Reviews : a book where I try to review other books

8 | Silently Loving You

By:

First Impression:

Despite being mentioned to be a fanfic, I still looked forward for it to be good. Truthfully, the expectations for fanfics have lowered, it's inevitable, and sadly my expectations were not reached I supposed. 

I did like how I don't necessarily need to know the material the fanfic is based off of since it's its own story but I have a few things to say about the plot and etc. 

Pacing: 

I kinda thought the first chapter went by too fast and too much was happening in one chapter. You could always go to the cliche route where you have a prologue with the characters as children. It's a cliche, yes, but nothing wrong with cliches honestly as long as it's not overdone in a story. 

I think the moments go too fast and we don't take much time to establish the place, the life of the main characters and also the moments where it should have more thoughts [E.g; when Xiali meets Yangyang again, the creep thing, etc]

Plot:

I have a guess that Ten is the one in love with Xiali because of the title and how you ended chapter 3 which is actually pretty good, I just hoped we took more time to establish the relationship of Yangyang and Xiali first and his relationship with the other guys. 

Another thing was the entire "we're actually a gang." reveal. In my opinion they're not really a gang, they're just a bunch college dudes who can fight. So I guess they can call themselves, defenders or just a group. 

I would suggest for them to keep the entire gang thing a secret, keep it as a revel for later chapters but hint it as they are introduced. [Toned bodies, training/fighting equipment in their dorm, bruises or fresh wounds on their bodies from previous fights.]

It could be better that way and can be a way to keep the story interesting with the build up to the reveal or them trying to hide the fact they're a gang when they try to protect Xiangli and she grow suspicious. 

Characters:

Since this is a fanfic, I'm not sure if the characters are accurate to the people it's based on and I think Xiangli is an OC so I have not much to say but perhaps tweak their descriptions and spend more time working on their dynamics.

Descriptions:

Could use some work. You tend to skip over certain things like the setting of the scene, details of what the character might notice in that moment. Descriptions of the characters, the locations, or maybe even the weather or day. 

Details are useful to make the locations feel more real and also make more room for actions for the characters to do. If you have a character roam around a room and describe the things there, it will help expand the locations in the book and also establish characteristics of the characters. 

Maybe someone sees an uncapped deodorant on the floor near a clearly smelly gym sock. Or they find a pan laying carefully on top of a stack full of plates in the sink. Or they find a lint roller in the couch and no dust was found [Then the character apologizes for having not cleaned the room ] Or maybe they have an interesting choice of furniture and decorating style. 

Further details could be eye catching elements of things, [Loud objects, seemingly creepy objects, colorful objects, and anything relatively out of the ordinary in the scene]

Dialogue:

They seem really natural and that's great1 

Is it compelling:

In a reader who's searching for fanfics like this one perspective, I would say not really. 

Fanfic is a very broad genre I suppose. So many people have written similar tropes just in different writing style or in different fandoms. And if the reader was an avid fanfic reader, I suppose the story would come off as generic.

It felt generic to me, and I don't read fanfic as often as I used to. 

Perhaps add more surprising elements, have the main character stand out more, make the story more exciting. 

But don't change it completely, I didn't say that, just tweak it a bit and enhance it too. 

Overall experience as a reader:

It was alright. I can say this book has potential to be more of a rom-com,  high school k-drama, type of book than a plain romance. 

There are so many things you can expand on like, the gang secret thing, or maybe college struggles, the two friends trying to reconnect after long distance, and more. 

I may have mentioned things you've already so if I have then ignore them. Reminder, these are all simply suggestions, in no shape or form am I implying your book is bad, just needs more work. 

Anyway, I hope this didn't come off as rude and at least helped you in some way. Have a good day/night, Farewell!