Author: astorynerd

Book: Lily of the Moonblood

Genre: Fantasy

Chapters Read: Prologue - Chapter 5

Kat Tails: 3

As always, thank you so much for your patience as I worked on your review! Now let's get into it, shall we?
Before you proceed, please note that this review will contain spoilers for the chapters I read <3

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Cover: 2/5

I like the font you've chosen as well as its placement. It gives the proper fantasy vibes for the story! Much of the subtext is difficult to read because it's small and the font color doesn't mesh well with the rest of the cover. The moon in the background links to the title, but other than that, we don't get a very good idea of what the story will be about based on the cover. There is little to latch onto other than the text. I would highly recommend requesting a cover from a graphics shop if you're invested in boosting your book's visibility on Wattpad. Your current cover isn't terrible, but it won't draw eyes and there are lots of talented designers around to help us writers out in the graphics area!

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Title: 3/5

I'm neutral on the title. It is whimsically pretty in a way and for some reason gives me Tangled vibes, but it's on the longer side and doesn't have a super strong hook. If you were to go for a better hook, I'd consider simply "Moonblood" as a punchier title. Feel free to disagree with me though, as I know I'm biased toward one-word titles xD

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Blurb: 2/5

There's a lot going on in this blurb, with the last few sentences in particular feeling thrown on. To prevent rushing the end of the blurb like that, it's important to follow a loose structure. You'll want to establish the protagonist(s) and the setting first, followed by the conflict, stakes, and the decisions that must be made. There are tense switches, spacing issues, sentence fragments, and the like present in your blurb that make it difficult to read and understand.

After reading your book, here is my suggestion for a new and improved blurb: 

The Moonblood brothers are hailed as the elite among the race of vampires. A careful truce exists between humans and vampires, where contact is to be avoided at all costs. But what will happen when Andrew and Lynx Moonblood find a human child in the forest?

And not just any human child. One in possession of a certain blood jewel. The two together may be a clue to the recent events of vampires going berserk and an enemy who lingers in the shadows, eager to shatter the fragile peace.

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Writer Interaction: 4/5

Disclaimer: This category does not reflect on a writer's skill at all. It is merely given points as it shows the writer is invested in their readers' opinions and suggestions and can be used to project future growth. (Also, Miya is using her judging rubric and doesn't want to change it because it totals to a neat 100 points as is XD)

Writer is invested in their readers' interactions and responds positively to comments.

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Plot/Pacing: 4/10

In the first five chapters, we've witnessed a car crash where two people die, but their baby survives. Said human child is in possession of a special crystal, which the two henchmen were supposed to obtain for their master. The baby is instead rescued and is cared for by four vampire brothers who are part of a special bloodline called the Moonbloods. We also discover that the antagonist has kidnapped the four brothers' uncle and wants that crystal back.

As a plot it definitely works, but I'm seeing two issues with it:
1. You have no clear main character and the plot is suffering because of it.
2. You're taking a long time to get the plot up in the air.

I'm going to make some suggestions but I'll be honest ... I don't know where you're going with this. I'll do my best to offer different strategies, but it will be up to you to determine which one fits with your plot plans.

I'm going to tackle number one first. Who is your book's main character? Lily? The brothers? The title made me inclined to believe the protagonist would be Lily at first, but then the time skip I was expecting didn't happen. If Lily is going to be your main character, you need to make her so sooner. But she's a baby and it looks like she's staying a baby so let's move on to the brothers.

The current problem is that you have the focus split between four vampire brothers: Andrew, Anthony, Lawrence, and Lynx. (As a side note, I cannot for the life of me keep Andrew vs Anthony straight in my head. This could be a me issue, or it could not be.) At this point ... I don't really care about any of them? You've taken on a monumental task in trying to get the reader to keep up with four main characters—something that will take some skill in pov juggling and character development to be pulled off well. My advice would be to pick one of them.

Work on the one character, their personality, character voice, observations, relationships, quirks, strengths, and weaknesses. It's better to have one character that a reader will like and connect with at the cost of sacrificing other characters' screen time, than to have the reader equally indifferent to all of them. The plot is the story seen through the main character's eyes. Determining who your main character is will help advance your plot.

Now onto pacing! 

A common problem—especially with first drafts—is to start the story at too early of a point. I think your prologue is right where it should be. It's crucial to the plot and fulfills the purpose of setting up the story. Depending on who you choose as your main character, you may want to proceed differently. If Lily is the mc, adding the two brothers finding her to the prologue and then time-skipping from there to when she's older would be beneficial. If the brothers, I have a few suggestions for how to smooth out and speed up the pacing:

1. If you are planning to switch pov, then it's recommended to stick with the same character for at least five chapters at the beginning of the story before switching. This gives the reader time to get their shoes wet.

2. The pov switches to Lawrence in chapter 2, mainly for the reason of giving insight into the family dynamic and the eldest brother. I would advise against this. It breaks pov and even worse, breaks it twice because we then flashback later in the chapter. Explore relationship dynamics later in the story and not immediately after a new character is introduced (we don't know them or care about their relationships well enough yet). The beginning should be plot-driven.

3. Less filler. The scenes where the brothers struggle to stop the baby from crying, while humorous, caused the pacing to lag. We lost needed tension and the stakes are suffering. The danger needs to be closer to home, whether that means introducing vampires going berserk or more red crystal lore. There should be a greater threat looming that overshadows trying to get the baby to stop crying ;-;

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Description: 4/10

I enjoyed the description of the Moonblood house at the beginning of chapter 2! You also employed good use of sensory description as the very first sentence of your book so kudos for that. I think you have a nice handle of what should be described, but tend to phrase your descriptions in a passive, telling manner instead of using active, showing voice. I'll give a few examples in the sections to come.

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Characters: 4/10

I think I mentioned most of what I had to say about characters in the plot section ...

They're somewhat two-dimensional at this point, so I would encourage you to get to know them more. Fill out some character sheets or whatever floats your boat and especially research to figure out what your characters want. Every story is built around what characters want, what's stopping them from getting it, and what will happen if they fail. This can also be broken down chapter-by-chapter. Try and break some stereotypes to round them out. If Lynx is a flirt, show that he can be serious in certain situations. If Anthony is cold, let him melt eventually.

It's all about the character's journey.

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Vocabulary/Syntax: 2/10

There are a lot of points that need editing. You have moments of nice prose, but these are mostly swallowed up by typos and sentences that lack clarity and structure. I won't be addressing every instance since I'm not an editor, but here are some starting points and examples on what would need fixing.

Minor typos like:

there fangs -> *their fangs

The man slightly shorter than her was also wearing the same of clothes.
(Same *type of clothes?)

Larger-scale fixes:

Original: The temperature in the forest usually dropped significantly as soon as the sun set.
Suggestion: The temperature in the forest usually plummeted as soon as the sun set.
(Try to use less adverbs as they're a subtle form of telling. Opt for a strong verb when possible.)

Original: Piks held up his hand - a beautifully cut red crystal pendant . The little moonlight that came down on the forest penetrating the swiftly moving clouds made it glimmer .
Suggestion: Piks held up a beautifully-cut red crystal pendant. The little moonlight that penetrated the moving clouds to fall on the forest caused it to glimmer.
(Awkward phrasing and spacing issues. The original reads like Piks' hand is a red crystal pendant.)

Original: He appeared to be a man in his 20's. His bangs gently swaying with the wind. He had a composed expression, only his sharp red eyes wondering here and there, which may feel like aimless but in fact he was scanning every bit of what was within his sight.
Suggestion: He appeared to be a man in his twenties. His bangs gently swayed with the wind. Though he watched the forest with a composed air, his sharp red eyes betrayed an intent search as they scanned everything in sight.
(Numbers below 100 are generally to be written out as a rule. The second sentence is a fragment due to the participle so it's best changed to a past tense verb. Try to switch up sentence structure without making them run-on. All the original sentences start with "He/His" which is why I completely restructured the third sentence in my suggestion.

Original: It was about more than 10 years ago.
Suggestion: It was more than ten years ago.
(Number rule again. Something can't really be "about" more than ten years ago. Either it was more than ten years ago, about ten years ago, or close to ten years ago.)

Original: It was a car. The front was smash badly. From the looks of it. No doubt, it somehow lost control and fell from the damned road.
Suggestion: A car had wrecked from the looks of it—the bumper and front end crumpled like a piece of metal paper. No doubt the driver had somehow lost control and fallen off the damned road.
("Was" often indicates passive writing and telling. You as the author are telling the reader "it was a car" instead of describing the car. There is a tense change with "smash".)

Original: The zippered bag Lynx threw back in the car, was covering a good portion of the back seats. Curiously Andrew moved the bag. The seats seemed pretty normal, but if you look closely it was bumpy....
Suggestion: The zippered bag Lynx threw back in the car covered a majority of the back seat. Curious, Andrew moved the bag. The seat seemed normal, but if he looked closely it was bumpy...
(Try to watch out using "you". This is a subtle break in pov and of the fourth wall.)

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Grammar/Punctuation: 2/10

I'm not sure what you need to know here, because you do things right half the time? So it's not like totally bad, but it's not consistent? 😅 So as I'm laying down the grammar and punctuation rules, keep in mind I'm not saying you've got it wrong all the time ... just sometimes.

" Lend me a hand Margaret. Why am I the one who has to play your servant?"
 (^ This space right here. You don't need extra spaces between quotation marks and dialogue.)

"Shut up Piks. I don't give a damn of what happens to these pathetic humans. I'm just mad that I have to do the the dirty jobs." she said sharply.
Corrections: "Shut up, Piks. (Commas are necessary to offset direct mentions of a person.) I don't give a damn about what happens to these pathetic humans. I'm just mad that I have to do the dirty jobs," she said sharply. (Instead of a period, a comma should be used to connect dialogue to the dialogue tag.)

" What a shame, we can't drink it now." - His lips parted in a greedy smirk, which revealing a pair of sharp fangs.
Corrections: "What a shame. We can't drink it now." His lips parted in a greedy smirk, revealing a pair of sharp fangs.
(The first sentence could also be "What a shame we can't drink it now." The current sentence has a comma splice though. The hyphen is not needed and "which revealing" was not grammatically sound.

"A letter to them, and some medications. Nothing much leading us to more informations " Piks declared.
(Both medication and information do not need to be in a plural form. This occurs in other instances in the chapters I read as well. Comma needed at the end of dialogue)

"Did you check the car properly ? "
(Extra spacing not needed)

Original: " I'm not touching those disfigured objects, she shivered at the sight.
Corrected: "I'm not touching those disfigured objects." She shivered at the sight.
Action tags should not be connected to dialogue.

Wild critters was making a bunch of noise and this somehow worked as a catalyst to thicken the silence instead of erasing it.
(I really liked this description towards the end. Should be "Wild critters *were making a bunch of noise")

"Andrew, Look!"
(Random words were often capitalized mid-sentence. Capitalization is for proper nouns and words at the beginning of a sentence.)

" Strange- the road is wide enough..
And no nothing to enjoy here......not yet.
(Ellipses should always be three dots, no more, no less.)

Original: " Lets see what's inside" - at first a tiny spark, then a ball of flame suddenly appeared on Lynx's palm. It's bright magenta light pierced the darkness. His ability,the charm.
Corrected: "Let's see what's inside." At first, a tiny spark, then a ball of flame appeared on Lynx's palm. Its bright magenta light pierced the darkness. His ability: the charm.

Original: " There's nothing here, brother. A bag and some broken glass-
Corrected: "There's nothing here, brother. A bag and some broken glass—"
(When dialogue is interrupted, you use an em dash and still include the closing quotation mark.)

You're going to want to go in with a fine-tooth comb for edits. All these examples are from the prologue and chapter 1. They're small errors, but those accumulate and keep your writing from reaching its potential.

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Style/Formatting: 3/10

I believe you're still finding your footing with your own unique style and that's okay! Work on the basics to build a solid foundation and you'll find your voice as a writer along the way. You hit the chapter length sweet spots and end chapters in fitting places. You also handled the twist revealing that Amos had been kidnapped by the antagonist splendidly. 

I would suggest including your art at the heading of the chapters instead of in the middle, as it makes for a huge gap in the middle of the chapter's text. Also, I noticed that you put quotes for 'Moonbloods' within the story. I think you can do without those since the term is already capitalized.

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World-building/Concept Originality: 5/10

I enjoyed the lore surrounding the red crystals and what I saw of the brothers' charm. I think these two elements could be expanded on more in the first few chapters to cast more light on the power of the Moonblood line and how the baby's crystal kept it hidden. The revelation of the other crystal being a fake was very well set-up. The vampire aspect was somewhat underwhelming. If you were to switch out them being vampires with being powerful magic users, it wouldn't feel like there was much of a difference to the story. They mention charm and having blood donors for feeding, but it doesn't feel like it impacts much of their life and even with my limited experience in reading vampire novels, it is something I've seen done before.

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Personal Enjoyment: 4/10

I think your story has potential but is currently difficult for me to read as it is. With refining in the areas of grammar and vocab/syntax, I wouldn't mind taking another glance at it.

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Total: 39/100

Congratulations, wise one! You've obtained the rank of a three-tailed kat. The third tail grants understanding of human speech, so put those sharp ears to good use. Continue to grow in knowledge and one day you will be able to speak the words you have heard.

I hope this review is of help to you in your writing journey!