Please do not feel discouraged if you did not place this round, your story will find its time!

There will be more contests next year to showcase your talent! Keep up the great work!

❥ Your fantastic judge: katiegoesmew 🪄

❥ The entries that have passed into Round Four but in no particular order:

➳ Shadows of Betrayal by MatheoRiddlexo07 (Mature)

➳ tarnished and hurt by slytherclaw_seeker (Mature)

➳ Double Devotions by mk_crenshaw (Mature)

Thank you to the below users for participating! We look forward to seeing your entries in the future!

🪄 Heart's Desire by _Mini_Padfoot_

Title: 10/10

I'm getting some serious romance vibes here, and, while I don't normally like extras listed in the Wattpad title, there are so many types of Harry Potter fanfics and so many preferences that adding in Sirius Black is a good idea to attract readers who seek fanfics about him - and ward off the ones who don't.

Cover: 4/10

This could be better, and my biggest concern with it is the title. At first glance, I couldn't find the word "desire." It's the same color as "HEART'S," Sirius' tie, and the rose petals, so it all blends together. I can't really make out the designs in "HEART'S," either, unless I look really hard.

But I like the pop of bright red against the mostly black-and-white background, and I like the font choice and the way "desire" is overlaid on top of "HEART'S."

My suggestions would be to move the text up to the top of the cover in the sky above his head, bump the font size for "desire" up a couple of sizes, and play with colors and ways to add some definition to the text. Maybe a lighter shade of red for "HEART'S" so the floral designs stick out more, and a darker shade for "desire" to give it more of a passionate feel?

You can try out things like highlights, shadows, shading, etc. around the text, too, but once the red text is against a mostly white background with some color tweaking, you may not need to do more to add definition.

Moving on, I like "a novel by serena" at the bottom, but I'd bump the font size up a notch or two so it's more visible. The background gray-scale image of Hogwarts is good, and the rose petals are fine, although you'd probably want to cut some of them out at the top of the screen if you move the text up there.

Or, at least, make sure they're set behind the text, and there's enough of a color difference that they don't blend in with the text. But the glow around Sirius and the shine on his face feel like too much to me.

You can still have it, but I'd tone it down a bit so it looks less like he just oiled his face after emerging from a nuclear reaction that makes him glow in the dark. (Unless that actually happens in the story, and if so, you have my attention.) 😉

Summary: 4/10

I'm not a person who likes story excerpts in the blurb, but other people do, so I'm not docking points for that. I do think the actual blurb that comes after the story should be right at the top.

When a potential reader clicks on your story and that little box pops up with more info, they can only see the first few lines of the blurb, so you need to hook them with a tagline that piques their interest.

There are also some grammar issues here, and you really want this to be clean, so it makes a good impression on any potential readers.

So, let me kind of go through my thoughts with you here, starting with that tagline. "In which." You can cut that out.

That makes the sentence incomplete, because there should be something before "in which." As far as the actual content of the tagline, she's not much of a secret admirer if you spoil him confronting her in the story excerpt.

That excerpt actually makes him seem more like the secret admirer who is revealing his presence to her, because he's the one in control of the situation, and that's what I thought was going on until I got to the tagline after the excerpt.

Honestly, since I haven't read the story yet, I don't know what information would go best in your blurb.

Sirius Black, obviously. Secret admirer and anonymous letters - yeah, I'm guessing these are really important to the plot, so they need to be here, too.

But there might be more you can include to increase your hook, so I'll just tack a link here to a helpful chapter by  that's all about how to write a good logline and pitch.

This is something I've had to reference frequently, because this is not my personal strong suit, and I've really had to work at it to get better: https://www.wattpad.com/1357752761-8-chapter-challenge-story-logline-and-pitch

Descriptiveness: 9/10

I'm bumping this score up because you're getting progressively more descriptive as the story goes on, especially when you're describing the interactions between people.

It's the little things that make a scene come to life, like Sirius face-planting into a pillow when his secret admirer writes back that he can't see her yet, or a light touch on the arm as a girl leans in to whisper in his ear. There could always be more, but what you have is great.

Reader Engagement: 10/10

I didn't plan on dropping comments while reading because I have a lot to do, but I couldn't help myself, and judging by the comments, nobody else could, either.

The warm fuzzies, the heart-pounding moments - you're really drawing the readers into Sirius' search and his blossoming relationships with the three suspects.

We're swooning over that thing with Kiara; we're cheering her on when she's punching Rosier; we're giggling behind our hands at Sirius writing "darling" in his diary. So - nailed it.

Plot Uniqueness: 10/10

A love...square? Rectangle? Whatever shape, it sure ain't a triangle, and the way you're developing Sirius' relationship with each of the three girls is definitely unique. I can't tell who the secret admirer is, and I'm usually pretty good at guessing mystery stuff.

Character Development: 10/10

Sirius' character continues to develop, and you're fleshing out even side characters like Rosier as you go on. The Marauders are developing, too, and even James is becoming less imbecilic as the story progresses. And, of course, the three girls are opening up to the readers, too.

Creativity: 10/10

Um...see all of the above and past round feedback. ;)

Writing Style: 10/10

The only reason I docked a point last round was because of the past event scene in italics, but that's long forgotten, and holy cow, you have a knack for writing these cutesy, teetering on the edge of fluffy/spicy moments.

Grammar/Punctuation: 7/10

Same stuff I mentioned before, but it doesn't detract much from the story. It's still very readable, and your structure, paragraph divisions, and dialogue all make sense.

Total: 84/100

🪄 Roommates I Dramione AU by somaacharya (Mature)

Title: 10/10

The forced proximity trope? Yes. Yes, please. 😉

Book Cover: 9/10

This is cute. Did you do the artwork yourself? I love how Draco looks so snarky, and he's definitely pestering Hermoine, and she's just trying so hard to ignore him.

The gray-scale really goes well here, too, emphasizing Draco's light hair and her dark hair. My only complaint is with the title. The white "S" kind of disappears in that white window.

If you could add a black outline or highlight to add more definition so it's easier to see, that would be ideal, because at first glance, it looks like the title is "ROOMMATE."

Also, side note, I think I've seen one other person who included the @ before their name on a book cover, and it's an interesting choice. I approve.

Summary: 8/10

Only issue here is punctuation. You should actually use commas in all the places you've used hyphens, and dependent clauses like "the Gryffindor princess" and "the Slytherin prince" should be set apart with commas, before and after ("Hermione, the Gryffindor princess, and").

I think I'd throw a comma in after "Hogwarts" in the third sentence, and in the last sentence, a hyphen would work really well after "chaos" to emphasize the contrasting outcomes.

Descriptiveness: 7/10

See round one feedback.Pretty good. Descriptions of Draco and Hermione are the most vivid, of course, but it would be nice to get more visual descriptions of other characters and the world, and engage some other senses, too - smell, sound, that kind of thing. But the picture is pretty clear to the reader.

Reader Engagement: 10/10

Well, when your comments are full of readers cheering, booing, fangirling, placing bets, etc., I'd say you pulled this off pretty well. ;)

Plot Uniqueness: 10/10

I retract my previous score and am bumping it up to the top. The heartfelt gift to Ron, the way he absolutely destroyed his relationship with Hermione and rubbed that gift in her face, her mental breakdown and decision to rebel - layered heavily with Draco (and reader) expectations that she's setting her sights on him, only for you to trick us while you send her into a rebound relationship with another guy who then attacks her, giving Draco the perfect opportunity to swoop in and save her—

Well. It's unique. And it's yours. Here are your points. 🙂

Character Development: 8/10

You talk about character development, but you don't show it much, if that makes sense. We're told the Houses are getting along. We're told Draco and Hermione are getting closer.

The scene in chapter five shows how far the flirting and teasing have gone, but I'd like more on-the-way stuff so it's not such a leap.

Want some more points? You can have them.  Chapters 6-10 are nothing but character development, and while it could be fleshed out more, it's definitely, obviously there.

Creativity: 10/10

Again, it's been done before, but your way of doing it is so fun.

But do you need more points? Here, take them. And see all the above for the reasons you should have them. 🙂

Writing Style: 8/10

It's fun, it's lively, it's funny, it's cute, it's hot - I like it. Judging by the comments, other people do, too.

The "time skip" thing is unnecessary. You're already describing the length of time and transition in the following paragraph, so you don't need the actual words "time skip" at all, especially since this is the start of a new chapter.

And the side commentary that breaks the fourth wall is better pushed down to an author's note instead of breaking up the narrative.

I am keeping this score the same, for similar reasons noted last round. The flashback could be better incorporated into the text, and I'd recommend putting the author's notes all at the bottom of each chapter in a dedicated section for that, but your style is still very fun and engaging.

Grammar/Punctuation: 6/10

Same stuff as before. I think it's probably something that happened when you copied and pasted into Wattpad, but there are a lot of places where there are no spaces following punctuation.

Chapter two is like that all the way through. But yeah, punctuation is your biggest area for improvement. This is still very readable, but a clean-up would be nice.

Total: 86/100

🪄🪄🪄

Good luck to everybody who has moved onto the last round. Please bear with us as there may be some time between the next results.

❥ R4 Judging Begins: August 10th.
❥ Round Four Deadline: same as below.
❥ Winners Deadline: September 3rd.

- El at The Happy Writers Community  🪄