Astania Reviews

Kae | Dear Myrtle Cove

TITLE: Dear Myrtle Cove

AUTHOR: 

GENRE: Romance

CHAPTERS I'VE READ: Two

PAYMENT FOR YOU

• Follow me (if you so desire, not required).

• Tell me what you think in the comments.

• Choose any story of mine, reading half of what I've read for you, and leave comments.

This review details my opinion. At the end of the day, this is your story, and you know it better than anyone. My opinion is merely that, and it is subjective. I perceived it a certain way and you do not have to agree, since it mostly comes down to my preferences.

Plot + World

The plot follows Lainey, a headstrong woman who has been through a lot of awful experiences. She works at a diner, and cares for her mother. When her brother returns to her life and she meets King, her childhood friend, it seems like her past comes back to the surface, perhaps forcing her to make peace with it, or perhaps to allow her to forge a new path. Either way, I think this is a very solid concept, and I could tell a lot of work had gone into it, as every scene seems to be planned out to flow into the next, and there's a lot of major and minor details given to the reader about the characters, like Lainey's brother and the surrounding cast, as well as the setting, too. I think what hindered my reading experience the most was that a lot of the characters mentioned early on seem to not be relevant yet, except for Lainey, King, Lincoln, Declan, and Lainey's mother. Everyone else could probably come up later if they play a role in the plot; they seem to be mostly side characters, diner employees, or Lainey's other family members, who could probably be explained later. I felt like there were too many names, leading to some confusion. Ideally, as writers, we want to introduce only the characters of immediate importance in chapter one, and usually not more than a few at a time, because a reader will lose track pretty quickly. Since Lincoln does appear in chapter two, mentions of him are good to establish that he's important so that when he does show up, we know who he is. However, I don't think you need to tell us the names of the diner's employees just yet, so the reader's focus is kept on the characters who we absolutely need to remember as we continue, and the rest can be introduced properly later once they become more important. In general, I liked the way Lainey's normal life is introduced before she meets King, so that we get to see how she thinks and we understand her more.

As for the setting, most of what I read takes place in the diner, but there are a few details given to us here and there to help place us in your world, and I liked these a lot! I think the integration of setting details is something you're doing well, and this is really clear in the first few paragraphs of the first chapter: the setting is given to us, followed by what's important to Lainey (her missed phone calls), that serve to hook us as your readers. I think this is something you could use as a basis for including the backstory too, by moving it slowly throughout the story, and giving us the important scenes by having Lainey mention them first, while not immediately telling us what they mean. This way, a reader asks themselves why, wanting to know more.

Characters

Lainey: Lainey is clearly a character who has had to be strong through a lot of her life, and someone who has also dealt with a lot of trauma. Her narration comes off as a woman who's in self-preservation mode, and maybe she's even blocked out some of her past experiences, like how she doesn't remember King at first, in order to get by. I appreciated these details, and I think they're really important. I get a good sense of Lainey's character voice, especially when she discusses how she felt accepted by men/boys in the past. That moment felt like, to me, a central axis of her character: she craves acceptance, and yet she's afraid of it because of her past. It's very clear to me that as a writer, your idea of Lainey is developed, and everything about her past has been fleshed out. I did find some of this information a bit too much for the initial first chapters, so while I understand and acknowledge that these details are important to know her character's current state, (and I don't think you should do away with them), I think they'd be better off scattered throughout the story then given to the reader all at once. The information comes too quickly to truly process, and I think it's not doing Lainey justice right now, because the backstory is detailed between moments where I was trying to follow the narrative, and it felt like I had to backtrack and reread sections, losing the impact of the flashbacks and her recollections of her ex. Otherwise, I think her arc is set up to be very clear, and I feel for her as a character quite a bit.