young adult/teen romance Archives - Page 3 of 4

The Wallflower and the Alpha’s by Addison Winters

by Penny Angeles-Tan | Nov 9, 2022 | Book Reviews

Stories like The Wallflower and the Alpha’s by Addison Winters annoy me because it has a lot of potential but the author is lazy, inattentive, and uncaring. Let me list down the reasons why this author gets my goat.

Massive proofreading/editing issues

She does not edit her work or get a proofreader or editor to help her make her story better.

She can’t make up her mind if she is “speaking” in the first or third person.
She messes up her pronouns. Male pronouns are him, he, and his. Female pronouns are her, she, and hers.
She messes up her tenses.
She can’t keep track of her POV.
She does not know how to use figures of speech correctly. She just uses them because she feels like it whether they are appropriate or not. Research first!
An apostrophe is used to denote ownership, so the title of the book should be “The Wallflower and the Alphas” not “The Wallflower and the Alpha’s” which is the actual title. It is so wrong that my spellchecker keeps telling me to fix it.

Now, for those of you who have been reading my reviews, you know that I tend to be forgiving with spelling and grammar IF the story is good enough. What gets my goat is grammar and spellcheck are FREE! Word has it, GoogleDocs has it … there are even free apps available! Use any of them!

She doesn’t pay attention

And, like I said, this story has potential but needs a MAJOR REVAMP to be worth selling on Amazon (for 4.99 a pop!) and on Goodnovel for almost 3.5k coins. Other things this (I assume YOUNG) author needs to do:

Know your proportions … two halves make a whole. Avery can’t be half-wolf, half-witch, and half-Veela … that is one “half” more than a whole person. To be precise you should have said PART wolf, witch, and Veela.
Don’t get lost in the minutiae. We don’t need to know her entire “getting ready for school” routine from how she washes her hair, what body scrub he uses and why, applies makeup, applies deodorant and perfume, dries her hair, fixes her hair, walks naked to her room, chooses underwear, chooses clothes to wear, puts them on … and so on and so on. It’s unnecessary unless you were just after the word count.
Keep track of where you are in the story! If you are confused, we are confused! Avery comes out of the shower of her ensuite in a towel, then Elijah and Jake come in and make out with her on the bed but she is suddenly in a dress. Then Avery is in a shed with Andrew (whoever that is) and walks away to go to the house then suddenly she is dry humping Elijah. What in the world?!? Make up your mind, are her clothes on or off? At one point she takes off her dress, and she is wearing it again, then you have her in a towel, then in a dress again.
In love scenes, keep track of where everyone is … some of the positions you have them in is just not possible unless your participants are snakes or contortionists.
Be aware of where your characters are supposed to be physically and mentally. You cannot have Avery scared of them one moment then suddenly okay with them eating her out at the back of the truck, and then scared to let them near her again wondering why they are looking at her “like that”.
At the point where Elijah acknowledges that she is his mate and decides to win her over … why, oh, why are you still making him bully her? WTF is the logic in that? He just said he was going to stop doing that and would try to win her over then he trips her and embarrasses her in front of the entire school?!? Does that sound logical to you?

A very easy solution is to reread what you have written before writing the next chapter and then going from there.

Freytag’s pyramid

This is one of the reasons I felt the need to post about Freytag’s pyramid on my socials a while back. Anyone who wants to venture into writing with the intention of possibly making money out of it should care enough to make sure their audience enjoys the experience and to do that there has to be structure.

I am not ruling out non-linear storytelling. Non-linear can be fun! Case in point, Pulp Fiction … one of my favorite Quentin Tarantino movies. But even with non-linear stories, it still makes an effort to hit all the stars.

Bullying

I am not a fan of bully romances, although I have read a few. I try to keep an open mind and endeavor to understand the psyche of the characters to see why they are the way they are. Here are my thoughts:

If the bully is an Alpha then he will not make a good alpha at all because he should be taking care of his pack members not making victims of them.
Make her do his homework? OMG! So pathetic! Elijah is not just lazy, he is also stupid! And this is supposed to be their Alpha? I’d transfer to another pack.
Big, burly boys stringing girls up a flagpole? Seriously? And everyone is just watching? How sick are the people in this school that they can just condone that? And where the fuck are the adults? What, not even a janitor in sight? Unbelievable!
Avery’s mates bullied her for AT LEAST SIX YEARS which included physical, mental, and verbal abuse. Now that they all know that they are her mates they expect Avery to just forgive them … let bygones be bygones … because they will spend the rest of their lives making it up to her? Why did they pick on her in the first place? What did she do to them? NOTHING!

Ugh! I’m getting angry. I HATE BULLIES. And, honestly, considering how long they have been bullying her she should have either rejected them or at the very least made it more difficult for them to win her over. Her having a crush on them all this time DESPITE their bullying her leads me to think Avery seriously needs psychiatric help. I wish I could say it is masochism but, unfortunately, based on the author, she is always devastated and in tears when they bully her … so, why?!?

If you want to give this book a chance because there is actually a good story under all the junk you can find it on Goodnovel and other reading apps. If you want to “save money” and buy the book on Amazon, be warned that it comes in four parts at 4.99 each. The advantage of reading it on Amazon is you can return the book and ask for a refund. But you can only do that within a short period so read fast and if you love it, keep it. Otherwise, return it.

Taming the Playboy Alpha by Stardust Wendy

by Penny Angeles-Tan | Nov 2, 2022 | Book Reviews

Taming the Playboy Alpha by Stardust Wendy is a story I started reading on Goodnovel a few months ago when I was in the mood for something in the young adult/teenager category. I’ve never read any other story by Stardust Wendy so I was curious to see how well she writes.

The main character is Freya, born an Omega with dreams of attending a school just for Alphas. To achieve her goal she made a deal with a wizard who could temporarily make her seem like an Alpha without granting her the strength and characteristics of one. In return, she will do him a favor which he will reveal at a later time.

Meet the playboy Alpha, Silas Bloodmoon. He is the Alpha prince and the Alpha heir of her pack. He is hands down the most popular boy in school along with his friends Lucas and Adam. Everyone in school knows that Silas and Elena of the Crescent Moon pack are a couple.

Freya’s goal for entering the school was just one thing … to learn. She was not there to make friends or enemies and she definitely was not on the lookout for a boyfriend. Things don’t work out the way she planned when Silas starts to show interest in her and actively pursues her. For Silas, it started off as a game, a bet, but later he couldn’t help but be fascinated by her.

As a storyteller, I think that Stardust Wendy is good because she got me engaged and anxious for the next chapter to be released. As a writer, though, she needs help as her grammar and spelling are less than desirable – incorrect word usage, misphrased idiomatic expressions, and tenses (!), to name but a few.

For those of you who read my reviews, you would notice that I probably say that a lot! This is because many of the authors who write on reading apps 1) are most likely not native English speakers, 2) do not have editors who go over their chapters before publishing, 3) never took a course on the correct way to write a narrative story and are not familiar with Freytag’s pyramid.

But while I noted all the things that could be improved, I could still read on and enjoy the story. The only part of the story that I found dragging was Freya’s torture which ran for several chapters. I thought that was overkill.

I’m glad that I was patient with Taming the Playboy Alpha by Stardust Wendy because it is a wonderful story! I hope that she decides to get an editor (me!) and will publish this as a paperback or ebook and release it on Amazon and Applebooks soon.

In the meantime, you can read this book on Goodnovel.

Alpha Bully by Sam Crescent

by Penny Angeles-Tan | Oct 18, 2022 | Book Reviews

I started reading Alpha Bully by Sam Crescent because I was curious to see how Marshall, an Alpha wolf, who bullied Scarlett, a human, intended to win her over. After all, he bullied her terribly for the last 5 years.

Marshall was just one of many people who bullied Scarlett, mostly because of her body shape. She wore loose, baggy clothes, and no matter how much dieting she did, she just couldn’t seem to lose weight. “Chunky girl” and “Piggy” were just two of the horrible nicknames other students in her school called her.

Rather than fight, as usual, our bullying victim just suffered quietly and in tears. Pffft!

After Marshall discovers that Scarlett is his mate he suffers pangs of regret and worries that he won’t be able to win her over. After talking with his dad and his best friend Jack he decided to just do his best.

As the story progresses it is interesting to see how much effort he is really putting in to try to get Scarlett. What I didn’t quite comprehend was how quickly it seemed for her to start accepting him. She expressed her doubts internally, but she still let him get away with doing things like holding her hand and putting his arm around her shoulder … on day 2 of school!

In my culture that is moving too fast, but the setting is not here, so I can only assume that in the U.S. kids just move and accept that fast. Here, he would be lucky if she even made eye contact.

That aside, the story is actually enjoyable. So much so that I bought the next book when I discovered it was about his best friend Jack and his mate. Marshall’s being a werewolf is almost incidental for most of the story.

Alpha Bully by Sam Crescent is book 5 of the Alpha Shifter Collection. It is available on Amazon in Kindle format for $3.99.

Six Like the Number by Dee Hanna

by Penny Angeles-Tan | Sep 18, 2022 | Book Reviews

Six Like The Number by Dee Hanna is a story I read on a whim one time on GoodNovel. I wasn’t sure if I would like it or not because, to be honest, I wasn’t attracted to the cover art. I was, however, intrigued by the title.

I’m glad I took the time to read it. It is hard to categorize because Axle, the male lead is supposedly a bad boy but doesn’t really act like the stereotype. He isn’t a bully and his biggest “rebellion” would be ditching class a lot. At most, I would say he is a (pardon my French) fuckboy.

The lead female is Six who is the daughter of a drug addict and is raising her 3-year-old younger brother, Theo. Neither of them knows who their fathers are and their mother is always strung out so Six is responsible for taking care of them both. To do this Six takes on a secret, unconventional job that will later become the catalyst for conflict.

Axle and Six are high school seniors, but that is incidental to the story. It really just establishes how they meet and interact daily. They were never enemies to lovers. At best I would say strangers/classmates to friends with benefits … and their relationship happened really fast. It took several weeks for them to be officially boyfriend and girlfriend but, again … no drama.

Six’s ex enters the picture and he is supposed to be the biggest baddie but, again, this does not manifest when he is around Six.

Six Like The Number is fast-paced and, was surprisingly (for me) a real page-turner. I couldn’t put it down once I started reading it several months ago and I had to re-read it now just for this review. I won’t say more! You have to read it for yourself.

If you’re looking for something to read that does not involve wolves, vampires, dragons, or any other kind of shifter … if you are looking for a story with substance, try out this book … Six Like The Number by Dee Hanna, available on Goodnovel.

Spin the Bottle by Effie Greene

by Penny Angeles-Tan | Jul 20, 2022 | Book Reviews

Spin the Bottle by Effie Greene is a story in the young adult/teen category in Goodnovel. I immediately checked if it was on Amazon as well, and when I found it I bought the book. To be quite frank, it is cheaper to buy a book on Amazon than pay per chapter on reading apps.

I really loved reading this story. The story is light, romantic, and (to a certain extent) innocent … certainly nowhere near the steaminess of other books I have read, which is exactly why I love it!

I like reading YA books every now and then as a palette cleanser and this book is worth the coin. Kudos, author Effie Greene! I also like the fact that the author didn’t push too hard for steamy scenes when it wasn’t necessary.

If you want to give this book a try you can find it on Goodnovel and on Amazon.