Title: Kingsblade
Author: sarahsarasarita

Description:
[ONGOING: New Chapters Every Sunday] Kingsblade. Rise of the Raven Queen. Her kingdom is in ashes. She's supposed to save it, but there's one problem. She doesn't remember she's the queen. She doesn't remember anything at all. With war looming on the horizon, it's a race against time as Leyrl Karanor, the sole heir to the throne of Áerlas, fights to untangle the truth about her past. Her search will reveal dark secrets about the Order she swore an oath to protect that may shatter what little faith she has left in herself... and her people. Praise for Kingsblade: 🥇 FIRST PLACE IN FANTASY IN THE HUBBLE AWARDS (July 2020) 🥇 FIRST PLACE IN FANTASY IN THE LIBRA AWARDS (July 2020) 🥈 SECOND PLACE IN FANTASY IN THE COFFEE AFTER DARK CONTEST (July 2020) TOP THREE BLURBS IN THE FLIRTING WITH THIRTY SUMMER WRITING CONTEST (August 2020) 🥇FIRST PLACE IN THE WORLD CREATOR CONTEST (August 2020) 🥇FIRST PLACE IN FANTASY (HEAT TWO) IN THE EONIA AWARDS (Fall 2020) TOP FIVE IN THE JINXED JULY CONTEST "Why are you so good at this?!" - BlameSaiki, author of "Those Who Struggle" "This is so good; it feels like something that could be turned into a paperback or a hardcover someday." - agodnamedjupiter, author of "The Two of Us" "I'm obsessed with your way of writing." - fangirldesire, author of "A Letter to you" "Just take my vote!" - JordanJamesII, author of "A Kid Named Adult" "Oh damn, cliff hanger! You better not take too long to post the next part." - spelunkadunk, author of "The Claimed"

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Your title is intriguing, and definitely hints at the genre of your book. As a reader, I would look at this title and assume it to be a Fantasy novel. It feels like something that might be set in medieval times, or in a fantastical land.

Readers will move on to your summary with a sense of curiosity, wishing to learn more about the plot and setting of the story.

Your summary itself does a nice job of piquing this interest. Readers learn that the queen of this fantasy land may still be alive, but she does not know that she is the true ruler. Readers will want to know how these memories were lost, and they will be fascinated to learn the more intricate details of her past.

One thing I will say about your description: I stopped reading the praises partway through. I became disinterested after the first few.

I have rules about this sort of thing, even with published books. I don't like to see praises at the beginning of a summary, and I'm glad that  you did decide to put yours at the end.

Aside from this, I don't believe in putting in all awards that a story has won. Pick two or three of the best; for example, maybe only include the three most impressive first-place honors. That's it.

As for reader comments, pick the best one. If a reader left a mind-blowingly good review, or several, that's amazing! You, as an author, should be very excited and proud of that. It is enough for the reader to see one other person's praises for the book. Beyond that, they want the story to speak for itself.

As for the plot of your story, I found a mixture of praises and critiques to point out.

Your character development is quite good, particularly with Liliana and Leyrl. I'm avoiding spoilers here, but I can see who they are as characters. I'm sure that readers will begin to be invested in them early on, and that this interest will continue as they learn the connection between the pair.

I struggled with the time jumping, though. I liked it when I finally got to a stretch where I was staying in the present with Liliana for a couple of chapters. She was my favorite character, and I liked keeping up with her the most.

Time jumps aren't always a big deal to me, but significant time jumps while in the third person past tense? Not something I do well with.

I'm honestly not sure how to make this work; if you had just one of these sections, I would suggest a prologue similar to what you have now. But as you have multiple, I would suggest an edit. This might involve switching your tenses and/or the type of point of view you use.

I noticed that, several times, you started to switch to first person whilst narrating Liliana's chapters.

I almost would have preferred this for her; admittedly third person past is my least favorite point of view. I think it could work for the flashbacks, though, if you had Liliana's chapters in first person past or first person present. This could also make Liliana and Leyrl's connections more impactful for the readers; being in that moment when Liliana discovers the truth could bring us closer to her emotions as a character.

I think that the themes in your story are a nice touch. As someone who considers themselves to be Christian, I could see some ties to the religion as well as a version of God. I thought it was nice how you gave this fantastical world a culture and religion of sorts, showing how faith might appear in a mystical setting.

Alongside this, your grammar is quite good. Apart from the places where you started to switch point of view, I didn't find any major errors. This makes your story easy to read, and the chapter lengths were a little varied. This helped with pacing; long chapters every time would be boring, so I like that some of them were slightly shorter than others. I also found the word counts to be interesting. Sometimes, a five-thousand-word chapter surprised me, because the wording made it feel like it was moving more quickly than that.

These word counts definitely made me focus in on your language, and your wording is an asset to the story's pace and flow.

Over all, I think you have a promising plot and interesting characters. Your title is working well, and the majority of your summary also does its job. The time jumps and the type of narration add in some obstacles for the readers, but your captivating language and well-developed characters help to compensate for this. Your themes and plot will keep readers involved in the storyline, and the various chapter lengths will keep anyone from feeling overwhelmed.

Would I recommend this story? Yes. Anyone who enjoys Fantasy or mystical stories will be intrigued. I think that the faith-based elements and the psychological aspects of the characters' memories will also create appeal. Anyone who has an interest in those subjects might also give this a look.

OVERALL SCORE: 93/100