Her Lost Dimension (by ClaireMari29)
*Note: Chapters 1-5 were read

Book cover - 4.5/5

The aesthetic and color palette is very cute. My only qualm is that I can’t read the text at the top; if it’s very important, like an author name or subtitle, I suggest you resize it.

Book title - 5/5

I think it’s a good title that suits the book’s theme very well!

Book description - 2/5

It’s wordy and has grammatical errors, in the other hand I like the aesthetics you incorporated! I also like that you opened and ended it with thought-provoking quotes. Since the description is fairly short here is how I’d rewrite it:

“Consider Your Wishes Carefully!”
         
Andrea Alcantara, a 20-year-old business student, is looking for a new reality for herself that is free of chaos and filled with peace, happiness, and harmony. She’s had enough after 19 years of abuse and difficulty caused by her parents’ expectations.

Once she found this new reality, Andrea didn’t know if she can embrace it; she would be permanently distorted and locked in a spot where the impossible into it reality. She is torn between two instincts: yearning for her former, normal life or staying in this supernatural world. 

Andrea now has to embark on a life-changing adventure. She’s about to ride an emotional and situational roller coaster and discover many ideals that she can apply to herself.

Will she return to her true life? Will she leave her imagined reality behind, or not?
              
“I will accept the repercussions since I wished for this!”

Prologue - 3/5
(This covers “Author’s Message and Story FAQ” to “Prologue”)
I’m not familiar with Tekken so I appreciate that you introduced me to its characters first. I also like the aesthetics and character designs you made, very unique and cute!

Like the book description, from the “author’s message” to “chapter 5” there are wordiness and grammatical errors (more on that in the “Grammar” section of this review). I followed the plot easily and although it’s cliche, I think it was executed alright. I was confused whether Andrea should be a protagonist I sympathize with or not. I think you’re trying to go for the former, but the way she treated the old registrar made me feel otherwise.

I suggest you make the transition of Andrea’s parents abusing her to her comforting herself more realistic. You can do this by adding a scene where Andrea cries and thinks self-deprecating thoughts, basically a depressive episode/mental breakdown.

Plot - 9/20

For Chapter 1, I like how you detailed the life and mannerisms found in Tokyo, Japan! It helped me get my bearings after the sudden change of worlds. I also liked how you ended on a  cliffhanger with Bryan Fury. I would’ve liked to see more on why Sanu was so trusting and generous to Andrea, and how he feels as someone who is self-aware that he’s just in a “fictional world.”

Chapter 2 was alright, I wished I saw more fighting between Andrea, Bryan and Bob so I could see more of Andrea’s extensive knowledge on Tekken put into action. I feel like the conversations between Andrea and Bob were a bit rigid, by which I mean, it felt like Bob was just a plot device for us to get to know Andrea more. You can change the dialogue and add more mannerisms (i.e. hand gestures, his favorite food and shops) to show more of Bob’s personality.

Chapter 3 just repeated what we already know, Andrea’s backstory and knowledge of the Tekken universe, so it felt a bit boring. I also don’t understand why Lei would broadcast an interview with her - I imagine that, following a realistic policeman, the interrogation would be private and broadcasted only if Andrea is put on trial. Also, why would Andrea need to be taken into custody? Sanu already did, so I find this very confusing. Is she seen as a threat to Tokyo? A very valuable asset that needs to be protected?

Chapter 4 also has the same things up for improvement as the 3 before. Confusing logic that leads to plot holes, rigid dialogue that feels more like lore-dump than moving the story, and repetitiveness. The advice I highly recommend for you is to show, not tell.

I liked Chapter 5 the most. I like the sparring scene between Andrea and Lei, worldbuilding on the politics of Tokyo, and learned a new side to Andrea about her fears of falling in love. It was well-balanced!

For all the chapters, I felt there was a lack of conflict. There was the one with Andrea vs. her parents, but this was easily resolved. Try to add a strong difficulty Andrea has to face. If you have, make its presence more known.

Characters - 7/10

Since this is a fanfiction I won’t be critiquing the Tekken characters’ personalities, and I myself am not too familiar with Tekken so I can’t say if the characters are portrayed accurately. However, I will say that I feel you should show their personalities more.

I will take about the main character, Andrea Alcantara. I wasn’t able to sympathize with her and I think it’s because, firstly, she doesn’t have too many flaws. She can adjust to her new dimension easily, all the good characters side with her immediately, she can learn martial arts perfectly in just 2 weeks and it’s shown that she’s honest, brave, smart in the Tekken universe and very determined. But what of her weaknesses? I would’ve liked to see her extensive Tekken knowledge get her in trouble. I want to see her weaknesses (ex. impatience) make her vulnerable.

Pacing - 5/7
Most of the time the scenes play out in a reasonable way that keeps me invested in the plot, but sometimes it slows down because of repetitive scenes and unnecessary dialogue.

Enjoyment - 3/7
I see the potential and the plot in itself is very interesting; you just need to improve some things in the grammatical/formatting aspect to make the story easier to read and make the plot more reasonable and engaging.

Writing technique - 6/10

The 3rd perspective is a great choice for this fanfiction and I like that, when Andrea was transported to Japan, you wrote some Japanese dialect to immerse me in this country! You are very detailed with describing the characters’ appearances, especially their outfits, and I suggest you tone it down on the outfit part. It can be lengthy and boring to read. I hope you can put this same level of detail into describing the settings (more on that later).

I didn’t see much use of metaphors or other figures of speech (ex. Irony, humor, exaggeration) and I recommend you add more of these. Also, as I stated with Bob, I suggest you rewrite your dialogue to show more of each characters’ personalities and show more of their mannerisms. The dialogue feels rigid and I believe you should show more, and not tell, that Andrea knows Tekken very well. For example, show her dodging a character’s moves perfectly and astounding them!

Seeing as this story is targetted for Tekken fans, you may ignore this advice because I myself don’t apply it to my fanfictions (fans automatically know what the characters/settings look like, you see). However, I do think it’s valuable if one day you’ll write an original story: you should describe the settings more. For example, you wrote “She was in the evening scenery of another country, full of buildings with lights and many people walking on the streets.” Detail these topics more. What does the night sky look like? What shops are inside the buildings? What do the people look like? What are the noises she hears? What about the vehicles that pass by?

Personally, I found the dialogue being written in bold font distracting. I prefer if it’s just in normal plain font for easier reading and to follow standard practice.

Grammar/spelling/vocab - 5/10

Your spelling is great and your vocabulary is good!  I only had a bit of a hard time reading the story.

I understand that English is not your first language, so I highly recommend you input your book into Google Docs to have your grammar checked. When I say your story has “wordiness”, I mean that there are a lot of filler words that are unnecessary and should be removed. What’s tricky about this is that “wordiness” can only be fixed by intuition, programs like Google Docs usually can’t solve it. So I suggest you have a friend/peer who speaks English very fluently to read your book and give their thoughts.

Here are some other suggestions:
Throughout the book you refer to Andrea with the antecedent “Filipina lady”, “young adolescent lady” or “which is awkward and repetitive. I suggest you just refer to her as “Filipina” and use that antecedent sparingly - use “she/her” pronouns in its place.
Similar to the previous point, don’t use lengthy antecedents such as “brown-haired man” or “Japanese girl”. Refer to the characters by their names and pronouns.
Remove filler words like “just, basically, seriously” etc. This helps alleviate wordiness, as I mentioned before
Format your paragraphs using TiP ToP (change paragraph when you change time, person, topic and place)

Overall - 49.5/84

To put it all together: the book cover is great, just needs a slight adjustment. Your title is perfect. Your pacing is alright as well! You should look into your grammar and formatting and avoid wordiness; you could use more figures of speech. Your dialogue and characterization could be improved, and there are some things I suggest you look into as regards to the plot.

Thank you SO much for being patient with me. I can see your passion for Tekken and I’m sure you enjoyed writing your story, so keep it up, and I hope this review will help you in doing so!