Title: Lilly in the grey by TanshinaAfrin
Source: ᴬʳᵗⁱˢᵗⁱᶜ ᴱˣᵖʳᵉˢˢⁱᵒⁿˢ ᴬʷᵃʳᵈˢ by janefanfics
Category: Masculine Muse (Kim Namjoon?)
Mature: Y (alcohol, blood, child abuse, childbirth, death, depression, emotional abuse, graphic depiction of suicide attempt, guns, loss of a loved one, medical depictions, mental health issues, moderate profanity, murder, needles, non-explicit sexual content, physical abuse, politics, pregnancy, pregnancy-related issues, self-harm, sexual references, violence; mentions of addiction, cheating, domestic abuse, drugs, gambling, genocide, military conflict)
LGBTQIAP+: N
Status: Complete
Special note (judging): I had four books from this category, and the other judge, itsmecrazY1432, had four books
Score: 63/100

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*****

Rubric (Masculine Muse):
Overall Impact (20 points)
- 0-5: Little to no emotional impact; character is forgettable.
- 6-10: Some moments of impact, but overall impression may fade quickly.
- 11-15: Leaves a good impression; character resonates with readers throughout the story.
- 16-20: Strong emotional impact; character lingers in the reader's mind long after reading.
Writing Style and Grammar (20 points)
- 0-5: Poor writing; numerous grammatical errors and awkward phrasing that disrupts readability and comprehension.
- 6-10: Basic writing; some grammatical mistakes and inconsistent style. Limited use of varied sentence structures and vocabulary.
- 11-15: Solid writing; generally free of errors, with good sentence variety and appropriate vocabulary. Style enhances the narrative, though it may not be consistently engaging.
- 16-20: Exceptional writing; flawless grammar and punctuation, with a distinctive voice and style. The use of varied sentence structures and rich vocabulary creates a compelling and immersive reading experience.
Character Development (20 points)
- 0-5: Underdeveloped character; lacks depth and motivation.
- 6-10: Some development; has a few clear traits but feels one-dimensional.
- 11-15: Well-developed character; shows growth and complexity throughout the story.
- 16-20: Exceptionally developed character; multi-faceted with a compelling arc that resonates strongly with readers.
Relatability (20 points)
- 0-5: Character feels completely unrealistic or distant from audience experiences.
- 6-10: Character has some relatable traits, but many elements feel exaggerated or underexplored.
- 11-15: Character relatable in most aspects; readers can identify with struggles and triumphs.
- 16-20: Highly relatable character; readers see themselves in the character, making their journey impactful.
Role in Story (20 points)
- 0-5: Character serves no clear purpose; feels extraneous to the plot.
- 6-10: Character has some role in the story but does not significantly influence the narrative.
- 11-15: Character plays a meaningful role; contributes to plot development and themes.
- 16-20: Integral to the story; drives the plot forward and enriches the overall narrative.
Total: 100 points

*****

Total score: 63/100

Overall impact: 10/20
I think the biggest barrier here is the language barrier, but Namjoon just doesn't stand out to me. He's a guy with a painful childhood whose cold attitude is meant to keep him from experiencing more pain from getting close to someone, and then he meets and falls in love with Jisoo, and then he's suddenly the perfect boyfriend who becomes the perfect husband and father. That's been done before, and without a deep emotional connection and strong character development, it's the same character I've read in many other stories.

Writing style and grammar: 6/20
This is really at the core of point loss in all other categories. You have a beautiful, poetic writing style, but there are a lot of problems that I think all go back to language barrier issues. Word choice is often incorrect or unclear, with frequent misspellings and the wrong form of a word used, and phrasing is often awkward and strange. It was harder reading at first, but after I got into the book, I learned your style and phrasing, so it became easier to follow along, although I still had problems.

I have two overall pieces of advice here. First, look into using an editing tool. Even if it's something as simple as Microsoft Word or Google Docs, the spell/grammar check will catch a lot of stuff here. Second, keep practicing and keep seeking out feedback. Learning by doing is the best way to go, and you're already doing that. So good on you.

So, now it's time to get into the details. Here's an example where the meaning is unclear: "Kim Namjoon, a widely successful, young actor of Korea is now determined to his new project 'Snowdrop', where he meets Kim Jisoo, a rookie actress playing her first role." I puzzled over that sentence for a long time, and then I finally jotted it down and came back to it after reading the entire book. Now, I realize the issue is "determined." That's used incorrectly here, but I don't know what the correct verb is supposed to be, because I'm unsure of the intended meaning.

Usually, though, I could work out the meaning, even with awkward phrasing. English is full of phrases that make sense to native speakers, but are actually quite strange, making it very easy to swap words that technically mean the same thing but don't make sense in context. So, unfortunately, this is an unavoidable problem, and the only real advice I can give here is to keep at it. Also, I apologize for my language being a pain. For example: "Since the first day, they get on each other's bitter terms." It feels like you're combining two phrases there: "they get on each other's nerves" and "they worked together on bitter terms."

There are some incomplete sentences, too, probably stemming from the phrasing issues. For example: "Rage apparent in his slim complexion." This is a dependent clause which can't stand on its own as a sentence. There's no subject or verb. It's just a descriptor, like, "He clenched his jaw, rage apparent in his slim complexion." Although "slim complexion" doesn't make sense. His face is thin? That's the meaning I get from it, but "complexion" is used to describe the appearance of the skin on the face—pale, olive, tan, dark, clear, blotchy, freckled, that kind of thing. I think you mean "expression," but "slim" doesn't work for that, either, because a facial expression is not thin, thick, tall, or short. It's summarized in an emotion, like rage, and described by details such as a raised eyebrow, narrowed eyes, clenched jaw, smirking lips, that kind of thing. Maybe you just mean "thin face?" That could work.

Anyway, moving on to prepositional phrases. Using the wrong preposition can change the meaning of a sentence. For example: "Jungkook slid his arms in her shoulder blades..." That means he put his arms inside her shoulder blades, which is not what happened. He put his arms "around" her, and using "shoulders" instead of "shoulder blades" shows that better, too. There's an amusing sentence somewhere where Jisoo puts her finger, hand, or arm (I don't remember the specifics) "through" Namjoon, which had me picturing him impaled on her arm, because that's what it meant. I think "to" was the correct preposition in that case.

There are some slang words you use in the narrative, and these are things you should spell completely unless they're used in spoken or text dialogue. The three I jotted down are fx (effects), 'cause (short version of because), prob (probability). Then there are some words you frequently use with the wrong meaning. I didn't note all of these, just the most common ones.
- third grade kidney infection → I think you mean kidney failure? A kidney infection wouldn't require a transplant unless it was so advanced it caused kidney failure.
- levitation → Hovering above the ground. You used it when people were going up to different floors of a building, and while it provides an amusing image, I'm betting they were using elevators or stairs, not powers of flight.
- scour → I don't remember the context, but to "scour" is to clean something by rubbing hard, usually with something abrasive, like steel wool or a scrub brush.
- broken ankle → You later said "twisted" or "sprained" ankle, which is the right word here. A broken ankle (or any other bone) is a fractured bone, and staying off of it for a week won't be enough time for it to heal.
- hissing → This is one you used a lot. A person hissing is showing disapproval, anger, or urgency. This is not interchangeable with "whispering."
- donator → Technically correct, but the word "donor" is more commonly used for organ transplants.
- wink → This is closing and opening just one eye quickly , often to show something is a joke or suggest something is a secret. It's not interchangeable with "blink."
- nape → The back of the neck. There are times you use this when you're referring to a head movement, and while the neck technically facilitates head movement, in context, it doesn't make sense.
- cabin → This is one I've encountered recently in another person's writing, too. You're using it where you mean "office," but a cabin is a wooden house in a sheltered area, like a forest, or a compartment of a ship or an airplane. I can see where you would think an airplane cabin or ship's cabin may be similar to an office, but it doesn't work in English.
- irate →This is an example of using the wrong word form. You use the adjective "irate" when you want the verb "irritate."

One last word thought: lilly. I looked it up, and although "lily" is the more common spelling for the flower, "lilly" is acceptable. There is a place somewhere in the story where you use the "lily" spelling instead of "lilly," and I recommend sticking to one or the other.

Getting past the individual words and into the grammar, you have a tendency to overuse commas (which I recognize because I do, too). You usually do a good job at sticking to past tense throughout the narrative, but there are rare places where you slip into present tense. There are some capitalization issues, more at the beginning, I think, where you capitalize random words in the middle of sentences, and that may be a proofreading miss where you meant to start a new sentence but then didn't. The only words that should be capitalized are the first word of a sentence (or section of dialogue), names, and titles, and those should always be capitalized.

There were quite a few punctuation issues as well. So, first, don't double up punctuation marks. The only exceptions are closing quotation marks (."), closing parentheses [.)], and trailing questions (...?). If you want to emphasize something, you don't need to use double punctuation (?! or !!), italics, bold, all uppercase, etc. Just use an exclamation mark (!). If you reserve that for rare uses of emphasis, meaning you don't use it all the time, it means a lot whenever it shows up. You can also indicate emphasis by saying a person is shouting or screaming, or there's an urgency to their voice, things like that. Show the emphasis through your writing instead of relying on visual aids to do the work for you.

There should always be a space after punctuation but never before it (except for opening quotation marks and parentheses). Although when you use dashes in the text, it can be helpful on Wattpad to add a space before and after ( - ) so it doesn't look like you're hyphenating words. And if you want to use trailing periods for effect, use an ellipsis (...), which is just three periods. No more; no less.

Commas never end a sentence or a paragraph, except for closing dialogue. You usually use double quotation marks for dialogue, but there are rare places where you use single quotation marks (''). Just pick one.

In dialogue, you should actually use a comma instead of a period when leading into a dialogue tag. There's no change to punctuation if you're ending with anything else (!, ?, ...). A dialogue tag directly describes how or who is speaking, and it's usually an incomplete sentence. Regardless of punctuation, it will always start with a lowercase first word (unless the first word is a name or title). 

Another good general guideline with dialogue is to separate speakers and actions. This helps the reader follow the flow of conversation. Also, phone conversations count as dialogue, so write them the same way. Texting is different. Using the (name: message) format works for texting. You don't set thoughts apart in the narrative, so they sort of blend in with the rest of the text, but you could italicize them and use dialogue rules for punctuation. I'll show an example below incorporating all of that dialogue stuff.

"He's kind of scary," Jisoo whispered into the phone. She peeked around the wall at Namjoon right when he looked at her, and she pulled back around the corner, whisper-yelling, "Ack! He saw me!"
Ji eun giggled on her end. "You have a crush on him."
"I do not," Jisoo insisted.
"Are you talking about me?" a deep voice interrupted her.
Jisoo turned white as a sheet as Namjoon rounded the corner. "No! Of course not!" she stammered.
"He caught you?" Ji eun shrieked. Her voice was so loud and high-pitched that Jisoo had to yank the receiver away from her ear.
Namjoon raised an eyebrow.
Oh, my gosh, he heard her, Jisoo thought. She wished she could disappear.
"Jisoo?" Ji eun asked. "Are you still there?"
"Um, I'll call you back later," Jisoo said. She hung up before Ji eun could reply.

This isn't completely grammar, but it kind of is, and it goes with writing style, too. When Namjoon writes that note, it's all in bold, so it looks like an author's note. I actually thought that's what it was for a moment. You don't use italics too often, so you could italicize that note to make it stand out (and any other dreams or written documents), and the same later with the headline announcing his new position.

And, finally, bold. Your headings for time skips and new scenes are sort of buried within the narrative right now. Instead of normal text and a comma, I'd recommend using bold and a colon (Later that night:), or, better yet, just incorporate that into the narrative: "Later that night, when Namjoon and Jisoo were having dinner..."

Your author's notes are usually in bold, I think, but sometimes they're in italics, too. Again, just pick one way of doing things and stick with it to help set these off from the narrative so the reader knows exactly what it is when they see it. I think adding a section divider before author's notes would be a good idea, too. You could just do a line of three or five asterisks (*** or *****), and that would immediately show the reader the change.

Character development: 11/20
Again, there's a language barrier here, but I don't think there was enough development right at the beginning of the story. We're told that Namjoon's cold behavior toward Jisoo was a front to hide his feelings for her, but we're not shown that. Most of the content at the beginning is from Jisoo's perspective, so we don't really get to delve into Namjoon. Then she gets sick, and he donates a kidney, and there's really no hiding his feelings after that. It just feels too sudden. We get the intro to how things were, and then it changes before we even really get a chance to see how things were. I would like more about his thought process and how he treated her prior to her getting sick, and I think that background would add to his character development later in the story, too.

And I said this before, too, but he's suddenly the perfect boyfriend, suddenly the perfect husband, suddenly the devoted father. I like his character in each of these roles. He's very sweet and devoted, and that gives me all the warm fuzzies, but there's not really an in-between or any development along the way.

Relatability: 16/20
Namjoon is definitely a relatable character. He's been hurt before, and he's scared to be hurt again, but once he gives in to his feelings, he experiences this wonderful, sweet relationship with Jisoo. Even their fight is realistic and relatable, and the way he tries to hide his pain after his injury so he doesn't worry Jisoo is foolish, but understandable. I love his reaction when her water breaks. If you've never seen it, look up the episode in the (very old) sitcom I Love Lucy when she goes into labor. It's hilarious, and it's exactly what I was picturing in this moment of the story.

Role in story: 20/20
There is no story without Namjoon, and that ending just underlines, circles, and highlights that. His life changed when he met Jisoo, and he had the same impact on her. That last chapter—I'm not a person who tears up easily when reading, but you got me. It's pretty clear that Namjoon's steady assurances and final words are all that will keep Jisoo going for a while, until her pain eases a little and the loss becomes less acute, but there will still be no story going forward without him.