Title: The Way You Live

Author: meryruaid

Summary: [no score – will not be added to final score]

I decided not to judge our summary, since it is hard to judge a summary when it doesn't follow the traditional format. However, I do like that you have succinctly shown us the direction of the story, and the utilisation of rhetorical question is a great way to keep the reader engaged. Well done! 

Grammar: 1.5/5

Okay, so you asked me to focus on this section, and I will happily do so. In short, your grammar and punctuation definitely need work – but don't worry; once you know the rules, you'll be able to fix them up in no time. English grammar is incredibly complex, so that's why we're here to help.

Let's start with the basics: capital letters. The only times you should be capitalising the start of a word is when the word is the start of a sentence, or when it is a proper noun (such as a name). You tend to randomly capitalise words in the middle of your sentence, and the start of your sentences also tend to lack capital letters. Additionally, a lot of the time, you don't capitalise the names of characters – and character names are definitely proper nouns that require capitalisation.

Next, read our sentences aloud. You tend to lack commas when they are required, so I recommend reading it aloud and looking out for moments where you need to pause for the sentence to be fluent. Those pauses, chances are, require punctuation. Also, make sure your verbs are presented in the correct format. An example of both these errors is in the following sentence:

Cutting her lips she clean up the fog appearing in her eyes.

First of all, you need the comma after the introductory part of that sentence. Secondly, you need to resolve the subject-verb disagreement, and it should look more like:

Cutting her lips, she cleaned up the fog in her eyes.

Also, be careful that you're not mixing up the spelling of some words. Sometimes, by spelling them incorrectly, you change the meaning. For example:

Three boys were ridding bike.

Ridding means 'to get rid of' (to throw away). It should be:

Three boys were riding bikes.

Now, let's talk tenses. You occasionally flip from past tense to present tense. For example:

It is Khizer Murtaza. [it is = present tense]

She thought it and began to cry. [thought/began = past tense]

You need to choose one and stick to it. Additionally, when you're writing, you flip from first person to third person within paragraphs with no warning whatsoever. For example, in the following excerpt in the exact same chapter (within a paragraph of one another), when you were referring to Eman, you wrote:

Is it possible that he forgot me so easily? [me = first person]

She suddenly breaks into pieces. [she = third person]

You need to keep it consistent. If you are going to switch, make sure the reader is made aware of the switch.

Next, punctuation and dialogue. You should not have gaps between the punctuation, inverted commas, and the words. For example:

"I like him as a teacher and nothing else . " I reply with a sight shrug.

There are a few errors in that above example. You wrote 'sight' instead of 'slight', you're using incorrect punctuation, and the formatting is incorrect. 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). It should be:

"I like him as a teacher and nothing else," I reply with a slight shrug.

Additionally, punctuation must always come before the closing inverted commas, and these inverted commas should be directly next to the words within the dialogue itself. For example:

"What about them?" he pouted with a carelessly retort." I have read as much as I want to read".

In that example, your inverted commas are attached to the wrong words, your adjectives are used incorrectly, and you haven't capitalised appropriately. Also, I'd suggest flipping the 'retort' and 'pout', because you can retort the words – not pout them. It should be:

"What about them?" he carelessly retorted with a pout. "I have read as much as I want to read."

And, a lot of the time, you flipped into script format. I'll discuss this more in writing style, but you need to keep it to one style. 

Characterisation: 2.5/5

Okay, first of all, Eman was quite a solid protagonist. She was clearly more mature and thoughtful than her friends to an extent, which leads to nice development as she loosens up with Khizer. We know she has flaws as a character, as she shows jealousy over those she loves, and she learns to stand up for herself and the ones she loves throughout the course of the story – good job!

Khizer is also quite sweet. I'm sure most of your readers swoon over him – after all, who doesn't want a man who thinks we're pretty when we cry?

However, your characters were simply not all that distinct. When you introduce side characters like Baron and Helina, we don't get anything of them – we don't get clear and purposeful appearances, nor do we get distinct idiosyncrasies in their behaviour and dialogue. Additionally, since your story is mostly dialogue after dialogue after more dialogue, it was very hard to differentiate characters with the dialogue alone.

Additionally, you do a lot of telling and not enough showing when it came to characterisation. For example:

"Farhan was his own man and he did what he wanted."

Don't tell us that! Show it to us. Let us see him spit in his fathers' face and go off to do his own thing. Don't just tell us such a pivotal piece of information like that. Make the reader work to understand the characters. 

Writing Style: 1.5/5

Okay, so it's hard to talk about an overall writing style when the sentences themselves don't make sense. Overall, I encourage you to look over your sentences and read them aloud to make sure that they have a clear direction. For example:

After you heart was not agree to accept anyone.

I genuinely could not understand what that sentence was trying to tell me. It felt like words that were just stung together. Another example:

Professor that he did not seem from anywhere.

Make sure that each of your sentences have a clear purpose and intention and direction. Once you've mastered that, we can talk about implementing figurative language to make your writing more rich and immersive.

You asked me to discuss description. I'll be frank with you: you don't have nearly enough of it. You had some nice moments where you describe the pain Farhan felt after his fight with his brother, but there weren't many examples of these. Let's look at when Farhan is riding his bike away, going crazy, ignoring traffic rules and signs. Describe that for us – make the reader feel as if they are on that bike. Describe the wind, describe what we would smell and see, what we would hear amongst the traffic.

Which brings me onto my next point: White Wall Syndrome. I don't like using the term a lot, because it makes it sound really dire, but don't worry – it's basically the writing term used to describe a story that lacks description (because the story may as well be set in a white room with white walls for all the reader knows). This made me a little sad, because your story is so culturally rich and unique with beautiful moments of diversity – use that to your advantage! Show us the world, and the culture.

This also helps enrichen the conflict in the plot; when Farhan comes along to tell Eman that Khizer drinks and smokes, it didn't feel that significant because it wasn't built up that it is such a drastic thing to do as a Muslim. Readers with limited background experience of this culture would not understand, and may feel a disconnect with the story.

Also, you tell and tell and tell, rather than show. Don't just tell us that "she was suffering from high fever and stomach-ache" – show it to us. Make us feel it.

Additionally, the script mode. Writing in script mode has its own mechanics and technicalities and sets of rules. Except, you kept switching between script mode and an actual narrative mode. I recommend the narrative mode for your story, and the best way to execute it is to use more description. 

Plot + Originality: 3/5

Your story covers a lot of important topics – betrayal, trust, and love. There are also brief moments where depression was mentioned, and, as a girl who is studying psychology, I'm just going to say this: don't throw around such terms lightly. Depression is an actual mental illness. If you're going to use it, make sure you do the research so you know how to execute the concepts.

Anyways, your dialogue has some beautiful moments of philosophy, discussing fighting and conquering your problems with a strong heart. That was a beautiful notion to read about, so well done.

We do see conflict thrown in the very last minute, with Eman being told by Farhan that Khizer drinks alcohol and smokes, and it was great to see Eman hold true to her love and only trust her love. However, we didn't even see her panic and grapple with the decision. We didn't see any internal conflict within her. Show us that development.

Overall, your story follows a little bit of a jumpy narrative, but has a clear beginning, climax, and end. It was, however, very hard to immerse myself into the story due to the grammar and writing style. However, congratulations on completing a first draft – it can only get better from here!

OVERALL SCORE: 8.5/20

Overall, a rather sweet read. Make sure you work on your grammar and punctuation, as well as your descriptions, and you should be good to go. I hope this review helps.