Title

The title gave me the vibe that this would be an adventure genre story. After all, adventure is in the title. The misadventure part really caught my eye. It was a thrill to imagine just what these misadventures would be. The title is a bit on the longer side of things, but that is okay. After all, it is as accurate as titles can get. In addition, there is something so nostalgic about the title. Maybe it’s because I grew up around these sorts of titles. With that said, extra nostalgia points for you.

Cover

I like how the boy in the cover is looking into the sunset. The cover, though admittedly simple, is very effective. I’ll be honest, besides adventure, the only other themes that I can sense is memory, mischief, and friendship. The sunset has always been a very common and powerful theme in literature. Showing that a character is looking into the sunset always often showcases the themes of hope and something more than the life that they had got to live.

The font could be a little brighter as the grey doesn’t really look very nice. I suggest using a white font; since white and black are natural contrasts. I like the font that you used. You can, however, improve the overall tone and impact of the cover by tweaking that font colour.

Blurb

The blurb was rather short and I’m not so sure if it’s very interesting. For sure, the premise is great! You seem to have a main trio and I cannot express how much of a sucker I am for trios. There’s just something so endearing about them. I don’t think I have anything more to say on this area. The blurb is sufficient and catches the attention of readers in the genre.
However, do note that since there are plenty of books on Wattpad, it is also useful to have something other than just the misadventures in the blurb. Perhaps add another problem or another hook, or maybe you could give more incentive as to why the readers should care about the characters. Additionally, you may also want to think about fleshing out the two other characters as well.

First Chapter

The first chapter introduces us to Jake and his friends. I think you were able to give us a lovely description of their friendship, however, the keyword here is description. There was a lot of telling in the first chapter and not a lot of showing. Most of the time, you were simply telling us that Jake did this, and Jake felt like this. Instead of showing us what was happening.

A lot of authors struggle with telling vs. showing. I am no exception. I struggle with this a lot, but over the course of researching, I found that there is actually a difference between telling and showing. Showing allows your reader to imagine and become immersed in the story. Telling simply spoon-feeds them, and that isn't good. There really is no need to spoon-feed the reader as readers are intelligent. You don't need to tell them that the character feels exactly like this and that the character is doing this. All you need to show the character doing something and the reader will most likely figure it out.

For example:
He grabbed the pen forcefully and furrowed his eyebrows. Staring down the man in front of him, he held the pen as if ready to murder him. Beads of sweat were running down his forehead. His tousled black hair a mat on his head.

This is an example of showing rage and murderous intent without explicitly saying that the character is pissed as hell.

An example of telling would be this:
As she stepped out of the door, she felt a sudden warmth rise to her cheeks. She had never been so nervous her whole life. Yet as she now stared at the woman who could be her salvation or destruction, she felt as if all hell would break loose.

Like I said, I am much better at telling than showing, so this is a little hypocritical. Nevertheless, please refer to the second example.
Can you see her fear?
Her nervousness?
Or were you simply told that she was nervous and that's how you were able to realise that, oh, she was nervous?
Now refer again to the first paragraph.
Can you imagine is more clearly? What emotions are he showing and what are the actions that he is doing? How is he reacting mentally and physically to the situation?

Remember, it's okay to tell in your story if it doesn't overburden the plot. Keep all the telling details short and succinct and make sure that they add something to the narrative. In addition, avoid the infodump. I have a personal dislike for infodumping, yet I can't say that I have avoided this myself.

In the chapter, you were able to show us Jake's insecurities and I think that it was displayed very well. He is insecure about a lot of things, which is understandable as he is a teenager. I personally like Tristan. There is something about him that reminds me of Ron Weasley. The only other issues I found were concerning your structure of the dialogue. We'll tackle the dialogue issues later.

The Chapters That Follow

I'll be honest, the book was far better than I originally thought. While reading through the next chapters, I found myself smiling every now and then. After Jake receive a makeover from Beth, he ends up becoming a heartthrob in school. Tristan's ex, a girl named Trisha, ends up having the hots for him and they end up doing questionable things. Like 'studying algebra' together… yeah, that happened. I'm not sure if I would be calling Jake a dumbass or an idiot.
Afterwards, it escalates to the point where they skip class, smoke weed, and go to the beach to do… stuff. I see what you did there and it made me laugh ;)

But it was also slightly disturbing, so we'll leave that discussion later.
It becomes apparent that Trish is a bad influence on Jake. The once lovable and insecure boy has become this pot-smoking monster. However, thanks to the intervention of his father, he ends up recovering partially and he can resume his life as normal. But then again, the actions he did with Trish resulted in dissension between him and his two best friends. Tristan ends up getting mad at him and Beth has a similar reaction (did I mention that they kissed early in the story? SHIP!!! Jabeth for the win!!)

It turns out that Tristan has been going out boxing. Honestly, I love how you wove these threads together. They aren't mad at him because of lame reasons. They are mad at him because he officially screwed up. He totally made a fool of himself and he even did stuff with his best friend's ex-girlfriend. I'll be honest, this must be one of the best friendships that I have read on Wattpad.

Every now and then I found myself smiling while I was reading these chapters. The plot is well-done and I'm certain that if the faulty, mechanical aspects of the narrative had been tweaked, I would have better enjoyed it.

Grammar

I noticed that there were several errors regarding the tenses. There were several times when you couldn’t keep the sentence flowing in just one tense. In addition, some of the sentences would be better off reworded.

One example would be this line from the first chapter: Smacking the alarm clock caused for the annoying vibrations of the mechanism to cease.
The for is unnecessary and should be removed as it clutters up the sentence.

Additionally, your use of tenses is a bit off. The most glaring times were when you used a past tense in the beginning of the sentence. Only to have it end with a present action verb.
When we write, we are told that we must always stay consistent. The same should be applied when grammar comes into play. Because of the inconsistent tenses, it was rather hard to get through the story. I highly suggest that you avail the services of an editor. An editor will help you correct your grammar and an editor will also help you to better structure the story.

There were also a few typos. Like when you wrote insecure instead of insecurity. These typosc an always be corrected in the editing process, so don't lose heart. Remember, the editors are there for a reason.

Dialogue

I said earlier that we will be tackling the dialogue issues. Well, here we are now. I noticed that when you wrote the dialogue, you attached the reactions to the sentence.

"What I mean is this," Lyssa said as her other persona chortled.

"You do realise that you know nothing about editing, right?" Lyssa shook her head at the other persona.

Okay, I get it that the example was a bit off. But if you get what I mean in this sentence, it's that you ended up attaching the reactions of the previous speaker to the tag of the current speaker. Erm... here's a better example.

"What I mean is this," Lyssa said as the other persona of her madness chortled.

"You do realise that you know nothing about editing, right?" The persona told her as she simply shook her head and prepared to retort.

A little downgrading of my own editing skills, but that's alright. If you noticed, the speaker was tagged at the end of the sentence (they can also be tagged in the middle or the front of the sentence) and the action that was intermingled with the dialogue was added after. So, if we applied mathematical equation to this, it would look like this:

Dialogue + speaker tag (who is speaking) + intermingled action (you don't always need to add intermingled action) = the perfect sentence to woo the ladies.

I hope that was at least understandable. I recognise that the above example is as confusing as samples can get. It might kill your brain cells but remember that the body generates new cells to replace the cells that had been severely damaged because of this example.

Characters

Jake is a flawed character and he is not perfect. From the very beginning, we can see that he is severely insecure. Had it not been for his friends, he would never have gained the confidence that he displayed in the later chapters. The fact that he was easily seduced by Trish shows that he is a boy who craves attention and love, but he finds what he seeks in the wrong place. He isn't strong in the sense of other male heroes, but he is strong in the sense that he was able to rise from defeat and become a new person.

Personally, I love these kinds of characters. Their weaknesses are so apparent that their strengths are very much hidden behind the veils, but the moment they hit rock-bottom, they rise and become better people. I would say that Jake's tale is reminiscent of a hero's journey. Where a character must leave behind the familiar in order to discover himself through misadventure and peril. I absolutely love this trope when it is delivered right. In addition, I also love this trope because no one knows what sort of peril lies abroad. It adds to the thrill of the story.

Tristan is no one-dimensional character. As much as I love Jake (Trish you will pay for what you did), Tristan is another character who is so grounded into reality. He shows in the story that he has emotions and he is severely hurt by the actions of his friend. They are almost like brothers in my mind, two others who will go through anything for each other. His story does not revolve around Jake and his story has a meaning of its own. In loss of Jake he seeks others and he even turns to boxing. Jake and Tristan were really the two characters that made this entire book worth reading.

As for Beth, I wasn't necessarily attracted to her as I was to Tristan and Jake. She falls a little flat several times in the story and I think she could use a little bit more tweaking.

Overview

All in all, this was a story that really reminded me of those tropes that I have loved since childhood. You got that nostalgia going for me so that gives you extra points in my book. Additionally, I fell in love with the complexity of the character and my hate for Trish fuelled me with adrenaline.

I would recommend this to anyone who likes to read stories about friendship and brotherhood. However, the negatives that I pointed out earlier must be corrected. It was a little hard to get through your story, especially in the first chapter. It was extremely difficult for me because I am not used to present tense narratives. Despite that, I was able to continue reading despite the difficulty and I was able to smile and laugh every now and then while I was reading the book.

After I was done, I found myself lying in bed and thinking about the story. It was such an effective narrative and I commend you in the highest way possible.

Reviewed by: Lyssa