Title: When Hope is Gone

Author: Writer_of_God

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

Rather than write a traditional summary that discusses stakes, conflict, and characters, you have chosen to stick a long quotation as your blurb. The quotation itself is highly intriguing, with lots of questions about morality and philosophy that, without a doubt, are relevant in your story. If you are, however, going to use the punctuation marks with the quotation, make sure the punctuation is accurate. Whenever you have a new paragraph, but the same speaker is still speaking, you still need quotation marks at the start of that paragraph. So it should look like:

"How do you destroy a monster without becoming one? It's ironic, isn't it, that we believe we're the good guys, at least to some extent. At what point does our fighting crime, become crime? The police in every city do their best, but aren't they the ones who are killing? Yes, they're killing killers, but doesn't that make them killers as well? It's for a good cause though, right? I'm sure they've never misjudged a person...

"If killing for a good cause is right, then when is killing wrong? We all have reasons for what we do and even if deep down we know it's wrong, how hard can it be to come up with a legitimate reason? The only problem now is, how can the police do their job, and how do we as people keep safe and keep others from killing each other just for territory, or revenge?

"Well who knows and who cares anymore. I guess here, at this forgotten college, anything is legal. It's different here, so different. One thousand people with one voice and one cause. Welcome to the rebellion."

Edit: After reading the story, I realise that the summary was not dialogue, but a letter. So, don't worry about the punctuation! 

Grammar: 3/5

Overall, your grammar could definitely use some work. First of all, let's look at some examples and break it down from there:

There were few twinkling stars that night, fewer than usual, everything was near pitch black.

That sentence is a run-on sentence. Basically, a run-on sentence is when 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 the 'than usual' and 'everything was', you have a comma splice.

Here is another example:

"Then smash your damn fingers I'm almost there."

Since there is no punctuation between the two independent clauses, it is also a run-on sentence. It should be:

"Then smash your damn fingers. I'm almost there."

Additionally, whenever you use ellipsis, you need to ensure you are using three periods – not four, not two. For example:

It's a stunning cream colour....

It should be:

It's a stunning colour...

Now, the biggest issue I found – and say biggest because this actually disrupted the fluency of the writing and made it difficult to engage with – was your tenses. You kept going back and forth from past to present tense, in both the prologue (the past) and the rest of the chapters (the present). For example:

I saw Hope open her mouth but then close it, realising that we all know where Mother is.

If we break it down:

I saw Hope... [saw = past tense]

... we all know where Mother is. [know, is = present tense]

You need to keep your tenses consistent.

Characterisation: 3/5

In all honestly, I don't think you spent enough time in the story building up your characters. For example, in the prologue, Carol and the mother die, and it's supposed to feel like a big and heartbreaking impact. However, because characterisation was glossed over, we don't feel that impact. We don't sympathise for Kendrall and Mason.

Additionally, in the very first chapter, Hope keeps being brought up – the fact that she was a perfect citizen. And yet, we don't see any of that foreshadowed in the prologue. I suggest lengthening your prologue to give us a better sense of the characters before throwing us into the deep end.

Now, you've chosen to write your story in first person, which is a sound choice, as it has a lot to do with characters learning who to trust and how to have hope. However, be careful when it comes to showing backstory; Kendrall basically blurts it all out to the reader in the first chapter alone. In a single, short chapter, she tells the reader about how she still has a soft heart, how she feels after losing her best friend, her father's addiction to alcohol and gambling getting worse. And all of that was told to us in a single paragraph.

When it's executed like that, it feels like the protagonist is rambling, and the story feels less engaging. My suggestion? Don't tell it to us. Show it to us. Show us the alcohol without blatantly stating it.

Anyways, Kendrall is a sound protagonist – she is thoughtful and clever, and her love of Labradors and writing makes her very relatable. However, there is a lack of cohesion in her narration that makes it hard to engage with her as a character, and I'll talk more about this in the next section. Also, let's look an example:

I'm exhausted, drained, angry, hurt, and so much more.

Try avoid blatantly telling the reader this. Try showing it through their internal monologue, or their physiological feelings. You shouldn't have to spell it out for your reader. 

Writing Style: 2.5/5

I mentioned a lack of cohesion within the writing, so let's talk about that first. For example, in chapter one, we have Kendrall wake up. She wakes up, blurts something out about how her father isn't the same anymore, and then grabs her diary and writes. However, since this is in first person, the reader is left a little estranged. It's like we're sitting in a room, and the girl who we were talking to moments ago about her father just picked up her diary, ignored us, and started writing.

Also, some sentences just contradict each other. Example:

Maybe I'll become a writer and put this in the papers, not that anyone reads them anymore. Recently, the papers have become quite popular.

You just said that no one reads them anymore. How are they becoming quite popular, suddenly?

Once again, avoid showing and telling – especially when you can use internal monologue and narration to show how your protagonist is feeling without explicitly stating it. Example:

I gripped the side of the couch in shock and fear.

Don't tell us that – show it to us. The gripping of the couch? Fantastic. The shock and fear? Try not to mention those so blatantly.

Next, you have some excessively long paragraphs. For example, at the start of chapter nineteen. In a single paragraph, we see Kendrall searching around, dropping a vial, spilling liquid, going to another cabinet, finding a pack, going to a lab station, and glancing back at the floor – which was starting to corrode. That's a lot of straight movement for one paragraph, and it should be split up to be more cohesive and to give you time to expand on some points with internal monologue.

Additionally, avoid repetitive sentence structures. For example, here are three sentences you have in a row:

I quickly scan my room...

I can't believe...

I shudder...

It's all: I [verb] [filler]. This gets incredibly repetitive and jarring for the reader, so I recommend mixing up your sentence structures more to make it engaging. 

Plot + Originality: 4/5

You have such a fascinating premise, that is quite heartbreaking! The little girl with a number as her name, and her death in particular, was very sad and memorable for me. There were also some great moments of philosophy all throughout your story – describing humanity, morality, and hope. Those letters made a great addition to your story, especially since they started from the beginning and showed to be a recurring theme, with the hidden notes inside a teddy-bear concept.

There are some great cliffhangers, like seeing Parker suddenly appear, and we have some great moments where characters are constantly forced to wonder what is right and wrong. However, while your chapters flow nicely into one another – from the kidnapping, to adequately settling into the new environment – it felt far too rushed.

A chapter should have a clear progression. A clear beginning, middle, end, and it should lead to an almost new perception of the story, as something new is thrown in, or there was an emotional development of some sort. Right now, I'm not feeling that within the chapters, nor am I feeling particularly engaged with the characters. I highly suggest slowing down the story to immerse the reader into the characters more. 

OVERALL SCORE: 12.5/20

Overall, an intriguing premise! Just work on your tenses, as well as showing and not telling, and you should be good to go. I hope this review helps!