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The Drowned Girls

The Drowned Girls

By 

Reviewer: Grisha2610 

COVER AND BLURB

While the cover fits the story perfectly, it would look more attractive if you use something more fantastical and personalized. I would suggest asking a cover artist to ask for the design of an animated mermaid in the ocean from a graphic shop. Otherwise, the font and color of the text are absolutely fine.

Regarding the blurb, it is quite fitting for a short story. However, it does contain some grammatical mistakes. I would just like to suggest slight modifications-

'Claire sails in search of her brother only to discover that his ship has sunken. Now a storm strikes the sea and the sailors think it's because of having a woman on board. Join Claire to see what happens when she is surrounded by those who could not despise her more.'

GRAMMAR

Unfortunately, your grammatical mistakes interrupt the story quite often, especially in dialogues. First and foremost, I advise you to not capitalize all the letters of some of your dialogues. It does not match with your descriptions at all. You can indicate the anger in the sailors' words by putting an exclamation mark. You also forgot to add articles here and there (examples given in the inline comments). I observed this mistake in the first chapter's name, where it should be 'The Walk on the Plank'. One more thing I noticed was how you wrote 'off' as 'of'. I have given you examples in the comments regarding what to put where. Also,

PLOT

*Note that I will go chapter-by-chapter and give a conclusion at the very end of the review when describing the plot

CHAPTER-1

The first chapter was very thrilling. I loved the dynamic created between the sailors and Claire, and how the whole background for this action-packed chapter is the hatred of sailors,s towards her for being a woman. It borrows this concept from other mythologies and I think you have enacted it in the story appropriately. I just wish that the chapter also had more about the relationship with her father. One more suggestion of mine would be to have a chapter before this that shows her search for her brother in the sea and the end being her caught by the sailors as a cliffhanger. In that chapter you can tell more about her situation at home and create a more mysterious environment. It will still be a short story but make it a little more fleshed out.

CHAPTER-2

Although I like the thrilling aspect of the first chapter, I enjoy reading this one a lot more. It creates a cryptic and calming environment with great descriptions and matriarchal figures around the protagonist. Her transition is great and nicely complements the dark parts of the previous chapter. The only qualm I have with this chapter is that there is no mention of her brother's sunken ship anymore. Maybe show the sunken ship while she is drowning to just add an extra layer of sadness to her story. Then, you can move on to her being mentally saved by the mermaids and add some more dialogues here and there to make it more detailed.

DESCRIPTION

I like the descriptions you gave when it came to the sea. The vocabulary you used there was great and created vivid imagery in the reader's mind. I loved the first line of the second chapter-

'Water surprised Claire. She expected it to be icy and cold but it felt warm and embracing.'

It is quite oxymoronic and foreshadows her powers in the future. However, I would have liked to see more of these types of descriptions in the first chapter. You should add more metaphorical descriptions for Claire's surroundings when she is on the ship. Overall, I think you are very good at depicting nature and helping it visualize in the reader's mind.

FINAL THOUGHTS

In terms of plot, I like the concept of the story. It is kind of like the story of the Sirens but spun more positively. However, there are major gaps that need to be filled in to make the story flow better. I do think that Claire can be a little more dynamic in the first chapter. Her emotions can be expressed by more descriptions instead of her telling us what she is feeling. Overall, while I do get some enjoyment out of this short story, it needs to be better grammatically and fix some small plot holes.