TCR Reviews [Closed]

1| Throne of Dragonix

Requester Baqkns 

Reviewer WriterofStarlight 

Title & Blurb:

The title fits the story's theme and gives the reader a good insight into the plot without giving anything away.

The blurb is a bit long and wordy. There's a lot of good information in there, but it needs to be consolidated if you want readers to take the time to read it.

Creativity:

The worldbuilding is incredible; there is so much detail and depth in everything! You even took the time to describe how different cultures interact with others and how that's changed with time, such as dragons spending their childhoods with other species.

You've done a great job of setting up the magic system as well. The way you wrote Iian's power in the second chapter gave me chills, and every description of magic usage after that was just as amazing. I felt it was particularly interesting how someone's mastery of their magic, or Arts, changes the way they age.

My one note here is that, while it's important to sprinkle bits of worldbuilding into the writing, there are a few aspects of it that should be established at the beginning. For example, the Unrecorded's history would be helpful to know more about at the start. Bringing it up earlier in the story would help establish why Iian is so shocked when her father talks to her about his plans, and could help the reader understand why Bloom is so important. The prologue sets up Bloom as a character, but it doesn't cover the tale itself, so the reader doesn't have that same emotional connection to Bloom that Iian or her father does. If you feel like that disrupts the flow of your story, I'd suggest making a note at the beginning to look at the glossary or bring the glossary chapter forward, right after your Achievements page.

Characters:

This story has a lot of characters, and all of them are solidly written. Iian's desire to save her friend is conveyed right away, Ignia's fury and desperation paint a vivid picture, and the Grand Aide's thoughts were particularly interesting to explore at times.

My favorite character, however, is Dragneel Bloom. She's established as the main character, and honestly one of the best-written I've had the pleasure of coming across. She's powerful, but not invincible; snarky, but not rash. Everything she does is calculated and planned, but she has a talent for improvising when needed. I loved her interactions with everyone, especially Iian.

Story Sequence & Pacing:

While the book is generally well-paced and keeps the reader's attention, there are several points where you explain the same thing over and over in several paragraphs when it can be consolidated into one. This improves as the story goes on, so I think it's a matter of going back and rewriting it so that it's more concise. That being said, your action scenes are gripping and the scene descriptions are beautifully woven.

Grammar:

The story is generally easy to understand, but there are several places where some editing would be beneficial. The main errors I found are incorrect/missing punctuations, misspellings/words out of place, several repeated words in a small number of sentences, and tense confusion.

I would suggest using a program like Grammarly to gauge your writing. It won't catch everything, but it can help you recognize a lot of those little errors without you having to go searching. Editing isn't really a big deal in the first draft or two, so if that's where you're at with the story, I wouldn't stress about it too much until later drafts.

Overall:

This is an incredible story! With some rewriting and editing, I honestly feel like it could be on par with professionally-written books. The worldbuilding and characters are brilliantly written, truly immersing the reader from the moment they click on this book.