Unhindered

Title: Unhindered

Author: jaychou101

URL: http://winglin.net/fanfic/jaychou101/

Reviewed by: Keleos

First Impressions
Title ~ 6/10
Firstly, the title isn’t something that would have caught my eye very well. Unhindered does spell cliché, and to be honest, anything cliché wouldn’t be unique anymore. It doesn’t stand out in the way that some fics do in the long lists of fics that have to be read, and frankly, that isn’t something that bodes well for a fic. L Also, I’d like to say that I haven’t seen any part of the title being relevant to the story. Or maybe not yet.

Nevertheless, the title shows what the story might be (I’m only guessing, based on what I hope it’ll be :P), so I guess that’s kind of effective, in a sense.

Posters & background ~ 4/10
The pictures are stretched over the window on my computer screen, so I can’t view the whole poster in its full glory. At least, not as an entirety. The thing about the poster is that it’s not really, strictly a poster, but more a bunch of pictures put together so that it appears as a poster. It doesn’t reflect any part of the story at all, not at least, the emotional start of the whole story in the foreword. A poster is supposed to enhance the effect of the story, but this one just didn’t do it for me. It was more of a… I guess it made the whole page look messy, and that really isn’t very good.

Background wise… I would have liked to see some colour in it. J

Foreword ~ 8/10
The foreword’s ok. It’s good to see something a little different, and it keeps you in suspense a little. It makes the reader want to keep on reading. And it sets the premise for the rest of the story. Overall, a good job here. J

Upon closer examination…
Storyline/plotting ~ 8.5/15
This should be far from complete, so I can’t really tell where this is going to go just yet. But from what we have now, the plot seems to be going only in one direction – the (possible) love story between Arron and Hebe. That’s sweet, don’t get me wrong. But the template that you’re using is, well, a template. That means that you can take anyone and use the same storyline, the same actions and the same words, and still create the story that you’re writing. There’s no sense of individuality or creativity, and it’s really quite a pity, because the standard of language that you’re using is really good. You started off well, but it becomes predictable after that.

I’m big on character development, and I didn’t really see that happening, either. There are some parts that I thought, well, Hebe’s character becomes a little schizophrenic, a little strange, and it affects that plot a bit. The rest of the characters are fine, pretty well-portrayed, so that’s a star.

Kudos on the planning. Some parts have discontinuations, but the overall plot shows that you’ve given thought process to the whole story, and it allows the whole feel of the tale to be right. J

Cast used ~ 3/5
The Fahrenheit-S.H.E. pairing isn’t new, honestly, and I’m not impressed. Seeing that you’ve not included an extra character, though, to make sure that everyone is paired up by the end of the fic, that’s a plus/ It leaves the story open for interpretation, and gives the readers some time for guesswork. Still, I really would like to see new pairs being fished out, if that’s possible. JJ

Language ~ 7/10
Language, generally readable, so I won’t really find fault on that. There’re a couple of things you have to really watch out about. The most apparent would be the strange expressions that feature rather prominently throughout the story. Examples: “My tears soaked in my jeans.” (Foreword) and “My jaw dropped open.” (Chapter 2). Those are a little odd there, but I still get what you’re driving at, so that’s still alright. Watch the tone on some parts as well. They come through as supposedly emotional, but the words don’t reflect that properly, and it spoils the mood of the chapter or paragraph.

Readability ~ 3/5
You’ve got a small number of comments, but I see you haven’t responded to them! Maybe it’s because you think they’re too few now? Don’t worry, it’ll improve soon! J

Overall feel… So far.
Creativity of the story ~ 7/15
The story is rather plain so far, but I can’t really make much of a decision here, but again, from what I can tell from what’s available, the plot is predictable. It’s clichéd, and there are a million other fics out there with approximately the same plot as yours. I’m perfectly fine with the romance in the story (hey, I write romance fics as well), but I’d prefer if there was another element other than that of romance, so that the story doesn’t become stale. But there really isn’t much, so I can’t score highly here. (Not to say that there won’t be, but it isn’t complete, so I’m scoring on whatever that you’ve already written).

Overall enjoyment ~ 13/20
The story is readable, overall, although there were some portions that I was inclined to skip after reading on for a while. The storyline contributes mainly to that, so perhaps it might be better if there were more twists and turns in the story?

I’d like to comment on your chapter length, though. I really like the length of each chapter: they’re succinct, to the point and not too long or short, which enhances the entire reading process. Overall enjoyment of reading gets higher when I saw the introduction of Crystal Liu as one of the characters. I’m not a fan of hers, but the introduction of a new character other than Fahrenheit and S.H.E. does provide another dimension to the story. Pity about the length of her appearance, but I’m hoping that she might feature a little more prominently in the later chapters.

Overall review scoring: 59.5/100 J