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Warning: The below contains SMASHING!
I have been recruited by the all-smasher himself to take on this story by imaginativeowl!
The story is about 9 chapters long as of this point, so it is still relatively short. I will be taking that into account.
TLDR - A soap drama/slice-of-life fanfiction where everyone seems bi and everyone is sleeping with everybody.
Main Characters - semi-smashing - The two main characters, Zon and Saifah, are excellent. Individually their philosophy in life is explored in-depth, changes over the journey as they evolve, and clash as to create chemistry, contrast, and necessary change. They are opposite in several ways that offer each other what they need to further develop themselves. There is clear attraction between them, and they are humorous together with clear chemistry. They do not get super dramatic or have life-altering moments like most stories but they have a simple slice-of-life pace to their day to day life. They are, for the most part, amazingly human and multi-dimensional. They have humor, angst, depression, and crushes. I hope they will continue to expand further dimensionally into proper anger and yet more sides of themselves. They are extremely flawed with being hypocritical, selfish, cheating, and liars, yet it is not in such a way as to be villainous, but sad because it all stems from a dark depressed place they are trying to work themselves out of.
Side Characters - semi-smashing - The only side character I didn't like was Zen, and that is mostly because of his name. Stick zon and zen in the same room and it gets messy to keep from confusing zon with zen from zod with zim and zak. Beyond his name then I quite liked Zen. Despite the stories attempts to portray various characters as evil or villanous or scheming, I really found them, when considered carefully, to be no better or worse than the MCs. This is credit to the POVs that from certain points of views can be reached but also not quite accurate when presented with the facts, yet without the story being contradictory. There is a good number of side characters and they play an active role in the MCs lives. There is a bit of confusion early on, mostly chapter one, because by nature of fanfictions you may not have the slightest clue who people are and their respective backgrounds. This did affect me, but not near as much as expected past chapter 1 as what is relevant was revealed and I never had further questions or found anything confusing.
grammar - Smashing - No issues. Read smoothly.
World Building - Semi-Smashing - The world building is largely done within the scope of the MCs and SCs. This is proper for a romance with a tightly written narrative like this. You dont need to know that it is Japan or Russia or what laws there are or what the Taliban did next. None of that affects the scope here. The world building flows with them, both bringing plot of its own and being affected by them and growing dynamically as the story progresses.
Plot - Smashing! - Despite being a story that is only 8-9 chapters long, it is a very fast paced plot in its own way because of its nature to be character-first. It is philosophy, healing, trying to come to terms with things, and romance and friendship. So even the scenes that are slice-of-life, which normally don't push the story much if at all, actually do the reverse in progressing the story quickly as you can actively feel they are trying to heal as people and come to terms with life. The chapters are pretty long by normal standards so this also helps make it feel like it is a fast story because every chapter accomplishes something. Not much in the way of cliff-hangers, which normally drives you forward into the next chapter, but instead having the feeling that you have taken a step forward. There is a constant tension and sense of dread because of an incoming event, a wedding, that is presented in chapter 1 and is slightly pulled closer and closer with each incoming chapter. You don't know when it will arrive, but its affects on the MCs is heavy so as much as I want to say that their humor and slice-of-life is nice, it is a somewhat grey and depressive way that has a cloud always hanging over their head. In the same way that someone might laugh to keep from crying.
As far as a romance goes it fits quite well into the framework so it works smoothly. The only caveat to that is a slight twist. Normally the structure of romances is that the two will be put into a position against their will. This story pulls the opposite in making it purposeful via a relationship arrangement, then makes the arrangement itself keeping them from being more romantic against their will because they are afraid and don't know what they want and its all within a set of rules they agreed on. Combine this with the emphasis on healing, then this story can handle multiple things. It can be of two friends healing and finding others, or come together in the end. There is equal ability for both because of their flaws but also their chemistry and you know what? Neither would be wrong or bad because they are already jut as much best friends as they are lovers.
I was hesitant going in because I do not consider stories of horny people just screwing each other constantly to be romance. But this story successfully pulled it off with them having real chemistry right from the start, humor, attraction, and while they are a pair of horny bastards, it is actually emphasised more as them trying to heal and get over something in their lives. If anything they dont have sex until after the chemistry starts within what is written despite the fact that there is background information that they had already had a one-night-stand before the story.
Overall I'd rate it 4 smashing out of 5! It has potential for 5/5 because the story is good, but comes up slightly short. Not because the story has obvious flaws, but because it hasn't accomplished some necessary goals yet. This is natural with a story that is only 8-9 chapters long. The story needs a few things to really grow even further. 1) The MCs need to have an honest-to-god conflict. Not laugh it off. But be angry. Cry. have an actual problem with each other based either on their contradicting philosophy or mistakes.2) While the SCs are numerious, they are slightly flawed because there is not much 'cross polination' between them. The SCs are mostly confined to the one MC they know. Saifah met Zen and knows most of Zon's friends, and Zon met Saifah's roommate, I think..., but there is so many dynamics and potential here. Like Saifah clashing with Neo over Zon or Saifah's roommate embarassing Saifah telling Zon stories or other things to really bring these two worlds together.
I am sure these things are coming, the author seems to have a clear plan in mind and is pulling it off well, but I cannot in all fairness rate it based on what I think or predict may happen or its potential, but about what it is in its current stage.
I'm out with a smashing!
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If you are interested in learning to write, mastering the craft, want some really good reads, or just to chat and hang out with a mature group of adults, feel free to hit me up for a smashing discord book club that has lasted years.
