Title: Beyond the Horizon

Author: brownskyninja

Genre: Romance

Quick Summary: Girl doesn't want to marry, so she runs away. 

Thoughts:

I like all the little worldbuilding details, but I think they border on telling quite a bit. Consider:

"Not even the Rain Festival or the Imamki Call Festival possessed the ability to hype them as much as a wedding did.

"After all, it meant that two families would be united by the gods."

That first sentence is a great amount of detail. The next sentence stretches it out too far. Readers aren't stupid; you don't need to spell everything out for us, you know? The same applies to the pictures littered through chapter four. Don't doubt your descriptions. Let them stand on their own without relying on pictures. If there are blanks, use words to fill them in.

Reading this kind of felt like seeing the first few layers of a painting. The colors are all mapped out and you have a faint idea of what you're looking at, but it's definitely not the finished piece. We skirt around all of the major events. There are thoughts and descriptions and feelings, but they feel surface-level. Chapter five is the closest we get to breaking away from the murkiness all first drafts had - honestly, I think it was my favorite chapter. But still, it is rough and unfinished and it shows.

I like Kiana, too. Her motivations and desires are clear here. But everyone else... isn't? And I get we leave them after chapter four but. I want more development on everyone else. I want to know more about them.

I also feel like a lot of their names are a bit too Anglicized but that's just me.

I think I'd like to see what this looks likes after revisions.