The Arks

LV 5

MyCharacterLeads

This novel opened up a whole new world. I like the way the plot was made. 👍 Writing quality - I don't have any doubt about choice of words, but I thought no some of the sentences need revision. (I need to reread some paragraph in order to understand them.) And I suggest to chop cramped paragraph. It was just hard to read and it will cause some readers to just skim all over it. (Suggestion: If the thoughts aren't connected to the first paragraph, cut it out and put it in another paragraph.) Character and story development - I don't have a thing to say. They we're just so cute to imagine. But the character development was affected by the fast pace of the plot development. It might be more convincing if you 'show' us not 'tell'. Just like the part where Mavs and the time boy create chaos. You have just tell us that they started one but you didn't show us how they did it. World Background - Unique! I love how the author integrated fictional character of the others celestial beings. Hope this will help.😉😉 Keep it up Author! 👍👍

LV 5

Veronica8

Pretty cool story with a lot of well written action and a strong female protagonist who acts as a central point for a distinct character ensemble. Her development is realistic and appropriate for her age. Nice work. I think this story will do very well here and I'm already seeing it on the feature page. If anything it needs to be there. Well written and solid quality. This is a book that this site can show off and gain a lot of positive praising from readers. Awesome work. Thanks for sharing. Keep writing.

LV 4

TheExtraDoor

Don't be put off by the giant paragraphs in the first chapter! The characters, their background, and their world are very well thought out. The author is very descriptive when it comes to the different beings and their elemental affinities. Overall, for those who like fantasy and fighting, I'd say it's worth a shot.

LV 2

Maromar

The writing displays a clear line of thought as far as worldbuilding and character design goes. A cataclysmic event that occurred before the story brings multiple races into close contact with each other on Earth. This at once, eliminates the justification problem fantasy writers grapple with when dumping multiple races on Earth. Of course, the easiest way is to simply state that these races have always been present, but that leans on the suspension of disbelief when authors don’t have this fact reflected in culture and technology. Mavislin11 did a good job on that front. That’s where most of the praise must stop, however. The Arks is in a rough spot. It begins with the basics. The text is written in such a way that it’s difficult to derive meaning in some instances, and painful to go through in others. A large part of the latter can be fixed by improving the economy of words. You ideally want to drive home a clear point in the shortest span of time possible. Take the following section: “After the Great Noble War across the galaxies had devastated the planets within, many were left scattered amongst the other stars. As the stars started to converge and planets collapsed, the Solar System was born. The only planet that was habitable for most species, Earth.” Every word that doesn’t directly contribute to the scene both weakens it and makes the passage heavier, causing readers to suffer from fatigue. Compare it to something like: “The Great Noble War set the myriad galaxies ablaze. From the ashes of collapsed planets and ruined stars, the Solar System as we know it emerged. Earth would prove to be the only planet habitable for most species.” The new sentence isn’t pretty either, but it tightens the imagery and eliminates some of the unnecessary language while maintaining the scene. It may only save a few words, but if every line of every paragraph gets trimmed, they’ll certainly pile up. A 75,000 word manuscript might feel sluggish because it’s actually a 65,000 word manuscript wearing an oversized jacket. My advice is to go through the entirety of The Arks with a scythe. Clear out every bit of chaff you can find: “had” “started” “began to” and so on. Whenever these words aren’t crucial to understanding the scene, kill them. Deal with any redundant bits of phrasing in the same manner. Another issue lies in the quoted selection’s placement. It’s the first paragraph of the story… Of course, opening with exposition isn’t inherently bad, but taking up too much space with it runs afoul of the commonly cited “show, don’t tell” rule. Good writing is really a matter of “show AND tell” where knowing when to do either will determine your effectiveness. Writers with certain well-developed voices like Tolkien can get around this by managing to be entertaining even when they go on for ages, so exceptions certainly exist. But I digress. As it is, the beginning drags because the exposition is an infodump. The scene could be reworked in such a way that it immediately focuses on Mavislin among those in the stadium with the announcer starting the tryouts with some reference to the Great Noble War, perhaps a commencement ritual meant to keep young mages from forgetting their history as well as honoring the lives lost. The explanation of the magic system can be drip-fed as it’s displayed. It’s of great importance that you keep a stable scene for as long as possible, novels are a completely separate medium from movies as they allow for greater depth, but that same depth can cause your pacing to veer out of control, leaving readers far from the picture you want them to see. Even if the storyline is crap (And what I’ve seen of The Ark’s storyline is not crap) and filled with beaten-to-death tropes, if you can pull off some prose that is both clear and concise, you’ll stand several heads over the next guy. That takes rewriting and editing though. Webnovel’s constant pressure on authors to produce daily chapters isn’t healthy for writing quality or the quality of a writer’s life. Don’t feel bad for holding another release back for a few days in order to get it into fighting shape. Most importantly, don’t be discouraged by my criticism, the story has potential. Writing is not easy, if it was, everyone would have a book out. The fact that you can come up with creative ideas rather than pointless re-hashes of yesterday’s trend means that you have the right chops. See it through to the end.

LV 3

Fiona_Singer

The whole fiction gives me an impression of being an crystalized meteorite: otherworldly, mysterious, but also very hard and cold. The text is fairly well-versed and is given an hint of old-world English style, allowing it to perfectly blend into the story background, but not too much as in becoming a barrier to understand the plots. And the world setting is beautifully unique, kind of reminds me old-school soft sci-fi works like Doctor Who, combining the futuristic, advanced element of races and planets from outerspace, and the wonderous, colourful element of magic and epics together. The author clearly devoted lots of time and energy into building up this vast, fantasy world, and the writing style depicted the world vividly. However the characters and the story aren't so impressive, which is the part that gives me the "hard, cold" feeling. It's not that the design of the characters and the outline of the plots are bad--they can be quite good too if well processed--but the way author fleshes out the characters and narrates the plots are too abridged, to an extent that sometimes readers feel like the motivations of the actions of the character are too unclear, and the emotions are too thin. I guess it's partly because it's written in a somewhat traditional English style so it's a little obscure--this is more or less inevitable if you are not using modern, plain language, and I suppose it's the writing style that the author feels comfortable with, so let's skip this part. The other reason may be that so far most of the main characters are not human and the real humans seem more secondary and a symbol of ignorance and bullying (well because they are indeed and it's worse in Dark Ages). But the thing is, according to the standard of a fair literature work, it has to be able to appeal to the readers, and unfortunately your readers are emotional, sensational, messy humans (In a perfect world we will have Martian readers), and quite to the contrary, to make the non-human characters alive you need to spend EXTRA EFFORTS on depicting their emotions and motives, because they don't think like humans, so it will be much harder for readers to sympathize with them, especially when they are somewhat unkind and indifferent in human perspectives, like your MC, and the author will have to try extra hard to guide the readers to understand their feelings. From this angle I would strongly recommend the author to learn from Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles: the blood-sucking monsters are very captivating in her texts, and she is masterful in describing the non-human sensations. Read how she built up the character Claudia, who is in my opinion very simliar to your MC, will be very helpful: she lost all her human family at a young age and was left alone until being turned to a vampire, and although she appears like a dolly child she was much older, and she was taught to be a vicious hunter and ruthless drinker from a young age--She's no kinder to humans, but still readers, whether like her or not, can feel her thoughts and moods, and she is very much alive on Rice's paper(in a vampiric way, at least). Not that if the author continued on like this, it would be bad, in general it's a very original and interesting work, and as the story unfolds and all the buried suspenses are uncovered, when people fully know the past and future of each character, we humans will understand why they did what they did, anyway. But still, if the author wanted to achieve a deeper sympathy between characters and readers where the latter would drop tears for the former, it's better to improve in this area.

LV 6

ExodusGaming555

Thanks man for reviewing my novel. I'll review yours back. I've read until chapter 5 and it's wonderful. The character is so lifelike and also very likable. You need to explain about the world more. I don't think I can comment much about you're writing quality as I'm not a native in English. Overall keep up the good work 😀😀😀😀👍👍👍👍👍👍 🍻~Cheers~🍻

LV 4

KayLillyt_1

Wow! A unique, intriguing and mind bending story. The author has created an amazing world that must be looked into. It has to be, you guys have to read this fantastic fantasy novel about magic. Definitely worth it.

LV 2

uniqueanime2

This was such a fun read. The author keeps me engaged with the characters and plot twists throughout. This was my first book by this author but definitely not my last.

LV 6

Henrique_Paiao

😗🤔😎😙😃😘😆🤣😘😆🤣😘😉😃😉😂😗😉😋😗😙😎😙😚😚😙😎😙😋🤔😗🤣😍😆🤣😍😎😘😪😴😮🙄😌😮🙄😌🤐😫😔😛😪😔😛🙄😴😮😫😔😜😫😔😜😫😔😜😫😔😜😫😔😜😫😔😜😪😌😛😔😫😜😫😌😜😫🤐😏🤐🙄😮🙄😮🙄😛🙄😛😜😜

LV 4

KENTARO12100

Excellent work, as I said in one of your chapters I love that the protagonist is a woman, it is something refreshing after I personally read too many novels with MC men, continue with your story is fascinating;)

LV 14

KageMugen

Writting this after 8 chapters ... Would give 4.5 to both Character design and Writting quality therefore I gave one a 4. Main problem in writing is in changing past and present tense which is easily fixable by any proofreader in the future. Anyway I enjoyed the story so far and maybe will read more of it in the future. Regards to the Author.

LV 12

PsyberRose

Part of a review swap and at time of writing, there are 29 chapters. It's an interesting story, with lots of potential. Writing Quality: English isn't my first language and thus, any grammatical errors here aren't noticeable by me. It's smooth reading and thus, doesn't detract from the enjoyment of the story. Stability of Updates: 5* in good faith. Story Development/Character Design/World Background: It's just the right pace, imo. Not too fast but not too slow. The various characters and their interactions are displayed nicely and the descriptions of their surroundings & actions are very well written. Also, the Author's take on the usual valkerie that we have in our lores is quite interesting. All in all, an enjoyable read for those who like this genre. Good luck, Author! :)

LV 3

d3trois

Not a bad start, I like it for now. Still haven't read everything tho ! .....................................................................................

LV 5

Miss_Lazy

the synopsis is greatt.. the introduction is interesting... i like the way you describe the world background and stuff.... i'll give you four stars all.... keep it uppp

LV 14

marjzach2012

The novel is very interesting and well-explained every detail. The characters are like mixed aliens and humans or from the other dimension. I first thought that they were all spirits and they are in thier spiritual world somehow. But I might be wrong, as the story progresses. It gave me a feeling of goosebumps though talking about the 4 elements, the devil and so other being with wings. Nonetheless it's a good book.Keep it up!

LV 4

Shammiyah

I like the way you started the introduction.I am always a fan of magical elements.Its really great to read a novel related to magic,mages and magical worlds.Do check out my novel "A lost Dream" and give your reviews.

LV 14

zetsubouaichan

I read this up to chapter 25. This is a fantasy read with a lot of magic and fighting going on. The start was intriguing with the character going to a tryout where we get to see some cool magic. I think the story has potential. The writing is pretty good. I can't comment on the grammar, as I'm not good at that as well, but I can tell that the author's storytelling and descriptions were pretty good. However, I was a bit lost after a few chapters until I read comments that there was a time-skip to a few years later. Because of this, I don't get to know the character well enough. I wish I could see the character's growth. The dialogues were good. But I think it would be great if the author could spend time to write on the characters' thought so that the reader could connect with the characters more.

LV 5

NagatoSaitou

Interesting Novel, i like a lot stories with elemental magic or that use elements in a certain way. Great world building also, i am curious about how the story will be developed by the author.

LV 4

Megabread

Hello, i would like to say that your story is great. I have seen that your description of the scenes is awesome, and i've only read the first few chapters but i liked it so far.