Like Romeo and Juliet by katherina-k

Reviewer: DeathBlade__

Title: 4/5
It’s an interesting title and it suits the romance genre of the book. However, in the first five chapters, Maria and Aaron don’t have a lot of chemistry and although I know that they will have romance in the near future, I couldn’t see it in the first five chapters. Still, the title is eye-catching and I can tell it will make more sense in the future.

Cover: 2.5/5
I love the font used in the color. Actually, I love everything about the text, its color, and the fact that it glows. What I didn’t like was the background image. It’s just a picture of a girl, who I am guessing is Maria. It hints at the romance aspect of the book which is great but looking at the cover, I would never guess it’s a book about mafias. The text can remain how it is because it looks really good but the background image needs some changes.

Blurb: 4.5/5
The blurb is very aesthetically pleasing. That is not necessary but it adds an extra flavor which is really nice. The way the information is placed in the blurb is also really good. The only problem was the last line. You have written every wey instead of every way. It is a minor mistake but the blurb comes under the first impression of the book and a typo like this can be a hindrance to the reader.

Writing Style: 6/10
The starting and ending of the chapters were really good. The first line of every chapter was a great hook to get into it and the last line of every chapter was a cool, cliffhanger-type ending which I really love.

However, the description could have been better. Every time you introduced a new character, you would go straight for their physical appearance in one go. It is necessary for the readers to know how the characters look but the way it was written could have been improved. I would suggest to not describe every physical aspect of them as soon as you introduce their character. Instead, you can do it more subtly. For example, say someone looks worried, you could describe how it changed the expression in their eyes. This would make reading the book a lot more fun.

I also wanted to mention that you need to reread your book thoroughly. The ending of chapter 3 and the starting of chapter 4 was the exact same thing. If you were showing the same scene in different POV’s, that would not be a problem. But it was the exact same thing, word-for-word. I don’t know if it was intentional or if it was an accident but either way it needs to be fixed.

Grammar: 3.5/10
There were a lot of grammatical errors. Your punctuations were fine, there weren’t many notable mistakes with that but there are other aspects of grammar that need editing.
Spellings/typos: There were too many spelling errors, one that I noticed a lot was that you wrote grinned as grined. There were many similar mistakes (basically, you made a lot of errors while changing nouns to the past tense). You also wrote slept as asleeped and drunk as drinked.
Tenses: Along with the spelling errors due to tenses, they were present in other places as well. For example, the first few lines would be in past tense and the next line would be written in the present tense. This kept popping up a lot of times and it could have really been avoided.
POV: I think I noticed this once or twice but it’s a huge error in my opinion. The book is written in first person POV but in a few instances, you shifted to third person POV.
I had read only the first five chapters but there were so many errors I found. I would suggest rereading your book and fixing the errors or hiring an editor who could help you out with it.

Plot: 3/10
In the first five chapters not much happened. We get to see Maria’s life as a mafia but I don’t really know where the book is going. In the 5th chapter, I could tell that Maria and Aaron are going to work together to find Eliana’s killer but it’s only the start. The book is very slow-paced in that sense. Although it is necessary to know how the characters’ lives were before actually getting to the main plot, it seemed like there was a lot of information which don’t really have an impact on the plot. For example, take Maria’s little sister. She could have been introduced with the rest of the family during their dinner but she wasn’t. I didn’t even know that Maria had a sister till the third chapter when she came to talk Maria out of doing jobs for men. She was no different from the other ladies of the family, except that she was stubborn so I didn’t understand why a separate interaction between them was necessary.

Now comes the originality of the plot. For now, it seems like any other mafia story, with a badass main character and a love interest who happens to be the enemy but for some reason, he finds the main character rather interesting. Mafia stories aren’t inherently bad but I would rather there were some twists that made it look a little different in the starting. Again, it has only been 5 chapters and I know I haven’t really gotten into the plot but the first few chapters don’t show anything different.

Characters: 2/10
The characters don’t have any redeeming qualities. Nobody is perfect and characters are supposed to have flaws but I just couldn’t relate with the characters. They are part of the mafia and people aren’t supposed to like them but they are the main characters of your story. Characters can make or break the book for most readers so even if their base is something of a hated character, they should have a dismissed side to them which can grow over time. Unfortunately, I didn’t get that from any of the characters. Also, instead of showing a side of a character, you tell the readers about it. For example, you had a paragraph where Maria was telling how manipulative Ivan can be. Instead of having her say it in words, you could have had her recall an incident where he was being manipulative. This would ensure the readers that those aren’t just plain words and that he actually is manipulative. Now, I will get into the main characters.

Maria: I found her to be an absolute hypocrite. In the very first scene, we see her killing a man with no mercy, and yet in future episodes, we see her hating Aaron because of what his family did to him. She made enemies with his family because they massacred her family but she has no problem doing that to others. How can I feel bad for her when she does the exact same thing? She causes pain to her victim’s family but it doesn’t even bother her. Also, when Aaron placed a knife on her throat she didn’t even flinch. I get that she is supposed to be a badass but it needs to seem a little realistic too. Aaron is clearly stronger so even if she didn’t want to show that she was scared, you could have portrayed her to be scared. I just really can’t root for her when she is such a hypocrite. The only person she cares about is herself and her family. That is very evident and is mentioned a couple of times as well. She thought of Eliana as her first friend but didn’t even care to remember her name? It makes me wonder if she really cared about Eliana at all. It makes me think that all she did was rant to Eliana while she had to listen. I really do hope that you can add redeeming qualities to her so that she can grow as the story progresses.

Aaron: I’ll be honest, I have nothing good to say about him. He’s such a jerk and he treats women as objects. He calls them a whore for fucking every guy they see but he fucks every girl he sees so what is his problem? He acts as if he is god’s gift to women and it’s really frustrating. And he is absolutely shameless. First, he breaks into people’s rooms and doesn’t leave when they want to get undressed. It’s not very hard to respect someone’s privacy. And then he has the audacity to think that sex with these random girls isn’t exciting. Instead of complaining about poor sex, he can learn to respect others. There was also a sentence in which he thinks that he wants to rip Maria’s head off and keep it as a showpiece and that he had other plans for her body. Honestly, I was so triggered by that. Aaron comes off as a really arrogant jerk and I don’t know if there is any scope for development for him. I would really suggest adding some subtle, good side of him so that the readers can at the very least hope that he redeems himself.

Enjoyment: 1.5/5
Characters of a book mean a lot to me. They make me want to continue reading the book. Unfortunately, I couldn’t relate to either of the main characters. Bad grammar is also a hindrance while reading but it is nothing that cannot be fixed but characters and plot define the book. I would suggest you look into my suggestion and improve the book. Every book has potential and with a little more outlining, the book can become enjoyable.

I hope you take my review as constructive criticism and not as discouragement. I wish you the very best for your book.

Total: 27/60