Project Athena | Reviews

Dungeon (Nadia)

Author: Ablazeisaleo

Genre: Mystery/Thriller

Reviewer: SardonicBeauty

Dungeon is a Mystery/Thriller book that revolves around the life of Bryan Adams and the deep mysteries that revolve around his life and his past.

The story starts strong with the main protagonist, Bryan Adams experiencing a nightmare. The description of the nightmare was portrayed wonderfully. It sets a dark and ominous tone to the story, along with a questioning direction for the readers; what happened with Bryan's father, and what was the contents that drove his father to incidents that followed in the dream.

In the first chapter, it is readily set that Bryan is an orphan and his hate for the justice system is very prominent, which sets a very strong foundation for many directions in which the plot can move towards. His lack of social life is very prominent as well, which again works towards the mysteries that surround him.

The way this book words the scenario is a treat to read. The constant tug between the dream and the incidents that are happening in reality paired with how Bryan deals with things add to the richness of the story.

The story is well-paced and written in a good manner, but here are some things that I noticed.

Firstly, the descriptions are done wonderfully, but it feels robotic. The dream Bryan has is a vivid one, yet as we, the readers get introduced to him after he has the dream seems almost alright. Rather than writing, "his breaths ragged and labored", show that.

A great way of doing that is by adding sensory details.

For example; "Each inhale was a struggle to him, a coil warped around his throat as he struggled to let air inside his lungs but to no avail, the remnants of dream was a reminder of what had happened, it wasn't just a dream, it was a reality which he had lived. The thought made the coil wrap around his throat tighter, and his lungs expanded in an empty reach for air"

This is just a way you can make us feel what Bryan felt after the nightmare, rather than just writing. After reading it, I feel no connection to Bryan, I feel bad but that is it. When you are starting that strong with a chapter, it will be more impactful if you make the readers grow a personal attachment to the protagonist, which will lead the readers to feel more emotions as things take place in the later chapter.

Few descriptions feel very much AI-generated, one of the reasons being they lack the emotional touch or perception of how a human feels during certain events and things.

For example the lines; "...offering a fragile smile..." add a touch of pain, which makes the reading more human and less robotic.

In some places, the descriptions are long and hard to comprehend when read together, I will suggest that you break them into smaller paragraphs of 1-2 lines.

For example, in the second chapter, "The walls of his cramped living room...fresh coffee" this paragraph is mouthy and gets hard to decipher and picture what is being described here.

A good way of dealing with that is, to make the paragraphs shorter and the descriptions more clean and easy to understand.

Second, cliffhanger. The first chapter is ended with one, to make it more investing, rather than hinting that later the phone lit up with a text or something similar, simply write something that shows, that Bryan's phone was sitting innocently on the as he looked at the time or something along the lines.

Then add the part, "...he couldn't shake the feeling..." and end the chapter with him looking at the phone. That is it. Don't give readers a clue as to what happens with the phone this will make the readers more interested to see what happens in the following chapters.

Third, the use of words and phrases. In many places, you have used words and phrases which does not go well or do not go at all with what you are trying to portray.

For example, in one place you have used the phrase "foam on the beach" where rather than that, "waves on the ocean bed" or something along those lines would sound and describe the situation better.

Another, "the ambiance went silent", here the word ambient does not go very well with the situation, rather than ambiance, a simple line like "everything went silent" will go much better.

In one place you have used reckless, " reckless of the outside world", again the same issue, the word reckless does not go here.

On an overall view, the start of the first chapter was really good, but in the chapters that followed, the structure of the writing lacked consistency. Whenever it comes to showing any emotion from Bryan's side it is either italic or it looks very loud and disruptive which again, can be relatable as he is a 17-year-old, but it can be shown well with more precision in your writing.

Another thing, complicated or unique words do not make for a good piece of writing, in some places simple lines or words would be the best to use to express, there is a healthy balance between them and with editing and a little more research, I think you will do well on that.

Overall, I will give this book a 4 star out of 5. It has lots of potential and is a really fun read.