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@rose-colored-fancy

I don’t think describing an accent (or especially a voice, since I was more describing his voice) as rough is an inherently bad thing, but I will look at it

So, I agree with everything you said, but I wasn’t exactly saying that describing accents in those ways were necessary “bad” or “offensive” things to do, I was more saying that they’re overused, and mostly just used to put emphasis on how the main character’s sound different. In other words, the author couldn’t think of any more unique way to describe an accent, so they just said “thick” or “rough” or something like that. That’s what I’m trying not to do, but I do agree with everything you said, and yes, it’s not like those descriptions are mean or derogatory.

I have at least one character who carries around his lie for two and a half books before he does something about it. Admittedly, he’s not a POV character until the third book, but I’d say it counts.

That makes me feel a lot better. So you’re series has multiple first person points of view? How many?

I’m wavering between “This is the next work of literary genius” and “All of this is trash and I don’t know whyyy”

That is so me. xD I couldn’t have said it any better.

Please do, you know how much I love elaborating

Oh I know. 🙃 Here’s a few I want to discuss:

You could spend more time on the character’s introspection in the first part, especially backstory.

I’m torn here. I quite dislike books that have a lot of telling backstory (and by backstory, I’m mainly referring to their ghost) through introspection at the beginning of the book unless there is a very  good reason for them to think about it. My thought of it is “this character has had these memories for years, why would they start going through them thoroughly in their mind again all the sudden?” It doesn’t feel natural to me unless that good reason to spark the thoughts is there, and even if there is  a reason, it often still feels unnatural to me when one considers that people often push away and don’t think on unpleasant memories, and when it comes to characters’ lies and flaw, unpleasant memories are almost always part of there backstory. This is personal taste, I know, but it borders on info dumping in how telling instead of showing it feels to me. I will try to find a way to incorporate more backstory and ghosts earlier though.

On that note, you tend to tell the backstory instead of showing it in narration.

I think this is your one tip that I didn’t understand, so feel free to elucidate.

Chapter 33 definitely had that problem though (if we’re talking about the same thing that is).

You need to set it up better through the first part, then it won’t feel rushed. Remind me to expand on this on SE.

Feel free to expand on it. Here’s the deal with setting it up early though. I was specifically designing a haters-to-lovers relationship between Joelle and Hugon, and thus I need them to actually hate each other or at least dislike each other for the majority of the book. Thus, I’m not really sure how to change their relationship at all, tips?

As for Delphine and Tristan, I’ll wait until I get more feedback from some other people before adding anything big, but I do plan on adding more conversations and introspection on Tristan’s part regarding Delphine and his reasons for being brusque with her.

Danon’s death was treated as an afterthought. That’s a lot to process for Tristan, who was apparently close to his father.

Close until he found out that Danon was a murderer, but I get what you mean. Any tips for making it better?

Structurally the story was pretty solid, but you seemed to be missing a low point.

Yeah, I went through the low point rather quickly. We’ll see about expanding it, but sometimes low points that drag out feel unrealistic to me. They were at a pinch for time, and had gone through worse, but yeah, we’ll see.

Hugon acts like a jerk throughout the first half of the book, but that’s very much his character arc. However, I would consider giving him some more sympathetic moments throughout the first half.

That’s another thing I want more feedback on (i.e, are most betas thinking he feels like a shallow jerk), but I get what you mean. I just find it unrealistic for him to be very sympathetic at all, not with his massive lie and flaw.

Thanks for all the great answers by the way! All the other ones I’m not mentioning here just means I’m taking them with vigor and will be using them a lot in my next revision.

What are your thoughts on using medieval jargon in your books? There are so many terms (whether French, English, Greek, or Latin in origin) that are used for armor, weapons, castles, villages, seneschal type positions, clothing, and on and on. Do you dumb things down or stick with the historically flavorful words? One example of this for me is the word “courtyard.” I use it to describe the grassy or outbuilding area around the keep but inside the walls of a castle. However, the correct term is “bailey.” I used courtyard so as not to confuse people. Thoughts?