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Review #4246936
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Review by Shaye
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Hi Inkslinger ,

I am Lorraine and I am reviewing your piece "Invalid Item"  today in affiliation with "Simply Positive Review Forum " .

Title: Interesting title. I'm not sure where you're going with it yet. There's obviously an instant link to the Brown Recluse, but I try not to think about spiders too much. *Laugh* It's a unique title as far as I can see, so good job there.

First Impression: Wow. What an action-packed first chapter! You introduce two characters that are clearly going to be key and you've also set the story up with a fast pace and really introduced us to these characters with a bang!

Plot: This is where I'm having the most difficulty with the story so far. You've got Rayn who's been wanting to leave for a while, and the perfect opportunity arises for her to do so. You don't really describe why she's so willing to just shoot off with quite a suspcious, shifty character, that's clearly nervous to be in the area right from the get-go. She doesn't seem that phased by any of it. If it wasn't got the description, I wouldn't know at this point that she'd lost her memories. I think you need to make something about her memories clear in the first chapter, or maybe not mention the lack of memories in the description of your novel. If you chose to not mention it in the description, I'm not sure how you'd go about writing a desription to be honest! *Laugh* It's clearly a very important plot point; one that needs to be mentioned sooner rather than later. I know you've got "and she wondered what it was she had forgotten", but this is quite generic. I found myself wondering if she'd forgotten the medallion, or if she'd simply left something somewhere, as opposed to her actual memories.

Characterisation: I tend to describe your own character's back at you, as I find it gives a good idea of the reader's impression of the character's, and helps you identify if your character is coming across in a way that you don't really want them to.

Rayn:
Rayn is a badass gunsmith who seems capable of looking after herself and has some sort of link to the medallion she always carries. So far, we know she's green-eyed (which doesn't match the cover; I'm not sure if that's important) and auburn hair. Not sure if there was other physical description mentioned, and I missed it. She's clearly capable with a gun, and it's afraid of much. She seems to want answers about being shot at, as opposed to breaking down into a teary mess.

Captain Black:
Captain Black, so far, seems to be a shify character. Clearly up to something less-than-legal, and someone the authorities are keen on taking out, no matter the people that may be standing in their way. I'm not sure yet if that's a testement to who he is, or who the authorities are, or a bit of both. He's got blue eyes, late-twenties, smokes, black hair. Up to no good? *Laugh*

Both characters are well-described physically, with snippets of information, rather than too much in an info-dump. Well done there! We've got a hint of their personalities; Rayn more so than Black. I'm not sure if Black's personality on show in this chapter were his true personality, or if it was a show he was putting on to make Rayn agree to come with him. Guess I'll find out soon!

Setting: Some great description here. You introduce the steampunk elements quickly with the airships. I'm curious if that dented, sad airship that blocks the view at the beginning of the chapter turns out to be Captain Black's airship. You did seem to pay special attention to describing it, which makes the reader think it might be relevant in the future.

You also managed to somehow get some good description of the shop collapsing as it was attacked by the Coalition with debris and white-dust etc. You've done well to keep the pace of the chapter, whilst still including description of the area. This is really well done.

Spelling/Grammar:

er, “ - There's a space between the end of the speech, and the speech mark. This has caused the direction of the speech mark to switch, as if it was surround the description of the character's action as opposed to the speech. Take the space out, and this should fix itself.

“Rayn.” She said - The period should be a comma, and then the S of she lower case.

pilot who had put in here - I'm not sure if it's just me, but this part doesn't make sense. What does "who had put in here" mean? I imagine it to be something like "who had been in here"?

I’m going to die here. I'd make this italic. It was quite off-putting to be reading everything as the narrator, and then switch to the first person suddenly, and then continue as the narrator. As this is Rayn's personal thoughts, I'd try and seperate it from the narrator.

breath.Something - Just missing the space.

Closing Thoughts: Probably the longest review I've given during GoT. This has a lot of promise, and I hope to be able to stop by and review the rest of it, or at least read the rest of it, at some point in the near-ish future. *Smile* Actually, this might be my longest review ever, now that I'm looking at the character count. Who knew I'd be doing that during GoT? *Laugh*

Lorraine


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Listen, smile, agree, and then do whatever you were going to do anyway! Robert Downey Jr.


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