Title: The Ring of Time

Author: Le0pard0

Summary: 4/5

This is a pretty fantastic summary. I like that you introduce the backstory of the crystal, and how this goes on to affect the two protagonists. I love the way you introduce a bit of their stories – with emphasis on Ethan's – and how this leads into how the ring could possibly help him. I particularly loved your final paragraph, with the rhetorical question and philosophical underpinnings.

If I'm being a bit picky, I'll be honest – I still don't know the direction of the story. What will Ethan do once he discovers this magical world? Will he go on to do something to cure his ordinary world? If so, what are the stakes – what are the dangers that may threaten Ethan in his goal? The stakes are the best way to completely take hold of the reader and make them yearn for more.

Otherwise, good work! 

Grammar: 3.5/5

Your grammar is pretty decent, and made reading a fluent and easy experience. However, there were a few things I caught. Let's go through them, shall we?

First of all, 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:

"If there is anyone here, we will see them." Drew said, his lips curved into a frown.

Since 'Drew said' directly refers to the words being spoken, it should be:

"If there is anyone here, we will see them," Drew said, his lips curved into a frown.

Another example:

"I had to try," Amora smiled.

You can't smile your words. It should be:

"I had to try." Amora smiled.

Or:

"I had to try," Amora said, smiling.

Next, watch out for your tenses. I know it can be tempting to switch to present tense when you're talking about the world, but it still must consistent with the tense of the rest of the story. For example:

Ethan's brain had hidden injuries that the medical science fails to explain.

In that sentence, there is a shift of tenses. Let's break it down:

Ethan's brain had hidden injuries... [had = past tense]

... that the medical science fails to explain. [fails = present]

You need to make sure the tenses are consistent throughout the story.

Also make sure that you have commas in the appropriate places. There were some instances where I felt like you were missing a comma. For example:

The death goddess was generous to Ethan as along with giving him legs, she gave him a body that was six feet and five inches tall.

For the sentence to read fluently, you need an additional comma so that the sentence looks like:

The death goddess was generous to Ethan as, along with giving him legs, she gave him a body that was six feet and five inches tall.

Also double check that you are using the appropriate vocabulary. For example:

The water pressure chocked him.

To 'chock' something is to prevent it from moving by using a chock, which is like a wedge/block that they usually use to hold vehicles in place. I think you meant 'choked'. Additionally, you had a few cases of missing full-stops, or moments where you didn't use a question mark even though a question was asked. Also, be careful with formatting. For example:

Where am I? Why am I here? Who did this to me?

For some reason, the middle part wasn't italicised. I'd go back and polish that so that it is consistent. 

Characterisation: 3.5/5

I felt like I learnt a lot more about Drew than I did in the first draft of this story. I like that he is quite flawed, especially in his arrogance, though his curiosity and intellect definitely shine through. It was especially intriguing to see how he, as opposed to Ethan, sees himself as anything but a failure, which leaves him struggling when he does switch bodies with Ethan. Since he underestimates the twelve-year-old so much, I'm very excited to see Ethan grow out of his shell and prove him wrong, as that may lead to some nice development where Drew loses some of that arrogance.

Now, speaking of Ethan, he has to be one of those characters who has stuck with me. Even after months of reviewing and reading other books, I vividly remembered him, his accident, and the scene with the river. With more chapters now, it was simply adorable seeing his innocence shine through – I was amused when I saw that he thought he was in the death realm. And don't get me started on how he thinks he's being called Drew because he didn't believe in the death goddess – that was hilariously cute.

However, despite that, I still struggled to really connect with the characters. After a bit of rereading, I realised this was because you told rather than showed, which made it quite difficult to leave and breathe these characters. For example:

He felt a strange connection to that woman.

That's not a bad sentence, but if you really want the reader to feel that connection with Ethan, you need to show this to us. Make us feel that connection. Does it tug at his heart? Does he suddenly feel light at the sight of her? Perhaps there's just a familiar smell that he senses? Make us feel it. Another example:

Drew was confused.

Again, show it to us. Make us feel his confusion. Make us understand it. Since you have perspective shifts that work well with the story, you need to make sure we engage with each character. 

Writing Style: 3.5/5

I was in love with some of your descriptions! Some of them were truly beautiful, and I was in complete awe of some of your metaphors – like, for example, the idea of the river containing infinite blue ropes to drag Drew down? Gorgeous. There were some moments, though, where I felt like some things needed to be expanded. For example, the shape-shifting monsters. While we got a nice description of the setting and the house, we got minimal description of the shape-shifting monsters, which was odd since Drew and Amora were literally running away from them and it would be important to give the readers that sense of panic.

Anyways, with the writing style, it was mostly very specific things I noticed. For example, word repetition:

Amora closed her white eyes. Slowly, she opened it, sending out sparks of white light. Her hair became luminescent and flew in different directions, and a white aura formed around her.

You used the word 'white' in each sentence. I suggest being a bit more creative, and playing up your sentence structure a bit more to reduce it. For example, a rough draft by me:

For a second, everything turned white – Amora's eyes, the sparks of light flying out of her hands, the aura that formed around her.

It was mostly just paraphrasing what you wrote in a way that limited the number of times you repeated the single word. Another example from your story:

The room was white with gleaming white light coming from a cuboid on the roof.

See how the repetition of the word white (again) makes the sentence quite awkward? Try to find other creative ways to introduce the setting without repeating yourself too much – otherwise, it starts to become a bit redundant.

Speaking of redundancy, here is an example I found of it:

"Sorry," Amora apologised.

You don't really need to say 'Amora apologised', because the reader can already see that she apologised by saying 'sorry'. I suggest just writing, 'Amora apologised' by itself without any dialogue, or writing, '"Sorry," Amora muttered'.

And, finally, be careful with your word choices. For example:

They jarred the pebbles on their way.

To jar something is to send a painful or damaging shock through it, hence why people sometimes describe pain as 'jarring'. You can't really jar a pebble out of the way, because the pebbles themselves don't really feel the pain.

Plot + Originality: 4/5

Even with eleven chapters in, the overall direction of the story feels a bit unclear to me. That being said, I know that Drew is desperate to swap bodies again, and Ethan is about to learn a whole lot of awesome magical abilities.

Now, speaking of the magic, I love how original it is! I love the ink house, the scene with the crazy fire, the magic within the earring and the conducting stick – it's so awesome how the mundane objects carry so much weight in your story. Well done! I found the premise super intriguing and I can't wait to see you build on it even more.

I like how the two worlds are vastly different, though I think you have more opportunities to compare and contrast them that you missed out on. For example, when Drew sees the clothes of Ethan's world and describes it as 'strange', that was a perfect moment to show us what he would expect from his world, and go on to compare it to what he was seeing at that time.

Additionally, I think there were moments where the pace went by too quickly. I loved the surprising scenes that left me curious – such as the Queen of Wolor – but because it's a different perspective entirely, you need to flesh it out for us and let the reader ground themselves into the new characters. That way, each chapter still moves seamlessly into the next.

Anyways, that aside, I'm excited to see what you have coming up next!

OVERALL SCORE: 18.5/25

Overall, it's so great to see you growing as a writer as you continue the story! Your story has many gorgeous descriptions, and with a bit of work on your punctuation and redundancy, you should be good to go. I hope this review helps!