Rigor Mortis

Title: .Rigor Mortis.
Author: Sheepoling
URL: http://www.winglin.net/fanfic/Sheepoling5
Reviewed By: Keleos

First Impressions
Title: 7/10
Good work on the title, because this is another fic that I must admit to having already read before I reviewed it. I was drawn to the title of the whole fic, and I think it really possesses the X-factor that stands out amongst all the fics with “love” in their titles. Not to mention that the intent of the fic becomes very obvious with this title, and you’ve achieved the aim of having a title. Good job.

But I think your chapter titles were boring, to say the least. Just nothing special about them other than the fancy names of numbers there, which I found rather unnecessary. From Chapter 5 onwards, they became a little lame, which is why I gave 7 and not anything higher.

Poster and Background: 9/10
Not too bad on this front, either. The poster was extremely well crafted, and it really gave of the classic dark story feel that many other dark fics are missing. I love the way the poster blends into the background, creating the illusion that your poster is roundish instead of the normal, ordinary square. Great work with the whole effect: this is one of the best posters I’ve seen in a long time.

Pity on the font colour, though. Red is a bit garish and a bit too clichéd for my liking.

Foreword: 8/10
Excellent forewords. I like the way you delivered the lines at the start of the forewords, but I would have preferred it if you kept it more succinct and had two lines, instead of six at the start. It would have been more effective that way, and the reader would have been more drawn to it. In general, though, the foreword was well written, and it served to tie the whole concept of your story together. Which was good.

Overall a good first impression.

Upon closer examination…
Cast Used: 3/5
I don’t think it’s really fair to judge you with this one, under this section, simply because you’ve used a variety of casts. I like some, and I’m adverse to others. But in general, I must say that your cats is just recycled with the same few people and rotated pairings. Nothing against that, but maybe you might want to try others in order to make the whole thing more refreshing. The fact that characters repeat themselves make me a bit confused sometimes, because there’s the cross story issues and I jumble the characters.

Not to mention the fact that your characterisation is not strong at all, and the entire fic suffers. I would rather read one story with a strong character, rather than a bunch of stories with all the characters looking the same. Which is exactly what your fic was.

Story and Plotting: 9/15
I’m passing you simply on the fact that your stories were well-plotted out, meaning that you knew exactly what you were writing and going to write, as seen through the plot summaries that you have in every chapter. So I’m guessing you gave it some thought before you actually put down your pen to write. I supposed that is really a good attempt, but your stories are… Interestingly boring.

Oxymoron.

Let me explain. They appear interesting on the surface, but all I ever wanted to do when I was reading it was to scroll all the way to the end and figure out what was going on. Not in a good sort of way, because your details were either too confusing, or too boring. And the stories were out of this world, again, not in a good sense, because I really found some of them really hilarious. I’m not really sure if it is the story itself, the writing or style that you took, or if its just my brain being warped, but really, this did not impress me at all.

Language: Spelling/Grammar/Vocabulary: 8/10

Language is fine, no major problems, but please… This is a horror fic of sorts, so do something that actually plays on the readers’ nerves. The language here was plain, ordinary and nothing special, and it most certainly did not play on MY nerves.

Average is for everybody else.

Watch the spelling as well. I’ve spotted quite a few throughout, and they’re not typoes.

Flow of Story: 3/10
Story flowed fine, but… Length is part of this component too. Flow of the story and continuity is no problem, so 3 marks. But length…

It was too long. (Not literally, of course.)

Writing Style: 3/5
I have something to say about your writing style, because I got a tad irritable when reading your fic because of the endless one-liners. I KNOW that sometimes you haven’t got that much to say in one line, but making your paragraphs so short means that you lose the effect of one liners when it comes about!

One liners are for impact.

Just like this.

Overall feel…
Originality & Creativity: 9/15
Alright. This IS different and creative, only if you consider the bits and pieces of movies parts (pun not intended) patched together as creative. You’re different, so I’m not sure if you get the normal person’s view of creativity.

SERIOUSLY.

I had the constant feeling that I had seen those stories somewhere before, from movies and stuff. Those that I haven’t seen before, like your Love Letter story, came up to me as a bit weird. Weird in the sense that the concept was extremely funny. Original, yes, but too strange to be considered a normal story that could be accepted, at least by my standards.

Overall Enjoyment: 5/10
I must admit that I completed this story only because I read it on the same day as reading some of the terrible fics out there. Good work for your planning, good work for your language (which makes the fic read well) and good work for trying something slightly different, but I didn’t like it. And it’s not because I don’t like dark fics, but rather, I felt that you didn’t work the potential this fic had in it. You started off promisingly, upping my standards a bit, only to have me really disappointed by the end.

It’s just not really interesting.

Bonus marks: 2/5
For replying your readers. :)

Total mark: 66 /100
Additional Comments: Well. What a vast improvement from the many stories you had in your days as a puppy, so I’d say well done. And well… As a sick coincidence, your marks are 66. Wow.

Anyway, keep going. We will get there. Haha.

Reviewed by Keleos@midnight-tree.co.nr