tag with a comma and begin the spoke sentence with a lowercase.

Examples:

"Hello," he said. "It's nice out today."

OR

"Hello." He said, "It's nice out today."

OR

"Hello," he said, "it's nice out today."

Whenever you have an exclamation mark, question mark or a name that must be capitalized, you simply add your mark, capitalize the name and do not change any other punctuation.

Examples:

"Hello," I said.

OR

"Hello?" she asked.

When you are using action tags, you follow the regular rules of writing and end the spoken sentence with a period and begin the action tag with a capital.

Examples:

"Hello." He grinned.

He grinned. "Hello."

If you follow these rules, you shouldn't struggle with your dialogue anymore.

Overall, your biggest issues are the comma mistakes and the typos. Let me know if I can help you correct any sentences you're unsure about, or if you'd like more info on commas and such.

8/15

Story Flow: (transitions & pacing)

As I've already mentioned, the flow of your sentences are very good. I rarely find myself reading twice to decipher the meaning. But I do have a problem with your transitions. In my opinion, you have too many timeskips. Your chapters are slip up a lot. I'd recommend either taking out the timeskips and attempting to pass the time through the writing, or just making new chapters when you can't find a way to do the first option. Of course, timeskips aren't bad. They're a good thing. But I wouldn't use them more than twice in a chapter unless for special circumstances. By special circumstances, I mean when you're really going hard on the timeskips and they're a part of the story. If you have no clue what I'm talking about, check out chapters 24 & 39 in my book. You'll realize I have like fifteen timeskips in those chapters, but they're used in a different way than you use them. They're used only for drama and pause, not to actually skip time, if that makes sense. In other words, no time has passed between the timeskips I use in those chapters. It's only for pause of the reader. Those are the two ways I would advise you to use timeskips: either 0-2 times a chapter to skip time and move on to another event, or 5+ times for drama and pause. I find you use them multiple times during the same event, and it's very choppy. I'd advise against it.

Again, that whole timeskip problem affects your pacing as well. When I remove the timeskips as a factor, your pacing is done rather well. I don't feel rushed or pushed into the situation, and I like how you draw out the more interesting parts. I also found it pretty cool how you occasionally pulled back in time. It keeps us on our toes and it's very fun!

7/10

Description: (characters & scenes)

I didn't find your character description as incredible as I think you could make it. But the good thing is, you definitely have the description talent. When I was a budding writer, I sucked at pretty much everything but description, so I know that ability when I see it (you do not suck at everything else and I do not get the sense that you are a budding writer, if that wasn't clear lol). Lots of people actually think description and prose is annoying, but I think it's the single most important thing about character development. So, what are some things you can do to make your characters more vivid? You mix physical descriptions with emotional descriptions. Here's a description from one of my books that I'd like to break down for you. Bardarian (also called the King of the Sea) is the character being introduced, although he's already an established character at this point. Archer is my main character, so we're in his head for this:

                Archer peeked out of their hiding place to get a better look. All of his insecurities came flooding back when looking at the King of the Sea. His impossibly large figure draped against the rail, effortlessly confident. His dark hair swept under his hat, his sharp jawline covered with his signature dark facial hair. He looked like a Captain. His famous ocean eyes were bored and lifeless as he watched the men carry the barrels.

So from reading this paragraph, we know that Archer's jealous of the way this person looks and his confidence. Normally, I would never include this much description in an initial introduction, but as I stated, we've already been introduced to this character before, so I've stuck it all in this description. We know he is large, has dark hair, ocean eyes, a sharp jawline and facial hair. I've crammed all of that description into that paragraph, but you'll notice I didn't put it all together. I separated it up with emotional descriptions: that he's effortlessly confident and he looks like an authority figure. Also that he's famous and is kind of bored at this moment. Adding in this emotional stuff minimalizes the info-dumping. It also adds dimension to this character: we get the vibes from this paragraph that Archer and Bardarian have history, we also know from the nickname that he's a powerful man. It's more than just description. Does that make sense?

The rules I use usually is for every two physical characteristics you give, give one emotional one to split them up. It works pretty well for reducing info-dumping.

Your description of scenes are beautiful. Or, at least the attic scene was in the very beginning. I found it really well done, but I didn't see you do it again. I understand that describing things might be boring, but it's really important. When describing scenes, looking into all aspects of the senses: touch, smell, taste, auditory as well as visuals. They're all important!

8/10

Originality: (plot & tone)

So your plot isn't overly original, but I didn't find it annoying and cringy like I do most alpha/wolf type books. That's a pretty big accomplishment that will allow you to worm into reader's heads such as mine, who has the wolf tag blocked on my recommended page (sorry!). I do this because I find most of the time, wolf books are written very simply and very one-dimensional. Yours is not. This will separate you from the rest of your genre. But because almost the majority of wolf books I've read on Wattpad are unedited and pretty much devoid of any sort of grammar, I would put a disclaimer at the beginning or end of your book that it's edited. It think that might help. Is it edited? I don't care. Do it anyway. It's polished enough for you to make that claim.

Your tone is quite unique. It's dramatic and emotional, and I love it. You have your beautiful sentences that I keep mentioning, and you have an awesome way of getting your point across.

8/10

Final Comments:

I'm absolutely in love with the structure of your writing. You have a beautiful ability to describe, but I don't think you're pulling that to its full potential. Your characters are fun and exciting and your story flows nicely, although I'd recommend reconsidering some of your timeskips. This really is a wonderful book that sets aside the cliches of most books in this genre. Looking forward to seeing what you do with this book! All the best.

Final score:

44/60