My Hero Academia-Plus Ultra!! by shikamaru2020

Genre: Action, BNHA Fanfic

Current Chapter Length: 5 Chapters

Update Schedule: Daily

Quote: "This is the story on how I became the number one hero..." ~Shikamaru

What Readers Think:

"this is sooo good for your first book" ThePandaQueen2000

Before I start this review, I want to make a quick apology with how long it took me to review this, and am thankful the writer was very patient with me. This book is just starting out, so it was on the shorter side. Regardless, I had a lot of off-Wattpad work and schoolwork to get to first that took up much more of my time than usual.

I can't really say what the story will be about since there aren't many chapters, so this book can go in many different directions. It does follow a student named Shikamaru, who is a fellow classmate of Bakugo. Unlike Deku, Shikamaru and Bakugo get along really well as they both have the goal of going to U.A. to become Pro Heroes (whether Deku will still make an appearance in this story is still unknown).

The first thing that really caught my eye for this story was actually something that was in the tags. It has the NoMineta tag, which, honestly, I'm glad that this character will be taken out of the story. Sorry (well, not really) no one really likes Mineta, so it's kind of nice to know that he won't be in it.

Beyond that, this was the first time I saw the Quirk, Chains, being used as a main character Quirk. That is really unique. The concept of this Quirk is that Shikamaru can create, well, chains. Not much more is really known about this quite yet, but it's pretty interesting to say the least.

Now, I do realize that this writer is fairly new to writing, but there is one major thing I need to point out. Details. Details are a writers best friend. Without details, a reader cannot tell what a character looks like, what is going on around them, or just what's going on in general. This story lacks this crucial writing element big time. Fear not, there is an easy solution: read what is written and pretend you know nothing about it. If nothing is said about it, then a reader knows nothing about it, and that would be a great place to start adding in some detail, whether it's what a person looks like, where the characters are at, what is going on inside a character's mind, etc etc.

Details can help a lot with a majority of what this story is struggling with. One of which is length. I understand short chapters are okay to have. They can be very effective at times, but they are not effective if they have no subsentence. As a reader, I want to know more about what the characters are up to. Short chapters take away from that.

Take Chapter 2 for example. On my phone and laptop, I can read the entire chapter without scrolling. Granted, I do have it on small text size, but all that happens is that Bakugo and Shikamaru agree to train, there's a bit of a time skip, and then they meet up to train. Or at least, they would train except something comes up to them? I put a question mark with that statement because it's all dialogue. Details can help set the tone of how serious this scene could be. I have question with how they got there, where this third person came from, if they knew this third person came, and little things like that. Paragraphs can be added between dialogue to give a bit of a feel.

Another part that detail can help in the story is with all the action-packed part. I can't see action without there being told what happened. Dialogue is great, but I need more from detail. You can never have too much detail. Well, actually, you can, but I've never had to say that to a book before. That is where this story is struggling with a bit. With more detail, I can see this book doing very well because as of right now, I can't really tell what's going on.

As I said in the earlier part, the dialogue is actually pretty decent. The author clearly understands basic dialogue rules. There are even some funny parts that are said in the dialogue. It is here that I can tell Bakugo is pretty much in character. Sure, there are moments I think Bakugo is swaying towards the side of being slightly OOC, but to say that is stretching it a bit. It's just the fact that I'm not sure how he and Shikamaru became friends, but that aside, nearly everything he says is pretty in character. That's pretty amazing to see.

The only thing I'd say to fix when it comes to dialogue is to make sure there are commas instead of periods inside of quotations. This is something I didn't learn until high school, and even after that, I still struggled, so it's tricky, but not impossible. Here is an example of what I mean by what this should look like:

"Oh! Why thank you. You are excused," Ms. Jupiter said happily. (Chapter 1).

Originally, that sentence had a period after excused. Any other punctuation point (like an exclamation point, question mark, or (my favorite) the interrobang) is fine to have right before the quotation marks. I mean, for the most part, the writing done for dialogue is done really well. Every once in a while, there may be a different mistake, but this is just the biggest issue I have with dialogue, and it's an issue not many people know about.

Overall, this story does need some work, but there are some strong points in it. I can tell the writer does have a ton of creativity inside the brain, but without detail, I can't really see it. I want to see it. This book has potential once there's more detail added in. Sure, that will take time, but I have faith that with a bit more time, it can be a pretty great story.

I am so excited to say that the author of My Hero Academia-Plus Ultra!! has agreed to do an interview, so I could learn more about what went into the making of this story.

JunieWeathers: What inspired you to write this story.

Shikamaru2020: I've always wanted to write a story and I love BNHA. So, I thought why not make a fanfic.

I also read other fanfics like yours and I wondered If I could do it too.

Junie: That is a really neat way to get into fanfic and writing. What's your favorite part about writing this story?

Shika: Just opening wattpad and see that more people are reading my story. It was really cool.

Junie: I can see where that can be exciting and fun. What kind of challenges do you face when writing this story, and how do you overcome them?

Shika: Finding out what was good for the readers. Some stuff might be interesting for me but not for other people. I also had trouble with story flow. Some stuff was just really quick, like you where slapped with stuff that you didn't know existed. I guess for this I calmed down a bit and stop forcing out chapters. It made me rush things.

I also had trouble with doubt. Even when I got a decent amount of readers, I was thinking I'm not good enough for this. My writing sucks. Why are people reading this trash. I have a lot of problems with that. I haven't really overcome it yet but I'm getting better.

Junie: That is a huge challenge for a lot of writers, but it's good to take your time. Patience is key. I really liked that the main character's Quirk is Chains. How did you come up with this Quirk?

Shika: I just really like chains on anime characters. It looks cool. I also got some of the ideas from Kurapika from Hunter X Hunter.

Junie: That is really interesting. Thank you for taking the time for me to interview you. My Hero Academia-Plus Ultra!! is up for anyone wanting to read a new BNHA story.