Title: The Missing Gem

Author: missmarswrites

Summary: 3.5/5

I really struggled to judge this summary, in all honesty. It's very cinematic, and contains some brilliant aspects – it introduces the two protagonists, I love how it starts with one side of the story and goes on to introduce the second side, and hints at how these two sides may intertwine.

However, I'm finding that, due to the rather ambiguous nature of the summary, it is lacking a few things.

While I understand how you want to be quite ambiguous and whimsical by saying "happiness is in the hands of fate", but then we don't actually know what the conflict is. We don't know how they meet, or what will go wrong, or what sort of hurdles they will have to jump over. We don't know if there are any stakes, and we don't know the setting either.

Also, watch out – you are missing a few commas, and you have a tense change in the very first sentence. However, we'll focus more on grammar and punctuation in the next section. 

Grammar: 3/5

Your grammar could definitely use some work, but don't worry – I'm here to help.

First of all, you are using commas in places where commas are not necessary, and you are also lacking commas in places where they are necessary. I suggest reading your story aloud to see where you need a pause for fluency, and those pauses usually indicate that you need a form of punctuation there. Additionally, watch out for run-on sentences. Here is an example:

She could not go back to sleep and just lying in bed doing nothing while staring at a white wall was so not her thing, she was so not that type of girl.

That sentence is a run-on sentence; a sentence where you have two independent clauses in one sentence with a comma or nothing to separate them. In this case, since you've used a comma between "so not her thing" and "she was so not that type of girl", you have a comma splice. To resolve this, replace the comma with either a semicolon, dash, or full-stop.

Next, let's talk about dialogue and punctuation. If dialogue is followed by a verbal dialogue tag (such as 'he said', 'she whispered', 'she exclaimed' – or anything referring to how the character says the words), there should be a comma before the closing inverted commas. If it's anything else, this comma should be replaced by a period (or a question mark for a question and exclamation mark for an exclamation). For example:

"I decided to get some work done." She explained.

It should be:

"I decided to get some work done," she explained.

Also watch out for apostrophes. In cases like "it's", the apostrophe is used to show that the word is a contraction of "it is". So, in examples such as:

My tongue did its' job.

You don't actually need the apostrophe.

Also, watch out for basic inconsistencies in the writing – make sure you are using the noun when the noun is required, and not the verb. For example:

My best friend sounded confuse, perplex...

It should be:

My best friend sounded confused, perplexed...

You also had typos written in the story within the story, but I assumed that may have been intentional since Nic was typing so quickly and was really into what she was writing. 

Characterisation: 3.5/5

Nic is a quirky protagonist. I love how playful you are with her narration; I laughed when she kept freaking out over the pizza guy calling her "ma'am". Overall, she seems like a very open character that is easy to engage with, easy to like, and easy to understand. Well done! She is clearly a bit of a romantic, and her love for writing and her desire to be swept off her feet is something many readers will relate to.

The contrast between Matt and Lucas is fantastic – especially since Matt isn't painted in a negative light to begin with (which is great!). Since we have perspective switches that allow us into Lucas's mind, we can also see that he is a great match for Nic. The love between them is very pure and comfortable, and very different to the relationship with Matt that was present in the prologue; it's all about hopes and dreams rather than jobs and money, and they are in very similar positions in their own way.

Their banter is fun, the references to pop culture (and the jokes about going to prison!) are great and make them feel real. However, there are moments where you dip into telling territory instead of showing. For example, let's go towards the very start:

The fact that he was already doing what he wanted for a living this early in life was satisfying enough for him and it truly fulfilled him but it also clouded his thoughts when it came to his girlfriend.

Don't tell it to us. Show it to us. I know you're trying to quickly let the reader familiarise themselves with the relationship since he is about to propose and, a chapter later, it won't work out. However, it would be more impactful if we saw this – and feel less forced. By telling us, we already know it's not going to work out. By showing us, we'll see red flags; but there is still room for us to hope for the best. 

Writing Style: 3/5

Okay, so, the writing was a bit hard to engage with – but this is mostly because of the lack of appropriately placed commas. This made the writing quite jarring and odd to read, but once you polish that up, I'm sure it'll be a lot smoother. Also, another thing you need to watch out for is tense. For example:

My mouth is agape and my eyes almost pop out of my face as I heard the man speak on the other side of the line.

If we break that down, it looks like this:

My mouth is agape... [is = present]

...I heard the man speak on the other side of the line. [heard = past tense]

You need to keep your tenses consistent, because this made the writing really clunky to read.

Next: description. You have some nice amount of description, but I encourage you to use it to add to the mood while keeping it purposeful. Do we need to know that Nic's hair is a messy bun? Do we need to know the colour of her clothes?

And since a lot of the chapters are in first person, use this to your advantage to really make us feel what the characters are feeling. When it's getting hot and passionate in chapter ten but then they suddenly stop, what does that feel like for Lucas? Does it make him feel cold or exposed or vulnerable or frustrated? Show that to us. Let us see what they are thinking. Let us feel what they are feeling.

Also, let's look at another example from the story:

"Try this," He pushed the place across the table to my side with the point of his finger against the thin brim of the blue plate. "and I dare you to try find something better."

Ignoring the incorrect punctuation, let's focus on that prose. Do we need all that detail? I always advise limiting the number of adjectives you use in a single sentence. You've also used 'plate' twice in a single sentence, which makes the writing awkward to read. Consider:

"Try this." With the point of his finger against the brim of the plate, he pushed the muffin towards me. "And I dare you to try find something better." 

Plot + Originality: 4/5

I love the way you introduce the story. We have a prologue, where everything seems happy between Nic and Matt, which leads into him proposing. Then, in the next chapter, it all goes downhill. You do foreshadow that it won't work out, based on what you tell us about Matt, but, once again, I encourage you to show it to us – that'll make it more impactful when it doesn't work out, as the readers will see the red flags for themselves.

Additionally, I love the little bit of awkwardness between Lucas and Nic to begin with – especially since she thinks he is married at first with a child (who turns out to be his sister and niece, respectively). It's also nice to see how all characters are starting to interact and contribute to the story; because Nic worked for Diane Fitzgerald, her best friend, Pixar gave her an exception and looked into Lucas's sketches – which is a nice way to tie things together.

My concern is that there is minimal conflict. Like, thus far, there seems to be no hurdles. It's a smooth-sailing love story in which nothing seems to be going wrong. I'm hoping that, since there are only fifteen chapters uploaded, more conflict will start to appear as more chapters are introduced. For now, it feels like the characters are just breezing on through the story. 

OVERALL SCORE: 17/25

Overall, a sweet story with some quirky characters. I encourage you to work on your tenses and punctuation, and you should be good to go. I hope this review helps!