Reviews 2.0

Dirty Little Secrets (riyamcyriac)

Reviewed by: riyamcyriac

Author: _rainynightslover

Cover:

I think the cover is very beautiful and well made. For a contemporary romance story, it seems accurate and nice to look at. I don't know if I would pick up the book if I just saw the cover though. It's nice to look at but doesn't pique my interest in the content of the story. I would re-read your story and look into what central themes are around it, and then pull an image that relates to that.

Title:

Dirty Little Secrets accurately fits the storyline and themes of the book. It fits and does interest me in picking up the book. It makes me ask the questions "what secrets? why are they dirty?"

Blurb:

I'm not a fan of excerpts at the beginning of the blurb because they don't tell the actual substance of stories. Honestly, I would completely cut it out if you're trying to achieve more of a professional look for the book. I would also look at the grammar and phrasing of your blurb. Your blurb is your selling point, so when you have grammar mistakes, the readers get the presumption that the whole book will be riddled with those mistakes.

I would also look at your verbiage and vocab. Every genre of books has a different style which attracts readers. For fantasy, it's high vocab and elevated phrasing, but for a contemporary romance that centers around rich kids, I would also use language dripping with elegance and refinery. Even if you don't think your audience like that, crazy rich and super intelligent doesn't promise much extravagance for your readers.

This is how I would write your blurb.

Luna Dinson decides to accept a spot at Van Buren University, a private university where only crazy rich and super intelligent people go. However, she discovers that Van Buren University is everything but normal. Among fancy balls, secrets whispered in the corridors and steamy love triangles, Luna's life will never be the same. Mid review check-in: Would you keep reading the story at this point.

Honestly, maybe not. I'll tell you why. The blurb didn't convince me that it would be something that's a fit for me. BUT, I believe that I must read the book to see if that theory is true, so here we go.

Prologue

From the first bat, I'm a little confused. It doesn't make sense how a private college (apparently the best in the world) would just send an acceptance letter to someone who didn't apply to it. Sure, I've heard of recruiting letters, which is realistic, but this only confused me and came off as a plot pusher, not something readers can relate with.

Second of all, I wanted to talk about location-verbiage consistency. Shown by the story, Luna lives in the US, yet she calls her Mom "mum". Mum is a very British/Australian things, and unless she's from there, it doesn't make sense. I also can't assume she's been there because her dad went to college in the US at VBU.

The writing isn't bad, but you rely a lot on telling us things rather than letting us experience them with Luna. You have created an atmosphere of suspense around the school and the mysterious boy, so it's compelling to read the next chapter.

Chapter 1

Luna's mixed feeling about going to a college where she knows nobody is very realistic. I'm a big sucker for realism in books, mostly in characters. She doesn't like people at her school but I mean...it isn't bad to have a familiar face.