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 Review #4666218 |
 | One Very Special Girl  [E] Popular Vs. Kindness. Which one wins?  |
| (3.0)| Personal Message: Hi, Izzey. I finally got to reviewing your story. The one you have requested me to review has been taken off. In fact, I've noticed that many of your items are now private so I chose to review this piece first. Sorry to keep you waiting. I had some growing to do before I review another item on WDC. I'll be reviewing your item according to the vital elements in story-telling. If you have any further questions, just shoot me an email. I'll email you the line edits because it'll kill me to do the formatting here.  Opening In my opinion, your story still requires more work so I shall refrain from commenting on the opening until you've found the core of your story. Conflict Conflict with others: Niklas vs. Jared. Conflict with society: Niklas’ school is very popularity-centric (like most schools) and Niklas is not. Unfortunately, the conflicts in this story are too few and are insufficient to maintain an emotional interest with your readers and did not drive the story forward. Your story is a bit stagnant. Create more conflicts, drive your characters nuts, and then your readers will stay interested with your story. Plot Your story's plot is not complete yet. In every story, there is a structure. Without the structure, the story is not a story. Even though your story is a short story (a flash fiction or a micro fiction), every story in fiction-writing has to follow any structure of your choice e.g. The Hero's Journey, The Save the Cat Beat Sheet, etc. I’ll break down your story so you can see what I mean. I'm doing this according to the 3-Act Structure. Beginning: Introduction of character - Who Niklas is. Inciting incident: Niklas meets Elisa and was very taken in by her. Debate: - (optional) Climax 1: ? Obstacle: ? Obstacle: ? Mid-Point (Big Twist): Jared didn’t approve Niklas’ interest in Elisa. Obstacle: ? Obstacle: ? Climax 2: Niklas retaliates? --> Didn't know where to put this one. Climax 3: ? Wrap-Up: ? End: Jared calls Elisa a special girl. -? Every story needs to move from Point A to Point B. A: Niklas, popular kid in school, well-liked but humble. B: Niklas protects Elisa? They usually start and end at the same point in the story to show character development, to show the difference in point A and B. Your story didn't have that. Pacing Pace is okay. Dramatic Tension The story lacks tension because the story lacks conflict. The only tension in the story is when Jared threatens Niklas that if he went out with Elisa or befriended her, he would be out of the team. But that threat did not even make sense because he just met Elisa. Setting & Locale You did not describe any setting other than “school”, “hallway”, “bleachers”, “gym hall”, and “lunch table”. You’ll need to describe more. How does the surrounding interact with the character? Describe the setting using all five senses. What does the character see, hear, smell, feel (touch), taste? How does the surrounding or setting contribute to the story? Characterization I want to know why Niklas is the way he is. What makes him different from other boys his age? Why does a popular boy like him not bask into his fame but rather goes against the flow and is a down-to-earth boy? What is the story behind it? That is the story that is missing. Elisa - what made her take up ballet? If she’s fat and she had her face disfigured because of the clef and all that, what made her pursue ballet and what made her brave enough to stand on stage to perform in front of an audience? She must be insecure in some way but I’m not seeing it. How would she be immediately drawn to Niklas and not feel embarrassed when he had an interest in her? Why is Niklas drawn to the ballet? There’s just so much more story that is not told. Most of all, in every story, your character MUST undergo a character development but all your characters are flat characters that are only ‘existing’. Push them to the boundaries by creating more conflict for them and let them change or learn something new. Dialogue Dialogue is very unnatural. This require in-depth understanding with how the characters’ personalities are and how they talk. Each person have their own unique voice but the dialogues are just serving as ideologies in a different format. Also, there’s too many repetitions on Elisa’s physical condition. No one talks like that. Point of View It would be more effective if this story is told in third person - limited. Maybe just Niklas POV. Currently, your story is told from Niklas and Elisa’s point of view. Show vs. Tell There’s too much telling and not enough showing. When Jared suddenly barged into Elisa and Niklas conversation, what were the body languages they portrayed that showed their emotions? Don’t tell readers their emotions. Let them feel it. Let readers be part of it. Format of the text It would be nice to have a bigger font so that it’s easier to read. We used to tolerate smaller fonts but nowadays, we'd prefer size 3.5 or 4. Isn't it easier to read my review now that I'm using font size 4 and 1.6 line spacing? Grammar and Spelling Look into your tenses, subject-verb-agreement sentences. They tend to get mixed up. “The” tends to be used in the wrong places. Look into that. It’s generally otherwise quite okay. Nothing major. Style You are still finding your own voice. You will eventually find it the more you read and write. Look into word choice too to deliver your message across. Cohesiveness & Continuity Some sentences may be confusing. Some words may be redundant. Just need to do some edits to tighten some sentences. Change some passive voice to active voice to reduce the confusion too. Some parts didn't make sense to me too. Refer to characterisation and dramatic tension. Choice of Title I believe you could come up with a better title but that doesn’t come until you have edited your story and see what it’s really about. It’s not there yet. General “big picture” pointers Overall, I’d say that your story is a good, easy read for teens. It has a lot of potential for growth. I like how you started by introducing your character. You have very intriguing characters but the story is not showing how wonderful they are. If there’s anything I learnt, writing requires many layers and it seemed to me that you’ve only applied the first layer to this story so do not worry about it and keep working on this. I’ve only recently learnt that professional writers who got their work published, they have edited their stories about 40 times. Can you believe that? Anyway, you’ll need to establish your story more because it lacks conflict. Because there’s not enough conflict, there’s not enough dramatic tension. I want to see how your characters evolve and grow. Keep writing, Izzy!  You can do it! Thank you for sharing this with us and Write On! Elycia Lee ☮      My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .
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