Webnovel Feedback Roasts For the Fearless

[CharlesEBrown]

Post a link to it, then. These people asking for reviews honestly want others to look at their signature?

There is a link but it's in the signature so those on mobile won't see it:
broken world | Scribble Hub

 

[philpil2010]

Post a link to it, then. These people asking for reviews honestly want others to look at their signature?

alright fine then https://www.scribblehub.com/series/1291377/broken-world/

 

[Tempokai]

I'll take it.

Reincarnated into Two Bodies

After falling to my death, I woke up with two bodies?! Reincarnated as both a humble commoner boy and a privileged young noble girl, our protagonist enjoys their new chance in life with two different perspectives. Although they only wished for a peaceful life, the world had other plans in...

www.scribblehub.com

I already know some of the problems it has, but I want to see if you see what I see, and maybe a few more?

After two years of casually stumbling across this webnovel while browsing SH, I finally decided to give it a shot because of your willingness to take a roast. It had lingered in the dusty corners of my mental 'maybe someday' reading list, often forgotten altogether because there's a lot of such stories out there in the web. Not because I lacked the time, mind you, but because the synopsis fumbled its persuasion check so thoroughly it might as well have crit-failed everytime your synopsis rolled d20. It dangled the promise of a 'fresh take' on a trope I’d read a handful of times pre-2023, only to wrap that promise in vague hand-waving and send it off unarmed.

I’m not here to roast the whole webnovel. Chapters 2 onward are fine in that “turn off your brain, it’s fun” kind of way. Sure, I could use the framework I've have, nitpick plot whatevers, and summon dead rhetoricians and philosophers for backup, but who cares? Certainly not me who had to think about writing this roast for two days straight. The narrative works for the average reader—and clearly, you’ve got plenty of those. My real issue is with the opening: the hook, the line, and whatever, basically the part meant to reel me in. Instead, it just patted me on the back and said, “Eh, whenever you’re ready. No rush.” And not rushing I did.

The synopsis is supposed to be your pitch-perfect salesman, but instead, it’s the socially awkward guy in the corner, mumbling vague promises. Sure, it has intrigue—dual bodies, class conflict, secret organizations, romance—and plenty of "just get to chapter 10, I swear!" energy. But here’s the catch: it’s playing peekaboo with the audience. “Oh, look, bandits!” Peek. “And maybe some romance?” Boo. It’s so vague it feels like you’re afraid to commit, as if revealing more would spook potential readers. Spoiler alert: readers aren’t scared of details—they’re scared of having no idea what they’re in for. This synopsis could’ve packed a punch, but instead, it’s winking nervously from behind a curtain, begging for blind trust.

The first few paragraphs of Chapter 1? Better than the actual synopsis. That “they became great adventurers, and it’s me” bit? Gold. The hook about Carine and Feyt as unstoppable prodigy partners? Intriguing, concise, and gives me a reason to care—too bad it’s buried in Chapter 1. Instead of setting the scene, I get a jarring Wikipedia-style info dump about prodigies and synergy, which then awkwardly shifts to the protagonist’s soul-sucking office drudgery. I opened a novel, not a brochure. Sure, it’s good info—but it belongs in the synopsis, not clogging your opening.

And speaking of Chapter 1, let’s talk about that inconsistent tone. You’ve got snarky office banter, deadpan humor, and then—BAM!—a life-or-death balcony rescue that feels like it’s happening in fast-forward. I get what you were going for: mundane misery giving way to unexpected heroism, but, there's always but, the transitions are so jarring that I had to double-check I didn’t accidentally scroll into another story. The fall-to-death scene, in particular, feels like it’s trying to do too much at once—urgency, physical action, emotional stakes—and ends up tangling itself in overlapping descriptions. By the time the protagonist is plummeting, I’m not feeling the emotional weight of their sacrifice because I’m too busy wondering what the hell just happened.

That scene needs a rewrite. Simplify the sentences and break the action into clear, digestible steps. Right now, it reads like you’re cramming the MC’s entire backstory into 1,000 words. Show cause and effect naturally instead of racing to a word count. If I need an GPT to confirm what I just read, clarity is an issue.

This isn’t a full teardown, though, so credit where it’s due. Once you go further than ch 1, the story flows well for a webnovel. It has the usual flaws—solid ethos (some grenmar issues), passable logos (eh, tropes are tropes, and soul thingy will probably will be explained further), and meh pathos (emotions are oftentimes told, and you can't clearly go to MC's perspective well due to need of pacing)—but those are forgivable if the reader’s brain is off. The premise is fresh enough, it got that fun twist on the reincarnation genre with good potential. Chapters 2 and beyond hit a solid groove that’s engaging and entertaining, and it’s clear why you’ve built a loyal audience. Remember, none of that matters if readers don’t get past Chapter 1, and there's 3000 viewer drop between ch 1 and 2. The synopsis and opening chapter are your gateway drug, and right now, they’re not addictive enough.

Fix the opening. The synopsis needs specifics—show the stakes and emotional beats. Stop being coy; let readers know what’s coming. In Chapter 1, ditch the info dump about Carine and Feyt—move it to the synopsis. Smooth the transitions, clarify the action, and give the protagonist’s sacrifice the weight it deserves. You’ve got a great story, but the opening stumbles. Tighten it, and you’ll hook more readers.

Two years. That’s how long I waited because the opening didn’t sell me. Don’t let others wait that long. Fix the hook, because you know this story deserves it. There's probably other chaps who read your synopsis and went "eh, later" and conveniently forgot about the webnovel lol.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

Two years. That’s how long I waited because the opening didn’t sell me. Don’t let others wait that long. Fix the hook, because you know this story deserves it. There's probably other chaps who read your synopsis and went "eh, later" and conveniently forgot about the webnovel lol.

This is one of about 30 stories that I have done this with myself... At least 30. About half of which are on my Reading List (many in the "Probably won't read but keeping just in case" header).

 

[anonjohn20]

This is one of about 30 stories that I have done this with myself... At least 30. About half of which are on my Reading List (many in the "Probably won't ready but keeping just in case" header).

Yep, the 300+ stories in my "plan to read" list are just things I might possibly but am unlikely to read.

 

[Zinless]

Fix the opening. The synopsis needs specifics—show the stakes and emotional beats. Stop being coy; let readers know what’s coming. In Chapter 1, ditch the info dump about Carine and Feyt—move it to the synopsis. Smooth the transitions, clarify the action, and give the protagonist’s sacrifice the weight it deserves. You’ve got a great story, but the opening stumbles. Tighten it, and you’ll hook more readers.

Two years. That’s how long I waited because the opening didn’t sell me. Don’t let others wait that long. Fix the hook, because you know this story deserves it. There's probably other chaps who read your synopsis and went "eh, later" and conveniently forgot about the webnovel lol.

I didn't even realize that the solution for my synopsis problem had been staring at me this whole time in chapter 1. The opening paragraphs in Chapter 1 have been on my mind for a few months now, making me wonder if I should remove or adjust them. I'll implement your fix as soon as possible, including the synopsis swap and the chapter 1 pacing! Hopefully, it will do well!

Thank you so much for taking the time to read and give feedback on my story!! I hope you have a good rest of your day, and happy roasting!

 

[DiabolicalQuill]

Hello. I thought I might reserve a slot, as I'm sure you have quite the list going at this point. I would appreciate your sharp insight/feedback on my story. The link is provided below.

https://www.scribblehub.com/series/1381743/the-vampire-overlord-and-his-witch/

 

[Tempokai]

Broken Dreams | Scribble Hub
Please do

Let’s not pretend we’re here for polite critique or gentle encouragement. I read two chapters of your webnovel, and it wasn’t out of admiration or even begrudging curiosity. No, I read it because I couldn’t look away from the unfolding disaster—a literary train wreck of such magnitude that I was morbidly fascinated by just how badly it could fail. It did, how surprising (not), and not just in one area, but in every conceivable way that a narrative can collapse on itself. What you’ve written isn’t a story; it’s a cautionary tale about what happens when someone dives into webnovel writing without a clue.

Synopsis. That pitiful excuse for a hook, more cry for help than compelling intro. Seriously? “Johan, burdened by guilt, finds himself in a tough, unforgiving world after a strange event”? That’s your lead? It’s cardboard soaked in lukewarm coffee—zero flavor, zero substance, zero reason to care. “Burdened by guilt”? The most overused, emotionally bankrupt trait in fiction. “Tough, unforgiving world”? Meaningless. What kind of world? Who knows. You might as well say, “Johan, some guy with feelings, is somewhere where stuff happens.” And that “strange event”? So vague it’s basically nothing. Intrigue? No. Lazy? Absolutely.

And then there’s the tagline: “Can Johan face his past and move beyond his regrets, or will this harsh new world consume him?” Is that supposed to be a hook? Because it reads like something you’d scribble in a high school creative writing class and promptly forget. What regrets and why they matter? What past and why it matters? What even is this harsh new world and WHY IT FUCKING MATTERS?! You’re dangling questions without substance, expecting readers to care when you’ve given them no reason to. The whole thing reeks of someone throwing words at a page in the hope they’ll stick. Spoiler: they don’t.

And don’t even get me started on the tags. “Archery.” “Army Building.” “Wars.” These are buzzwords you’ve slapped onto your story like cheap decals, hoping they’ll trick readers into thinking this is an epic adventure. But here’s the problem: your tags don’t reflect the story at all. By the time I finished Chapter Two, I was still waiting for a hint of “army building” or “wars" like some fool who knew it was a bad idea to hope for anything. I got a mopey protagonist wandering through vague misery with NO REDEEMABLE CHARACTERISTICS. The disconnect between your tags and your actual content isn’t just misleading; it’s outright false advertising. Did you even read your own synopsis before you chose those tags, or were you just "eh, I'll do it later" and then conveniently forgot about them?

Now, Chapter One, where everything that could go wrong does so in spectacular fashion. It’s not just a bad start; it’s an apathy-ridden slog through poorly constructed prose that makes me wonder if you were writing this at 3 AM while drowning in cheap whiskey. Johan, our protagonist, opens with a dreary inner monologue that reads like the journal of someone who thinks they’re profound but is really just tired and sad. “The darkness in my heart mirrors the gray sky,” or whatever nonsense he rambles about—it’s so melodramatic and cliché that I could practically hear a moody violin playing in the background. This isn’t characterization; it’s filler masquerading as depth.

And then, without warning, we’re hit with a sudden reality shift. One moment Johan is wallowing in existential dread, and the next he’s on a battlefield, surrounded by corpses. There’s no buildup, no transition, no emotional weight to the scene. It’s as if you just decided, “Eh, I guess we’re doing this now.” This should have been a moment of visceral terror or awe—a gut-punch realization that everything Johan knew has changed. Instead, it’s delivered with all the impact of someone announcing they forgot to buy milk. He mutters something about going mad, and that’s it. That’s his big emotional reaction. If Johan doesn’t care, why should we?

And let’s not forget the absolute lack of sensory detail. A battlefield should be rich with sights, sounds, smells—the copper tang of blood, the cries of the wounded, the chill of fear creeping up Johan’s spine. Instead, we get a vague description of “bodies like discarded dolls.” It’s the kind of bland, uninspired imagery that would make even the most forgiving reader roll their eyes. Where’s the horror of the world, tension that could've saved the scene without hurting the pacing, anything that matters to the story that wants to be told really? Pathos isn’t just missing here—it’s dead, buried, and forgotten.

By Chapter 1, I was ready to quit. I should’ve started the roast there, but no—rule of three chapters, right? So, I clicked "Next." It gets worse. Chapter 2 snuffed out the faint glimmer of hope from Chapter 1, like an undead dying a second death—only this time too lifeless to resurrect. Johan’s character? A blank slate. He stumbles into a village, feet bloodied, only to meet a farmer who flips from hostile to over-sharing his tragic backstory like they’re lifelong drinking buddies. I literally voiced to myself, "Wait, what?" I reread the scene three times, thinking surely this was a setup. Nope. It’s just a blatant info dump. The tonal whiplash is dizzying. One second, the farmer’s chucking rocks; the next, he’s doling out bread, tea, and unsolicited trauma tales about his dead wife and missing kid. The shift isn’t earned, it isn’t believable, and it sure as hell isn’t compelling.

You waste paragraphs on Johan walking and whining about being tired, then cram the entire village’s backstory into one bloated monologue. Pacing? A disaster. It either drags through pointless details or sprints into exposition dumps, leaving the narrative both sluggish and chaotic—like ADHD on a caffeine bender wrote it.

When Ito, the farmer, drops his “kill me” bombshell, I felt nothing. What should land with a gut-punch thud instead limps in, dragged down by clunky dialogue and zero buildup. His grief had potential—until overwrought lines bled it dry. And Johan? He mumbles a lame apology, naturally, without a hint of fire or gravity to match Ito’s plea. It’s a masterclass in failing both worldbuilding and persuasion, leaving the average reader bored and me with a textbook case of how to butcher my own guides: The Dao of Worldmaking and The Dao of Rhetoric.

You can’t tell a story. You’ve got ideas—bandits, corrupt lords, guilt-ridden heroes—but no clue how to make them work. Your characters are lifeless, your pacing is a train wreck, your world-building is pointless, and your prose is a cliché graveyard. You’re not just making rookie mistakes; you’ve cornered the market on them. To salvage this disaster, scrap everything. Start fresh. Rewrite the synopsis. Learn the basics. Until then, Broken Dreams isn’t a title; it’s your writing career. Do better—or quit wasting everyone's time.

 

[anonjohn20]

That’s your lead? It’s cardboard soaked in lukewarm coffee—zero flavor, zero substance, zero reason to care.

“Johan, some guy with feelings, is somewhere where stuff happens.”

don’t even get me started on the tags. “Archery.” “Army Building.” “Wars.” These are buzzwords you’ve slapped onto your story like cheap decals

I could practically hear a moody violin playing in the background. This isn’t characterization; it’s filler masquerading as depth.

it’s delivered with all the impact of someone announcing they forgot to buy milk.

You know I'm kind of envious of these writers. This is some S-tier, 10/10 reviewing from Tempokai.

 

[philpil2010]

Let’s not pretend we’re here for polite critique or gentle encouragement. I read two chapters of your webnovel, and it wasn’t out of admiration or even begrudging curiosity. No, I read it because I couldn’t look away from the unfolding disaster—a literary train wreck of such magnitude that I was morbidly fascinated by just how badly it could fail. It did, how surprising (not), and not just in one area, but in every conceivable way that a narrative can collapse on itself. What you’ve written isn’t a story; it’s a cautionary tale about what happens when someone dives into webnovel writing without a clue.

Synopsis. That pitiful excuse for a hook, more cry for help than compelling intro. Seriously? “Johan, burdened by guilt, finds himself in a tough, unforgiving world after a strange event”? That’s your lead? It’s cardboard soaked in lukewarm coffee—zero flavor, zero substance, zero reason to care. “Burdened by guilt”? The most overused, emotionally bankrupt trait in fiction. “Tough, unforgiving world”? Meaningless. What kind of world? Who knows. You might as well say, “Johan, some guy with feelings, is somewhere where stuff happens.” And that “strange event”? So vague it’s basically nothing. Intrigue? No. Lazy? Absolutely.

And then there’s the tagline: “Can Johan face his past and move beyond his regrets, or will this harsh new world consume him?” Is that supposed to be a hook? Because it reads like something you’d scribble in a high school creative writing class and promptly forget. What regrets and why they matter? What past and why it matters? What even is this harsh new world and WHY IT FUCKING MATTERS?! You’re dangling questions without substance, expecting readers to care when you’ve given them no reason to. The whole thing reeks of someone throwing words at a page in the hope they’ll stick. Spoiler: they don’t.

And don’t even get me started on the tags. “Archery.” “Army Building.” “Wars.” These are buzzwords you’ve slapped onto your story like cheap decals, hoping they’ll trick readers into thinking this is an epic adventure. But here’s the problem: your tags don’t reflect the story at all. By the time I finished Chapter Two, I was still waiting for a hint of “army building” or “wars" like some fool who knew it was a bad idea to hope for anything. I got a mopey protagonist wandering through vague misery with NO REDEEMABLE CHARACTERISTICS. The disconnect between your tags and your actual content isn’t just misleading; it’s outright false advertising. Did you even read your own synopsis before you chose those tags, or were you just "eh, I'll do it later" and then conveniently forgot about them?

Now, Chapter One, where everything that could go wrong does so in spectacular fashion. It’s not just a bad start; it’s an apathy-ridden slog through poorly constructed prose that makes me wonder if you were writing this at 3 AM while drowning in cheap whiskey. Johan, our protagonist, opens with a dreary inner monologue that reads like the journal of someone who thinks they’re profound but is really just tired and sad. “The darkness in my heart mirrors the gray sky,” or whatever nonsense he rambles about—it’s so melodramatic and cliché that I could practically hear a moody violin playing in the background. This isn’t characterization; it’s filler masquerading as depth.

And then, without warning, we’re hit with a sudden reality shift. One moment Johan is wallowing in existential dread, and the next he’s on a battlefield, surrounded by corpses. There’s no buildup, no transition, no emotional weight to the scene. It’s as if you just decided, “Eh, I guess we’re doing this now.” This should have been a moment of visceral terror or awe—a gut-punch realization that everything Johan knew has changed. Instead, it’s delivered with all the impact of someone announcing they forgot to buy milk. He mutters something about going mad, and that’s it. That’s his big emotional reaction. If Johan doesn’t care, why should we?

And let’s not forget the absolute lack of sensory detail. A battlefield should be rich with sights, sounds, smells—the copper tang of blood, the cries of the wounded, the chill of fear creeping up Johan’s spine. Instead, we get a vague description of “bodies like discarded dolls.” It’s the kind of bland, uninspired imagery that would make even the most forgiving reader roll their eyes. Where’s the horror of the world, tension that could've saved the scene without hurting the pacing, anything that matters to the story that wants to be told really? Pathos isn’t just missing here—it’s dead, buried, and forgotten.

By Chapter 1, I was ready to quit. I should’ve started the roast there, but no—rule of three chapters, right? So, I clicked "Next." It gets worse. Chapter 2 snuffed out the faint glimmer of hope from Chapter 1, like an undead dying a second death—only this time too lifeless to resurrect. Johan’s character? A blank slate. He stumbles into a village, feet bloodied, only to meet a farmer who flips from hostile to over-sharing his tragic backstory like they’re lifelong drinking buddies. I literally voiced to myself, "Wait, what?" I reread the scene three times, thinking surely this was a setup. Nope. It’s just a blatant info dump. The tonal whiplash is dizzying. One second, the farmer’s chucking rocks; the next, he’s doling out bread, tea, and unsolicited trauma tales about his dead wife and missing kid. The shift isn’t earned, it isn’t believable, and it sure as hell isn’t compelling.

You waste paragraphs on Johan walking and whining about being tired, then cram the entire village’s backstory into one bloated monologue. Pacing? A disaster. It either drags through pointless details or sprints into exposition dumps, leaving the narrative both sluggish and chaotic—like ADHD on a caffeine bender wrote it.

When Ito, the farmer, drops his “kill me” bombshell, I felt nothing. What should land with a gut-punch thud instead limps in, dragged down by clunky dialogue and zero buildup. His grief had potential—until overwrought lines bled it dry. And Johan? He mumbles a lame apology, naturally, without a hint of fire or gravity to match Ito’s plea. It’s a masterclass in failing both worldbuilding and persuasion, leaving the average reader bored and me with a textbook case of how to butcher my own guides: The Dao of Worldmaking and The Dao of Rhetoric.

You can’t tell a story. You’ve got ideas—bandits, corrupt lords, guilt-ridden heroes—but no clue how to make them work. Your characters are lifeless, your pacing is a train wreck, your world-building is pointless, and your prose is a cliché graveyard. You’re not just making rookie mistakes; you’ve cornered the market on them. To salvage this disaster, scrap everything. Start fresh. Rewrite the synopsis. Learn the basics. Until then, Broken Dreams isn’t a title; it’s your writing career. Do better—or quit wasting everyone's time.

I saw the name and for a second thought it was mine

 

[Daydreamers]

Let’s not pretend we’re here for polite critique or gentle encouragement. I read two chapters of your webnovel, and it wasn’t out of admiration or even begrudging curiosity. No, I read it because I couldn’t look away from the unfolding disaster—a literary train wreck of such magnitude that I was morbidly fascinated by just how badly it could fail. It did, how surprising (not), and not just in one area, but in every conceivable way that a narrative can collapse on itself. What you’ve written isn’t a story; it’s a cautionary tale about what happens when someone dives into webnovel writing without a clue.

Synopsis. That pitiful excuse for a hook, more cry for help than compelling intro. Seriously? “Johan, burdened by guilt, finds himself in a tough, unforgiving world after a strange event”? That’s your lead? It’s cardboard soaked in lukewarm coffee—zero flavor, zero substance, zero reason to care. “Burdened by guilt”? The most overused, emotionally bankrupt trait in fiction. “Tough, unforgiving world”? Meaningless. What kind of world? Who knows. You might as well say, “Johan, some guy with feelings, is somewhere where stuff happens.” And that “strange event”? So vague it’s basically nothing. Intrigue? No. Lazy? Absolutely.

And then there’s the tagline: “Can Johan face his past and move beyond his regrets, or will this harsh new world consume him?” Is that supposed to be a hook? Because it reads like something you’d scribble in a high school creative writing class and promptly forget. What regrets and why they matter? What past and why it matters? What even is this harsh new world and WHY IT FUCKING MATTERS?! You’re dangling questions without substance, expecting readers to care when you’ve given them no reason to. The whole thing reeks of someone throwing words at a page in the hope they’ll stick. Spoiler: they don’t.

And don’t even get me started on the tags. “Archery.” “Army Building.” “Wars.” These are buzzwords you’ve slapped onto your story like cheap decals, hoping they’ll trick readers into thinking this is an epic adventure. But here’s the problem: your tags don’t reflect the story at all. By the time I finished Chapter Two, I was still waiting for a hint of “army building” or “wars" like some fool who knew it was a bad idea to hope for anything. I got a mopey protagonist wandering through vague misery with NO REDEEMABLE CHARACTERISTICS. The disconnect between your tags and your actual content isn’t just misleading; it’s outright false advertising. Did you even read your own synopsis before you chose those tags, or were you just "eh, I'll do it later" and then conveniently forgot about them?

Now, Chapter One, where everything that could go wrong does so in spectacular fashion. It’s not just a bad start; it’s an apathy-ridden slog through poorly constructed prose that makes me wonder if you were writing this at 3 AM while drowning in cheap whiskey. Johan, our protagonist, opens with a dreary inner monologue that reads like the journal of someone who thinks they’re profound but is really just tired and sad. “The darkness in my heart mirrors the gray sky,” or whatever nonsense he rambles about—it’s so melodramatic and cliché that I could practically hear a moody violin playing in the background. This isn’t characterization; it’s filler masquerading as depth.

And then, without warning, we’re hit with a sudden reality shift. One moment Johan is wallowing in existential dread, and the next he’s on a battlefield, surrounded by corpses. There’s no buildup, no transition, no emotional weight to the scene. It’s as if you just decided, “Eh, I guess we’re doing this now.” This should have been a moment of visceral terror or awe—a gut-punch realization that everything Johan knew has changed. Instead, it’s delivered with all the impact of someone announcing they forgot to buy milk. He mutters something about going mad, and that’s it. That’s his big emotional reaction. If Johan doesn’t care, why should we?

And let’s not forget the absolute lack of sensory detail. A battlefield should be rich with sights, sounds, smells—the copper tang of blood, the cries of the wounded, the chill of fear creeping up Johan’s spine. Instead, we get a vague description of “bodies like discarded dolls.” It’s the kind of bland, uninspired imagery that would make even the most forgiving reader roll their eyes. Where’s the horror of the world, tension that could've saved the scene without hurting the pacing, anything that matters to the story that wants to be told really? Pathos isn’t just missing here—it’s dead, buried, and forgotten.

By Chapter 1, I was ready to quit. I should’ve started the roast there, but no—rule of three chapters, right? So, I clicked "Next." It gets worse. Chapter 2 snuffed out the faint glimmer of hope from Chapter 1, like an undead dying a second death—only this time too lifeless to resurrect. Johan’s character? A blank slate. He stumbles into a village, feet bloodied, only to meet a farmer who flips from hostile to over-sharing his tragic backstory like they’re lifelong drinking buddies. I literally voiced to myself, "Wait, what?" I reread the scene three times, thinking surely this was a setup. Nope. It’s just a blatant info dump. The tonal whiplash is dizzying. One second, the farmer’s chucking rocks; the next, he’s doling out bread, tea, and unsolicited trauma tales about his dead wife and missing kid. The shift isn’t earned, it isn’t believable, and it sure as hell isn’t compelling.

You waste paragraphs on Johan walking and whining about being tired, then cram the entire village’s backstory into one bloated monologue. Pacing? A disaster. It either drags through pointless details or sprints into exposition dumps, leaving the narrative both sluggish and chaotic—like ADHD on a caffeine bender wrote it.

When Ito, the farmer, drops his “kill me” bombshell, I felt nothing. What should land with a gut-punch thud instead limps in, dragged down by clunky dialogue and zero buildup. His grief had potential—until overwrought lines bled it dry. And Johan? He mumbles a lame apology, naturally, without a hint of fire or gravity to match Ito’s plea. It’s a masterclass in failing both worldbuilding and persuasion, leaving the average reader bored and me with a textbook case of how to butcher my own guides: The Dao of Worldmaking and The Dao of Rhetoric.

You can’t tell a story. You’ve got ideas—bandits, corrupt lords, guilt-ridden heroes—but no clue how to make them work. Your characters are lifeless, your pacing is a train wreck, your world-building is pointless, and your prose is a cliché graveyard. You’re not just making rookie mistakes; you’ve cornered the market on them. To salvage this disaster, scrap everything. Start fresh. Rewrite the synopsis. Learn the basics. Until then, Broken Dreams isn’t a title; it’s your writing career. Do better—or quit wasting everyone's time.

Thank you for the feedback and srry for wasting your time.

 

[Tempokai]

I feel like my writing is shet in the starting chapters, so I want you to roast me Hard
link: https://www.scribblehub.com/series/644643/paranoia/

Not worth my time and energy. It reeks of "I don't care in persuading myself in believing in my own story", so why should I? I just skimmed two chapters, and it reads like what I expected, poor grammar, nonexistent basics of storytelling, and whole "I'm 15, my childhood was in Tumblr and now I write what I have in my mind" vibes. If you treat the storytelling like that, why should I or anyone who has limited time in this world care about the story that doesn't believe in itself?

 

[RedMoonBlue]

Not worth my time and energy. It reeks of "I don't care in persuading myself in believing in my own story", so why should I? I just skimmed two chapters, and it reads like what I expected, poor grammar, nonexistent basics of storytelling, and whole "I'm 15, my childhood was in Tumblr and now I write what I have in my mind" vibes. If you treat the storytelling like that, why should I or anyone who has limited time in this world care about the story that doesn't believe in itself?

Okay. Got it.

 

[Hoshino]

I only fear one thing and that is confessing to someone.

Do your worst~

HanaSuki

Natsumi Tohka a person with 8th grade syndrome who easily gets embarrassed by what they say and has difficulty expressing emotions, has a single wish: to be transported to another world. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ (Temporary synopsis) 1 chapter every weak on every Friday and Wednesday.

www.scribblehub.com

 

[Tempokai]

Echo of The End

In a world ruled by strength, cultivation, and influence, what happens when one man alone holds the power to change everything? 'Welcome to the world...' Alaric, born into the family of a Duke, was believed to be just another child. But there’s nothing ordinary about him. Strength is...

www.scribblehub.com

Never in my life did i think it was a perfection but please go ahead. [I will probably cry myself to sleep after this.]

I read three chapters—suffered through them, really—and skimmed the fourth just to confirm my suspicions that this story isn't just flawed; it’s structurally unsound. Where do I even begin with this literary lasagna of mediocrity you dared to serve? It’s like you built a lasagna, then invited people in, and then started saying to each guest, “Trust me, it gets good later!”, while the lasagna is cooking in 50 degrees Celsius oven. No. No, it doesn’t. Not for the poor reader who came for the antihero MC doing smut things, only to find themselves trapped in a prologue that feels like three separate short stories slapped together with duct tape and self-indulgence.

I'll start with the elephant in the room—the synopsis. You promised us an antihero MC awakening to power and possibly some spicy scenes, but what did you deliver? A snarky immortal (totally not authorial self insert, and totally not a red herring for readers to disengage with) doing not-so-subtle narrative acrobatics in Chapter 1, some irrelevant kingdom ruler's fall, and a parental drama in Chapters 2 and 3 (and 4, but I don't want to write about it, ugh) that reads like it came from someone’s overly sentimental baby journal mixed with third grade xianxia plot. You set the stage for one story and delivered an entirely different one. That’s not just a betrayal of the reader’s expectations—it’s a straight-up scam towards the readers. If your synopsis doesn’t reflect the first 10,000 words, you’re lying to your audience. Your implied author, the one who is on the page, suffers for that. Full stop.

This isn’t “antihero cultivation MC makes morally questionable decisions.” It’s “Here’s Alaric’s birth and the musings of his side characters for thousands of words because surely readers are dying to know how he drooled on a toy and stared at ceilings.” Why? Why would you think anyone would care about this when the synopsis points in the complete opposite direction? By the end of Chapter 3, your ethos as an author is in shambles. Readers don’t just lose trust in the story—they lose trust in you. And when that happens, it doesn’t matter how good the writing becomes later. They’ve already closed the tab, like I did at chapter 2, seeing "ugh, it's those type of stories again, where nothing happens for 20 chapters". I mean, starting from a birth scene? What's this, yet MHA fanfic?

That’s the tragedy here, isn’t it? Because your problems don’t stop with the misleading synopsis. Oh no, that’s just the appetizer. Let’s talk about the pacing—or should I say lack of pacing. This story crawls like a wounded snail dragging a boulder uphill. Chapter 1 is a vague, lore-dump-y mess that has no connection to the MC the readers came for. Sure, it's probably that immortal that will leave the book for MC to become OP, I get where you're going, but the tone of the character, man, it hurts. Chapter 2 is an extended birth scene that thinks it’s so much more profound than it actually is. I mean it in a bad way. By the time I got hit by Chapter 3, I'm drowning in Xironia’s POV—a hormonal cocktail of stress, adoration, and long-winded diary entries about her prodigy baby that repeat the same points over and over. Oh, muh bahby is so clever, is so quiet, stares at people too much. I GET IT. But where is the plot? Where is the main character? Where is the reason we’re supposed to keep reading?

If I wanted an endless slice-of-life about noble family dynamics, I would’ve picked something with a synopsis that warned me about it or specifically said it will be that. You’re not saying in the synopsis that you're writing an epic saga where readers will forgive you for spending three chapters setting up the world and backstory. You’re writing a antihero smut webnovel, and readers of this genre expect to be hooked immediately. Yet you opened with a meandering narrative that feels like a vanity project rather than a focused story.

And then, the descriptions attack like a Fire Nation. My god, the descriptions. You managed to drown every scene in so much melodrama and overwrought detail that it becomes exhausting to read. Not Tolkien type exhausting read, but Sartre type. The storm battering the windows. The mother’s burning eyes from reading too much paperwork. The baby’s quiet intelligence as he dissects a toy like he’s auditioning for Mensa. None of this needs to be described in such excruciating depth. You managed to follow "show, don't tell" to a tee, now learn how to SHOW & TELL. Brevity is your friend, but you’ve banished it like an exiled Duke. Every sentence feels like it’s auditioning for Most Poetic Line of the Year, and the result is a story that drags on and on without saying much of anything.

And can we talk about the dialogue tags? Because they’re not helping you either. They’re bloated, clunky, and try way too hard to add emotional weight to conversations that don’t warrant it. When you write, “he said, his voice thick with emotion as his trembling hands brushed against the soft, glistening surface of the newborn’s cheek,” all I see is an implied author screaming for attention instead of letting the dialogue speak for itself. Pare it down. Simplify. Try to write without them, like Asian writers. Trust the readers to infer tone without spelling it out like we’re children learning to read.

Oh, and let’s not forget those 4th-wall-breaking author’s notes. Honestly, they might be the most infuriating part of the whole package. You say you’re a student, that English isn’t your first language, and that we should bear with you. Fine. But then you go and spoil future plot points in your notes, like some amateur magician revealing the trick before pulling the rabbit out of the hat. Why should we stick around for the story when you’re already spoiling the punchline? And the self-deprecation? It’s grating. It doesn’t make us sympathize with you; it makes us question why you’re even publishing this in the first place if you’re so unsure of yourself. If you don’t respect your story enough to present it confidently, why should anyone else respect it enough to read it?

At the end of the day, this isn’t a webnovel—it’s a deconstructed burger, served raw, with the promise that it’ll taste good if we just wait long enough. But here’s the thing: most of the readers don’t have the patience to wait for the plot to maybe show up in Chapter 5 or 10 or 20 unless you give a meaning to do so. If you don’t deliver on the promise of your synopsis within the first few chapters, you’ve already lost them. And this isn’t me being overly harsh. This is the reality of the medium you’re writing in. Webnovel readers are spoiled for choice. They don’t owe you their time. You have to earn it, and you’ve failed to do so.

I didn’t quit because of the amateur writing—honestly, for a beginner, it’s not the worst I’ve seen. I quit because your story didn’t respect my time. It danced around the MC, teased a plot that never materialized, and drowned me in side character POVs I didn’t sign up for. It betrayed the ethos set up by the synopsis and expected me to stay invested out of sheer goodwill. Sorry, but no.

If you want to improve, here’s my advice: Rewrite the opening. Center the MC. Cut the fluff. And for the love of everything holy, stop indulging in your own narrative at the expense of the reader. Until then, this story is staying exactly where I left it—in the tab I closed at Chapter 2.

 

[LazyMoofy]

I read three chapters—suffered through them, really—and skimmed the fourth just to confirm my suspicions that this story isn't just flawed; it’s structurally unsound. Where do I even begin with this literary lasagna of mediocrity you dared to serve? It’s like you built a lasagna, then invited people in, and then started saying to each guest, “Trust me, it gets good later!”, while the lasagna is cooking in 50 degrees Celsius oven. No. No, it doesn’t. Not for the poor reader who came for the antihero MC doing smut things, only to find themselves trapped in a prologue that feels like three separate short stories slapped together with duct tape and self-indulgence.

I'll start with the elephant in the room—the synopsis. You promised us an antihero MC awakening to power and possibly some spicy scenes, but what did you deliver? A snarky immortal (totally not authorial self insert, and totally not a red herring for readers to disengage with) doing not-so-subtle narrative acrobatics in Chapter 1, some irrelevant kingdom ruler's fall, and a parental drama in Chapters 2 and 3 (and 4, but I don't want to write about it, ugh) that reads like it came from someone’s overly sentimental baby journal mixed with third grade xianxia plot. You set the stage for one story and delivered an entirely different one. That’s not just a betrayal of the reader’s expectations—it’s a straight-up scam towards the readers. If your synopsis doesn’t reflect the first 10,000 words, you’re lying to your audience. Your implied author, the one who is on the page, suffers for that. Full stop.

This isn’t “antihero cultivation MC makes morally questionable decisions.” It’s “Here’s Alaric’s birth and the musings of his side characters for thousands of words because surely readers are dying to know how he drooled on a toy and stared at ceilings.” Why? Why would you think anyone would care about this when the synopsis points in the complete opposite direction? By the end of Chapter 3, your ethos as an author is in shambles. Readers don’t just lose trust in the story—they lose trust in you. And when that happens, it doesn’t matter how good the writing becomes later. They’ve already closed the tab, like I did at chapter 2, seeing "ugh, it's those type of stories again, where nothing happens for 20 chapters". I mean, starting from a birth scene? What's this, yet MHA fanfic?

That’s the tragedy here, isn’t it? Because your problems don’t stop with the misleading synopsis. Oh no, that’s just the appetizer. Let’s talk about the pacing—or should I say lack of pacing. This story crawls like a wounded snail dragging a boulder uphill. Chapter 1 is a vague, lore-dump-y mess that has no connection to the MC the readers came for. Sure, it's probably that immortal that will leave the book for MC to become OP, I get where you're going, but the tone of the character, man, it hurts. Chapter 2 is an extended birth scene that thinks it’s so much more profound than it actually is. I mean it in a bad way. By the time I got hit by Chapter 3, I'm drowning in Xironia’s POV—a hormonal cocktail of stress, adoration, and long-winded diary entries about her prodigy baby that repeat the same points over and over. Oh, muh bahby is so clever, is so quiet, stares at people too much. I GET IT. But where is the plot? Where is the main character? Where is the reason we’re supposed to keep reading?

If I wanted an endless slice-of-life about noble family dynamics, I would’ve picked something with a synopsis that warned me about it or specifically said it will be that. You’re not saying in the synopsis that you're writing an epic saga where readers will forgive you for spending three chapters setting up the world and backstory. You’re writing a antihero smut webnovel, and readers of this genre expect to be hooked immediately. Yet you opened with a meandering narrative that feels like a vanity project rather than a focused story.

And then, the descriptions attack like a Fire Nation. My god, the descriptions. You managed to drown every scene in so much melodrama and overwrought detail that it becomes exhausting to read. Not Tolkien type exhausting read, but Sartre type. The storm battering the windows. The mother’s burning eyes from reading too much paperwork. The baby’s quiet intelligence as he dissects a toy like he’s auditioning for Mensa. None of this needs to be described in such excruciating depth. You managed to follow "show, don't tell" to a tee, now learn how to SHOW & TELL. Brevity is your friend, but you’ve banished it like an exiled Duke. Every sentence feels like it’s auditioning for Most Poetic Line of the Year, and the result is a story that drags on and on without saying much of anything.

And can we talk about the dialogue tags? Because they’re not helping you either. They’re bloated, clunky, and try way too hard to add emotional weight to conversations that don’t warrant it. When you write, “he said, his voice thick with emotion as his trembling hands brushed against the soft, glistening surface of the newborn’s cheek,” all I see is an implied author screaming for attention instead of letting the dialogue speak for itself. Pare it down. Simplify. Try to write without them, like Asian writers. Trust the readers to infer tone without spelling it out like we’re children learning to read.

Oh, and let’s not forget those 4th-wall-breaking author’s notes. Honestly, they might be the most infuriating part of the whole package. You say you’re a student, that English isn’t your first language, and that we should bear with you. Fine. But then you go and spoil future plot points in your notes, like some amateur magician revealing the trick before pulling the rabbit out of the hat. Why should we stick around for the story when you’re already spoiling the punchline? And the self-deprecation? It’s grating. It doesn’t make us sympathize with you; it makes us question why you’re even publishing this in the first place if you’re so unsure of yourself. If you don’t respect your story enough to present it confidently, why should anyone else respect it enough to read it?

At the end of the day, this isn’t a webnovel—it’s a deconstructed burger, served raw, with the promise that it’ll taste good if we just wait long enough. But here’s the thing: most of the readers don’t have the patience to wait for the plot to maybe show up in Chapter 5 or 10 or 20 unless you give a meaning to do so. If you don’t deliver on the promise of your synopsis within the first few chapters, you’ve already lost them. And this isn’t me being overly harsh. This is the reality of the medium you’re writing in. Webnovel readers are spoiled for choice. They don’t owe you their time. You have to earn it, and you’ve failed to do so.

I didn’t quit because of the amateur writing—honestly, for a beginner, it’s not the worst I’ve seen. I quit because your story didn’t respect my time. It danced around the MC, teased a plot that never materialized, and drowned me in side character POVs I didn’t sign up for. It betrayed the ethos set up by the synopsis and expected me to stay invested out of sheer goodwill. Sorry, but no.

If you want to improve, here’s my advice: Rewrite the opening. Center the MC. Cut the fluff. And for the love of everything holy, stop indulging in your own narrative at the expense of the reader. Until then, this story is staying exactly where I left it—in the tab I closed at Chapter 2.

Thanks for this. I will try to improve and fix it.

 

[Tempokai]

burn it shred it. I need to know what's wrong with it

Just skimming your synopsis and two laughable 500-word chapters tells me you're not here to write seriously. Why should I waste time on this nothingburger of a webnovel that reeks of "12-year-old Tumblr user discovers copyright laws"? If you won't treat storytelling as sacred, why should I treat your incoherent ramblings as worth a second glance?

 

[anonjohn20]

500-word chapters

Yikes, his chapters are about 1 page each (if you use a larger font). lol

 

[Tempokai]

Help me pls

Radiant Morning

In the dawn of a new era, legends from previous years past will crawl their way back into the heart of the world of Radaris. The future was made by a past and when that past is covered in the decaying webs of time by those who lost the battle...

www.scribblehub.com

Honestly, I can see why this story has zero engagement. It’s dead on arrival. Like, it’s not even a “rough draft” situation—it’s the 0.5th draft you tossed online at 3 a.m. because even your teacher would cringe too hard to look at it. Let’s call it what it is: cringe. Every element here is radiating beginner energy so hard, it’s like a flashing neon sign that says, “I have no idea what I’m doing, but hey, maybe someone will stumble upon it and pat me on the back.” Spoiler alert: they won’t.

First off, the synopsis? You didn’t even bother capitalizing your protagonist’s name, lucas morningstar. That alone screams, “I couldn’t be bothered to proofread.” And then the synopsis itself? It’s vague, overinflated with generic fantasy buzzwords like “chosen one,” and absolutely fails to give the reader any reason to care. You really thought “Radiant Morning” was a gripping title? Cringe alert: It sounds like a rejected title for an 80s paperback about knights with mullets. No one’s clicking on that unless they’re accidentally searching for a discontinued line of breakfast cereals.

The lack of decent tags and clarity in your synopsis is a glaring red flag. It’s like you’re actively trying to not attract readers. It feels undercooked, like you had an idea in your head, but you slapped it together without asking yourself what would make anyone give a damn. Experimenting for your own enjoyment? Sure, that’s fine. But if this is your "serious" attempt at storytelling, my advice is simple: find someone who knows how to write in English and beg them to teach you.

And the actual content? It reads like a foreign exchange student and a 14-year-old edgelord co-wrote it after watching too much shounen anime. Purple prose, cringe dialogue, overwritten action scenes—it's all there. The worst part is that it’s not even entertainingly bad. It’s the kind of bad that makes you tired because every mistake here has been made by 1,000 first-time authors before you. You’re not breaking new ground; you’re just reinforcing why most of the people (regretfully not me) have no patience for beginner webnovels.

I don’t even need to roast you hard. Your story is already roasting itself. Every misstep, every clunky sentence, every self-indulgent paragraph filled with “bubbling seas of disgust” does all the work for me. My honestly poor advice? Stop publishing drafts that even Wattpad would hesitate to feature, learn the basics of storytelling, and for the love of all things holy, learn how to write with restraint. Until then, Radiant Morning is destined to stay in the dimmest, dustiest corner of the SH.

 

[JayMark80]

Honestly, I can see why this story has zero engagement. It’s dead on arrival. Like, it’s not even a “rough draft” situation—it’s the 0.5th draft you tossed online at 3 a.m. because even your teacher would cringe too hard to look at it. Let’s call it what it is: cringe. Every element here is radiating beginner energy so hard, it’s like a flashing neon sign that says, “I have no idea what I’m doing, but hey, maybe someone will stumble upon it and pat me on the back.” Spoiler alert: they won’t.

First off, the synopsis? You didn’t even bother capitalizing your protagonist’s name, lucas morningstar. That alone screams, “I couldn’t be bothered to proofread.” And then the synopsis itself? It’s vague, overinflated with generic fantasy buzzwords like “chosen one,” and absolutely fails to give the reader any reason to care. You really thought “Radiant Morning” was a gripping title? Cringe alert: It sounds like a rejected title for an 80s paperback about knights with mullets. No one’s clicking on that unless they’re accidentally searching for a discontinued line of breakfast cereals.

The lack of decent tags and clarity in your synopsis is a glaring red flag. It’s like you’re actively trying to not attract readers. It feels undercooked, like you had an idea in your head, but you slapped it together without asking yourself what would make anyone give a damn. Experimenting for your own enjoyment? Sure, that’s fine. But if this is your "serious" attempt at storytelling, my advice is simple: find someone who knows how to write in English and beg them to teach you.

And the actual content? It reads like a foreign exchange student and a 14-year-old edgelord co-wrote it after watching too much shounen anime. Purple prose, cringe dialogue, overwritten action scenes—it's all there. The worst part is that it’s not even entertainingly bad. It’s the kind of bad that makes you tired because every mistake here has been made by 1,000 first-time authors before you. You’re not breaking new ground; you’re just reinforcing why most of the people (regretfully not me) have no patience for beginner webnovels.

I don’t even need to roast you hard. Your story is already roasting itself. Every misstep, every clunky sentence, every self-indulgent paragraph filled with “bubbling seas of disgust” does all the work for me. My honestly poor advice? Stop publishing drafts that even Wattpad would hesitate to feature, learn the basics of storytelling, and for the love of all things holy, learn how to write with restraint. Until then, Radiant Morning is destined to stay in the dimmest, dustiest corner of the SH.

*I fixed the first section of the first chapter to the best of my ability. But I can only do so much*


Labored breaths. Scratches littered his dust covered face. His eyes were like blood ruby. Unkempt long white hair slid to his waist. Radiant green enclosed the cube. A scorched earth and warm sweat mix entered with the draft from openings above. Lucas inhaled cold air. Rolls of sweat dropped from his chin to the rocks. He heightened his senses to shape his mana as he scrutinized his opponent, a tall boy of sturdy build, with narrowed eyes.

Lucas glanced at the barrier which encased their heated bout. Its surface rippled against the constant wind from Tempokai’s relentless strikes. He shut his eyes. Mana coursed. It filled his lungs and solidified his muscles. Then, a radiant white light erupted from his cock to encase him in light.

A snort reached his ears. Tempokai was an idiot and liked to snort at shit. Earth shattered as the air whistled. Lucas knew he’d win.

Morning art: Shroud AMOOOOOOGUS

Tempokai knew he done fucked up but he was committed. He made a retard shit face in the split second it took for him to almost reach his fist inches from Lucas’s face. A sudden burst of hot white light enveloped his fist, the swallowed him with its radiance. It burned. Skin blistered. Tempokai blacked out due to the sheer power of the cringe.

The mana light disintegrated into beads, then faded.

Lucas released his minty breath and slowly opened his eyes. How does someone fucking slowly open their eyes? This man had talent. Tempokai’s robes were charred and jagged on the side where his right arm and torso were blotted with red blisters.

“Oh shit, I over did it again,” Lucas whispered to himself.

He bobbled on over like wobbling weeble on aching legs. He winced because his back hurt when he rolled Tempokai’s fat ass over and stared with scrunchy brow. Tempokai got dusty again. Blistered skin, parts of seared flesh and the smoke of forbidden powder, probably cocaine, filled the air.

“God’s forsake me! Why am I such a fucking idiot!? Tempokai is my friend!”

An entire paragraph of utter garbage pounded in his head.

Get yourself up, Luke! You got yourself here, and now you must help Tempokai. He forced the light into his eyes, forced himself to smell the scorched earth and taste the receding bile in his throat.

He laid his eyes on Tempokai with clenched ass cheeks. The crispy boy draped over Lucas’s battered shoulder with difficulty. The beefy boy ate too much pizza, so Lucas heaved while staggering to a shaky balance.

He didn’t dare think more. Any more repetitive internal monologue would further drain his editor’s sanity. Lucas lumbered through the green barrier. It rippled at his passage as he pissed himself.

The quick but momentary wetness cooled his beating heart and slowed his rushing mind. Having relieved himself, he could forget and focus. Time to get their fat asses to the infirmary. Gretchen was going to be as pissed as his pants.