Title: The Cursed Prince

Author: Tris_fire

Quick Notes:

- You have asked me to also point out any awkward vocabulary. I have discussed vocabulary in the "writing style" section of this review.

- You have also asked me to give suggestions regarding descriptions. I have also discussed this in the "writing style" section of this review. 

Summary: 3/5

Only a regular day, if I popped into the bookstore, picked up a review, and saw a summary like yours – one that involves magic, betrayal, badass characters, mazes, secrets, princes and beasts – I would be thrilled. I would pick it up and cherish every moment of it.

And that's what yours could have made me do. It shows many promising elements. I love the way you introduced the two characters, and the conflict, context, and stakes are exceptionally clear. Well done!

However, I didn't feel drawn to it. Why? The grammar needs work. Normally, I wouldn't focus on grammar in the summary part, but it did get to a point where I was rereading the summary because I couldn't grasp what you were trying to say. So, I thought that I would break it down for you:

"Meet Nova, A skilled Assassin from the future is sent to the past to kill a creature, called the Beast."

This sentence is grammatically incorrect for a number of reasons. Words like 'A' and 'Assassin' do not need to be capitalised, and the sentence itself does not connect with the 'Meet Nova'. The comma before the word 'called' is also unnecessary. It should be:

"Meet Nova: a skilled assassin from the future who has been sent to the past to kill a creature called the Beast."

Next:

"The fate of the Supernatural's rests in her hands..."

The capitalisation of the word 'supernatural' is entirely up to you, but I thought I'd mention it because, later in the summary, you chose not to capitalise it. You need to decide on one way to present it and stick to this. Also, you don't need the apostrophe.

In the paragraph about Medea, you are missing a full-stop between the words 'future' and 'Or'. Also, I think that, if you're going to follow the 'Meet this character' trope, and you introduce more than one character, I think it is important to show how their lives will connect. Otherwise, the whole paragraph about Medea seemed completely irrelevant because it didn't quite contribute to the summary in the same way that Nova's paragraph did.

As for the title, which you have asked me to discuss, I think it is apt. It gets the general themes of the story across, though I did notice that your story contains lots of motifs of entrapment. I wondered whether you may want to use that in your title, such as 'The Trapped Prince'. But 'Cursed' works perfectly as well. 

Grammar: 2.5/5

Okay, so there were a lot of minor errors and some bigger, more glaring issues that I found throughout your story. I recommend that you go back and polish up a few things – there were sentences missing full-stops, and there were beginnings of sentences that were missing capital letters. I've decided to break down all the errors I found using examples from your story.

First of all, punctuation and dialogue. If dialogue is followed by a verbal tag (such as 'he said', 'she whispered', 'she exclaimed' – or anything referring to how the character says the words), there should be a comma before the closing inverted commas. If it's anything else, this comma should be replaced by a period (or a question mark for a question and exclamation mark for an exclamation). For example:

"I am already late" Nova said as she stepped ahead.

You need punctuation before the closing inverted commas. It should be:

"I am already late," Nova said as she stepped ahead.

Another thing that was also briefly brought up in the summary: apostrophes. You have to use them correctly for your sentences to be grammatically correct. For example:

"Who's key is that?"

The above example is incorrect. "Who's" is short for "who is", and "who is key is that?" is not a complete sentence. I think you meant:

"Whose key is that?"

Again, if you don't use apostrophes correctly, it can change the tense of your story. For example, in your most recent chapter, you wrote:

"Maybe it wasn't here. Maybe it's in the chimney somewhere."

In that above sentence, you changed tense. Let's break it down further:

"Maybe it wasn't here." [wasn't = past tense]

"Maybe it's in the chimney somewhere." [it's = present tense]

I can see how you might have been confused but, basically, "it's" is always short for "it is" and can only be used in present tense. So you need to change that second sentence to, "Maybe it was in the chimney somewhere."

And, finally, commas. You have a lot of run-on sentences throughout your story. My suggestion? Read your story aloud, and only pause when you reach a punctuation mark. You'll find that there are pauses that should be in your story that are missing the appropriate punctuation. For example:

"Swaying with the rhythm Nova Vittosky danced her last dance with the crown prince."

Read it aloud. In my ears, it sounds clunky – and that's because it's a run-on sentence. To fix it up, you need a comma, and it should be:

"Swaying with the rhythm, Nova Vittosky danced her last dance with the crown prince."

Character Building: 3.5/5

I think, for the most part, your characterisation was pretty good! I loved the sneaky bits of backstory woven into your chapters, and it was incredibly realistic how you handled some situations. I found it eternally amusing seeing Nova struggle with the transition into the past, and seeing her wonder whether people had pockets and bombs made me smile. Don't be afraid to use this more – you could even compare what a ball would look like from the future she has come from, or maybe make her marvel at it more because it's just so different. That would be a great step towards masterful characterisation.

I think your choice to stick to limited third-person was a fantastic one – it's great to see these characters guide us through the story. I think you handled Medea's voice especially well, because I absolutely loved her narration. I loved her occasional fits of aggression, and she's just so different that it was wonderful to read.

However, there are some moments where I just didn't feel the characters as much as I should have – especially in that first chapter. When a character feels pain, don't just make them say 'Ahhh' – that doesn't make us feel anything towards them. You need to describe their pain, and you need to make us see it and feel it. Did Alex's face turn ashen? Does his voice turn hoarse? Does a scream tear from his throat? And how does Nova feel when she sees it? Does her heart fall to her boots? Does her chest ache? 

Writing Style: 3/5

You asked me to mention vocabulary, and I don't really have much to mention. I think your vocabulary is apt throughout the story. In fact, I think the thing that you need to work on is your sentence structure – it's very basic most of the time, and when you do use incomplete sentences, you need to make sure that it's used impactfully and not just as a throw-away line.

Next, descriptions. Again, like the vocabulary, not too bad! I think you've done a good job at fine-tuning it so that the voice of the character still seeps into the descriptions. For example, in the very start, when you added the little, "A genius idea" to the end of the descriptions, that was incredibly effective and a great way to capture your reader.

However, I found that while your descriptions were broad and purposeful, there was something lacking. You were very good at giving us brief glimpses of the setting, but not very great at delving deeper into it. For example:

"The music was serene."

Okay. Sure. But give us more. What did the instruments sound like? What made it sound serene? Did the notes roll and sway in smooth, wave-like motions? Give us more.

And, while this breaks my heart to say, I did catch glimpses of plagiarism in your descriptions. For example, in your story, you wrote:

"Suddenly there was the sound of heavy footsteps – the approaching footsteps have the wet sound of someone on grass; someone no many someone's who have not learnt to walk quietly and instead relies on the verges to muffle their steps."

Unfortunately, I have certainly read this before in a book called 'Darwin's Ghost'. It goes like this:

"The approaching footsteps have the wet sound of someone on grass; someone who has not learnt to walk quietly and instead relies on the verges to muffle their steps."

Therefore, your description was more or less directly copied from another person's work. While I understand that it's difficult to weave together descriptions of the top of your head, I absolutely do not condone plagiarism – no matter how small. Please avoid doing this. I didn't want to report your story because it's a small paragraph that you can easily change. But, please, for future reference: it's okay to be inspired by other stories, but it is not okay to copy another story. 

Plot + Uniqueness: 3/5

By any chance, have you Sarah J Maas? Your story kind of reminds me of her work – I love the fairy-tale motifs within your story, such as Cinderella and Beauty and the Beast. I also adored the use of time and past vs future, and that made your story incredibly unique and engaging. It's so refreshing to see sci-fi and fantasy become fused into one!

I also will add that I thought your endings and beginnings of chapters were great, but especially that first chapter – your ending was fantastic. It was incredibly powerful, and it completely changed the direction of the story from predictable to unpredictable.

I did, however, take away points on the plagiarism. I do know that your ideas and your story is entirely yours – you haven't copied characters, nor have you copied a plot-line that I know of. But you have used other people's words in your writing without referencing them, and unfortunately, that's not how you should handle it.

So, how do you do descriptions? Well, I came up with some tips to help you.

First, take yourself there. Write down what you see, what you hear, what you smell. Now, imagine yourself as a poet. How would a poet describe the sound of the birds? What metaphors would you use? That's a great way to start.

Secondly, what does the reader need to know? Does the reader need to know the colour of every single brick, or do they need to know the exact temperature of the room? If not, don't include it. You can take them to your setting with the description, but you can leave some room for imagination. Keep it as purposeful as possible. 

OVERALL SCORE: 15/25

Overall, a very creative story with promising elements to it. I highly suggest you go over your grammar and practise coming up with your own descriptions to avoid plagiarising other people's words. I hope this helps!