I was a trashy NEET with no friends or ambitions, nevermind something like a girlfriend or a career. After years of lazing around and doing nothing, even I realized that it would take a miracle for me to turn my life around. Luckily, I got just that. A blue haired...
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I'd love feedback here, if you don't mind.
Good day to you. Before I start with the feedback, I would mention that English is my second language. I stopped reading after finishing chapter 6: Paving the Way with Mile.
It's a generic r-18 story with mediocre writing.
Let's start with the writing.
I dislike the way you write, and the first thing that I dislike is your dialogues. You almost always omit any kind of body language, facial expressions, voice tone, and so on. Considering how the story is told through the perspective of MC, first-person POV, he can comment on every observation, and it would help build his personality. But even without that, body language can help me understand the characters and what they think and do. It helps me to see them as living people rather than talking heads.
Example.
"Hey, figurine girl."
"Figurine girl?"
"Err. What's your name?"
"Well, I'm the embodiment of your inherent skill, so… Corruption?"
"Corruption doesn't sound like a name though, and it would be confusing, if I had a skill, to call it and you the same thing."
"You do have the skill though? And we are the same thing?"
"Whatever. Your name is Fig now."
"Fig?"
"Yep."
"... Short for 'Figurine Girl'?"
"Yeah."
"..."
"..."
"I guess your naming sense has always been kind of trash."
"Rude, but besides the point."
"Not beside the point! This is about my name! I only get one of those!"
"Anyway, can you really do it?"
"Do what?"
"Can you really use that magic to let me have sex with Luce?"
It would be a complete lie to say the thought wasn't tempting.
"I can't, but you can!"
"Huh?"
"I'm just the manifestation of your inherent skill, the only one who can do anything is you!"
There are only dialogue lines, no details about movements or, for exmaple, a change of voice. I will explain why it's necessary for me a bit later.
Another problem with your writing is weird phrases.
Examples.
"Finally! I thought you were going to sleep forever!
It's already after one you know?" After one?
Her face had a line of light brown freckles running
across the entire thing Weirdly phrased. I'm not saying it's wrong but calling someone's face 'thing' is somewhat weird.
I haven't done much socializing
since before I turned twenty, and so on. Weirdly phrased.
but the more I thought about it, the more
I desperately hoped it was real. I think that the two words I highlighted should be switched places.
"
Even ignoring that even someone like me can't just be looking at porn 24/7, Even ignoring that even? What?
Another sentence I found weird, though I'm not sure if it's a problem with your writing or maybe a minor plothole?
That said,
even with the money the school gave her, s
he hadn't moved out yet because of a combination of wanting to stay at home a little longer
and the fact that the scholarship didn't cover housing, just tuition and fees.
Why is MC saying it's strange that she didn't move out if her scholarship didn't cover housing? She hadn't moved out EVEN with the money that DIDN'T cover housing. Like, what? What the hell? Is it MC who is stupid, or it's you who phrased this poorly?
Also, I found one typo.
To use Luce's
owm words from a few years ago: I "just reek of failure."
But it was only one typo, and overall your text was clean, at least to me. The main problem with your writing, in my opinion, are bad dialogues and weird phrases.
Now let me talk about the plot, characters, and worldbuilding.
I will start with the MC. Remember when I said I would elaborate on dialogues? Welp, the time has come.
I perceive your MC as an incel and in no way a NEET. I couldn't find a single explanation of why your MC is a NEET. MC consistently, throughout every dialogue and interaction showed that he doesn't act like a NEET. There was no reason apart from his laziness why he dropped from college or didn't work.
The idea of
getting some crappy job in the area never really appealed to me, in fact the thought always made me sick.
Having to do menial tasks every day for minimum wage, dealing with some shitty power tripping manager looking down on me, dealing with dozens or hundreds of
annoying strangers passing by and talking to me for hours on end. It all sucked so much, especially knowing that
I'd only have to take such a sucky job in the first place because I
dropped out of college like an idiot.
To me, NEET is someone who has serious troubles interacting with other people. It's not just being lazy. But the thing is, even if MC has some psychological trauma that made him a NEET, he does not act that way. He actually does the opposite.
"Oh!"
Mile's eyes lit up as her face quickly became a mixture of unconcealed shock and happiness.
No no no, even if you're surprised, that's just plain an overreaction isn't it?
He was a NEET for apparently a few years, and he thinks it's an overreaction? And by the way, it's NOT an overreaction. Mile reacted EXTREMELY mild after hearing that a NEET decided to stop being a shut-in. So not only he doesn't think of himself as a NEET, Mile doesn't think of him as a NEET either.
And all of it comes partially from badly written dialogues that didn't convince me of the opposite.
About him being an incel. Well, let's start with the fact that he thinks of himself as somewhat handsome while being a virgin. Then let's talk about the fact that he is constantly horny, and he even tried to peep on his stepsister. Then, let's say that he doesn't try to change to get laid because he is a lazy fuck. If he isn't involuntary celibate, I don't know who is.
"Besides, even if I could just suddenly see her as my mom, wouldn't that just make it weird if I wanted to sleep with her?"
Over the years I'd fantasized about my stepmom and her daughters countless times.
maybe because I had a crush on her as a kid and grew up thinking she was hot
Having a crush= wanting to have sex and fantasizing about her. Okay.
Let's also mention this.
I wanted to give her the love she seemed to want from me, but I just couldn't do so from the position of a son… Who he is, if not an incel? There is a multitude of beautiful women, he now has the ability to have sex with them, yet he can't control himself. He absolutely must fuck someone who not only took care of him for several years while he was a lazy bum but also took care of him when his father died. I mean, seriously?
I actually wanted to stop reading your novel sooner(at chapter3) because of MC, but I noticed this comment.
And here you thought this story would be about how a NEET mind-fucked all the women around him into becoming his slave harem.
Nope! It's ACTUALLY about how a NEET was unwittingly able to overcome his issues, get his life pulled together, and become a productive and respected member of society while finding his own self-worth doing positive and healthy things ... who also mind-fucked all the women around him Into becoming his slave harem!
And this comment can't be more wrong. This is precisely a story where MC fucks every woman. Like, he is sorry for his stepmother, so as an apology, instead of trying to become a better son, he would fuck her and her daughters? This is overcoming his issues and getting his life pulled together?
I can't say anything about the other characters. I can once again say that Mile didn't react properly when MC said he wanted to start working.
I can also say that to hide that MC is an incel, you tried to asspull that the maid girl somewhat liked him.
But here comes another problem. He can't be handsome. He is a NEET, and he was a NEET for a long time. There is not enough worldbuilding to assume that the world in your story differs from our world. Yeah, there is mana, but apart from that, you didn't say anything about the world. This means that I should apply our world's logic.
Not to brag, but I'm not a bad looking guy. I'm above average height,
I'm still fit from working out back in college, people say I've got a handsome face and a great smile.
Even if he was as ripped as Chris Bumstead in his college years, after a couple of years of a NEET lifestyle, he MUST look like shit. It's not about genes or about muscle memory. NEETs don't train, NEETs don't eat properly, and NEETs don't move enough. You can't be fit.
Yet he can.
Another example of you not giving enough worldbuilding.
Despite being the smallest they'd been in years thanks to her constant exercise, they still easily filled a G cup How the fuck am I supposed to believe a track runner can have a G cup?
And lastly.
Not because I was a NEET, or at least not entirely,
but because she caught me trying to peek while she was changing ten or so years ago.
It was kind of a rude thing to do, but in my defense
I was a fourteen year old boy
Maybe because I first knew her as my parents' friend and she only married my father
when I was already seventeen
Even now that eight or so years had passed, I just couldn't bring myself to feel that way about her.
Can you smell something here? 14+10=? 17+8=? And I'm not even counting this "
Barely a year after they were married, my father passed away," in the second equation. MC is either 24, 25, or 26.
As usual, I didn't rate your story. But if I had to, 2 stars.
sorry for the off topic question. I wasn't looking for substitutions though, just wondering how you felt about their use (which you did answer, so thanks :D)
