Judged by: Mathew!

First Place: Drugs, Treasons, and Other Demons 🥇

I liked Sarah as the main character in all her flawed but beautiful glory. Her sense of humour and thought process were entertaining so I enjoyed being in the 'passenger seat', so to speak, with her. I had a weird love-hate relationship with the Pablo and Juan but nevertheless enjoyed their contributions. Honestly, you did a really good job of making me feel the same way as the protagonist. This was a unique hook of the road trip with a group of girls that you basically hate so really intrigued me. The pacing was relatively smooth considering it was an intense action thriller kind of romance. My only gripe with the book was that the world-building fell short as most of the scenarios felt odd considering it was a kidnapping. I get that the main leads had to like each other but the pacing and world-building should work hand in hand with one another to make the story believable. You absolutely nailed the technical side and readability. From the spelling and grammar to diction, the sentences and paragraphs flowed really well so was an enjoyable and smooth reading experience. Great work!

Second Place: Never Summer Again 🥈

You did a really good job of making the protagonist relatable so I really enjoyed Lydia's internal monologue. The way each character described the things or people they saw felt in line with their style of speaking or vocabulary and less omnipotent so we, as readers, felt like we were in the character's shoes. While the story was relatively well paced for the most part, I felt like there were a few filler chapters where nothing really progressed apart from some meaningless interactions between characters so maybe combining a few chapters or cutting them down would help? There was some solid world building as each character was fleshed out with the protagonist's environment being established well so truly bought the story to life. The readability was quite high as most of the spelling and grammar were correct (apart from a few minor errors) but the flow of some of the paragraphs were interrupted when there would be tons of info-dumping. My advice would be to limit the exposition to a prologue or earlier chapters unless a new character or setting is being introduced. Overall, this was a highly enjoyable book and I found myself looking forward to reading more. Well done!

Third Place: Parth Probodhika: Pristine hues of his peace 🥉

While the story began relatively slow paced, you could really feel the love and respect both protagonists had for each other so I thought that was really well portrayed. You also do a really good job of creating character arcs throughout the story so we don't start out with exactly the same characters and are able to actually go through a journey with them. The prologue, though in keeping with the storyline, acted more as a POV for each character than an actual preface to the story. Being an Indian myself, I really appreciated the way our culture was depicted as it felt accessible for foreigners too. The readability varied in different sections for me as the spelling and grammar were all amazing but sometimes the sentences and paragraphs felt like they were going off on a tangent. Combining philosophical and religious perspectives with the romance aspect was really refreshing as it's something that I haven't read before. Overall, this was an enjoyable book and had some really high strengths but there were also a few aspects that needed to be tweaked for it to improve. Good job!

Congratulations to everyone who participated in this category!