We want to thank everyone who invited us to read their stories for this category! We're so excited to post the final results. For each participant who has placed, we will include a small blurb with our combined feedback on your submission. We hope that each participant will accept our feedback as constructive and with an open mind. It's meant to help you grow as a writer.

We have created a worksheet with more detailed scoring and feedback for each participant. Please reach out to us through a direct message to receive your final scoring sheets and for the winners to receive the stickers we've created as a part of the prize.

Date Your Idol by Lil_kiyomi

We didn't find the plot to be very original, though it feels as if the story is just getting into the thick of the plot so we're looking forward to seeing how it builds. We were pleased with the minimal grammatical errors in this story. A good brush through for editing is advised to clean up the minor errors.

We didn't feel very attached to the characters. Some of the connections seemed a bit far fetched and the personality of the main character made it difficult to root for her. In future chapters we hope to see her character grow with more positive traits and depth. The instances of flashbacks made the story confusing in some areas and some plot points felt unnecessarily drug out.

Chronicles of the Joseon Jade by blackbangtan_4567

One of our biggest praises for this story was the originality! We were impressed with the creativity and found the world unique and captivating. We thought the book cover was compelling and fitting for the story, and that the blurb was okay but could be improved without the ellipsis.

The story could use the most improvement in pacing, building of emotion, and grammar. Since the story is fantasy and involves a pretty complex world, take your time building different aspects of the world so that there are less points of confusion. Though there are very cool characters within the world, taking more time to develop their inner emotions and experience will help build the reader's attachment to characters. The story could use a good amount of editing. Some of my biggest tips for working through editing are to read other stories to get a better feel for sentence structure/flow, and to read your work aloud to catch errors easier.

Torn Between by AraBTS07

Congrats on your first place ranking! We especially enjoyed when the story finally got into some of the drama and we found few errors in grammar. Though a bit busy, the cover was cute and fit the romantic comedy identification of the story.

There were times when characters seemed to be introduced more out of convenience rather than contributing to the plot. We would work on building more depth to the characters emotionally as some depictions seem very surface level. Some transitions, changes in point of view, and time skips contributed to the plot being difficult to follow at times.

The premise of the love triangle isn't very original and can be cliche, but that isn't necessarily a negative thing. Since the book is described as more of a romantic comedy, we would lean on more of those comedic moments that can make the cliche feel more interesting and fun.

We also wanted to express our appreciation to chimmoony and Strawberry1d for your participation in the Mikrokosmos Maze Awards! Please feel free to reach out to us here or on our personal accounts to receive your scoring and feedback.