Title: Crime and Punishment® by Seong_Grace
Source: ᴬʳᵗⁱˢᵗⁱᶜ ᴱˣᵖʳᵉˢˢⁱᵒⁿˢ ᴬʷᵃʳᵈˢ by janefanfics
Category: Vivid Imagery
Mature: Y (blood, murder, strong profanity, torture, violence)
LGBTQIAP+: N
Status: Ongoing
Special note (judging): I had five books from this category, and the other judge randomlygore, had five books
Score: 20/100

Clicking the "External Link" button below the "Continue to next part" button will take you straight to the book, or click the link in the inline comments here. →

*****

Rubric:
- Descriptive language (30): Use of rich, descriptive language that paints a clear and vivid picture in the reader's mind.
- Emotional impact (25): The imagery evokes strong emotions or reactions from the reader.
- Originality & creativity (25): Use of unique, creative imagery that stands out from common or cliché descriptions.
- Clarity & coherence (20): The imagery is clear, and the language is well-organized and easy to follow.
Total: 100

*****

Total score: 20/100

Descriptive language: 5/30
There are some details that you do well, little touches like the mountain of dirt beside the grave, the mud, the rain mixing and pooling with blood, the rat in the hideout, the general creepy atmosphere there. But there aren't a lot of other details. There's no description of what any character looks like, beyond a vague note that Y/n is beautiful and wearing a shirt and skirt. I can't picture the scenes. It's all really fuzzy, unclear shadows, and for Y/n, I only know she's in high school because of the flashback chapters. Prior to that, it says she's walking to (or from?) school, and with no further details about age, height, figure, hair color, eye color, outfit (school uniform? something else?), I just don't know.

And the same with the environment. Where is the first body? Inside? Outside? What does the area look like, beyond the bloody body on the ground/floor? How long did they drive after they loaded the body into their van? Where did they bury the body? Where is the new hideout? What does it look like from the outside? Beyond cobwebs, rats, and a bloodstained table, what does it look like on the inside?

There's a lot of room to add in detail with the crimes, too. Right in the prologue, they clean up the crime scene to eliminate evidence, and then they drag the bloody body to their van. That just spread more evidence around. It'd be better to clean up after they loaded the body into the van. What are their tools? What is the evidence they took when they fled after discovery? Did Jimin throw a rod at the truck driver, or shoot him? A bullet would hit him in the head, but a rod wouldn't, unless it was a convertible truck.

Action and movement are other areas for possible detail. There are some inconsistencies I'll go over in a following section, but you want to describe a character's actions like you're watching a movie and writing it down. The reader needs to see that movie, or something close to it, just from reading your story.

The close-up details like the ones I mentioned at first are important, but you need the broad brushstrokes, too, to get that overall picture. These will also help with scene transitions, which are very jumpy and stilted right now.

Emotional impact: 5/25
The prologue is the best for this. I get that sense of horror and shock. But then...it's really hard to get that emotional impact when I can't picture the scene. I'm a person who can get uncomfortable with dark themes, and I also have a weak stomach, so with a book of this type, a good goal for your descriptions would probably be to make me squirm and get nauseous. 😉

Originality & creativity: 5/25
Again, this suffers from the lack of descriptive detail. The prologue is, again, your best sample for this. A dark hideout with cobwebs and spiders and a blood-stained table is really cliché, which doesn't mean it's the wrong place for your characters to be. That detail about the rat running out of hiding could also be considered cliché, but one of the criminals throwing a steel rod at it to kill it certainly isn't, nor is your description of what that did to the poor rat. It's just adding in more details like that to make the image in your mind come out in text. That's how you turn the cliché into your unique work.

Clarity & coherence: 5/20
This is really down to a language barrier, and I will be the first to admit that English is a weird, difficult language. I'd actually scored this book by a different rubric, and then the other judge and I conferred and switched to this one, so there are more detailed notes about this down below. There are also some consistency issues that complicate things, especially with action. For example, when they bring Y/n to the hideout, they tie her up on a blood-stained table. Then, when she wakes up, she's on the table, and then suddenly tied to a stand, and then in bed? And backing away? How can she back away? She hasn't been untied, and it's implied that she's tied to whatever surface they put her on. Keeping the details consistent eliminates any confusion for the reader, so they don't have to stop reading to try to figure out what's going on.

Extras (old rubric):
Title: Okay. I'm getting a mystery/thriller vibe here, and tags about serial killers, along with the bloody blurb reinforcing that, so yep. Good title.

Cover: I like the color scheme, the blue with the highlights of white, the rainy background, the images of the three characters, all that. There might be a little too much of a glow around the characters' heads, though, but I'm back and forth about that. Maybe it's fine. Maybe soften it a little bit. I'm undecided. Anyway, as far as the text, loving the title, your name, graphics credit, but the subtitle is too small, and the text is a little awkward and repetitive: "If you do a crime and it has a punishment, you did a great mistake." A crime automatically comes with a punishment, and it's automatically a mistake (to normal, non-criminal people, anyway). And there's already "crime and punishment" in the title. Are you trying to say the criminal has to make a mistake to get punished (like, get caught)? Maybe something like this would work better: "One mistake will get you caught." That's shorter and more concise, so it's catchier, too.

Summary: So, when a potential reader clicks on your book title, and that pop-up box comes up, you want the first thing they see to be a catchy info blurb that tells them enough to pique their interest, not a book excerpt. That usually doesn't hook interest as well as a blurb, because there's more to your book than a single scene, and the larger picture is what interests a possible reader. I'd recommend moving the excerpt below the blurb and putting some sort of section divider between them so they don't blend together.

Your blurb, then, is the part that starts with "Crime" and ends with "apartment." I'd move the "Maknae Line x reader (BTS)" down with the content warning, again, just to keep it separate and keep clear what is part of what. So, you don't need "Crime and Punishment" again in your blurb. I'd change that to "This," just because we already know the title. The phrasing is a bit awkward with some extra wording here, and a big part of that is that English isn't your first language, and that's fine. It's a messy language (I apologize😅). I'd simplify "under scenarios of" to "around," and then put a comma after "three boys", cut "life," and list the three boys' names (as you've already done). Then, put another comma, and then a comma after "girl," and I'd swap "got" to "was." It just sounds a little more formal, I guess? "Got" sounds really casual, especially with this being the intro to your professional work. You can then cut "under a suspicious circumstance," since that's kind of implied with a murder.

So, that leaves us with: "This is a story revolving around three boys, Park Jimin, Jeon Jungkook, and Kim Taehyung, and a girl, Jeon Y/n, who was murdered in front of her apartment."

Other things I didn't mention are spacing issues, but they're inconsistent, so I think they're just typos. You don't need a space before a comma, and "in front" is two separate words, so that needs a space there.

This is a very basic, informative blurb. I would recommend checking out this chapter by justwriteit where they explain how to write a catchy logline and a good blurb. It's something I have to refresh myself on pretty regularly, since I'm good at judging them, but not so great at writing them. But I think this would help you put together something with a bit stronger hook to really reel your readers in. Link in the inline comments. →

Addendum: Is Y/n the one who got murdered? As of chapter 10, she's still alive, and the wording in the blurb makes it seem like her body in front of her apartment sets this whole story off, but it doesn't. There is no body in front of an apartment, at least, not in the story up until chapter 10. There's a body in a grave somewhere, and talk of multiple bodies piling up from rampaging psychotic serial killers, and then Y/n gets kidnapped, threatened with torture, and used as a hostage. If she doesn't die until the end, I'd rework the blurb, because you don't want to give away the end. You want to give away the beginning. If the reader knows the end, why should they read?

Reader engagement: A big part of this is the language barrier. There's a lot of awkward phrasing and odd word choices that mean I'm spending more time deciphering what an individual piece means instead of immersing myself in the bigger picture. Adding in more descriptive detail, too, will work to draw the reader into your story, showing them what you see in your mind's eye while you write this.

Plot uniqueness: I don't fully understand the plot, but it's definitely unique. Jimin and Jungkook are psychotic serial killers who kidnap Y/n, their former best friend's adopted younger sister. Taehyung, Y/n's older brother, is a police officer investigating the murders.

That's what I know. But I have a lot of questions.

How did Taehyung find Jimin and Jungkook in the first place? Why was he even looking at them? How do the criminals pick their targets? What did Taehyung do to make them so angry at him? The flashback makes him seem like an overall jerk, but that isn't enough for this level of enmity. There's something about him stealing a girl from one of them in high school, but that only affects one of the boys, and it's stated that he was trying to come between them. I don't know why stealing a girl from one would set two other boys against each other. And then he pushed the Hyungs away, which seemed to be part of the overall pattern of him being a heartless jerk to everybody except his girlfriend. But then there's an argument in the schoolyard, and the Hyungs make him their puppet? How? It sounded like he was making everybody else his puppet. And, again, I don't understand where Jimin and Jungkook come into all this.

Y/n's role is also unclear. Taehyung wouldn't accept her as his sister when he was in high school, but again, that doesn't affect his relationship with any of the other boys or their relationships with each other, and that would mean there's little to no point trying to use her against Taehyung, because the last Jimin and Jungkook knew of them, Taehyung hated Y/n.

Character development: There's development going on, but I don't understand it. I covered the confusion with the boys' background above. I have more questions, though. In the prologue, Jungkook seems like he's shocked senseless by the first murder the reader sees, but then he's really casual about everything, and it seems like he's actually the ringleader. He's definitely more callus when it comes to kidnapping Y/n than Jimin. Jimin seems like he has some misgivings when it comes to her, and it's noted that this is a pattern with beautiful women.

They ask a really weird question of her when she wakes up: Why were you alone at night?

Why does that matter? It just made her easier to kidnap.

Then she's confused and surprised that they were Taehyung's friends in school, or even that Taehyung had any friends in school, which didn't make sense until the flashback, but it still doesn't exactly make sense afterwards, either. He had a large friend (frenemy?) group. If she's looking for a reason these people kidnapped her, it would make more sense that they were among those who hated her brother, and there are plenty of those people around.

Maybe this is part of you showing how awful Taehyung was in high school, but he used the f-word at his mother. And he got away with that? But then she seems scared of him later, so I guess that's part of him being a horrible person. Which makes it weird that he comes to accept Y/n as his sister and that he's on good terms with his parents by the time she's kidnapped. There's no explanation for how any of that happened. He was the jerk who drove everyone away, and then he's the nice guy that cares for his family enough to be moved to tears when Y/n is kidnapped? And the Hyungs respect and care for him?

Wouldn't Y/n know about his friend group? If Taehyung was close enough to the boys to be texting them all the time, chances are good somebody would have stopped by the house to visit at least once, right?

And then there's the girl in high school who was apparently oblivious to how rotten Taehyung was. How? He didn't even hide his mean streak from her. He was nice to her, but he was mean to others in front of her.

At this point, there is only one likable character in this story, and that is Y/n. Jimin and Jungkook are certified sociopaths, and Taehyung and company are borderline functional sociopaths. And the girl in high school was just an idiot. And Taehyung's parents are wimps.

Creativity: I was thinking this when I first started reading this story, but it's interesting how a fanfiction turns the objects of your affection and admiration into serial killers. That isn't an angle I would ever explore. It doesn't exactly show them in their best light, and I really have no idea how you came up with it, but it's impressive. And there's clearly a very detailed backstory in your mind about all this. It's just that it doesn't quite come through right now.

Writing style: This really just comes down to the language barrier. You know the story you want to tell, but I'm just not getting it right now. I usually jot down notes as I read to try to locate problem areas so I can suggest improvements, and it's a bit tricky here, because I'm not exactly sure how to describe the issues, but I'll give it a shot. Hopefully, with everything I've typed until now, this comes out helpful.

I've mentioned scene transitions already, but adding these in will really help smooth the flow of the story. We go directly from the murder scene to the boys digging a grave somewhere. You don't need a long, detailed transition scene, but a short paragraph about them driving for _____ hours or minutes through _____ scenery to _____ new scene would help.

For the flashback, instead of heading it with "Past," I'd recommend using a scene heading. Something like a date (or timeframe) and a place in bold. Just a few words. Then just add that to the top of each successive flashback chapter. Your transition from the flashback up through current time is good and smooth, so you don't need to say anything about the flashback ending or another scene heading.

Grammar/punctuation: Just a general thing first, and I don't know how helpful it would be, because I am a native English speaker, but maybe an English editing tool would help? Not to rewrite your work, of course, but to help point out specific problems and offer suggestions. The one I use is the free version of ProWritingAid, which is a browser extension that adds colorful squiggly lines under possible problems in the text. Then, you just hover over the lines, and it offers suggestions. It's not always right, so you can't just accept everything it says (for my favorite example, it recommended I change "stroking my cheek lightly" to "striking my cheek" 😆). But it might help. I'm kind of wary of Grammarly, although I've never used it. I just haven't heard great things. The whole mess with AI detection percentages being high if you use Grammarly, and people telling me there are things I point out that ProWritingAid would have caught, but Grammarly didn't...It's up to you, though. Whatever works best for you is what you should use.

So, anyway, I noticed this in the blurb, but you tend to use very repetitive phrasing. Things like "crimson red" and "corpse body" in the prologue. Both "crimson" and "red" mean the same thing, and "corpse" and "body" mean the same thing. Eliminating clutter like double words helps sharpen the meaning of your writing, so it isn't hidden as much behind the extra stuff.

For lack of a better term, awkward phrasing is also an issue. I guess it comes down to simplifying and cutting clutter? For example, in the prologue, you say: "entering to the van and starting the driving." Cutting that back to "entering the van and starting to drive" is clearer and more concise. For another example, and this kind of goes with rearranging a little bit to make the meaning clearer, too: "The mountain stood alongside their pit as a proof of them digging the pit deep for the dead body" would work better as something like "the mountain of dirt next to the deep pit stood as proof of their digging."

One thing I notice many people struggling with is past and present tense, but this is not an area where you struggle. This story is in the past tense, and you stick to the past tense. There are occasional slip-ups where you slide into present tense for a moment, but I've seen where people do this in almost every sentence, and you don't, so that's a really good thing. Consistency is key.

An area where you do struggle is matching singular subjects with singular verbs, and the same with plural. This is probably due to English being weird. I hadn't realized until I was judging another book by a non-native English speaker, but "hair" and "hairs" is a great example of this. You'd think "hair" is singular, and "hairs" is plural, but we use "hair" to encompass all the hairs on a person's head, and "hair" refers to a few strands of hair. Yes, I know. Weird. Sorry. English is...a pain. 😅 But, for an example, in the prologue, you say "scenes was." "Scenes" is plural, and "was" is singular. So, you would need to say "scenes were" (plural) or "scene was" (singular). And I think an editing tool would be good for catching these things, because I get called out on this all the time in mine, so...😉

There are some areas where I think you've mixed up the meaning of English words. In the prologue, when you say Jungkook was on the "edge of his stream of consciousness." That means he's about to pass out, which he isn't. It sounds like he's been shocked senseless. But he hasn't been, because when Jimin says something to him, he sighs and speaks casually about cleaning up the scene and getting rid of the body. I think what you're trying to say is that he was lost in thoughts.

You use the word "eloping" a couple times, and that means to run away to get married, so not the best word choice when Jimin and Jungkook are saying they need to run and hide from the cops. "Blood drips" sounds very small and tame, like a nosebleed, so something like "blood spatter" would be better to describe a murder scene. And I have no idea what you mean by a "wiping stick" in the prologue.

There are quite a few misspellings throughout, too, which you don't do consistently, so I think it's just down to writing too fast and then just needing to go back through to proofread. Things like "wipe of" (wipe off) and "hobi'es" (hobbies).