The Reader's POV: Review Book {CLOSED}

Shock Waves ☆ DNA

Author: abbyapple9878

Reviewer: _DNA_732

Chapters reviewed: 10

1.YOUR COVER:
A cover is supposed to provide a glimpse into what a story is about, even before one reads the blurb. That's how much importance a cover has. It reveals the genre of the story, which is exactly why we tend to "judge a book by its cover".

Your cover has achieved that. It doesn't mislead the readers in any way, and the two hands wielding electricity gives a pretty obvious idea of what the book is about. Not to mention that the aesthetic is so appealing. And I'm not just talking about the cover here. Every graphic in your book is beautiful. I loved it.

Your tagline, however, seems a bit too common.
"A story about hardships, strength and love".
If you think about it, most stories on Wattpad are based on this very sentence. If you need to bring in more readers, I suggest coming up with a much more gripping tagline.

2.YOUR BLURB:
To be honest, I don't have anything too negative to say about your blurb. It's short, reveals the basic gist of the story and makes us curious about what's going to happen next in the story.

Though I did notice something. You've mentioned that Mia and her family are forced to move to San Francisco. However, in the first chapter of your book, you've written LA instead of San Francisco. This isn't a major flaw, but it sort of gives away that you haven't done any proofreading yet. I know this is only your first draft, but it's always better to edit out your mistakes as much as possible before publishing it.

3. YOUR WRITING STYLE:
Every writer has a style of their own while writing, and though it took you some time to get to that phase, you have come a long way from the first chapter of your story, literally and figuratively.

First of all, your prologue. As far as I've understood, and this is just my opinion, a prologue is something that provides us with a clue as to what's about to happen later in the story. It's supposed to incite a reader's curiosity and is supposed to make them excited to start reading the story. Yours unfortunately, don't qualify any of those points, it was more of an introduction to the story than a prologue. How about turning it into chapter one instead?

Moving on to chapter one, try to begin the chapter with anything other than waking up to an alarm. Seriously, it's one of the most clichéd ways to start a chapter, trust me, I know, because I find myself doing this almost everywhere. A friend of mine has already written an entire paragraph on this, so I won't repeat that again.😉

It gets better from there. By the fifth chapter, your writing has gotten a lot, lot better. There were only small errors, like the part where Bella and Mia have a conversation on Blake, you wrote that they had been speaking for a long time, when they had only spoken a few sentences, which could account to barely a minute. That should be settled with some proofreading.

4.GRAMMATICAL ERRORS/ TYPOS:
Plenty. Which is expected because it's only the first draft. I hope you change it up in your second draft. But it's always better if you edit it once before publishing the chapter.

Once again, it gets better after the first few chapters. But if you don't want to ruin the first impression of your book, an intense editing session is recommended.

5. PLOT DEVELOPMENT:
I've read ten chapters already, and by this time, your plot should've started to gain some speed. But Mia is still honing her skills and recovering from her injuries, and multiple times too, which has made the plot sort of monotonous and slow-paced.

At the same time, the beginning (Chapter one) seemed a bit rushed, so many events occurred in the same chapter. This might've been because you merged your first three chapters into one.

Either ways, make your plot a bit more consistent.

There were also some plot holes, for instance, Michael Payson readily agreeing to help Mia to develop her powers, when he just met her, sounds a little bit far fetched. However, if this has any connection with the plot, it's alright. Even then, try making Mia a little wary of his generosity.

6.CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT:
Impulsive is the first word that comes to my mind when I think of Mia. She makes her decisions on a whim, which has been the root cause for many of her problems. I'm curious to see how her character arc is going to change in the future chapters. I won't comment much here, because you know much more about her than I do, obviously.

Blake, on the other hand is, dare I say it, a hot guy. You got me with his eyes, sis. He's cocky and considerate at the same time. However, he changes moods so fast, that it almost makes him seem bipolar. Just make his personality a bit more constant, and that could be made better. Of course, he's perfect just the way he is as well.

Tori. I cannot end this review without talking about her. She's the fictional incarnation of every single teenager out there, if you'll excuse the popularity part. I loved her! Don't you dare change her up for anything in this world. There couldn't be a better sister duo than Mia and Victoria.

FINAL IMPRESSION:
Though it had a few troubles in the beginning, your book got better by the time I was done reading the designated number of chapters. Mia and Tori's relationship, the awkward yet funny chemistry between her and Blake, and her enthusiasm for taking on anything that life offered her hit a little more closer to home than I thought. I am definitely going to finish reading this book. You've sparked my curiosity! Just try changing up whatever I've pointed out, and you should be good.

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If you've got any questions, PM me on my account. Any suggestions to improve my reviewing are welcome!

Deena :)