Title: A Journey to the End

Author: jamjammac

Reviewer: GnomeMercy

Summary: 4/5

You have everything you need in a basic summary: characters, setting, stakes, and dilemma. Well done!

There isn't much I can say here, as you did have everything there! Although, I do think you had some similar sentence structure. All the sentences were short and simple. That's okay, but when put together one after the other it can sound a bit robotic and stilted.

Also, I found a small error in the first sentence:

A savage pandemic spreads throughout the human race rapidly killing millions. Only some people are immune.

There should be a comma after "human race"—this is just so that it's easier to understand the sentence and because when reading that in your head, you'd most likely put a pause there.

A savage pandemic spreads throughout the human race, rapidly killing millions. Only some people are immune.

Other than those small problems, you have a pretty good summary!

Grammar: 2.5/5

Overall, you definitely knew your grammatical basics, so well done! There were, however, a few little things I noticed.

Firstly, there were quite a lot of typos (especially in the later chapters). I recommend doing a reread of all current, published chapters and fix them as they're easy enough to spot and fix.

Also, things like (?!), or even things like (???) or (!!!!!!!), are technically grammatically incorrect. If you want to show emphasis, use it in the verbal tag (that's basically anything like "he said", "she replied", "they stated", etc., etc.) or in the description.

On the subject of verbal tags, you had a small problem with that, too. After any bit of dialogue, there's usually a verbal tag. If there is, you can't end with a period. (If it's just something that's unrelated to the way they spoke then the period's okay.) That's because a verbal tag is technically a part of a dialogue sentence. After things like dashes, exclamation, and question marks, you don't need to capitalise either. Here are some examples and the corrected versions.

" I promise I'll never hurt you again, I'm so sorry Jo." I whisper.

Corrected version:

"I promise I'll never hurt you again, I'm so sorry Jo," I whisper.

Another example:

"...until we're far enough away that they can't do anything!" He explains to me.

It should be:

"...until we're far enough away that they can't do anything!" he explains to me.

Lastly, commas. They're heard, I agree, so I'll show an example of commas used incorrectly. If you're stuck and don't know when to use it, try reading the passage allowed and seeing where you pause ever so slightly. Commas are really things you need to know properly about, so I suggest doing some research, too.

Here is an example from your story:

Five more days I think go myself.

Firstly, I think you meant:

Five more days I think to myself.

Secondly, you need a comma after "five more days" as that's his thought and another part of the sentence:

Five more days, I think to myself.

Other than that, you definitely knew the grammar fundamentals. However, there were a few errors and typos—but those are an easy enough fix!

Characters: [no score -- will not be added to final score]

I won't be giving this a score as there were only a few chapters, but do try to flesh out your characters and story more to really let your audience sink things in. I'll talk about this more in the "plot" section of the review—and how to do that as well.

Writing Style: 2.5/5

When it came to writing style, you definitely knew some things. However, there were just a few issues.

Firstly, redundancy. That's basically the repetition of a word or a phrase in anything to a sentence to a paragraph. Here's an example. Say the word/phrase you're repeating is "thing". "Something" and "everything" kind of fall into this category. If you keep using it again and again, it sounds a bit stilted and repetitive. To solve this, just try rephrasing the sentence(s) or finding synonyms (though not all synonyms are interchangeable so be careful with that one).

Another thing was similar sentence structure. That's basically when the beginnings of your sentences are basically of the same structure (as the name suggests) and are usually something like: subject + verb. Here is an example I created:

I walked...

I greeted... 

I tripped...

It sounds a bit awkward, so try changing up the sentence structure from time to time.

Lastly, the golden rule: "show not tell". An example of telling would be:

The sky was blue. The clouds were white. The sun shone.

Another example of telling is:

Bob was sad.

But showing is kind of like giving your audience evidence these things happen. Emotions can be through your characters' actions and words—and personalities work in a similar way, too. It makes things more believable and takes your writing to another level. A great way to practice is to think of a word (like happy, for example) and describe it without actually using the word.

Here's the description above, but I show these things instead:

The sky was a pale periwinkle blue, the clouds alabaster white. Sunlight pierced through, highlighting the black of her hair and glazing everything in gold.

A bit over-the-top there, but it gets my point across. See the huge difference between the two of them? It makes your writing interesting and allows you to use techniques like similes and metaphors.

Overall, a good job! Just some things to work on. Pacing was also a pretty big problem, but I'll talk about that next section.

Plot: 2.5/5

I love sci-f. I mean, viruses, aliens, planets, science—what's not to like? And while your premise seemed interesting and definitely had lots of promise, everything was a bit too fast-paced and lacked proper development. Chase and Jo were setting off to another planet within four or five chapters, and nothing had been set up to prepare it. Realistically, they would have a base on a habitable planet all ready for them—which would have taken at least a decade to prepare—and if Jo had the virus, they would have killed her immediately to stop the spread. What I'm saying is: take your time to flesh out these characters. Give them personalities that change the course of the story, let the plot develop at a slower pace so we understand what's going on. Characters and plot can really make or break a story, so make sure you take some time to make them 3D and as realistic as possible. Sorry if this came out as harsh or anything, I really like the initial idea and was excited to see what came next, but it needed a bit more development and there needed to be more time to let everything sink in.

OVERALL SCORE: 11.5/25

A very interesting idea with a promising start! There are a few things to work on, but other than that you're good to go! I know how hard it is starting a story, so good luck. I hope this helps!