Are you a fan of books? Are you a fan of Pokémon? Well then, you've come to the right place! In this book club, we will devote every review purely to Pokémon fanfiction.
Includes:
- Articles on Pokémon Fanfiction
- Specific interviews with the autho...
1. I liked how you gave characters different styles of talking. Many people tend to write flowery, descriptive writing, then carry that style to the dialogue as well. Most people don't talk like that, and most people have different catchphrases and slang that they use. I could see you trying to incorporate that, which pleased me.
2. I like aspects of how you made Serena hate White. I normally see hate from a character only when it is convenient, but you gave Serena pure, unbridled hate. While I think it could developed more progressively, it was fun to see White from her perspective. Seeing Serena say things like "White talked with her stupid voice" or "White wore those stupid clothes" made it almost comedic how much Serena hated White. Though it wasn't comedic to the point of being unrealistic, as many people tend to hate everything a person does when they hate that person.
Negatives:
1. The relationship developing between White and Ash feels really forced and superficial. White had two conversations with Ash before realizing she had a crush on him, and it felt like Ash jumped from Serena to White without a second thought. Don't you think White would be a little more guarded around the guy that has no problem making out in a public space, the guy whose girlfriend called her a bitch? Don't you think Ash would feel backlash for talking to an unpopular girl, especially from his girlfriend? If you're going to make Ash jump from Serena to White that quickly, establish somewhere that the feelings between Serena and Ash were either weak or not mutual. The characters need to be more developed to do this, and if you'd like I can send you links to what I use for reference when developing a character.
This led to a lot of actions that seemed unnecessary and were just there conveniently to push the plot forward. For example, unnecessary blushing. There was one point where White blushed just because Ash asked if she was ready to eat. If you want her to blush there, give it reason. Maybe it's his spirit and overtly happy personality that she saw in that moment, any aspect of him that she likes works. If you want something there for convenience, at least give it reason.
You also mentioned in an author's note Serena's sudden turnaround in behavior was because she realized the error of her ways, but I should have been able to figure that out by just reading. If you need to describe something in the author's note, don't. Put all the details needed to understand the story in the actual story. I was confused throughout the whole chapter, only to find out at the end why she didn't go out and beat up White for actually stealing her boyfriend (which, for her character, would have been most realistic). Have you ever seen author's notes in published works? While it's okay to have author's notes, the story should be understandable even if you didn't have one.
Why did Serena get over Ash so quickly? If she was so concerned over losing her boyfriend, I feel she'd be mourning for more than one paragraph. Even saying something like "Weeks had passed and Serena still couldn't believe Ash had left her" would suffice.
2. The characters need more development. The only change in White and Ash were their feelings for each other, and even that was shaky. The first time Ash came to White's house, she said she liked him, but then she thought "Do I like him? I don't know" later in the story. This change would only really happen if Serena tried to manipulate White into hating him or if Ash did something bad that changed her opinion on him (Maybe both! You could make Serena frame Ash for something to try and drive White away from him). Also, how did Serena magically know when White and Ash were together? Every time they visited, Serena would make an appearance to talk about how much she hated White. Is she following one of them? Is Ash open with her about their interactions? This should be explained before Serena goes and accuses White of boyfriend stealing.
3. New subplots were sprouting up in this book like weeds. Why would it be revealed only in the last chapter that Calem is going to kill the King of Unova? Don't you think security would be extremely tight at such an event? How would he get past that, and how would he get out so easily? Didn't cameras record him? Plus, this is a romance novel, and I don't think ending with such a dramatic subplot was a good idea.
4. First person POV changes, unless done correctly, are unnecessary and disrupt the flow of the story. If you'd like to focus on multiple characters, use third person. Third person allows shifts in focus to be more subtle, which will improve your story. You can find plenty examples of this online and in books. Reading a lot will help you get better at things like this.
There were times where you'd switch POV without even saying you did. Again, this is something that's difficult to pull off in first person, but can be done in third person. For example, when Serena beat up White, it switched from "I walked to school" in Serena's perspective to "I woke up, feeling blood on my forehead" in White's without warning. I had to reread that part multiple times to make sure I was reading it right. There were also times where you'd switch from first person to third person without warning, like at the end of chapter six. I know I keep saying this, but I strongly suggest you switch this book to purely third person.
5. The summary of your novel needs work. There's grammar errors (e.g "Wonderful girlfriend wonderful life" when it should be "Wonderful girlfriend, wonderful life"), and I hardly got an idea of what the basis of your story is. All I got was the "unpopular girl steals the heart of a popular boy" trope, which is terribly overused. Your description is your selling point--it can bring in new readers or drive them away. Rewrite your description and show that your story is more than just an overused trope.
6. Most books are written in past tense, so it was an odd (though not necessarily bad) change of pace to see yours in present tense. However, it felt poorly executed, enough to where I sometimes had a hard time focusing on the story because of it. I'm personally not too experienced with writing in present tense, so I can't give specific tips. However, I suggest you look up tips online and read books written in that tense (The Hunger Games, for example. I've read that book two or three times and I never even realized it was in present tense until someone pointed it out to me. That's another reason I feel this issue is worth pointing out despite me not being experienced with this topic.)
I think that by fixing the issues I've brought up in this review, the flow of the story will become better and this will naturally become less of an issue. It's still important that you know this is an issue, however, so that once you've edited you can look it over to make sure this has been fixed.
7. There was hardly any setting description. The location would be stated, but you'd give the readers no information about what that place was like. There was an overall lack of description, but it was most apparent in this context.
8. There were a lot of small grammar errors that built up very quickly. Your story, for the most part, is one big paragraph. Each paragraph should focus on one idea, maybe two if they're very closely related. A new paragraph also begins if a different person is talking. (e.g one paragraph is White studying. Once she stops studying and does something else, you start a new paragraph. When White is talking, then Serena talks after, you start a new paragraph.) There are also a surplus of spelling errors, which proofreading could easily fix.
Overall, I admittedly had a hard time finding positives in this novel, but it still has potential! I know I included a lot of things that need fixing, but if you go through and fix them, your story will be much better! First drafts of stories always need a lot of work, so please don't think your work is beyond saving just because it needs so much fixing. I'd love to see this work go as far as it can!
