Author: LilPegz19

Title of Work: Beyond the Barrier 

Package: Silver Egg Package

Reviewed: Prologue & Chapters 1-9

↢ ❦ ↣

4 out of 5

Your cover is really beautiful! I love how the blue and purple mesh well together. It really adds some mysticism to the cover and alerts me right away that this is a fantasy novel. The only critique I have is for the subtitle and perhaps the author name be in a clearer font because it's really difficult to read the subtitle. I think if the same font was used or perhaps a bit of a shadow so that it pops out against the slightly bright background, it would help make it pop like the title does.

2 out of 5

Your blurb does a good job of introducing the character, but I would recommend being mindful of the number of book-specific terms that are being introduced to the reader. When a reader first comes across their book, they look for things that will persuade them to give your book a chance. You have limited amount of space to persuade the reader. So it comes down to making difficult decisions. 

↣ For example, does the reader need to know who she's the daughter of? We already get the sense she's the daughter of the king because you've chosen to refer to her as "Princess Delilah". You can introduce her family in the story.

↣ Your blurb switches between past and present tense. I would go through and ensure you are using one tense through the blurb so that it's not difficult to understand and to increase the flow of the summary. For example: She knows that she is the one who can unite the two races. However, her father warned her to stay away from them, or she'll pay a fatal price. 

Your blurb would definitely see a vast improvement if you avoided switching between tenses and eliminate information that's not really necessary to include in the blurb. It would also be beneficial for you to fill in those gaps so that we can understand what's at stake. I don't understand what the stakes are, what the real conflict is, and what the consequences are if she doesn't succeed in uniting the two races. Think of it along this framework: [character] has to [action A] in order to [resolution].

1 out of 5

I felt the prologue wasn't strong enough to capture my interest. There's nothing in the prologue that inspires me. I want to know what makes this different from other fantasy novels. I think part of what hurt your opening hook was the constant switching between tenses, the use of second person, and the amount of info-dumping.

You have time to introduce your fantasy world to your readers! Take your time and deliver it bit by bit. I can see you're trying to generate a bit of mystery and trying to foreshadow a potential conflict, but that conflict isn't abundantly clear and that's what hurts your prologue (and ultimately your blurb as mentioned previously).

Prologues are meant to be a preface. They can serve as an introduction to the characters or to the potential conflict. I couldn't see that here. I think some ways to resolve this is to show it to the readers with a scene or eliminate this chapter altogether. I don't think it's benefiting you to keep it in otherwise.

5 out of 10

As previously mentioned, the Prologue doesn't really contribute to the story well. It causes a lag in the story and doesn't motivate me to become invested in the story.

I thought the plot was easy to follow along for the most part, but most of fell really flat. I think there needed to be more going on to keep my attention. As I mention later on, I enjoyed the scenes that revolved around the Queen because it was something new and fresh.

5 out of 10

I wanted to like Delilah,  but I struggled because I feel as though I don't quite know her yet. There wasn't a range of emotions given and it felt like the tone remained stagnant throughout the chapters I read. I wanted to know more about her, to see more of her personality, more of her emotions. You have a great start by incorporating her thoughts, but I think if you added a bit of body language or provided more emotions, I would be more committed to connecting with her.

I felt more interested in the Queen's story because there is a lot of heartache there. I think what sells me on her character more than Delilah's is because of the complexity of emotions. We get to see things from different perspectives and it's not just one emotion.

I did like the introduction of Lucian because your descriptions were absolutely beautiful! I was a little confused with Delilah's attitude towards him. Does she love him but doesn't want to admit it? Or does she not want to allow herself to love him because of her duties? It became a confusing because of how cold she was to him. And her reason for rejecting him made it unclear. Does he pressure her to feel something she doesn't feel? Or that she thinks she can't feel? I think if you make the distinction clear, it'll help make this scene stronger.

6 out of 10

I appreciated that you gave a lot of thought to your fantasy world, but there were multiple times in which I felt there was too much of an info-dump that it generated too much distraction from the story. For example, is there a way to cut back the information about the Elysium to keep the description short? Do we need to know about the barrier shortly after that? Or is there a way for you to introduce that with the addition of another scene so that it's not a lot of information at once?

I would have liked to see a bit more active magic (that is, magic used in fights because I liked the training scene) and perhaps it'll come later! 

I like that you weave in their wings so fluidly like it's a natural part of life. I just wish there was a bit more action. And I thought it was interesting that you provided them with telepathy.

 7 out of 10

I really liked your descriptions. You have a great range of vocabulary, though there were times when I felt it was a little bit too much. For example, do we need to know the full appearance of Madame Athena? Is she an important character? When you have side characters, they don't need to be given the same amount of attention as the main characters. Usually 1-2 short sentences will suffice because we won't see them as often as the main characters.

In terms of setting description, I would have liked a little bit more in the earlier chapters. For example, in Chapter 1, what do the training halls look like? There's not much to visualize. I think if you scale back a bit on the character description and apply that same level of detail to the setting, it would be good.

4 out of 10

The dialogue felt unnatural for the most part. I think it has to do with inconsistent usage of contractions and just general tone that's being portrayed to the reader. One thing to help with this is to read your work out loud. If it sounds awkward or makes you uncomfortable, you might consider rephrasing some lines so that they sound like a conversation that would occur between two people.

I also didn't get a sense of dynamic emotions when I read conversations between characters. I think the dialogue that sounded the most unnatural was between the king and the Delilah. And like I previously mentioned, I think you could remedy this if you read these lines out loud and put yourself in your character's shoes.

I did want to mention that it seemed to improve more as the story went on, particularly with the interaction between Delilah and her mother because I got more than one emotion and the scene felt more dynamic rather than dull/static.

2 out of 10

Overall

↣ I think for the character thoughts, it would be beneficial to choose single quotations (' ') or italics instead of using both. After you pick one, ensure that it maintains this formatting throughout the story.

Prologue

↣ If you decide to keep this prologue or rework it, I think it would be helpful to consider using contractions. It reads unnaturally without it, so consider contracting "it is" to "it's."

↣ It's jarring to have the first half of the prologue begin in second person and then have the rest of the chapter told from a third person POV. I think it might be useful to keep one over the other.

Chapter 1

↣ In the first paragraph, I would recommend being mindful of passive voice. This would mean to eliminate "were" and "was" where necessary because then it starts migrating into telling rather than showing. Ensure that you are correcting this throughout the story.

↣ With the first line of dialogue, I recommend keeping the dialogue with the following paragraph because it belongs to the same person. Separating it can be confusing (long-term) and cause the reader to become lost in the dialogue as they may not know who's saying the line. Ensure that you are correcting this throughout the story.

↣ When you are describing the Elysium, you've switched to present tense and the chapter appears to be mostly in past tense.

Chapter 2

↣ Is there a word missing before this phrase "king of the jungle"?

↣ Is there a way to rephrase this? It's awkwardly phrased: "I and my army need to ride out..." Perhaps "The army and I must ride to the Damni border."

↣ The first letter of the word following the dialogue is mistakenly capitalized: "Delilah," Her father called out to her...

↣ This phrase is awkwardly worded: "...give them faith in us." 

↣ The first letter of the word following the dialogue needs to be connected to the dialogue: "I'll be right there, thank you." She said... should become "I'll be right there, thank you," she said. Ensure that you are correcting this throughout the story.

Chapter 3

↣ This sentence should be capitalized: he smiled.

↣ Should the 'm' be capitalized in "Your majesty?" a servant called.

↣ I haven't been checking to see what English you are using in your writing, but did you mean to spell sceptics with a 'c' or a 'k'? It depends on what English writing system you're using. It may be worthwhile to check throughout the story to ensure you're using the same system.

Chapter 4

↣ I noticed that the 'm' in "mother" is not always capitalized in dialogue. Is this intentional?

↣ It seems awkward for her father to refer by her mother's name when we already know her mother's name. It comes off as a bit redundant: "Your mother, Seraphina, was a wonderful woman..." Perhaps you could remove "Seraphina"? Do we need to hear her name again?

↣ A comma is needed after "please" so it falls before "Eda": "come and read to me, please Eda?"

Chapter 5

↣ The dashes in the beginning of the chapter appear to be different than the ones you previously used. I would recommend changing it so it's consistent throughout the story.

↣ Why does Delilah refer to her mother as "Seraphina"? Wouldn't make sense for her to continue to refer to her as "Mother" as she has been thus far?

Chapter 7

↣ Is it necessary to refer her as the "Princess" or "Heiress" when we already know her name? "....even the Princess could see a pinkish tint on her cheeks..." It seems unnatural otherwise.

Please note that the errors I've noted above are not all the errors that are throughout these first ten chapters and I'm not a professional editor. I only mentioned the errors I noticed immediately.

5 out of 10

I think you've got a good start here. You seem to have a lot of your world building well thought out, but I think if you scale back on explaining things, it won't appear as much of an infodump or detract from the story. Remember, you don't have to include everything you've built into the story before the ending. You can do it bit by bit throughout the story or over the course of a series (if you choose to go that route). A lot of writers ask me "how much is too much?" There's not really a definitive answer for this. But, I think if you're providing more information other than what something is, then it's too much information. For example, when you talk about the magic skill of telepathy. Do we need to know what the royals use it for? That information isn't really essential to the reader and it can derail the story.

World building can be an extension of setting description, so ensure you have a balance of description, narration, and dialogue so they don't overpower one another. You might set yourself a line limit. As previously mentioned, side characters don't really need much description because the focus isn't on them. Simply 1-2 lines will suffice for them. 

Another thing that would have improved my enjoyment of the story would be proofreading your work to smooth out those grammatical and formatting errors. Correcting those would be a great start and would definitely raise your story's quality significantly. Some ways to do this would be through Pro Writing Aid or Grammarly (through their free services, not their membership plans if you don't want to pay) or Google Docs and Microsoft Word.

Another difficult decision you have to make is how you want to include your prologue. As it stands, your prologue is holding your story back and preventing it from being the best it can possibly be. Consider reframing it so it starts with a scene (it will eliminate telling the reader what's happened or what will happen).

As I always tell my clients, this isn't to say it wasn't a great story. Everyone always has something they need to work on, so don't take the low scores to heart. No one ever has a perfect story, it takes a few helpful people and an author's ambition to get it to where they want to be. So, don't be afraid to make mistakes or ask yourself questions when you come to those difficult decisions. I do hope you take my suggestions into consideration because I think it would really help elevate your story.

You don't have to apply all of my suggestions, but I tried to give as many examples and ask as many questions as I could to help you brainstorm about what could have been done better. I wish you the best of luck in your writing endeavors!

~ Wera

↢ ❦ ↣

Thank you for applying to receive one of my reviews! I hope you found this review helpful!

Please consider this chapter as confirmation of completion of the payment for this package.

If you have any questions about any part of this review, please leave an in-line comment and tag wera_nyooms in your comment.