If it is one chappy, I recommend chapter 1 rather than the prologue.
www.scribblehub.com
First, I want to say I needed more context just to give you a proper review, and because your chapters were so short overall, I went ahead and just read the first three. You have a distinct voice and I assume based on what I’ve read so far you have a plan in mind for the lore. The best quality I can say is the fact that you’ve managed to end off each chapter so far on a point where I thought “Alright, I’ll read the next one.”
What I want to start off with first is tackling your world building because it’s the biggest chunk of what you’ve written overall. The prologue was an extremely big part in keeping my interest because of how much it fleshed out the world and the MC in turn. With that being said, these chapters being like this are fine, but if every chapter after this continued to be a another dose of lore told to me by a faceless narrator, my interest will go down.
In the future, go back to doing things like “A fine amethyst mist engulfed her body to perform its duty.” It does its job perfectly, letting us know how it functions by seeing it in action, rather than being told that it’s the amethyst of prosperity that does {function}.
One of the biggest gripes I had with your world building came in chapter one. We had a ton of build up to who and what the Schwarz family meant to the world. I would’ve liked some extra detail on how the people in the camp felt about the fact that they were about to take down a member of the powerful house. Just an example would be like having one of the grunts say, “I’ve heard the Schwarz can conjure a fireball large enough to wipe out a city,” and then another one coming up and saying “Don’t worry, she’s a Schwarz only in name.” My example’s not really the best, but the concept is mostly what I mean. It would help to zoom in on the characters more, so we can experience the world through their lens.
Based on your story so far I know you’re painting more of a grand narrative, and drawing closer to a character can make it harder to focus on showing the overall view of your world, but as it stands, there’s not much of a reason for us to care about many of the characters. That doesn’t apply to the main character, however. You’ve managed to give us a reason to care about her, and want her to succeed in the small amount of time we really spent on her. And the added context of the prologue on what she transforms into by the end was a huge bonus.
But the story itself doesn’t really stay around her for much time unfortunately, or really any characters if I’m being honest (but from what I can tell, that’s probably changing soon).
And the biggest flaw I see is, that you seem to be writing everyone’s dialogue in the same stiff, and almost eloquent tone as the narrator. It works well enough with Geralt since he’s a knight, but definitely not the assassins in chapter one. They should be speaking in a more gritty tone, not saying things like, “Tell them that it is time.” If your point is to imply that they’re actually knights in disguise prepared to assassinate the girl, then it possibly works. Otherwise, the boss starting off by saying “Excellent,” paints him more like Dr. Evil from Austin Powers. Just start off with conjunctions for now. Change “tell them it is time,” to “tell them it’s time.” I’m the type of reader who can’t get hooked on a story without a character to latch on to, so don’t take everything I said as a negative. As I said, you’ve built up Aurora well enough that she alone was enough to get me to read another chapter.
Lastly, I’ll look at prose. I’m not a huge prose person, so I won’t give you technical tips. But I will say, your prose fluctuates from simple and serviceable to suddenly making me have to pull out a dictionary. It’s more apparent where you’re describing Aurora’s physical appearance. We get this sentence “Aurora’s figure still exuded the heart warming charm of juvenile innocence, of naive childish ignorance veiled in frivolous yet shy frill and playful meandering lace,” but right before that we get a brief description of Geralt’s eyes and Aurora hanging her head in shame. I won’t say that it’s a bad quality to describe the character in detail, but it does stand out.
The worst part about that is it feels like it’s told through Geralt’s perspective, which makes his… detailed comments stand out when you get to the part where she’s described as fourteen. This would be the single point you would’ve benefited from being less zoomed in on the characters, so it didn’t feel like he was the one thinking about her like that.
As for your tendency to rely on repetition, I can see it’s a stylistic choice, and it’s fine to do so sporadically. But when you rely on it too often, you dull its effect. These all happened within a few hundred words:
White, white, white as far as her eyes reached.
Honour. Loyalty. Blood. Death. Pain. Sacrifice. All was for naught. All was in vain. Perhaps we all strove for too much? In the end, the impossible, our hopes, our dreams, our visions, were never meant to be.
Her legs, her arms, her muscles, her bones, an endless agony of pain and suffering befell her. Death cost her dearly. Her right femur lay shattered. Her lung punctured. Her inner organs ruptured
Her hand trembled, and pain shot through her body. Her breathing grew heavy, unsteady. Her lungs coughed blood.
Try not to have sentences start with the same word as the previous one.
Overall, I really did enjoy your story, and I’m not just saying that to patch up your feelings. The system of your world feels understandable, while also giving enough information to feel vast. Your main character’s change from the prologue into chapter 2, made me have to see how the next chapter ends up. If you want me to tackle anything else, feel like something I said didn't make sense, or think I missed anything, feel free to message me about it and I’ll take a look at it.
www.royalroad.com
*waiting patiently*
