Sapphire's Review Store 2.0

Review by Gnome: Kids Playing Soldiers

Title: Kids Playing Soldiers

Author: __A__Poets__Heart__

Reviewer: GnomeMercy

Summary: 4/5

While I think the quote you used is very nice, there is nothing else there. Since this is a story, it should have a proper description instead of just a quote. You have a synopsis chapter inside the book (which I'll talk about soon), but I suggest that is put in the description and not inside the story.

On the subject of the synopsis, I think it's lovely. It's so mysterious, but it's really interesting, too. The only sentences I found (that I thought was a bit informal—if I want to be nit-picky) was:

Wonderland suffered a great tragedy in a catastrophic situation caused by two fighting scientists. These scientists caused a disaster known as toxicus de mori nox. The death of the world, in a toxic night.

The problem here is that the first two sentences technically repeat itself. In a synopsis, you should only give enough information—anything more or extra isn't really needed. I suggest changing it to something along these lines:

Wonderland suffered a great tragedy known as toxicus de mori nox. The death of the world in—a toxic night.

This way, it's much more concise and clearer. (I put the em dash because I felt the comma looked a bit off.)

Another sentence I saw was this:

Red? 

Or

White?

I think it would be grammatically correct to write it like:

Red or white?

(Though I understand what you were trying to achieve with that.)

Overall, a lovely synopsis, but it would have been more impactful if it was outside of the book instead of inside (this is so people who are thinking of reading it have an idea of what the book is about).

Grammar: 3/5

Overall your grammar was mostly correct and it made your writing that much more clearer and easier to read! Well done!

However, there were some sentences that I believed were a bit too complex and were in need of other punctuation.

For example:

And so, in secret, with the world's government watching them, they built a system that created children with no emotions, no thoughts of their own, who grew faster, but lived longer, the perfect soldiers.

Firstly, there are quite a lot of commas used here. There is a lot of other punctuation you can use that are similar to commas. Brackets () and em/en dashes (—) (--) (–). Semicolons can be used as well—but they're different to commas and have their own set of rules. (Keep in mind that you can always end the sentence and start a new one, too.)

A simpler way to write this would be:

And so, in secret—with the world's government watching them—they built a system that created children with no emotions, no thoughts of their own. Children who grew faster, but lived longer; the perfect soldiers.

(Also, sometimes "Toxicus de Mori Nox" wasn't capitalised, so try to keep it consistent.) Also, the first sentence kind of contradicts itself. How can they build something in secret when they're being watched? I mean, it's possible, but it might need some more elaborating needed.