Mr. Joey! Congrats on becoming a RISING STAR! Along comes your "Grand Star" to greet you!

As you can see, I don't use review templates either, however, I don't have such a well-fitting, yummy metaphor for explaining why. Honestly, I'm just too lazy to create one, and also, like you, think that each person reviewed should get "their own" review as they and their pieces are individual as well.

It was interesting to see your point of view on reviewing in particular and WDC in general. I'm impressed how much work and time you put into your reviews and how many points you consider for including and why! You almost tackle reviewing scientifically with all the sub-categories (and reasons and occasions for them) you've developed for yourself.

I feel almost like an amateur now , although the next I'll do will be my 3000th review (no joke).

I am quite emotional as well and like that I review. I simply write what I think about how the characters made me feel, if I could imagine the setting or if there are logic holes (or other flaws) and newest also correct mistakes I stumble over.

I don't structure or think long about it... and forget objective. I am an individual sharing her thoughts and not an unaffected observer repeating them, see?

One thing is tough as you noticed very well: being honest, yet polite and -hopefully- positive while doing so. It is a skill that only distils over time and needs constant practice.
However, one must be willing to learn it as it's the basis of virtual communication and this not only on WDC. You are definitely willing to try and reviewers will honor it, those who answer that is.

You tackled a bad habit here that some users engage in and which is quite impertinent IMHO. It's not only an acts of courtesy to at least let a reviewer, who probably put a lot of time into a review to help make their piece better, know that one has received the review, but even more an act of acknowledgement and respect for a fellow human being.

I have to admit, I sometimes forget and only know when reviewers inform me of that , but I'm not doing it on purpose as I have the attention span of a bug. I can't speak for anyone else but me, however.

You mentioned your difficulty with grammar, punctuation and spelling, but this was very good, except for the few little things following below.

Maybe some general suggestions first that might help you train your skills.

1. Try to avoid beginning sentences with conjunctions. That's the technical term for and (point 3) below) and but (point 12) below). It's not considered good writing. I've heard that very often myself.

2. After words I personally call "triggers" like never, ever, since, etc. always follows present perfect, like I pointed it out in point 3) of the corrections below.

3. Read your story/non-fiction aloud! That way you not only find odd or too complicated formulations, wrong-chosen words and misspellings, but also have your language in your ear - with all its pauses and stress, intonation and rhythm. That way you can also learn to set punctuation right. At least it helped me... and I'm ESL.

Anyway, before you fall asleep, here come the corrections, chronologically and line-by-line.

1) ... who might want my review(period) Below are my thoughts on review templates. (I guess you wanted to say that. )

2) ... the person(comma)... subject of my review(comma)...
3) And I never make that decision until I have read...

4) ... many who aspire to be the next bestseller author,... (comma) trying to find out... this thing(no comma) we call 'creative writing'.

5) ... several perspectives(period) There are the writing mechanics(colon) SPAG.
6) ... story mechanics(colon) plot, ...
7) ... genre mechanics... which change(comma) depending on...
8) ... literary fiction and say(comma) fantasy,...
9) ... and then I discovered... I have to research.
10) ... my thoughts and suggestions...
11) Then (no comma) I wait(comma) with a bit of anticipation,...
12) But Writing is now my passion(semicolon) it is what I do(period)

13) ... will haunt me for the remained of my days. (I know what was you want to say, but word usage seems odd; maybe the rest of my remaining days?)

By the way, I've read over your sample reviews and have to say I recognized myself in them. Very long, very entertaining, sometimes losing focus a bit, but never boring or fully unfitting the reviewed piece.

Thank you for sharing and... may I have a review? *giving Joey puppy eyes*


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My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Go Noticed" .